Cooley Family Farm

I decided that I wanted to try a Mexican Pizza with the tomatillos Kevin brought in for me.

I made my own pizza dough using the recipe I posted with the Asparagus Pizza. But you can use any pizza crust that you like.

1 1/2 tbsp. Chipotle Puree
1 large red onion, peeled and thinly sliced
Olive oil
Salt and Pepper
1/4 pound tomatillos, husked, and chopped into small pieces
2 cups of cooked corn kernels
3/4 cup cooked black beans, drained
Fine cornmeal for dusting
1 1/2 cups crumbled feta cheese

Season the tomatillos with salt and pepper and set aside. Heat a medium saute pan over medium heat. Drizzle in just enough olive oil to coat the bottom and add the onions. Cook until tender and starting to brown, about 10 minutes. Remove to a plate and set aside.

I flattened my pizza dough onto some parchment paper on an air bake sheet.

I didn’t have any chipotle puree on hand but I did have some left over chipotle peppers in adobo sauce in my fridge. I decided I could make my own paste out of those. I spread a thin layer of the paste on my pizza dough.

Next put a thin layer of cheese on. Kevin and I have a different taste for cheese. So on my half I put feta, on his half a put a combination of cheddar and montery jack. Next add the corn, onions, tomatillos, black beans, and the remaining cheese.

Bake at 425 for about 15 minutes or until finished.

Overall Kevin and I really liked this pizza, but there are some things I will do differently next time. First… Kevin and I don’t eat a lot of spicy food and we found the chipotle paste to be to hot for us. I will do something more mild for my sauce. Next I really love the black beans on the pizza so I will add more black beans. And the slightly caramelized red onions were very tasty. I don’t think I put on as many as the recipe called for so I will be sure to add more red onion next time. And finally… I will be sure to have some avocado and cilantro on hand to top the pizza with when it comes out of the oven.

-Tracy

Right now we have a good supply of eggplant in the field. I’m not sure when the season for eggplant will end, but this is a great time to get some extra for some wonderful baba ghanoush.

Ingredients:
2 medium eggplants
1/4 cup tahini (sesame seed paste)
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 garlic cloves peeled and smashed
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp olive oil

You can use any of the varieties of eggplant that we have. I picked the above two purples.

Prick the eggplant skin with a fork and roast in a preheated oven at 400ºF for about one hour or until the eggplant is tender. Let the eggplants cool briefly. Cut the eggplant in half and scrape out the pulp.

Puree the pulp in a blender or food processor with the other ingredients until smooth. Taste and season with additional salt and lemon juice, if necessary. Chill a few hours before serving.

We ate this with pita bread as an appetizer. You can also roast a variety of vegetables and serve atop a plate of the dip, drizzle with olive oil, add a couple of black olives if you like and eat it as a main dish with pita bread. Yummy!!

Give it a try!!
Tracy

My sister was just here visiting from California. While she was here she found this recipe for us to make for dinner one evening. Since it called for a little of everything I thought it sounded like a great idea. I so love summer and all the fresh food choices we have!! I knew by the ingredient list that I would like the recipe, but it surpassed my expectations. I loved it and am craving it right now. My batch was pretty big so we had it for leftovers during the next couple of days. It reheated wonderfully.

Calabacitas with Potatoes

Ingredients
Sweet Corn
1 Tbs oil
New Potatoes
Onion
Yellow Squash
Zucchini
Tomatoes
Oregano
Salt & Pepper
Shredded Cheddar Cheese

You notice that I didn’t put quantities in the ingredient list. I will give some guidelines here, but the quantities don’t matter a lot. Making things fairly even will work out great. I had some medium sized squash and zucchini, so mine was fairly heavy on that end of things.

But as a guideline this recipe called for about 3 ears of corn, pre-cooked in the microwave, 2 med. potatoes, 1/2 cup chopped onion, 3 squash, and 2 tomatoes.

Start by dicing the potatoes. Heat the skillet with the olive oil (chicken broth can be used instead) and add the potatoes. I put my skillet on medium heat. Stir as needed. While the potatoes are starting to cook dice the onion. Cook the potatoes until they are just tender then add the onion.

