Breakfast. Also known as a Nica tipico or desayuno tipico. See also: delicious. Gallo pinto (mixed red beans and rice), eggs, and cuajada, a salty white cheese with a texture somewhere between feta and mozzarella.

I’m just home from a week-long work trip to Nicaragua, where pretty much all of the food is local. I’m still processing the trip, and am not sure what to say yet, other than Nicaragua is an amazing country with wonderful people, and if you’re even considering a trip, do it. You won’t regret it. And if you want the name of a guide or driver, let me know. We were fortunate to have two fantastic people share their country with us and they were a big part of the success of the trip.

Cold chocolate deliciousness, where chocolate is actually local. I (wisely) decided to ignore that rule about no ice if you're not positive where it came from, and I did not regret it. I think I play fast and loose with food safety when I'm traveling, but so far I've been lucky.

I didn’t take photos of everything I ate during the week, but suffice to say that probably 90% of what I had came from the immediate area. Chicken, red beans, rice, plantains, eggs, cabbage and fresh cheeses made up a significant portion of the meals, supplemented by great rum and drinkable beer (it was cold, which was enough). Watermelon was in season, which made me incredibly happy. And we had tomatoes that tasted just like tomatoes from the garden, which means I’m going to need to figure out a way to get to Nicaragua every January. This trip confirmed that I’m a warm weather girl, happiest when the humidity is high and the temperature is at least 70. Alas, home doesn’t quite meet those conditions (though the humidity IS high), and I married a cool-weather boy. I guess I’ll just have to keep exercising my passport. Enjoy the photos. Next week we’re back to potatoes, kale, and other exciting winter foods that don’t photograph particularly well.

Grilled beef, plantains, potatoes, and something akin to chimichuri. Too much (delicious) food was one of the recurring themes of the trip.

Grilled chicken, bean puree, plantain chips, cabbage salad, salsa. Free range chicken is the norm in Nicaragua, and it is very good.

Dragonfruit ice cream. Pretty, but not very good, though some of the group loved it.

Quesillo, one of my favorite bites of the trip. Corn tortilla with two kinds of fresh white cheese and vinegary sauteed onions with salt and cream.

Variety plate. Counter clockwise from bottom left: quesadilla-like thing, fried cheese, plantain chips, cabbage salad, chopped steak with onions, red beans with salty cheese.

Nicaragua's two beers. I slightly preferred Victoria, but the primary selling point for both brands is that they were cold.

I’ll be late posting next week as I leave for Nicaragua for work (my job does not suck) first thing Saturday morning and doubt I’ll have easy access to the internet while there. You can picture me eating tropical fruit as my week 8 contribution, and I’ll try to post about the trip when I’m back. Week 9 will almost certainly be a soup-from-the-freezer meal, since I get home and head straight back to the office for the week.

Sources:
Elk tenderloin from the freezer
Peas grown by my in-laws up the street from the freezer
Delicata squash from Inaba Farm, Wapato, WA (via Full Circle box)
Flour from Fairhaven Mill, Bellingham, WA
Syncline Rose, Columbia Valley, WA (via Full Pull Wines)
Exceptions: olive oil, salt, pepper

I’ve found the food processor to be my most successful pasta dough mixer, just pulsing the dough and adding a teaspoon of water at a time if/as necessary, until it looks like kind of like peas. My standard pasta recipe is 250 grams of flour to three eggs, plus a pinch of salt. Depending on the size of the eggs, you may not need to add any water. After a couple hours in the refrigerator, my dough was ready to roll out.

While I rolled and filled the pasta, I simmered my go-to tomato sauce: one small chopped onion, one pint of tomatoes, and a 2-3 Tbsp chunk of butter, simmered for an hour or so over medium low heat. It’s my adaptation of the oft-raved about Marcella Hazan simple tomato sauce (I don’t like discarding the onion, so just chop it up from the start, and I use less butter), and you can find a batch of it simmering on my stove nearly every week for one use or another (a favorite use is to dip toast in it for a relatively light and very satisfying lunch or dinner; it’s also a great sauce for lasagna and has become the basis of my sauce for spaghetti and meatballs).

