things to do: hill east farmers market

Last Wednesday after work, Tony and I stopped at a new farmers market in Hill East -- 13th Street and E Street Southeast. For anyone who works or lives on the Hill, it's a nice spot to grab fresh mid-week produce, and it runs until 7 p.m.

For the novelty of it, I bought some golden beets.

Here's what I did: I scrubbed them, wrapped them in foil with a little bit of olive oil, roasted them in the oven at 400 for an hour, let them cool, and rubbed the skins off. I sliced them for Tony's salad last night. He says the taste is indiscernible from red beets. They're pretty to look at, though. (I'm an admittedly picky eater and didn't try them. Can't bring myself to eat beets.)

I also bought some farm eggs, and this label cracked me up. "From hens running free indoors and out." At first I thought these people let their chickens into their house. Tony set me straight -- "indoors" clearly refers to their coop.

And some nice corn.

Which was pesticide-free corn. Which means a few of the ears I picked up had little worms munching away.

<3

In other farmers market news, I got a cool white eggplant at the H Street market Saturday morning. Again, for the novelty of it. I made eggplant parmesan, and Tony and I really couldn't tell the difference between the taste of white eggplant and purple.

the garden: tomatoes of late

The tomatoes I've been picking lately -- since the heat mercifully disappeared -- are so darn pretty. They're uniform in shape, size, and color. I feel like I should call Bonnie Plants and invite them over for a photo shoot -- that's how pretty my tomatoes are. It wasn't that way all summer. I picked a TON of tomatoes this summer, even during the hottest weeks, but they weren't consistently good-looking. I'm thinking the extreme heat stressed my tomato plants and made them produce smaller fruit that was misshapen at times.

That said, I enjoyed my misshapen tomatoes, and I enjoy them now. They just look better lately.

<3

So here we are, in late September, and which of my summer crops are still growing? I have one eggplant growing on my plant. I've picked four so far, so that'll give me five for the year, which is about what you can expect from one plant. And the tomatoes and peppers are still going strong. I'm really getting my money out of those plants.

recipe: fried eggplant

Right on schedule, I got the first eggplant of the summer out of my garden Sunday.

I made it into a simple dinner of fried eggplant, topped with mozzarella cheese and served over spaghetti.

Now, I once made eggplant parmesan from Tony's aunt's recipe, which she got from his grandpa. It was delicious, but it required an entire Sunday afternoon to prepare, from salting the eggplant to making the homemade tomato sauce. Alas, I had neither the time nor the patience for so much cooking yesterday, and I didn't want to turn on the oven. So I whipped out my frying pan and prepared the eggplant in the second-best-way I know how.

Fried Eggplant

• 1 eggplant
• Flour as needed
• 2 eggs
• Breadcrumbs as needed
• Olive oil
• 3 to 4 servings of spaghetti  
• Jar of pasta sauce

Boil water, and cook spaghetti according to package.

Meanwhile, prepare the eggplant. Peel it, and slice it 1/4-inch thick. 

Put flour in one bowl. Beat eggs in another bowl. Pour breadcrumbs in yet another bowl. 

Coat each eggplant slice in flour, dredge in egg, and coat with breadcrumbs. 

Heat oil in large frying pan. Fry eggplant over medium heat until golden brown. Flip. Fry until light golden, then top with cheese and cover pan. Eggplant should continue frying to golden brown as cheese melts. I cooked the eggplant in two batches. 

Drain spaghetti when al dente. Return noodles to pot, and add pasta sauce as desired. Return pot to burner, and heat until pasta sauce is warm. 

Transfer spaghetti to plates and top with eggplant. Serves 3 to 4.

<3

From the archives:

recipe: roasted asparagus