Tag Archives: Local Produce

Farm to Belly: Carrots & Beets

The first harvest of beetroot and carrots has been pulled and there’s no end to the possibilities. You can eat the carrot straight out of the ground but some sources say that they have to be steamed to give you all their benefits. If you want a raw treat, grate them and mix with balsamic vinegar and feta cheese for a truly healthful side dish that I posted last year. Scroll down for the recipe.

Beetroot, Carrot & Feta Salad

3 medium-sized beetroot (with leaves)
4-5 medium-sized carrots
1.5 ounces of balsamic vinegar
3 ounces of goat’s milk feta

Grate the carrots and beetroot. Chop up the beetroot greens. Cut the feta cheese into cubes. Mix the grated vegetables, and cheese together in a bowl with the balsamic vinegar for a quick, easy, utterly delicious, juicy and crunchy salad.

Catskills Sandwich: Breadfellows Bread and Homegrown Zucchini

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Homemade Catskills sandwich: Breadfellows‘ delicious semolina bread, lightly toasted with boiled eggs and last year’s home grown (frozen) zucchini sauteed in butter. Tasty.

Daily Catskills: 05/04/16

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44F at 9am, misty, humid and soaked with overnight rain. More rain in the afternoon.

Catskills Sandwich: Fried Crab Cake

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Phoenicia Diner‘s fried crab cake sandwich with bacon served with salad on a soft roll. The crab cakes are soft and fishy, as opposed to thick and doughy, and melt in the mouth making the sandwich deliciously light.

Chasing Honey Farms: Spring Update

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The three pesticide-free beehives that were installed last May on Chasing Honey Farms natural apiary in Fleischmanns have survived the winter. Moreover, the bees have been collecting pollen for the last two weeks. When it was 80F in the middle of March, all three hives were active.

Proprietor Chase Kruppo had to start his beehives from scratch again a year ago because the bees he had installed the previous year had died over the winter. Once the new bees were installed in their hives on May 2nd last year, they were left to their own devices with wax foundations in the hives.

Chase is opposed to doing any artificial feeding of established colonies, but to start them last year, he said they definitely need a little boost. They arrived before the blossom, so they got one serving of sugar water for a week or two, in a one gallon bucket via the drip method. Chase noticed that the bees had stopped using the sugar water a week or two after going in the hive so he removed it. The carniolan bees had already surprised him with their industriousness, because they had formed a patty of wax comb inside the box in which they were transported.

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Daily Catskills Lightbox: 05/25/15

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Hand picking worms off the organic apple trees in a young orchard. Last year was a banner year for apples in the Catskills.

Farm to Table Events: Downstate & NYC

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November 6th to 15th is Cider Week in NYC and there is Farm to Table style gathering at The Pines in Brooklyn, the owner of which is from Delaware County and a keen supporter of farmers and producers here.

They are hosting a Catskills backyard blowout on November 9th from 6pm to 10pm. They will be bringing down Delaware County-grown eats, wild-apple ciders and all manner of special things and special guests to the banks of the Gowanus including Wayside’s special crab apple cider.

They will be firing up seasonal snacks on the grill, roasting s’mores around the fire pit, and pouring cider all night long. Entry cost is $35 all-you-can-eat and cider specials a la carte. If you’re in NYC next week, please go to The Pines and support our local producers.

The Pines
284 Third Ave
Brooklyn, NY 11215
Buy tickets here.

Word of Delaware County-based Wayside Cider is spreading like wildfire and they’ve completely sold out of two varieties, Halfwild and Catskills. They have very limited amounts remaining of the Skinny Dip that included local quince. Wayside has been in business for a year and thus far have pressed about 30,000 gallons. Before the end of the season, they’ll press another 7,000 gallons. This has been a tremendous year for the Catskills wild apple and many supportive neighbors have invited Wilson, and his business partner Irene Hussey, onto their land to pick their heritage apples and they’ve found five or six varieties of apples that are geo-specific to the Catskills. Some of those trees they have marked for grafting and Wilson is putting together a “roster of apples” from what exists here in these mountains.

For Cider Week, co-proprietor of Wayside Alex Wilson will be taking part in a panel discussion at Wassail in Lower East Side entitled So You Want To Start a Cidery. Tickets are going quickly.

