All that and this is the stuff of a thrifty cook. No tossing these lovely peels to the compost. Making use of them to add oodles of flavor to your holiday cakes. Who knows, it could even lead to drying our peels to add them to tea come winter. Constant Comment did it to very good advantage way back when…and now they’re rich kids–chuckle.

This year I candied one of each critter: lemon, orange, grapefruit, citron, and lime. Lemon and orange were quite good as was the grapefruit. Citron was hard to find but it rewarded with an extra thick pith. Lime with its thin peel was not as plump and enticing, although still brought an intrigue all its own.

You can see how large the citron is and how little fruit it has, making it a shoe-in for candying with its thick rind. This is the etrog variety as opposed to the more readily available fingered citron, also known as Buddha’s hand. The advantage of the fingered citron is that its all rind and thus gives up a goodly amount of candied peel.

Just ask friend, Michael Mock, who experimented with that this year. He ended up with a couple of cups of diced peel, plenty for not only fruitcakes but also Christmas Stollen and my latest use of candied peel: in a beet salad with fresh oranges, olive oil, red wine vinegar, and a healthy spike of country mustard.

Back to the matter at hand, though. The gist on candied peel is really just the same as on everything else that’s commercially prepared today. Making it is easy, but it is yet another chore. That said, as people who do their own chores know, there’s nothing like home made for both satisfaction and end product.

How easy? How about 1, 2, 3.

1. Take the peel off the fruit (or in the case of etrog citron, cut the fruit out of the peel) and dice it–or at least get a bite-size cut. No need to fret over removing the pith as you want that for meaty dices and the bitterness goes mostly gonzo during the blanching. (Besides, like Old Fashion drinkers know, a little bitter makes the sweet rock & roll.)

2. Blanch in boiling water a couple times. Draining and rinsing each time to remove the bitterness. (Some recipes call for three and four times of blanching. I did it twice, letting the peels bubble about for a minute or two each time before rinsing.)

3. Simmer with sugar and water (one part sugar to two parts water) until things get syrupy. Use enough water to barely cover your fruits nets about the right amount of syrup.

If you’ll notice in the last image here, some of my jars have less syrup than others–point being there’s no hard and fast rule, just you experimenting.

Just you, the measure free hippie cook, in charge. (How was it that we ever turned into technicians anyhow? Following orders from headquarters in the privacy of our own kitchens? Aren’t our lives ruled and regulated enough already? More chuckle…)

Our cover girl, Celeste, is never far from the kitchen action of course. She is even in the holiday spirit enough to let the latest member of the family–Blue Bird–to share the frame with her.

A few big spoons of small white Navy beans that were waiting in the fridge all cooked up, oil, vinegar, salt, pepper, and we were there. Grab the Parmigiano Reggiano–that we can afford since we grown our own and eat beans–some homemade Tangled Up Focaccia and we were there. On the deck with a glass of wine eating first class peasant food and loving it. Indeed, we don’t have to be gourmet to eat well, no?

Breakfast. This morning. Out came a clean pot and in went organic polenta from the bulk bins for a new batch of porridge. Stir, stir, stir. Then to the garden to round up what have you. A couple scallions. A handful of young fava beans. Back in the hippie kitchen. Choppity- chop for the veggies and into the pot they went. Just a quick stir and then covering to let hot golden polenta turn the greens al dente.

Fry an egg. Grab a couple roasted chiles. Ultrafast. Healthy. Thrifty. Local/Seasonal. Me and Swish were ready to feast.

Oh–and that last fava that turned up in my pocket unchopped and uncooked. I just chomped that down au naturelle, tender and young freshly picked as it was…

In case you haven’t appreciate what a radical tune Jimmy Crack Corn is before, here are the lyrics:

When I was young I used to wait
On master and hand him his plate
Pass him the bottle when he got dry
And brush away the blue-tail fly

Chorus

Jimmy crack corn, and I don’t care
Jimmy crack corn, and I don’t care
Jimmy crack corn, and I don’t care
My master’s gone away

When he would ride in the afternoon
I’d follow him with my hickory broom
The pony being rather shy
When bitten by the blue-tail fly

Chorus

One day he rode around the farm
Flies so numerous that they did swarm
One chanced to bite him on the thigh
The devil take the blue-tail fly

Chorus

Well the pony jumped, he start, he pitch
He threw my master in the ditch
He died and the jury wondered why
The verdict was the blue-tail fly

Chorus

Now he lies beneath the ‘simmon tree
His epitaph is there to see
Beneath this stone I’m forced to lie
The victim of the blue-tail fly

In this case, there were leftover French lentils and quinoa in the fridge–so into the bowl they went with some jarred roasted red peppers, a pear from the season’s end, and a handful of raisins.

Next a quick troll through the garden for a clutch of kale and cabbage leaves and a stalk of immature green garlic that I treated like a scallion. Flip the high heat on under a puddle of water in the cast iron wok. Choppity chop and into the wok. In half a minute the works has wilted nicely, so off goes the heat and into the bowl go the veggies.

Then some olive oil in the work and a bunch of local hazelnuts. Stir-stir while they toast a little, and over the salad they go, oil in tow.

Red wine vinegar, coarse salt, a crack of fresh pepper, and a scatter of red chile flakes.

This baby was done, and boy was it a lip smacker. “Beans and rice” never tasted so fine–just like my new hero Dave Ramsey knows.

