Who Says Veggies Have to be Healthy?

Hi friends!  One of the great benefits of all the great veggie based cooking I've been doing lately is eating more healthy.  When you spend your week planning meals around swiss chard and cucumbers, it's tough to make a meal that doesn't at least err on the side of "good for you."  Every once in awhile, though, there is an opportunity to put the saute pan and extra virgin olive oil away and pull out the granulated sugar and vanilla extract!

I have an incredible recipe for carrot cake that receives RAVE reviews every time I make it, so I jumped at the chance to make it with some of my beautifully fresh, locally grown carrots.  The recipe came from a book so there's no link to it this time, but because I care so much about all of my readers, I have taken the time to type out the directions.  Note: This recipe makes a LOT OF CAKE - enough for a sheet cake.  I cut the recipe in half to make the portions more manageable, but the full recipe is here for you.

Cake Ingredients:

• 2 cups white sugar
  
• 3 eggs
• 3/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 3/4 cup sour cream
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 1 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 20-ounce can crushed pineapple
• 2 cups chopped walnuts
• 2 1/2 cups flour
• 2 cups grated carrots (pack them down firmly when you measure)

Frosting Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup softened butter
• 8-ounce package of cream cheese
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 4 cups confectioners sugar

Directions:

• Grease or spray a 9x13" cake pan (I used large muffin tins for my halved recipe, which you'll see in the photos.  You can also use 2, 9" round cake pans) and set it aside.
• Beat the sugar, eggs, vegetable oil, and vanilla together in a large bowl.  Mix in the sour cream.  Add the baking soda, cinnamon, and salt.  Mix all together thoroughly.
• Add the can of pineapple (including the liquid) and the chopped walnuts to the mixture.
• Add the flour in half-cup increments, mixing after each addition.
• Add the grated carrots in by hand (they'll get all gunky in the mixer blade)
• Spread the batter evenly into the cake pan and bake at 350 degrees for 50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.
• Let the cake cool completely on a wire rack before frosting.
• For the frosting, mix the butter, softened cream cheese and vanilla until the mixture is smooth.
• Add the confectioner's sugar in half-cup increments until the frosting is the proper spreading consistency.

The most time consuming part of this recipe, which you can see is a pretty straight forward one, is grating the carrots so I would recommend grating them first and then starting the whole process. 

Don't be scared of the crushed pineapple - you can't even taste it.  It does, however, add an incredible amount of moisture to the cake.  For evidence, I present my boyfriend who HATES pineapple and LOVES this cake.



The batter looks...how can I say this delicately...super gross.  The first time I made it I thought it was going to come out all wrong because it seemed runny looking, but it came out perfectly.

I hope you enjoy this recipe!  If you give it a try, tell me what you thought of it in the comments!

Welcoming a Special Guest Chef!

Before I get started I just want to say THANK YOU!  Today From Plot to Pot reached 1,000 page views and I couldn't be any more excited and appreciative!

Every time someone tells me they read my blog, I can hardly believe it. It's really cool and I hope you are enjoying it as much as I am.

I have one friend I know is a fan because he came over last night to help me cook!  That's right, my friend James is my first ever guest chef - even before my boyfriend (though he pitched in last night to help too...more on that later).  James' company and help really made the work fly by.  Dinner only took about an hour to make last night and had I done it alone, probably would have taken FOREVER.

Together we made a leek and cumber salad, garlic green beans and parmesan crusted pork chops.  Ok, so the pork chops don't have anything to do with my share, but my goodness they were tasty.  I also made carrot cake earlier in the day using carrots from my share, but that is a post for another day.

The leek and cucumber salad was a really simple, oven free, way to use the leeks and cucumbers piling up in the vegetable crisper.  It also required the most peeling, chopping and seed scooping!  There's not much to it when you get all the work done - just mix your veggies and black olives with a lemon and olive oil dressing and pop in the refrigerator to chill.

The garlic green beans didn't require much prep, just cutting of the ends of each bean (probably not even necessary, but they looked a little stringy), boiling in salted water for a few minutes and then quickly sauteing with pine nuts, and chopped garlic.  Sadly, by the time we sat down to dinner the green beans had gotten cold (a result of only having one large saute pan) so we had to zap it in the microwave quickly to reheat.

