Kabocha Tart with Boursin, Leeks and Ham

Philly area winter* makes it tough to source local produce ingredients for the tarts. Last Thursday at East Goshen Market Lil Lady snagged a few kabocha squash and a pile o' leeks from Livengood Farm. Meanwhile WFM had boursin at the excellent price of $3.00/150g. I didn't make a sample to test out this combo but we did have a left over that we enjoyed as an after farmers market snack. I was surprised by the delicious affinity of these ingredients.


*Down to Earth Harvest had some great looking produce from their hoop house at Rittenhouse Mkt on Saturday.

LaPasta @ WholeFoods Market

LaPasta you get a B.  The noodle part is reasonably thin and it retains a good bite all the way thru saucing. It does not have the bright grain and egg flavor of a fresh noodle but I don't know of any frozen noodle that does.@ $12.43/lb I had hoped that somehow this important flavor dimension had been captured. The filling is just as good as the noodle i.e. grade B. In a noodle with enough space inside for the filling to make a statement this filling said: better than average, appeals to broad range of tastes, could not be identified if blindfolded. Still it was a solid B. 

Carefully cooked and simply sauced the end result is excellent for convenient home cooking, a decent substitute for home made but might disappoint if you're expecting something put together by a cook skilled in pasta preparation. Overall you get quality tortelloni that plate up nicely for a price. 

La Pasta

 I saw these noodles in WFM tonight. The price is nearly 2x that of Talluto's delectable asiago tortellini's ! When I got home i visited their website. Seems like they believe their product is amazing. Find out if I agree tomorrow.


On their contact form I wrote:

Howdy La Pasta,

We cook up plenty of pasta around here.In fact we live close to a place that makes fantastic fresh and frozen filled pasta...blah blah... your noodles cost about twice as much ... at your website, I read "    You'll be amazed with every bite"... After reading that bit of confident salesmanship I must find out if I will indeed be amazed.

G

February Fixens

Belle Cakery's Fancy Fixens

Superbowl Tart: Spinach, Ham, Green Onion, Cheddar -- Offered at Saturday's Markets

2 o'clock Bobolink's Jean-louis, 5 o'clock Petit Billy, 8 o'clock Tasty Cheddar on Sale at WFM, 11 o'clock Bobolink (forgot name), Selles-sur-Cher in the center.

Bone-in Lamb Stew (Stockton Mkt lamb)

Cooking Up Stockton Farmers Mkt Ingredients

I made tacos with a slab of grouper I brought from Metropolitan Seafood at the Stockton  Mkt. The youthful fish monger was gracious and knowledgeable. He informed me that the grouper was from FL and confirmed that it was fresh as can be.  It was. This fillet was of excellent quality. It was $30/#. The taco looks good too right?

I came home with 2 wedges of Bobolink's cheese. I choose 'Jean Louis'. This cheese was named in honor of "Jean-Louis Palladin, a fearless and passionate cook who helped to free French cuisine in the United States from a hidebound orthodoxy while influencing a generation of chefs and food lovers". My other choice, was a harder cheese that was in a brie like shape but with a completely different mold, texture and flavor...so not brie like at all. These were both remarkably distinctive. There was a boldness of style that caught both of us by surprise. The flavors were unique in their layered complexity. The molds on each were assertive and matched up with the innards to meld into extreme deliciousness. We tasted these with bottles of Stella and slices of a tasty, crispy baguette from Crossroads Bakery.  The pics here don't do the products justice.

Jean-Louis

Tullamore Farms had a table at market. Jeanmarie Mitchell was selling products from her farm.We chatted a little about her farming practices. I was sold. I grabbed some lamb stew meat. Then we talked a little bit more and it turns out she's knowledgeable about cheese steaks! So I had to test out her grass fed, free range chip steak. We made cheese steaks yesterday for dinner. The beef was great. It was sweet, lean with a delicate beef flavor. No pics. We ate the sandwiches before the camera appeared. The lamb cubes are for tonights' spezzatino.

When I was at this market Sunday I had an amazing cup of Sumatra from Fresh Coffee Scoop. I brought a bag home with me $14/12oz. It brewed up at home just as tasty as the cup I had at market.


Stockton Farmers Market is worthy of destination designation for the Philly area. Super friendly folks with great products at an indoor market in the 'country'.

 

Stockton's Farmers Market

I was off doing some recon at Stockton NJ's Farmers Market. While I was there I had this excellent pork sandwich from Mighty Quinn.

I had a great visit there. This is an indoor year round farmers market. Yippee an indoor winter market! Great idea right?


I grabbed a few ingredients and chatted with some vendors. The atmosphere there was friendly and relaxed. I saw plenty of tempting products. I tried out coffee, bread, cheese, fish, lamb and chipped steak. I have high hopes for this stuff. I will be reporting back soon details on how things cooked up.

Artsy Tartsy

We had a few of these onion and chevre tarts for meals during the past week.They were left over from last Saturday's rainy market. I found out this one tastes great with with a beer.

Mini canele just out of their molds.

 Artsy

FYI ... There's a New Crapregator in Town

 a shovel full o' sexy.

Spot Prawns Scampi Style

Last Saturday's Rittenhouse Market was a chilly, wet affair with just a little bit of biz being conducted. One bright spot was the acquisition of another 1# bag of spot prawns from Otolith. 

The 'scampi' technique uses the spot prawns assets to very good effect. I used this bloggers recipe as an outline. We left the shells on and split them along the top. We did not bake them at all. Instead we convection broiled them from a middle rack. It worked great but I let them go maybe a minute too long. We served it up with a crispy Italian load to dredge the pan and bowls of tortellini and escarole soup. Hasty tasty!

Saturday's Tarts: Mascarpone and Meyer Lemon or Petit Billy With Caramelied Onion

Fresh Loire Valley Chevre from DownTown Cheese RTM

Savory Tart with Petit Billy, Caramelized Onions, Herbs, Guanciale