Spinach and Belgian Stoemp

I am declaring the local food season officially OPEN!! After months of dwindling vendors and almost no produce besides apples and potatoes I am starting to see the people come back. Our Inwood farmer’s market is now sporting a new vendor selling sprouts! They are not quite as delicate as Two Guys from Woodbridge that works the USQ Greenmarket. But they aren’t bad. He has told me that his sprouts are seasonal unlike the Woodbridge Guys who grow them hydroponically year round.

Another fantastic thing I keep seeing is spinach! Spinach is a spring delicacy here in New York. I just don’t see it locally as the summer gets on. Our CSA sometimes has it in June. But that spinach has a tendency to liquefy after 2 days out of the ground. This time of year the getting is good for hearty spinach. It isn’t too old or too babyish. It is simply perfect. And I think we have a few weeks too, because I am just starting to see it show up. By the middle of May the stalls will be overflowing with spinach.

The week before last, I bought 2 big bags thinking that they looked small. But when I got home, it was as though the things had had babies. There was so much spinach I almost didn’t have room for it. We now throw it into everything! Pizza, green eggs, guacamole (it is actually amazing in guacamole), and even the smoothies that Thing 2 is currently boycotting. But then again, he is currently boycotting everything. I am breathing deeply and cherishing the fact that his older brother is now eating everything from braised brisket to kale soup.

If you have trouble getting spinach clean, try this. Fill up your sink with cool water. Add a bit of vinegar. I use Bragg’s Apple Cider Vinegar. Float your spinach in the water for 30 minutes. Be sure to agitate the plants so that all the sediment comes off. When you feel that they are clean enough, remove the plants from the water, shake off the excess and towel dry. Store wrapped in a plastic grocery bag in the fridge. Even if you place them in the crisper, they will stay good longer in a plastic bag. Or you can remove the stems and store in a large glass Tupperware in the fridge. That’s what I do. All my lettuces go together in a 4 quart glass bowl with a tight fitting lid. My greens are good for a week or two. A few days ago my colleagues at work questioned whether my stuff was really organic because it lasts so long. But they are organic. I think it is the soak in the water before storage.

Recently I went to one of my favorite place to eat a stick to my ribs lunch in New York, Le Petite Abeille. Their croque monsieur and omelettes are to die for, as are their French fries. I try to stay away, but these are hand cut lovingly fried Belgian fries. Though I try to stay away from the polyunsaturated oils and fried foods in general, I find I just can’t do it sometimes. C’est la vie, n’est-pas? Well, on my recent trip I did manage to order something that didn’t come with fries. But it did come with this oddity they called stoemp. I had never heard of it. The menu seemed pretty devoted to it. I ordered and hoped for the best.

When my plat arrived I saw, stoemp was just mashed potatoes with stuff mixed in it. My stoemp had spinach and leeks in it. Brilliant. I didn’t even have to look up a recipe for this one. I have now made the dish twice, and I highly recommend peeling the potatoes. My first batch was ruined by some very bitter red skinned potatoes. And don’t even bother cooking the spinach. I did that in the first batch, and I really didn’t need to. Uncooked spinach will wilt down when added to the mashed potatoes, but stays fresh enough to give the final dish some bulk and nice color. By the way, I made the pictured batch on Easter Sunday with a perfectly braised brisket (so much better than my overcooked Crockpot versions) and we all agreed that this was the best Easter dinner ever!

STOEMP

2 very large potatoes, I used peeled redskins

2 tablespoons of good quality butter

1 leek, white and light green part only (throw the top into your freezer stock bag with other veggie scraps, and if you don’t currently do that—start!)

2 handfuls of washed spinach, chopped.

Boil the potatoes until soft, drain and add milk sufficient to make mashed potatoes. Mash the potatoes by whatever means you prefer. In a small skillet melt the butter and add the leeks. Fry the leeks on medium heat until they are soft and just starting to turn brown. Mean while, fold the chopped spinach into the hot potatoes. When the leeks have cooked, add them and all the butter into the mashed potatoes and mix well. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Our kids don’t like mashed potatoes (I know, I don’t get it either…) so DH and I couldn’t finish it. Therefore there were enough for me to have leftovers with a hardboiled egg for breakfast the next morning. Hallelujah, it was an Easter miracle!

