Farmers' Market Fail (ish)

So the red onion linguine I was so excited about...not really that fabulous. In fact it's pretty much wheat pasta with a vague hint of sweet red onion, and all the fabulous color bled out when I cooked it. Total fail.

My eggplant was pretty good though. I just threw it in a pot with mushrooms, tomatoes, onion, jalapeno, and a carrot. I seasoned my pot o' veggies with corianger, smoked paprika, and a tiny bit of cumin. I really cooked the veggies down to mix them in with the boring pasta. Yum! The veggies were fab.

I also bought some sweet italian sausage that paired nicely with it all. I won't be buying the fancy pasta again. I will stick to buying glorious veggies at the farmers' market.

Farmer's Market Find #1

I like to talk about food, so I am thinking I will do a "Farmer's Market Find" of the week every Saturday.

Today my find was Pappardelle's Sweet Red Onion Linguine. I'm a little sad to discover that they are not local. In fact they are huge and nationwide, but I don't think that diminishes the joy I find at discovering a sweet red onion pasta. Let's not go into how much effort it took not to also buy the orange szechuan or the dark chocolate linguines. Yes...they have dessert pastas, I know! The selections are so tempting, and choosing is so difficult.

I'll need to figure out what to do with this pasta, but I bought an assortment of Schurl essentials, some of which I can perhaps pair with this beautiful pasta. Other finds include: 1 white onion, 9 beautiful large button mushrooms, 1 pound of very red tomatoes, and 3 skinny eggplants. I've also got some carrots in the fridge purchased last week that need to be eaten.

I'm thinking I need to keep things simple with this pasta, so maybe I will just cook and serve them with a little oil. Maybe a light touch of parmesan shavings?

I can eat the eggplant on the side, I think. Don't even ask how I plan to prepare this purple mystery food. I want to love eggplant, but I have no idea how to cook it successfully or season it so that it tastes worth eating at all. I bought them as a gesture towards figuring that out.

This will be a meatless meal since the animal fleshes in my fridge at present are some swai (fish) and bacon. Yes, animal fleshes. I spend a lot of time with my vegan friend Molly lately, so I feel inclined to emphasize meat in ways that might bother her. I love to eat animal flesh, and I think it is a most natural thing, though I don't mind a meal without flesh or even without dairy. I'll be eating a vegan dinner with Molly this evening.

Anywho, if you're wondering, my beet adventure resulting from the farmers' market visit last week was pretty fabulous. I ate two helpings of beets, which was a poor choice since they can be rough on your digestive tract until you are adjusted. Regardless, I went for the roasted beets with cumin, lime, and mint. It was sooooo tasty. I'm not sure I recommend eating beet leaves like one would Swiss chard though. They were pretty bitter.

That is all, I guess.