Kale and Leafy Greens Salad with Garlic Homegrown Garlic Vinaigrette

I have been enjoying homegrown season to the fullest this week! Tonite, our family of four celebrated a low-key Father’s day at home with bone-in ribeyes from our friend who raises our beef, Jack McCormick of Ellis Grove. Jack provides us with steers for our meat department and he produces beautifully marbled beef. The steaks were amazing but I think they were even better because of our buffet of homegrown veggies! In addition to grilled beets, potatoes and onions and the last of the season asparagus, we made a fresh garlic dressing for a greens salad.

A few years ago, Chris and I took a couples cooking class at the Kitchen Conservatory in Clayton MO. We especially enjoyed the recipe for fresh garlic dressing. I have modified the recipe a bit to use honey instead of sugar and to let the fresh farm garlic really shine. I hope you will give it a try. Freshly-harvested garlic is very mild and roasting it mellows it even further. The result is a savory dressing with a hint of sweetness. I guarantee it will become your favorite balsamic dressing of the season!

 I hope you had a great Father’s Day weekend too! Eat well this summer, Angie

For dressing:

2 heads of Eckert’s Homegrown Garlic
½ cup plus 2 Tbs. olive oil
1/8 cup fresh parsley leaves
1/3 cup balsamic vinegar
1 tsp Eckert’s Pure Honey
½ tsp Kosher salt
¼ tsp fresh cracked pepper
2 Tbs water

For salad:

5 cups of mixed greens and Eckert’s Homegrown Kale
1 cup of Eckert’s Homegrown Sungold Cherry Tomatoes, halved
2 oz goat cheese
Fresh cracked pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Cut tops of garlic heads off (remove about 1/4 “ of papery tops). Place heads in an oven safe dish. Drizzle 2 Tbs olive oil over heads. Cover with foil and bake for 45 minutes. Remove garlic from oven, remove foil and allow heads to cool for 15 minutes.

Squeeze cloves out of papery heads into a blender or food processor. Process or blend roasted garlic, parsley, and vinegar. Drizzle in oil. Then add honey, salt, pepper and water until well incorporated.

Arrange greens in a medium bowl. Top with tomatoes and drizzle with dressing. Top with goat cheese crumbles and fresh cracked pepper. Serve immediately.

Aunt Helen’s Strawberry Salad

The days of May seem to trot along at a hectic pace filled with a plethora of end-of-school year activities and celebrations. Can you relate? My husband and I both have May birthdays, our anniversary and Mother’s Day tucked in there to celebrate! Of course I find this all fun but it does seem to cut into my time in the kitchen.

 Last week I needed a quick, seasonal salad for several weekend get-togethers with friends and family so I opted for Aunt Helen’s Strawberry Salad for several occasions.  Now it may seem like cheating to use bottled salad dressing, but I declare it officially isn’t if you are having a busy week! And if you want to be a little sneaky about it, you could pour the dressing into a Ball jar and act like you made it from scratch. I promise I won’t tell a soul!

The dressing in this salad, Aunt Helen’s Sweet Vinaigrette, has a balance of sweet and tangy flavors that compliments ripe strawberries. I most often make this salad with feta cheese but it is also tasty with Swiss or Provel. I like it best topped with sliced almonds but walnuts are also delicious.

While this salad is named in honor of Aunt Helen, my husband’s great aunt, the recipe is not actually hers. We named  it after her so we could remember  her spunky personality and celebrate that she lived to be 105 years old! Aunt Helen’s Salad can be found on our restaurant menu and the dressing is for sale in our Country Store in Belleville.

I look forward to making this many more times this strawberry season and I hope you will give it a try when you find yourself craving a delightful salad amidst a busy week.

