01 Oct Sun 2017
Gloria J. is September art contest winner!
You just won
September Art Contest!
Gloria J.
Congratulations from
Home Farm Herbery
22 Sep Fri 2017
A great review from another satisfied customer.
01 Sep Fri 2017
You just won August Art Contest, Kimberly R.
You just won August Art Contest
Kimberly R. of Lake Butler, FL.
Congratulations from
Home Farm Herbery LLC
Arlene Wright-Correll
22 Aug Tue 2017
French Tarragon is SO Easy to Use and Grow©
French Tarragon is SO Easy to Use and Grow©
By Arlene Wright-Correll
Often called the “chef’s best friend” or at the very least an essential herb in French cuisine, French tarragon plants (Artemisia dracunculus ‘Sativa’) are sinfully aromatic with a scent redolent of sweet anise and flavor akin to that of licorice. The plants grow to a height of 24 to 36 inches and spread across 12 to 15 inches apart.
French tarragon demands little to keep it lush, just good drainage and regular watering during dry spells. For a continuous harvest, use your pruners to cut back half your plants in June.
NOTE: French Tarragongrows well in a container, but only for a season. After that, its roots outgrow the pot, and it loses flavor.
We love to grow them here at Home Farm Herbery
and we love to cook with them!
Though this herb is native to Siberia and western Asia, tarragon is primarily used in France.
We grow great French Tarragon at Home Farm Herbery where it's often added to white wine vinegar, lending sweet, delicate licorice-like perfume and flavor. It pairs well with fish, omelets, and chicken cooked with mustard, and it's a crucial component of béarnaise sauce.
French tarragon isn't always easy to find, but when you get it, you'll love the bittersweet, peppery taste it imparts. Heat diminishes its flavor, so add tarragon toward the end of cooking, or use it as a garnish. A little goes a long way
Tarragon is a bittersweet herb with a hint of licorice flavor, but too much can overwhelm your recipe. 1 Tablespoon fresh tarragon = 1 teaspoon dried. Dried tarragon should be kept in a sealed container in a cool, dark place and used within 1 year.
Heat greatly intensifies the flavor of tarragon, both fresh and dried. Tarragon is also a good herb to use in infused oils.
Tarragon is a prime ingredient in Béarnaise Sauce and the French favorite herb mixture, fines herbes.
Here is our recipe for Home Farm Herbery’s Béarnaise Sauce.
Ingredients
1 tablespoon plus 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into 1/2" cubes.
3 tablespoons minced shallots.
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper.
2 tablespoons Champagne vinegar or white wine vinegar.
2 large egg yolks.
1 tablespoon (or more) fresh lemon juice.
1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh tarragon.
To prepare as follows:
Melt 1 tablespoon butter in a small saucepan over medium heat. Add shallots and a pinch of salt and pepper; stir to coat. Stir in vinegar, reduce heat to medium-low, and cook until vinegar is evaporated, 3-4 minutes. Reduce heat to low and continue cooking shallots, stirring frequently, until tender and translucent, about 5 minutes longer. Transfer shallot reduction to a small bowl and let cool completely.
Meanwhile, fill a blender with hot water to warm it; set aside. Melt remaining 1 cup butter in a small saucepan over medium heat until butter is foamy. Transfer butter to a measuring cup.
Drain blender and dry well. Combine egg yolks, lemon juice, and 1 tablespoon water in warm, dry blender. Purée the mixture until smooth. Remove lid insert. With blender running, slowly pour in hot butter in a thin stream of droplets, discarding milk solids at bottom of measuring cup. Continue blending until a smooth, creamy sauce forms, 2-3 minutes. Pour sauce into a medium bowl. Stir in shallot reduction and tarragon and season to taste with salt, pepper, and more lemon juice, if desired. DO AHEAD: Can be made 1 hour ahead. Cover and let stand at room temperature.
Béarnaise and steak is a match made in heaven, but this sauce has a few other divine uses. Try it spooned over poached eggs or spread over roast fish.
