Farm To Table

(mid september. number 22.)

We visited our friend Will Boal, who worked the 2011 farming season at Let Us Farm, located in Oakville, WA (about 30some miles from Olympia. He's the guy in the yellow mackintosh). 

Will was living in a delightful old farm house, with a well stocked kitchen and a large table cover that turns his modest 3 or 4 person dinner table into a proper feasting platform. All of these vegetables (and also the eggs) came from the very land we cooked the food on, and were gathered mere hours before the meal was served. 

Secret Restaurant Portland has been casually existing within the "farm to table" movement for a year and a half now. So this first weekend of fall, we went to the farm and we filled the table. We made a midafternoon lunch/dinner- a sort of old fashioned "Sunday Supper."

Last Chance

(early september. number 21.)

At the end of the entry for Dinner #20, I metioned Nigel Slater's Tender as a major source of inspiration. This year, due our awfully rainy spring, most August veggies and fruits were late. We missed out on doing SR in August, largely due to my being gone for 2 weeks in the middle of it (see previous entry). This was serendipitus, as this early September Secret Restaurant was scheduled for a hot-as-Hades weekend, with peaches and figs and tomatoes in full force. To plan the menu we basically spent time reading what Mr. Slater had to say about the ingredients we hoped to work with, and chose some exciting recipes as the jump off point. Once again, major inspiration credit is due to Nigel. As a disclaimer, however, we did make a point to do something unique with each dish. We ate outside on the porch, knowing it was probably our last chance.