There is a great butcher shop in Davis Square called McKinnon's and you really can't beat the prices.  I don't get there as often as I would like, but when I do I try to grab a few items (chicken breasts, steaks, pork) to keep in the freezer when we need a good protein and sometimes what I have in the freezer dictates what I make for dinner.  In this case, I had pork chops and since neither the beans or the salad called for cheese I figured I'd try to incorporate it into the breading on the chop.  I found an easy recipe from the Food Network website and it was really pretty incredible.  Follow the simple directions and I don't think there's a way to mess it up.

The only hiccup I had with the pork was trying to figure out when it was cooked.  I called in Craig for reinforcements since he's more experienced at these kinds of thing.  The recipe tells you to use a meat thermometer until the internal temperature hits 150 degrees.  Well...surprise! we don't have a meat thermometer!  We do have one for frying oil so I tried using that, but I felt like the temperatures weren't making sense in conjunction with the cooking time so we eventually decided just to cut into the chop and do a visual check (hence the slice mark in the photo of the final meal).  Obviously, making sure the meat is cooked properly was a huge priority - after all, I didn't want to give my very first assistance chef/dinner guest food poisoning.

Everything in the meal ended up being really delicious, although I wish the green beans didn't need to be microwaved.  The pork was fantastic and juicy and the leek and cucumber salad was fresh, light and perfect for the summer.  You could easily throw this together for a cookout.

Thanks again, everyone for helping From Plot to Pot hit 1,000 views!  I look forward to the next 1,000!!!

          

Week 7 - Back to Business!

Hi friends!

So my week-long hiatus from the kitchen is over and I am back to business.  My time off caused me to have to toss a few share items - the baby bok choi and basil :(  Let's take a moment of silence to acknowledge the loss.

Thank you.

I've got big plans for this week!  Today I had a total "grown up" moment shopping (at long last) for a food processor.  I browsed K-Mart and Homegoods and narrowed down which brand I wanted to buy and it all went out the window when I hit the Christmas Tree Shop and found a Ninja food processor for only $50 (according to their website it's a whopping $169!) AND I had a $25 gift card!  Happy consumer dance!!! I've already used it, but that's a post for another day.  For now let's see what came in the week 7 share!

This week my share includes:

• Basil
• Bok Choi
• Cucumbers
• Leeks
• Parsley
• Salad Mix
• Scallions

It's one of the greenest shares I've gotten this season and I have to say I'm not entirely sure what I am going to do with all of it.  Bok choi seems like a tough vegetable to cook with other than stir fry so it looks like I'll be making that pretty soon.  There's also a LOT of basil so hopefully I can incorporate that into some dishes this week to keep it from going bad again.  I have a great recipe for lime basil cookies so that might be the answer to some of the problem!

Veggie Person of the Week

Given all of the greens this week, I was limited on my choices for a veggie person, but I made the best of it and created one of my all-time favorites - Bernie Bok Choi! Don't you just love his glasses?

         

  

Week 6 - Everything's On Hold!

Hi Friends!

As previously mentioned, other obligations are keeping me out of the kitchen this week BUT I did want to keep up with my share inventory for week 6 of my ReVision Urban Farm CSA.  I hope to resume my cooking adventure on Monday and with almost two weeks of share items stored up in my refrigerator there are endless possibilities for culinary greatness!


Ironically enough, I wasn't able to get this posted last night because I had to be up bright and early for a work event at ReVision Family Home, across the street from the Farm!  Even though it's about a gagillion degrees outside it was great to see the farm crops looking lush and healthy!  A testament to our great Farm team!

The ReVision Urban Farm Stand is also up and running for the season so if you're in Dorchester and want to pick up some amazing, fresh, locally grown veggies be sure to stop by and say hello! 

This week my share includes:

• Basil
• Carrots
• Cucumbers
• Green Beans
• Leeks
• Radishes
• Swiss Chard

I was relived to see that the share was a little on the smaller side this week, knowing I wasn't going to be able to do much with it.  I think I might put a spin on the blog and do a little baking this week - hows does carrot cake sound to everyone?

I was also incredibly happy to see more swiss chard since it has fast become my favorite share item!  I realized this week that BOTH of my currently posted swiss chard recipes are based around eggs (Sweet Potato and Swiss Chard Quiche and Green Eggs & Ham) so I'll be on the lookout for something different.