Once the pasta was shaped (and started sticking and ripping, leading me to fear another gloopy mess), I brought a pan of water to a gentle boil, dropped the pasta in for a couple of minutes (until it floated), then fished it out and topped it with the sauce and a little parmesan. It didn’t split! With some toasted cibatta (for sopping up every last drop of the tomato sauce) and a bottle of sparkling rose, it was a dinner worthy of a celebration – even if that celebration was just another day ended with a delicious dinner.

Sources:
Pasta: Flour from Fairhaven Mill (Bellingham, WA), eggs from Wilcox* (Roy, WA), homemade ricotta from Dungeness Valley Creamery milk (Sequim, WA), nettles from my backyard via the freezer, garlic from Filaree Garlic Farm (Okanogan, WA), parmesan from Beecher’s (Seattle, WA)
Bread: Flour from Fairhaven
Tomato sauce: Onions from Andersen Organics (Othello, WA) via Full Circle, tomatoes from Tonnemaker Hill Farm (Royal City, WA) via my pantry
Mountain Dome Brut Rose (Spokane, WA – outside the radius, but close enough for me) via my friend Paul’s Full Pull Wines
Exceptions: butter in the tomato sauce (organic, but not local), salt, yeast in the bread, olive oil

*Unfortunately the last three times I’ve stopped at the Dragoun’s Lair to pick up farm eggs, there haven’t been any, so I had to resort to grocery store eggs for this. It has been a LONG time since I’ve bought eggs at the grocery store, and luckily since the last time I checked, the egg options at my local QFC have improved slightly so I was able to get Wilcox brown organic eggs. Not ideal, but at least they are local (Roy, WA), and a better option than the standard grocery eggs from who knows where. We don’t go through that many eggs, and I often don’t have any eggs in the fridge, so it’s nice to know I have a reasonable option if I can’t get my preferred farm eggs and need eggs for one reason or another.

Happy dogs at the beach on a sunny (!) Christmas Eve

We’re on a two-year run of spending Christmas Eve at home, just the two of us and the pup, and I think we’re starting a new tradition. Saturday morning we loaded up the car, picked up my in-laws and their two dogs, and headed out for a mini road-trip, stopping at some of my favorite places on the Peninsula: Beaver Valley and Chimacum – where I always say I want to move – lunch at the Geoduck in Brinnon (if you ever find yourself in the area, it’s totally worth stopping for some incredible people/bird watching – this trip’s sightings included an Elvis impersonator, regulars who travel with their own can cozies, and a flock (?) of eagles just outside – and the oyster sandwich), retrieving and exploring the shoreline with the dogs, and finally to Hama Hama Oyster Company for crab and oysters, except the people in front of me got the last of the crab. More oysters is not a bad consolation prize, especially when it’s Hama Hama oysters.

We’ve been on a hard cider kick the past few months, and after finding a couple of new-to-us varieties of cider at the Chimacum Corner Farmstand, our Christmas Eve menu was set. I think we’ve found ourselves our new tradition, at least for as long as we have quiet Christmas Eves at home. Cider sampling started the evening off, followed by my first-ever attempt at cibatta (and a successful one at that!) and delicious oysters. The cibatta recipe came from Rustic Italian Food, which I’ve had out from the library for a couple of weeks. That recipe is a keeper. Who knows what next year’s Christmas season will bring, but I can only hope it comes with more oysters and cider. In fact, I think this is a tradition we’ll be rolling out throughout the winter, not just at Christmas. Winter can use more fun evenings.

