Kitchen Scoop Blog

I used to say that I'd never met a tomato I didn't like. Now I have to qualify that by adding "sun-ripened." Even the Roma Tomatoes have lost their flavor if they are not sun-ripened. There's just something magical about the flavor the bright rays of the sun instill in the humble tomato. Beverly has been raving about the organic, heirloom tomatoes that have been showing up in her CSA box each week. Now that her growing season in Miami is over, the North Carolina tomatoes are just starting to come in. All I can say is it's about time!!

Here are some tips on maximizing the flavor when your tomato harvest arrives:

What are your favorite quiche flavors? We like broccoli because it’s so easy to use a bag of frozen florets -- makes for the perfect Desperation Dinner, too!

You could really use just about anything in a quiche. We hate to admit it, but we often use quiche as a vehicle to clean out the refrigerator produce bin!

If you haven't noticed yet, I'm a strawberry fanatic! And local, hand picked strawberries are the absolute best in my book. Depending on where you live, you may or may not have the pleasure of having strawberry fields just down the road, but here in NC, I do. Going out on a dewy Saturday morning to pick a bucket or two is a June tradition. Since I always end up with more than I meant to pick, the strawberry recipes keep me busy for a week or two.                                              

This year I created this Magical Strawberry Muffin recipe that will surely become a favorite for next year as well. Try it out and let me know what you think. Any fresh strawberry, no matter where it is from, will work just fine. But if you have local available - go for it! 

When your kids get older and need to sleep late, it’s time to transfer the Father’s Day meal over from breakfast to a late lunch or even dinner. Barbecued Pork Tenderloin with Seared Vegetables is the perfect compromise for everyone – including the cook.

This recipe is so easy to do that your teen can take over as chef. (Moms, you’ve gotta love that!) This tenderloin offers up the barbecue smokiness Dads crave when you just don't feel like the hassles of firing up a grill.

It’s a fitting feast for the holiday, and everyone is happy. Sounds like a plan!

From Guest Blogger Umit Celebi, who also took these photos:

It’s been almost 30 years since I moved to New York City and I often ask myself, “What keeps me here?” Certainly, it’s the eight Vermeers at the Met and the Frick; it’s that first glimpse of the gloriously green field at Yankee Stadium when you emerge from the shadow world under the seats; it’s those two early evenings in the middle of each year when the sun sets precisely in line with the city’s grid casting a miraculous light directly down every street in Manhattan (click here); it’s the pan-fried chive dumplings in the dim sum parlors of Elizabeth Street.

But what really keeps me here are the overheard conversations. I can’t tell you how much I have gleaned over the years from simply being within earshot of just a handful of the hundreds of millions of verbal transactions that take place here every day. The very thing that sometimes most frustrates me about living in New York, (the throngs of people), also provides me with the thing I love the most – aural access to the thoughts and emotions of my 8 million neighbors. And since the food here is a very close second, something that combines both of these is a rare treat indeed. And that’s where Di Palo’s Fine Foods comes in.

If it seems like we’re pushing Fred’s Red Barbecue Sauce on you, well, we are. This is by far our favorite BBQ sauce, it's great with chicken or pork, and it’s easy to make.

This is what you’d call a Memphis-style sauce, slightly sweet, tangy and complex -- without the dreaded flavor of artificial smoke. (We really, really hate the flavor of artificial smoke, so that puts a lot of supermarket sauces off limits.)

The only commercial sauce we've found that comes close to Fred’s Red is a Western North Carolina style sauce called “Bone Suckin’ Sauce.” (Click here, no corn syrup or artificial ingredients.) But Bone Suckin’ Sauce (great name!) costs about $6 a pint, more if you have to mail-order it.

The Fred’s Red recipe makes a quart for a fraction of that, and it keeps in the refrigerator for months. Granted the ingredient list is a bit long, but it’s stuff you’re likely to have on hand (maybe with the exception of the allspice -- so just leave it out).

Finally, one backstage story on this recipe.

I think there must be a gardening gene, yet to be discovered in some secret strand of our DNA. My paternal grandmother created one of the most beautiful and extensive rose gardens I’ve ever seen (and I've visited my fair share) in the small Pennsylvania town where I grew up. In the midst of the Depression, newly widowed and with six children to raise, she began what was to become a horticultural heaven on earth that remains to this day — in the hands of a first cousin — a lovely, edenic refuge.

I first heard the call — and it really did feel like an almost audible cry from somewhere outside — at a cottage we were renting in the Berkshire Hills of Massachusetts over 20 years ago. It was a somewhat ramshackle, brown shingled Cape that had once been surrounded by traditional perennial beds. After several decades of neglect, however, the gardens had become grassy and weed-choked.

On weekends when I’d planned to relax and recoup from a hectic life in the city, I found myself on my hands and knees, pulling up bishop's weed, digging out a border, and plugging the holes with begonias, geraniums, impatiens — all the usual, generic suspects from the local garden center. At that point I didn’t know the difference between an annual and a perennial — or that there even was one. I just felt the thrill of a new infatuation — the yearning to know more and go deeper. I couldn’t wait to get up to the house on Friday nights — jumping out of the car as soon we arrived to check on my plants, often in the dark, by flashlight.

I've known about Farmer Fred Miller for several years now through my friends Tony and Elizabeth Voiers who have been members for years. So it's a little ironic that this year, when it is only me at home, I decide to join the Hilltop Farms Organic Community Supported Agriculture Farm Share. I mean, seriously, what was I thinking? All that produce and only me to consume it.

When did bread become an appetizer? Nearly every sit-down restaurant plops a basket of bread on the table -- along with the water and usually before you’ve even ordered drinks. It's like a pacifier, only for adults.  And before the real appetizers arrive, (the ones you’re paying for), the waiter will whisk that basket away.

Granted, if you’re like me, the bread basket is long empty. And my appetite is long gone. Great bread is just so hard to resist!

Do you eat a lot of fish and canned tuna? Do you worry about the mercury content? Here's a great update from Science News (click here) and a chart that shows the various suspected mercury levels. (The report said that exact mercury levels are dificult to determine and it depends on how polluted the waters are where the fish grew.)

How are you dealing with the the threat of mercury in fish? Does it change your choices at all? We'd love to know, so please tell us in the comments section following this post. Thanks!