Winter's Bounty: Fresh advice for locavores on surviving winter

Congratulations!

Your New Year’s resolution was to eat more local foods so that you could support area farmers, get better-quality produce and help protect the environment. And now that you’ve gotten the requisite excuses out of the way (I had to empty the fridge, I had to finish Mom’s famous holiday fudge, Mars is in retrograde, etc., etc.), you’re ready to begin.

But now you realize it’s the dead of winter, the city’s farmers markets are closed and roadside stands have been abandoned until spring. What are you going to eat now that you’ve cleaned out the pantry?

“Salad greens ... broccoli, cauliflower, kale, collards,” says New Hanover County Agriculture Extension agent Ken Wells as he starts to tick off a long list of wintertime vegetables available in the Cape Fear area. He adds cabbage and sweet potatoes, along with nuts, goat cheese and pork.

“There’s a fair amount of potatoes that are grown up in the little Washington” area, Wells notes, and some growers even do greenhouse strawberries and tomatoes.

Tidal Creek Cooperative Market produce manager Trace Ramsey adds to Wells’ list: carrots, turnips, beets, rutabagas, fresh dill and oregano, radishes, rice, eggs, honey, seafood, various cheeses, all kinds of meats, even biscuit flour.

As Tidal Creek’s produce manager, Ramsey scans area farms and food producers for organic products to stock the coop, but last summer he also made a commitment to eat locally, choosing foods from within a 100-mile radius of Wilmington.

“I think the false perception about eating locally is that it can be really hard to get into it,” Ramsey says.

Finding local foods in winter is as easy as visiting a coop like Tidal Creek, on Oleander Drive; a health foods market such as Lovey’s, in Landfall Shopping Center on Military Cutoff; or a locally operated food market such as Eagle Island Fruit and Seafood on U.S. 421.

Various farms and meat markets also dot the agricultural landscape here, and many of them are represented at the Southeastern Farmers Market in Lumberton, about a 90-minute drive from Wilmington. There you can stock up on assorted greens and sweet potatoes, pecans, speciality meats and apples from the N.C. mountains, says market manager Michael Smith, who notes some of the growers at the market also sell to area supermarkets.

Even with the bounty, some diners may find it difficult to get excited about regular meals of stewed greens and boiled roots. Ramsey hasn’t had that problem because he looks for locally produced favorites such as eggs and bacon, and he uses common winter vegetables in various ways.

Ramsey substitutes root vegetables in soups and stews that call for potatoes only, and he uses all kinds of winter vegetables in salads. When he’s on a sweet-potato roll, Ramsey puts them in soup one night, makes fries the next, adds them to stir-fry for another dinner, and turns them into one of his favorite side dishes – sweet potatoes mashed with chopped pecans and a bit of honey.

“Collards are so sweet and tender right now you don’t have to do anything to them,” Ramsey says, explaining that he lightly steams the greens or adds chopped, raw collards to salads.

Ramsey took a leap into local eating, and he tracks his experience at his blog, cricketbread.com, but he advises newcomers to the idea, those who didn’t have a chance to spend last summer canning and freezing local fruits and vegetables as he did , to take it slow, adding local foods to regular meals and working from there.

“It’s so easy to do a dinner a week that’s all local.”

Bruschetta with Braised Greens
8 tablespoons olive oil

8 garlic cloves

1 pound mixed greens such as collards, kale, spinach and turnip greens

3 1/2 cups chicken or vegetable stock

1/2 cup dry red wine (optional)

1/4 teaspoon hot red pepper flakes

1 loaf French or Italian bread cut into 12 1/4-inch-thick slices

3 tablespoons grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese

Heat half the oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Finely chop 2 garlic cloves and saute until they begin to color. Add the chopped greens and saute until they begin to soften, 2 to 3 minutes. You may have to add the greens in two batches if your skillet is not large enough, but the leaves will quickly decrease in volume.

Add the stock to the pan and bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 20 minutes, or until most of the liquid is absorbed. If you’re using the wine, add it during the last 5 minutes of the cooking time and keep stirring until most of the liquid is absorbed or evaporated. Add the red pepper flakes and salt to taste.

While greens are cooking, cut the remaining 6 garlic cloves in half and set aside. Toast the bread on both sides, then brush with the remaining olive oil. While bread is still hot, rub with each slice with the cut side of the halved garlic cloves.

