I’ve officially been writing this blog too long. Or, I’m officially lacking in creativity and originality.  Why do I say that? Because, after writing about the Roasted New Potatoes Salad that you see above, I discovered I wrote about the exact same salad and only slightly differently almost exactly two years ago.

However much that may say about the seasonality of local food, it’s discouraging that I didn’t recall the previous post until late in the game, as I was attaching tags and the like before posting. (Bloggers will understand.) If I had a shred of pride, I’d just forget that I’d planned to post this.

Well, no one’s going to call me proud, by golly, although they might call me shameless, because I’m posting the rehash. If you’re really bored, you can compare the two versions and try to identify the differences, kind of like one of those children’s puzzles. But I’ll tell you, the main thing this post has going for it is a picture of the final product. To reiterate the salad’s fine qualities:

• You can make it in advance.
• It doesn’t require (nay, doesn’t want) refrigeration.
• It’s delicious. Everybody said so at dinner the other night. (Yea!)

Try it.

Roasted New Potatoes Salad

• 2 1/2 pounds new potatoes, preferably of similar size
• 2/3 cup olive oil, divided
• 5 large cloves garlic, minced
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves (or 1/2 teaspoon dry)
• 1/2 teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary leaves (or 1/4 teaspoon dry)
• 2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
• 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• 1/4 cup minced leek or shallots
• 1/2 cup flat-leaf parsley leaves

1. Scrub potatoes and cut into 1/2-inch slices. If potatoes are small, halve them. If potatoes are large, you may want to cut in half lengthwise before slicing. Place potatoes in single layer in roasting pan or baking dish.
2. Drizzle oil over potatoes, then sprinkle with garlic, salt, pepper, thyme and rosemary. Use your hands or large spoon to coat potatoes well with oil and seasonings.
3. Bake in 375-degree oven, stirring occasionally, until potatoes are tender and golden, about 50 minutes. Cool.
4. Transfer potatoes to bowl, and scrape pan drippings into a jar with a tight-fitting lid. Add remaining 1/3 cup olive oil to drippings along with vinegar, mustard and leeks or shallots, and shake until well-combined. (Or whisk these together in a small bowl.) Pour dressing over potatoes and toss to combine. Taste, then adjust salt and pepper as you like.
5. Let stand 1-6 hours at room temperature. When ready to serve, add parsley to potatoes, and, if desired, toss to coat. Makes 8 servings.

Katharine Hepburn brownies

• 2 squares (ounces) unsweetened chocolate
• 1 stick (1/4 pound) butter
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup coarsely chopped walnuts (optional)

1.  Melt the chocolate with the butter over low heat in 2-quart saucepan.

2.  Remove from heat and stir in the sugar, eggs and vanilla; blend well.

3.  Stir in the flour and salt and walnuts, if desired.

4.  Pour the batter into an buttered and floured 8-inch square pan. Bake 35-40 minutes at 325 degrees F or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool, then cut and serve. Makes 16-20 brownies (depending on how you cut them).

Lucky me. I found myself in possession of a selection of succulent local pears. Even though these are quite lovely eaten raw, I decided to use nearly all of them as the basis for my local-food contribution to yesterday’s local wine-local food dinner.

At first, I thought I’d make a pear tart of some kind, perhaps a pear tart tatin. Then I looked through a few cookbooks and discovered an unusual and simple recipe for Balsamic-Roasted Pears with Pepper and Honey in my Gourmet Cookbook. I made a few adjustments to suit my needs, and in return I got a delicious, time-saving recipe that was a little different and, despite my fears, not overly sweet. Here’s my version (with a shorter name). It probably isn’t as pretty as Gourmet’s, but it tasted lovely.