Potato Leek Soup with Kale Chips

My mother used to make a Baked Potato Soup that was a bomb of pureed potato, sour cream, cheddar cheese, cream and bacon. I always thought of the soup as unhealthy because of how high it was in fat. But it was a special family soup. My mother loved making it and I loved eating it!

Fast forward 15 years and I have changed my views about what is healthy and nutritious. I embrace fats in my diet, especially butter fat from both butter and cream and whole milk (as long as it's a good pastured source). No longer do I think that such a soup should be slandered as unhealthy. There are some considerable alterations that one can make to make this soup more nutritious.

First off, my mother always peeled the potatoes. She was using russet potatoes, or your average Idaho Potatoes. Here in the Northeast, farmers do grow russets, but they are quite a bit smaller here. What I see everywhere are creamer potatoes or waxy potatoes. This time of year you can still find the little 'new' potatoes because the potato season is just beginning. I have gotten a couple pounds of potatoes from our CSA for the last three weeks and they have all been these creamer potatoes with very tender skins. Potatoes with their skins intact are far far more healthy. Potatoes in general I believe receive a bad rap. High in Vitamin C, Vitamin B6, copper, potassium, manganese, iron and protein to start, this tuber may have some carbohydrate calories, but it sure supports a nutritious diet. But skins are where alot of the nutrients lie, so keep them on and learn to love them. In this soup you won't even know that they are there. And I did scrub them very very very well.

Second of all (drum roll), I made my own stock for this soup. Last weekend I boiled a pot of chicken bones on low for four hours just like Sally Fallon told me to. Then I boiled it down to a very thick broth and froze them in my silicone muffin cups. I had forgotten where my ice cube trays were. But the muffin cups worked just fine! After all the bitching and moaning I did about making my own stocks, I overcame. Who here is proud of me??

Lastly, I cut back on the amount of bacon. I used about 4 ounces of true artisan bacon from Flying Pigs at the Union Square Green Market. They still use nitrates, but I am not as worried about them after a reader suggested that nitrates occur naturally and non-naturally. I really am trying to investigate all sources of information for a truly independent opinion. I have read that the non-natural sources have been found to be carcinogenic. I need to do more research there. I simply assumed that if I bought artisan bacon at the farmer's market (at $15 a pound no less) that they would not be using nitrates. Read your labels guys! I do know that the pork is pastured and humanely treated though.

Potato Leek Soup

About 2 pounds of potatoes

4 cups of chicken broth (or enough to almost cover the potatoes)

4 ounces of bacon, diced

3-4 small leeks, sliced

1 cup of heavy cream

In a 3 quart saucepan, place the potatoes and broth. Boil and then cover and reduce to a simmer to allow the potatoes to get nice and soft. In a large frying pan, cook the back on medium heat until crispy. Remove the bits and drain the grease, but leave 2-3 tbsp of fat. Fry the leeks in the remaining fat until soft, maybe 10 minutes. When the potatoes are soft, add the leeks into the potato pot. This next step is much easier with an immersion blender, but you can puree using a food processor too. Add the cream (substitute with milk if you wish, or just add milk if the soup is too thick) and puree the leeks and potatoes and their skins, everything all together. Stir in the bacon bits and enjoy. Like really really enjoy.

As far as the Kale chips go, did you know about this? Who's been holding out on me??? I got this recipe from the guy that was standing behind me in the line to pick up my CSA veggies. When he said it was the only way to eat kale I knew I had to give it a try. Thank goodness I stood next to him.

Kale Chips

1 Bunch of hearty kale, the flat kind (I am not sure you can do this with the curly kind, but I am sure a reader will tell me)

Drizzle of olive oil

Kosher or Sea Salt

Cut the very very woody stems off the kale, but leave an inch or so of stem in place as a 'handle'. Spread the kale in one even layer (no overlapping!) on a sheet pan. I had to use two pans for my bunch of kale, which was not all that big. Drizzle the kale with a little olive oil, sprinkle them with salt. Bake at 400 for about 15 minutes. But check on them. It went by really really fast for me. Then just remove from the oven and enjoy.

I didn't tell Thing 1 that it was kale. I just told him they were chips. He ate the first one (and crumbled it all over my nice clean couch), and then promptly handed me back the stem and said "I like chips, they are good. I am going to get another one." He must have eaten 10 of them when it was all said and done. Did I hear that right? Did both of my children eat dark leafy greens this week? Score two for Mommy.

Don't forget to check out Fight Back Fridays at Food Renegade! There are lots of real food articles to read!