Eat well this spring, Angie

Aunt Helen’s Strawberry Salad

5-6 cups mixed salad greens

½ cup shredded Swiss cheese or Feta cheese crumbles

1/3 cup English walnuts or slivered almonds

Aunt Helen’s Sweet Vinaigrette drizzled to taste

We are so excited to announce that we now have Homegrown Strawberries available for purchase in our Country Store in Belleville and even more excited to tell you that Pick-Your-Own Strawberries will open this Saturday, May 17th at 9am at our Belleville Farm. As always, please check our harvest hotline for the most up-to-date picking information.

Chicken Salad with Pesto Vinaigrette

This week's temperatures have me craving basil like crazy- is anyone else with me? My basil plants are happily enjoying the warm, dry days from their playful patio pots. Since it is early in the growing season, I don’t have quite enough leaf production to make pesto from scratch which lead me to a recipe short cut. I used Cucino Vina's Pesto in a jar or as I call it "presto pesto" to satisfy my basil craving!

The pesto vinaigrette only calls for a tablespoon of pesto yet it adds an unbelievable amount of flavor to the salad. I have included the recipe for homemade pesto in hopes of inspiring you to plant lots of basil this spring. By the way, now is the perfect time to plant basil and we have sweet, cinnamon and thai basil plants available in our greenhouse in Belleville.

Give this refreshing and flavorsome salad a try if you want to get an early glimpse of summer flavor!

Eat Well, Angie

Pesto vinaigrette

¼ cup white wine vinegar

¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 Tbs. pesto (see recipe on p. 26)

2 tsp. fresh lemon juice

1 tsp. whole-grain Dijon mustard

½ tsp. salt

¼ tsp. ground black pepper

Chicken Salad

3 cups chopped cooked chicken

1 cup cored and chopped tomato

½ cup chopped black olives

½ cup chopped artichoke hearts

¼ cup toasted walnuts

4 slices Eckert's Hummingbird bread or 4 lettuce leaves

To prepare pesto vinaigrette: In a small bowl, whisk together vinegar, oil, pesto, lemon juice, mustard, salt, and pepper. Cover and chill.

To prepare salad: In a medium bowl, combine chicken, tomato, olives, artichokes and walnuts. Add the Pesto Vinaigrette, tossing gently to coat. Serve immediately open face on bread or on top of a lettuce leaf. Makes 4 servings.

Basic Basil Pesto

Kosher salt and ground black pepper

1 peeled clove garlic

¼ cup toasted pine nuts or walnuts

3 cups packed, fresh basil leaves

⅔ cup extra virgin olive oil, divided

 ½ cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese

On a cutting board, sprinkle ¼ teaspoon salt over garlic and roughly chop. Using the flat side of a knife, crush garlic mixture into a thick paste. Add paste to a food processor with nuts, basil and 1 tablespoon olive oil. Pulse until ingredients are finely chopped. With machine running, add remaining olive oil in a slow steady stream. Add Parmesan and pulse to combine. Season with salt and pepper. Makes about 1 cup.

Register for this class or see a full listing of upcoming classes by clicking here.

Oven-Baked White Asparagus

We are very excited to announce the beginning of homegrown white asparagus season! Eckert’s is proud to now have fresh-cut, white asparagus for sale in our Country Store in Belleville. White asparagus is different from its green counterpart because it grows underground in mounds of soil. The deprivation of sunlight (and therefore chlorophyll) results in white stalks instead of green. The flavor of white asparagus is bit more bitter than green and that is why I love to serve with fresh slices of lemon to counter-balance the natural flavor.

Take a look at our grower, Don Ross, who farms white asparagus just a stones-throw from one of our peach farms, on his harvesting machine. He drives over the rows of asparagus and cuts tips under the earth. I encourage you to give this unique vegetable a try. The flavor is uniquely delicious and the growing story is a long-standing German tradition! It doesn’t get much more local than this….

