Saving summer bounty

Among the many somewhat neurotic Greek gods Demeter has always been a favorite of mine. Her devotion to her daughter forced her to tread inconsolably the earth barren by her anguish, while Persephone abducted by Hades sojourned in the Inferno. Eventually the situation resolves when Zeus intervenes and divides Persephone’s year in two: one half to be spent on earth with her mother and the other six months to reign with her terrible husband over the realm of Shadows. As fall approaches, one cannot help but recall the goddess of agriculture and seasons. When the garden (whether yours or the farmer markets) produces its last summer firework, it is cost effective to save the results of its labor to consume in winter. Tomatoes and cherry tomatoes finally fruit abundantly. There is a cornucopia of raspberries, string beans and herbs. The last zucchinis and eggplants show off. To retain a little of the summer warmth and do away with the tasteless greenhouse tomatoes, using the freezer is less time consuming than preserving. It is also more true to the product, as it does not require the addition of preservatives. Laziness becomes a virtue. I simply lay raspberries on a cookie sheet, which I then place in the freezer. A couple of hours later, I bag them and return the labeled bags to the freezer. Herbs and string beans are another good candidates for freezing. With minimal care, frozen summer vegetable stock and tomato sauce line up to enrich my future winter meals.

Summer vegetable stock
(Easy, Preparation and cooking time:30 minutes)
Ingredients:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 onion frozen for 10 minutes
3 garlic cloves
1 leek
2 carrots
Any vegetable available (zucchini, eggplant)
4 cups (1000ml) water

Material
8-quart saucepan
Peeler
Paring knife and board
Strainer

Peel the onion and slice finely. Peel and crush the
garlic cloves.
Slice off the bottom of the leek. Keep the white part and ¼ of the green tops. Slice finely and wash in cold water to remove all the earth. Save a full clean leave for the bouquet garni of the frozen tomato sauce.
Peel and slice the carrots. Wash the zucchini and eggplant.
Pour the olive oil in the saucepan and set on the low range of the gas. Add the onion and garlic. Stir-fry for about three minutes. Add the sliced leek, carrots, zucchini and eggplant and cook for another 5 minutes. Pour the 4 cups of water and simmer for another 20 minutes.
Strain the stock, keeping the vegetables for a salad and to thicken the frozen tomato sauce.
Pour a cup of stock in as many containers as needed. Wait until it is cold to freeze. Label each container with date and content.

Frozen tomato sauce
(Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 30 minutes, Cheap)

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 onion
3 garlic cloves
2 lbs (1 kg) tomatoes or cherry tomatoes*
1 bouquet garni (leek leave, a sprig of thyme, sage and laurel leaves, oregano and parsley and any other herbs available)
1 cup cooked vegetables leftovers from the previous recipe

Material:
1 4-quart pot
1 paring knife
1 blender
Plastic containers of 1-cup capacity

Place the onion in the freezer for about ten minutes.
Wash a leek leave, a thyme branch, a sage and a laurel leave, Roll the leek around the other elements and secure by knotting the leek ends together for a twine-free bouquet garni.
Peel and slice the onions.
Place the flat blade of a knife over a garlic clove, and hit it with the other hand. Peel off the skin. Repeat with the other cloves.
Pour the oil in the pan and set the pan on the low range of the gas. Stir-fry the onions and garlic until slightly colored.
Cut the tomatoes in quarter and remove the seeds. If using cherry tomatoes, remove the stems and leave whole.
Add the tomatoes and the bouquet garni.
Cook for about 20 minutes. Retrieve and discard the bouquet garni.
Place in the blender, add a cup of the summer vegetables from the stock and mix.
Pour a cup into as many plastic containers as needed and bring to room temperature prior to freezing.
Label with the date and a description of the content.
* If the tomatoes are slightly acid, add a tablespoon of sugar

Frozen herbs
(Easy, preparation time: 10 minutes)
Ingredients:
A bouquet of basil
A bouquet of mint
A bouquet of chives
A bouquet of dill

Material:
Scissors
Salad spinner
Paper towels
Blender
Plastic bags
Labels

Wash the bouquets separately, gather the leaves and spin in the salad spinner.
For the mint and basil leaves, the technique is the same: align the leaves on top of each other, roll into a tight cigarette and cut into thin bands. Gather a spoonful worth of herb per package, label, date and freeze.
For the chives: clean and dry the chives and snip off the end. Gather a spoonful worth of herb and proceed as highlighted above.
For the dill, place the cleaned leaves in a blender and pulse. Place a tablespoon of the minced herbs into a bag and continue as above.

Frozen string beans
(Easy, Preparation and cooking time:10 minutes, Cheap)
Ingredients:
String beans

Material
Saucepan
Plastic bags and labels

Snip off both end of the string beans.
Pour water in a saucepan and bring to a high boil. Drop the string beans in the water and wait until the boiling resumes.
Strain and refresh the string beans under cool water.
Bag and freeze.

Chicken without the egg

As part of New Year celebrations, countless resolutions are made. Mine is to cook an entire chicken on Sunday night and then to accommodate the rests for several other meals during the week. Anyhow, chicken is on the recommended pyramid of aliments, at the third level, which means you can eat it 2 to 3 times a week. There is however no end to what you can do with it: it is the “new” pork. Here is how to use almost every bit of it.
Roasted, as a complete yummy meal. As stock, for a healthily restorative chicken soup, as a salad for an elegant lunch, as an Asian inspired stir-fry. I leave to your imagination other usages. The stock can enhance any vegetable soup and the chicken meat any sandwich.

