"Lettere D'Amore" Cookies

Love letters are still one of the best ways to express our adoration for someone, and these precious “Lettere D’Amore” cookies fill all those boxes. Handcrafted - check. Expressive - check. Thoughtful - check. Delicious… okay, I guess that’s not usually part of a love letter, but maybe that’s what makes these even better!

The cookies are made from a traditional Italian sweet pastry dough called Pasta Frollo, then filled with homemade strawberry jam made from Hood Strawberries we picked at Sauvie Island Farms last year. Use whatever jam you have available, especially if you made it yourself. Homemade always shouts “I love you!”

INGREDIENTS

Sugar 200 g (1 cup)

Butter 200 g ( a little less than 2 sticks)

Flour 500 g (4 cups)

Eggs (2 eggs)

Lemon zest (1/2 lemon)

Orange zest (1/2 orange)

Strawberry jam (1 cup)

INSTRUCTIONS

Let the butter soften until it becomes malleable and easy to bend without cracking. Mix the butter and sugar till smooth then add the eggs, lemon and orange zest and keep mixing until the eggs are completely absorbed into the mix.

Add the flour a little at the time. When the mixture becomes too hard to mix with a fork, use your hands until you have used all the flour. Wrap the mix with wax paper or plastic wrap and let rest for 30 min in the fridge.Cut the dough into 4 pieces. Dust your work surface with flour to prevent the dough from sticking and roll them one at the time with a rolling pin until a 1/4" thick.

Cut the rolled dough into 3" squares, put some strawberry jam in the middle of the square and fold three of the four angles to the center of the square.

Bake at 350 F for 15 min, then let cool.

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Farming Today: Q & A with Our Table Farm

A drive through Oregon’s Willamette Valley in late summer is a sensory experience. The smell of freshly baled hay floats in the sun-baked air, rows of grape vines march up a hill, an old red barn sits nestled among blueberry bushes, and immediately our fast paced lives slow down to a crawl.

Visiting farmland tugs at a primal place in our hearts that urges us to stay one moment longer. While we hang on to this pastoral picture of family farms, the reality is quite different, and in fact its survival depends upon us. Small farms are ceding to factory farms and garden diversity is shifting to monocultures, all of which is taking a toll on our environment, our culture and our lives.

Here at Pinolo we believe in supporting local farms so we decided to talk to one of our farm partners… one that represents a new generation of farmer, and one with a deep understanding of our current agricultural system and a vision for a better future. Meet Narendra Varma and his vertically integrated cooperative farm Our Table.

With a background in high tech, a love of food, and a curiosity for “systems,” Narendra and his wife Machelle bought 58 acres in Sherwood, OR ten years ago and started Our Table Cooperative as a hands-on way to look at food from a systemic perspective. The result is an organic farm growing berries, produce, eggs and pastured chickens (of which we purchase their beautiful blueberries and raspberries).

His decade of experience running a cooperative farm, coupled with his curiosity for food systems, gives Narendra a unique perspective of the current challenges and insights into the future of agriculture. Read on to be inspired.

Our Table founders Narendra and Machelle Varma.

Q:  What’s the benefit of being a cooperative rather than just owning a farm?

A: Cooperatives have a rich history in agriculture (and food) because all farmers know that risks are high and rewards are generally small – therefore, sharing risk allows one to weather bad years in exchange for also sharing the rewards in good years. Our Table is unique because it is a multi-stakeholder cooperative that brings together workers, independent regional food producers, and eaters into a single vertically integrated structure – a community food system that is owned and controlled by the community.

Q: What are the biggest challenges farming faces today?

A: Fundamentally the biggest challenge is that the retail price of food is too low to pay for the costs of farming without exploiting nature (use of chemicals on land for example) or people (poor wages and working conditions). Americans spend less than 9% of their income on food – less than most other countries and this is a huge problem – the average American household spends more on TV/phone/internet than on food. It is a question of what we value as a society.

Q: How does this affect the lives of people/consumers?

A: This economic imbalance mentioned above is what drives all the other problems – environmental degradation, rural poverty, poor quality food produced with large amounts of chemicals, nutritionally deficient highly processed foods, etc. Chronic disease alone costs hundreds of billions each year in perpetual “treatment” and most chronic diseases are a result of poor nutrition and/or environmental degradation (e.g. asthma). Of course climate change is also a huge factor that we don’t discuss much but should. It IS already impacting all our lives and will continue to do so. Regenerative agriculture is an excellent response to climate change since appropriate practices can capture huge amounts of carbon in the soil and improve soil fertility/productivity while also employing lots of people.