Sing it Dave!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

BEANS AND RICE (RICE AND BEANS)
Copyright Scott Dawson Songs 2008

Fannie Mae, GMAC and MasterCard
Had control of me
I was sinking, sinking in a river of debt
When a friend
Shared with me
A radio personality
With a message
That I wouldn’t soon forget

Act your wage, budget the till
Name every dollar bill
Sell the Rolex, the speedboat and SUV’s
The only time you shall haunt
Your neighborhood restaurant
Will be working
As a server for Applebee’s

So I’m squeezing every dime
No fish, no beef, no pork
Now when dinnertime rolls around
I don’t even need a fork

Rice and beans
Beans and rice
Keeps me fed for a modest price
I’m adjusting
To living on beans and rice I got pintos, kidneys, limas too
With a can of spam I got
Poor man’s stew
Thanks Dave Ramsey
For teaching me beans and rice

Rice and beans
Beans and rice
Cayenne pepper and a onion slice
Mighty tasty
I’m cooking up beans and rice

I got long grain, short grain
Wild and brown
This recipe is spreading all over town
I’m making progress
By living on beans and rice Someday soon
You’ll hear me
On the air screaming “I’m debt free”
But until then
I’m living on beans and rice

In short, I’ve learned that if I am open to the at bounty lies outside the kitchen door, I can connect with what eating truly fresh food in season is all about. I can free myself  from the trap of thinking it’s reasonable to eat tomatoes and lettuce during the dead of a Pacific Northwest winter or fresh strawberries outside of their luscious, local June season. I can revel in the joy of anticipating new potatoes, of discovering that fava beans that are ready by June when not much else is, and of putting up my own roasted red peppers for winter.

Growing your own comes at a cost of course. Some years things don’t produce well.There’s turning the compost piles, if you’re low tech like me and just use a pitch fork. And then there’s straightening up from yet another row and leaning wistfully on your hoe to watch your neighbors heading off to something spiff like a farm-to-table dinner in wine country or a luxurious yoga class.

My experience is, though, that the garden brings its own enduring joy. It’s own peace of mind. The beauty of the garden is simply and undeniably luxurious. Then there’s the exercise you get, all without having to pay for a class or head off to the pool. And we haven’t even gotten around to the savings on our food bills. Or how by being less dependent on the cash economy, we can trade in our 40-hour weeks for part-time work.

Quite the deal a kitchen garden is. Mental health therapy. Significant cash savings. (As in I’ve probably spent all of $20 on fresh produce over the past year.) Physical exercise. And fresh delicious food.

On the stove at the moment is a clam chowder. Potatoes and frozen green beans from last summer’s harvest, fresh pulled leeks and carrots, and a can of clams. I even have a few leggy fronds of parsley from the kitchen window pot to add right before serving so it keeps it’s “somewhere-over-the-rainbow color” as I put it in one book or another.

All in all, not bad for the eve of winter solstice when it’s all we can to do keep the home fires burning.

Warm salads are another favorite of mine. Here I rely on garden spaghetti squash that’s keeps all winter in the basement or even in right in the kitchen–and is easy to bake. Then some freshly picked kale, flash cooked with garlic and red chile flakes. Dress with olive oil, fresh lemon juice, and coarse salt. Garnish with ruby pomegranates jewels and a polite chop of walnuts.

Pretty tasty no matter what carb and protein you pair it with. And it even works for the vegans in the crowd. Merry Howdy!

Here’s how ultrafast cooking works in my hippie kitchen. In the morning when I’m having breakfast, I steam up a pot of quinoa. This grain cooks in 10 minutes and has the highest protein of them all. I leave it sitting out at room temperature and then when dinner comes along all’s that needs doing is chopping the last of the garden tomatoes, walking outside and plucking the end of the basil, and dressing with a polite pour of olive oil, swig of red wine vinegar, coarse salt, and fresh crack of peppper from the grinder.

All that and I get some leftover quinoa to put in a soup the next day or even mix with an egg and minced celery and onion to fry up into crisp patties. Yep. Having a pot of leftover whole grain around–whether it be millet, amaranth, wheat berries, brown rice, or quinoa–can make your kitchen life easy, frugal, healthy, and wise.

So rock & roll. It’s easy to make simple everyday food in your own kitchen. Fun too since you get to be the boss.

A quick swab of the cutting board. And the deal’s done–plenty of time still to listen to Pure Prairie League’s Amie, isn’t that right Sandy?

First I roasted some plums and peaches. Balsamic on the plums, red wine over the peaches and sugar sprinkled over all. Why the same pan? I was lazy.

Then I ate the plums. Scarfed them right up. So the project became the peaches. These got sliced and stirred around in their winey goop. Then I used the leftover polenta like flour and oats for a cobbler crust. All it took was some butter and sugar worked in for a nice spready hit that covered the peaches. Into the oven and then under the broiler at the very end to brown it up a bit more.

Voila! A lovely offering that comes from being thrifty, working in season, and not being afraid to be your own boss in the kitchen.

So here you go.

In these vids I show how to

1. Turn the burner on high with a puddle of water.
2. Put your rustically chopped veggies in, in the order of which takes longest to cook Build your flavor using the sacred quartet: oil, vinegar, salt, pepper
3. Pair with protein and carbs
4. And bring on the goodies to make Plain Jane fare rock your socks!

It’s as simple as that, and the clean-up is too. Plus I talk about eating seasonally, thrift, health, and how delicious this food revolution really truly is. Hope you come along. We’re having a blast…