The Geoduck in Brinnon

Sources:
Ciders: Spire Mountain Draft Apple Cider (Fish Brewing Co., Olympia, WA); Tieton Blossom Nectar Cider (Tieton Cider Works, Tieton, WA); Eaglemount Ginger Cider (Eaglemount Wine & Cider, Port Townsend, WA); Finn River Dry Hopped Cider (Finn River Farm & Cidery, Chimacum, WA)
Oysters: Hama Hama Oyster Company, Lilliwaup, WA
Bread: Flour from Fairhaven Mill, Bellingham, WA
Exceptions: lemon and olive oil (best oyster toppings, bar none); salt and yeast in the bread

A Christmas tradition, and this year they bloomed just in time.

This weekend was my family’s Christmas and everyone gathered at my house. My parents flew in from Montana, and my brother and sister trekked slightly west from their homes in the Seattle area. We’ll all spend actual Christmas with our significant others’ families, so this was a great opportunity for us to spend some time together and share some of our traditions with the newest members of our the family (apparently not everyone gets toothbrushes and clementines in their stockings. Who knew?). Unfortunately I had to work on Saturday, so I took my parents to Seattle with me on the ferry early Saturday morning with a list of some of my favorite places to visit during the Christmas season in Seattle, and strict instructions about what time to be back to catch the ferry home. Sunday was designated to be Christmas, so I didn’t get my preferred day of prep ahead, but I’m trying to learn to let go a little more.

When we got home on Saturday night, I (wisely) mixed up the waffle batter before starting in on my brother’s frozen whiskey sours (jury is still out on that one – I’m not sure I want to admit to liking it, but I’m also not sure I won’t be making them again very soon). Thankfully we’re all old enough that no one is rocketing out of bed insisting on opening packages first thing in the morning, so we were able to ease into the day, and for the first time ever we actually ate breakfast before opening packages.

With fresh squeezed orange juice and Prosecco (a tradition from our grandparents), maple syrup from Vermont, butter that I bought instead of made (I’m learning to cut myself a little more slack), and the coffee that is requisite if my father is going to be pleasant, it wasn’t a perfectly local meal. But it was perfect in its realness, including the messes, and in one more year of keeping traditions alive. I’m so grateful for my family, and for our ability to continue to carry traditions forward even as all of our lives have changed and we’ve grown older. Merry Christmas!

Someone was *very* excited to be included in package opening.

Sources for this week’s meal:
Whole milk from Fresh Breeze Dairy, Lynden, WA
Fairhaven Mill flour, Bellingham, WA
Honey from Sailing S Orchards and Apiary, Sequim, WA
Eggs from Mountain View Farm, Belfair, WA (purchased at the awesomely named Dragoun’s Lair)
Raspberry thyme jam from berries my in-laws grew
Huckleberry syrup from berries picked in the forest near our house
Breakfast sausage from Heritage Meats, Rochester, WA
Exceptions: organic butter from Costco (sad face), yeast, baking soda, salt, sugar in jams, maple syrup, coffee, fresh squeezed orange juice and Prosecco (family traditions and all that)

In a typical week we might eat meat three times; I think my Dark Days posts tend to skew to the meatier end of the spectrum, and this post is definitely in that category. This week I managed two Dark Days dinners: steak and potatoes (and kale), and stuffed cabbage, and these were the two meat dinners we will eat this week. Many of our other dinners are largely local ingredients, but will have a major component (like dried pasta or rice) that doesn’t count. We’ve made significant strides toward a mostly local diet, but we’re far from perfect, and I can live with that.

I generally spend Sundays getting ready for the week ahead: prepping dinners, doing laundry, finishing up whatever projects I’ve started on Saturday. One bonus of this (particularly in these dark days of winter) is that I’m working on dinners when there is actually enough light for photos. The bigger bonus (and the real reason I do so much prep on Sundays) is that I can walk in the door from work at 6:30 and we can be eating by 7:00 most nights, and still eating high quality, fresh food.