Next, dice the squash and zucchini. When the onions are soft (but not brown) add the squash and zucchini to the skillet. Cover the skillet and cook stirring occasionally. Dice the tomatoes. When the squash and zucchini are slightly soft add the tomatoes, oregano, salt & pepper and cook for another minute or so.

Slice the corn off the cob trying to keep some in chunks. I wasn’t able to do this, but it is more for presentation since it still tastes the same! Stir the corn into the mixture.

This can be served as a side dish as is, with cheddar on top or in a flour tortilla with cheese. Kevin liked it best as a side dish. I loved it in a tortilla with cheddar on top.

Other ways to enjoy include using Monterey Jack Cheese, lime juice, sour cream, or cilantro to taste.

Hope you enjoy!
Tracy

About a year ago some of our good friends (Ben and Mika) invited us over for potstickers at their home. They made a fun time of it and we all hung out in the kitchen with various jobs in preparing things. In addition to the potstickers they also made vegetable tempura. Everything was delicious!

I’ve really been craving the vegetable tempura. In particular I haven’t been able to get the tempura green beans off my mind!

So I decided that I wanted to make vegetable tempura so I could have some of those delicious green beans as well as experiment with some of the other vegetables that are currently being harvested.

We don’t eat fried food very often, but this is one of those dishes that is really fun to do every once in a while. And if you can share with family and friends and just hang out in the kitchen that’s even better!

The Batter Mix
1 large egg, cold
5 ounces iced water
1 cup of flour

Mix the batter and leave it lumpy. The batter should be a little thin. You can adjust the thickness based on preference by adding flour or water. Place the batter in the fridge until ready to use.

You can use a variety of vegetables. I used green beans, potatoes, eggplant, sweet banana peppers, and sweet onions.

I kept a bowl of ice water for placing the vegetables in as I cut them up. I’ve read that cold vegetables and batter placed in hot oil will produce a crisper tempura.

I snapped one end of the green beans, cut the potatoes and eggplant into thin circles (leaving skins on) no larger than 1/4 inch. I cut the banana peppers in half and removed the seeds. and the onions I had were small so I quartered them.

I used my wok for cooking the tempura. I put just enough canola oil in the wok to keep the vegetables from touching the bottom of the pan while they were cooking. Heat the oil and start dipping the vegetables in the batter and placing in the hot oil.

For me it was a little challenging to find the right heat setting. I have an electric range and it worked out best right around medium high heat. I turned the vegetables over with tongs until both sides were a light golden. Be especially careful with the hot oil as it can splatter. When the veggies were ready to be removed I put them on a wire rack over a cookie sheet so they could drain any excess oil, I then moved them onto a clean dish towel. Right before serving I put the tempura on a platter.

Kevin’s favorite was the green beans and potatoes. I was very surprised to find that my favorite was the banana peppers since I’m not usually a big pepper eater.

For dipping the tempura in I had side dish of soy sauce with a little sesame oil. Kevin liked his lightly salted. And we had a nice bowl of Japanese rice.

For my first try I think it was a success! We still had some batter and veggies left so I made some more as left overs the next day. I think the second batch turned out even better. The second night my results looked a little less golden than in the picture above. Either way… we enjoyed it both nights! I hope you give it a try!

-Tracy

Kevin started harvesting garlic so I decided to give green garlic pesto a try. So glad… what a yummy treat. The green garlic is milder than dried garlic. If you love garlic you will love this recipe. We made some whole wheat pasta and tossed it with a little butter and added the pesto. It was great. The pesto also tasted wonderful on the veggies. I was out of french bread but I have a feeling it would make fantastic garlic bread as well.

I made a full batch of the pesto which yielded about 1 1/2 cups. A little can go a long way so next time I plan to cut the recipe in half. What I’m posting below is the full recipe, so be sure you want a lot of pesto if you make it as is.

5-6 shoots of green garlic, trimmed of tough dark green parts and cut into 2 inch pieces
2 oz. Parmesan Cheese, cut into small cubes
3/4 t. coarse salt
1/2 t. pepper
1/2 C. extra-virgin olive oil

Put everything except olive oil into a food processor or blender. Process until it is fairly smooth. You may need to stop and scrape the sides a couple of times.

