Ramp pickles
So the pickled ramps turned out great! They're a sweet pickle, I'm going to experiment with a less sweeter version tomorrow. As promised, here's the recipe (it's adapted from a Tom Colicchio creation):
3 bunches of ramps, white parts only
1 cup distilled vinegar
1 cup bottled water
½ cup sugar
¼ cup honey
1 tablespoon coriander seed, mustard seed, black peppercorns, fennel seed
1. Cut off and clean white bulbs, saving leaves for others use (...pesto!)
2. Prepare brine bringing vinegar, water, sugar and honey to a boil for 1 minute. Add dried spices and remove from the heat after 1 minute.
4. Blanch ramp bottoms in heavily salted water for 1-2 minutes until the remaining greens on the ramp bottoms turn very bright green. Drain and cool quickly in ice water.
5. Pour brine over ramps and let sit for 3 to 5 days in refrigerator, for those that will be used within a few weeks. To preserve some for later use, seal the jars and process them in a boiling water bath.
3 bunches of ramps, white parts only
1 cup distilled vinegar
1 cup bottled water
½ cup sugar
¼ cup honey
1 tablespoon coriander seed, mustard seed, black peppercorns, fennel seed
1. Cut off and clean white bulbs, saving leaves for others use (...pesto!)
2. Prepare brine bringing vinegar, water, sugar and honey to a boil for 1 minute. Add dried spices and remove from the heat after 1 minute.
4. Blanch ramp bottoms in heavily salted water for 1-2 minutes until the remaining greens on the ramp bottoms turn very bright green. Drain and cool quickly in ice water.
5. Pour brine over ramps and let sit for 3 to 5 days in refrigerator, for those that will be used within a few weeks. To preserve some for later use, seal the jars and process them in a boiling water bath.
This afternoon Dan and I drove out to his brother's place (Alec) and picked up a bunch of wood he had out there that we're going to use to construct several raised garden beds. His brother lives out in the country so we let our dog, Daisy, run free for a long time, she needed it- it's great to see her run free and flush birds out of the marshes there. We then stopped by our buddy John's place to say "hi" and check out his place. (I'm happy to say Daisy romped free there for awhile as well~). He's got a great garden set-up going on and we are going to help him plant 2 acres of Cherry trees this spring, I'm excited to see his orchard when it starts producing! For helping him out we'll get free cherries for life- yay!
After John's we headed home and began constructing our new raised beds, I'm very happy to say that I have the whooole day off tomorrow and it's supposed to be 80 degrees here (crazy!) so the day will be spent working in the garden and harvesting and cleaning up ramps. Ahhhhh... heaven.
We made some loaded baked potatoes for supper, everything was from Minnesota (except for the potatoes!... next year hopefully I'll have some still lingering from the fall). Local toppings included hydroponic tomatoes, cucumbers, and lettuce, green onions from our cold frame, ramps, chives from Alec's yard, cheddar cheese, butter, and sour cream for Dan. Not bad for early May in Zone 4.
After John's we headed home and began constructing our new raised beds, I'm very happy to say that I have the whooole day off tomorrow and it's supposed to be 80 degrees here (crazy!) so the day will be spent working in the garden and harvesting and cleaning up ramps. Ahhhhh... heaven.
We made some loaded baked potatoes for supper, everything was from Minnesota (except for the potatoes!... next year hopefully I'll have some still lingering from the fall). Local toppings included hydroponic tomatoes, cucumbers, and lettuce, green onions from our cold frame, ramps, chives from Alec's yard, cheddar cheese, butter, and sour cream for Dan. Not bad for early May in Zone 4.
Then I made some ramp compound butter, I've never made this before but it sounds really good! Basically I just blanched a bunch of ramps (dropped them in salted boiling water for ~30 seconds and then put them in ice water immediately), chopped these up and then mixed these with salt, pepper, 1/2 lemon juiced and zested (not local, I know), and 1 lb of unsalted room temp butter. I then rolled this out on parchment paper and put this in a freezer bag with the air removed. Later on I'll take this out and cut up medallions of the butter to put in pasta, on top of chicken, on baked potatoes, etc... mmmm....