The Catskills’ Village of Fleischmanns, has another new restaurant, offering a wide range of delicious and authentic Greek takeout food: Aegean Flavor.
The advantage of opening in Fleischmanns is that there is still a dearth of variety in the Catskills and residents are excited to have novel options. The restaurant opened last week, was immediately successful and busy without any advertising, and the food is exceptional, and reasonably priced. They do the staple lamb and beef gyro in pita bread ($8.95) that is tender, not too oily and not too dry, just perfect. The pita in which most sandwiches come is plump and fresh. Spanakopita, a spinach and cheese turnover in filo pastry, ($4.50 pictured below) is light and tasty, not too salty. For vegetarians, the falafel sandwich ($8.95 pictured above) is superb, stuffed into the pita with crisp cucumber and healthy tomato, all dressed in a lightly spicy sauce. There is also a cheese turnover called tiropita for $4.50.
This week’s Wild Saturday speaker is HEATHER BRUEGL, a citizen of the Oneida Nation of Wisconsin and a first line descendant of the Stockbridge Munsee. Her remarks focus on generating awareness of ongoing racism, the fight for clean water, and other issues of the Native community.
Heather is a public historian, activist, and de-colonial education consultant who works with institutions and organizations for Indigenous sovereignty and collective liberation. She is the Director of Education at Forge Project, which supports indigenous artists and leaders through fellowships.
This presentation takes place on the lawn at 1pm at 1633 Burroughs Memorial Road, Roxbury, NY 12474. Bring blankets or a lawn chair.
Most of the scapes on the garlic have been removed and I have about 70 or 80 to use or sell. The scape is the developing garlic flower – the fully-blooming flower is pictured bottom right – and it’s removed in order to allow the plant to direct its energy to the bulb.
Pictured bottom left is the scape growing on the garlic stalk viewed from above. See our Instagram story for a video that gives you a much clearer picture.
Scapes have a much more delicate, subtle sweetness than bulb garlic. They are delicious chopped and added to omelettes, scrambled eggs and stir-fry dishes like you would spring onions or shallots. They’re a lovely addition to creamy, roasted potatoes.
They also make a superb pesto. Eaten raw, garlic provides those infamous, extraordinary health benefits in addition to flaming hot breath.
Garlic Scape Pesto
10-12 large garlic scapes 1/4 cup of grated or shredded parmesan 1/4 cup of pine nuts or sunflower seeds 1/4 a cup of olive oil Salt and pepper to taste
Blend all the ingredients except for the oil in a blender. Mix in the oil when the other ingredients are blended well. If your pesto is too thick, add a drizzle of extra oil. Serve on bruschetta, toast points, crackers. Or add a dollop to soups, pasta and cheese plates. Delicious!
The rake (above) drags the freshly fluffed hay into windrows and then the baling machine is driven down those rows and presses the hay into a tight bale, while the clouds overhead look like they’re forming their own rows ready to rain on the hay. At least the rain waited until 3am, when all the hay had been baled, before it unleashed a clamoring thunderstorm, breaking the humidity and marking an end to a stressful three days.
On Day 2 of haying, farmers fluff up the hay with a machine known as a “tedder”. Nobody knows why it’s called this. The tedder looks a little like a mower, but it has sets of long prongs mounted on revolving circular heads that twist the hay around and toss it like a giant salad. This helps it dry in the sun. Tedding takes place once in the morning and again, at least once, in the afternoon because the ground and the unmowed part of the hay is still damp.
Only ten acres were mowed because after the risk assessment of the weather, comes the hedging: if it rains, then only ten acres were lost.
To be a farmer is to engage in continual risk assessment. To live on a farm is to accept a high level of risk, to be comfortable with being uncomfortable, watching the weather forecast like a skittish doe with her new fawn in Spring. Small-scale farming is dependent on something more unpredictable than the economy and that’s the weather. It’s the boss here and it’s flighty, but the farmer needs at least three days of sunshine to make hay and here on June 13th, was our first window of opportunity. After a rainy Sunday and a colder June than 2021, the forecast predicted a low chance of rain, and on Monday Jake mowed under ominous clouds, some of them as dark as slate and I held my breath as they sailed overhead.
On Day 1 of haying at Lazy Crazy Acres, ten acres of lush, bushy, thickly fertile grasses were mowed.
In addition to a gallery, new arts center, and two cafes, Fleischmanns has a pop-up plein air painters group that has temporarily moved into the empty shopfront that used to be the old bank on Main Street (with its magnificent safe still in place), evoking memories of Brooklyn in the nineties when artists would occupy abandoned commercial buildings. Tomorrow, Saturday June 4th 2022, they will host an artists reception from 2 – 4pm.
