A love letter to farmers' markets

Plus, notes on grocery shopping for yourself, and a zingy, easy pesto pasta recipe

Hello! This is my first real newsletter!! My plan as of now is to start off with some (hopefully helpful) ramblings about food and cooking for yourself, add in a dash of recipes you can make at home, and finish it off with a sprinkle of the new recipes you can find on my site now. You can click the links through this newsletter to get to them, and everything will also live in the Recipe Archive tab at the top of my website. Happy cooking!

The Union Square Greenmarket on a Wednesday afternoon

Let me sing the praises of the New York City farmers’ market!

When I first moved to the city, I didn’t realize how much I missed fresh produce until I discovered the greenmarket. It’s a big NYC-wide farmers’ market that sources from all over the Northeast, and takes place throughout the week across the city. Every Saturday, I would trek from Brooklyn all the way out to Union Square, and then take the subway back carrying two pounds of potatoes and a bag of leeks and three different types of cheese. It’s so refreshing to see piles of green produce lined up under the big city buildings, and to emerge from the grime of the subway station to crates full of apples and berries, and counters full of bread and pastries. It’s also nice to connect with the people who sell and grow the food you eat! Greenmarket interactions feel like a little slice of small town life in a big city.

I think the best thing about the market is the number of new ingredients I’ve discovered. Different types of mushrooms, Japanese sweet potatoes, Jerusalem artichokes, all the many varieties of tomato, shishito peppers…the list goes on and on! Knowing that I have a new ingredient in my fridge gets me excited about cooking, expands my palette and experience, and helps me engage with the food that I make for myself. I went from not knowing that mushrooms existed besides criminis, to shiitakes being a staple in my fridge.

Here’s a January (or February) challenge—what if every week you find an ingredient you’ve never cooked before, and discover something new?

Yes, the costs do add up at the farmer’s market. But I’m finding things I can’t find at the grocery store, and I feel as if I’m engaging with my food more intentionally. I tend to buy anything that’s interesting to me at the market, and then supplement my pantry at the grocery store with normal things, like oils, tofu, pasta, etc. And because I go pretty much once a week, coming up with dinner ideas is much simpler—I just look in my fridge and decide from there.

The key to grocery shopping for yourself is not to overdo it. You need less than you think. Go as seldom as possible so you don’t over-purchase—once or twice a week only! Not only will it save you money and food waste, but a few days of feeling like you “have nothing in your fridge” can actually push you to be more creative with your recipes. Get to know the brands and kitchen staples you like to have (for me, it’s things like tofu, cheese, potatoes, pastas, eggs, butter), then supplement from there with fun things, like fancy mushrooms or green onions or raviolis.

A recent greenmarket haul

If you have a recipe you really want to make, by all means purchase your ingredients around that! And then if you have some leftover ingredients, I get inspiration just by searching for the food—use NYT Cooking, Bon Appétit, Instagram, or even just Google, to find ideas. Once you get to know the best ways to make an ingredient shine, you can start experimenting with it yourself! (Speaking of which, anyone have ideas for what I can do with all these carrots??)

Below are two new recipes that I’ve developed with ingredients from the greenmarket. One is for spinach pesto, and the other is for a pasta dish to make with the pesto! They’re bright and fresh, and remind me that really great food can be made at home, even in the middle of winter in New York City. Check them out below, or find them in the Recipe Archive tab at the top of my page.

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Spinach pesto

This pesto may be made from the humble spinach leaf, but don’t worry, it really packs a punch. It’s a great, healthy (ish?) sauce you can add to a bunch of things—pasta, toast, sandwiches, pizzas, chicken…the pesto-bilities are endless! Adjust the garlic levels to your liking, and start small, as raw garlic can be pretty pungent. The parmesan is also optional if you don’t like/want cheese.

