Chive Blossom and Potato Focaccia

A seasoned and seasonal bread, this chive blossom focaccia is spiced with roasted chiles and chunks of potato. This savory Spring bread is great with a bowl of light soup or along side a simple grilled dinner.

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I am thinking about inheritance today. After touring some lovely homes yesterday and learning about the items my hosts inherited, I got to thinking about what I've inherited. Material things, not values and quirks--that's for another post. I've inherited jewelry. I've inherited furniture. But today, I'm thinking about the plants I've inherited.


While I was stationed overseas, houseplants were one item that I inherited from folks moving on to new duty stations. I enjoyed them during my time, and when I left I passed them on to a new arrival. Houseplants are a quick way to make a new place feel more like a home, and my worms and I nurture more than we kill so our net is positive.


Most of the plants  are ones I have inherited on a more permanent basis. Even though I don't live in Virginia any more, the daffodils and tiger lilies my dad planted are still blooming each year. My dad is to daffodils what John Chapman was to apple trees--he's planted bulbs in 3 states and the District of Columbia. The daffodils Dad planted our first Fall here in Ohio are just starting to bloom.

Yes, I am kicking myself that I didn't raise the camera just a tad more.

My newest plant inheritance is a clump of chives. My folks' most recent downsizing coincided with the beginning of gardening season and their giving up their last community garden plot (after more than 20 years as community gardeners in 2 places). My dad dug up the chives one morning in Maryland, and I plunked them into a hole in my backyard the next day in Ohio. Last Spring was my first year with chive blossoms, and I happily harvested them to make all sorts of recipes.

Here's my first one--a focaccia bread that was terrific as an appetizer when dinner was delayed due to SPRING! Weather and the need to get out and dig. I'd pair this with my Finnish Summer Soup with Kale if I were going to make it soon, as the cool evenings are still soup weather around here.

For more recipes using herbs, please see my Recipes Using Herbs Collection. For more recipes using potatoes, please see my Potato Recipes Collection. For more recipes using roasted Hatch chiles, please see my Hatch Chile Recipes Collection. These collections are part of the Visual Recipe Index by Ingredient, a resource for folks like me eating seasonally from the farm share, the farmer's market, and inherited plants in the back yard.

Kale and Sausage Burrata Pasta with Caramelized Onions

A skillet meal of Italian sausage, fresh kale, and caramelized onions tossed with pasta shells and bound together with creamy burrata cheese.

One of my go-to ways to cook a pile of produce from the Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm share is a stir fry. It's pretty fast to throw together once all the vegetables are prepped, and you can customize the flavors as simple or as complex as you like. I've shared a handful of stir fry recipes in the Recipe Index by Category on the right sidebar, but it's often just a quickly thrown together, very little planning, dish.

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This dish is the pasta equivalent of a stir fry. I started off like usually I do for a stir fry, by cooking the meat and vegetables in a skillet. Instead of firing up the rice cooker (or delegating that to a kid), I'd boiled some water in my pretty purple pot. Once the pasta, meat, and vegetables are cooked it's a simple matter to toss everything together with the burrata and you're ready to eat.

Cheesy Roasted Potato and Egg Pizza

This grilled pizza recipe combines fresh eggs with roasted potatoes and a thick layer of creamy gouda cheese.

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In addition to the Strategic Winter Squash Reserve, potatoes are one of the longest-storing vegetables from the Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm share. During the late winter I've got a few carrots in the crisper, lots of vegetables put up in the freezer, as well as potatoes and winter squash in the basement Strategic Winter Squash Reserve. One of the ways I'm feeding my family locally-grown produce year round, even while we live in an Ohio that doesn't know if it's winter or Spring this week.


When I roast potatoes I always roast a bunch more than I think we'll eat. It's part of the whole 'cook once eat twice' routine. My daughter will eat leftover roasted potatoes for breakfast or snack (sometimes after checking to see if I planned to use them for a dish, sometimes not bothering to check). When I put leftover roasted potatoes on a pizza I want to make sure I'm cooking the pizza fast so the potatoes don't dry out. Tossing the potatoes with olive oil and covering them with cheese helps. Heck, covering many things with cheese helps. Perhaps not the dust & dog hair bunnies . . .

