Fresh Sage - A Delicious Twist

OK.  There is a good reason I named this blog 'The Healthy NUT.'  I am just a little crazy and this post may prove it.   I have had almost no desire to cook much lately, relying on easy summery recipes that require a minimum of time in the kitchen.  We eat lots of salads and fresh veggies, chicken and fish.

Recently a friend e-mailed me asking for some recipe ideas for a bumper crop of sage.   I suddenly had a burning desire to make something I could garnish with fried sage. Usually I make  vegetarian cassoulet or bean soup in the fall and  both recipes are enhanced by the frizzled sage on top.    But who wants to make a meal like that in August.

Today while in the market, I spotted a butternut squash  -already peeled and cubed.  A recipe was forming in my (crazy) brain.  I added a package of crumbled gorgonzola to the basket and I knew what we were having for dinner.
Perhaps it was the 13 inches of rain that fell on us in 24 hours that gave me a yen for comfort food, but this is what I cooked up tonight.

Quinoa Risotto With Butternut Squash and Fried Sage Leaves and Gorgonzola

Olive Oil

4 cloves ofGarlic

1 Onion

A handful of fresh sage

1 cup tricolor quinoa

2&1/2 cups of water or broth

salt

pepper

2 cups of cubed winter squash 

1 cup of gorgonzola cheese, crumbled

Coat the squash with olive oil and bake in 400 oven for about 30 minutes.

Heat a generous amount of olive oil  and fry the sage leaves quickly.  Remove from the heat when they are crispy and drain on a paper towel. 

In the same pan, heat more oil (a tablespoon) cook the onion for 3-4 minutes add garlic and  quinoa.  cook for 3-4 minutes until quinoa starts to jump around in the pan. Slowly add water or broth, 1/4 cup at a time and stir as you would risotto.  Keep stirring and adding the water. This will take about 25-30 minutes for the quinoa to cook.  

Add salt and pepper to taste.  Turn off the heat and fold in the gorgonzola and the roasted squash.  Garnish with the sage. 

I served this with a straight- from- the- garden -yellow- tomato- and -basil - salad and a simple dressing. Drizzle with olive oil and a splash of balsamic vinegar.  Salt and pepper to taste.

Anyone who has read my recipes before knows that I like a recipe that can be changed up with whatever is on hand.  I can envision this working with asparagus and goat cheese or sun-dried tomatoes and parmesan cheese.  

Today's Take-away 

               Sage - It's not just for Thanksgiving anymore!

Busy, Busy, Busy!

My life is so full these days, I barely have time to write about it.   A few family obligations have stepped in the way of my writing time to some extent and this blog has been neglected while I kept a few other balls in the air, so to speak.

The truth is, I have been doing some writing, but it has been mostly poetry.  Much of it is on my poetry blog here : wabi sabi poems and images and lately, on Facebook too.  I was delighted to have several of my short poems published over the past few months including these two haiga.

These appear in the current issue of Prune Juice, a journal of senryu and kyoka .

My garden is blooming  and I am so blessed to have a wonderful peaceful backyard where I can work up a sweat pulling weeds and meditating on the beauty all around me.  I am one of those people who communes with the trees and the birds and even the bees.  In the garden, I feel close to the Creator.  

 I have a wrap-around view from my sunroom of the entire garden so even when the mosquitoes are biting, I can enjoy it.

 In the sunny area we've planted an array of flower magnets with lots of nectar and seeds to  attract the hummingbirds, gold finches, butterflies and bees too.

Above you can see the blue salvia - sure to bring in the hummingbirds ....

as will the monarda.........

also called bee balm!

Day lilies add so much joy and color to one area and each variety feels like an old friend.

This hydrangea loves its shady spot and, with the ferns and astilbe, it brightens up the mostly green fern garden.

I have begun harvesting herbs.  Today the kitchen smelled of lemon verbena.  I dry this wonderful herb to flavor my teas.  

Chamomile has seeded itself willy-nilly throughout the garden - I welcome these cuties especially since they make a wonderful sleep tea AND I add them to my hand cream and ointment recipe.  Chamomile is a lovely healing herb found in many natural skin care products on the market.  

