2011

Local Food 11/19/2011

And it’s time to say farewell to the market after another great year.  The last market day of the season is always a bit sad. 

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It’s also a bit sparse; we did have a whole lot of options of things to pick up this week.  Although, now that it’s too late, I’m wondering why I never bought more winter squash while I had the chance!  We did pick up some green onions, chocolate bread, pumpkin bread, pumpkin butter, and black walnuts!  I’m pretty excited about the black walnuts even though I have no idea what I’m going to do with them.

Local Food 11/12/2011

Second to last week of the market!

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I’m actually surprised at how many delicious things I was able to pick up this late in the season. 

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Cabbage, tomatoes, potatoes, pumpkin nut bread, green onions, and mustard greens.  Yum!

Local Food 11/5/2011

So few weeks left!  This means I feel tempted to buy more and more because it’s my last chance! 

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I picked up some exciting greens this week – tatsoi, choi, and a bag of mixed greens.  I also got a jar of creamed honey and a bottle of normal honey as gifts. 

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And lots of tomatoes.  Little tomatoes, big tomatoes, and green tomatoes.  Woo!

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Then there’s the ubiquitous bag of potatoes.  Yum.

Local Food 10/29/2011

This was a very light week at the market since Art went without me due to the weather and my being under said weather! 

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He picked up tomatoes (!), a nice bag of lettuce which is deceptively large, and some sweet potatoes.  Each new week that still brings tomatoes is a surprise.

Local Food 10/22/2011

This week was surprisingly lucrative at the market!  I’m always surprised to see greens again when Fall comes along.  Every year, I forget that they come back! 

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In this very green picture I’ve got eggs (1 dozen small and 1 dozen large), cucumbers, acorn squash, mustard greens, and lettuce. 

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I also picked up lots more tomatoes, potatoes, a small bag of mixed greens, and four mini loaves of double chocolate bread. 

Lots of delicious things and I’m looking forward to getting to use them all.

The Meat – October 2011

About a month after meeting the Zekiah Farm animals, we were able to pick up our meat from the farm.  The lamb isn’t ready yet, which is probably a good thing, since our freezers are VERY full with what we picked up today.  We picked up 12 cow and 12 pig this time. 

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Art and I headed to the farm and chatted with other farm friends while everything got staged and customers were rung up in the register.  Picking up meat is never a quick trip since we enjoy the camaraderie quite a bit as well!  We filled our car with nine boxes of meat – seven of cow and two of pig. 

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This first picture isn’t actually from our bulk order, I just needed two packs of hot dogs and we ordered a pork belly from another pig to replace the one we never got to use due to The Great Freezer Disaster of ’11.  The plan is to cut it in thirds and go from there.  I have this desire to make the perfect BLT with home smoked pork belly and local tomatoes.  We’ll see if the tomatoes are in compliance at the market this weekend. 

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This picture shows three packs of short ribs, three soup bones, and five marrow bones.  I’m not sure what will be happening with any of these things, but I know it will be spectacular. 

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The only downside with our cow order, if it can even be called that, is the NY Strip.  We had wanted the entire thing in roast form but the butcher (not our farmer) decided that we really wanted steaks.  So we got 10 really pretty NY Strip Steaks.  We’ll eat them, and enjoy them, so it’s no big deal.  Hopefully next time we’ll get the roast whole. 

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Two more soup bones are here and there are three rib roasts.  Rib roasts are very exciting and I’m looking forward to giving them a try! 

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This is a collection of roasts – top rounds and rump roasts.  I think.  We got these in 3-5 pound packs, which is a nice size for our family and when we’ve got company.  Very manageable! 

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Here is our beautiful brisket which Art will smoke perfectly, the eye round roast (one of my favorite cuts), and another top round roast. 

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This picture has flat iron steaks, ranch steaks, the hangar steak, skirt steak, and a few more roasts.  It’s hard to tell from the pictures, but all of this meat has amazingly gorgeous marbling. 

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That huge piece of meat is the filet roast.  We’re weird and chose to forgo filet steaks, I can’t wait to roast this into deliciousness.  The flank steak and petite tender are also in this picture.  I have no idea what a person does with a petite tender, but I’m sure it will be tasty. 

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And then there’s the ground beef. 

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120 pounds of ground beef, to be exact.  Mostly all from the chuck since chuck meat is primarily good for braising, which is a cooking method Art just Does Not Like.  So instead we ended up with a whole lot of ground beef.  I predict many tacos in our future.  I love tacos. 

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Then there’s the pig.  We opted to get our ground pork as sweet Italian sausage because that’s our favorite way to use pork.  We didn’t end up with a lot of bacon from this pig, but I opted to get it in one pound chunks instead of sliced. 

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This pig gave us two pork loins and three fresh hams. 

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We also ended up with six shoulder roasts, spare ribs, baby back ribs, and a tenderloin. 

Our freezers are almost completely filled with all of this delicious meat and I’m very excited about all of the great meals I’ll be able to make with it all in the year to come!  It still weirds me out to buy a year of meat all in one fell swoop – especially when it hits my bank account, but it’s a great experience and I’m so glad we’ve started doing it.

Thank you Zekiah Farms!

Meeting the Meat – August 2011

August brings us the Charles County Fair and Art and I enjoy going to get our yearly dose of funnel cake.  The past two years, we’ve also had the pleasure of getting to meet our future meat.  I took a bunch of pictures this year, all with my phone, and we had a great time chatting with our very awesome farmer. 

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I am so very grateful for the relationship we’ve be able to develop with our fabulous farmers at Zekiah Farms.  And I love that we have the ability to visit the animals that will end up feeding us for the year to come!

Local Food 9/24/2011

This was a good week at the market for staples!  Potatoes, tomatoes, onions and garlic - the best things in life. 

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Local Food 10/15/2011

This week we added some green!  Delicious mustard greens, in fact.  Yum. 

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Potatoes, tomatoes, onions, mustard greens, double chocolate sugar cookies, local honey, and some local honey candies.  I’m so happy that we’re seeing greens other than kale again.

I went a little crazy with tomatoes, I admit.  The end of the season is looming so I feel the need to get as many as possible in the meantime!

Local Food 10/1/2011

Another good, but sparse, day at the market.  Potatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, and delicious tomatoes!

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