Holiday Farmers' Market Cocktail Night ~ December 2

CUESA is teaming up with our local United States Bartenders Guild (USBG) chapter again for a festive evening filled with seasonal farmers' market cocktails. $30 gets you two full-sized cocktails made with early winter produce and the distinctly American Jim Beam bourbon, along with samples of eight other holiday-inspired drinks featuring an array of specialty spirits. Bartenders from the following restaurants and bars will participate: 15 Romolo, Rickhous, Bourbon & Branch, Butterfly, Lingba, Sauce, Jardinière, La Mar, Rose Pistola, and Seasons Bar at the Four Seasons San Francisco. Buy tickets >

Tuscany-themed dinner to benefit CUESA ~ November 11

Dine at Luce, where Dominique Crenn, Chef de Cuisine of Luce, and Donatella Zampoli, Executive Chef from the Wine Estates of Marchesi de’ Frescobaldi, will create a 6-course menu inspired by Tuscany, paired with wines from the Frescobaldi Family. The menu includes (but is not limited to): Allstar Organics Aubergine Timbale with Vegetable and Scamorza Cheese, Thomas Farm Potato Gnocchi with Bone Marrow and Lobster, and a Marin Sun Farms Tuscan Style Lamb Shank with Potato Bracelet and Tempura of Tierra Vegetables Mignon. Make reservations here or call 415.616.6566.

Pasta (gnocchi!) & Pesto Workshop

The class will be broken into two groups, with each group taking a turn at making pesto and gnocchi. Recipes will utilize seasonal ingredients: handmade potato and pumpkin gnocchi, sage and roasted garlic pesto (a great match with the gnocchi!), and a cilantro and pistachio pesto. Participants will go home with a starter kit including recipes, samples of their creations (unless it's all eaten in class...), and dough to freeze for future gnocchi-making. The class will he held in CUESA's Dacor teaching kitchen. Cost: $45 Learn more or register here >

The picture of fall

Last weekend, The New York Times Magazine featured the Bates family, the farmers behind the Apple Farm, and their "fruitopia."

The State of the Urban Farm: An evening with author and farmer Novella Carpenter ~ Nov 18

Join Garden For the Environment and 18 Reasons at the Women's Building as they bring you an evening with Bay Area urban farming hero Novella Carpenter. The author of Farm City: the Education of an Urban Farmer (Penguin Press, 2009) will present "The State of the Urban Farm." A New York Times book critic described her newly published book as, "easily the funniest, weirdest, most perversely provocative gardening book I've ever read." The talk begins at 6:30 and will be followed by a reception and book signing at 18 Reasons at 8:00. Read more or buy tickets here (they're going fast!) >

Saturday, November 7 ~ Olive-o-Rama

10:00 am - 1:00 pm - Olive Booth
Join us for a tasting to compare several varieties of oil from Bariani and Sciabica & Sons, including newly pressed Fall Harvest oils. Learn about how olive oil is graded (what does extra-virgin mean, anyway?) and how characteristics such as bitter vs. fruity lend themselves to cooking. Take away handouts with tips on growing your own olive tree and curing raw olives.

11:00 am - Seasonal cooking demonstration
David Bazirgan, Chez Papa Resto

11:45 am - Seasonal cooking demonstration
James Stolich, CookWithJames

Tuesday, November 10 ~ Food Wise Booth

12:00 - 1:00 pm - CUESA's market chef Sarah Henkin will be giving out recipe cards and samples of a simple meal made with market ingredients.

Saturday, November 14~ Market to Table

11:00 am - Seasonal cooking demonstration and book signing
Laura Werlin, author of Great Grilled Cheese and Cheese Essentials

Feature + photos by CUESA intern Daisy Chow

Olives have a long history in the Mediterranean, but were not widely cultivated in California until the 20th century, when an industry formed around the development of reliable canning and pitting systems to produce the mild-mannered canned black olive.

Today, that appears to be changing, as a wide array of olive varieties are now grown commercially in California, including Manzanillo, Mission, Sevillano, Ascolano and Barouni, among others. While the majority of these get pressed and made into olive oil, others can be bought cured, and a small percentage can also be found whole, for those interested in curing them at home. 

Olives can be harvested in early fall when the fruit are green-ripe and contain more oleuropein, the bitter compound that makes them inedible raw. When left to further ripen on the tree into November and December, the bitterness decreases, the olives turn darker — anywhere from red to blue-black, depending on the variety — and their flavor mellows.

Oleuropein isn’t toxic, but even a nibble of an untreated olive will leave an astringent taste lingering in your mouth for hours. They key to “curing,” or making these ancient fruit edible, is to rid them of their bitterness while preserving their other flavors. 