The herb garden, moved to its new sunny location, is thriving.  The  African Basil plant pictured above (purple flowers) wintered over very successfully in my sunroom and took off as soon as I planted it outdoors in the spring.  

The summer weather has been good to us so far - not too much humidity.  The plants look so healthy this year- not as stressed as usual.   The humans are loving it too!  

My plans for the rest of July include:

* Keeping up with the weeds and the herb harvest.

* Early morning walks with the Admiral, who is recovering from surgery.

* Making photos and poems as a way of writing the joy I feel in the natural world around me. 

* Reading list : Moloka'i by Alan Brennert and Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver.

*  Daily meditation (and prayer) a way to spend  time with God and offer thanksgiving for all of the wonders of summer.

Take Away - It's summer!  Don't forget to stop to smell the lemon verbena!

Digging a New Garden

The trees on the south side of our yard grew while we weren't looking. 

 Suddenly, it seemed, our beloved herb garden, was bathed in shade for most of the summer last year. 

 So, we decided to move it to a sunnier spot - which just happened to be in the middle of the lawn.  Good-bye grass..... hello, raised herb garden!

The Bearded One, my personal hero and the strongest man I ever met, was in heaven, digging and measuring and hauling compost from one side of the yard to the other.  No really!  He LOVES to do that stuff!  

My job was to design the layout and transplant all the herbs and plant the annual herbs - either grown from seed or purchased.  

What a team!

 Chives- a favorite spring herb since it arrives early enough to be on the table for Easter, also provides a bit of color in May and June, and the flowers can be chopped and added to the recipe or used to flavor a salad.

These tiny basil plants will become my pesto in August and September, when I prepare and freeze as much as I can for use all winter.  I keep snipping the basil all summer, topping it every time I see it trying to bloom.  This helps the plants to produce more leaves and provides the perfect accompaniment to fresh tomato salads.

This is one of my views from that lovely sunroom pictured above.  I am truly blessed to have this garden to look at whenever I want. The sunroom  is my treehouse in summer and my greenhouse in winter.  

Thyme is blooming it's little head off right now and that's OK.  It will bring in the bees and the scent is strong enough to waft into the house when it is humid.

This Carefree rose bush was also languishing in a shady spot so I decided to make this the focal point in the center of the herb garden.  I'm hoping it will take off once it feels the sun's warmth again.

I'm trying some new herbs this year.  I found a seed packet for Jamaican Hibiscus - the tropical hibiscus that flavors 'Red Zinger' Tea.  I have been buying this delicious herb from Mountain Rose for many years.  This year I'm going to try growing it in the garden and then moving it into the house in the fall.

My list of herbs for this garden includes thyme, Greek oregano, lemon verbena, basil, rose, calendula, lovage, fennel, dill, pineapple sage, chamomile, hyssop, sorrel, rue, artemisia, African blue basil, cinnamon basil, lemongrass and lavender.

In another, shadier area I have lemon balm and spearmint and peppermint. They are in containers to keep them within bounds.

Thought for Today - most herbs are easy to grow....... as easy as growing weeds!

These Are a Few of My Favorite Winter Herbs and Spices

In winter, I keep both the teapot and the soup pot filled.  Warm liquids are, in my opinion, the key to staying healthy in the winter.  

After growing, harvesting, drying and blending my herbs, I find plenty of uses for them when the weather is cold.  