The elk steak, mashed potatoes and celery root, and kale salad were Sunday’s dinner. The kale salad is one of my favorite ways to eat kale (second only to kale mac and cheese, with more kale than pasta, which, incidentally, is what we had for dinner last night: lacinato and red kale from Full Circle, Beecher’s Flagship cheese, Twin Brooks milk, homemade breadcrumbs – and boxed pasta, making it one of those almost local but not quite dinners). Anyway, that kale salad (because who would have thought raw kale would be so delicious?): the kale is de-stemmed and then very finely sliced, tossed with a garlicky dressing, and then topped with breadcrumbs. It makes a great side for a heavier meal (it showed up at Thanksgiving and was a welcome jolt of light and healthy), and was perfect with this dinner. Celery root mixed with the potatoes make the BEST mashed potatoes, hands down. And the elk steak was outstanding.

The stuffed cabbage is basically this recipe, though I made it with wild rice and skipped the parsnips since I didn’t have any, and the tomato paste since I didn’t have any local tomato paste. It’s in the oven as I type this (and I only am able to type this now because my amazing husband did all of the dishes from the last two days just before I got home from work so I have a few minutes of unexpected time…only 9 more days to a working dishwasher), and can’t be done soon enough. I can’t wait. That’s an odd thing to say about stuffed cabbage, I think.

Sources for this week’s dinners:
Steak and potatoes:
Elk backstrap from the freezer (last year’s elk)
Flour from Fairhaven Mill, Bellingham, WA
Yukon gold potatoes, celery root, and lacinato kale from Full Circle Farm, Carnation, WA
Homemade breadcrumbs (flour from Fairhaven, honey from Sequim, not-local yeast and salt)
Garlic from Filaree Garlic Farm, Okanogan, WA
1998 Trey Marie Trutina Red Bordeaux Blend, Columbia Valley, WA
Exceptions: salt, pepper, olive oil, mustard, lemon juice (basically, the dressing for the kale)

Stuffed cabbage:
Savoy cabbage, carrots, and celery from Full Circle Farm
Onion from Andersen Organics, Othello, WA, by way of Full Circle box
Garlic from Filaree
Ground elk from the freezer (last year′s elk)
Wild rice I brought home from Minnesota (I am embarrassed to admit how old this rice is – suffice to say it should have been eaten more than one year ago – but it still tasted good and this was the last of it)
Tomatoes grown at Tonnemaker Hill Farm, Royal City, WA
Exceptions: olive oil, salt, pepper

Nothing like leading with a somewhat unappetizing picture...

I’m off to a soupy start to this year’s Dark Days Challenge, this time with an elk and vegetable stew with a tomato broth. We eat a lot of soup in the winter, some of them more successful than others. Count this one in the very successful category: meltingly tender elk, a thick, tomatoey broth, and plenty of vegetables. The vegetable stock didn’t hurt, either. In the past year I’ve taken to throwing many of my vegetable scraps in a bag in the freezer and then turning those scraps into stock when the bag is full. I’ve made chicken stock for quite a while, but we don’t eat enough chickens to keep us in chicken stock, so it’s nice to have vegetable stock to fall back on.

Vegetable scraps, waiting their turn in the stock pot.

This was pretty much a standard stew, or at least standard for the stews I grew up with (save for the elk) and still make today. Carrots, onion, and celery browned in a little olive oil in my dutch oven, minced garlic stirred in just before stirring in a pint of crushed tomatoes. I cooked that for a few minutes over medium heat, then added rosemary and thyme, followed by enough vegetable stock to cover the vegetables by about two inches and turned the heat to low. Then I added the potatoes and quartered mushrooms. While that simmered, I tossed the cubed steak in flour, salt, and pepper, and browned it in a separate pan in a bit of olive oil over medium high heat. After it was browned, I scraped the meat and all of the little tasty brown bits into the dutch oven with the vegetables. After stirring it well, I put the lid on and put the whole thing in the oven at 300 degrees for about two hours. Since we weren’t planning to eat the stew right away, I put as much as I thought we’d eat in the fridge and the rest in the freezer (perhaps it will make another appearance during Dark Days…).

