Spicy Tomato Chutney

Tomatoes are coming in from our garden: cherry, grape, yellow, romas, and reds. We can't eat them fast enough, sliced all by themselves or with fresh mozzarella + fresh basil + olive oil + balsamic vinegar, diced in salad, roasted with onions and garlic on sourdough with feta, blended into gazpacho, and still they keep...

Green Apple Chutney

We have a few old timey apple tree's where we live, when they're ripe they are firm, crunchy, and greenish gold in colour . . . am not certain what variety they are but they make delicious apple sauce, taste fulfilling fresh off the tree with a rosey after taste when ripe, and add a...

Fire Cider

Eighteen days ago, I thought to mix up some fire cider inspired by the profusion of parsley growing in our garden.  I buried the jars in the garden, swaddled in old clothes, inspired by the magic this method worked on the garlic ginger syrup.  I just dug it out to enjoy during the equinox yesterday...

Gourmet Herbed Salts

Salt. It has been around for a long, long time, with evidence of its use dating back as far as 6500 B.C. The British evaporated salt by boiling seawater from salt spri­ngs in small clay pots over open fires during the Iron Age. Salt was used as money by the many ancient cultures, including the...

Golden Milk Cake

We love golden milk, with fresh turmeric and ginger grown locally by Paradox Farms and a few cardamom pods simmered slowly in milk.  But frankly, in the muggy heat of summer the thought of a warm beverage makes me shudder.  Recently, I came across a recipe for turmeric cake in The Washington Post, and it...

Kimchi

The napa cabbages have grown jy-normous!  Harvested six and had no room for any of them in the fridge, so did what I usually do:  make kimchi with most of it, and keep a bags worth in the fridge for stir frying or soup. Not only is it delicious, it's good for the gut due...

Summer Peach Preserves

“Peaches in the summertime, apples in the fall, if I can’t have the girl I love I won’t have none at all . . . ” Anyone else love Shadygrove? It’s certainly summer here in these shady groves of the Blue Ridges, and the scent of fresh, ripe peaches wafts through our kitchen, mingling with...

Cilantro: Coriander by Another Name

Cilantro is in full bloom, a dazzling sight artfully arranged by hundreds of miniscule flowers dancing together.   It’s creating fruits now, which are known as coriander seed and used in almost all the sub-continental  dishes I grew up eating:  daal, curries, biryani, fish, kababs, none of them are without either powdered coriander seeds, crushed coriander...

Shrub

Peaches are coming in, juicy and scrumptious, so I make shrub with the skins and scraps and even some pieces plus herbs. What is a 'shrub' you ask?  A vinegar sipping beverage with fruits, sweetener, and herbs/spices dating back to the Babylonians, who mixed date vinegar with their water to make it safe to drink....

afterbirth::panjeeree

long before audumla licked the salt that shaped buri, before vasilisa walked the path to and from baba yaga's hut, before sita burned herself on a blazing pyre, before isis went in search of osiris's chopped up body, there was mummy jaan:: the good mother of my heart:: my mother's mother who combed my hair...