My harvests have come to an end with the most recent snowfall, but I thought I'd share how I've been using some of my harvests. I hosted a brunch this past weekend and almost all of the dishes had an ingredient that came from my garden.
I made some lemon and rosemary roasted potatoes. I potted up two of my rosemary plants which I'm keeping in the house over winter so nice to have the fresh herbs to toss with the few remaining fingerling potatoes that I had stored in my cold room.
This sausage and egg bake was made with apple and sage sausages that I bought at the "Seed to Sausage" store in Ottawa - their original store in Sharbot Lake was not far from my old place in Lanark county, so I was very pleased to see their new location here. The casserole was based on my Spaghetti Squash and Swiss Chard Casserole. I replaced the chard with kale from my last harvest and added the sausage and extra eggs to the ricotta mixture. Yummy!
I made this Chilaquile casserole for the first time and loved it!! It's basically like breakfast nachos! I had never actually tasted scarlet runner beans and had read that many people don't like the taste of them. I wanted to make sure mine went to good use so I thought this would be a good recipe to eat them with - the enchilada sauce with my homemade tomato sauce had a lot of strong flavours. So the cooked beans and sauce mixed together were layered with broken up taco chips and some cheese.
I did have one dish with nothing from my garden - phyllo pastry wrapped around a minted lamb mixture and feta. One of my guests was my friend whom I buy my lamb from.
And I made carrot cake cupcakes from the last of my rainbow mix carrots. I still have plenty of Nantes carrots in the crisper.
For condiments, I had some salsa (recipe here) and some homemade hot sauce (it's hot and delicious but I can't remember how I made it).
And now I'll pop over to Seed to Table as Michelle is hosting Harvest Monday for the month of January. I look forward to seeing what other gardeners have on the go this week.
Your brunch looks gorgeous, I love how you included vegetables from your garden in most everything. I really like runner beans as green beans, but never thought to use them as dry beans.
ReplyDeleteThanks Phuong. I did try the runner beans green, but I think I prefer the dried and cooked version.
DeleteIt's been a long time since I've had Scarlet Runner beans. Your breakfast Chilaquile casserole sounds lke a delicious way to use them. One of my favorite dry beans is another runner bean - Gigandes, a huge white bean. I like to pair that bean with tomato sauce and greens, sometimes with an addition of sausage. Isn't it wonderful to have a stash of homegrown goodness! You've been putting yours to delicious use.
ReplyDeleteYes, I remember reading about the Gigandes - I like the idea of a simple white bean.
DeleteYummy, what a lovely lot of dishes, I'm feeling hungry. And such a nice thing to have people over for brunch :) we went round to a friends' for New Year's Day roast lunch and board games which was a real treat and lots of fun, I'm sure your guests felt the same.
ReplyDeleteIt really was a nice break from the holiday festivities. Instead of more alcohol, I offered some apple cider that I picked up locally a week earlier (ok, maybe not instead of alcohol, more like in addition to). :)
DeleteIt's always fun to see what others are doing with their garden goodies. I love rosemary with potatoes and sweet potatoes as well. The Chilaquile casserole is really timely because I have been making a lot of enchiladas lately and I'm thinking this has all the same flavors. I didn't like enchiladas for a long time then I discovered it was the canned sauce I didn't like. Homemade is so much better!
ReplyDeleteThat's it, sometimes I think I don't like something only to realize I just didn't like the processed version of it. Homemade means you can add more of what you like and less of what you don't like!
DeleteBrunch at your place looks like the place to be. Nice that you could incorporate so many elements from your garden. Chilaquiles is great. We usually make it with shredded tortillas but corn chips would make it crunchier.
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful spread and including veg that you have grown yourself is so satisfying, isn't it. I'm trying to eat from the garden every single day - every soup, stew, etc, has one or more veg from either the freezer or cold cellar.
ReplyDeleteWonderfully delicious brunch, great that you are able to use so much from your garden. I tried overwintering rosemary but was unsuccessful so gave up.
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