EBDRPAP: 1084 Main Street, Fleischmanns, NY 12430.
If you’re going hiking any time soon eat this first. Arguably one of the most hearty and delicious breakfasts in the Catskills: one large runny egg over easy, smothered in Hollandaise sauce, over slices of pastrami, all on top of a large hash brown. A sensational Catskills breakfast.
A dewy, misty morning and a humid afternoon with hazy clouds, some light rain, and a high of 79F. The green has almost filled in this week, but not quite. Hay fields are now knee-high.
A humid morning with mist rising off the mountains. Steamy with a high of 77F, and thunder storms moving through continually throughout the afternoon. During a quick break between storms, it looked like most of the green had suddenly filled in over the past few days.
Humid and overcast with a high of 79F. Much-needed rain continuing for most of the afternoon and into the evening on the last day of the burn ban. Acres of dandelions at Lazy Crazy Acres attract the bees.
The Catskills village of Fleischmanns in Upstate New York is undergoing a very slow but sure renaissance, after a long period of quiet, under the influence of newcomers who remember when the village was bustling with locals and tourists fifty years ago. Main Street, which has been relatively sleepy in recent decades in comparison to neighboring towns and villages has sprung to life following the opening of its cafe, The Village East. In addition to the farm store run by Alan and Robin White of Two Stones Farm, and the Main Street art gallery, there is a keenly anticipated wine bar and Greek restaurant in the works.
Adding to this burgeoning roster is The Arts Inn on Main Street which will host arts workshops like poetry and plein air; meditation and dance classes; music evenings and movie nights. The Inn will open its doors on May 29th, 2022 from 5pm to 10pm for its first variety show that is free to the public and donation-based. There was a fundraiser online and all the performers will be paid.
Opening an arts and event space has been a lifelong dream for former dancer and teacher Heidi Stonier who owns the property with husband Randy Leer; they closed on the property two weeks before the pandemic hit and have spent the last two years renovating it. The Arts Inn is coming to an area that really needs and welcomes it. “I feel the love,” says Heidi who has been been conducting free meditation classes and has made deep and genuine connections with members of the community.
To fund their vision, three rooms are available for rent via AirBNB. The rooms are themed: guests can stay in the Jane Austen room, the Rumi Room or the Matisse Room. There are weekend packages available for guests who participate in the workshops. Art is for sale in the rooms, most noteworthy are exquisitely serene barn paintings by Carol C. Young in various striking turquoise hues, think Edward Hopper without the people. Downstairs in the common areas are a lounge, a game room, a dance studio and a music room gorgeously renovated.
Says Heidi: “We have to think about creating a world that’s based not on material things, but on love. The way that we can communicate love, aside from caring for those directly around us, is through art. It brings people together. This is how you can touch someone on the other side of the world in a different culture or set of circumstances. It’s a universal language that spreads love”.
The Arts Inn, 923 Main Street, Fleischmanns, NY 12430.
Spring is here and the wild edibles are unfurling. This week, we have garlic mustard around the raised beds here at Lazy Crazy Acres, in their second year. Leaves, shoots, seeds and the unopened flowers of garlic mustard are edible at certain stages of growth, and if you don’t eat all of your crop it should be pulled because it’s an invasive weed that crowds out native plants.
Greens like garlic mustard can be introduced into your spring diet by packing them into a grilled cheese. I got this idea from Dina Falconi’s Foraging & Feasting: A Field Guide and Wild Food Cookbook – a must-have in every wild kitchen. In it, she details her “Wild Grilled Cheese Master Recipe”, but there are a variety of ways to make the classic American grilled cheese. Every American has their own method as I discovered when I first arrived in the States. In England, we fry everything, even chocolate, so even I’m surprised that we didn’t come up with the idea of frying a cheese sandwich in a pan. I was taught to cook a grilled cheese by my own American and that recipe is below.
A dark morning of ominous clouds gives way to some afternoon sun and higher temperatures, causing thick, wet snow to drip, slip and crash from high places. Still gusty with a high of 45F.
Summer in the morning, with a high of 80F and winter in the afternoon with intermittent rain and a low of 50F. A humid and overcast evening. Red buds and yellow leaves spreading over the landscape.
A sharp rise in temperature to a high of 77F. Hot in the sun, humid and bright despite cloud cover that becomes thicker like a fluffy blue milkshake later in the afternoon, bringing some light sprinkles.
Sunny with scanty cloud, deep blue skies and too gorgeous to remember what the temperature was. Beautiful degrees Fahrenheit. The perfect Spring day to “plant” some mushrooms.