 

1 lb. white asparagus spears, ends trimmed and peeled
2 Tbs. butter
Salt &  Pepper

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Wash asparagus and place spears on a large sheet of heavy-duty aluminum foil; dot with butter. Bring edges of foil together to form a pouch, seal tightly and place on a cookie sheet. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until asparagus is “crisp-tender.” Carefully open foil to allow steam to escape. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Makes 4 servings.

Oven Roasted Chicken with Herb Butter

Thank you Show Me St. Louis! I had a ball at the station last Thursday making Herb Butter with Host Julie. Cooking on Show-Me is always a pleasure J

I made Herb Butter in during the demo and Julie loved it on Eckert’s Bakery Bread. Luckily, I had a extra Herb Butter to take home after the demo so I decided to use it on chicken last night. The results were delicious and kid-approved!! (Really! The kids didn’t even mind the little flecks of “green stuff.””) I simply melted the herb butter in the microwave for 20 seconds and brushed it on chicken pieces from Eckert’s Butcher Shop. I hope you will give both of the recipes a try.

Thank goodness fresh herbs are finally here in our greenhouse at Eckert’s. I have started to grow a few on my windowsill and as a result I am feeling like I have a little more optimism about spring actually arriving….

Eat well this winter-like spring, Angie

Eckert’s Garlic Herb Butter - As Featured on Show Me St. Louis

1 head garlic
1 Tbs. olive oil
3 Tbs. fresh thyme
3 Tbs. fresh rosemary
3 Tbs. fresh sage
3 Tbs. fresh parsley
1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

With a knife, trim the papery tip off the head of the garlic to expose the white tips of the cloves. Leave cloves connected to the root end. Place bulb of cloves on aluminum foil. Drizzle with oil and wrap with foil. Bake 30-45 minutes or until cloves are soft when pressed. Remove foil and allow garlic to cool.

Extract the soft garlic from the skins and discard skins.

In a small bowl, combine garlic, butter and herbs until well-combined. If desired, shape butter into a log and wrap with wax paper. Store in refrigerator up to 1 week or freeze for up to 3 months.

Oven Roasted Chicken with Herb Butter

3 Tbs Melted Herb Butter

3 ½ pounds bone-in, skin-on chicken pieces (2 split breasts cut crosswise, 2 drumsticks, and 2 thighs)

Rinse chicken pieces and pat chicken dry with paper towels. Lightly season with salt and pepper. In a oven-proof baking pan, place chicken pieces, skin side up; arranging breast pieces in center and leg and thigh pieces around the outside of the baking pan.

Brush chicken with herb butter. (If butter is cold, warm a few seconds in microwave). Roast until breasts register 160-degrees and legs and thighs register 175-degrees about 35 to 40 minutes. Rotate the baking pan half-way through the roasting.

Transfer chicken to a warm serving platter. Tent loosely with aluminum foil and let rest 5 to 10 minutes.

We still have a few spots available in our upcoming herb classes. We are offering a herb class this Saturday, March 29th and another herb class on April 12th. Click here for a full listing of our upcoming classes.

Pork Tenderloin with Creamy Paprika Sauce

Does anyone else tear hundreds of recipes out of magazines throughout the year? I have the greatest intentions of making them ALL but I admittedly fall short of my culinary goal. On a day without scheduled evening activities, I dig into my collection of jagged recipe pages and select something that catches my fancy. I try to select the recipe before I leave the house so I can make sure to pick up the required ingredients.   

This recipe was inspired by a Cooking Light issue from months ago. It was listed as a 30 minute meal and it took me a bit longer but it was worth every extra minute spent. The sauce was creamy and flavorful, the pork was tender and I will definitely make it again. I changed a few things in the original recipe to make it a little more kid-friendly and to create a fuller-flavored sauce.

 

 A stainless steel skillet is key to allowing the meat to brown long enough to leave browned bits on the pan. (If you want to know why, Google “Maillard Reaction.”) In my usual hurried cooking manor, I rush the browning steps and in turn sacrifice flavor. Luckily, my patient husband was standing over my shoulder encouraging me to allow the browning steps “to go a little longer” on the pork and onions. Thanks Honey!

