Melissa Bahen - Farmhouse Weekends: Menus for Relaxing Country Meals All Year Long

Farmhouse Weekends

Menus for Relaxing Country Meals All Year Long

melissa bahen

Creator of Lulu the Baker

Digital Edition 1.0

Text 2021 Melissa Bahen

Photographs 2021 Melissa Bahen

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced by any meanswhatsoever without written permission from the publisher, except brief portionsquoted for purpose of review.

Published by

Gibbs Smith

P.O. Box 667

Layton, Utah 84041

1.800.835.4993 orders

www.gibbs-smith.com

Illustrations by Celeste Rockwood-Jones

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Bahen, Melissa, author.

Title: Farmhouse weekends : menus for relaxing country meals all yearlong / Melissa Bahen.

Description: First edition. | Layton : Gibbs Smith, [2021]

Identifiers: LCCN 2020033174 | ISBN 9781423656722 (hardcover) | ISBN9781423656739 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Cooking, American. | LCGFT: Cookbooks.

Classification: LCC TX715 .B14825 2021 | DDC 641.5973dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020033174

For the loves of my life:
Speedy, Addie, Ellie, James, andGeorgie.
I love you forever and ever.

Introduction

Some people daydream aboutrelaxing, beautiful country living because they are overworked, overstretchedadults. Not me. My fascination with farm life started when I was a kid. As a child,I loved reading books about living on a farm. I was enchanted by the serene, bucolicsettings, the talk of planting and harvesting crops, and most importantly, thedescriptions of mouthwatering, made-from-scratch farm feasts: flap jacks,hand-cranked ice cream, pies galore, biscuits and gravy, steamed peas with butter,and more. It all sounded magicaland delicious.

For basically my whole adult life, Ive been trying to create thatfarmhouse lifestyle for myself, in whatever small ways I could manage at the time.When my husband and I were newlyweds living in a condo in the suburbs of Las Vegas,we tried our best to grow cherry tomatoes on our tiny patio, and canned dozens ofjars of homemade jam using the apricots from my parents backyard. When we graduatedto our first stand-alone house after we started having kids, it was in a suburbanneighborhood in western Oregon. We filled our postage stampsize backyard withraised vegetable beds and fruit trees, grew corn along the fence in our side yard,and kept chickens in a little A-frame coop we bought on Craigslist. (I didnt haveany friends at the time with backyard chickenshow times have changed!)

We finally moved into our dreamfarmhouse in the country in the late fall of 2014. A white farmhouse witha wrap-around porch and modern touches, our house is surrounded by a big garden, anorchard full of fruit trees, a much bigger chicken coop, and acres for the kids torun and play onexactly what Id always dreamed of having. But do you want to knowsomething? When you get down to details, our life looks largely the same as before:we can dozens of jars of homemade salsa at the end of every summer; we have fresheggs to scramble up or mix into buttermilk pancakes for breakfast; we pick cherriesin late spring and apples in the fall. And those are things you can do whether youlive on a farm in the country or in a tiny apartment in a bustlingmetropolis.

Even though we live in the country, we arent farmers by trade. Myhusband and I both have jobs that have nothing to do with farming, raising chickens,or cultivating berry bushes. During the week, we have work and community events andour kids have school and activities. My family packs its weekdays full of activitiesjust like other families do. And on those busy days, we are grateful for meals readyin minutes. But weekends at the farmhouse are a different story entirely.

Weekends are when we get to work the soil and plant our garden, orwander the aisles of our local farmers market looking for the most beautiful freshproduce.

Weekends are when we stir bowls of ripe berries, mashed with sugarand pectin, and pour the mixture into dozens of containers, stashing a years worthof sweet-as-candy jam in the freezer.

Weekends are when we finally have time to slow down, take a deepbreath, and work on the big project weve been putting off all week, whether thatsbuilding raised garden beds, canning homemade salsa, or kneading a batch of doughfor caramel sticky buns and patiently waiting for it to rise.

Weekends are about relaxing, taking time to slow down and enjoygood people, delicious food, and experiences worth savoring.

Farmhouse Weekendsis a cookbook for everyone out there who daydreams of country lifeto help youcreate and enjoy one wherever you make your home. Its for people who spend theirweek being busy, running errands, and working 9 to 5, but long to spend theirweekends mucking about in a big vegetable patch, collecting fresh eggs from a flockof backyard chickens, or canning a few dozen jars of homemade salsa. It will inspireyou to create meals and experiences to enjoy in the easy companionship of family andfriendseverything you need for the perfect farmhouse weekend. Lets getstarted!

spring

Spring at the farmhouse is a timeof awakening and renewal. We watch flowers slowly poke their heads out of the groundand bring some much-needed color to the landscape: first daffodils and grapehyacinths then tulips. We visit the new baby lambs on the farm and watch them runthrough verdant fields of new grass. We start seeds for our garden: peas, radishes,and carrots outside for late spring eating; green beans, tomatoes, and peppers inpots inside until the weather turns warm enough for them to be transplanted to thegarden. The longer days mean the chickens start laying eggs again, if they stoppedduring the winter months, and new chicks can be heard sweetly cheeping at the localfarm store. We splash in puddles, get our bikes out of storage, and collect theyears first bouquets of wildflowers. We eat tender asparagus spears as soon as theypoke through the dirt, and watch the bees buzz from blossom to blossom in theorchard.

pick tulips visit new farm babies go strawberry picking plant seeds splashin puddles fly a kite spin yarn from new wool go bird watching make homemade farmers cheese withfresh milk chase butterflies collect and press wildflowers ride a bike down a countrylane shell a bushel of freshgarden peas attend a local flowerfestival