Veggie Person of the Week

As you can see from the photo above, there weren't a lot of good options for a veggie person this week.  We've already made Candie Carrot and Cat Cucumber and the basil, chard, leeks and green beans didn't offer a lot of opportunity so that left the radishes.  They were so small I wasn't sure I could pull it off until I noticed their roots.  The roots were they key to creating the Radish Rockettes - Rhonda, Rhoda & Rita!

 

As always feel free to follow me on Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram for photos, videos and recipes!  They usually make their way onto social media before they get written up in my posts!  Happy Farming!

           

Literally Stuffed!

Hello everyone!  It feels like it’s been ages since my last post so apologies all around.  I am participating in an alumni theatre production at my college and have spent more time working on sets then in the kitchen.  The performances are this weekend, which means I’ll be in rehearsals every night this week so it’s likely my disappearing act will continue for a short while.  I promise to make my usual Wednesday post with my share items and veggie person, but not sure about how much cooking I’ll be doing.

All that being said, I haven’t completely ignored my culinary responsibilities!

On Friday I made good use of my kale, swiss chard and collard greens.  I didn’t want my lovely leafy greens to go bad this week so I looked for recipes that would make the best use of them.  My boyfriend’s birthday was also this week so I wanted to make an extra special dinner for a great guy to enjoy.  Normally I’d bake a cake for him, so this was a real departure from his past two birthdays – homemade dinner and store-bought pastries!  Thanks to our neighborhood bakery, Patsy’s, for our delicious desserts!

I started working on prep for this dinner around 6pm on Friday and we ate around 10pm…I spent the entire 4 hours in the kitchen!  I’m sure for the more experienced cook (and someone with more than one large sauté pan) the time would be drastically reduced, but what can I say…it was a labor of love.

This dinner was all about stuffing - Roasted, Stuffed Red Peppers, Stuffed Collard Greens, and Swiss Chard Stuffed Garlic Bread.

The prep for these dishes took so long due to the lone large sauté pan.  Both the kale for the stuffed red peppers and the collards had to be cooked and cooled before I could get into the rest of the cooking.  Then I had to use the same pan for the red pepper stuffing and again for the collard green stuffing.  Let’s just say my pan got a workout on Friday night and was washed and dried approximately 350 times…at least that’s how it felt!

Let’s break it down by dish, shall we!

Roasted, Stuffed Red Peppers

I love red peppers – raw, grilled, roasted, whatever.  When I saw this recipe using kale I knew it would be a winner.  It also used brown rice, which the collard recipe used as well so I figured it making both means no random extra rice hanging out in the refrigerator languishing unused until it was thrown away.  It’s also a really nice vegetarian dish so if you’re having friends or family over and they don’t eat meat you can whip these up and everyone can enjoy them!

Made on their own this dish would be fast and easy to prepare even though it has quite a few components in the stuffing – chopped onion, red pepper, kale, brown rice, lemon juice, garlic, parmesan cheese, and pine nuts.

In retrospect I should have cooked the kale first to free up my lone sauté pan, but I didn’t and started with prepping the pepper halves.  Oh well…live and learn!

I started with the pepper halves (3 peppers for 6 halves), gunked out all the seeds and weird inside pepper flesh (is there a name for that?), brushed with olive oil inside and out, added some pepper and sale to the insides, and popped in the oven (cut side down) for about 15 minutes.  Take them out of the oven and gingerly flip them over (you’ll want to use a spatula since they’re soft)..

The kale (with the stalks removed) then needs to be cooked (just dump a few tablespoons of water into a sauté pan and cover), strained in a colander and finely chopped.  Sauté pan wash & dry #1

Then you take your sauté pan and add the chopped pepper and onion until the onions are nice and golden, add in the kale and other goodies and remove from heat.

Note: I also should have warmed the pine nuts earlier too, but I didn’t and had to rush to get them done and added to the stuffing.  When the directions say to stir them constantly they are not kidding.  I stepped away from the oven for a few seconds and the next thing I knew they were almost burnt on one side!  At $6 a jar, it’s a costly mistake to burn your nuts…err…you know what I mean!