Next pour in the olive oil until you get everything is pretty smooth. If needed scrape sides again during this process.

You can be flexible with the ingredients too. I used about 1/2 Grana Padano and 1/2 Parmesan for the cheese. I also was about out of olive oil so I ended up using 1/4 cup olive oil and 1/4 cup plain sesame oil (not toasted). It was still great and no one knew I altered it. Also… it is very common to use pine nuts when making pesto. I prefer mine without but you could put some pine nuts in as well.

Best of all this is simple to make and you can be creative when spicing up a meal.

Tracy

Well… I’m hoping the picture says it all!!! When Kevin told me he was going to start digging potatoes and picking green beans I was so excited. I’ve been craving them! And then it was so easy to decide how I was going to fix them. One of my favorite ways is to just put them in foil on the grill. Kevin also found an onion in the field so I knew it would be complete.

Ingredients
New Potatoes
Green Beans
Onion
Butter
Salt
Pepper

Wash the veggies. Cut the potatoes into bite size pieces, snap the end off of the green bean. Put it all in foil. Dot with butter. Add salt and pepper to taste. Place on the grill till tender.

It’s so easy and one of the most delicious dishes ever. Besides… an added bonus of no messy kitchen. The only bad thing is that we had no left overs.

Hope you enjoy!
Tracy

Kevin brought a couple of beautiful beets to me last Friday. It honestly took Kevin a few years to get me to cook beets. I thought I didn’t like them…. until I found out that you don’t have to boil them to cook them, and that they can be pretty quick to make, and that they can taste sweet without any “earthy” taste. All this with just 1 ingredient other than the beets. So healthy!!

First I cut off the greens and peel the beet. Then I cut the beet into chunks that will fit into my food processor for ‘fine’ shredding. With the food processor the beets are shredded very quickly. Personally I haven’t tried to shred them by hand. And I think for the best texture they should be finely shredded.

I was working with two good sized beets which was about a pound of beets. After they were shredded I tossed them in my skillet with 2 tablespoons of fresh lemon juice. Using fresh squeezed lemon juice is important for the best flavor. Make sure you don’t heat the skillet too hot, then you can do other things while they are cooking and just stir them every once in a while. I’m not exactly sure how long I cook them. I’m terrible about keeping track. But I do believe it’s about 15 minutes or less. You don’t want them to be crunchy, but don’t cook them to mush either.

Now… for the greens that I cut off the beets. I was looking at them thinking of how many times I’ve read or heard that the greens are healthier than the actual beets. My first thought was to toss them in with our salad. We always enjoy that. But then my conscience kicked in as I remembered my first blog where I said I was trying to improve on my ability to cook greens. So here is what I made:

Spiced Beet Greens and Pears

Greens from the pound of beets (approx. 1/2 lb. of greens)
Olive oil
1 small red onion, sliced
1 pear, peeled and thinly sliced
cinnamon
nutmeg
Sea salt
Water
1 1/2 Tbsp. Toasted Walnuts, chopped

Wash the greens and spin them in the salad spinner, then cut them into thin strips or small pieces and set aside. Next chop the walnuts and put them in a skillet over low to med heat. Watch them closely so you don’t burn them like I did (luckily they weren’t ALL burnt). After the walnuts are toasted put them in a bowl for later.

I cut the onion into very thin strips. I then used the same skillet that I used to toast the walnuts to finish this dish. I put just a splash of olive oil in the pan and added the onion. Cook the onion until it is soft and smells yummy. Then I tossed in the beet greens and pears along with a splash of water ( about 2 Tablespoons at most). Next I added the cinnamon and nutmeg. I put more cinnamon in than nutmeg. Maybe a little more than 1/8th teaspoon of cinnamon and about 1/8 teaspoon of nutmeg. You can always add more if you want a stronger flavor. Also add a dash of salt. Stir the mixture well and then braise by lowering the heat to low or medium and putting the lid on for about 8 minutes. Stir occasionally.

