Roasted Chicken

We just had our first batch of chickens butchered last week - what a beautiful batch of roasters! roasters in the 6 pound range are hard to come by, and this batch averaged 6 pounds! We had also lucked out the week before when Tom found a stainless steel cabinet type smoker at Penn State Salvage - so we will be able to offer smoked, fully cooked chickens starting with our next batch. We just experimented and smoked two birds, and boy were they DELICIOUS!
People had asked how we prepare our chickens, and here's our favorites:
I like to use the roasted chicken recipe out of the Grassfed Gourmet Cookbook, by Shannon Hayes. It's an excellent cookbook, with a wonderful knowledgeable author who will really show you the way around purchasing and preparing local, grassfed meats.For more details go to http://www.grassfedcooking.com


Chicken Herb Rub
1 tablespoon coarse salt
1 tablespoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablsepoon dreid thyme
2 tablespoons dried oregano.

Mix all these together. Use 2 tablespoons of this mixture and combine with 1 clove of chopped garlic and ¼ cup of olive oil in food processor. Process into a smooth paste and rub over chicken and under skin.

Shannon’s Favorite Herb-Roasted Chicken
Preheat oven to 350F
Rinse chicken, pat dry with paper towels. Rub herb paste all over chicken, being sure to get underneath as well as on top of skin. Allow to sit for 2 hours in the fridge, OR roast immediately for roughly 1.5 hours. Internal temperature of chicken should be 160F in breats, and internal temperature of thigh should be 165-170F. Let rest 10-15 minutes before carving.

Greens, Glorious Greens!

The rains have been generous to us this spring, and after recovering from some flooded early crops, we are now starting to see some of the results that rain will have. One is an abundance of weeds, the other is happy greens.
You'll be seeing an assortment of mild and spicy greens, all so colorful and good for you.

Here's a summary of recipes I've been passing on:

Raspberry House Dressing:
Our daily house dressing is quick and easy: a generous dash of extra virgin olive oil, another generous dash of Tait Farms Raspberry Shrub (sort of like a honey sweetened raspberry vinegar - yum!), plus some salt and freshly ground pepper.

Basic Vinaigrette.
It keeps for weeks in fridge:
1 cup olive oil
4-5 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1/2 to 1 teaspoon salt
1 to 2 medium cloves garlic, minced
Combine everything in jar. Cover well and shake it up!

Variations:
➢ Add very finely minced parsley and/or other herbs (dill, basil, marjoram, chives etc.)
➢ Substitute different vinegars
➢ Add 1 to 2 teaspoon good quality mustard
➢ For creamy vinaigrette, add 2 to 3 Tablespoons sour cream or yogurt
➢ Add 2 Tablespoons lemon juice plus a little lemon rind

Salad Greens with Garlic Dressing
3 cloves garlic ( or you can use garlic scapes!)
3/4 cup oil of your choice
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1 tablespoons chopped fresh basil
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon grated parmesan cheese
1/2 tablespoon ground black pepper
1/2 cup milk

Put garlic, oil, vinegar, basil , salt cheese and pepper in blender, process 2-3 minutes. With blender still running, slowly add milk, processing until dressing is smooth and thick. Toss with greens. Covered and refrigerated, this dressing will keep 1 week.

From: Moosewood Restaurant Cooks at Home

Rule of Thumb:
Be a benefactor with the oil,
A miser with the vinegar, a poet with the salt,
and a demon with the pepper!

Those beloved Garlic Scapes! Plus 2 Scape Recipes

The pig-tailed curly greens you've taken home...They're the immature seedheads of hard-neck garlic.  We remove them so that the plants can put more energy into producing larger garlkic heads, rather than seeds.   AND they're oh so wonderful!   We wish the season for them was longer, but it is very short, so enjoy them now!   Try them chopped coarsely for a delicious garlicy crunch in your salads and stir-fries.

And here's a recipe sent in by a CSA member to help you utilize all those scapes and spinach this week.

Garlic Scape Soup
from Heidi Swanson's Super Natural Cooking
I have never tried it but I have wanted to.....

2 Tbsp clarified butter or extra virgin olive oil
2 dozen garlic scapes, chopped with flower bud discarded
3 large russet potatoes, unpeeled and cut into 1/2 inch dice
5 cups vegetable stock or water
2 large handfuls of spinach leaves stemmed
juice of 1/2 a lemon
1/2 teaspoon salt
black pepper to taste
1/4 c cream (optional)
optional garnish with chive blossoms

Heat fat in a large saucepan over medium heat, then add scapes and
saute for 2 minutes. Add the potatoes and stock, cover and simmer for
20 minutes or until the potatoes are cooked through and beginning to
break down.
Remove from heat and add the spinach. Puree using a hand blender or
other blending device (blender or food processor taking care that hot
liquids can easily explode). Season with lemon juice, salt, and
pepper. Whisk in cream if you are using and more salt if the taste is
too flat (in my experience/opinion, potatoes need quite a bit of
salt).
Serve hot or cold.

Garlic Scape Pesto
(recipe adapted from a combination of online sources - http://kalynskitchen.blogspot.com)

1/2 cup garlic scapes, finely chopped
4 T fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup olive oil
3 cups grated parmesan cheese
salt to taste

Put garlic scapes and lemon juice in bowl of food processor with steel blade, and process until scapes are very finely chopped. With food processor running, add oil through the feed tube and process 2-3 minutes. Remove lid, add half of parmesan cheese and process 2 minutes, then add the rest of cheese and salt and process 2-3 minutes more.

Serve tossed with hot pasta. This would also be good on fish, as a topping for bread, or as a seasoning for cooked rice.

Summer is here!

Now that the rain has stopped, and temperatures are up to the high 80's and low 90's - crops are popping out of the ground!     CSA shares are starting with  green onions, garlic greens - oh so tasty just added to just about anything - baby lettuces, spinach and microgreens.     Tiny broccoli heads are beginning to form, and emerald green rows of seedlings have appeared in the dark damp soil.

We're focusing on weeding in the garden right now, as any transplanting done in this heat is too stressful on the young plants.

Our meat birds are managing to stay cool under the pine trees, coming out during the cool early hours and evenings to chase bugs in the grass and sample the clovers.   It's a nice looking batch of birds that will be ready toward the end of the month - you may want to place your order now before we're sold out!