busy weekend

Yesterday I made ricotta cheese for a future batch of ravioli. Today I made 20 1/2 pints of sweet pickle relish and as soon as I can find some heads of dill I will make some dill pickles.I have yet to make a batch of dill pickles that are not mushy so I keep trying.Any good recipes?
I forgot to take pictures but lunch today was Blt's with foccacia bread from Marthas Stone soup and local tomato and lettuce.The bacon was not local.Tonight we had burgers on the foccacia bread with homemade ketchup and local lettuce and onions and the burgers were from dufort farms in Rehoboth,Really good juicy burgers. We went on a foraging walk at Colechester farm today with john Root from Amherst.About 25 people.I had seen him speak before but it was really fun to walk through the farm and see all the edible plants in their habitat.

yes we eat junk food!

We washed windows today and then I finally hooked up my wireless printer to my new laptop.The windows were easier. Needless to say I did not feel like cooking. So we had hot dogs. They were not local or grass fed I am embarrassed to say. But we still managed to add some local elements, a can of state of Maine baked beans,homemade sauerkraut and home canned relish.I have not tried grass fed beef hot dogs yet for a few reasons. They are usually frozen and there are only two of us and they don't have preservatives so they would go bad before we finished them.I think this is true anyways,I guess i need to investigate this. We did have local made cinnamon toast for breakfast and BLT's with local lettuce and tomato.

ravioli dinner and a salad pizza lunch

• Last night we had raviolis that I made with homemade lemon pasta and stuffed with ricotta and Atwells gold cheese from Narragansett Creamery RI.fresh local eggs and herbs from my yard.We also had a salad of all local ingredients.Lunch today was a pizza shell from Eva's in Providence with Naragansett Creamery's smoked mozzarella and Atwells gold along with some garlic.After it was baked I topped it with a fresh salad of local raw corn,shaved raw summer squash,arugula,olive oil lemon juice and some fresh shaved Atwells gold cheese.Atwells gold cheese is a hard cheese from Narragansett creamery that I use as a local alternative to Parmesan cheese. I try and keep these meals as local as possible without forfeiting taste.I could of used local grown whole wheat flour in the pasta and I do often,but I feel that the delicate taste of the filling and lemon pasta would of suffered from the substitution.Moderation in everything.

local lunch

Todays local meal was a simple one. Stuffed quahogs from the freezer and sauerkraut made last fall.The sauerkraut was made by me last fall with local cabbage. It is amazing to me how crunchy it still is. The stuffed quahogs were made a few weeks ago by me. Joe dug the clams and the chorizo i used was local the onions and peppers were from the freezer from last summer(local)the bread i used was just leftovers from the freezer. This is a meal showing how freezing and preserving can give you a local meal any time of year.

light summer meal

I really did not feel like dinner tonight with the heat.I made a fritatta so if it wasnt eaten we could have it for breakfast.I used a zucchini that was given to us some fresh spring onions from the Plymouth farmers market some fresh oregano and basil from the garden, fresh eggs from the market some hard cheese from naragansett creamery(Atwells Gold) I use this cheese like parmesean and some leftover rice.The perfect light summer meal.Trying to use zucchini more than just in bread. I did see a zucchini marmalade recipe that peaked my interest today so you may see that here soon.

getting back in to the swing of things

I am trying to get back to showing our local eating on a more regualr basis.Tonights is not totally local but it is close.We had meatloaf that i used all local ingredients except a yellow pepper,our salad was one we had years ago at Alforno in Rhode Island.Shavings of raw summer squash with raw corn, shavings of parmesean ( I used Naragansett creamery's Atwells gold) with lemon and olive oil. and rice that of course was not local.Try making the salad it is really great, fresh and crunchy.