Wednesday, June 24, 2009

A garlic dream


Last weekend was the first of the season’s Farm Table Dinners. By all accounts it was a success! The theme this month is garlic. Back in the day (when I lived in my fantasy world) we used to grow garlic but in all honesty I lost the seed stock in the “divorce”. Luckily a farmer’s market vender Joyce Chillingsworth who bought some seed stock from us a couple years back, had plenty of all of my favorite heirloom garlic that I have come to love so dearly. It was really exciting to see and taste all the different varieties. Even though I didn’t grow them myself, the culinary excitement has been in high form! I may have even overdone it a little in the taste testing department. Haven’t had a mosquito bite yet!


At the new farm there will be plenty of room and better soil to grow garlic so that’s good news for sure!

The first dinners for me are always nerve wracking. I want the place to look absolutely perfect. Not a blade of grass out of place, every flower blooming, all the animals’ friendly and ready to charm, you know the perfect picture of a farm. I found out that doesn’t really exist other than on the labels and cartons of dairy products in grocery stores. The one thing I’ve finally come to realize is this place is truly a working farm 24/7. So that being said, you might find your occasional tangled up fencing or un-weeded vegetable beds. Barking dogs will greet you as you arrive, and you might smell the fresh and clean smell of manure. The goats may or may not want anything to do with us and this time of year its hot.
But……it’s good. It’s beautiful in a farmy kinda way, but more than anything it’s real. Which is something I have come to appreciate this year. I have never been so proud of the garden! All of the plants have never looked healthier.
So guest arrived had cocktails (berry mojito) and a tour of the farm and this is what we had for dinner. Life is so good!


Garlic Lovers Dream-Living Kitchen Farm and Dairy June 20th

First
Creamy roast Sicilaino garlic and candy onion bisque with salsa verde and braised chard
Second
Garden delight salad:
Fava beans with burgundy garlic, Armenian cucumber in yogurt sauce with
Red Toch garlic
Marinated beets and sweet onions with French Tarne garlic
Marinated homemade goat milk feta With Tuscan garlic
Garlic intermission
Our raspberries and lime ice
Entrée
Beef involtini stuffed with homemade chevre, shantung purple garlic and sage. Spanish Roja spiced wine sauce and roasted vegetables with Inchilium Red
Dessert
Chocolate goat milk crème custard with berries and crystallized Vekak garlic
Yum

1 comment:

Lost City Denise said...

You're off to a great start of Farm Table Dinners it looks like!

Oh and you know I love the new photo of the chickens...has Carissa seen this yet? She's going to flip!!!