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Recipe: herb and floral pasta

Mom and Dad arrived in Colorado last week to take care of maintenance at their Boulder home that had been postponed due to the pandemic. They look fantastic and healthy (and are fully vaccinated), but since Jeremy and I are between our first and second vaccination shots, we’re all donning masks during our brief visits at their place. When we dropped off their houseplants I had been babysitting since November 2019, Mom handed me garlic and oranges which she had purchased in bulk, and Dad gave Jeremy a nice bottle of wine. It’s these little things that make them happy. I view our time together with more appreciation now.

so good to see my folks

April has graced us with deliciously snowy spring storms alternating with warm sunny days. Our local hill is now closed, but we grabbed one last powder day the Friday of closing weekend and have since enjoyed more powder days in the backcountry. Spring is magical.

waiting for the lifts to open

rewarding views in the backcountry as we approach treeline on our way up

neva is utterly thrilled to play in the snow, no matter the season

the pups played so hard they wiped themselves out (yay!)

Springtime snow is synonymous with increased wildlife traffic through our yard in both frequency and variety. Most notable are the moose. Mamas with their yearlings still in tow are foraging wild currant and young aspen tips. Our local mule deer visit multiple times a day. We catch glimpses of foxes, coyotes, raccoons, and other critters as they mince or trundle their way past our deck or our game camera or the watchful eyes of Neva and Yuki from their window benches. But I know our winter-flavored spring will flip the switch to summer-flavored spring soon, so I’ve been busy wrapping up my cold-weather cooking and sewing projects.

mule deer feeding where the snow has opened to the ground

yearling moose enjoying our driveway aspens

a big pot of chicken (dark meat) posole

happy rag quilts for kids

Whether it’s snow or sunshine falling on us, I am embracing the imminent arrival of colorful produce, flowers, leaves, grasses, birds. I may be getting ahead of my skis here since we’re expecting another foot of snow tonight, but I recently made a lovely herb and edible flower pasta and thought it would be perfect to share for Mother’s Day or a celebration or just because.

herbs and edible flowers, all-purpose flour, eggs, semolina flour

I basically used the pasta recipe from this handmade pappardelle. The dough can be made with a food processor or by hand, but you should definitely weigh the flours as volumes are inconsistent and can give you a pasta dough that is impossibly difficult to roll.

mix the flours together in a food processor (or bowl)

3 egg yolks and 3 whole eggs

pour the beaten eggs and yolks into the running food processor

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Recipe: huckleberry pistachio chocolate bar

When the weather cools down for the season, we tend to witness strings of amazing sunrises and sunsets. It means I can take Neva for a fetch session and she doesn’t get too hot in the autumn air. Autumn’s atmospheric volatility is also accompanied by winds, which can make getting outside a little dangerous (tree fall is real, folks) or miserable at best when dirt and small rocks fly at your face and get in your teeth and ears and eyes. But when the winds die down, it’s important to take advantage and maybe hike into the woods for some target practice.

one of many impressive sunsets last week

my happy little girl, ready to go home after playing fetch

jeremy practicing with his air rifle

packed up and ready to hike out

I’m not sure I’ll get much in the way of a grouse season this year because there were matsutake mushrooms to be found, huckleberries to pick, things got busy, and I was late getting my air rifle and learning to use it. But I’m okay with that. I think foraging and living in the mountains has taught me long-term planning and patience. Stuff doesn’t necessarily happen when you want it to – especially if you are waiting on something that may or may not grow from year to year.

precious precious huckleberries

I began toying with the idea of dried huckleberries a few years ago, but had to wait until I had a season good enough to spare a quart or so of berries to dry. That (amazing) season happened this year. After Erin and Jay were done dehydrating their gigantic haul of matsutake mushrooms, they kindly dehydrated a few cups of my fresh huckleberries for me (120°F for 60 hours!). I knew exactly what I was going to do with those dried huckleberries. I had known for over a year.

Cooler weather around the house means chocolate emerges from its summer hiatus in my kitchen. This is the time I start to bake and ship cookies to friends around the country – when I can be mostly certain that the chocolate won’t melt in transit. This is also when I start to play with ideas for holiday gifts – like chocolate bars. Except I was going to make the ultimate chocolate bar using my dried huckleberries.

pistachios, dried huckleberries, flake sea salt, dark chocolate

Our fresh huckleberries are small to begin with, but dried, they are like dried currants… small ones. Pop one in your mouth and the flavor is subtle at first, until you get to the chewy center and the concentrated berry essence grows into something wonderful. Huckleberries pair exceptionally well with chocolate. While I enjoy working with chocolate, I am not a fan of eating chocolate – except when huckleberries are involved.

teeny tiny delicious dried huckleberries

Making a chocolate bar is quite straightforward. Melt or temper your chocolate: dark, milk, or white, but really – dark chocolate is the best; mix in your goodies like nuts, dried fruit, crisped rice, candy, etc.; pour into molds and let set. That’s it. But for anyone who has been reading my blog, you know and I know that tempering chocolate is the right way to do this. And please use a good quality chocolate, especially if you are going to honor the great and mighty huckleberry.

melt the chocolate over a water bath

seed the melted chocolate

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Recipe: cherry (ice cream) bombes

My 45 years of experience have taught me that if I don’t schedule my summers, the things I want to do will not get done. Some of those things are “need to do” items like house projects or house maintenance. Some of those things are “stuff I want to do” like hikes and Neva training (actually this is a “want” and a “need” to do item). Maybe that’s why summer is not a relaxing season for me. It’s ALL SYSTEMS GO because the mountains are calling, Neva wants to go out and play, the weather is nice enough to have people over for dinner, summer fruits and mountain forage are begging to be made into recipes, and of course, my parents are in Boulder for the summer. This is also the only time I venture down to Denver – when the roads are free of snow – to visit with good friends. But a drive to Denver once in a blue moon reminds me why I prefer to stay close to the mountains and away from the city. I am officially a country mouse.

let’s go for a hike!

hiking, swimming, having a blast

belated father’s day dinner (dad is happy because… good wine)

ellen being ellen at post oak hall

soup dumplings with erin

When I received a shipment of dark sweet cherries from Stemilt Growers last week, I looked at my notes to see what cherry recipes I wanted to try. There were several easy ones that involved little effort and even less time. Those would have been ideal considering how packed the days are. So of course, I chose a multi-day recipe that involved some technical unknowns (mainly because I didn’t know if it would work) with the potential for great disaster. My idea was to make a cherry bombe – cherry ice cream in a dark chocolate sphere, finished in a red mirror glaze. What could possibly go wrong?

eggs, salt, almond extract, vanilla extract, amaretto, cherries, cream, milk, sugar

pitting cherries

quartered

The cherry ice cream is the easiest part. It involves making a custard base, a cherry purée, and some chopped cherries. I added amaretto because I like boozy almond flavor with cherries, but it’s okay to omit it and stick with almond extract which is also in the recipe. I think I could have gone with more than a pound of cherries, because I like more fruit in my ice cream. So if you do decide to increase the cherries by another 8 ounces or so, just be aware that the final ice cream volume will likely approach one and two-thirds quarts or more. Then again, is there such a thing as too much ice cream? Important questions to ponder…

adding sugar to the cherries

stirring in amaretto after the cherries have simmered

reserve half of the cherries

purée the liquid and remaining cherries

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