May the Creative Force be with you,
Arlene Wright-Correll
Caraway Seed Cake Surprises, Delights & Treats Us©
Caraway Seed Cake Surprises, Delights & Treats Us©
By Arlene Wright-Correll
We all know the many uses of Caraway Seeds.
Besides putting them in Breads, Caraway seeds can be freshen breath and its essential oil is found in many mouthwashes, toothpastes and chewing gums. It is used in several liquor recipes and to improve the flavor of various complementary herbal combinations.
Many of us know about using them in pickling, salad dressing, sauerkraut, cold slaw or cabbage salad, and I especially love them in rye bread, but how about a cake?
Home Farm Herbery's Caraway Seed Cake
A hint of citrus added to a traditional seed cake.
Ingredients:
3 cups sifted unbleached flour,
2 ½ teaspoons double acting baking powder
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup butter or shortening
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
2 tablespoons grated orange rind
1 tablespoon grated lemon rind
1 cup milk
1 tablespoon caraway seeds
1 tablespoon poppy seed
1 tablespoon aniseed
Directions:
Grease and flour 10-inch tube cake. Sift together flour, baking powder, nutmeg and salt. Blend together butter or shortening and sugar, creaming well. Add eggs, one at a time. Beat 1 minute after each. Blend in orange and lemon rind; mix thoroughly. Measure milk; add alternately with the dry ingredients to creamed mixture, beginning and ending with dry ingredients. Blend thoroughly after each addition.
Spread one-fourth of batter in 10-inch tube pan, well greased and lightly floured on bottom only. Sprinkle with caraway seeds. Alternate remaining batter with poppy seed and aniseed, ending with batter on top. Bake at 350 degrees F 75 to 80 minutes. Let cool in pan 15 minutes before turning out. Frost while slightly warm.
Fruit Juice Glaze:
Combine 1 ¼ cups sifted confectioners’ sugar, 3 tablespoons orange juice or lemon juice. Beat until well blended
May the Creative Force be with you,
Arlene Wright-Correll
01 Jul Sat 2017
William D. won June's art contest!
Your order automatically entered you in June’s contest & you won a FREE original work of art valued at least at $100.00. Congratulations. You prize is on the way!
Home Farm Herbery LLC
01 May Mon 2017
Home Farm Herbery's April art Contest winner
Nicole B of Smyrna, GA has just won Home Farm Herbery's April art Contest. Congratulations.
21 Apr Fri 2017
The Benefits of Growing Wild Chicory©
The Benefits of Growing Wild Chicory©
By Arlene Wright-Correll
Wild Chicory is a bushy perennial herb with blue, purple, or occasionally white flowers.
Wild Chicory is grown and cultivated for their leaves or for the roots which are baked, ground, and used as a coffee substitute and additive. The Wild Chicory leaves are used in salads, often times preferred over the Dandelion. The Wild Chicory leaves are cut and generally blanched, as the unblanched leaves are bitter. The young blanched heads are also a good vegetable for cooking, similar to Sea Kale. Planting outdoors is really simple. Just plant this perennial in a sunny spot with proper drainage and it will come back year after year.
One of the biggest benefits is the Finch love the seeds and since store bought Finch seeds have become more and more expensive over the years; this is really a simple way of attracting these beautiful birds.
Just about any visitor to New Orleans, including myself, has tasted an obligatory cup of the city’s signature blend of coffee and chicory. But chicory’s varieties and uses extend far beyond a slow Sunday brunch at Café du Monde.
When cooked, the roots taste like parsnips, but they are almost too skinny to bother with. Instead of boiling them, however, you can scrub them and roast them slowly until brittle and dark brown inside. Grind and brew them like coffee or blend with regular coffee. The resulting beverage tastes much like coffee but doesn’t contain caffeine.
People, for at least 5,000 years, have cultivated chicory for its medicinal benefits.
According to the “doctrine of signatures” (a renaissance theory that a plant’s appearance indicates its healing properties) the milky sap of chicory demonstrated its efficacy in promoting milk flow in nursing mothers, or perhaps diminishing it if it were too abundant; it seems to have been prescribed for both conditions.
