From the category archives:

Foraging & Gathering

Violet Tea Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting & Candied Wild Violets

by Laura 5 June 2011

I’ve been holding back this post. The moment for wild violets has passed, at least in the woods and marsh banks near our home where I gather them. Perhaps there are still a few beneath the greenery that has grown up seemingly overnight, tempestuous, lush, aggressive. I spied two violets waving together amongst the wood [...]

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Potato & Fiddlehead Fern Gratin

by Laura 25 May 2011

Thin slices of creamy potato and tender fiddlehead ferns baked in a bath of cream and topped with a crust of melted Emmenthaler. Share This: Recommend on FacebookShare on PinterestShare with StumblersTweet about itEmail a friend

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Savory Breakfast Bread Pudding with Fiddlehead Ferns, Sausage, Caramelized Leeks and Red Spring Onions, & Gruyere

by Laura 23 May 2011

One pan, some pork sausage browned, caramelized leeks and red spring onion tossed in behind to caramelize, then in go fiddlehead ferns to sauté with some garlic. All of this is tossed into a buttered baking dish over a cubed loaf of crusty country bread. It’s topped with grated Gruyere, and eggs and cream are [...]

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Stinging Nettle Soup

by Laura 22 May 2011

Spring has come to Minnesota, hesitantly and then with a rush. This week the trees have leafed out, apple and plum trees have blossomed, and the lilacs are ready to burst into bloom. Winter is a barren season in Minnesota, and spring comes begrudgingly. When it finally arrives, seemingly overnight, from dim gray to shades [...]

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Spring Salad

by Laura 22 May 2011

Spring Salad: wild cress, butter lettuce, wild violets, hazelnuts, avocado, red spring onion, champagne vinaigrette Share This: Recommend on FacebookShare on PinterestShare with StumblersTweet about itEmail a friend

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Candied Wild Violets

by Laura 21 May 2011

I’m something of a guilty forager. It’s public land, yes, but part of me still feels like I’m taking something that doesn’t belong to me, like I’m breaking a rule. Gathering wild violets or ramps or morels, well, it feels like a secret engagement, something quietly forbidden. I know logically that that’s just bunk, but [...]

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Wild Ramp Cream Cheese

by Laura 13 May 2011

If you are lucky enough to find some ramps this spring, and you can barely wait to cook with them, you can tame them and get one or two onto your plate in a heartbeat with this cream cheese. Smeared onto some good bread, a bagel, or crispbread, these wild leeks, redolent of garlic and [...]

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Maple Sugaring at Family Farms

by Laura 2 April 2011

This piece was originally published in Honest Cooking magazine. My daughter Sophia and I visited Family Farms in Delano, Minnesota on a dun-gray day in late March. The roads that wind through the countryside west of the Twin Cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis are dotted with small, anonymous farms, with families tending modest fields [...]

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