I chose to share this pizza now because the eggs made me think of Easter. I like seeing photos of Facebook of my friend's new chicks--they are so interesting and cute and varied looking, it's no wonder their eggs will all end up varied and interesting looking as well.


For more recipes using potatoes, please see my Potato Recipes Collection. It's part of the Visual Recipe Index by Ingredient, a resource for folks like me eating seasonally (and no, that doesn't mean just Cadbury Creme Eggs) from the farm share, the farmer's market, garden & grocery abundance. I'm sharing more pizzas on my Visual Pizza Recipe Index, and this will go in the Vegetarian Pizzas category. If you're into Pinterest, I pin interesting pizzas to 2 boards, so follow me on Pinterest. I'm sharing articles and recipes on my FB page, follow me there. And I just learned of the hashtag #dailypizza so I may try that out on Instagram, but for behind the scenes photos follow me on IG. Want to know How To Use This Blog?

Swiss Chard with Bacon and Roasted Potatoes

Fill your plate with vegetables--this dish consists of a heaping helping of sautéed Swiss chard and a side of roasted potatoes. A bit of bacon for flavor and you're ready to eat.

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I did not choose the name Farm Fresh Feasts for this blog because I create fancy feasts out of the farm share box each week. Instead, I felt that even a simple meal, prepared with fresh goodies from local farms, can be a feast.

I've long viewed Swiss chard as a comfort food simply because I grew up eating the chard grown in our suburban backyard garden. [This makes me curious what my kids will grow up to view as a comfort food, actually. Not any beet preparations, except maybe Chocolate Cherry Beet Brownies. Perhaps turnips in Pasties. Possibly kohlrabi in Chirashi Sushi. Certainly Yakisoba and homemade farm share Spaghetti sauce.]

This meal could be seen as comfort food by my family--they sure devoured it and I was glad to have snapped some photos before we ate. Something as simple as chard and potatoes can't be seen as high falutin' food but it sure does hit the spot.

Maple Peanut Butter Bacon Waffles

A hearty whole grain waffle flavored with maple syrup and peanut butter. These also have a bonus crunch from crumbled bits of crisply cooked bacon baked right into the waffle.

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When the weather turns to warm days with cold nights my thoughts run like sap straight to maple syrup. I get my jugs of locally-harvested maple syrup at the farmer's market and, to paraphrase the little old lady in the hot sauce commercial, I put that $%^! on everything.

I've shared muffins made using maple syrup, like my Healthy Morning Glory Muffins,  Winter Squash and Banana Muffins,  and {No Sugar} Carrot Cake Muffins.  I've used maple syrup in desserts, like my Pumpkin Cranberry Maple Kugel (although this makes an awesome breakfast) and Maple Doodle Cookies. I've even used maple syrup to sweeten up savory dishes like Maple Teriyaki Salmon Sushi and my Red Cabbage, Leek, Brat and Beet Skillet Supper (aka Hot Pink Mess) and in my morning Orange and Beet Smoothie. I'm a big fan of real maple syrup from local producers.

Three different stores for these ingredients--the local grocery, the farmer's market, and The Christmas Tree Shops (because where else do you buy peanut butter but The Christmas Tree Shops?).

When the maple syrup jug is brand new I tend to be quite free and easy with my syrup. Only towards the end of the jug do I get a bit stingy, but I am fortunate to enjoy a year round farmer's market so a new jug is just a Saturday morning trip away.


I didn't intend for this to be my second Friday Waffles with Meat post in a row, but I guess it turned out this way. At the beginning of the year I looked thorough the previous year's unblogged photos and jotted down recipes that would be suitable on each page of my monthly editorial calendar. [Sounds fancy, but I just printed off some calendar pages with boxes big enough to write in.] When I sat down yesterday to plot out my March recipes, these waffle photos spoke to me the loudest. Always listen to the waffles. I put them down first. Only after I looked at my recent posts did I realize that a mere week ago I posted my Corned Beef Hash Brown Waffles.

