Eighth of an Acre Bounty

Random thoughts and anecdotes on cooking, critters, gardening and life on our small city lot.

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Dark Days Catch-up

January 25th, 2009 · 3 Comments

As I mentioned below, I missed last weeks Dark Days post so this one will cover two meals. First up was this weeks meal, a variation on keftedes as learned from a Moroccan friend.

I took a pound of beef from our quarter of grass-fed beef (Prairie Springs Ranch) and mixed it with a bunch of minced garlic, diced shallot, cilantro, ground cumin and coriander, salt, pepper and a drop of lemon juice. Hand molded into small patties and cooked em up on our cast iron skillet. Along with the keftedes I roasted some sunchokes in olive oil and garlic and also cracked and warmed a pint jar of green beans I canned this summer.

Last weeks Dark Days post would have been about the sunchoke gratin I finally got around to testing out. Despite never having tried this before, it came out pretty tasty and was surprisingly simple. I alternated thin slices of sunchoke with slices of leek from the garden. Between the layers I seasoned with salt, pepper and diced rosemary. The nifty little pottery casseroles I brought back from Turkey on our last trip there. These have been incredibly useful for a two person household when you don’t want to make a full size dish. Once all the layers were completed and seasoned I poured a bit of cream over each one to juice it up a bit. They went into the oven for around 45 minutes and came out a bubbling goey treat.

Local Ingredients: Beef, Sunchokes, Leeks, Rosemary, Green Beans, Cream, Garlic.

Non-Local (or unknown): Salt, Pepper, Olive Oil, Cumin, Cilantro, Coriander, Shallot, Lemon Juice.

Tags: Cooking · Dark Days Challenge 08-09

3 responses so far ↓

  • 1 Mangochild // Jan 25, 2009 at 3:27 pm

    First, I love those pots! I am by myself most of the time, so I always hate to use the massive size pans for a casserole/layer dish just for me. Though left overs are good, not that much! Do you think they might be found here in the States?

    On the meals, sunchokes and leeks sound like a delicious combo. I haven’t been able to find them locally really, do you know anything about their growing needs?

  • 2 maya // Jan 27, 2009 at 10:59 am

    Hi Mangochild. I think you should be able to find something similar, ramekins would work too. From everything I have heard and read, sunchokes are about the easiest thing to cultivate. I have not yet planted any myself, but as soon as the ground stops freezing every night I plan to. They are in the sunflower family so I would follow similar soil amendments as you would for sunflowers. ALthough, I have to say that most people have issues with overgrowth rather than a poor crop.

  • 3 (not so) Urban Hennery » Blog Archive » Dark Days 08/09 Week #10 Recap // Jan 27, 2009 at 10:32 pm

    […] us with two weeks of updates is Maya. First up were keftedes learned from a Moroccan friend, I may just have to try those, yum. The previous week was the sunchoke gratin she was […]

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