Coming to the end of the summer.

How sad it is when we come to the end of the summer. I will miss the tomatoes, corn and all of the wonderful berries and herbs that I find with Mark in Findley Market. With the wonderful winds from Hurricane Ike, I was thrown off most of the week. We kept our power, thanks to the fact that we are in a very old building and setup on a downtown grid. All of our lines were underground and away from the flying trees and the massive power lines flying everywhere. Most of the city was without power most of the week, and allowed most of the city to do the dreaded fridge cleaning, whether they liked it or not. We all know that it should be mandatory to go through the fridge once every few months, but most of us neglect it. Its a great start to the fall.
I was excited to go to the market this week. I knew there was a fire in one of the buildings, but I am glad that the wonderful Cincinnati fire department was able to save the rest of the buildings. I was hoping that most of the vendors would be up and running and there would be plenty in the farmers market. I was right... we had plenty of options. As we were pulling in we saw the VW thing. It was Justin and Acacia Flamm. I was hoping that they would be there. We rushed to the asian market to get what we call pork sushi. I know it sounds awful but in fact its not sushi at all. They sell sticky rice with pork and lentils. Its wrapped in a banana leaf and cooked to perfection. Its a wonderful start to the market. Acacia and I went to get tea and a waffle, while the guys went to get our yummy pork sushi.
As soon as I saw Justin's face, I knew something was wrong. No pork sushi. The woman who makes these wonderful goodies had no power, so no pork sushi. I promise to take a picture next week and post it. But if you are at Findley Market try one. They are heaven. I also promised to get Justin a few since he would be out of town next weekend. We did end up with filet's, bacon, wonderul squash, tomatoes, corn, plenty of honey crisp apples. I will post plenty of pictures from our wonderful finds this week.

Caprese Salad our style

I love tomatoes. This time of year we have a hard time not buying a ton of them and eating them like crazy. I am going to find a way to make pasta sauce before the summer is over (well since its over I guess I need to get moving :). I love when Mark makes Caprese salad. We get our fresh mozarella from Angelinas and usually basil and tomatoes from whomever looks the best at the farmer market. Add on some Shadeau bread, and we are all set. Here is what our dinner of caprese salad looks like.

The day of Roasting

I had book club this night so Mark was home alone most of the night. I came home to this wonderful dinner. Roasted Chicken, Roasted Thyme, Roasted Garlic, and corn salad. Mark made this corn salad out of his wonderful head, corn on the cob, bacon, cherry tomatoes and garnished with balsamic vinegar, olive oil and parm. I dont think I have ever liked this kind of thing so much. I can eat it all day every day. Its served cold and its fabulous.

Ribs, beautiful ribs.

Thank the Lord Busch's opened again after the wedding. They have beautiful ribs. We went for one slab of baby back pork ribs. We usually go for beef ribs, but they were out. Mark does great work on ribs. Slow cooked in the oven, just the right temperature so the meat falls off the bone and the bbq sauce carmelizes and makes beautiful crust. Today we had it with corn on the cob, straight from Guaido's in Findley as well as their mustard greens. YUM. I swear, no wonder I have a hard time loosing weight with food like this. Sooo good.

Fire Roasted Peppers

Mark is having a lot of fun having a gas stove. This might be the one redeeming quality of our place. We love a gas stove. This is definitely a must when shopping for a house. Mark loves to make different types of pesto. I love it as well because its great to eat on just about anything. Today was roasted red pepper pesto. I didnt get a picture of the finished product, but I did get the actual fire roasting. This stuff is WONDERFUL.
Here you go:

My first attempt at plating my food.

I cant take credit for this entire meal. We were not able to go to Busch's at Findley Market this week because they were closed for a wedding. Man do we miss our Findley Market routine when things dont work out the way we plan. We went to our second favorite spot, Eckerlin 's for our meat. They luckily had great t-bone steaks for us to eat. I decided to cook some zucchini and tomatoes with white onion and plate the food without the help of Mark. He did cook the steak, but I think I did pretty good for my first try.

Here you go:

I dont think it was too bad. Steak was grilled on the Le Creuset grill pan since we didnt want to go outside to grill, and the zucchini and onions were sauteed in a pan, later I added the tomato and finished it off with parm shavings.
Thank you Grandma and Grandpa Klump for the great veggies.