Welcome back September

Wow, the amount of posts for August was appalling! Guess it's a sign that I was far too busy enjoying a week with my parents in Oceanside, Oregon and the farm, along with 10 days of film festival, and another week spent in Georgia with my oldest bestest friends getting sunburned/bug-bitten, laughing, talking, drinking, eating, playing banangrams & taboo, swimming, entertaining a two year old, and doing my part to stock up on cholesteral laden goods characteristic to the South... eg. breakfast at Cracker Barrel with grits, fried eggs, and biscuits (only five though) & gravy, chicarrones, fried okra, fried green tomatoes, fried summer squash ...  about the only thing I didn't eat for old times sake was moonpies!  I was however incredibly fortunate to get a bag of end of season Georgia peaches and they were SPECTACULAR. If only I could have canned them all and brought them home.  I had also forgotten how incredible night time in the south is - there is a veritable symphony of cicadas and tree frogs lasting all night and the slow sleepy dance of fireflies (though sadly they seemed far less in numbers than  my childhood memories recall).

Now though, the garden is in full swing and we are laden with chard, collard greens, beets, potatoes, and carrots so I'm doing my best to come up with recipes that use a bunch of these.

This meal came together fairly easily (assuming that your greens are already washed and chopped), was colorful and the flavors all worked together so well. I found the Greens Adobo recipe in the Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant Cookbook and the sweet potato hash was inspired by this post. The Greens recipe is awesome and I think would work well both with Asian pairings and Southern pairings (as well as the intended Filipino pairings). Note that the spices were not measured per se for the sweet potato hash so I suggest seasoning, cooking, tasting and adjusting to suit your personal palatte.

Greens Adobo (from Moosewood), Sweet Potato Hash, & Fried Egg (serves 2)
Greens

• 5-6 cups chard, stems removed, and chopped
• garlic
• 3-4 large garlic cloves, sliced
• 2 Tbs soy sauce
• 1 Tbs white vinegar
• freshly ground black pepper to taste

1. On medium heat, fry the garlic pieces in oil (grapeseed, canola, or olive) until golden brown in a large skillet (or wok).
2. Remove the garlic and then add greens to skillet. Stir over medium high heat until wilted.
3. Remove skillet from heat, and add seasoning & garlic pieces, stirring through. Serve almost immediately. I did cover mine for about 5-10 minutes and they tasted fine.

Hash

• 1 large sweet potato, peeled and grated (fine grater size rather than the large 
•  grater size for cheese or in food processor)
• 1-2 pinches garlic powder
• 1 pinch ground sage
• 1-3 dashes (mexican) chili powder
• freshly ground salt and pepper to taste 

1. Heat 2 Tbs of oil in a skillet over medium high heat. Add the sweet potato and the spices.
2. Occasionally stir the sweet potato until the color changes from orange to a lighter yellow orange and the hash begins to brown on the underside.
3. Taste to ensure seasoning is good and that the hash is cooked enough for your preference. Remove from skillet and fry up your two eggs!