Other waffle recipes I feel like pointing out on the blog are my Butternut Squash Waffles, Overnight Yeasted Carrot Waffles, Eggnog Sourdough Waffles, Banana Blender Waffles, and Chocolate Zucchini Waffles. Yes, we eat a fair amount of waffles around here (and leftovers become school day breakfasts) because it's easy to make a few rounds and then call everyone to the table so we can sit together and enjoy breakfast.

Though that doesn't always happen when you have sleeping-in teens and a hungry, early-rising spouse, so sometimes we eat in shifts.

That doesn't mean we eat alone.


Often a crowd appears.

Berry Mango Swirl Muffins

A multicolored muffin swirled with blueberry, mango, raspberry, and strawberry purees. This whole grain treat makes a large batch, great for bake sales and sharing.

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I was sitting in a Tim Hortons enjoying a blue and yellow swirled lemon blueberry muffin when I got the idea for these muffins. My folks have been visiting this month, which means I've been out and about much more than usual (and have tried a number of interesting breakfast and lunch places--stay tuned for more inspired recipes). Looking at the muffin, I tried to figure out how to simultaneously 'lightly mix together' the batter, as one does for the Muffin Method, while still getting the blueberry puree fully incorporated into the mix.


Clearly I didn't make lemon blueberry muffins for today's Leap of Faith Muffin Monday with the #MuffinMonday bakers. I didn't even master a swirl technique that I could share on the blog. I did, however, make a whole mess of muffins. Enough to give a plate to the office staff of both the junior high and the high schools, some to take to the shop, and the most photogenic ones saved for the dogs.


That's right, apparently Vincent got up to shenanigans while I was at the shop and ate the pretty muffins, not a crumb or paper left. I love that old wiener dog, and while I have no concrete proof (my daughter saw him on the dining room table though), instead of making a bazillion more muffins I've just taken photos of what's left. They were fruity and fun to make, though, so I hope you'll consider trying these when you want to make a bunch of muffins that stand out a bit.

Corned Beef Hash Waffles

Leftover corned beef waffled with shredded potatoes for a savory treat for a post-St Patrick's day breakfast or brunch.

"You're making meat waffles?"

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I suppose at this point very little I do in the kitchen surprises my spouse, but this one sure did. See, I had leftover corned beef. My daughter loves hash for breakfast. I wanted to find a way to actually get good hash browns--crispy brown on the outside and cooked all the way though. This recipe is a fun combination of all of the above.

I see stylized photos on websites, and I make the assumption that behind the camera, and surrounding the beautifully garnished plate of food, are equally stylized spaces and people.  I'm here to blow up any ideas that I'm a stylized person by sharing, because my spouse took them, photos of me making these waffles.

Fried Egg, Lettuce, and Tomato Grilled Cheese Sandwich

Grilled cheese meets a fried egg then mashes up with a BLT. This colorful sandwich rocks three classics in one delightfully messy handful.

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February in the Midwest is NOT the time for ripe tomatoes and fresh lettuce. Why am I sharing a recipe calling for these ingredients on my blog that celebrates locally-sourced foods? Simple. This is the time to lock down YOUR local source for the upcoming season's fresh fare.

If you're local to the Dayton area, there will be a Community Supported Agriculture Fair at the 2nd Street Market on Thursday, February 25th from 5:30-7:30pm where you can meet farmers, learn cooking tips from a local chef, and hang with like-minded folks. Look around your community for a similar even this time of year, or try Barn2Door or LocalHarvest to find food near you.

If you read this blog often you realize that these photos were not taken last week because they feature ripe tomatoes. I do not buy tomatoes at the grocery store. Period. Even a plain Jane eater knows that tomatoes grown locally and picked when ripe--not picked prematurely and shipped across many wintery states--just taste better. LIFE IS TOO SHORT TO EAT FOOD THAT DOESN'T TASTE GOOD. So, I eat my fresh tomatoes in the summer and Fall. I eat so many that at times I'm sick of fresh tomatoes and welcome any simple tips for putting them up for winter (like this freezer-friendly Fresh Tomato Pesto), but in October I know I'm facing at least 7 months with fresh tomatoes, so I gorge while I can.