The blue of the blossoms and their tendency to close as if in sleep at noon (in England) suggested the plant’s use in treating inflamed eyes. The bruised leaves have been poultices on swellings while root extracts have been used as a diuretic and laxative, and to treat fevers and jaundice.
The second-century physician Galen called chicory a “friend of the liver,” and contemporary research has shown that it can increase the flow of bile, which could be helpful in treating gallstones.
Much laboratory research also has shown root extracts to be antibacterial, anti-inflammatory and slightly sedative. They also slow and weaken the pulse and lower blood sugar. Leaf extracts have similar, though weaker, effects.
Chicory is a good source of folic acid, necessary for the formation and maturation of red blood cells and in the synthesis of DNA; potassium, which is required for the contraction of skeletal and heart muscle and for the transmission of nerve impulses; and vitamin A. One of the traditional bitter herbs of Passover, it is eaten as a spring tonic in many cultures.
A compound called maltol (3-hydroxyl-2-methyl-4-pyrone) from chicory (as well as larch bark, pine needles and roasted malt) is used in baked goods to intensify the flavor of sugar 30-to-300-fold.
The colonists bought it to America mainly as a medicinal crop.
Thomas Jefferson and others grew it as a forage crop. Since it doesn’t dry well, it was usually cut and fed green to horses, cattle, sheep, poultry and rabbits.
As I said it is an easy to grow perennial and the thing I like the best of it is it attracts the finch and I really enjoy watching these birds flit around these lovely blue flowers.
May the Creative Force be with you,
Arlene Wright-Correll
01 Apr Sat 2017
More Cooking with Chervil©
More Cooking with Chervil©
By Arlene Wright-Correll
We love cooking with our dried chervil and we love sharing our recipes. Here are two of our long time favorite recipes. The first one is very simple and the second one is deliciously elegant.
Roasted Pepper Frittata
Chervil has long been a favorite in egg dishes, but usually in the dried form. This recipe takes a nice helping of the fresh greens and adds it to a mix of colorful bell peppers. This recipe has long been a favorite of mine.
Makes 6 servings
1 red bell pepper
1 yellow or orange bell pepper
1 green bell pepper
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
2 tbsp. dried chervil
Salt and pepper to taste
8 large eggs
3 tablespoons low-fat milk
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
Fresh chervil sprigs for garnish
Preheat broiler.
Cut all the bell peppers in half lengthwise and remove the stems, seeds and ribs. Place cut sides down on a baking sheet. Broil until the skins blacken and blister. Remove the baking sheet from the oven, drape the peppers loosely with aluminum foil and let cool for 10 minutes. Using your fingers or a small knife, remove the pepper skins. Cut the peppers lengthwise into strips 1/4-inch wide.
In a bowl, combine the bell pepper strips, garlic, vinegar, chervil and salt and pepper to taste. Let marinate un-refrigerated 30 minutes.
In another bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk and Parmesan until frothy. Add the pepper mixture and mix well. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
In a 10-inch ovenproof frying pan over medium heat, warm the olive oil. When the oil is hot, add the egg mixture and, when it starts to set, lift the edges of the frittata with a spatula so that some of the egg mixture runs underneath.
Reduce the heat to medium and cook until the bottom is set but the top still is runny, 8 to 10 minutes. Place the pan in the oven and cook until the eggs are set on top and golden brown on the bottom, 6 to 7 minutes.
Remove the frittata from the oven and loosen with a spatula. Invert the frittata onto a serving plate. Garnish with fresh chervil sprigs.
We adapted the following recipe from Emeril LaGasse around 16 years ago.
