Marsh Hill Farm has an amazing crop of organically grown garlic this year – starting mid July. Our crop sold out quickly last year, so be sure to get yours early. We will also have a wide variety of organically grown vegetables such as sweet garden peas, sugar snap peas, spinach, heritage carrots; heritage chiogia and golden beets; beefsteak, cherry and roma tomatoes, peppers, green and yellow beans, potatoes, and all sorts of other veggies will be available this year. Free range, home grown frozen roasting chickens and turkeys are also available.
Garlic Scapes are the wild and curly shoots that spring from the tops of garlic plants. They’re brilliantly green, can be thick or thin, curved or corkscrewed, and, depending on how they’re cut, just long or very long. They’ve got a mild garlic fragrance and a mellow garlic flavor. Smell the cut end or snap one and the scent will be a cross between garlic and summer grass. It’s got a freshness that garlic loses as it develops. The scapes, which look as beautiful in the garden as they do at the market, are meant to be cut — cutting them strengthens the garlic bulbs that are growing underground — so it’s a win-win for the garlic and us, the cooks. Although scapes needn’t be cooked. In fact, if you do cook them, you should cook them lightly, maybe in a quick stir-fry.
We think you get the most from garlic scapes by using them raw. They’re terrific chopped or very thinly sliced added to a tuna or chicken salad, stirred into hot rice or scattered over a salad, the way you might scatter sliced scallions or an herb. They also make a wonderful pesto that can be stirred into pasta for a wonderful quick supper.
Reach out to [email protected] for more information!
GARLIC SCAPE AND ALMOND PESTO
Makes about 1 cup
10 garlic scapes (1 bunch), finely chopped
1/3 to 1/2 cup finely grated Parmesan (to taste and texture)
1/3 cup slivered almonds, pine nuts or sunflower seeds (you could toast them lightly, if you’d like)
About 1/2 cup olive oil
Sea salt
Put the scapes, 1/3 cup of the cheese, almonds and half the olive oil in the bowl of a food processor (or use a blender or a mortar and pestle). Whir to chop and blend all the ingredients and then add the remainder of the oil and, if you want, more cheese. If you like the texture, stop; if you’d like it a little thinner, add some more oil. Season with salt.
If you’re not going to use the pesto immediately, press a piece of plastic against the surface to keep it from oxidizing. The pesto can be stored in the refrigerator for a couple of days or packed airtight and frozen for a couple of months, by which time our tomatoes should be at their juciest.
http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/06/the-crisper-whisperer-what-to-do-with-garlic-scapes-recipe.html
http://www.canadianliving.com/food/garlic_scapes_and_potato_salad.php
White Bean and Garlic Scapes Dip (New York Times)
1/3 cup sliced garlic scapes (3 to 4)
1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice, more to taste
1/2 teaspoon coarse sea salt, more to taste
Ground black pepper to taste
1 can (15 ounces) cannellini beans, rinsed and drained
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil, more for drizzling.
1. In a food processor, process garlic scapes with lemon juice, salt and pepper until finely chopped. Add cannellini beans and process to a rough purée.
2. With motor running, slowly drizzle olive oil through feed tube and process until fairly smooth. Pulse in 2 or 3 tablespoons water, or more, until mixture is the consistency of a dip. Add more salt, pepper and/or lemon juice, if desired.
3. Spread out dip on a plate, drizzle with olive oil, and sprinkle with more salt.
Yield: 1 1/2 cups.