When the greens are cooked, transfer them to a sieve and let them drain for a minute or two. Place about 3 tablespoons of the drained greens on each slice of bread. Top bruschetta with cheese and serve immediately or broil a minute or two to melt the cheese before serving.

Serves 6 as an appetizer or accompaniment to soup.

– Recipes from America’s Small Farms by Joanne Lamb hayes and Lori Stein with Maura Webber (Villard Books, 2003).

Creamy Turnip Soup
1 tablespoon unsalted butter

1 cup coarsely chopped onions or leeks

4 cups chopped, peeled turnips

2 cups chicken or vegetable stock

2 tablespoons minced fresh parsley

1 tablespoon sugar

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1 bay leaf

1/8 teaspoon freshly milled black pepper

1 cup milk

1/8 to 1 teaspoon salt

Melt the butter in a Dutch oven over low heat. Add the onoins and cook, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 8 minutes. Stir the turnips into the onions, then add the stock, parsley, sugar, lemon juice, bay leaf and pepper. Cover and simmer for 45 minutes or until the turnips are very tender.

Remove the bay leaf and puree the turnip mixture in a blender or food processor. Return the puree to the pan; add the milk and salt to taste (if you use salted stock, you will need less salt). Heat the soup just to a boil; divide into 6 warm bowls and serve.

Makes 6 servings.

– Recipes from America’s Small Farms by Joanne Lamb hayes and Lori Stein with Maura Webber (Villard Books, 2003).

Sweet Potato, Caramelized Onion and Butternut Squash Lasagne
1 pound lasagne noodles

Olive oil for coating the pasta, brushing the potatoes and greasing the dish

2 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and sliced into 1/4-inch-thick rounds (1 1/2 pounds)

2 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons olive oil

3 medium sweet onions, sliced into 1/4-inch-thick rings

1 teaspoon sugar

1 large egg, lightly beaten

2 teaspoons dried basil

1 teaspoon dried oregano

2 garlic cloves minced

1 teaspoon salt

3 cups ricotta or goat cheese

1/2 cup of a blend of parmesan and romano cheeses

1/2 pound butternut squash, cooked and mashed

1 pound mozzarella cheese, thinly sliced

Freshly ground black pepper

Cook the pasta until al dente, drain and toss with a little olive oil to keep the noodles from sticking together.

Preheat the oven to 475 degrees.

Spread the sweet potatoes in one layer on a baking sheet. Drizzle a little olive oil over the potatoes and turn to coat both sides. Bake for 15 minutes, until cooked and lightly golden. Remove and set aside. Reduce the oven heat to 375 degrees.

Melt the butter along with the 2 tablespoons olive oil in a large skillet. Stir in the onions and sugar and saute over medium heat for 20 minutes, until soft and beginning to turn golden. Set aside.

Place the egg, basil, oregano, garlic and salt in a large bowl and whisk together. Add the ricotta or goat cheese and the grated cheeses, and whisk until smooth. Add the squash and mix to blend well. Set aside.

To assemble the lasagne, lightly oil a 13-by-9-inch, deep baking pan. Line the bottom of the pan with a layer of noodles. Spread some of the cheese mixture over the noodles. Add a layer of sweet potatoes, then a layer of the onions. Top with a layer of mozzarella and sprinkle with black pepper to taste. Continue until all the ingredients are used and the top is a layer of onions lightly covered with mozzarella.

Bake for 1 1/2 hours or until bubbly and golden across the top. Remove and cool for 5 minutes. Cut into squares and serve.

Serves 8.

Smith and Hawken The Gardeners’ Community Cookbook by Victoria Wise (Workman, 1999).

How do “locavores” do it?
Find out more about their experiences and places to get local foods at these Web sites.

www.cricketbread.com: Tidal Creek Cooperative Market produce manager Trace Ramsey shares information about his efforts to eat foods produced within a 100-mile radius of Wilmington.

www.wilmingtonlocalliving.com: Wilmingtonians Jessica Probst and her husband, Sal Marsico, share information about local farms, their gardening experiences and what they’re eating as they strive to eat locally as much as possible.

www.localharvest.org: Type in your ZIP code to find local foods and farmers in your area.

www.agr.state.nc.us/markets/gginc/: From seafood to emu to where to spend a day on a farm, visit the N.C. Department of Agriculture’s Goodness Grows in North Carolina Web site. Click on the Goodness Grows General Store link to find all kinds of food products made in the state.