Balsamic–Goat Cheese Pears

• 6 tablespoons butter
• 6 firm-ripe local pears, peeled, cored and quartered
• 1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
• 5 ounces fresh local goat cheese, at room temperature (I used Goatsbeard Farm)
• 2/3 cup local honey
• Freshly ground black pepper

1. Place butter in 9 x 13 (or so) baking dish, and melt 3-4 minutes in middle of oven as it preheats to 400 degrees.
2. Arrange pears in single layer in butter. Bake in middle of 400-degree oven until tender, about 15 minutes.
3. Pour vinegar over pears and bake 5 minutes more. Remove from oven and allow to cool slightly.
4. Transfer pears to platter. Dot with portions of with cheese, and spoon some of juices from baking dish over pears. Drizzle honey over all, and sprinkle with pepper. Serve warm or at room temperature. Makes 10-12 servings.

In pictures

From left (above): Peeled, cored pear half; raw pears in butter; pears fresh from oven; (below) pears dotted with cheese. Click any for larger view.

Tip: Use a serving dish with a significant lip, or add a lot less pan juices than I did. Despite what I thought were reasonable precautions, I managed to get sticky vinegar-honey-butter stuff all over my car. At least it smells good.

I’ll talk about the food below, but here’s a bit about the wines. The wines we tasted, before I lost track:

• Bonterra Vineyards 2006 Chardonnay Mendocino County
• Badger Mountain 2006 Chardonnay Columbia Valley
• Lolonis 2005 Chardonnay Redwood Valley
• Benziger 2006 Sauvignon Blanc
• Lolonis 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon Redwood Valley
• Lolonis Ladybug Red Cuvée VI (blend of Zinfandel, Carignane, Merlot, Cabernet

I think there may have been one opened that I missed and a couple more that never got opened. I think the hosts got carried away! I can tell by the photo above, courtesy of Lynn, that there are at least two that I never tried. Those would be the one with the white label and the one with the sunflowers (the Kansas state flower, btw).

The wine stories

Make no mistake; I’m no wine expert. But I’ll pass on now a few notes about a few of the wines, and a little more that I learned last night.

First, Lynn and Dan said they had some trouble finding all these wines. Jeff Jensen, my neighborhood liquor store owner, has remarked before that Kansas, as a low-wine-consuming state, is low on distributors’ lists. As a result, almost all the wines available here are from big wineries, so maybe that was part of the problem. The other part could be that people haven’t asked for organic wines enough.

The good news, nevertheless, is that the wines they did find were very good and modestly priced. Most, they said, were in the $12-$13 arena, with the most expensive (the Cabernet Sauvignon) at $18. I also learned that there are organic wines and wines from organically grown grapes. The main distinction between the two involves sulfites. (You can get the full story from Organic Consumers; scroll to to bottom to get the capsule version.)

It was also interesting to learn that the vineyards of wine giant Fetzer are entirely organically grown. Fetzer owns Bonterra, maker of the first wine listed above.

But how did they taste?

Oh, right. Taste. I do love the way wine pros write about wines. Here’s from Bonterra’s site about that Chardonnay:

…green apple, baked apple, pear and citrus notes in the wine. There’s a touch of vanilla from the dollop of new French Oak. An initial impression of rich, buttery cream quickly turns to aromas of honey and lightly toasted almonds, followed quickly by tropical aromas of pineapple, citrusy lemon and Crème Brûlée.

Here’s what my notes said: “fruity, long on the palate.” Of course, I was just being brief. I knew about all those fruits in the company’s description, but I was busy. The hosts said this was their favorite of those they felt compelled to sample in advance. In any case, it was very tasty, and I would recommend it.

The other Chardonnays and the Sauvignon Blanc were, to my mouth, very light in color and body, drinkable but not memorable.

As to the reds, well, before we got to them I’d sampled those four whites and tasted some of the food listed below (which doesn’t include Diane’s appetizers, or Brian’s cheese grits, or Sarah’s other quiche, or the tiramisu cake that John and Ann brought). My palate was happy but not fresh, shall we say. Nevertheless, the Lolonis Cabernet seemed to have reasonably good complexity and body, but the Ladybug Red was a little thin for my taste. Check the links above for how the wineries describe them.

