May Magic in the Kitchen

 

The magic begins outdoors.

Look closer. What do you see?

Dew clinging to petals of deep purple violets.

It was a heavenly Memorial Day morning, with sunshine and dew and a fresh, light breeze. I don't know that I have ever had such a blissful harvest before in my life. Or a more beautiful one. Or one that cost me less in effort, since there had been no planting or watering involved. Nature did all the work until it was time for me to pick the flowers.

Once the flowers are picked and rinsed, an infusion (or tea) is made by pouring boiling water over the blossoms and letting them steep for "several hours." What does "several" mean in a recipe? Another recipe said half an hour would suffice, but I had work to do, so my violets steeped for three or four hours. Doesn't that sound like "several" to you? The magic begins right away with the boiling water, which turns a beautiful shade of blue. 

Next step is to drain the tea, leaving the infused blue tea behind. (Could this be used to color hard-cooked eggs? Wouldn't they be lovely?) 

Violet infusion

By now you have squeezed a fresh lemon, strained that juice, and it's time to add lemon juice to your violet infusion, which turns it from blue to what some call purple but what looks like fuchsia to me. Magic!

Lemon juice changes the color of the violet tea.

From here on, it's jelly-making as usual. Bring to a boil with pectin, add sugar, bring to a boil again, ladle it into jars, and admire the rosy magic (it changed color again!) you have created. 

From Forest to Table

 

A fiddlehead is a fern in early spring, before the front unfurls. The name comes from its resemblance to the scroll of a violin. Picked at that stage, steamed and then sautéed, it has a flavor somewhat similar to asparagus but much more subtle. This was only my second year harvesting them, and I carefully cut only one or two per clump (sometimes only one if there were only two or three), wanting to anticipate fiddleheads for many years to come. 

I am not one to sneer at conventional wisdom when it comes to wild foods, so I followed online instructions and steamed the fiddleheads for 10 minutes before draining and patting them dry and adding them to butter and olive oil in a skillet I had already used to sauté sliced mushrooms. Added the mushrooms back to the skillet to warm them before serving. Topped with freshly grated Parmesan and freshly squeezed lemon juice. That was the first course one night.

I had gathered enough fiddleheads that we didn't eat them all the first night, so the next evening I sautéed additional mushrooms and made a cream sauce, resulting in the perfect accompaniment to panfried fresh lake trout. I didn't realize until I looked at the photo later that the chicken on the dish looked like it was falling off a cliff. Oh, well. Dinner was good!

Soon the toothwort blossoms will be open, and I'll gather leaves and flowers for salad.