1. Fritos on my sandwich. I don’t really eat junk food, but someone at work had a bag of Fritos. Fritos are pretty much the opposite of wild food, but pressed between a ham and cheese sandwich they’re pretty damn good.
2. Chelsea’s stuffed peppers. These particular peppers were labelled as “ancienne peppers” at the Mexican market. I believe they are fresh guajillos. They are great for stuffing and grilling. Here, we stuffed them with charred sweet corn and chihuahua cheese, and prepared a tangy green tomato salsa to go on top.
stuffed pepper
3. Eggplant parmesan. More fresh veggies from Chel’s mom’s garden. Eggplant is kickin’ right now, so no better time for eggplant parmesan.
eggplant parm
4. Native plums. More wild food. I found these plums, which happen to grow wild all over Illinois, at the very domesticated farm stand of Nichol’s Farm at the Daly Plaza farmers market. They have a thick, sour skin and a very aromatic and soft flesh. They could be made into an incredible jam.
native plums
5. Juneberries in August! Yes, more wild food. When you’re in the mood for something sweet and all you’ve got in the fridge are some leftover sweet dough and juneberry preserves, you’re on your way to a delicious, sweet juneberry crisp.
juneberry cookie
6. An assortment of Florida honey. And finally, even more wild food. Chelsea’s brother Morgan sent us a surprise package of incredible honey from Florida. He’s an expert on Tupelo honey and had been promising us another fix of this good stuff. Well, we got more than we expected. In addition to the Tupelo, we received saw palmetto as well as goldenrod and autumn wildflower honey.
Florida honey
7. Chili jam! We tried a delicious chili jam years ago in San Francisco and have been in love with it ever since. We no longer live in SF but have been craving that jam ever since. If you can’t buy it, make something to satisfy that craving! I waited until chilis were in season before springing for a beautiful display of hot peppers at the Daly Plaza farmers market. This was a mix of jalapeno, habanero, anaheium, cascabel, and four of the tiniest type of habaneros I’ve ever seen. Chelsea crafted a custom recipe for the jam.
hot pepper mix
chili jam
8. Biscuits and corncakes. This past Easter Chelsea made some incredible buttermilk biscuits. She set out to do the same in order to take advantage of the incredible honey that Morgan sent us. Why not throw in some local sweet-corn cakes for good measure?
corn cakes and buttermilk biscuits
9. Bottled juneberry wine. My brother John and I crushed these juneberries on June 27.
juneberry crush
I’ve racked the wine a couple of times since then and set a date for bottling on my iCal. Lo and behold I received a reminder to bottle my wine this weekend. What was really cool was that I ordered some bottling supplies, not remembering that this weekend was my programmed bottling weekend, and the supplies arrived the day before! I see this as a happy coincidence and a good sign!
racking juneberry wine in July
bottles
bottled juneberry wine
extra wine that wouldn't fit in a bottle
The recipe is by master home winemaker Jack Keller.
10. Spit-roasted meats. Chelsea and I took a long walk yesterday and found ourselves running the gyro, pink wine in a cup, spitted meat, Euro-trance, funnel-cake gauntlet that was the Greektown street festival. While trying to reach the other end of the block I kept saying, “I should take a picture of that spit-roasted pig, I should take a picture of those spit-roasting chicken skewers, I should take a picture of those spit-roasting chickens and lamb,” etc., etc. But then we found ourselves at the end of the block party and it was too late. That’s okay, heyrocc on flickr captured some of that smoky, meaty goodness that was to be found up and down Halsted Street.
spit-roasted meats at Greektown festival by heyrocc on flickr
[...] your stash of juneberries run [...]
I just tasted my juneberry wine and I was so impressed that I got on line to look for a place where I could buy some in bulk next year. So I stumbled on your blog… I’m in north Chicago land, almost Wisconsin – do you know of any place that sells juneberries? i don’t know if I could pick as many as I want.
Hi Vince, glad you stumbled upon my post. Can I ask what recipe you used for your wine? Is it a similar color as mine? The recipe that I used called for diluting the juice slightly. I’m wondering how it would turn out with pure juice.
On the subject of buying juneberries, I think you are out of luck. However, I would not be surprised if a few entrepreneurial farm stands at the markets started selling pints for $4 or $5 for curious tasters. But the idea of being able to buy 15-20# for a good batch of wine is pretty slim. My suggestion is to do what I did and go out with a group of at least 3 people and pick until you get tired. If you have access to several trees you will be able to pick a ton.
[...] Juneberry wine [...]