Further north in Cold Spring, Glynwood is hosting its third annual Cider Dinner on November 13th from 6.30pm to 10pm. Guest Chef Shawn Hubbell of Soons Orchard & Farm Market joins guests in November during Cider Week NYC for a farm-fresh meal paired with the best craft hard cider the Hudson Valley has to offer.

Glynwood
362 Glynwood Road
Cold Spring, NY 10516

Catskills Conversations: Burr Hubbell

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JN: How long have you lived in the Catskills?

BH: I was actually born here and then I moved away for college. I lived in New York City for a while and Boston for a while. I came back here and practiced law for a bit and then moved to the Finger Lakes area when our first child was born. I lived in Dutchess County for a while and came back about four years ago, right after Hurricane Irene.

So you like to travel?

No, I actually don’t like to travel, but my first wife was a navy brat and she did like to travel, so we did.

I was having a conversation with somebody else about that, about how young people are moving away and how we can keep young people in the region.

And that’s been an issue ever since I went to school here. I can remember the Rotary Club had about eight of us come down from my class in 1976 and asking us what would it take for [us] to come back here, but in being 18 years old, we didn’t really have an answer at the time.

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Weekend Links: 06/13/15

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Good news for Farm-to-Table in New York City. Lucky Dog in Hamden receives $40,000 in grant funding for its efforts. The link details some of the NYC restaurants that receive local produce. View the news release from the Delaware County Economic Development, a video by VeccVideography.

Farmers Almanac explains all those seed copters that are flying around this week.

Ever come to the country, been woken up by birdsong and wondered who was singing to you? Browse for birds by name and listen to their call from The Cornell Lab for Ornithology.

Travel the Milky Way on June 21st when Catskills Creameries open up their gates to the public.

The Farmers’ Museum in Cooperstown is due a visit.

Outdoor cinema in the Catskills looking for funding.

Spring Shoots Update

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Green shoots are emerging from the raspberry sticks; the beetroot is flourishing; the cauliflower is shooting; the asparagus is prolific, as is the rhubarb; the hops are hopping, but the spuds and blackberries have yet to emerge. The dog is already too hot and has dug a mud hole under some equipment. His home for the summer.

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Spuds

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Back in England, I have a friend who has a spud bucket, a large metal rubbish bin filled with soil, into which she thrusts a needy hand and miraculously pulls out a spud or two for dinner. She keeps it in the backyard and, needless to say, does not need to buy spuds, ever. Potatoes need well-drained, loose soil, but lots of rain, so they are perfect for high elevations here in the Catskills. To have your own potato bucket simply:

1. Drill three or four holes in the bottom of a bucket, about half the size of a garbage pail;
2. Line the bottom of the bucket with a three-inch layer of rocks for drainage;
3. Add a six-inch layer of peat and compost on top of the rocks;
4. Throw in four seed potatoes;
5. Cover with a two-inch layer of peat/potting soil mix and pat down.

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A Tasting in Arkville at Jack’s Bread Breakfast

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Dinner at the breakfast & lunch joint! Arkville Bread Breakfast, home of the Catskills’ legendary fish and chips will host a tasting, starting at 5.30pm on Saturday April 25th. Address: 43285 Route 28, just after the Crossroads at Route 38 in Arkville, New York.

Daily Catskills: 03/28/15

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20F at 8am with barest of snowfall. Did we blink and miss Summer? Update: light snowfall continued throughout the morning and was much heavier by the afternoon. Really, more snow? Yes, really. 30F by 1pm.

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Tag Archives: Local Produce

Farm to Belly: Carrots & Beets

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Catskills Sandwich: Breadfellows Bread and Homegrown Zucchini

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Daily Catskills: 05/04/16

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Catskills Sandwich: Fried Crab Cake

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Chasing Honey Farms: Spring Update

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Daily Catskills Lightbox: 05/25/15

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Farm to Table Events: Downstate & NYC

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Catskills Conversations: Burr Hubbell

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Weekend Links: 06/13/15

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Spring Shoots Update

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Spuds

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A Tasting in Arkville at Jack’s Bread Breakfast

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Daily Catskills: 03/28/15

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