Carrot cake cookies

 
It's still September, so I'm still not talking about pumpkin.

(I'm beginning to think I'm the only blogger who is not.)

What we're talking about today is carrots. Well, really what we're talking about is carrot cake cookies, but that's only because I'm slightly crazy.

Seriously: Am I the only person that gleefully plans and plants a huge garden full of vegetables, only to find at harvest time that I'm trying to turn them into baked goods instead of savory side dishes?

Crap: I finally may be developing a sweet tooth after all.

Even though we have had two pretty significant frosts already here in Vermont, I'm still getting a few things from the garden. I have a little bit of kale, which I had better hurry up and harvest before the deer find it (bastards!), and carrots.

This year marked my first attempt at growing carrots: It was a success! It's so rewarding to see the little orange tippity top of a carrot poking through the ground and then to pull it up. Gasp! It's a real carrot! That I grew!

(It's the little things, really.)

The fun and wonder begins to wear off as you pull up carrot after carrot after carrot. And realize that you don't particularly like cooked carrots.

Uh oh.

Slow cooker beef chili

I feel slightly disloyal by posting this chili recipe.

One of my favorite easy recipes -- and one of yours as well, given how many times it has been viewed and pinned -- is my crockpot turkey chili with butternut squash. It's my go-to lazy day recipe in the fall.

So I tried to keep it quiet when I decided to try a beef chili. I just assumed that there was no way it would be as good as my turkey chili and I could just move on.

Well, clearly I didn't move on.

Now, I'm not going to say that one is better than the other. They are distinctly different. The beef chili is old school with a twist, while the turkey chili is new school (so to speak) with old-school comfort and feel.

I will not make you choose. There will be no contest. There will be no declaring a winner or calling one superior or even the best (I reserve "best" for the cornbread that you will want to make to go with either chili -- best EVAH).

It all depends what you're in the mood for: nouveau or traditional.

Today, we're talking traditional. Beef, beans, chili powder -- the whole nine yards.

Roasted pear and cardamom butter

Holy crap, we've got tons of pears in the wee orchard!

Regular readers will know how amazing this is, after the Great Pear Theft of 2011 (thanks to the deer and possibly a bear) and the Great Season of No Damned Fruit At All of 2012 (thanks to the weather). Although, to be fair, the animal thieves did teach me that I could harvest the fruit by shaking the tree while I waited for my fancy new fruit picker to be delivered.

We have two pear trees -- a seckel and a Bartlett (I think) -- in amongst a bunch of apple trees, two sour cherry trees, one plum and one peach, which must have heard me talking about how I thought it was dead and was going to cut it down because it yielded a number of peaches in its own defense this year ("I'm not dead yet!").

When we purchased the farmette several years ago, I was more than a little excited about the wee orchard, envisioning the lovely pears and apples that I could pick and eat or turn into gorgeous desserts.

But it's time for a reality check: homegrown fruit is damned ugly.

Unless of course you want to spend most of your time -- I mean a LOT of time -- monitoring the trees, spraying for diseases and handpicking gross-ass caterpillars and bugs, you're going to end up with ugly fruit. Mr. Ninj spoke recently with the owner of a commercial apple orchard; he talked about how they have a team that walks around the orchard with a laptop, monitoring the trees and feeding the data into special software programs that show them the short time windows they have to spray the trees to avoid massive fruit loss due to fungal infections and the like.

Um ... no thanks. The Ninj and her laptop don't have that kind of time.

CSA Share Ninja Rescue 2013: tomatoes and winter squash (13 ideas)

This is the final installment for 2013 of my CSA Share Ninja Rescue, a weekly feature in which you tell me on Fridays what veg you got in your CSA share box (or found at the farmers' market) that you don't know what to do with and I'll give you a whole bunch of recipe ideas on the following Monday.

Even though I'm wrapping up this feature for this year, I know that many of you will continue receiving CSA shares well into the fall and perhaps even through the winter; if you need some ideas, feel free to message me or post your request on my Facebook page.

And rest assured that the CSA Share Ninja Rescue will be back in 2014 as well.

But for now, since it's nearly fall, I thought I'd leave you with ideas for two perfect transition veggies: tomatoes, which are signaling the end of summer (and the ramp-up of crazed canning season!), and winter squash, which heralds the arrival of fall.

Please note that I am skipping pumpkin. This is for two reasons:

1. I respect seasonality. Therefore, I recently pledged not to jump into the pumpkin patch until it is truly pumpkin season (read: October 1), no matter what Starbucks' latte menu says.
2. I'm sure you're being inundated on blogs, Facebook and Pinterest with pumpkin EVERYTHING, so I doubt you're out of ideas quite yet.

Many thanks to all of you who have made requests or left comments this year. As I always note, this feature is only successful when you participate and tell me what you need -- and we were very successful indeed in 2013!

Now, the recipe ideas...

