Garden living, or weaving the garden into your daily life, is a lifestyle filled with rewarding promise and new adventure. Harvesting your own vegetables from your kitchen garden for a dinner party, then arranging a beautiful bouquet from the same source takes careful planning, but can enhance your life whether you live in the city, suburbs or country. "Hyper-seasonal" is how I describe my cooking, along with giving traditional Southern heirloom recipes a healthier twist to make them relevant to today's tastes.
Recipes
Slightly rustic and simply elegant, this easy dessert is a mainstay in this Farmer's kitchen! The complement of basic ingredients with pretty fruit is what makes this dish so elegant. Peaches in the summer, apples in the fall, pecans in winter, and strawberries in spring, the dough for this tart is quite versatile.
Tart Dough
- 2 cups of all purpose flour
- ½ tsp of salt
- 1 tbsp of sugar
- 1 ½ sticks of butter
- ½ cup of ice water
Combine the dry ingredients with your fingers in a large mixing bowl. If using a food processor, then just pulse to mix.
Slice the cold butter into cubes and mix with hand mixer or pulse in food processor until the dough begins to clump into a ball and the butter is pea size or smaller.
Pour the ice water into the mixture, slowly, continue mixing simultaneously until ball of dough is formed.
On a floured surface, roll the dough into a large "pat" and chill for about an hour.
After chilling, roll or spread out the dough into your desired shape... the rustic feel of an imperfect circle or rectangle is what makes the simple elegance of this dessert so pretty.
Slice 6 or so peaches into wedges and arrange on the dough to suit your own fashion. Cover with sugar, about half a cup, depending on the sweetness of the fruit and your own sweet tooth.
Bake at 350 for about 45 minutes or until the dough is golden brown... Glaze with peach jam or preserves and serve with a dollop of peach preserves as well.
Mimi's Apple Cake is so delicious because the toasted pecans in the cake gives me that sweet and salty complement I crave, and the simplicity of the cake itself is so appealing. The ingredients are not complicated and are readily on hand.
Mimi's Apple Cake
- 3 Eggs
- 2 cups of sugar (this can be cut down by a third cup if need be)
- 1 ½ cup of vegetable oil
- 1 teaspoon of baking soda
- 1 pinch of salt
- 3 cups of all purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons of good vanilla
- 3 cups, about 3 average size apples, of chopped raw apples
- 1 cup of toasted and chopped pecans
- 2 teaspoons of cinnamon
In a large bowl, beat the eggs, add the sugar and oil, and then add dry ingredients, apples, and nuts.
Pour into a greased bunt pan or tube pan.
Bake at 335 degrees for 1/ ½ hours.
Garnish with freshly whipped cream and roasted pecans, buttered and salted.