Ingredients/Tools:

• Two big handfuls of spinach

• 1/2 to 1 clove of garlic

• Dollop of dijon mustard

• Lemon juice

• Grated parmesan

• Olive oil

• Mini food processor

Method:

Wash the spinach leaves, then add them to the food processor with a bit of olive oil, and blend them first. Then add garlic, mustard, lemon juice, and blend. Add in the parmesan, more oil, blend it again. Lastly, add salt, pepper, chili flakes to taste, and any more oil and blending needed to make it smooth and saucy.

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Agnolotti with crispy mushrooms and spinach pesto

This dish is made up of ingredients you can find at the farmers market, and it’s full of flavor and texture—the mushrooms are crispy and buttery, the pasta is smooth and meaty, the cheese adds creaminess, and the spinach pesto brightens it all up. I used agnolotti al brasato, a meat-filled little pasta pocket, but any tiny pasta pocket will do, like tortellini or a small ravioli. You can also use any type of mushrooms—I recommend using more than one, and combining a heartier mushroom like a portobello, crimini, or white button mushroom, with a fancy, lacier one like an oyster or a maitake. If you do combine them, cook out the moisture from the heftier mushrooms first, before adding the fancy ones, so they all achieve the same level of crispy goodness.

Ingredients

• Agnolotti al brasato (or another small pasta pocket)

• Butter, olive oil

• Small portobello mushrooms (or criminis, white)

• Yellow oyster mushrooms (or oyster, maitake, shitake)

• Mozzarella, or another farmers market cheese

• Parmesan

• Spinach pesto

Method:

1. Boil water for the pasta. Salt it well! Add pasta when the water is ready.

2. Chop mushrooms (or pull them apart if using oysters, maitakes, or another lacy mushroom).

3. Add butter and a bit of olive oil to a pan, heat it, and add the portobellos. Let them sauté until they’ve released a lot of their moisture, then add in the oyster mushrooms. Coat them in the butter and let them sit in the pan before moving too much—you want them to really get crispy!

4. Add salt and pepper when the mushrooms are nice and crisped, and let them sit in the pan, flame off, until the pasta is ready.

5. Layer up! Pasta first with a little bit of butter, then drizzles of pesto, then the mushrooms, then bits of mozzarella, then grated parmesan to top it off.

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New Recipes on the Site

Below is a collection of all the new recipes you can find on my site this week. Let me know if you try any of them!!

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Chicken Tikka

This is a typical appetizer at Indian restaurants, that’s basically just chicken, marinated in yogurt with lemon juice and a bunch of spices, and baked a really high heat. Traditionally it would be made in a tandoor (a super hot clay oven), but this recipe achieves the same crispy, charred exterior and soft, juicy interior, just using your oven and a grill pan! This recipe is for one person, but for me it makes a bit more than a meal—so leftovers also works great in a sandwich, either as a naan-taco or with normal bread.

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Scallion pancakes

When I want a cooking project I can still make on a weeknight, and I have a lot of alliums (scallions, leeks, green garlic, etc) scallion pancakes are always what come to mind! Be warned, it’s a project—they require a fair amount of cleanup and at least a couple hours of your life, but they’re so fun and worth it. And if you make too many, turns out they’re also delicious the next day as leftovers, even cold!! Here is my recipe for one! (Makes about 8 pancakes)

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Potato Leek Soup

Sundays in winter are for stirring and simmering and sipping on some SOUP. Also, did you know you can make your own croutons just by chopping up some bread and roasting in olive oil?! I used brioche and added garlic powder and salt and WOW what a game changer!! I think this recipe the best out of all the potato leek soups I’ve made so far. So here it is, in all its liquid glory!! NB: the recipe below makes 4 servings for one person (because what’s the point of making soup if you’re not going to make yourself leftovers?)

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Tandoori Tofu Nuggets

Ever wanted to make a chicken nugget at home but had no idea where to start? Enter, tofu nuggets! They’re just as good (if not better) than chicken nuggets, and they’re much simpler since you don’t have to use ground chicken (or however you make a chicken nugget, I honestly have no idea). They get super crispy on the outside, and the inside stays springy and soft, and of course the tofu takes on any flavor you give it. Give these a try, and you WILL be a tofu convert!!

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