Port Potager

Another Thanksgiving has come and gone, and we are still eating our way out of several gigantic containers of leftovers. That is in no way a complaint, by the way--we're loving it. Perhaps one of the reasons we have so much food left over this year is because we filled up on appetizers throughout the afternoon. Here's our cocktail snack spread: That all looks perfectly reasonable, until you remember the 22-pound turkey and vat of mashed potatoes waiting in the kitchen. Any other day of the year, this would have been a light lunch.   In addition to a nice, cured salami and several cheeses, we had bites of red and blue tart , made from some of the last Chioggia beets of the year. Chioggia beets are my favorite because they are extra sweet and not so earthy. When raw they are red and white striped, but after you roast them the colors blend into the pink you see above. Kirk went fairly light on the blue cheese, which probably pleased our younger guests. Th...

Thanksgiving is just two weeks away, and that means it's time to start thinking about what to cook — and eat! This is my favorite holiday of the year, and while we have our traditional recipes (obviously turkey and stuffing, for example), the side dishes are somewhat flexible based on what's available from the garden. It's nice to try something new or give a tired dish a different spin sometimes too, so I've compiled links to all of our favorite fall and winter garden recipes. Even if you don't go out on a limb for Thanksgiving dinner, these are great comfort foods to eat throughout the dark days that are coming our way. Appetizers and Snacks Appetizers: Horse Dip and Roasted Garlic Dip Celery Soup Chipotle Lime Pumpkin Seeds French Leek Soup Pickled Beets Root Soup World's Best Chicken (or Turkey) Soup  (also great for leftovers!) Side Dishes Bacony Green Beans and Candied Yams Green Bean and Goat Cheese Almondine Herb-Roasted Roo...

My original plan was to take some pictures of all the vegetables we used from the garden for Thanksgiving dinner, then show how we prepared them in a series of before and after photos. This plan went well first thing in the morning when we went out to pick what we needed: Clockwise from the top we have mixed greens and herb salad (lettuces, arugula, kale, beet greens, mint, and cilantro), cabbage and broccoli, frozen green beans from earlier in the season, frozen peas from earlier in the season, a jar of dried sage, chives, and carrots. My Thanksgiving photography took a nosedive as the day went on, though. I took only one other picture all day, and it wasn't of prepared food or even of the kids. So instead of a big recipe extravaganza, here's what I learned yesterday: 1. It takes three times as long to pick damp vegetables on a freezing morning than it does to pick them later in the afternoon. This is because you have to stop several times to thaw your wet, frozen ...