Green City Market farmers and vendors share creative and delicious Thanksgiving recipes
Are you looking to impress your Thanksgiving guests with innovative, creative recipes that feature organic ingredients?
The Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum hosts Lincoln Park's Green City Market every Saturday and Wednesday from 8:00 a.m. until 1:00 p.m. Here, shoppers browse the Genesis Growers squash table on Saturday morning, Nov. 14.
If you live in Lincoln Park, you may not need to look any further than your own back yard.
This weekend, Lincoln Park Now decided to make a special trip to the
Green City Market to see what kind of recipes we could get the farmers and vendors to share with us. And boy oh boy, did we get them to give up some good ones!
If you are already planning on doing a significant portion of your Thanksgiving shopping at the Green City Market or another Chicago farmers' market, then you're not alone. This is the third or fourth year that Elissa Lafayette of Lincoln Park has dressed her Thanksgiving dinner table with Green City Market trimmings.
This year, Elissa will host six guests including two vegetarians, and she is still working out the menu. "I can't decide between brussel sprouts, a spinach gratin, or a mushroom gratin," Elissa said. She has, however, already special ordered her bourbon-roasted turkey for the more carnivorous guests.
Joel Espe, co-owner of Hawks Hill Elk Ranch in Monticello, WI.
If you want to steer away from the traditional turkey dinner and serve an exotic meat, just visit Joel Espe of
Hawks Hill Elk Ranch.
Elk meat has a higher percentage of proteins and nutrients than other red meats, according to the Hawks Hill Elk Ranch brochure, and it is also lower in fat and cholesterol.
The brochure also asserts that, "Elk meat has an excellent, robust flavor with little if any 'game' taste."
We asked Joel to share a recipe with Lincoln Park Now readers that would stand out on their Thanksgiving menus, and this is what he gave us!
Slow Cooked Elk Roast
1 medium onion
Elk Roast (approx. 4 lbs.)
1 cup brewed coffee
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/8 teaspoon pepper
2 tablespoons vinegar (regular, or apple cider)
1/2 cup water
4-6 tablespoons cornstarch
Place a few onion slices in the bottom of the slow cooker. Cut roast in three or four pieces and place on top of onion slices. Combine the coffee, soy sauce, and vinegar. Pour this mixture over the roast. Cover and cook on low for 9 to 10 hours, or until meat is tender. Remove the meat from the cooker. Gravy: Pour meat juices into a pan. Stir the cornstarch and water together and stir into the meat juices. Cook over medium heat until thickened.
Vicki Westerhoff of the Genesis Growers farm in St. Anne, IL., helps customers choose her seasonally fresh, organic squash at the Green City Market.
We couldn't help but notice all the beautifully colored squash laid out on the
Genesis Growers tables. (I suppose neither could the Chicago Sun Times when they researched
a similar story connecting farmers' markets produce to Thanksgiving dinner tables!)
Vicki Westerhoff runs the Genesis Growers farm, which serves Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), farmers' markets, restaurants, and distributors.
We found Caryn Mitchell, a graphic designer and artist who lives in Logan Square, hanging out near the Genesis Growers table. Caryn is one of Vicki's CSA customers, which means that she picks up a surprise, seasonal box of vegetables once a week.
The CSA boxes feature a variety of seasonal foods, which Caryn said is great for people who love cooking and experimenting with new foods. "You get to be creative and come up with different kinds of meals," she said. And another added bonus? "You're getting fresh food straight off the farm."
Although Vicki was very busy helping what seemed to be a steady stream of enthusiastic customers, she took the time to share a simple, very tasty-sounding Thanksgiving dessert recipe with Lincoln Park Now readers.
Custard-Stuffed Pumpkin
Hollow out a pie pumpkin
Make a basic custard (If you don't have your own recipe, try this one!)
Pour the uncooked custard into the hollowed pumpkin
Flavor the custard with clove and nutmeg
Bake the whole pumpkin for 5 or 6 hours, until tender
When serving the custard-stuffed pumpkin, Vicki wanted to remind our readers to be sure to mix together the custard and the softened pumpkin meat to get the richest flavor.