When the greens were done cooking I put them in a serving bowl and sprinkled the toasted walnuts over them.

This turned out really good. Even if you don’t try this recipe.. make sure you use the greens at least in a salad!

-Tracy

This recipe is super easy and fast to make. From start to finish you can be done in about 10 minutes. I purchased “Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla Bean Paste” from Kitchen Art in West Lafayette. This was my first experience with vanilla bean paste and I really love it. The company that makes this brand is Nielsen-Massey.

Asparagus with Vanilla Balsamic – serves 4 to 6

1 pound asparagus
1 tablespoon aged balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 teaspoons vanilla bean paste
Pinch salt

Wash the asparagus and remember that you don’t need to trim the ends of our asparagus since we hand pick it above the surface of the soil.

Bring a large pot of water to boil. Submerge the asparagus stalks in the water and boil just until tender, about 90 seconds. Pour into a colander and rinse with very cold water from the tap. Drain well. The cold water rinse will keep the asparagus bright green.

In a small bowl, whisk together the balsamic vinegar, olive oil, vanilla bean paste and salt.

Drizzle the mixture over the asparagus. This can be served hot or cold.

Well.. with a bit of a cold snap and rain to boot I decided that soup sounded good. Besides, Kevin was working really late and wouldn’t be joining us for dinner. A good batch of soup makes for great left overs and reheats well.

So I pulled out a wonderful Asparagus Soup recipe that I adapted from one that I found on Allrecipes.com.

Asparagus Soup

Ingredients:
1/4 cup margarine
1 onion, chopped
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
5.5 cups water
6 tablespoons chicken soup base
2 potato, peeled and diced
1 pound fresh asparagus, chopped
3/4 cup fat free milk
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper

First I chopped up the ingredients that were needed. The original recipe called for 1 potato, but I love potatoes so changed it to 2. After the ingredients were chopped I heated the butter in a stock pot and cooked the onions till they were tender (about 4 minutes or so). The recipe didn’t call for red onion, but what I had in storage was a combination of red and white and it worked just fine.

Next stir in the flour, mixing well. Cook for about 1 minute, stirring constantly. Do not burn, or let it go lumpy. Add water and chicken soup base. Stir until smooth. Bring to a boil. Add potatoes and chopped asparagus. Reduce heat, and simmer for about 20 minutes.

After the soup has simmered till the desired tenderness of the asparagus remove some of the asparagus into a bowl with a slotted spoon. The original recipe calls for all of the soup to be pureed, but we like having some asparagus chunks in the soup, especially the tips. Yum!

Puree the soup in a food processor or blender (in batches if needed) and return to pot. Add the asparagus chunks back into the soup.

Stir in the milk, soy sauce, and black and white pepper. Bring soup just to boil. Adjust seasonings to taste. Serve hot.

The soup was a big hit! Today is market day and Kevin is looking forward to left over soup before heading out to West Lafayette.

Make Our Favorite Salad and serve with a warm crusty loaf of bread and it will be wonderful dinner.

Enjoy!
Tracy

I’m so happy spring is here! I’ve got some asparagus in my refrigerator to prove it!!! The other night Kevin walked the asparagus patch behind our house with a flashlight to harvest whatever may be available before that night’s cold weather came. But this isn’t the first asparagus we’ve had so far. Last Friday Kevin brought me the first batch of asparagus for this season. He told me this was the earliest he has ever picked it before. There isn’t much yet, but not to worry, it’ll be popping up like crazy soon and then there will be enough for everyone.

There are so many wonderful ways to use asparagus that it was hard to decide what I wanted to do with the first batch! I really love it pan fried, but pizza sounded good too. Since I like to pan fry the asparagus before I put it on the pizza I decided I could have it both ways!!!

First there are a few things I would like to say about our asparagus. Many of you may already know this, but Kevin picks nearly all of our asparagus himself. Sometimes I help and sometimes he has some farm help, but usually he is the one doing the picking. We hand pick all of our asparagus by snapping it above the ground. Why does this matter you may wonder? Well… you have probably seen many recipes that say to cut about an inch off the bottom of the asparagus when you are preparing it to cook. This is because most asparagus is cut below the surface of the ground and that bottom inch is not usable.