Lobster Ravioli in a Fennel and Chervil-Infused Nage
Total Time: 1 hr 25 min Prep:15 min Cook:1 hr 10 min
Yield: 18 ravioli, serving 6 as an appetizer
Ingredients
2 ribs celery, roughly chopped
2 onions, roughly chopped
2 carrots, roughly chopped
1 lemon, juiced
1 orange, juiced
1 teaspoon black peppercorns (we like to use our Grains of Paradise)
¼ tsp dried thyme
¼ tsp. dried parsley
2 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
2 bay leaves
1 cup dry white wine
1 teaspoon salt
2 live (1 1/2 to 2 pound) lobsters
1/2 cup finely chopped fresh fennel bulb, fronds and upper stems reserved
1 tablespoons dried chervil
1/2 cup heavy cream
6 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon lemon zest
1 lemon, juiced
1/4 cup minced died onions
½ teaspoon minced dried garlic
36 wonton or egg roll wrappers
Directions
In a large pot place 1 gallon of water and the celery, onion, carrot, lemon and orange juices, peppercorns, thyme, parsley, garlic, bay leaves, white wine and salt. Bring to a boil over high heat, reduce to a simmer, then add the lobsters and poach for 9 minutes. Remove the lobsters from the water with tongs and drain. When cool enough to handle, remove the lobster meat and claw meat from the shells, finely chop and set aside, reserving the shells.
Into a clean pot strain the cooking liquid through a fine mesh strainer. Add the lobster shells and bring to a boil over high heat and reduce by half. Add the fronds and upper stems from the fennel bulb and reduce again by half (should be between 2 and 3 cups). Strain the liquid again into a clean saucepan and bring to a simmer. Add the chervil, cream, 2 tablespoons butter and 1-1/2 teaspoons lemon zest to the pan and season to taste. Remove sauce from the heat and cover.
In a large sauté pan, melt 2 tablespoons of butter over medium heat and sauté the fennel, shallots and garlic until soft. Add the chopped lobster meat and sauté for 2 minutes. Add the lemon juice and remaining lemon zest and butter to the pan and stir to incorporate, next pour onto a plate to cool.
On a flat surface spread out 18 won ton wrappers and spoon 1 tablespoon of lobster filling into the center of each. Brush a little water on the outer rim of the filled wrapper and top a wrapper. Press gently around the filling and the edges of the wrappers to seal.
(Ravioli may be refrigerated at this point, covered tightly, until ready to use, up to 2 hours.)
Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil, drop in the ravioli in batches and cook for 30 seconds. Drain thoroughly and place 3 ravioli in the center of each serving plate, and coat with the sauce.
May the Creative Force be with you
Arlene Wright-Correll
March Art Contest Winner..
This is no April Fool Joke Marlin Woosley..
Your name was pulled for the winner of the March 2017 Art contest and you are winning a $499.00 painting. It goes out Monday...Congratulations ... Home Farm Herbery
05 Mar Sun 2017
Some More Good Reasons to Use Chives
Some More Good Reasons to Use Chives@
By Arlene Wright- Correll
Here at Home Farm Herbery we not only grow chives, we sell the seeds so you can grow your own and we dry the chives and sell them to our customers who do not grow them.
We along with our customers have many uses for them and we find this multipurpose health booster to be high in vitamin C, folic acid, potassium, calcium and iron and this is true of not only Chives, but the Chive Flowers also.
When you use these you will find your digestion improving, your cholesterol lowering, your metabolism improving and also your support system!
Chives are best eaten raw so when you add them to your salads or include them as a garnish in other dishes you are really getting their maximum effectiveness.
Whenever you make your favorite biscuit recipe try adding chopped chives and you will be delighted as they will be bursting with flavor.
Why not consider combining 1 tablespoon of Freeze Dried Chopped Chive Rings
with 4 ounces of gorgonzola cheese, 1/8th teaspoon kosher salt and 1 stick of softened unsalted butter?
Just mix in a bowl and then form into a log and refrigerate until firm. We use it as a sauce for gnocchi and also to accompany meats such as hamburgers or steaks.
When we plant tomatoes, carrots, roses and apple trees we mix chive seeds among the dirt. When they first grow the chives will repel aphids from the tomatoes as well as from our sunflowers and mums.
After 3 years of chive growth we discovered they prevented rose black spot and apple scab.
The chive blossom make a wonderful addition to salads giving them a subtle onion flavor and we also find them great to add to salad dressings.
May the Creative Force be with you,
Arlene Wright-Correll