Food

BEAUTIFUL NEW HARVEST TREATS

Courtesy of From Scratch Club. Roasted Ridge Squashes.

The Carnival Squash is one of the prettiest autumn squashes you’ll find. It’s worth the extra effort you may need to make to hunt them down. With its harlequin-mottled, deeply fluted shell, it makes a perfect edible bowl for squash-based soups and stews.

Photo: Courtesy of Seasons and Suppers. Squash Synergy

Roasted, and turned into a bowl, this Carnival holds hearty Roasted Squash Thai Curry, for a harvest time celebration supper. Seasons and Suppers’ recipe is a classic green Thai curry medley, with a twist. Packed with spinach and red chiles to round out the sweet fleshed squash, it’s a carnival of flavors.

Photo: Courtesy of A Little Saffron. Delicata Squash.

The Delicata doesn’t know whether it wants to be a summer or a winter squash, so it kind of owns the best of both. Thin-skinned, like its zucchini cousins, and rich orange-fleshed, like its butternut buddies, the Delicata is a sweet harvest reward. Sliced into beautiful rings, it caramelizes as it roasts.

Photo: Courtesy of A Little Saffron. Herb Roasted Delicata Squash with Pomegranate

Try gilding your roasted Delicata with a sprinkling of pomegranate seeds and Parmesan shavings, as A Little Saffron does. Check out her Herb Roasted Delicata Squash with Pomegranate recipe. It’s also wonderful sprinkled with funky creamy gorgonzola crumbles.

Another recipe we love, by TheWimpyVegetarian, on Food52, is Crispy Delicata Rings with Currant Fennel Apple Relish. It’s a fall party for your mouth, with sweet, tart, salty, tender, crisp, and crunchy -- all grooving together.

Her delicata rings are simply tossed in olive oil, toasted to a delicate crisp, and sprinkled with lime juice. The currants, fennel, and apples are nudged into gentle submission with apple cider and Calvados.

Photo: Kimberly Hasselbrink. Courtesy of theyearinfood. Pears and Plums.

Plums and pears are the classic autumn harvest duo. Brilliant blogger, extraordinary photographer, and fabulous foodie, Kimberly Hasselbrink, of The Year in Food, turns them out into a gorgeous seasonal salad.

Photo: Kimberly Hasselbrink. Courtesy of theyearinfood. Salad of Sauteed Pears and Plums

Warm sauteed slices of ruby-hued fruit waltz, then drape atop a frazzle of lightly dressed arugula, sprinkled with toasted pumpkin and sunflower seeds. Each mouthful is a contrast of cool freshness, silky tartness, and earthy toasty crunch. This salad is a stunner. We want the plum harvest to never end!

Photo: Bdieu. Cashew Apples.

Tamarind Cashews exude autumn. This traditional Indian snack of cashew nuts, glazed in butter, honey, tamarind and tomato pastes, with the warm spices of garam masala and a kick of cayenne -- it is a joy to munch. A recent recipe by Melissa Clark adds coconut flakes and chopped fresh mint to the mix. It’s a beautiful interpretation.

Photo: Courtesy of Maya Ethnobotanicals. Sassafras Bark.

American Harvest Eatery, in Springfield, Illinois, is a farm-to-table restaurant that celebrates both farmers and chefs equally. The ingredients in their dishes are sourced locally, organically, and sustainably. Chef Khyran Boyds has developed an exquisite tasting menu that really rocks the autumn harvest with extraordinary creativity.

Using locally harvested sassafras bark, Boyds turns out a new take on a Root Beer Float as the menu's dessert course. Imagine: fried root beer cream soda ice cream (yup!) with sassafras caramel! And if you can get there, go -- and experience it for real.

Photo: Courtesy of Suidhe Farm Cottages. Chanterelle Mushrooms

In Cambridge, Massachusetts, another restaurant, named Harvest, struts its stuff with one of the most beautiful fall wild crops, chanterelle mushrooms. These delicate apricot-colored frilly coronets lend their unique earthy flavor to a brilliant locally harvested seafood dish, "Snappy’s Scituate Scallops, with Jersey butter & sugar corn, smoked bacon, chanterelles, garlic scapes, and cherry tomato salsa." Yum!