My favorite beverage is tea.  I enjoy my black tea in the morning because it has just the right amount of caffeine to get me going, but the rest of the day, I drink herbal teas.  Some of my favorite herbs for tea are listed below and I blend them, depending on how we are feeling that day.  

ginger 1,2,4,5

garlic 2,5

elderberry 2

lemon balm 1,2,3,4

cinnamon 1, 5, 6

turmeric, 1,4,5

rose hips 2, 6 

chamomile  1, 2, 3, 4

fennel 1,5,6

mint 1, 2, 5, 6

hot chili pepper (cayenne) 1,2,4, 5

hibiscus flowers 2,3,6

lemon verbena 1,2,3,4,5,6

1) warming, stomach soothing
2) cold and flu
3) sedating
4) aches and pains
5) cooking
6) flavoring for tea

Making Herbal Tea :  To make a  ginger, mint, hibiscus, rosehips, elderberry tea for signs and symptoms of a cold - use 1-2 teaspoons of each herb for a pot of tea.  Add fresh ginger to the cold water and boil. Then pour over the herbs.  Brew for about 10 minutes and strain.  Serve with sweetener of your choice. (I use stevia.)

Other favorite combinations:
Ginger, mint, fennel, chamomile - to settle the stomach.
Chamomile, lemon balm, lemon verbena - for sleep.
Lemon balm, ginger, hot pepper - to warm up after being out in the cold.

My favorite herbal recipe for a sore throat involves pouring boiling water over  a generous amount of thyme, sage and oregano leaves and steeping for 10 minutes.  This can be used in two ways.  If you have a sinus headache, cover the pot and your head with a towel and inhale the fumes, being careful not to burn yourself.  If your throat hurts, cool the 'tea' and gargle with it.  It works!

****

Introducing African Blue Basil

  A few summers ago, I bought variety of basil called African Blue Basil.  It was billed as an annual that promised to be more ornamental than culinary.  It smelled wonderful and, although the leaves were similar to basil leaves, they were bluish and much smaller than my Genovese basil.

  This plant grew happily all summer and every so often I cut pieces of it to add to bouquets or to scent a room in the house.  It was a wonderful plant, flowering repeatedly and seemingly impervious to  drought, disease, bugs and neglect. It grew to be about 3 feet tall and perhaps 2 feet wide and it added color to my herb garden.

  This year I bought another African Blue Basil and guess what?  I discovered there is even more to love about it.  I brought in a few sprigs at the end of September, thinking the plant would die soon.  I put them in water to enjoy for a week or so.  I noticed that the bouquet was not wilting, so I kept adding water.  Lo and behold, the cuttings rooted!

 I planted them in a pot and put them in a sunny window on the porch and I'm hoping the plant will winter over.  It will be  so nice to crush a fresh leaf and enjoy the scents of summer when the snow is flying outside!

  This plant performs beautifully in the garden and I plan to use it in my sunny garden to attract bees and butterflies and for some lovely bluish purple flowers all summer long!

  I will still reach for the old fashioned Genovese basil when I'm ready to make pesto, though.  The flavor can't be beat.  And if I want a cup of basil flavored tea, my first choice is an Indian basil called  Holy Basil or tulsi.  It is wonderfully clove- scented,  and is a healing herb widely used in India. I find it a soothing addition to my herbal tea pot when I feel a cold coming.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

