Beyond Mustard and Ketchup - Spreads and Dips for Burgers

If you are looking for an uncommon condiment option for your backyard bar-b-que this summer, consider the following recipes.  Each can be used on burgers as well as other sandwiches and wraps, and the hummus and chipotle spread make dandy dips for crackers and fresh vegetables.  What a perfect reason to visit the farmer's market soon!

Spreads and Dips that double as wonderful Burger Condiments from Mary Phillips...

Home Made Hummus

This classic dip and spread is gaining in popularity, but is often overlooked as a sandwich ingredient.  Hummus is excellent on traditional and veggie burgers, especially when paired with sprouts and avocados. 

Ingredients

4 cloves fresh garlic

2 cups canned chickpeas, drained, liquid reserved

1 1/2 teaspoons salt to taste

1/3 cup tahini (sesame paste)

6 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice (2 lemons)

1/4 cup olive oil

Options: add a teaspoon of cayenne pepper, a few sundried tomatoes, or roasted red peppers for custom flavors.

Directions

Turn on the food processor fitted with the steel blade and drop the garlic down the feed tube; process until it's minced. Add the rest of the ingredients to the processor and blend until the hummus is coarsely pureed. Taste, for seasoning, and serve chilled or at room temperature.

Nutty Chipotle Spread

Too good to be true! Your vegetarian friends will thank you for this amazing spread that tastes like a chipotle cheese sauce.  Excellent on veggie burgers as well as traditional burgers with a few slices of bacon.  Your meat-loving friends will thank you, too, just before they faint when you tell them the ingredients.  Have a spoon handy, you might want to eat it right out of the bowl.

Ingredients

1 cup roasted cashews

3/4 cup water

Juice of 1/2 lemon

4 chipotles in adobo sauce ( you may need to adjust to your heat preference, start with 2 and  go from there)

Fresh garlic and salt to taste

Directions

In a blender, process cashews into very fine pieces. Add lemon juice, chipotle and garlic salt and water.  Be sure to add water slowly until desired consistency is reached. Blend about 1 minute, until smooth, scraping sides as necessary. Makes about 2 cups.

Fresh Dilled Mayonnaise

If you have never had mayonnaise from your own blender instead of a jar, now is the time to try it.  For summer sandwiches, add a bit of hot pepper and dill.  This is so good you won't want to put anything else on your burger – not even a bun!

Ingredients

2 egg yolks* from fresh eggs

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (more or less to taste)

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

2 teaspoons fresh dill

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon white sugar

3 tablespoons fresh squeezed lemon juice or vinegar (or combination)

1 cup vegetable oil

Directions:

Put the egg, pepper, salt, mustard, white sugar and half of the oil in the blender.

Start on high and run until smoothly mixed.

With the blender running, slowly add the lemon juice and remainder of the oil.

Keep an eye out to be sure that as the mayonnaise thickens it stays down in contact with the blender blades

* RAW WARNING: this recipe contains raw eggs, which may carry salmonella bacterium (about 1 in every 20,000 eggs carries salmonella).  Use only fresh eggs with clean, intact shells from reliable sources, or SUBSTITUTE a dried egg yolk powder.  

Perfect Pesto

When summer gives you basil, make pesto.  This wonderful spread is fantastic on burgers when paired with a mild cheese and tomatoes.  It is also amazing on light summer wraps filled with fresh veggies and turkey.  Pesto freezes well, so make a double batch.

Ingredients

2 cups packed fresh basil leaves

2 fresh garlic cloves

1/4 cup pine nuts or walnuts

2/3 cup olive oil divided

Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

1/2 cup freshly grated pecorino, parmesan or Romano cheese 

Directions

Combine the basil, garlic, and pine nuts in a food processor and pulse until coarsely chopped. Add 1/2 cup of the oil and process until fully incorporated and smooth. Season with salt and pepper.

If using immediately, add all the remaining oil and pulse until smooth. Transfer the pesto to a large serving bowl and mix in the cheese.

If freezing, transfer to an air-tight container and drizzle remaining oil over the top. Freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw and stir in cheese.