Roasted chicken (Easy, Prep time: 20 minutes, Cooking time: 1 hour, Cheap)

Ingredients:
1 whole chicken preferably free-range
2 sprigs of thyme or dry thyme leaves
2 sprigs of rosemary or dry rosemary leaves
1 sprig of sage or dry sage leaves
1 head of garlic
1 tablespoon of crystal salt (14 gm)
1 tablespoon of (14 ml) olive oil
1 teaspoon of pepper
3 baking potatoes
1 large sweet potato or yam

Material:
Paring knife
Cutting board
Large salad bowl
Baking sheet
Parchment paper

Preheat the oven at 400F (204C).
Cover the baking sheet with parchment paper.
Peel and cube the potatoes and store them in the salad bowl filled with cold water. Peel and cube the sweet potato.
Place the chicken on the cutting board. Empty the cavity and save the liver. Remove the leaves from two of the sprigs. Lifting the skin off the breasts delicately, insert the leaves between the skin and the flesh of the chicken. Insert the remaining sprigs and the reserved liver in the cavity. Break the head of garlic into cloves keeping the skin on.
Wipe the potatoes dry. Set the chicken breasts up in the middle of the baking sheet, positioning evenly the two types of potatoes and garlic cloves around. Sprinkle with the tablespoon of olive oil and the salt and pepper.
Place the baking sheet and its content in the oven. Cook for 40 minutes, remove from the oven and turn over the chicken. Cook for another 20 minutes. Remove from the oven and wait for 5 minutes before carving.

Serves 5 persons for dinner or 1 for a week

Chicken stock (Easy, Preparation time: 5 minutes, Cooking time: 1 hour largely unattended)

Ingredients:
Chicken bones
1 carrot peeled and cut in large pieces
1 celery piece
1 entire onion peel included, cut in 2
1 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of black pepper grains whole
1 bouquet garni

Material
Slow cooker or 6-quart pot
1 colander
1 plastic box with cover

Put in the pot what remains of the chicken after you carved it. Add all the other ingredients. Cover with water. Cook on the low setting of a gas stove for an hour, or in a slow cooking set on low for 4 hours.
Strain the stock through the colander into a plastic box and discard all the solids. Wait until it is cold or refresh the stock, as you would a Champaign bottle, by placing the plastic box on ice in a bigger salad bowl, before refrigerating. The grease will rise to the surface, allowing you to remove it easily from the stock, after a few hours spent in the refrigerator. The stock will keep safely for 3 days in the refrigerator, or can be frozen for up to 3 months.
Note: you can buy a bouquet garni in a jar or you can make your own, by laying down the green leave of a leek and covering it with a sprig of time, a laurel leave and any other herbs such as oregano and rosemary. Fold the leek leave in half and tie everything with kitchen string. Et voilà, garnished bouquet for kitchen use.

Quick chicken soup (Easy, Prep time: 10 minutes, Cooking time: 10 minutes, Cheap)

Ingredients:
Leftover chicken meat
2cups (454 ml) chicken stock
1 carrot
1 celery branch
1 garlic clove, peeled and sliced
½ cup whole-wheat pasta (113 gm) of your choice
Salt and pepper to taste

Material:
Paring knife and board
Peeler
4-quart pot

Peel and cube the carrot. Wash and slice the celery. Slice the chicken meat.
Put the meat, chicken stock, carrot, celery and garlic in the pot. Bring to a boil over the medium setting of a gas stove burner. Pour the pasta in and cook for an additional 11 minutes (or the prescribed cooking time on the package)
Serves two comfortably for lunch.

Truffle chicken salad (Easy, Preparation time: 5 minutes, Moderate)

Ingredients:
Leftover chicken meat
1 jar of black truffle pieces
1 lettuce
Chives
1 ¼ cup (54 ml) mustard dressing (see Bistro carrot from December sixth blog)

Material:
Food processor with the blade attachment on
Salad bowl

Wash and dry the lettuce. Display in the salad bowl. Drizzle with the sauce.
Place the chicken with the truffle juice from the truffle jar in the bowl of the food processor. Pulse lightly until the chicken is broken in small pieces. Remove the chicken “paste” and place in the middle of the salad bowl. With a wooden spoon, mix in the paste the broken pieces of truffle.
Serve as a light lunch with toasted bread and potato chips


Chinese chicken stir-fry (Easy, Preparation time: 15 minutes, Cooking time: 15 minutes, Cheap)

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons sesame oil
3 slices of Pancetta or Prosciutto in small pieces
1 2-inch (6 cm) piece ginger root peeled and grated
3 garlic cloves peeled and minced
1 lemon grass bulb, tough leaves removed, heart sliced fine
1 hot pepper seeded and sliced
1 onion peeled and diced
1 carrot peeled, cut longitudinally in thin strips
2 celery branches peeled and sliced
2 bok choi washed and sliced or 1 lbs spinach leaves washed
1 cup of broccoli florets cut small
½ lbs (170 gm) rice noodles cooked and cooled
Leftover chicken meat sliced finely
1/3cup (76 ml) soy sauce

Material:
Board and paring knife
Wok or large frying pan

Place the wok over the stove on the medium setting of the gas stove. Pour 2 tablespoons sesame oil. Stir-fry the ginger, garlic, lemon grass and hot pepper for 2 minutes. Add the pancetta. Add the onion, carrot and celery pieces and cook for 10 minutes or until soft. Add the bok choi and broccoli florets and cook for an additional three minutes. Add the chicken meat, the noodles and soy sauce. Mix well and serve hot.