Can you believe it’s been over a month since Laura launched the Dark Days project? Just think of all the local farmers and food producers we’ve collectively supported!
I’m off to the Seacoast Eat Local-sponsored farmer’s market tomorrow, which Sarah so eloquently wrote about on the Eat Local Challenge website. I look forward to stocking up for a mostly-local Thanksgiving, as well as for the next month, or so, until their next one right before Christmas.
This weeks’ official entry is a meatless one. I made cheese this week, and so we used it in an eggplant bake, of sorts. I opened the first canned tomatoes, and enjoyed them in an onion-y, garlic sort of sauce. I have to say, they really were very good and I breathed a sigh of relief I hadn’t realized I was holding onto, when I tasted them and realized all that work really was worth it (not to mention the very real relief that nobody who consumed them died)!
I first baked the white eggplants at 425 (after slicing and brushing them with olive oil) until they were browned. While they baked, I sauteed a giant onion in butter until soft, added a few cloves of garlic and let that cook until I could smell it (probably 30 seconds or so), then added the chopped tomatoes. It was a small jar, so the resulting mixture had the texture of salsa. I let that cook as long as the eggplants kept baking. At the last minute, I tore in some fresh basil.
When the eggplants were brown, I spread the sauce in the bottom of a 9 x 13 pan, set the eggplant rounds on top, then tore some basil over them. My homemade mozzarella topped the whole thing off, along with a few shreds of parmesean.
I popped it back in the oven (which I’d turned down to 350), and let the whole thing get melty.
While it cooked, I steam/sauteed some carrots to go alongside.
We enjoyed the meal, despite the crappy photo. Although I think I’d peel the eggplants next time, as the skin was a little tough. Here’s the breakdown:
- Eggplant, carrots: Moulton Farm (8 miles)
- Onions, garlic: Carter Hill Orchard (50 miles)
- Tomatoes: Ledgewood Farm (3 miles)
- Mozzarella: (0 miles)
- Butter: (within 100 miles – Cabot co-op)
- Fresh basil: of somewhat dubious origins
- Olive oil, parmesean cheese, salt, pepper: non-local
Oh, man, I am so with you on the “nobody died” part. Isn’t low-acid canning nerve-wracking? We had a number of failed seals on our first batch of tomatoes, and so I worried that the others were somehow tainted as well. So far, no ER trips
I like to make myself feel better by trying to remember the last time I heard about someone dying of botulism. I can’t think of ever hearing about it. I’m starting to think that the same people who make us feel paranoid about this are the ones who tell me I shouldn’t sit on a public toilet seat.
It’s a conspiracy, I tell you!