Photo: Courtesy of Nuts.

It’s harvest time for nuts too. At Haven Gastropub Brewery, in Pasadena, California, Executive Chef/Partner Greg Daniels serves up autumn nuts that are so crazy-good, I can’t bring myself to call them mere "bar nuts." But that’s what really they are.

Pecans, walnuts, and cashews, are tossed and roasted in an incredibly inventive, mind-blowing butterscotch-curry.

They grab you by the hand and keep you warm. In perfect complement, your other hand can beat the chill with a glass or two of one of Haven’s more than 70 whiskeys, scotches, and bourbons.

Photo: Courtesy of Knowledge Server. Wheat

Our amber waves of grain are now being harvested to make a beautiful new vodka. American Harvest is made from organic American winter wheat. It was introduced to market just about a year ago and has been collecting fans ever since.

It shares a heritage with Grey Goose, both being progeny of Sidney Frank Importing Co, a third-generation family business.

Photo: Courtesy of Liquid Living. Vodka Cocktails

It’s a sipping vodka -- smooth, soft, silky -- kind of creamy. It has a distinct, yet hard-to-place mellow flavor, derived from a recipe the company won’t divulge. This vodka is handcrafted in small batches from organic winter wheat grown on a sustainable family farm.

American Harvest is distilled and bottled in Rigby, Idaho, using water from Snake River Plain aquifers. The company is serious about making a serious impression -- while leaving a light footprint. It uses wind power for one-third of its monthly electrical consumption. Its distillery remains feed herds of (what must be) very happy cattle. Its glass bottles, printed with organic inks and water soluble varnishes, are, of course, 100% recyclable.

Photo: Courtesy of Season and Suppers. Harvest Vegetable Bean Soup.

A harvest soup is a must-have this time of year. Seasons and Suppers jams their Harvest Vegetable Bean Soup with a wealth of fresh, local vegetables, still available at the market, including onions, carrots, butternut squash, oven-roasted roma tomatoes, and spinach. White beans and pancetta add depth and heft.

HARVEST VEGETABLE BEAN SOUP

Ingredients

1 Tbsp. olive oil
4-5 roma tomatoes
1/3 cup diced pancetta or bacon
1 red chili pepper, cored, seeded and diced (can substitute jalapeno)
1 cup diced onion
1 1/2 cups diced carrots
1 1/2 cups diced butternut squash
6 cups chicken or vegetable broth
Chunk of Parmesan rind
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1/2 tsp. dried oregano
1/2 tsp. cumin
1/4 tsp. cayenne pepper
Salt and pepper, to taste
3 cups cooked white/navy beans (2 cans, rinsed, if using canned beans)
2 cups baby spinach
Shaved Parmesan, for garnish

Instructions

Preheat oven to 425° F. Cut roma tomatoes in half and place on a parchment lined baking sheet, cut side up. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Roast in the pre-heated oven for 30-40 minutes, until shriveled. Remove from oven. Allow to cool 10 minutes, then remove tomatoes to a cutting board. Peel off skin and chop roughly chop tomato flesh. Set aside.
Heat olive oil in a large Dutch oven or soup pot. Add pancetta and saute until mostly cooked. Add chili pepper, onion, carrots and squash. Cook, stirring regularly, until softened, about 10 minutes. Add chicken or vegetable broth, Parmesan rind and spices. (*If using canned beans, add them now). Bring to a boil and then reduce heat and simmer about 20-25 minutes, until the beans and vegetables are cooked. (*If using pre-cooked beans, add them now and cook until warmed.)
Note: If you’d like a thicker soup, puree the soup a bit in the pot with an immersion blender or remove about 2 cups, run through a blender lightly and then return it to the pot.
Stir in the chopped, roasted tomatoes and spinach and cook, stirring, just until the tomatoes are warmed and the spinach is wilted. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed (be sure to salt sufficiently to really bring out the great flavours). Serve with shaved Parmesan.

Read about the beautiful harvests all this week, as it relates to Arts/Design,Nature/Science, Food/Drink, Place/Time, Mind/Body, and Soul/Impact, including Harvesting Hope,Reaping Hope, New Crop of Harvest Books and Apps, and After Harvest, It’s Still Alive.