Q: What’s your vision for addressing this challenge, and how can people support that?

A: We try and pay farmers a “decent” wage – our average wage is $15/hour which is considered good but is of course still very low. Consider that everyone working at Our Table would have done better financially by being on unemployment these past few months thanks to the CARES act unemployment benefit of an additional $600/week. For workers who are truly essential, this is an abomination. We all agree that healthcare workers are essential, especially during a pandemic, but I eat three times a day and I see a doctor or use healthcare services no more than 5-6 times a year. The solutions have to be systemic because the problems are systemic. We can try and create an oasis here at Our Table but it’s a pretty small oasis and doesn’t necessarily scale well since our food is priced out of reach for many people (including all our farmers!).

Q: The pandemic has turned industries upside down, how has this affected farming and are there positive takeaways from it?

A: In the early days of the pandemic related lockdowns, the industrial food system effectively collapsed due to long supply chains and low inventories. This system is very “efficient” in one sense but also very fragile and really a monoculture with little diversity. In contrast local farms and stores were fully stocked and able to help feed our communities without missing a beat. I think many people saw this and hopefully will remember it so that even in the post-pandemic future, they will choose to support local food systems. Additionally, the fine-dining segment of the restaurant industry has essentially collapsed and is unlikely to come back any time soon. Many small farms used to depend on restaurants as their main customers so that has had a huge impact. I predict that many small farms will fail if the pandemic does not get better by early 2021.

All Our Table products are available for free pickup or home delivery online at https://www.ourtable.us/farmstore.html#/

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3 Ways to Support Small Farms

1. Sign up for a CSA or buy produce from farmers markets. You can rest easy knowing all your money goes directly to supporting small farms.

2. Speak with the farmers. Build in 10 minutes on your next visit to a farmer’s market and learn more about what they do,, how it benefits us and how we can better support them.

3. Try something new. See a new vegetable variety you’ve never cooked with? Ask the farmer more about it and give it a try! Not only does this expand our palate but it supports crop diversity.

Blueberry Jam

When blueberries are in season it’s easy to simply eat them by the handful. But if you find yourself with an overabundance or just want to try something new, Sandro’s blueberry jam is easy to make, full of pure blueberry flavor, and fantastic on yogurt, granola, bread and butter, or a gelato like Fior di Latte. This year we sourced our blueberries from Our Table Cooperative and made this jam to pour over a silky peach gelato for a special flavor to raise money for Friends of the Children-Portland. If you find a new use for this versatile and loose jam, let us know!

Ingredients

1 lb blueberries

4 oz. sugar

Juice of 1 lemon

Zest of 1 lemon

Instructions

In a pan combine blueberries, sugar, lemon juice and lemon zest and cook on low heat, stirring constantly.

Once the berry skins begin to split, pull off the heat and let cool. Finally, put into a food processor and store in jars in fridge or freezer.

Championing Equality, Supporting Kids, Making Gelato

Championing Equality, Supporting Kids, Making Gelato.

How are these three things tied together? Through Friends of the Children-Portland.

We understand now is a unique time for action. A time to create a more just world, a world with equality at its heart. With this in mind we have embarked on a longterm partnership with an organization that tackles diversity, equity and inclusion at its roots. Friends of the Children-Portland.

Through one on one mentorship with kids beginning in kindergarten, Friends of the Children-Portland breaks the cycle of poverty for our community’s most vulnerable children, igniting generational change that challenges a long history of institutional racism and classism.

To kick off this partnership, we launched a “Kids Creation” gelato contest through the non-profit. Participating children submitted their fun ideas, and Sandro chose one based on seasonality, creativity and pure flavor. Then he had the pleasure of joining Friends of the Children-Portland staff to drop off the winning flavor for all the participants!

Watch the short video below to see the process - from conception, to the making of the gelato, and even Sandro and Friends of the Children-Portland dropping off flavors for the kids to try!

Basil: Q & A with Mark Barton at EverSummer Gardens

Basil from EverSummer Gardens

During these tumultuous times it’s important now more than ever to support the causes we most want to see thriving in our world. For us, small farms with innovative practices are essential for creating a healthy society that values people and the environment, and so this summer we’ll feature these farms and ways you can support them as part of a seasonal “Summer Farm Series.” We hope you enjoy it!

EverSummer Gardens is an organic, hydroponic basil farm in the Columbia Gorge that’s run solely by owner Mark Barton. EverSummer grows amazingly robust and flavorful Genovese basil that he’s slowly developing into a unique Gorge varietal.