I'm not a Foodie, though. I couldn't tell you the difference between one Fancy Name Chocolate and Another Fancy Named Chocolate. You don't have to be a Foodie to eat local, though. Even a little kid can tell you that a local strawberry, picked during your area's strawberry season, beats anything you can pull out of a plastic clamshell for sweetness and flavor. That's one reason why I eat locally. Keeping my dollars in my local economy is another.

Whatever your reasons, this is the time to research your options for a More Local 2016. You'll need to fortify yourself, so I suggest a sandwich. For more grilled cheese sandwiches, please check out my Clickable Collage of Recipe Suggestions--I've got a whole photo collage devoted to Grilled Cheese and Tomato Soup, showcasing locally foraged, grown, and sourced produce. But wait there's more recipe ideas! For more recipes using tomatoes, please see my Red & Yellow Tomato Recipes Collection. For more recipes using Salad Greens, please see my Lettuce & Salad Greens Recipes Collection. These are part of the Visual Recipe Index by Ingredient, a resource for folks like me wondering how to make the most of the farm share. I'm pinning recipes from all over the web to my Pinterest boards, follow me there. I'm sharing new finds on my Facebook page, follow me there. And I've discovered how fun it is  share quick photos on Instagram, follow me there. Want to know How to Use This Blog?

Deep Dish Meatball Pizza

A pizza you can really sink your teeth into--this is filled with meatballs and vegetables sandwiched between two layers of cheese in a hearty deep dish pizza.

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Sometimes I just don't have much to say other than this:

"This pizza was good. You should try making one like it. Here's what I did."

So instead of waiting further to post until I have something worth reading, or something worth getting off my chest, I'm giving you the recipe and stepping aside. With some photos, because we eat with our eyes first and it was a really tasty pizza. Very forkable (it's kinda heavy to lift up to your face with your hand).

Tuna Broccoli Casserole with Potato Chip Topping

Full of broccoli and tuna, with a creamy sauce and the crunch of potato chips, this noodle-less tuna casserole is a family-friendly 5 ingredient dinner ready in under 30 minutes.

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This is the tuna casserole of my youth. Other folks grew up on Tuna Noodle. Not us. My mom left the pasta for other dishes and fed us this simple 5 ingredient dinner.

After years of fixing my spouse's favorite Tuna Noodle Casserole, from his mom's recipe, I realized how much I missed the one I grew up with--so I made it for my kids. It's important not to lose sight of your childhood favorites when you join your life with someone else.

I'm using locally grown broccoli from my Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm share in my version. Growing up, mom always used boxes of broccoli spears and arranged them across the bottom of the dish with the 'tree tops' to the outside of the dish and the 'tree trunks' in a line down the middle of a 9x13 inch pan.

The combination of tuna, broccoli, creamy sauce and crunchy chips is an addictive one--and a terrific way to use up those chips at the bottom of the bag. If you've got bigger chips, I recommend making up a batch of Spiced Cottage Cheese Chip Dip and making quick work of those. I'll help.

This casserole is fairly dry when you first serve it. That means it just begs to be smushed around on your plate. I fixed this for lunch one day and my daughter had a rare second helping, then the kids fought over the leftovers.

For more recipes using broccoli, please see my Broccoli Recipes Collection. It's part of the Visual Recipe Index by Ingredient, a resource for folks like me poking in the farm share box and wondering what to do with all the vegetables that have appeared all at once in my home. I'm pinning more casserole recipes to my Pinterest boards, follow me there to check them out. I'm sharing recipes and articles that catch my eye on my FB page, follow me there. And for what's up in the kitchen or with the dogs, check out my Instagram feed. Want to know How To Use This Blog?

Deconstructed Salmon Artichoke Dip Pizza

Take a classic hot artichoke dip, add salmon, then deconstruct it onto this pizza. It is cheesy, hot, gooey, and a terrific way to enjoy a seafood pizza for pizza night.

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I've added a new category to my Visual Pizza Recipe Index--Seafood Pizza Recipes. I've added this as a service to my readers despite the fact I feel that all flesh is meat, including salmon, lobster, muskrat, alligator, capybara, and conch. But hey, you do you. If you prefer doing penance by eating lobster, rock on. If you want to eat seafood on your Friday Night Pizza Night, I'm adding a 5th recipe idea to my newly-made category to give you options--this Salmon Artichoke Dip Pizza.