Two awesome-looking kohlrabi came through from the Paisley Farm CSA this week. This was my first time cooking with kohlrabi, so I wanted to try something a little interesting. Also, I wanted to use up some turkey sausage that had been sitting in my freezer. Here is a recipe that I came up with for sausage stuffed kohlrabi.

I know a few people who become almost lyrical when talking about this strange-looking and strangely-named vegetable, so I’m glad to’ve finally indulged my curiosity about it.  Its juicy texture is sometimes compared to that of an apple, though its flavor is vegetable-y and not sweet. It’s related to the cabbage (as is broccoli, cauliflower, kale and Brussels sprouts), and it’s name is German for “turnip cabbage.” The round bulb looks like a root, but is actually part of the kohlrabi plant’s stem.

I made up this recipe as I went along, so I can’t vouch for its reliability, but it did come out pretty tasty. Please suggest any improvements that come to mind.  A better variation might be to stir in some of the chopped kohlrabi pulp after the rice has cooked, so it retains some crunch. Or, stuff the un-cooked kohlrabi, then braise them, like this Epicurious recipe for German-style stuffed kohlrabi says to do. My version, however, seemed simpler for a first-timer like me.

Thanks everyone for coming out to the Borough Hall Greenmarket yesterday and for having a taste of my Sweet Corn and Tomato Risotto. I had a blast! I hope you all were inspired to buy some corn and tomatoes and try this yourself. Here is the recipe.

Greenmarket update for McCarren Park, from market manager Chelsea Whittaker:
Local chef Jordon Colòn of Eat restaurant, at 124 Meserole Avenue in Greenpoint, will be doing a cooking demonstration in the morning using only Greenmarket produce. Come watch him cook, eat his delicious food, and ask him questions about his restaurant and cooking.

And don’t forget to check out your favorite market’s Twitter page for more updates: @McCarrenPkGmkt

And my own note: Red Jacket Orchards now has popsicles! They’re made by a gourmet popsiclery in Chelsea Market, but made of course from Red Jacket juices. Yum!

There’s a lesson every cook learns when he’s first starting out, and maybe re-learns many times thereafter. It is, simply: I can make that! It’s when he realizes that some food he’d always encountered only as an already assembled thing, that seemed to have been created by some mysterious procedure, is something he can create himself at home, in his own kitchen.  In that moment he has taken that food back from the chefs and supermarkets. Whether he chooses from then on to always make this food himself, or whether he goes back to allowing the pros to make it for him, he’s broken its mystique it and gained an understanding of what’s inside it.

It’s a lesson I learned again a couple of weeks ago when I visited my brother Joe in Vermont and he suggested that we make sausage. “Make sausage,” I thought “you can just make sausage?” Somehow, I’d always thought some special machinery or a secret, unobtainable ingredient was required to transform meat into actual sausage.

But  it turns out all that’s really needed is meat, fat, spices, and something to chop them all together with. A chef’s knife might do, but there are some gadgets that help to do the job properly.  A meat grinder or food processor will ensure that the meat, fat and spices are thoroughly mixed and have the even texture you expect in sausage. And if you want to pack your sausage into links (rather than patties), you’ll need sausage casings and some kind of sausage stuffer.  Sausage stuffers come in many shapes and sizes, but perhaps the most common for home use, and the one my brother and I used, is the sausage stuffer / meat grinder attachment to the KitchenAid stand mixer.

As for casings, Joe managed to find them at his local supermarkets. That’s Vermont, though, and people up there expect such things to be on hand. You may need to seek out a butcher shop.

Other than that, you just need a recipe. Sausage recipes are as endless as, well, as endless as there are kinds of sausage. We were after lamb sausage, since Joe had a lamb he’d recently bought all wrapped up neatly in butcher paper parcels in his freezer. Interestingly, all of the the recipes called for pork fat and not lamb fat – lamb fat being, I suppose, a bit harder to come by. This being Vermont, we didn’t have to look far to find pork fat – we got ours from a farm near Middlebury.

The process was slow and labor intensive, but simple. Cut the meat & fat in to cubes, and toss it together with the spices. Run the mixture through a meat grinder. Run the mixture through a meat grinder again. Taste-test your recipe by taking a bit of the mixture and cooking it on a hot skillet. Adjust the spices as necessary.  Attach the sausage stuffer to the meat grinder and thread a sausage casing onto it (the casings will need to’ve been well rinsed & soaked). Pull a little of the casing off of the stuffer and tie a  knot in it. Run the sausage mixture through the meat grinder again, this time feeding the mixture into the casing.

This part definitely works best with two people: one person pushing the meat mixture through the grinder and one person holding the casings as the mixture feeds into it. I found that it helped to force he mixture down into the casing with my hands, since the  stuffer didn’t to push the meat through with enough force to fill out the casings for nice plump sausages. Twist the sausage into links as you go, or wait until you’ve filled entire casing is filled and then twist it into links. Lay it out in a single layer on a baking sheet and freeze. Amazingly, it’s sausage!

