The Earthy Delights Recipe Blog
Celebrating wild harvested, traditional & artisanal foods
If you’re a fan of pawpaws, you’ve probably eaten your share of the fresh fruit in season. But what about the rest of the year? Pawpaws are notoriously hard to store for more than two or three weeks in the fridge, and if unrefrigerated, the large, oval fruits ripen quickly and must be eaten within a few days. The answer?Pawpaw curd, another fantastic way to preserve the exotic flavor of pawpaws – practically indefinitely. Fruit curds are a mixture of …
Hearty and satisfying braised lamb shanks make a perfect winter dinner for two, but if you’re in the mood for an intimate gathering of friends, it’s easy to scale up this recipe with hardly any extra effort. Here’s the secret: it’s made in a slow cooker (sometimes known as a crock pot). Once the initial prep is out of the way, everything goes into the cooker where it simmers quietly on its own for hours, filling the house with the …
The game hen is the diner’s delight. Half a bird gives you a bit of everything – a leg, a thigh, a breast and a wing – in a single portion-sized serving. It’s as satisfying as eating an entire chicken, but a lot less filling. Game hens are a great choice for grilling too, especially when split in half. Their petite size means that they cook quickly, sealing in the flavor and keeping them moist and juicy. One of our favorite …
Strawberry. Just the word itself conjures up visions of warm spring afternoons and the sweet fragrance of gleaming, sun-ripened berries. Strawberries are the most familiar and best loved of berries. Pop one into your mouth whole and taste the succulent juice as you bite in. Fresh strawberries, sliced and stacked in layers between buttery-rich shortcakes, are nothing short of miraculous in their simplicity and homespun goodness. There are a couple of simple tricks to making the best shortcake. Real butter, …
Black lentils, like French Green Lentils (lentilles du Puys), differ from other “garden variety” lentils in several ways. Black lentils retain their lens-like shape and firm pleasant texture when cooked, making them a good choice for salads. They’re much smaller, too – only about 1/8th-inch or so in diameter. Black lentils cook very quickly, requiring only about 15 – 20 minutes to cook to a pleasant ‘al dente’ consistency. The natural deep ebony color of black lentils fades to an …