Tomatoes

• Tiny tomato bisque: Easy and quick, this bisque is equally as delicious with fresh or frozen tomatoes (the recipe is at the very end of the post)
• Tomato jam: Made with fresh tomatoes, this is a wonderful savory condiment to use throughout the tomato-less winter
• Green tomato cake: I make a few of these spice cakes and freeze them when I'm forced, by an impending frost, to pull all the unripened tomatoes off my plants (that should happen soon, unfortunately)
• Bloody Mary tomato salad: A salad that tastes almost like a cocktail -- one of my faves!
• Fresh tomato and sausage ragu: Kick your pasta up several notches with this delicious sauce
• Gazpacho: Perhaps the easiest and most delicious way to use up nearly everything from your CSA share all at once
• Marinated Dried Tomatoes: ZOMG -- I love these! They are so wonderfully tangy on pizzas and even better when rehydrated in a cream sauce over pasta

Winter Squash

• Curried acorn squash soup:  I see this as a lovely soup for lunch or a light dinner
• Acorn squash muffins: Delightful for breakfast or an afternoon snack -- or even as a substitute for cornbread with chili (see below)
• Roasted butternut squash with quinoa, sausage and greens: Amazing fall flavor and full of whole-grain goodness
• Crockpot turkey chili with butternut squash and apples: Loaded with veggies and beans, this is a fall-flavorful riff on traditional chili about which my readers rave (there's a bonus cornbread recipe in there as well!)
• Butternut squash gnocchi with sage brown butter: Don't let the craptacular photo put you off -- this is some wonderful pasta, made with squash instead of potatoes
• Butternut squash-infused rum: I'm planning to mix this rum with ginger beer for a signature Thanksgiving cocktail

So ... what was your favorite recipe (or recipes) from the 2013 CSA Share Ninja Rescue? Leave a comment: The Ninj wants to know.

Blueberry bread

Blueberry bread -- a sturdy, not-too-sweet bread with a delightfully crunchy top for breakfast for breakfast or snacking. 

Yes, it is September and I am a food blogger -- but The Ninj is not posting about pumpkin.

It seems to me that the "Summer is dead, long live Fall" battle cry happened far, far too early this year. Weeks before Labor Day, I saw Halloween candy for sale in the grocery store, and the number of pumpkin recipes appearing on food blogs is overwhelming.

And, frankly, absurd. I can't imagine anyone has very many pumpkins popping up in the garden quite yet.

What happened to seasonality, people??!!

Which is why The Ninj is making a solemn pledge to stay out of the freakin' pumpkin patch until October, when pumpkins are seasonally appropriate. You have my word.

This is also why I'm sharing a great recipe for blueberry bread today. I'm still harvesting blueberries off my backyard bushes, and I just passed an open Pick-Your-Own blueberry farm yesterday.

Seasonality. Say it with me. Say it to your friends. Write it on your favorite bloggers' Facebook pages.

Banana-zucchini muffins

So, have you used up all your zucchini yet? (Snort)

Yeah, I know: bad joke. Mine is still coming in from the garden and I don't know how many more baggies of shredded zucchini my freezer can hold. I still have one in there from last year, for cripes sake.

But if you also happen to have a past-its-eating-prime banana hanging around, today is your lucky day.

If not for the pathetic banana on the counter, I would likely have made my summer harvest zucchini bread this week. But frugality (read: cheapness) got the better of me: I was determined to use up the banana and the zucchini -- and not by throwing either one into the compost bin. My challenge to myself was to find a way to use them both in one recipe.

Lucky for you, I scored. And scored big.

You know how yummy banana bread is? And you know how much you love zucchini bread? Yeah? Well, now combine them together, add some flax seed meal to make it good for you and -- voila! -- you've got The Ninj's favorite new breakfast: banana-zucchini muffins.

The best thing about these banana-zucchini muffins is that they are incredibly moist, without any added oil -- and not that rubbery, oh-you-clearly-added-applesauce-instead-of-oil-to-make-it-healthy moistness. We enjoy them au naturel (which makes them handily portable), but they are also wicked with a little butter or fruit butter schmeared on them.

And they freeze well, too.

CSA Share Ninja Rescue 2013: corn (9 ways)

Welcome back! Regular readers know that Monday is the day we share the CSA Share Ninja Rescue, a weekly feature in which you tell me on Fridays what veg you got in your CSA share box (or found at the farmers' market) that you don't know what to do with and I'll give you a whole bunch of recipe ideas on the following Monday.

(Since summer is winding down, we're getting to the last few installments of the Rescue for this year. If you need help with some veg, be sure to let me know quickly!)

This week: corn! In my opinion, it's one of the things that makes summer so wonderful.

And traditional corn-on-the-cob is always a tasty option, whether you boil it, grill it, slather it in butter or just eat it plain. But have you considered some other ways to prepare sweet summer corn?

I discovered, after making a fresh corn salad (pictured) for the first time a few years ago that I actually prefer it raw in salads. You can just zip it right off the cob and it's ready to go (the OXO corn zipper will be your new best friend).

Here are nine delicious ways to enjoy all that awesome summer corn -- and none of them involve the cob!

