Robbing Potatoes

A freshly robbed potato

We've finally started "robbing" new potatoes from the potato patch--hurrah! Robbing is a thrilling process of rooting around with your hands in the potato beds until you feel . . . Viola! A potato! It's a treasure hunt with a delicious, nutritious reward.

Once you find the potato, slip your fingers around it and gently extract it without harming the roots and stems, leaving the potato plant to grow and thrive and produce loads more potatoes throughout the summer and into the fall. Robbed new potatoes seem like a bonus prize, a little special extra treat.

This morning, I robbed several overflowing handfuls of Yukon Gold potatoes from our potato hills.

New potatoes, leeks, and collard greens.

We happen to have a large quantity of raw cow's milk from next door to use up before it goes bad, and leeks and celery ready to harvest in the garden, so a creamy potato soup was clearly in order.

I sometimes like to add sturdy greens of some sort (collards, kale, cabbage) to potato soup, but not too much as to overwhelm things. And there were collards galore in the garden, so a soup was born:

Creamy soup with New Potatoes, Leeks, Collards, and Celery

• 8-12 new potatoes
• 3-4 leeks
• A small bunch of collard greens, cut into very thin strips
• A handful of celery stalks of any size (we're growing a gorgeous heirloom red stalk celery that can be harvested at any stage by the stalk), sliced thinly
• Fresh parsley, coarsely chopped
• 3-4 cups of milk (raw if possible!)
• 3-5 Tbs. butter
• Salt and pepper
• A generous handful of fresh dill leaves

Ingredients on their way to the kitchen.

1. Cut potatoes and leeks into bite-sized pieces.
2. Saute leeks in a generous amount of butter in a heavy soup pot. Add salt.
3. When leeks are soft, add potatoes and a few grinds of black pepper. Stir, cover and cook, adding water as necessary.
4. Add collards and celery. Add a little water to keep things juicy. Continue to cook, stirring.
5. Add water and cook on medium heat until everything is nice and soft.
6. About 5 minutes before serving, add parsley and continue cooking.
7. Turn off the heat, stir in the milk, and cover.
8. Tear up a bunch of fresh dill, sprinkle in, and stir. Mash everything up a little bit with the back of a ladle if you want the soup to have a creamier texture.
9. Let sit for a minute or two to cool and for all the flavors to meld. Add more salt to taste. Serve!

The soup

. . .

mmmmm!

We had the soup with a salad fresh from the garden -- lettuce, radishes, cucumbers, and edible flowers and a garlickey dressing from our own garlic. Every ingredient was from the garden, with the exception of the milk, which was from the cow next door, and the salt, pepper, and butter, which, along with the oil and vinegar in the salad dressing, were from somewhere far away.

Summer!

Full Bloom

Photos from this morning in the garden:

Dino Kale

Chamomile

A whole lot of garlic and potatoes

Valerian & Ironweed

Onions, leeks, and brassicas

Love in a Mist

Leeks flowering, with sorrel in the background

The incredible, edible day lily

Lavender

Red Milkweed

What's Growing in the Garden Now

Spinach 

Fava Beans

Leeks

Catnip

Sorrell

Garlic

Not pictured, but growing strong: multiplier onions, regular onions, and various perennial herbs.

Soup Season

When the air starts feeling cold, I start thinking about making soup and baking things. It feels biological, but I'm sure it must be at least partly socialized. Either way, when Fall comes, I make soup.

Right now on the stove is simmering a pot of one of my all time favorite soups: potato leek with sorrel.

At left: a variety of potatoes from the farmers market.








The sorrel is fresh from the garden, the potatoes and leeks are from the farmers market this week. The only other ingredients are butter, water, milk and/or half and half, salt and pepper. And that is quite perfectly enough. You can add some thyme if you want -- it's delicious with or without. I like to use a variety of varieties of potatoes, because it looks more interesting but also because I think it makes for a more complex taste.

Here's how to make the soup:

1. Melt 4 Tbs butter in a soup pot.
2. Chop a bunch of leeks. The proportions are very flexible, so you can use 5, 6, 8, 10 leeks-- whatever you feel like! But do use only the white and light green parts.
3. Saute the leeks in the butter with some salt and pepper.
4. Chop a bunch of potatoes -- at least 6 or 8.
   
5. After a few minutes, add potatoes to the leeks and butter. Add a little more salt and pepper.
6. Add a little water to keep the potatoes from sticking to the bottom of the pot.
7. Chop the sorrel, and after the potatoes have cooked for a few minutes, throw the sorrel into the pot.
8. Cook while stirring for a few more minutes until the sorrel is wilted and everything looks good and juicy. If you want at this point, you can add some fresh or dried thyme.
   
9. Add a couple/few of cups of water and bring to a boil.
10. Simmer until potatoes are soft.
11. Add about a cup of milk and throw in some half and half or cream too if you have some on hand and like a richer taste. Taste the soup and add salt and pepper to taste. But don't overdo it because the flavors of the potatoes, leeks, and sorrel are so good all by themselves!
    
12. Serve hot with chunky bread and red wine. Go ahead and top with sour cream just to complete the dairy overload. Sprigs of fresh thyme make a nice fancy garnish.
    

It's so good. Such simple ingredients, all in-season and local, and perfect for Fall.

Enjoy!