Sundried Tomato Alfredo Sauce

The garden beds are finally in and planted.  We decided to go with some old barn boards and a lot of reinforcement.

In the front bed is an assortment of lettuces and salad leaves, arugula, spinach, spring onions, chard, and eggplant. The second bed has broccoli, cauliflower and some Roma tomatoes.  The third bed contains some more Roma, a few San Marzano, and plenty of Beefsteak tomatoes (the cherry tomatoes will be in pots near the kitchen). The last bed has garlic, white and red onions, carrots, and bell peppers (including those cute little cherry peppers that I love so much in summer salads).

We tilled the 16' x 24' bed below, but need to till it again and then greatly amend the soil, and it will contain corn, green beans, pie pumpkins, kidney and cannellini beans, potatoes, and leeks.  This is the spot where my old garden was before we had the bright idea to till it under and plant grass.

Those are my three apple trees in the upper left corner of the picture, and I'm hoping like crazy they produce more than a collective 20 apples in their 4th year.

Unfortunately, the fence I was hoping to use to grow the peas, cucumbers and green beans won't be installed until the first week of July.  I guess I'll just have to fashion a make-shift fence around the new plot for this year.  Oh well.

But I've got a compost bin now.

Oh, and here is my kitchen herb garden, filled with parsley, rosemary, thyme, basil, cilantro, and chives:

The sage, oregano, and lavender is out in the perennial garden along with the roses and lilies (which is behind all of the beds in the top picture).

Tim wants to order shitake and oyster mushroom spores to inoculate some logs and hopefully we will have some fresh (and dried) mushrooms.  We need to look into portobello mushrooms, too, because those are my favorite and so versatile to work with in the kitchen.

So, my friends, that is what I've been doing all week (month, really).  That, and wagging my finger at my kids who are not exactly going to be done with school the first week of June (just like I told them they wouldn't be if they didn't follow the schedule and went along with their schedule - but that's another story, and this is a recipe and food blog, not a homeschooling blog written by a mother who has no problem with saying "I told you so").

Today, however, I spent in the kitchen making bread and my favorite mushroom ravioli.  I made enough ravioli to freeze and we also enjoyed some for dinner topped with this amazing, rich, slightly sweet, creamy sauce.  The sauce is dreamy over any pasta, really, but the cream and sundried tomatoes really compliment the assorted mushrooms in the ravioli (which will be my next post).  This alfredo also makes an awesome dip for bread - so yummy!


Sundried Tomato Alfredo
makes a little over 1 cup

• 3 Tbs butter
• 1/4 c chopped sundried tomatoes (not oil packed)
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
• 1 Tbs chopped fresh parsley
• 1/8 tsp grated nutmeg
• salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Melt butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat.  When it's ready to sizzle, stir in the tomatoes and garlic.  Saute for about 2 minutes, or until garlic becomes fragrant and tomatoes soften.

Remove the pan from the heat.  Whisk in the cream.  Return the pan to the heat.  Heat just until the cream begins to bubble (do not boil), whisking often.  Remove from heat.

Stir in the Parmesan, parsley, and nutmeg until the cheese has melted. Season with salt and pepper.

Serve over hot pasta or use as a dip for baguettes.  Yum.