Q: Why do you use hydroponics for growing basil?

Mark: Hydroponics is a very efficient way of growing. We have so much more control over the environment and have the ability to give the plants everything they could possibly want. In return, I get an abnormal amount of yield from each plant compared to outdoor growing.

Q: Tell us more about the varietals you’re growing?

Mark: We only grow sweet Genovese basil, partly because it tastes the best and it’s the most popular. A consistent comment from all my buyers is that my basil has a very noticeable intense, strong spicy flavor compared to others. It also has an incredible shelf life. I attribute the flavor to the fact that we collect seeds from the most vigorous plants in the greenhouse each season and we are slowly creating our own special Gorge variety.

Q: How can people buy your basil (other than in our Lemon Basil sorbetto, of course)?

Mark: My basil is in all Portland area Whole Foods as well as select restaurants like Double Mountain Brewery.

Pinolo Lemonade

This fresh strawberry and elderflower lemonade captures spring in a glass. Both elderflowers and strawberries ripen at the same time, and fittingly enough they happen to be a match made in heaven. For this recipe you can make your own elderflower syrup using Sandro’s recipe here, or during the season (June) we make and bottle extra for our friends, which can be purchased on our website at Shop Pinolo.

Serves 4

4 Lemons

3 Tbsp Elderflower Syrup

Handful Diced Strawberries

2 c Sparkling Water

Squeeze lemons, add elderflower syrup and mix well. Toss in strawberries then pour into individual glasses. Add ice to glasses, pour sparkling water on top and stir well.

Pro Tip: If you like your lemonade on the sweet side then add sugar to the diced strawberries and let sit for 10 minutes until sugar melds with strawberries.

Elderflowers: Q&A With Heather Arndt-Anderson

S.nigra or “Black Beauty” elderflowers. Photo courtesy of Heather Arndt-Anderson

One day last spring we opened an email that put that faraway look into Sandro’s eyes - the look of creative excitement brewing. That email was from local author and Sunset Magazine Garden Editor Heather Arndt-Anderson offering elderflowers from her backyard bushes. What we ended up with was not only Fioritura (an elderflower strawberry sorbetto) but also a deeper connection with a friend, and an annual Pinolo partner.

Such is the magic of both plants and food to build relationships and deepen our understanding of the world around us. This is something Heather understands at her core having penned several books on the history and cultural connection of food, including Berries: A Global History, Chillies: A Global History, Portland: A Food Biography and Breakfast: A History, and which is also the ethos of her recipe-centric blog Voodoo & Sauce.

So this year, when Heather sent a photo of her blossoming elderflower bushes we seized the opportunity to tap into her knowledge and passion for this ingredient. Here’s what we learned…

Do you have a memory about the first time you discovered or used elderflowers?

HAA: I’d always known that elderberries were useful as medicine, and I have many fond childhood memories of eating at the Elderberry Inn on the way to the coast with my grandma. The first time I heard of using elderflowers, though, was from IKEA — they sell bottles of DRYCK FLÄDER elderflower drink concentrate, and that’s when I learned about how popular the blossoms are all over Europe. I’ve always studied plants and herbs, and always loved making potions, so I started making my own St-Germain shortly after that, about ten years ago.

You're a true homesteader, what's your favorite way to use elderflowers at home?

HAA: My favorite way to use elderflowers now is in syrup, which can then be turned to jelly or added to cakes and icings. I would love to figure out how to get their fragrance into other stuff too, though. Maybe a homemade soap? 

How about an unexpected use for them?

HAA: I’ve started experimenting with making candy with them — Swedes love gummy candy, so I’m starting there, and then I’ll try other Northern and Eastern European confections. 

Any other tips for growing or using elderflowers?

HAA: They’re super easy to grow —Northwest has a few native elder species — and can handle a wide range of growing conditions. I have one growing in full sunlight next to my driveway and another in partial shade behind my house. They can even tolerate crappy soil. Once you buy (or find) an elder bush, you can grow them from cuttings. Just snip off a branch in the fall and keep it in a bucket of water over the winter. In the spring it’ll have roots and you can plant the new baby shrub in the ground. 

A Note From Pinolo: This year Heather’s elderflowers are featured in our Aroma di Primavera sorbetto, made with tangerine and elderflower.

European Elder variety

Elderflower Syrup

Elderflower syrup is versatile both in the kitchen and at the bar. From adding flavor to sparkling water, blending into a cocktail or even adding to cake frosting, it’s an easy recipe for harnessing the sweet floral essence of spring’s bounty.