Thyme and rosemary, holding on in the garden despite the cold.

I’ve struggled with elk (and deer) turning out too tough in soups in the past, even with long cooking times and I’m not entirely sure what made this time different, but I suspect it may have something to do with the cut (sirloin tip) or the overnight rest in the fridge. Whatever it was, the texture was exactly what I was hoping for. Maybe this will be enough to inspire me to attempt another elk roast soon. Have you cooked game roasts successfully? Any tips?

Sources for this week’s dinner:
Carrots and celery from Full Circle Farm, Carnation, WA
Onions from Andersen Organics, Othello, WA, by way of Full Circle box
Garlic from Filaree Garlic Farm, Okanogan, WA
Rosemary and thyme from our garden
Tomatoes grown at Tonnemaker Hill Farm, Royal City, WA
Vegetable stock primarily made from trimmings from Full Circle vegetables or Andersen alliums
Potatoes from our garden
Cremini mushrooms from Champs Mushrooms, Abbotsford, B.C., by way of Full Circle box
Elk steak from the freezer (2010′s elk shot near Forks, WA)
Flour from Fairhaven Mill, Bellingham, WA
Exceptions: olive oil, salt, and pepper

Beets, ready for roasting, when it was late summer and the light was still good.

The start of Dark Days snuck up on me this year, and it was looking like I was going to be starting the challenge with a snack (the quince “paste” that never quite set right and Yarmuth Farm “Dylan” cheese below – quince from an orchard on Guemes Island, I think, but now I can’t find the name of the place for the life of me) instead of a full dinner, but once again my freezer came to the rescue.

Quince "paste" and Yarmuth Farms Dylan aged raw milk goat cheese

I love soup, and borscht is one of my favorites. I made a batch a couple of weeks ago and threw a container in the freezer, knowing that I still had a few busy weeks to go and could use a very fast dinner option. At the time I wasn’t planning to pull it out for a Dark Days meal (much less the kick-off week), but sometimes life has different plans than the ones I make for myself. In looking back through my archives, I see I used borscht as a Dark Days meal last year; this year’s borscht was similar, though meatless.

Since participating in Dark Days last year, local food is more a part of our regular diet than ever, but there’s always room for improvement. I’m following largely the same guidelines as I set for myself last year, though I’ve found more local suppliers in the past year,  and we’re eating less dairy and wheat than we used to (though thankfully I’ve seemed to do okay with limited quantities of both). The flour I’m using generally comes from Fairhaven Organic Flour Mill in Bellingham, WA. Though they don’t source all of their grains from the immediate local area, I’m willing to live with that. Once again I bought and canned tomatoes from Tonnemaker, and this year I also got tomatillos and peppers, so expect salsa verde to make a few appearances. My in-laws’ garlic crop wasn’t great this year, so we ended up buying 10 lbs of garlic from Filaree. And we still get a box of fruits and vegetables from Full Circle Farm every week. We managed to get down to just one chest freezer since my husband didn’t get an elk this year, but we still have lots of meat left from last year’s successful hunt, and there are a few salmon in there, as well.

I’m looking forward to having a weekly reason to force myself to sit down and write here again, and am hoping I’ll be able to stick with it. Let’s do this!

Sources for this week’s dinner:
Carrots, celery, and cabbage from Full Circle Farm, Carnation, WA
Onions from Andersen Organics, Othello, WA, by way of Full Circle box
Beets from my in-laws’ garden up the street – a combination of pickled and roasted (via the freezer) – plus grated beets from Full Circle
Dill from HerbCo, Duvall, WA by way of Full Circle box
Exceptions: salt, pepper, Bragg apple cider vinegar (so far my ACV experiments have not succeeded)