Delicious Fresh Side Dishes

I once heard a friend's husband grumble, "I'm a meat and potatoes man!" when he was served a salad with his meal. I know, potatoes are vegetables, and the beef is grass-fed. Still, the vegetables aren't just to convey vitamins. They can be the balance to the meat and potatoes, in taste and texture as well as colour.

I'm not a fan of kitchen-sink salads, where everything is tossed in -- raw, cooked or pickled. It was a fad in American restaurants for a while, I think. One was presented with a huge wooden bowl overfilled with lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, green onion, sliced radishes, pickled beets, boiled egg, three kinds of diced meat and two kinds of grated cheese. This was accompanied by a half cup or more of sweetish cream dressing. There might be olives or peperoncini or nuts in it, too. It was enough food for four people. It was the salad bar brought to you. I see salad bars are in decline. There is a lot of waste in a buffet of any kind, and spoilage. One dish of salmonella salad dressing, and the owner might as well close the doors.

I don't make big salads because my husband is not one to eat raw greens much. A salad big enough for the two of us fits in a small serving bowl. We are almost at the end of our lettuce season in the garden, and I pull what I need for that meal, drop it into a colander in a bowl of cold water, let is sit for a few minutes, take it out, give it a quick additional rinse, then dry it in a clean cotton tea towel. (I do this by laying out the leaves and rolling up the towel.) In addition, I add some of the softer herbs like basil and parsley fresh from the herb garden.

We don't have any tomatoes ripe yet, so for added flavour and texture contrast, I have been using radishes. We have lots of radishes. Radishes do not keep well, getting soft and unappealing in about 48 hours, so I take just what I want for the day. We sometimes eat the small ones whole.

A good light dressing is nothing more than olive oil with a little flavoured vinegar added, shaken together. I make rosemary vinegar by adding about two tablespoons of dried rosemary to a quart of cider vinegar, and letting it marinate for a couple of weeks. Strain, and keep in a jar in the cupboard for, oh, maybe a long time. It doesn't go bad.

I don't recommend making flavoured oils, even garlic. The herbs or ingredients sometimes cause the oil to go rancid faster. The oils, once an ingredient is introduced, need to be refrigerated.

Our peas were late this year and we haven't had many, but they have been really good. If I don't find enough for a meal, I pick some of the small green beans, or snap larger beans into smaller pieces and cook them with the peas. Rather than boiling them hard, I get a few big parsley leaves, wash those (lettuce will work, too), put the leaves in the bottom of the pot, add between 2 tablespoons and 1/4 cup of water, depending on how much vegetable I am cooking, start the beans simmering, and after a minute or two, add the shelled peas. As the peas are small and fresh, I bring this just up to a boil, take off the heat, and drain. It takes the raw edge off the peas but keeps all the bright green flavour.

Carrots, whether the wee new ones from thinning the patch, or larger ones pared and sliced, are delicious with a pat of butter, about a tablespoon or so of fresh grated gingerroot, and a teaspoon of honey. After cooking the carrots, put them back in the pan and add the butter, ginger and honey. They will melt together as you toss the carrots. Some people want to add parsley here, but I think it ruins the balance of honey and ginger.

For seasoning at the stove, if I am using salt at all, I use coarse sea salt on hot vegetables. It isn't as penetrative as iodized fine salt, coating the vegetables rather than inundating them with salt taste. Most of us get plenty of iodized salt every day in prepared foods to meet our requirement for iodine.

Pork Roast with Stuffed Apples

I have no potatoes. My potato plants haven't even blossomed yet. I do have apples, though.

I had a small pork roast defrosted. Apples are always good with pork. The pectin helps break down the fat. Pork in this area tends to be fatty rather than lean. People prefer it that way as it is more tender. Most people here in the northern reaches of the St. John River eat as their ancestors did. The only problem with holding to the traditional diet is that our ancestors worked twelve to fourteen hour days outdoors, with just Sundays and holidays for rest. Now most people work indoors and aren't burning 3,000 calories a day.

I put the roast in a small roasting pan, gave it a light sprinkle of rosemary and fresh ground pepper, and added about a half cup of water to the pan. That went in the oven at 350F.

I cored the apples - I do this with a knife rather than an apple corer, but it is slow and imprecise. I recommend the corer. The stuffing was fresh bread crumbs, torn into pieces about the size of the end of my finger; some green onions from the garden, using both the little white bulb and the top, sliced; some fresh sage and parsley; and a drizzling of bacon fat and stock. I have a small herb garden near the front door so I can just nip out with a pair of scissors and get what I want, give it a quick rinse in the sink, then after shaking off the extra water, snip it into the recipe with the same scissors. The bread stuffing goes into the apples, which are set into the roasting pan. One per serving is enough, but I doubled it since I knew I would have leftover pork. Two went into a separate pan. I could have transferred it all to a bigger roaster, but one pork roaster is enough to wash. I added a bit more water to each pan.

I had started the pork roast with the roaster lid on, then took it off for the last fifteen minutes or so. the roast was small, about two pounds, so the total cooking time was under an hour and a half.

I made gravy with some chicken stock I had in the refrigerator, added to the pan drippings. We had homemade noodles, garden beans, and a salad.

My old meat thermometer had done a lot of work over the past decade, and the last move must have loosened the spring, as it no longer registers. I could covet a digital probe thermometer. My friend, Paula, who lives in the Ottawa Valley of Ontario and raises pork with her husband, tells me that we no longer have to worry about cooking pork to a high internal temperature, as trichinosis is no longer common in pigs. Back when pigs wandered about and got into things it was a problem. I suppose if I let pigs run feral I would be more concerned about it, but commercially prepared and farm raised pork is quite safe. No need to fear infecting the family if the pork is a tad pink inside. Safe handling techniques and a reasonable rinse before cooking are still necessary to eliminate clinging bacteria.

We've been conditioned to believe that a small roast isn't worth the effort. I disagree. Cook a small roast covered, with a bit of added moisture, and for a much reduced time. The slow cooker isn't the only option. We use a wood fired heating and cookstove (Bakers Choice by Suppertime Stoves of Ontario) throughout most of the year, and oven roasting utilizes the "free" energy. A small roast can be done in a dutch oven (a covered cast iron kettle) on top of a wood burning stove that doesn't have an oven, set toward the side so it doesn't get too hot. I once used a dutch oven to cook a moose roast on an open fire. I added half a bottle of beer so it was half-stewed, of course, but with potatoes cooked in the broth and a garden tomato sliced and served alongside, salt and pepper for its seasoning, it was one of the best camping meals I ever had.