• Smoky Corn Chowder: Bacon and corn are a winning combination in this hearty chowder
• Fresh Corn Salad: Easy to prepare, gorgeous to behold and super delicious (pictured above)
• Corn Pudding: Because sometimes you need comfort food in the summer, too
• Corn and Broccoli Calzones: A fresh, unique take on a traditional calzone
• Corn Fritters: A great summer side
• Best-Evah Cornbread: Not lyin' -- it's the best! Enjoy with a bowl of chili.
• Corn with Bacon and Mushrooms: Just as yummy a side for breakfast as it is for dinner
• Bacon Cheddar Corn Muffins: How about slathering this savory muffin with some tomato jam?
• Sweet Corn Cocktail: Of course there's a boozy corn cocktail!

What's your favorite way to eat corn? Leave a comment: The Ninj wants to know.

Burlington Food Tours

Whether you’re a resident of or a visitor (or even a wannabe visitor) to my home state of Vermont, you’re probably well aware that the Burlington area is a food-lover’s paradise.

Now there's even a food-focused walking tour of Burlington.

Burlington Food Tours offers a cultural walking tour of the downtown area, with tasty sampling stops along the way at various vendors at the farmer’s market as well as specialty food shops and area restaurants. The experienced guides also provide some Burlington food history and overview of the area farming and locavore culture along the way.

I recently took part in this food-focused walking tour. You can read about my experience in this piece I wrote for Vermont Life magazine's web site.

CSA Share Ninja Rescue 2013: pickle roundup (20 ways!)

It is indeed Monday, the day we share the CSA Share Ninja Rescue, a weekly feature in which you tell me on Fridays what veg you got in your CSA share box (or found at the farmers' market) that you don't know what to do with and I'll give you a whole bunch of recipe ideas on the following Monday.

But the feature may look a little different today. I decided to shake things up a little and not focus on specific vegetables but on a technique instead.

So today we're talking preserving: namely, preserving through pickling. 

Pickling is a great way to preserve a lot of the garden's excess bounty to enjoy over the winter months, when your CSA or garden isn't overloading you with delicious, colorful veggies.

Additionally, I tried to include a lot of recipes and posts from some of my favorite bloggers, rather than just recipes from professional chefs and foodie mags (although they are represented as well). Who knows? You might find a new blog to follow!

Lastly, for all of you who are thinking, "Great, Ninj, but I don't can!" or perhaps, "This is lovely, Ninj, but I don't like cucumbers!" -- don't worry, I've got you covered, too. (Come on, would The Ninj leave you hanging?!!!)

Let's get pickling, shall we?

Cucumber Pickles (canned)

• Garlic Dill Pickles from Food in Jars
• Dill Spears from Sherri Brooks Vinton's Put 'Em Up
• Best-Evah Dill Pickles from The Ninj 
• Curry Pickles from Homemade Trade
• Sweet-n-spicy Bread and Butter Pickles from Martha Stewart

Other Pickled Vegetables (canned)

• Pickled Chard Stems from Local Kitchen
• Pickled Garlic Scapes from The Garden of Eating
• Carrot and Daikon Radish Pickle from What Julia Ate
• Pickled Pepper Rings from Sweet Domesticity
• Pickled Rhubarb from Well Preserved

No-Canning-Required Recipes

• Quick Cucumber Pickles from Rachel Ray
• Cider Vinegar Pickled Beets from Food and Wine
• Pickled Radishes from Bon Appetit
• Refrigerator Dilly Beans from The Ninj 
• Pickled Eggs from What Julia Ate
• Fermented Dill Pickles from The Ninj
• Fermented Honey-Garlic Pickles from Well Preserved
• Pickled Carrots from David Lebovitz
• Pickled Green Strawberries from Kitchen Apparel (guesting on Shared Appetite)
• Pickled snow peas from Alana Chernila

Do you have a favorite pickling method or recipe? Leave a comment below: The Ninj wants to know.

Blueberry vinegar

More excitement around Casa de Ninj this summer: the high-bush blueberries are producing!

Regular readers will recall that last year was pretty much a crapfest in the wee orchard: no peaches, no pears, no cherries, a handful of blueberries and a few measly apples. Pffft. Hardly worth the countless hours I spent hand-picking beetles off all the trees.

Of course, all this misery was courtesy of Mother Nature, who is a fickle broad indeed, giving us a killing late spring frost in 2012 -- as if we hadn't gone through enough cold all winter. Similarly, this summer she has given us unseasonably cold temperatures alternating with blistering heat and seemingly endless rain. For cripes' sake, it's mid-August and I'm still waiting on the tomato harvest; if we don't scoot this along, my unripe tomatoes will be touched with frost before I can eat them.

But it turns out there's a silver lining to all this craptacular weather: the blueberries are thriving.

I'm done complaining. We only have four blueberry bushes and I have already harvested at least six quarts, with many more out there just waiting for me. We have oodles, even with my sharing them with the birds this year (we're all peacefully co-existing now that I've started feeding them and gave them some bitchin' bird baths).

So I was delighted when the week's "assignment" from Sherri Brooks Vinton's Put 'Em Up Fruit for the From Scratch Club's virtual book club turned out to include blueberries.

Booyah.

I already put up some of what I'm calling Black and Blue Jam this year, using the aforementioned blueberries and a boatload of wild black raspberries foraged from the edges of our woods, so I wanted to try something other than jam. Behold: Sherri's book offered up blueberry vinegar!