1 1/2 lb Eckert’s pork tenderloin, cut into 1 inch pieces

1/2 tsp salt, divided
1/2 tsp freshly ground pepper, divided
4 Tbs. Olive oil, divided
1 cup finely diced onions
3 large cloves garlic, minced
3 Tbs. all-purpose flour
3 Tbs. tomato paste
1 tsp. paprika 
3/4 cup dry white wine
1 1/2 cup chicken stock
2 Tbs apple cider vinegar
3 Tbs light or regular sour cream ( I used Mexican cream. Yum!)
4 cups cooked rice or noodles
Fresh chopped parsley or chives, (optional)

Sprinkle pork with 1/4 teaspoon of salt and pepper. Heat a large stainless steel skillet over medium-high heat. Add 2 tablespoons oil and swirl to coat. Add pork and cook 3-4 minutes per side. Turn meat with tongs only when it pulls easily away from the pan, resisting the urge to tug it free.

Once browned, remove pork from pan and set aside.

Return skillet to medium heat and add remaining 2 tablespoons of oil. Add onion, garlic and remaining salt and pepper to skillet and sauté 4 more minutes. Add flour, tomato paste and paprika, sauté stirring constantly for 1 to 3 minutes or until the mixture is well-browned.

Add wine to deglaze the pan and cook 2 minutes while whisking the browned bits loose from the bottom of the pan. Add stock and vinegar and bring sauce to a boil. Return pork pieces to the skillet and simmer for 5 minutes or until pork reaches an internal temperature of 145 degrees. Remove pan from heat and stir in sour cream. Serve pork over a bed of rice or noodles if desired. Top with fresh parsley or chives if using. Makes 6 servings. 

Eat Well this Winter, Angie

 

Roasted Brussel Sprouts with White Wine

Our culinary team has been brainstorming plans and recipes for 4^th Annual Wine and FoodFestival at our Belleville Country Store on March 1^st and 2^nd. I am thrilled to have a new excuse to dig into my recipe file called “Cooking with Wine.” Last night Chris grilled some gorgeous steaks from our fresh meat department and I had the simple task of preparing the sides. I pulled this recipe from my files and within a few minutes it was roasting beautifully in the oven.

Chris and I were both impressed with this first-time recipe (Admittedly, the kids were not so big on

it but then again, they don’t ever like brussel sprouts!) The acidity of the wine and lemon juice complimented the bitterness of the brussel sprouts beautifully. I used a chardonnay but any dry white wine would work just fine. Give this delicious and simple recipe a try!

 

 

 

2 cups brussel sprouts, halved

2 cloves of garlic, sliced

2 Tbs minced shallots

2 Tbs white wine

2 Tbs lemon juice

2 Tbs olive oil

½ tsp salt

Preheat oven 350 degrees. Toss ingredients together in a 9x9 or similar size baking dish. Bake 15 minutes. Stir and bake another 15 minutes or until sprouts are beginning to soften and brown.

Eat well this winter, Angie

 

Please join us, March 1st & 2nd for a celebration of wine & local foods! Be sure to bring this coupon with you to receive $10 worth of FREE groceries.

 

Hugs and Kisses Grilled Cheese

This recipe is so adorable for Valentine’s week! Our classroom educators love coming up with new recipes for our various classes. Ms. Connie and Ms. Dorothy are the creative forces behind the February Mommy and Me class in our Cooking Classroom.  Their recipes were so popular that our first two classes sold out! Luckily we decided to add a third class on February 22^nd at 9:30 for children ages 2-5. (Visit us online to register http://eckerts.stores.yahoo.net/mawilosafe22.html).

I love their festive grilled cheese and certainly it can be modified to accommodate even the pickiest of kids. I think it is a perfect sandwich for breakfast, lunch or dinner. My kids love to make grilled cheese on the electric griddle so we will be making these at home later this week.