From David Sherman, market manager of the Borogh Hall Greenmarket:
Dance with a farmer this Saturday the 7th at the Brooklyn Borough Hall Greenmarket. Come and support local, sustainable agriculture and get your groove on with NYC’s premier global party band The People’s Champs, who will be performing for free at the market. We will also be serving up our delicious sweet corn for all our customers to enjoy. Nothing goes better with local Donut Peaches and Free-Range Bacon than sunshine and afro-rock grooves! The most fun you’ll ever have shopping for groceries — guaranteed!

This week’s McCarren Park Greenmarket update from market manager Chelsea Whittaker:
Starting this Saturday, King Ferry Winery will be at the market. Now you can pick up a bottle or two of wine while you do your weekly shopping. Now that’s what I call one-stop local shopping! And remember, you can use your debit, credit, and EBT (food stamp) cards at the market.

Market Update from Chelsea Whittaker, Manager of the McCarren Park Greenmarket:

Curious about composting? Then stop by the market at 11am for an indoor and outdoor composting workshop with Kate Zidar of the North Brooklyn Composting Project! And don’t forget that the market is now accepting EBT (food stamp), debit, and credit cards.

As of last week we have Cranberry Hall Farm back in the market! They have the first corn of the season and some delicious looking tomatoes. Wilklow Orchard is also in the market now, selling their sweet berries and currants. Stop by the market this Saturday for these new additions.

This weekend was Grilliardsburg, Karol Lu’s annual BBQ held  in the back courtyard of Redd’s Tavern.  For last year’s event I made a lattice-topped peach pie, and I thought it might be hard to top that this year. Not to mention I had less time to prepare, so I decided instead of a pie I’d make rustic tarts.  They weren’t going to look as fancy, but I’d found some nice-looking fresh blueberries and sour cherries at the farmers’ market, so at least I knew they’d taste good.

I also used the all-purpose flour from Cayuga Farms, who grow and mill their wheat upstate and sell it at the Union Square and McCarren Park Greenmarkets. Their flour is less refined than what you find in the grocery store, so the crust has a darker color and a heartier, nutty flavor. It definitely has a fuller taste than most white flour, but doesn’t taste like whole wheat.

Rustic tarts really are quicker to put together than a full-blown pie: just roll the dough out into something like a circle, spread or pile the filling on its center dot the filling with chunks of butter, and fold the edges of the dough over onto it. There’s no need to make the edges of the crust even, or to flute the edges of the crust, or to weave an lattice on top.

As I was assembling my tart I had a brief, small panic: the crust wasn’t holding together. It was tearing. Since the tart doesn’t bake in a pan, it’s less forgiving when it comes to patching up tears. I was just about ready to give up and turn my tart into a pandowdy, when I remembered I’d forgotten a step: the fraisage.  In the fraisage, which I learned from an old issue of Cooks Illustrated, you lightly smear the dough away from yourself with the ball of your hand. This toughens up the dough slightly, enough to allow it to be assembled and baked without a pan, but not as much as kneading would do. After fraisaging it gently I re-rolled the dough & had a much easier time assembling it.

The look of a rustic tart definitely has a charm of its own. You can leave them entirely rough-edged, like mine, or you can pare the edges of the crust until they’re smooth and even, and layer the edges into uniform folds. This will give your tart an elegant look, like this, but then, that’s not very rustic, is it?

Market Updates for the July 3 weekend from the Greenpoint and Borough Hall Market Managers:

Greenpoint Greenmarket Update:

Get ready for your 4th of July picnics and barbecues by stopping by the Greenpoint Greenmarket! Dipaola Turkey and Arcadian Pastures have juicy burgers and sausages ready for grilling. For those who prefer not to eat meat, Madura Farms has a variety of tasty mushrooms perfect for the grill! We will be making and serving up ice cream around 11am and there will be music all day!

Hope to see you at the market soon!

Borough Hall Greenmarket Update:

Hi yall,
This Saturday, July 3rd at the Brooklyn Borough Hall Greenmarket, we will be cooking local,sustainable Burgers! They’re from our long time farmers, Wilklow Orchards and Rexcroft Farm.

The burgers will fire up at 11 and will feature toppings and condiments from our other fantastic farms.
Its berry season so dessert will be a Red, White and Blueberry Trifle, featuring the many different types of berries our farmers grow.

I hope to see you there and please pass the news along.

A big project at work has left me little time lately for cooking (or writing). So rather than let this blog go stale for another week, I’ve taken a look into the Dave’s Kitchen Archives for some photos of food I cooked around this time last year but never wrote about. Here’s some of what I found:

Grilled pizzas, with pesto, tomato and mozzerella

Horseradish Greens…

… which got stirred into a pot of risotto

Rhubarb Cobbler

And it was all delicious.