4 cups chicken broth combined with 1 cup water

2 tbs extra virgin olive oil

2 or 3 shallots finely diced

4 garlic cloves finely diced

1-1/2 cups aborio rice

1 cup dry white wine

1 lb peeled, deveined, chopped shrimp pieces (1″ dice)

2 roasted peeled and seeded poblanos (1″ dice)

2 cups chopped arugula

salt and pepper

freshly grated parmesan cheese

Prepare and have all ingredients at the ready, this only takes about 20 minutes

Measure the wine

Roast and peel and cut up poblanos, chop the arugula

You can leave the shrimp whole but I prefer them in about 1 inch pieces

Combine chicken broth and water and bring to simmer on back burner

heat 2 tbl olive oil in large saute pan on medium high heat

add shallots and cook, stirring for about 3 minutes

add garlic and rice and cook, stirring constantly for about 3 minutes

Add the wine and cook until it is absorbed.

Add the broth a ladel or 2 at a time, stirring occasionally and waiting until it is absorbed before adding more.

About halfway thru the broth add the poblano

Add the shrimp and arugula with the last broth addition and cook only until

the shrimp are done – about 2 minutes.  Turn off the heat!

Serve with a sprinkling of freshly grated Parmesan Regianno.

A few of these ingredients came from my garden

Shallots

Garlic from Hood River

Arugula (green beans and celery in the back ground)

Wondering what to do with that 4 pound butternut squash you bought a month ago?

Roasted Squash and Escarole with Farfalla & Asiago Cheese

Serves 6 to 8

3  to 4 pounds butternut squash, peeled, seeded and cut into bite-size chunks

1 medium to large red onion, cut into chunks

2 large heads of escarole cut into 1 inch strips

15 to 20 large fresh sage leaves, torn

5 large cloves garlic, coarsely chopped

1/2 cup pine nuts

1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 teaspoon (or less if you are not a fan of) hot red pepper flakes

1 tightly packed tablespoon brown sugar

Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

1/2 cup half-and-half

1 pound bow tie cooked and drained pasta,

6 ounces (about 1-1/2 cups) freshly shredded Asiago cheese

Freshly grated nutmeg.

Preheat oven and 2 large sheet pans to 450°

In a really, really big bowl, toss together all the ingredients except half-and-half, pasta and cheese.

Generously salt and pepper, then pour out onto the  pre-heated pans.

It will look like a lot but the escarole will shrink a lot

Bake 25 minutes, turning a couple time until squash is tender.

Almost ready for the broiler

Be careful not to burn the escarole – it will get crispy.

Once the squash is tender, flip on the broiler for about 5 minutes to caramelize the squash.

You want crusty brown edges on the squash and wilted, crisp escarole.

Scrape into a serving bowl,  add the half-and-half, hot pasta, and 1 cup of cheese.

Toss to blend, tasting for salt and pepper, and enough cheese.  Grate some fresh nutmeg in to taste.

Adjust seasonings to your liking and may I suggest serving with a nice glass of red wine  and more grated Asiago cheese.

I especially like the Cougar Run Merlot from my cousin’s vineyard

Parker & Mary Carlson

Carlson Vineyards in Colorado

Note: You could peel the squash a day ahead and store it, tightly covered, in the refrigerator.  I found the best way to peel the squash is to cut it in half lengthwise, then slice into one inch pieces, peel with a sharp knife and then cut into chunks. Heating the pan ahead cuts cooking time and the cold veggies make such a nice sizzle.  I also am a big fan of the non stick aluminum foil for easy cleanup!

This would make for a very nice Valentine’s Day dinner!  Just add flowers from Walter Knoll Florist!

Or better yet, schedule Elvis to deliver your flowers!

Our Valentine’s selection this year is amazing and I am adding product daily so visit soon!

I know of two types of garlic – soft neck and hard neck. Toward the end of summer last year and on a whim with an abundance of garlic bulbs I planted both soft and hard neck garlic. I separated the cloves from the bulbs and planted each “toe” root end down about two inches deep. I can’t remember if we had a lotta rain or if I was just diligent about watering, but within a week or so they had sprouted leaves and by the time we had our first cold snap they were probably a foot tall.

They quickly died back only to pop out of the dirt in the spring along with the daffodils, arugula and chard.

By mid April the hard neck variety was already beginning to flower – not really a flower per se but “scapes” began to appear on the central stalk of the hard neck plants.

Well it turns out that the scapes when young and tender can be snapped off as far down the central stalk as is tender and then cooked up like asparagus. They had a wonderful mild garlic flavor with just a slight crunch to them when I used them in a stir fry.

As the scapes develop on the plant they make a couple loop-d-loops and then straighten back out – this process took about 2 weeks, once they straighted back out the stalks lose their tenderness and I read it is either time to cut them off or let them go to “seed”. Each scape becomes a mini clove of garlic. I cut about half of mine off and put them in a vase where they continued to develop into mini cloves – after about a month they have formed cloves and are beginning to develop the characteristic purple skin.

I have now harvestest about a third of the plants – and this is done when about half of the leaves have turned brown – some of the bulbs are pretty small still and these are the hard necks that I did not remove the scapes from. My home grown garlic is very mildly flavored right now – I used an entire large fresh creamy white head in a batch of humus over the weekend and needed to add a store bought clove to bring it up to the garlicyness I like in humus! I imagine as they continue to dry they will develop a stronger garlic flavor.

The soft neck variety does not produce scapes. And I am finding it is more strongly flavored than the hard neck. This year I will plant even more garlic – and both kinds – the soft neck is what is used for the braided garlic you see around and I want to have enough to make a braid next year. This weekend on PBS’s Diary of a Foodie, the Gourmet Magazine show, they featured garlic and I learned that the soft neck variety will store for 6 months and the hard neck for 4.

Click here for a fun very interesting NPR interview with a garlic grower in California