So please, please listen up. Whatever you do… please do not cut an inch off the bottom of our asparagus. It would be a terrible waste and think of how Kevin has been out walking the asparagus patch bending and stooping to hand snap each stalk. Ok, I feel so much better now that you know you don’t have to throw anything away when you get our asparagus.

The next thing I wanted to mention is the diameter of the stalk. Until I became the wife of a vegetable farmer and we had asparagus to take care of I did not know this fact. The asparagus already knows how big around it is going to be before it pops up through the ground. Yes, it’s true. I have seen it with my own eyes! A thick asparagus spear does not mean it is older or tougher. You may have a preference to thinner or thicker and I do too depending on what recipe I’m making. But the thick stalks are not tough old ones, they are just as tender and delicious as the thin ones.

I’ll stop babbling now and get to the recipes.

First to pan fry the asparagus. This is a recipe all by itself and can be used as a side dish, it can be used in pasta dishes, in omelets, and of course pizza. Whatever you can dream up it will be fantastic.

Pan Fried Asparagus

Ingredients:
Asparagus
Oil
Butter
Course Salt
Pepper
Garlic

After washing the asparagus I cut the stalks into about 1 inch pieces.

I usually use safflower oil and butter to cook the asparagus in. Heat up the pan over medium to medium high and add everything putting the asparagus in last. Don’t put too much oil and butter or it will be greasy. You can base the amounts of ingredients on preference. It’s a very basic and yummy recipe. I found it on allrecipes.com. Cook until the desired tenderness. Be sure to toss it around in the pan sometimes so it doesn’t stick to the bottom or burn. In this batch I meant to make it a little firmer, but it was so yummy I didn’t care.

Now for the pizza!!! The crust, the sauce and the toppings…..

Pizza Crust (adapted from allrecipes.com)

2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast
1/2 teaspoon brown sugar
1 1/2 cups warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 cup whole wheat flour
2 1/3 cups all-purpose flour

I toss everything in the bread machine and put it on the dough cycle which in my bread machine takes 1 1/2 hours.

When I take it out of the bread machine I roll the dough out into 2 pizzas. Don’t make them perfect. They look so much prettier and authentic if they are odd shaped. I poke holes in the rolled out dough with a fork.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

I bake mine on parchment paper on a baking stone or air bake sheet. Sometimes I put them in the oven for about 10 minutes without toppings first. After I have added all of my toppings I bake pizza until the cheese and crust are golden brown, about 15 to 20 minutes.

If you don’t have a bread machine do this:

1 In a large bowl, dissolve the yeast and brown sugar in the water, and let sit for 10 minutes.

2 Stir the salt and oil into the yeast solution. Mix in 2 1/2 cups of the flour.

3 Turn dough out onto a clean, well floured surface, and knead in more flour until the dough is no longer sticky. Place the dough into a well oiled bowl, and cover with a cloth. Let the dough rise until double; this should take about 1 hour. Punch down the dough, and form a tight ball. Allow the dough to relax for a minute before rolling out. Use for your favorite pizza recipe.

The Sauce
1 pint frozen tomato sauce (about 2 cups)
1/2 tsp. onion powder
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
1/8 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon basil
1/4 teaspoon thyme
1/4 teaspoon oregano
1/4 teaspoon pepper

The frozen tomato sauce is how I preserved our bounty from last summer. The sauce can also be made from whole frozen tomatoes. I just toss everything in a sauce pan and simmer it down until the desired consistency.

Asparagus Pizza

After you have rolled the pizza dough out you can start topping it with…

Pizza Sauce
Mozzarella
Parmesan
Ramona
Goat Cheese
Pan Fried Asparagus

I love cheese blends. And I love goat cheese. Kevin doesn’t care for goat cheese like I do so I only put it on half. It’s been a year since I made an asparagus pizza so I forgot that it can handle quite a lot of asparagus. I wish I had put more of it on this pizza, but it was still delicious.

Hope you enjoy it!

Tracy