The meal

My contribution: WheatFields bread, a baguette and (my favorite) sesame semolina. I got off the cooking hook because I had so many other things going on this weekend. Others were more generous with their time—and with their local ingredients.

Lynn’s luscious many-vegetable salad featuring her homegrown lettuce

Sarah’s quiche involved eggs from her and Ray’s hens.

Sarah also brought these gorgeous, succulent picked-that-day strawberries.

And here’s a look at the lovely—and delicious—empanadas that Carolyn made and that featured beef that she and Bryan raised.

As you can tell, it pays to have friends who live in the country and put their property to food-producing use. Yum!

If you have any organic wine experience or thoughts, please let everyone know in the comments!

Finally! Some good news on the food front: Red wine makes you live longer. Sort of. (OK, it’s not the wine but something in it, but why be picky?) Also in the news: socializing delays dementia. Probably, anyway. (Sometimes I wish these scientific studies were more definitive.)

Put these two together, and you get wine group. I knew there were positive things about getting together somewhat regularly with a group of friends where we theoretically learn about wine and most definitely enjoy the wine and socialization and good food that accompanies it.

Sadly, the founder of the group gets headaches with red wine, but she doesn’t let it hold her back. In fact, we’re going to sample organic wines this weekend at her house. Here’s a toast to friends, especially those packing red wines.

CSA delivery

Lettuce, spinach, kale, mesclun. Perhaps you see a pattern there. That’s spring for you. The good thing is that it’s all so quickly prepared and versatile to use, as long as you keep an open mind. On delivery day, I decided to make something to go with pasta. I sauteed some garlic, green onion, curly kale and asparagus (the end of the run, I was told) in some good olive oil and tossed it with macaroni then topped it with grated Parmesan. Delish.

A big birthday

My baby is entirely legal now. In honor of the occasion, we had dinner featuring a local chicken plus not one but two items (dumplings and shortcake) made with Heart Smart Bisquick. Somehow, she has thrived despite her pale beige diet. (Isn’t she cute?) For the occasion, I also decided to whip the cream with a whisk instead of an electric mixture. Do I know how to live or what?

Potluck party

Latest potluck was neighbors’ alley party, which they planned this year at a significantly earlier and cooler date. I made the strawberry and spinach salad that Mercedes Taylor-Puckett suggested in this week’s Lawrence Farmers Market newsletter. I guess it was good; it disappeared fast enough. I thought the dressing was a little bland, though, and I’m very glad I cut the olive oil by half and the sugar by a third. Guess I don’t like things quite as sweet as the Allrecipes readers.

Lawrence Food Future

I attended a 3-hour meeting on the future of food in Lawrence. The information-packed session suggested that promoting local food is not only a healthy and “green” option, but also one that is good for economic development. I wrote about it for Ethicurean.com, and I think it will run tomorrow. If you go to the site with the link in the preceding sentence, you should see it on Monday. I’ll let you know if it’s postponed.

Kitchen revisited

Alanna Kellogg, who writes the Veggie Venture blog, included me in a post about kitchen remodels on the BlogHer site. No fancy new pix, but some information about various kitchen remodels if you’re thinking about doing yours. (Note: We only stripped the kitchen, not the whole house, to the studs.)

Here’s a sampling:

Soba salad; asparagus vinaigrette

Chicken and noodles; beet, apple and spinach salad

Mixed salad; peach pie

Pasta salad; Neil’s famous brownies

Chicken-rice casserole; rhubarb crisp (my contribution)

That’s not counting the guacamole, sun-dried cherry tomatoes, chocolate trifle of some sort, cookies, more salads, more everything.

Loren has promised killer workouts this week. After that meal, we’re going to need them. What’s your favorite potluck dish?

Note to Amanda (and anyone else wondering): I’ll post the rhubarb recipe later this week. In the meantime, I also recommend the Rhubarb Fool, available on this post.