late autumn-

I vie with the plants

for a square of sunlight

~~~~~~~~ 

   

Taking a Ride 'Out East'

 Riding out to the east end of Long Island in autumn is a treasured event for us and we try to go out several times if possible.  The landscape, although changing, is an idyllic throwback to how the rest of the Island was 50 years ago.  

One of our favorite places to stop  and linger, is the Peconic River Herb Farm in Calverton, pictured in several photos here. 

 In addition to having a wonderful selection of plants   and garden accessories, the Peconic River Herb Farm has evolved into one of the prettiest places I can imagine.  

Over the years, the owners have lovingly landscaped the gardens and they now rival  many of the country gardens on 'Gold Coast' estates.

I used to dream of owning an herb garden business in my younger days.  Alas that was not to be.

 Instead, I visit this lovely place, wander around for an hour or two, buying lots of plants and goodies for my tiny garden, and pretend that I have a 12 acre farm.

  It doesn't matter what direction one looks in, the view is terrific.......

.....as is the selection of perennials, herbs, annuals, shrubs and there is even an entire barn filled with all manner of delightfully kitschy accents for the garden.

Another wonderful place to visit is the lovely Lavender Farm called Lavender By The Bay located in East Marion. It has to be the most wonderfully scented place in the world!

There are lavender plants in every variety available for sale as well as lavender scented gifts and bouquets galore.

The lavender fields , shown below, in late afternoon, provide all the lavender one could possibly want.  I grow my own lavender, but that doesn't stop me from finding something pretty to take home.

Fifty years ago, the main crop on the North Fork of Long Island was potatoes.  Since 1973, when the Hargraves began growing wine grapes and producing wine, the North Fork has become a wine-making region. Wineries dot the area and wine tasting tours are very popular. We usually stop to buy a bottle or two.

And to take a few photos, of course!

I could almost believe I was in Italy!

  If you find yourself on Long Island, be sure to plan a day on the North Fork.  It is lovely! And follow the links above to find the hours of operation and get directions.

Lazy Days of August

  I love August! 

  My days are lazy and my 'to-do' list is a joy to behold!

 1) It begins and ends with wandering around in the garden chasing butterflies, bees and hummingbirds, with camera in hand, of course.  

  2)Pinching the flower tips off the basil is another important 'job' for this month.  It promotes more leaf growth which, in turn, makes more pesto!  Making pesto is a late summer ritual for me.  I make enough to freeze it in ice cube trays for use all winter. (I add those pinched flowers to my salad.....ummm good)

3) Next on the list is watching the veggies and herbs grow so I can 

4) Harvest herbs and veggies, a few at a time.  Hot peppers, mint for winter tea, fennel seeds, rosemary and sage and of course, oregano are some of my favorites.  This job also requires spending a leisurely morning, wandering around outdoors in the garden. 

   5) Every day or so, I venture out, scissors in hand, to pick a few flowers.  Bouquet-making is a relaxing job, collecting scents and bursts of color to brighten up a corner of the house.

   6) There is no better time than August to catch up on one's reading!  My selections for the next few weeks include 'Defending Jacob' by William Landay,  'The Round House' by Louise Erdrich, 'The Principles of Uncertainty' by Maira Kalman and 'Turn My Mourning into Dancing' by Henri Nouwen.

   7) Oh, and did I mention chasing butterflies?

Still in the Garden

    September days, so mild and  breezy and  bathed in the sweet light of the equinox, call me to stay in the garden. The herbs are still growing, begging to be brought inside and preserved, one way or another.  I am still picking and drying my favorites for cooking and brewing teas during the darker days ahead.

    My favorite tea for winter is named "Cold and Flu Tea," and everyone who tastes it,  loves it. It is my go-to brew at the first sign of a cold.  Truth be told, almost any tea will make you feel better if you are getting a cold!  That said,  herbal teas have a long, revered history of improving health and allaying symptoms.  The herbs work in different ways to make you feel better.  It seems to me that if I drink this tea, I feel better sooner!  And there is evidence that elderberry is an immune-system booster, enabling your body to fight off the nasty little viruses that cause colds.

   I use several herbs that I grow and a few that I am unable to grow but can purchase from an on-line purveyor of organic, fair-trade herbs and spices.

  My recipe is made with 1 part of each herb unless otherwise noted.  I blend together a large quantity of the dried  blended herbs so it is ready when I need to brew a cup of TLC. (the ginger root is not added until I am ready to make the pot of tea)

   Cold and Flu Tea

                      

                                                                                                                                                                                                     

                        Lemongrass                                            Lemon Verbena