Spoon the stuffing mix into the pepper “shells”, sprinkle on some of the leftover pine nuts, and bake at 400 degrees for about 15-20 minutes.  Sauté pan wash & dry #2

Stuffed Collard Greens

I made some ingredient switches from the recipe (which the author suggested as alternatives).  I used ground turkey instead of venison, whole grain rice instead of bulgur (I don’t even know what that is), and Paul Newman brand tomato basil sauce (on sale!) instead of a low-sodium option (because I wanted it to actually taste good).

To start, you need to take your collard greens, cut out the stalks, and slice in half.*  Then you need to cook the leaves just a little, until they turn bright green.  You just use your handy dandy sauté pan with about an inch of boiling water, and cook the greens just enough – cook them too much and they won’t be sturdy enough to act as a wrapper for the filling.  This whole process took me awhile because I only cooked about 4 leaves at a time.  I was afraid if I put all the greens in at once the cooking times would be too different and some of them would be overcooked and some undercooked so I just sucked it up and took the longer more careful approach.  When the greens were cooked just right, I removed them from the pan and laid them out flat on a dish to cool (they can be layered on top of each other and they won’t stick together).  Sauté pan wash & dry #3  

Now it’s time to make your filling!  The recipe didn’t call for this, but I put a tiny bit of olive oil in the pan before adding the ground turkey and onions.  Let the turkey cook fully, then add in the cooked brown rice, onion powder and garlic powder.  I know a full tablespoon of the seasonings looks like a lot, but it tastes fantastic so don’t skimp!  I added a little salt and pepper as well even though the recipe didn’t call for it.  

Now it’s time to stuff and roll the filling into your collard green halves…it’s kind of like an arts and craft project.  *This recipe is probably easiest when you have LARGE collard leaves, but mine were on the medium to small side and managed to make due.  It just resulted in leftover filling, which I plan on making a pasta sauce with since I have zero time to cook this week.  My greens also had some holes here and there so I doubled up with some of the smaller greens to “patch” them up when needed.  I also overlaid some of the smaller greens to create a larger leaf to stuff and roll and it worked pretty well.

Take a few spoonfuls of the filling and tightly roll the greens around it.  The photo in the recipe shows the filling in the middle of the green, but I found it easier to spoon the stuffing a little bit closer to the end of the green so I could make the roll tighter.  Some of the stuffing will fall out of the ends, but just try to stuff it back in there as best you can.  Place the rolls into a glass baking dish and when they’re all in there cover them with the tomato sauce.  Pop in the oven and cook at 350 degrees for about 20-25 minutes. 4^th and final sauté pan wash

    

Swiss Chard Stuffed Garlic Bread

I saved the easiest recipe for last.  It doesn’t get any more basic than this…and the best part – NOT SAUTE PAN NEEDED!!!  The recipe is big enough for 2, one pound loaves of bread, which was waaaaay more than I needed to make so I just played around with the ingredient amounts and improvised to make 1 small loaf.  I bought a small loaf of ciabatta bread from the grocery store.

Cut the stalks out of your swiss chard and break the leaves into small pieces.  In a bowl, mix the greens with some olive oil and set aside.

Take a baking sheet and put a layer of aluminum foil on top.  Place the loaf of bread on the foil and cut deep slits in the bread without cutting through the bottom.  

Melt some butter and add minced garlic.  With a brush, coat the insides of the bread slices with the butter and garlic mixture.  

Stuff the oil coated swiss chard into the slits in the bread.

I got creative and added some fresh mozzarella I had the in fridge (cut into small cubes) and stuffed that in with the swiss chard.

Wrap the bread with the aluminum foil and pop the baking sheet into the oven at 350 degrees until the bread is cooked through.  I had mine in there for about 10 minutes, but I think 15-20 minutes would be best if you prefer it a little crispier.  

That’s it!  So simple and REALLY full of great flavor.

         

 

I WILL Eat Green Eggs & Ham!

Before heading in to my newest creation, I wanted to share a great article from the Dorchester Reporter about farmers markets in Dorchester and Mattapan, highlighting Victory Programs' ReVision Urban Farm!

One of my colleagues also gets a share and we like to chat about what we've made or are going to make throughout the week.  While looking through our box of share goodies on Wednesday she mentioned a recipe she found through Martha Stewart's website for a Green Eggs and Ham Omelet that sounded yummy, easy and fun.  Anyone who enjoys this meal at home can give a shout out to Cristina for sharing it with me! 

