Fall Comfort Foods at Your Local Farmers' Market

This Week at our Oakton Market
Saturday 10am–2pm
2854 Hunter Mill Rd.
Map

Heritage Farm is surprising us again, this time with soybeans from their gardens in Pennsylvania.  I told Nevin that the succotash recipe that I hand out in the summer is actually a summer adaptation of a winter succotash that calls for hominy rather than fresh corn. But I will rewrite it for the fall/winter season to use soybeans instead of limas for those of you who savor the flavor and appreciate the high-protein value of the soybeans.  It will still be a great recipe!

And Betty is surprising us too by sending tamales -- authentic Honduran tamales with a lightly spiced filling of masa and pork wrapped in banana leaves. Betty told me today that if you grill them to heat them up, rather than steaming or heating in a microwave, the leaves will burn off and leave them with a slightly smoky flavor.  I'll get back to you on that. 

Kristen of Sweet Hearts Patisserie brought rum macarons last week and bourbon-flavored ones with caramel the week before. You never know what the new temptation will be, but we do know it will be scrumptious.  

We are so glad that you enjoyed Annie once again, and I will have her recipes for you this week.  We are also working on a plan to have her give demos and classes all winter in an indoor location. She will continue to highlight seasonal foods from the market and will always conduct accessible classes with opportunity for give-and-take and sampling too!  

And at the produce stands, greens are here!  And winter lettuces. Check the Smart Markets tent for the Guide to Greens handout to learn how to prep and cook the kale and mustard greens and, later on, the collards. And remember to cook up those beet greens when you take home the lovely fall beets -- just saute them in a little butter or oil and add them back to your beets. I never throw away beet greens unless I am forced to buy beets in the grocery store, where either the greens have been removed to disguise the fact that they are months old, or they are still on the beets but look terrible.

From the Market Master

Dear Shopper,

To those of you who already understand what a rich, full market we can pull together in the fall, we thank you for your continued support of our markets into September and October. But this week I want to address all of you who have turned away thinking that without corn or tomatoes or peaches, the market has nothing to offer you. We do indeed still have an abundance of great fruits and vegetables, and this is the season when cooking those good things in combination can produce many of my favorite foods. We call them comfort foods, but what does that mean?

When I think of comfort foods, I think first of the aromas that hit you when you come into a home where something full of flavor is on the stove or in the oven. The sauces and spices of fall remind me immediately of Nanna Mommy’s Applesauce Cake and Daddy’s Famous Spaghetti, or my other grandmother’s fried apples and freshly baked rolls. I make applesauce every year and my house smells great for a week, and I don’t even add spices; it’s just the aroma from the apples cooked slowly in apple cider that wafts through the house and leaves it smelling like fall.

Next I think of those layers of flavors that you can rarely develop in a summer saute or or an ice cream dessert. In the fall we can start with a mixture of finely chopped vegetables and then gradually add other flavors to build a complex dish that after an hour on the stove or in the oven can soothe any soul. And while those slow-cooked meat dishes, such as a pork roast with winter veggies, beef stew or chicken pot pie, are the quintessential comfort foods, you do not need meat to make a lovely, slow-cooked stew with those same layers of flavor. That’s what beans and lentils are for — vegetarian comfort foods!

Comfort foods also taste better the next day — re-warming enhances those complex flavors and you can dine on a great vegetable soup, from minestrone to mulligatawny, all week long. Or freeze it and thaw it out later on a night when you don’t have the time or energy to cook. Being able to take a day to make a gigantic pot of chili or spaghetti sauce and know it will be in the freezer when you need it — now that’s comfort!

And last but not least, it’s the spices we use in the winter to heighten our senses that have been dulled by the outside cold and indoor heat. It’s the switch to dried spices that shout instead of whisper their flavors. It’s the chili powder and cumin and oregano, and curry and turmeric and coriander, and cinnamon and cloves and nutmeg. From appetizers like Sweet Potato Sticks to desserts like Applesauce Cake made from that homemade applesauce, the list is as long as your memory can conjure or your curiosity can carry you.

So get comfortable in your own kitchen and cook up a favorite recipe from your past or a new one from the market. Maybe you will have something to add to the definition.

See you at the market!

Jean

Photo by FotoosVanRobin