                        Lemon Balm                                           Hyssop Leaves

                        Nettles                                                   Red Raspberry leaves

                        Peppermint                                             Hibiscus

                        Nettles                                                   Ginger Root

                         Elderberry flowers                                 Rose Hips

  Here's how I brew it:  Take a one inch piece of ginger and slice it.  In a quart  size pot, bring one quart of water and the ginger to a boil, lower and  simmer for 5-10 minutes.  Turn off the heat and add 4 tablespoons of the herb mixture to the water and steep for 10 to 15 minutes.  Add honey or stevia and sip until you feel better.

Herbs DO have medicinal properties  and while all of these herbs are generally considered safe, it is always good to check with your doctor if you are on medications or are pregnant, before ingesting herbs.


  Take away for today:  Tea is good for what ails you!

Bottled Summer

  Making herbal vinegars and thus preserving some of the best but most elusive flavors of summer, is one of my favorite activities.  Late August into early September is the best time for this.

Favorite books for vinegar recipes:

Herbal Treasures by Phyllis Saudys

Flavored Oils and Vinegars by Ann Kleinberg

The Good Herb byJudith Benn Hurley






     After  buying several bottles of vinegar, ( mostly white wine vinegar ) and gathering  my favorite recipes from years past and a few new ones to try out, I'm ready to pick my herbs and prepare some herbal vinegars for use throughout the winter months.

     I usually use my old Mason jars to extract the flavors from the leaves, washing them first thing in the morning in the dishwasher so they will be dry when I'm ready to use them.

Herb gathering is best done mid-morning

 



 A trip to the garden to get handfuls of the healthiest looking leaves for each recipe and I'm ready to go.  I wash the leaves and dry them well with paper towels, then leave them under a ceiling fan for an hour  or so.









  Next I chop the herbs  and place them in the jar, heat the vinegar( in stainless steel) just until it starts to bubble, cool it slightly,  then pour it over the herbs.  Once cool, I put some plastic wrap over the top and cover with the lids, find a cool, dark place and let the vinegar work its alchemy.  I leave the jars for a few days to a few weeks, shaking them every day or so, making sure the herbs stay below the level of the vinegar.

Each vinegar turns a slightly different color, depending on the herbs.

    Once I am happy with the flavor, I strain out the herbs and pour the vinegar into bottles,(often I wash and thoroughly dry the bottles the vinegar came in and use them,)  label them and I'm ready for a splash of summer whenever I need it!

   Some books recommend putting a fresh snippet of herb into the bottle, mostly for looks, but I don't do that because I don't like fishing it out when the vinegar level gets lower than the sprig of herb.

   Here are my favorite herbal combinations, all are with white wine vinegar unless otherwise noted:

  ** Basil, garlic, cayenne peppers.
      This has lots of kick and works well with a good olive oil to perk up a winter salad or when a soup recipe calls for vinegar.

  ** Garlic chives  and nasturtium flowers and leaves.
       More delicate than the vinegar above but with some kick.  Garlic flavor is subtle.
     
  ** Cilantro, jalapeno peppers, garlic, lime peel.
       This is a new one I concocted this year and I'm planning to use it to add some zip to a  black bean salad or black bean soup during the winter, when cilantro and jalapenos are scarce.

  ** Raspberries - delicious, especially on fruit salads.

  **  Lemon peel, lemon verbena, lemon balm, lemon basil, lemon thyme.
       This is my go-to vinegar when I need lemon and there is no lemon in my refrigerator!  It always works for me.


  **  Fennel, mint.
      This smells wonderful.  It's the first time I've made this but I think it will be wonderful on a Waldorf salad or a carrot salad.

  **  Balsamic vinegar, rosemary, garlic.
       Add some olive oil, some more garlic, black pepper and more rosemary to this vinegar and marinate chicken breasts in it for a few hours, then grill.  Delicious.

  **  Red wine vinegar, oregano and garlic.
       Good with any Italian dish, especially antipasto.



  ** Bonus medicinal cider vinegar : Hyssop, thyme, sage and  lavender.
       I also  made a medicinal honey with the same herbs in it and am planning to mix the cider vinegar with the honey when I get a sore throat during the winter, which is often. (I remember my mother giving us honey and lemon by the teaspoon when we had sore throats.) These herbs are soothing to the throat  and said to be expectorant. Cider vinegar is full of minerals and said to be healthful on its own, so adding herbs can only improve its medicinal qualities!

  Although I store the vinegars at room temperature, I am planning to keep the honey in the refrigerator since it doesn't have the acidity of vinegar.  I use all my vinegars within 8 to 10 months.

Thought for today :  Making herbal vinegars in August can bring a splash of summer flavor to a cold winter night.