Garlic Scapes

Garlic Scapes
Originally uploaded by lilysecret42

One of the local farmers down at Findlay Market last Saturday was selling garlic scapes. I wasn't familiar with them but after the woman selling them broke off a bit and let me taste them I was sold. Very garlicky but not overpowering. She told me they could be cooked like a vegetable. Once I got them home I looked them up on-line and found a few recipes for scape pesto. I used about half of them to make a pesto out of the scapes using them and some fresh basil from a pot I have growing outside, Parmesan cheese, olive oil salt and pepper. It was too thick to puree in my mini food processor, so as I was planning on lathering a fish fillet with the stuff, I added some fresh lemon juice to smooth things out. Incredible taste.

I stir fried the other half of my bunch of scapes with local asparagus - olive oil, salt and pepper, finished with a splash of balsamic vinegar. Delicious.

Mother Earth News has this to say on garlic scapes:

If you grow your own garlic or have a good farmer’s market, then you can enjoy a new kind of vegetable — garlic scapes. The scapes are the flower stems that garlic plants produce before the bulbs mature. Growers often remove the scapes to push the plant’s energy toward bigger bulbs, and when harvested while they are young and tender, the scapes are delicious.

Packing Lunch

I've been a lunch-packer ever since I starting working jobs that were not actually in a restaurant. I have many reasons for doing so: I like to cook and I always have leftovers around, eating out is generally expensive if you go for the good stuff and unhealthy if you go for the cheap stuff. I also try to avoid using disposable stuff when possible so I've been collecting various lunch gear over the years and I thought I"d share a few finds.

To-Go Ware has some very nice bamboo cutlery in recycled plastic cases which are manufactured in different parts of the world. I bought a couple of sets of bamboo cutlery when I was in Athens, Georgia a few months back and I love them. They are in my lunch bag every day.

Reusable Bags has a lot of great products, from shopping bags to water bottles. I purchased a couple of their sandwich bag replacements and have been loving them.

No post about packing lunch would be complete without a link to Lunch in a Box. Biggie has a great site on packing bento lunches, primarily for children but most of her techniques and recommendations are appropriate for any age.

I try to bring along my own cloth napkins and dish towels when I pack lunch as well. I've been collecting cloth napkins and I've even recycled a few old cotton dresses into napkins for the very purpose of packing lunch. I also keep a couple of those freezable bricks to pack into my lunch box because unfortunately, where I work presently, there are persons who are not adverse to stealing other people's lunches out of the communal fridge, therefore I keep my food at my desk. The last time I stored something in the fridge, it was a container of lemon wedges for my iced tea. Someone stole all my lemons, but did leave the box. Who does things like that? I'd have given them a lemon wedge had they asked.

A couple of Seventeen Year Cicada photos

I hiked a couple of trails around the Cincinnati Nature Center on Sunday and spotted scads of Seventeen Year Cicadas emerging. They weren't so numerous in the woods yet but along side the meadows there were hundreds.

The newly emerged adults are cream colored before their exoskeleton hardens:



And here's an adult with the nymph shell left behind:

Pileated Woodpecker

Pileated Woodpecker
Originally uploaded by lilysecret42

No blogging today, just a little video I shot of a Pileated Woodpecker excavating a dead tree.


Edited to add:

As I was walking Caldwell Nature Preserve today, just before taking this video, I came across a man out hiking with three adorable little girls, who were probably five years old. They were sitting on a fallen log while the guy chatted into a cell phone. I was kitted out in my usual gear: day pack, binoculars, walking stick. I said hello to them and one of the girls looked at me in wide-eyed amazement, as if she'd just seen a mythical being, and said "You must be - a girl scout!"

Local Food Resources

Epicurious has developed a great interactive map that lets you know what foods are in season in your area, then links to recipes for those foods. It's a nifty tool.

For Cincinnatians, the Enquirer posted a wonderful comprehensive list of pick-your-own-produce farms, community sponsored agriculture and farmer's markets in our area.

Quick Cicada Round Up

As I noted in my previous entry, I did spot a couple of early emerging seventeen-year cicadas when I was kayaking on Sunday. I also received an email from the Cincinnati Nature Center saying their cicadas are emerging and they are hosting a lecture on the insects:

Cicada Lecture at Rowe Woods
Learn all about the 17-year periodical cicadas that will be emerging this summer in Clermont County. Dr. Gene Kritsky, professor at the College of Mt. St. Joseph will share his knowledge of these unique insects.
Other Info:
Age Group:Adults
Date:5/31/2008 Time: 10:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Current/Maximum Registered: 8/50
Cost: $6; with CNC membership $4.

WCPO also posted a small entry on the east side cicadas. Can you spot what's wrong with this quote?

Kritsky says 17-year cicadas have a life span of only about two weeks.

I weep for the state of journalism in my home town.

Summer is here....

The Nighthawks, Ruby-Throated Hummingbirds and Chimney Swifts have all arrived on the scene and the seventeen-year cicadas are starting to emerge out on the east side of town, so as far as I'm concerned, summer has officially arrived.

One of the highlights of the long weekend was a fourteen mile kayak trip down the Little Miami. I arrived on the river at eight in the morning, well before the "cabrewers" showed up. There were simply scads of birds about, including Spotted Sandpipers, Cedar Waxwings, Waterthrush and Black Vultures. I floated past a Great Blue Heron rookery, in which I counted twenty nests, though I'm sure there were more that I couldn't see. In fact, I floated past it three times, since I kept paddling back upstream to take in the sight. I apologize for the poor picture quality, but I'm nervous about taking my good camera out on the river, so I had to settle for my cheap, water-resistant digital with a mere 4X zoom. There are some nice photos and descriptions of heron courtship, breeding and nesting behavior at the Great Blue Heron Rookery website.

More on Furoshiki

I found an interesting site on the many uses of Furoshiki, which are large squares of cloth used in Japan for wrapping and toting a variety of objects. I'm going to have to make myself a few of them. Not only are they environmentally friendly, but your cool factor will rise significantly if you tote a watermelon with a Furoshiki.