For this recipe we suggest using the purple elderflower variety if possible. The purple flowers have a more intense smell and flavor than the white variety, which is more grassy.

Quick Tips: It’s important to collect the flowers in an area without pollution because it’s best to use the flowers without washing them. It’s also important that you collect flowers completely opened and before they start turning brown.

Ingredients:

Juice of 2 Lemons

500 g  (2 ½ cups) Sugar

500 g  (2 ½ cups) Water

5 big heads Elderflower (if you like a more intense flavor, just use more flowers)

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 380 F.

Combine the water and the sugar in a saucepan over medium heat until the sugar is completely dissolved, it doesn’t need to boil.

Let the syrup sit for 10 min and in the meanwhile check if any insects are hiding in your elderflowers - they love them as much as we do!

Do not wash the flowers. Washing removes a lot of the aroma and flavor.

 If you’re using the purple elderflowers, add the 5 large flower heads to the warm syrup (stems, flowers and all).

If you’re using the white variety, then nearly double the flower heads (8 heads) and use only the flowers removing as many stems as you can. The green stems of the white flowers have a grassy smell that can give a bitter taste to the syrup.

Add the lemon juice, stir the syrup and be sure that all flowers are completely submerged, then cover the saucepan with a lid and let flowers infuse overnight.

In the morning strain the syrup through a fine sieve lined with cheesecloth.

You can bottle the syrup and keep it for several months. I prefer to keep it in my freezer to better preserve the flavor but it will be fine if you refrigerate instead. You can also boil in lidded canning jars for five minutes,  then keep them in your cupboard and store in your fridge once opened. 

Bravo!

how to use the syrup:

During the summer, a fast and delicious use is to add ½ cup of elderflower syrup to a quart of water or sparkling water. It’s much healthier and better tasting than plain soda!

For a cocktail use, try it in your mimosa!

And for a cooking application, drizzle some on a homemade cake when it’s still warm or on pancakes.

Tiramisu

Tiramisu is the most iconic Italian dessert both inside and outside of Italy. This delicious dessert was born in the Lombardy region around Milan, that’s because it’s where mascarpone cheese is produced. While Americans often substitute the less expensive whipped cream for mascarpone, it’s the most important ingredient for the authentic integrity of this dish. Mascarpone has a more intense flavor, and by adding the egg whites you get a more velvety consistency than with whipped cream. Sandro’s recipe is the classic recipe everyone in Italy uses.

See our previous “Savoiardi” recipe for homemade lady finger cookies.

Ingredients:

Preheat the oven to 380 F.

• 500 g Mascarpone (2 + 1/4 cups )

• 5 TBS Sugar

• 5 Eggs

• 3 Cups Strong Coffee

• Chocolate

• Cocoa Powder

• Savoiardi (lady finger cookies)

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 380 F.Make some strong coffee and put it in a wide container to cool down.

In two different bowls separate the white eggs from the yolk.

Add the sugar and mascarpone to the yolks and mix together until you get a smooth and creamy batter.

Whip the egg whites until they become completely firm and foamy.

Quickly dip the savoiardi in the coffee, layer them on top of the mascarpone mix and cover the cookies with a second layer of the batter. Chop some chocolate and sprinkle it on the top of the last layer. Repeat these layers until you have used all the mascarpone mix then cover the last layer with some cocoa powder.

Put the dish in the fridge and wait the following day to let the cookies soften up.

Buon Appetito!

Lingue di Gatto

Possibly the cutest name for a cookie ever, lingue di gatto translates to “cat’s tongue” and earned its name because of the cookie’s shape. In Italy, it is typically eaten on the side with some gelato, custard, or simply with some tea. Not only do kids love the name, but it’s a perfect recipe to get them involved in the kitchen as well. Have fun!

Ingredients:

• 120 g Flour

• 80 g Sugar

• 3 Eggs White

• 100 g Butter (at room temperature)

• 1 pinch of salt

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 380 F.

Mix the sugar, salt, and butter together.

Sift a spoon of flour and some egg white into the bowl and mix until the flour gets completely absorbed.

Repeat the process until you have used all the flour and egg white.

Butter a baking pan then sprinkle with flour to prevent the cookies from sticking to the tray.

Using a pastry bag with a ½ inch wide mouth make 3 inch long cookies an inch apart.

Bake in the preheated oven for 20 minutes.

When the edges of the cookies start changing color to a light brown remove them from the oven.

Let them cool down &

Buon Appetito!