Sugar Snap Pea Salad

This fast and easy salad is a unique way to serve sugar snap peas when they are in season.  Look for fresh sugar snaps at your local farmers market early - mid spring.  They don't like hot weather, so we harvested the last of ours here in Texas over the weekend.  This yummy treat will be the final homage to the peas until the fall, when we hope to get a quick crop in before winter comes:)

Sugar Snap Pea Salad with Pancetta

Toss together in a large bowl:
2 cups - give or take - fresh sugar snap peas sliced lengthwise
1/4 cup cooked and crumbled pancetta OR, as a vegetarian option, 1/4 seasoned and lightly pan roasted pecans...I use salt and a bit of cayenne to season the nuts
1/4 cup finely diced onion
1/4 cup olive oil, whisked together with 2 Tbs lemon juice and/or 2 Tbs red wine vinegar plus salt, pepper and fresh garlic to suit your tastes

A sweet and sour delight! Enjoy...

Easy tarts with sweet cheese and summer berries

When summer give you berries, make tarts! These are so fast and simple:

The crust is made from Nasoya Natural Dumpling Wraps.  The little round pastry crusts fit right inside an oiled mini-muffin tin.  Dust with a little cinnamon and sugar, then pop into a 350 degree oven until crispy and browned. Remove from the baking tin and let cool.

Mix up some organic ricotta (well drained and dry) with either brown sugar or honey and fill each crust.  A cup of ricotta will fill 2 dozen tarts.  

Top with fresh berries and garnish with sprigs of mint from your garden.

Berry and Sweet Cheese Tarts

empty shells fresh from the oven

Once you make these simple tart shells, you will be filling them with endless combinations: mushrooms and cheese, scrambled egg with fresh chard, grated and sauteed zucchini and onions with Parmesan... Let your imagination go wild with whatever is available at your local farmer's market this week! xo

In Praise of Fennel

Fennel is so much more than a culinary herb plant...Yes, it is delish as a salad or seasoning; but also as a wonderful addition for a butterfly garden! It starts easily from seeds, often reseeding itself generously each spring... Swallowtail butterflies in particular are drawn to the aromatic foliage, but rarely eat enough so that there isn't enough to share:) Try this multipurpose plant from seeds or seedlings this spring! xo

Swallowtail larva on fennel

Veggie Garden Sampler - another idea collection

As usual, when I can't sleep, I browse the web for garden porn... tonight it is all veggie gardens for some reason.  Maybe I'm hungry:) Hope these leave you inspired to go get dirty, too! xo

think you can't garden on a hilly lot? 

Mosaic Glass Block Garden Lights

We will be making these awesome garden lights at our next Wine and Whimsy event:

Wednesday, May 2, 2012 7:00 - 9:00 pm

Suggested materials (and wine) donation: $25.00

click here for location link and map...

We had to special order the blocks, and my 'classroom' is still wee and tiny, so 19 ladies max this time:) xoxo

Radish Salad, an alkaline treat...

It is radish season, and the little devils can pile up during harvest time rather quickly! Our very favorite way to serve them (other than right out of the ground with some bleu cheese dressing) is in this wonderful and crunchy salad.  It is a very alkaline mixture of raw veggies and herbs, and thus wonderful for ze body~~~

enjoy~

radish salad

Gather:
Radishes, zucchini, cauliflower in equal proportions. Approximately 2 cups CHOPPED each will made ample servings with plenty to have as leftovers.
I send the radishes and zucchini through the food processor on 'slice' to save time.  I'm lazy that way.

In a bowl, whisk together:
-1/4 cup olive oil
-1/4 cup lemon juice (ok, I use more like 1/2 cup oil and juice each because I like my salad to drip)
-fresh or dried garlic to suit your garlic needs:)
-fresh or dried dill, about 1 tsp but we like more more more
-salt and pepper to taste

Coat the tossed veggies with the dressing and chill at least an hour.

First harvest of the season

Try to stop eating this salad once you start.  I dare you!

Happy radish in the dirt:)

Metal and Hardwood Garden Benches; New From Forgotten Works Studio 2012

Our newest benches are Pure Texas! As always, we use 100% reclaimed materials that are byproducts of Texas industries: steel scrap from the oil and gas companies, solid native hardwoods left behind due to construction or industrial development, and leathers and hides from the cattle ranching world...

Marshmallow bench: $2250.00; powder coated steel and hide

Mesquite table/ bench from our 'pierced' series: $695.00

Ribbon bench: $2250.00 - powder coated steel in lime and solid mesquite with marine finish

Wood legged bench: SOLD $1195.00

Email Maryphillips8888@sbcglobal.net for more information, or call  Eddie at 817-395-2588 

Our Bohemian Homestead; a visual history...

