Cheese at the Farmer's Market

Finally we have cheese at the Farmer's Market in Shreveport. I am so excited.

The cheese makers come from south of Dallas, which seems like a very far piece to come, so I hope they had an excellent day and will be back. They sell artisan cheeses made from milk from their own cows, so this is the real thing.

I got some nice feta, which I am using for supper tonight mixed with tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers, also from the marker. I added just a hint of ground Jalapeno Pepper, a market find and some oil, also market available. It will be a wonderful addition to the cucumber salad I made with the other half of the one I cut up with the feta. Had to use Greek Yogurt from Kroger, as there is no yogurt at the market yet. As the main dish, a spinach pie (just warm it up in the oven). How do I survive without the market?

Have some cheddar, which will go well with cauliflower to make a cheese soup, and, for school lunch next week, pepper jack. The market just makes Saturday as far as I am concerned.

Thanks to Noma for seeking and finding some interesting vendors.

Respectable Doings with Figs

Here is the best one yet:

Fig, rosemary and goat cheese spread on Market bread.

Slice the tomato-basil bread from the market thinly and toast. Mix mashed figs with chopped rosemary and goat cheese. Spread on the toast and broil for a few.

Lovely.

The fig chutney turned out great by the way! Very nice with chopped fresh ginger. I have a small container in the fridge and several small freezer baggies for a time when figs are not taking over.

Fig bread, on the other hand, not so good. Pudding again...

Going Figgy

I have given away almost as many figs as my friends can stand, and still count them among my friends, so I'm thinkin' of ways to save figs for the future...

Ideas:
Dry them. My state of the art oven has a drying feature and they will be ready in a day or two. Oven isn't really state of the art, but I'm trying to keep the oven on my good side.

Fig bread. But not too much, and follow the recipe closely. Sometimes I play just a bit too much and it turns out more like pudding. Maybe some muffins, too.

Fig Chutney. This sounds really good to me. I'm not much of a canner, but I'm a-thinking I can get some of those little freezer bags and freeze up a few batches.

We will see what happens.

Figs for the Future. Has a certain ring.

Squash Soup

I read lots of soup recipes and have a couple of twists to make your soup life easier.

Firstly, use what ever sort of squash you can find at the market. I don't even know the names of all of the squash I used this time. There is a turban squash, something that looks like an acorn squash, but with a white flesh, zucchini, and some sort of yellow squash that looks like butternut, but with a different shape.

Secondly, cut the big seeded squash in half, take out the seeds and rub the inside with olive oil. Put these cut side down in a roasting pan. Add the quartered onions, garlic cloves, carrots, zucchini, celery ribs including the leaves and drizzle a bit of olive oil over the whole. Roast in a hot oven until the big squash is tender and the rest of the veggies are getting a nice brown color around the edges.

I used a frozen container of chicken stock with all of the fat skimmed off. You don't have to do this in advance. The fat will be frozen on top and you can just scrape it off. Easy.

Dump all of the roasted veggies except the big squash on top of the frozen lump of stock. Before you dump in the big squash, cut off the stem ends, but you don't have to peel the squash. This is a real time and energy saver.

With a slotted spoon take out all of the veggies (putting them on the frozen stock cooled the veggies quickly and melted the stock at the same time!) and put them in the blender. Blend until very smooth. Stringy squash will not be stringy; skins will not be a problem but will add some color and fiber.

It will be so smooth that added cream will not be necessary. Salt and pepper are really the only things necessary to spice it up, but if you have some other things you make want to play. Some recipes call for cinnamon and brown sugar. I think a bit of hot sauce would be nice, but then I do live in Louisiana and we do hot sauce with ice cream. It depends on what you like.

Many recipes call for a spoonful of sour cream on top, but what about plain yogurt instead?