Friday, August 29, 2014

summer preservation society!







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This year we are honoring our region's most fruitful season by preserving the best and brightest ingredients, and with them we hope to preserve a little bit of summer, too!

The hard job of making this happen fell to Ian, our head chef. He found the very best farms, ordered almost 400 pounds of fruit and root, and orchestrated a massive effort by our culinary team to capture the flavors of summer in a lot of quart-sized Weck Jars. And thus, the molly moon’s summer preservation society was formed.

Ian started with strawberry pink peppercorn jam, made with June-bearing strawberries from Viva Farms. (Viva is a farm incubator that we love & started working with this year - they help farmers get their start with small plots of land, equipment, marketing, and start-up loans.) Next up was candied ginger (to make that much-loved flavor, ginger ice cream), made with organic ginger from Hawaii. And finally, preserved peaches. This was Ian's first time preserving peaches, so he started with the best - yellow-flesh Sweet Dream peaches from Tiny's Organic in East Wenatchee.

We'll be scooping ginger ice cream, made with all this house-candied ginger root, in September. The strawberry pink peppercorn jam will be featured on a sundae this winter, and we'll bring out the peaches for spiced peach ice cream in January or February.

In addition to our house-preserved goods, we'll also be using Ayako & Family Jam, a not-too-sweet, plum jam that Molly herself is addicted to. Made with amazing, organic Damson plums from Mair Farm-Taki outside of Yakima, this tasty treat will be featured on a sundae in early December!

Ian says he can't wait to figure out the spiced peach ice cream. "We're going to pull 'em out, puree 'em, add spices and then make some really good ice cream." He punctuates his confidence with his characteristic thumbs up and a slow nod of his head.



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