Joel Masters of West Town models a squash grown on Green Acres farm in North Judson, IN.
We also ventured over to the
Green Acres Farm table, where we found a variety of squash and green vegetables. The vendors at this table told us that their Japanese sweet potatoes are in high demand for the Thanksgiving season.
Green Acres's Japanese sweet potatoes actually sold out on Saturday, so if you're looking to pick some up during your Thanksgiving shopping at the Green City Market, head out early!
We met and talked to West Town resident Joel Masters while he was working at the Green Acres booth. He shared a recipe for a Queensland Blue Squash Pie, but he had to rely on his memory.
He said he uses half the amount of sugar one uses in a regular pumpkin pie, and he spices it with cardamom, cinnamon, ginger, heavy cream, and salt. When he e-mails us back with the full recipe, we'll be sure to post it on here for you to enjoy!
Kim Wilkens pours a sample of pure maple syrup from Burton's Maplewood Farms in Medora, IN.
Before we left the Green Acres table, Joel insisted that we
had to find a woman named Kim Wilkens and ask her for her delicious maple-syrup-and-bourbon recipe.
Just his description sounded way too good to pass up for our Lincoln Park Now readers, so we sought out Kim within the Green City Market tent.
A representative of the Burton's Maplewood Farms, Kim taught us all about how darker amber syrup, typically referred to as "grade B," is actually higher in antioxidants than the lighter variety. She said that this is most likely because the darker amber syrups remain inside the tree longer than grade A syrups.
She told us that Burton's Maplewood Farms syrup makes a great drizzle over desserts and pies, and she also uses it as an alternative to sugar in her Thanksgiving cranberry sauce!
Kim's Maple Syrup-Bourbon Cocktail
1 small shot of pure maple syrup, grade B
1 and a half shots of whiskey or bourbon
Mix together the liquor and the syrup, then add the juice of one lime. Top off with sparkling water, and serve over ice.Sounds like holiday cheer to us!
The secret ingredient in Bill Warner's Frost Sweetened Spinach is good soil and freezing temperatures.
We were feeling pretty satisfied with our experience at the Green City Market. We met a ton of friendly and helpful people, and managed to get a hold of a bunch of really awesome recipes for you, our readers.
On our way out, Bill Warner of
Snug Haven Farm offered us a sample of his Frost Sweetened Spinach, which looked too fresh and delicious to turn down.
Snug Haven Farm is located in Belleville, WI., in a three-sided valley open only to the south, which protects it from northerly winter winds. According to a flyer that Bill gave us, "Because the spinach is continually freezing and thawing, the sugar content in the spinach increases and the spinach becomes incredibly sweet."
I tasted the sample, and I can attest to the truth of this statement.
For our final Green City Market-inspired, unique Thanksgiving recipe, here is Bill Warner's braised spinach.
Braised SpinachStart out with your favoile oil--I usually use garlic olive oil. Pour a small amount into a large, heavy skillet. At this point, feel free to experiment and add minced garlic, nuts of your choice, etc. Be creative.
Get the oil very hot before you add the spinach (which you have cut into appropriate sized pieces). Keep stirring around until the spinach is barely wilted.
Add salt and pepper to taste. Drizzle with clarified butter, grated Parmesan cheese, feta cheese, bleu cheese, or any other wonderful addition you can think of.
I just like it plain most of the time and serve it with my favorite pasta or use it in wraps with tiny pieces of my favorite meat, grilled to perfection. YUM!
Happy Thanksgiving shopping, Lincoln Park Now readers! Stay tuned for a post in the very-near future where we showcase photographs of the different vegetables and fruits we encountered at the Green City Market and challenge YOU to come up with your own recipes.
If anyone tries out the recipes we feature here, let us know how it turns out! You can
e-mail us or leave a comment below.
2 Comments
dunjastef said:
Love the article, Jenn!
I'm going to look up Hawk's Hill ranch now to see what their prices are like...I'm so intrigued by this elk meat! :)
Caitlin Giles said:
This post is making me hungry. Thanks goodness for the year-round market, right?
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