 

 

 Eat well this Valentine’s Day, Angie

 Hugs and Kisses Grilled Cheese

1 tablespoon cream cheese, softened
1 teaspoon powdered sugar
Dash of cinnamon
2 slices raisin bread
1-2 slices of apple (we used Eckert’s Homegrown Fuji)
1 slice Muenster cheese
Butter

Mix cream cheese, powdered sugar, and cinnamon. Spread on one piece of raisin bread. Top with apple slice and cheese. In remaining piece of bread, cut out a heart using a 2-inch heart cookie cutter. Place that slice of bread on top of cheese. Preheat and butter a non-stick griddle. Toast sandwich on both sides until golden brown and cheese is melted. Makes 1 serving.

Eckert's Sweet Party Meatballs

My favorite part about Super Bowl is the ….. FOOD! Are you with me on that? I can’t tell you who is playing but I can tell you what I will be serving. Speaking of that, I have been looking for a good meatball appetizer recipe for Super Bowl Sunday for several weeks. I was intrigued by the many recipes for cocktail meatballs calling for grape jelly but I wanted to put an Eckert’s spin on it. I experimented last night with a few sauces until I arrived at this sweet and savory combination.

The meatballs themselves were moist and very flavorful. They would be great on pasta with tomato sauce or as an appetizer straight from the oven. The combination of Eckert’s Peach Grilling Sauce and Eckert’s Peach Preserves provides a sweet medium to keep the meatballs moist throughout a party.  I will be making them again this Sunday and I hope you will too.

This is our last week for our ground beef special in our Belleville Country Store. When you buy 1 lb you get 1 lb free. Perfect timing don’t you think?

Eat well this Super Bowl, Angie

Eckert's Sweet Party Meatballs

1 lb ground beef
1 Eckert's applewurst sausage link (a link of bratwurst can be substituted)
1/4 dried plain bread crumbs
1/4 cup finely minced onions
1/8 salt
5oz Eckert's Peach Grilling Sauce (your favorite BBQ sauce can be substituted)
1 cup (8oz) Eckert's Peach Preserves

 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. In a large bowl gently mix ground beef, applewurst, bread crumbs, onions and salt until combined. Form mixture into round balls about 1 1/4" in diameter. Place meatballs on a baking sheet and place in oven for 12-15 minutes or until the internal temperature is at least 150 degrees. Pour grilling sauce and preserves in slow cooker. Transfer meatballs to slow cooker and gently toss to cover with sauce. Cover slow cooker and place on high for at least 1 hour and up to 4 hours. Makes about 30 meatballs.    

Baked Eckert's Apples

Have you heard?  Jonathan apples are ripe and ready for pickin'.  This is one of my favorite baking apples and with the cooler temperatures it seems only right to dive in to some of my all time favorite apple recipes.  I particularly like this one because it is delicious with several apple varieties including:  Jonathan, Jonagold and Golden Delicious.  The news gets better - starting Saturday Jonagold apples will be available for picking at our Belleville Farm  - never have we opened Jonagold  to the public for pick-your-own (at least not that I can remember!)  I hope you enjoy the first taste of fall, too!

Baked Eckert's Apples

Ingredients:
4 large baking apples (Jonathan, Jonagold or Golden Delicious)
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup chopped pecans
1/4 cup chopped raisins
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1 Tbs. butter
3/4 cup boiling water

Directions:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.  Remove apple cores to within 1/2-inch of the bottom of each apple using apple corer, making the holes about 3/4-inch wide.  Combine sugar, nuts, raisins and cinnamon.  Place apples, top-sides up, in 8-inch square baking dish.  Spoon nut mixture evenly into apples.  Top each with dot of butter.  Carefully pour boiling water into bottom of dish.  Bake 30 to 40 minutes or until apples are tender but not mushy.  Baste apples with liquid in dish just before serving.