Several methods can be used. Water curing changes the natural flavor the least, requiring only several days of soaking, draining and refilling. In brine curing, natural fermentation in a salt solution over several months gives the olives a unique flavor. Dry salt curing, also known as oil curing, requires packing the olives in salt to draw out both water and oleuropein and works well with smaller olive varieties. Lye curing, or soaking the olives in an alkali solution followed by several fresh water baths, is the fastest method and results in mild, buttery olives. But working with lye can be hazardous, so it is rarely recommended for beginners.

Calabrese-style Cracked Green Olives

Every fall, Carmen Gagliardi and his wife Kathleen — parents of Marcia "the tablehopper" Gagliardi — cure their own olives. In the Calabria region of southern Italy, where Carmen is from, fall is the time for pressing wine, hunting mushrooms, making prosciutto and preparing the olives that will be eaten for the rest of the year.

I visited Carmen recently at his home on the Peninsula to watch him make his water-cured Calabrese-style cracked green olives. It took a little time and effort, but it was well worth the flavor, which, Carmen says, you won’t find in any commercially made olives at the supermarket. The recipe (see below) requires you to remove nearly all the moisture in the olives after the curing process so they can be preserved, confit-style, in olive oil.

Ingredients
Fresh green olives
Salt
Chile flakes
Cayenne powder
Dried red chiles, roughly chopped
Wild fennel seeds
Olive oil

Instructions
1) Choose freshly picked, medium-sized, uniformly green olives that are similar in size so they cure at the same rate. Olives that have begun to show a purple blush can still be water-cured, but you should eat or give them away first as they will not keep as long as the true green ones. Discard any bruised olives; they will get too soft when cured.

2) Lay a clean kitchen towel or rag on top of a cutting board or other sturdy surface and place a bucket of fresh, cool water nearby. Using a light rubber mallet, crack each olive and discard the pit. Place the cracked olive meat into the bucket. You will see the water turn cloudy with oil and oleuropein.

3) Rinse the cracked olives in a colander, then drain. Place them in a non-reactive container and cover with water. Cover with a heavy plate, or anything that keeps them submerged. Change the water daily.

4) After 5 or 6 days, start tasting the olives. They should be ready in about 10 days, give or take, depending on the size of the olives and your flavor preferences.

5) When the olives have mellowed to your liking, drain them well and transfer to a press of some kind. (Carmen made his own olive press by making holes in a pitcher and placing it under the press from a sausage stuffing machine. But a potato ricer or citrus press could work for pressing the olives in batches.) Then slowly press all the water out of the olives, allowing plenty of time for the water to drain before gently adding more pressure. This step is crucial because leftover water will cause the olives to soften.

6) In a stainless steel or glass bowl, pour some olive oil over the pressed olives and toss to coat. Add the remaining seasonings to taste, toss to coat and distribute the seasonings, adding more oil as needed. (At this point, you may want to refrigerate your mixture overnight, then check the seasoning level the next day — this way, you’ll have a better idea before jarring.)

7) Place the olives in glass jars that have been sterilized as for preserves (Carmen uses his espresso maker), and pour in additional olive oil to cover the olives completely. Cap tightly and keep refrigerated.

See a complete slide show of Carmen's process here >

This is the most up-to-date information about which sellers will be attending the market as of Friday. If there are no changes to a seller's status, they will not be listed. You'll find a list of which farmers regularly attend each market here. Please understand that there are often last-minute changes—it's the nature of farming!

Saturday, November 7

In: Bernard Ranches
Out: Knoll Farms, Critical Edge Knife Sharpening
Out for the season: Madison Growers, White Crane Springs Ranch

Tuesday, November 10

In: Snyders Honey

Thursday, November 12

In: Happy Girl Kitchen (new)

Returning and plentiful this month (weather willing):
Chicories, rutabagas, hard squash, persimmons, carrots, Meyer lemons, nettles, radishes, collard greens, sunchokes, kohlrabi, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, broccoli, rapini, baby lettuces, cardoons, puntarella, radicchio, sweet potatoes, leeks, fennel, cabbage, salsify, mushrooms, walnuts, citrus, potatoes, pastured chicken, braising greens, pomegranates, apples, pears, onions

Winding down/limited supply:
Dungeness crab (hopefully by mid-month), Christmas trees (end of November through mid December), berries, pastured eggs, tomatoes, peppers, grapes

Vendor and value-added items not to be missed:
Olive oil from Bariani, vegetarian mincemeat from June Taylor, celery salt from Allstar Organics

Featured recipes for November

Golden Beet Borscht with Dill Crème Fraîche from Cindy Pawlcyn of Cindy’s Backstreet Kitchen, Go Fish, and Mustards Grill and author of Cindy Pawlcyn’s Appetizers

Persimmon, Arugula, Fennel, and Pecorino Salad inspired by Taylor Boetticher, of Fatted Calf

Capunet-Piemontese Cabbage Rolls from Staffan Terje of Perbacco

Croustade with Apples and Prunes in Armagnac from Paula Wolfert, author of The Cooking of Southwest France