It is starting to be harvest time in Indiana. What an exciting time. All the work sprouting seeds starting in February, planting in May, occasionally weeding and watering — it is starting to pay off. I have gotten several cherry tomatoes in the last couple weeks, and in the last week or so the big tomatoes are really starting to come in. I have been enjoying the cherry tomatoes all by themselves, and I have been making the big tomatoes into my favorite simple salad. Slice the tomatoes. Sprinkle some fresh chopped basil over them (plenty of basil in the garden too), and then pour a little olive oil and balsamic vinegar over them, and a little salt and fresh ground pepper. Very tasty.

tomato basil salad

Last weekend there was also quite a bit of good stuff at the Spencer Farmer’s market. I bought some eggplant, peppers, and heirloom tomatoes from the Harrimans. I know that I have my own tomatoes, but I thought that the heirloom tomatoes looked really interesting. One big one that I got was called Kellogg’s breakfast. I can’t remember the name of the other one. I also traded some bread starter with Joanna Sparks for some of her goodies, which included parsley, garlic, and pearl onions.

heirloom tomatoes – the one the left is called “Kellogg’s breakfast”

I finished out my weekend of harvesting with some harvesting in the wild. Volya, one of the grad students in my lab is an avid mushroom hunter. We went mushroom hunting in the Charles Dean Wilderness, just south of Lake Monroe. It is part of the Hoosier National Forest. He showed me which mushrooms are okay to eat and which are not. We mostly collected chanterelles, and boy did we get a bunch! We spent several hours hunting, though we took a little break to take a swim in Lake Monroe, which was quite a bit warmer than the pond on Twin Springs.

Chanterelle harvest – This is about 30-40% of what we got.

After getting home, I washed the chanterelles and then boiled them for 10 minutes like Volya told me to. I then decided to add them into a risotto, with onions, garlic, butter beans, fresh tomatoes and basil, and vegetable stock (and a splash of dry vermouth). It turned out pretty tasty.

Chanterelles up close

Risotto with chanterelles, fresh tomatoes, and basil