Potato Weather

Cool nights, warm days, occasional rain – these conditions make it easier to reconnect with your oven, which probably has been laregly ignored the last few months with the exception of a pie or two. Reacquaint yourself this weekend, and what says getting to know each other all over again better than potatoes? Just like a Tom Petty song, there is something good, honest and enjoyable about a baked potato but you don’t have to go russet. Try oven roasting one or more of the dozen varieties of potatoes found at our markets. Small to medium potatoes roasted in a hot oven 375-425ºf then tossed in chives and butter/olive oil and served with your favorite late summer veg, like green beans. While this is easily a meal onto itself, a cook with a Pro-Pasture Friday worldview could make this the foundation of a meal that includes egg based aioli, pasture raised meat and poultry or by adding one of the award winning cheeses found at our markets.

Apples and peaches can both be found at the market – it’s always wonderful the way one season/crop bleeds into another, nostalgia and promise joined together like strands of DNA. Or two kinds of fruit in the same place at the same time. Or something.

PSU’s Chef in the Market features Chef Eric Joppie of Bar Avignon. King Market welcomes back Whole Foods: they visited us a few times this the summer, shopping the market and working with young cooks on how to prepare foods. This week they will be preparing cucumber boats. No word on their seaworthiness, but they’re guaranteed to look like canoes and all will possess good yaw.

Pioneer Courthouse Square Market had a great Labor Day holiday and it’s excited to be back to work this Monday. PCS, Kenton, Buckman and NW all run through the end of September, stop by and visit while the season lasts. Hours and locations here.