Little Farm Cooking

We here at the little farm strive to eat sustainable. We grow our own produce on our little lot. We buy local from the source or at farmer's markets. We make our food from scratch including breads and crackers. These pages will be a record of our journey. I hope you will visit often and take away what information you need. Happy Cooking!

Sunday, January 25, 2015

USING WHAT WE HAVE IN THE FREEZER AND PANTRY WEEK

So here I go with a new cooking blog.  I hope you will stick with me as I develop this blog.  Much design still needs to be done and skill at blogging needs to be attained .  I have never done a cooking blog before but I decided to just jump in feet first. So here goes.

Right now in the little farm kitchen, I am trying to just use what we have with some supplements from the farmer's market.  This week was focused on using up the food in the freezer as I have a new plan for it.  More of that in a future blog.

We were away part of this week so there are only three recipes to post.  The first day I pulled out a little package of shrimp left over from a previous dish.  We picked the shrimp up fresh in Half Moon Bay and I froze what we didn't use.   The last three things I pulled out were some leftover cooked salmon, also from Half Moon Bay, frozen mustard greens also from our garden, and udon noodles.  And the recipe I came up with was this

                                               Udon Noodle Soup With Salmon, Shrimp and Greens
I started out my soaking some dried mushrooms we had in the pantry.I used 4 cups of dashi broth (Made from seaweed.  Very easy to make)  and 4 cups homemade chicken broth.  Then stirred in some miso paste, from the Asian supermarket, about 2 tablespoons. Just add to taste.  I let that cook for about 5 minutes then slowly poured in 3 tablespoons soy sauce and about 2 tablespoons of  mirin.  I let that simmer for a while.  Meanwhile I brought another pot of water to a boil to cook the udon (cook about 3-5 minutes after the water boils).  After the broth had simmered for a while, I added the salmon, the shrimp and simmered a little longer.  Next I added the greens and mushrooms plus some tofu cubes and simmered about 5 more minutes.  When all is done just put some noodles in bowls and ladle the soup over them.  There you have it!

            Sausage and Brown Rice with Garden Frozen Peppers and Farmer's Market Onions

I never seem to grow enough onions so toward the end, before the new crop comes in, I have to supplement with farmer's market onions.  This was a simple dish.  Just cook up the rice.  I happened to love my rice cooker but use what ever method you like.  Slice the sausage into rounds, chop the onions and the peppers and sauté together.  Put some of the cooked rice in bowls and spoon the sauté over it.  Top with hot sauce or whatever you like.

                                                                     Stir Fry
The last meal was just using left overs.  Had some rice and tofu leftover so just did a stir fry with whatever veggies I had in the fridge.

There you have it.   I promise to take picture for the next weeks menu.  Things were a little hectic this week.    The only thing I know for sure I will be making is turkey pot pie to take to my son's house on Wednesday.  Have not done the menu for next week this evening yet.  I hope one or all of these recipes will give you some jumping off points for your own kitchen.  Happy cooking!

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