I also decided to roast some of the veggies I had in my arsenal - potatoes, carrots, onions, turnips, and my kohlrabi.  I chopped them into chunks, mixed them with olive oil, thyme, salt, pepper, and parmesan cheese, placed them on a foil covered baking sheet and cooked at 350 degrees until I felt they were done.

The "green" in the omelet was cooked swiss chard (the recipe calls for spinach, but I just switched them out).  Cut out the stems of the chard and slice into ribbons (enough for 2 cups), pop them into a saute pan with some water and cook until wilted. 

Here's the only tricky part (and it's not that tricky) - once the greens are wilted you put them in a colander and strain out as much water as you can.  There's a lot of moister in those greens!  I did the best I could, pressing the chard and trying to squeeze out as much water as possible before chopping it up.  Although the end result of my omelet was fantastic I would try to get a little more water out the next time around.

Once you chop up the greens, mix them in with the eggs, salt and pepper and pour the mixture into a small pan.*  Once the bottom of the omelet gets sturdy enough you'll want to use a spatula to pry up half of the omelet and tip the pan, allowing the uncooked egg on top to dribble down into the bottom of the pan to cook.

Add some shredded cheese and a few slices of thin cut deli ham onto the middle of the egg mixture and fold in half.  Continue to cook the omelet, flipping occasionally, until done.

   

The Results!

The flavor in this omelet is incredible and it paired really nicely with the roasted vegetables making a great "breakfast for dinner" meal.  I think swiss chard may be one of my favorite greens - the flavor is really amazing proving that the yumminess of my previous sweet potato and swiss chard quiche was not a lucky surprise.  I have a little of the chard left and am going to try a swiss chard garlic bread recipe I unearthed today so stay tuned for that!

Happy cooking everyone!

* Yes, I purchased a new pan!  When I first moved into my apartment  (6 years ago) I purchased an inexpensive set of pans from the Christmas Tree Shop and never looked back.  A few months ago, the handle on the small fry pan broke and we never got around to replacing it.  I decided that this recipe wouldn't work in a larger pan so I bought a new one.  I'm also wildly self conscious about how old all my kitchen equipment is now that they're being photographed and posted publicly.  Don't judge my dingy baking sheets please!  I feel inspired to replace some of the sadder items as the season goes on!

Week 5 - Almost Everything Is Still Alive

Hey friends! Before I get into the meat and potatoes (seriously, potatoes!) of this week I am excited to announce that my super awesome brother Paul has been nominated by Scout Somerville for Best Bartender!  Why not do me a favor and vote for him here.  If you're a local and you haven't enjoyed a cocktail at Beramot's bar with my brother, what are you waiting for?  Go and visit him today!

So you've probably noticed that I have been posting less frequently, but trust me when I tell you I'm not holding out on you!  Things have been a little busy on my end and I haven't had a lot of time to devote to the kitchen.  I did use the broccoli from last week to make my very first blog recipe again, but that's pretty much it.

The recent heat wave didn't help either.  I mean, who wants to voluntarily turn on an oven when it's 95 degrees outside? 

I am sad to report that my lack of culinary activity resulted in the unfortunate demise of the mustard green's from last week. All of the other unused items from week 4 are still fresh and ready to go...and boy do I have plans for them!  That's a story for another post, though.

This week my share includes:

• Basil
• Bok Choy
• Cucumbers
• Kale
• Potatoes
• Red Torpedo Onions
• Salad Mix
• Swiss Chard

I did cook tonight with some of these items (and a few from last week) and will post all about it tomorrow so come back and check it out!!!

As always, after oohing and ahhing over the contents of my weekly share I select one lucky item to be magically transformed into a veggie person, but this week I decided to try something a little different.  I've created quite a few veggie people since the tradition began over a year ago and it struck me...they don't have any veggie pets!  Since I am a self-proclaimed (and unashamed) cat lady the pet of choice seemed obvious and thus Cat Cucumber was born!


As always, you can check out all of my veggie people (and now pets) by following me on Instagram and Twitter!

        

A Tale of Two Tarts

After a hike around Milton's Blue Hills Reservation on the 4th of July, my boyfriend and I were pretty exhausted, but since it was still pretty early in the day and dinner was inevitable, I decided I might as well cook.  I quick trip to the grocery store for some necessary items and I was ready to use the fennel and carrots from my share to make two different tarts.

