How To Make Hodgepodge

How To Make Old-Fashioned Nova Scotia Hodgepodge
When your garden or a farmer's market offers the first harvest of potatoes, carrots, beans, and peas, it's time to enjoy a wonderful meal of the new vegetables, enhanced with a bit of heavy cream, butter, pepper and salt. Fresh chives are also a nice addition just before serving. Instead of butter, you may use finely diced salt pork fried to a golden brown to which you add the cream before drizzling over the vegetables. The above veggies were purchased at the Liverpool public market from Valerie Jollimore who is open daily except Sunday from 9 am to 5.30 pm.

New small potatoes, halved or quartered
Carrots, scrubbed clean and cut into bit size pieces
Beans, cut into bite-size pieces
Peas, shelled or use snap peas in the pods
To a large saucepan, add carrots, potatoes and beans. Add just enough water to cover. Add a pinch of salt. Bring to a boil and cook for 15 minutes or until vegetables are tender. Cook peas in a separate pot or a couple of minutes in the microwave.
Drain vegetables; add peas.
Add a small amount of heavy cream and a dab of butter. Add pepper and salt to taste. Sprinkle with chives (optional).
If using salt pork, add the cream to the fried pork and when heated, pour over the vegetables.

Strawberry Season Nearing End

This fresh strawberry pie is a once a year indulgence, and made from the Bridgewater berries sold by Valerie Jollimore at the Liverpool Farmer's Market. Note: The recipe for the pie as well as the “stabilized” whipped cream which doesn’t collapse is in the dessert book by Mary Mouzar and Joanne Uhlman.
V.J. is at the market every day except Sunday from 9 am to 5.30 pm.Strawberries this week (July 12 to 18, 2009) are on special at $2.75 per quart box or $32. for a flat of 12 boxes. Enjoy them now because the supply is diminishing.

It is now hodgepodge season and V.J. has all the right ingredients including new small potatoes, regular peas and snow peas, yellow beans and carrots.