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Saturday, June 2nd, the 16th season of Montgomery’s Farmers’ Market opens its tents at the Village Shopping Center, 1340 Route 206 South, in Skillman. Montgomery’s Farmers’ Market, an outreach of the Montgomery Friends of Open Space (MFOS), features locally-grown, conventional and certified organic produce, meats, eggs and other farm products.
I'll get my haircut and then head over to the market for some updated photography.
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My kids and I enjoy eating bacon. We don't eat bacon very often but when we do, we delight in each strip. We've learned what we like and don't like in our bacon. We tried turkey bacon for a while but ultimately decided it was a #FAIL. It didn't satisfy in the way real bacon does. We normally cook our bacon in the microwave in one of those special microwave bacon trays. It works well for making crispy bacon, but leaves the microwave polluted for a few hours which annoys my vegetarian wife.
During my 30th college re-union this summer, a friend told me about making bacon in the oven. After trying this a few times I don't want to make bacon any other way. Oven bacon is a hit with my kids and cleanup is easy. We cook the bacon in baking pan lined with aluminium foil. Once the bacon is done it's easy to remove and discard the oil and foil. Oil and foil?
Last summer I started buying cheeses from Brick Farm Market, purchased each Saturday at the Montgomery Farmers' Market. The Brick Farm Market creamy cheeses are brought in from the Hopewell area and nearby North Eastern producers. I often eat the cheeses straight while sipping an IPA. I also experimented with melting the cheese to make sandwiches using baguette's I bought at the Terra Momo Bread Company stand. The baguette's are made from a hard-wheat bread flour baked to a characteristically golden color. Its crusty on the outside and airy on the inside. Delicious!
This Saturday, while buying cheese I noticed that ... he also had bacon. We chatted about how much love cooking bacon in the oven and he mentioned he likes to use a bit of the bacon grease in an iron skillet to cook his eggs.
This past Sunday night I suddenly had the idea to combine all these things into a lunch sandwich. I had the bread, the cheese, the bacon and eggs. I cooked everything up but soon realized the egg would not travel well. I decided this would work better as a breakfast sandwich. I originally used organic eggs from ShopRite but wanted to source as much as possible from local businesses. So I added eggs from the Griggstown Farm to my Saturday morning market shopping list.
Pre-heat oven to 400ºC and remove the cheese from the fridge. Let it sit out while you cook so it can warm up. This helps bring out the flavour of the cheese.
Line the baking pan with aluminium foil and layout the bacon strips on the foil. Don't crowd the strips. We don't want them to stick together while they cook. Be careful when lining the pan that you don't create a hole in the foil. When the oven has reached the proper temperature, put the baking pan in the center rack of the oven and cook for 18 minutes. I use the oven time so I don't forget and burn my bacon.
Remove the baking pan from the oven when the bacon is cooked. Do not discard the bacon grease. Drain some of the bacon grease into a skillet before discarding the foil. In the skillet, cook one egg over medium heat, on both sides until the yolk is cooked through but soft and the egg white is thoroughly cooked.1
Slice some of the cheese and place on one side of the bread. Toast in toaster oven until the cheese just starts to melt. Remove toasted bread from toaster oven and place bacon on top of the cheese. Then place the cooked egg on top of the bacon. Cover with the remaining slice. Enjoy with a fresh cup of coffee brewed with beans you Benfatto Coffee.
Last weekend kicked of the annual Montgomery Friend of Open Space Farmer's Market. I got some cool new photos that I'll be sharing with your over the next few weeks during the summer. Back this year was the Farmer & The Chickpea with some delicious food and dessert items.
A little background:
All of our recipes have an Italian influence, as our background (and our hearts) are in Italy. We love nothing more then taking a traditional American Dish and putting a Mediterranean spin on it.
The main store is located on main street in Manville, NJ. I've never been to the store but based on the few items on sale at the farmers' market I'm sure it must be a treat. Next time I'm driving through Manville, I'll be sure to stop and spend some time in the store. If your time is limited you can always stop in at the farmers' market tomorrow and pick up a few of the delicious items for sale.
I bought one of the lentil cakes with maple roasted sweet potato and pumpkin for my wife for lunch but ended up eating most of it myself. It's ok to share but sometimes it's good to keep things for oneself.
The lentil cake was delicious with a glass of Villa Milagro Rosita.
I have type 1 diabetes but these bread puddings look so delicious. I'll have to find how to eat just a small piece that works with my diabetic diet.