U.G.L.Y. Yup, it sure starts out plain, so keep scrolling down!

I am blown away by the changes! This is the first time to upload all of the photos and view them side by side. It just goes to show: you don't have to start with something fancy! All we started with was a dream for Forgotten Works; an interactive garden/gallery full of inspiration for gardeners and new homestead enthusiasts...

October 2006 we moved our wee green bungelow to 7 acres of pasture; up from the lush creekbed where it had flooded twice.

By Summer of 2007 it was yellow for some reason, and the sheet composting project to help add nutrients to the worn out soil had begun in earnest.

2008 saw the addition of a small lakehouse (400 sf) to the left (west side) - to serve as a studio and office -and a kiosk to the right (east) side - to become a sunroom (currently the sun room houses two smelly teenage boys!)

2009 (right) was the turning point: the sunroom had windows and was actually attached with a door, and the plantings were beginning to look more natural, more permanent... not quite as "little oasis in the pasture".

2010(below): Eddie shattered his ankle, so it was all I could do to keep everything alive. We didn't see too much expansion (the orchard gained 40 trees), but the plants really started to fill in and make the place look established! Looks like we are sticking with the red, too;)

The gardens, too, have seen progress. We started with a herb bed, and honestly didn't know where we were going next!

The first few years were all about building soil ... in fact, this process is still very important and far from finished. In a perfect world, we would have improved ALL of the soil before planting anything, but that isn't very fun, is it? :) Looking east is the herb bed and veggie beds beyond. Year one sure was bleak!

We added a shed, and while working on soil improvement we let lots of legumes take over and work their magic as cover crops amid a few perennial herbs. I had surgery in 2008, so it was a pretty scraggly year!

2009 and 2010 were turning points for the garden as well: it crossed the threshold from 'pasted onto the landscape' over to 'a PART of the landscape'... I am sure the ever improving soil helps as well, and it sure makes all of the loads of manure hauled from the local stables seem worth it!

Other improvements include adding molasses and cornmeal to the soil, as well as beneficial nematodes and fungi cultures: it's all about building a healthy soil ecosystem capable of sustaining life!!!

A few beneficial insects like ladybugs have helped out as well, and I can't underestimate the value of the chickens when it comes to consumming harmful insect pests!

Conclusion: don't move just because your 'house' doesn't feel like 'home' yet! You can start with something plain (or hell, like us, even downright ugly!) and transform it into a lush, nurturing haven with just a dash of homestead savvy.

I can't wait to see what the next four years bring,,,time to go get dirty my friends!

Seed Bombs - a make-it-yourself guide

materials for seed bombs are inexpensive and easy to find

If you have ever had the urge to beautify an empty lot or barren urban space, then easy-to-make seed bombs can be a wonderful way to enable spontaneous floral attacks!  As a child, you probably called this pocket-sized phenomenon a 'dirt ball', but with the addition of two key ingredients, these messy clots of clay become magically transformed into weapons of mass-creation. 

Gather up a large bowl, a small shovel, a pitcher of water and a baking sheet.  Then follow this simple recipe:

slowly add water, it is an art, not a science:)

5 parts clay soil (5 cups will make about 36 healthy bombs).  If you are cursed with heavy clay soil in your yard, then this is a perfect use for it.  If not, use Red Art clay, available at potter supply stores or craft stores.

2 parts (2 cups) compost.  This can be your own home-made compost or garden center bagged compost.

1 part (1 cup) seeds.  Avoid very large seeds like beans or peas.  Native and easy-to-grow varieties are best: try zinnia, fall clematis, Echinacea, sunflower, clover, or vetch.

Mix all of your ingredients in a large bowl until evenly dispersed and crumbly.  Add water until the mixture is moist enough to stick together.

Roll bombs about the size of a golf ball and place them on a cookie sheet to dry.  Do not bake in oven or you will kill your seeds.  Allowing the bombs to dry slowly will result in fewer cracks.

To make seed bombs as a school project, use 'buckets' or another large measuring devise in place of 'cups' in the recipe.  Package your seed bombs in decorated envelopes to give as gifts, and be sure to keep one tucked in your pocket or purse just in case you see a plot of land that needs a boost of colorful life!  

For more seed bomb fun, look for a video coming soon from Mansfield Magazine Online!