I decided to make two since they both required puff pastry and they come two sheets to a package...also we were HUNGRY!  On the agenda this holiday were a Carrot Ricotta Tart and a Caramelized Fennel Tart.  Both of these recipes are a little flawed, but for different reasons.

Let's take this post one tart at a time!

Carrot Ricotta Tart

The Carrot Ricotta Tart is, as you saw if you already clicked the link, in French...and I do not speak (or read) French.  So I did a cut and paste into Google Translate and then made a few more adjustments to calculate oven temperature from Celsius to Fahrenheit and Grams to Ounces.  The translation was less than perfect so I used my own best judgement.  For example it called for 4-6 puff pastry squares, which would lead you to think here in the US that you would need 2-3 packages of frozen pastry, which you DO NOT.  One sheet was perfectly adequate.  To save you folks at home the hassle here are my English instructions with some edits based on what I did:

Ingredients

      5 or 6 carrots

      1 sheet frozen puff pastry
      7 oz ricotta cheese
      Pinch of thyme
      Salt

      Pepper

      Honey

Instructions

• Thaw pastry sheet (approx. 30 minutes) 
• Peel the carrots, removing the tops and bottoms
• Thinly slice them (use a mandolin slicer if you have one)
• Steam carrot slices until tender, put aside until needed.
• Preheat oven to 400° F
• Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and unfold the pastry puff
• Lightly mark a 1” border around the pastry crust with a butter knife
  
• Fold the edges of the pastry over, making small walls along the 4 sides
• Lightly prick the bottom of the pastry puff with a fork
• Spread the ricotta cheese on the pastry
• Lightly salt and pepper the top of the ricotta cheese
• Layer the sliced carrots on top
• Add a little more salt and pepper on top of the carrots with the pinch of thyme and drizzle with honey
• Bake the tart for 20 minutes or until pastry puff is browned 
• Eat while still warm

The one major difference between my attempt and the recipe is that my carrots were teeny tiny so my slices were also teeny tiny and the end product looked more covered in polka dots than beautifully rustic.  I also didn't get my carrots to bake as well as it looks like they did on the original recipe page.  I think this probably has to do with the thickness of the carrot slices.  I did mine by hand and my knife skills are still pretty unfortunate so they ended up on the thicker side.  A mandolin slicer and fully grown carrots would probably solve all these problems!

I really loved this tart even with the too thick carrots.  The honey drizzled on top was lovely and the ricotta cheese was creamy and indulgent tasting.  The whole thing was so easy to make and would be perfect as an appetizer for a dinner party or luncheon (all those luncheons we have, right!? Ha!).

Caramelized Fennel Tart

I had such incredible hopes for the Caramelized Fennel Tart recipe!  When I looked it over it seems totally easy and foolproof, but I think it might just be my first dud since starting my blog.  It started out promising when I was slicing the fennel, which smelled so so so delicious, but went awry as the cooking of the fennel went on...and on...and on.

The fennel sadly ended up very dry, in part because I basically killed it trying to make it "golden brown" as directed.  I can't help but think something was missing in the recipe itself.  There was never any substance to the "mixture" other than the cooked fennel.  It was overcooked before putting it into the oven and REALLY bone dry by the time I took it out.

If you look at the photo on the recipe page the filling looks substantial - like there is something liquid bonding
everything together, which just didn't happen for me.  It mentions 2 tablespoons of olive oil twice in the ingredients list that I thought was an error, but perhaps there was something there that I overlooked.  Maybe and second dose of olive oil should have been added in somewhere along the line, but the recipe never calls for it.  Anyway, I am at a loss

for what went wrong. If you have any thoughts on what could have made it more of a filling and less of a pile of overcooked fennel please let me know in the comments!  I'd love to try it again and see if I can make something as beautiful as the photo in the recipe.

All of that being said, the taste of the fennel (even overcooked) was actually pretty nice.  My boyfriend liked it more than I did, but I find myself being much more critical of my adventures than he is.  I was dreaming of something more delicious and the reality of that sad dry fennel was just too much of a disappointment.

Not sure what my next adventure will bring, but I hope you'll keep checking in with me!  Until next time...au revoir!