Here comes another post about food. (Yep, it’s mostly what I think about—the growing, preparing and eating of it—so bear with me.) Deep into summer, the meals are so fantastic: not only delicious but informed by a certain effortless spontaneity that I love.
We went to the market and I bought some parsley, just because I like having it around. Then we picked up a lovely eggplant, for more or less the same reason. When we bought our usual loaf of bread from Bessette Family Farm, I decided to get some fettuccine, too, homemade by one of the teenage daughters in said family. I’ve been wanting to try it all season and this was the week.
You can see the Italian goodness coming a mile away, no? We discussed frying or baking the eggplant, and we thought about using one of the frozen pesto portions we made last year. But I’m a little sick of pesto, and much preferred to make a quick tomato sauce with one of our last few quarts of 2009 tomatoes. I also used CSA onions and garlic from our garden. As for herbs, I kept thinking “You know what else we have? I’ll throw it in”: the parsley from the market, CSA basil, and oregano from the garden. Salads came together in exactly the same fashion.
As for the eggplant, my husband had the brilliant idea to roast it in chunks, then add it to the sauce at the very end. It brought an incredible sweetness to the meal, and the pasta was tender and tasty. We shredded an aged goat cheese from Caromont over our plates. Sheer heaven. I won’t even mention the peach and blackberry cobbler.
What’s your latest culinary triumph?