arugula with smoked trout and new potatoes

my shopping cart is majority organic products. but it's a range of dedication and decision. all dairy, eggs, meat, body products, and cleaning products = always organic. salad greens, leafy greens, broccoli, bananas, and berries = most likely always organic. mushrooms, oranges, and onions = probably not organic.

but what i love even more than buying organic, is going to the farmer's market. even though i know many of the vendors use traditional fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides, i'd like to think that a smaller production farm needs to use less. i'm happy to spend more and financially support these smaller farms. and really, this freshly harvested stuff just tastes better, hands-down.

farmer's market potatoes

this weekend we found ourselves in union square and decided to check out the market, picking up things here and there, especially focusing on items that are typically not available at our neighborhood farmer's market. i saw a vendor with lovely greens, gorgeous and fresh. i scooped up a little bit of arugula and some radish sprouts.


and then i checked out ... and the bill was nearly $20. for a handful of arugula and a fistful of sprouts, enough for two people. yes, i know it was going to be more expensive, and i support that expense, on principle. but wow, almost twenty bucks. and i couldn't even feign ignorance (like i did last summer in geneva when everything was priced in ounces and my bulk nuts came to like 50 francs. a quick flustered je suis désolée and i meekly only bought half of them).

which brings me to an interesting article i read two weeks ago in the times about the price of organic foods. we all know that almost all foods - organic, local, or otherwise - are going up in price right now and we're all making different changes.

but when organic or local becomes much more expensive (five bucks for a dozen eggs, seven bucks for milk, twenty bucks for salad greens for two, etc) then what happens? how can i say it's better? how can i convince others that it's worth it, especially when they might not have the extra money to begin with? what are the trade-offs? frick, how can i convince myself that it's worth it on my non-profit salary budget? sometimes i can't. i always bought fair-trade organic sugar but now i get the boxes of regular stuff for my baking.


but i know what you really want to know is, well how was the arugula and radish sprouts? was the bunch worth the jackson? check it out for yourself ...

arugula with smoked trout and new potatoes: serves 4
adapted from martha's everyday food magazine (may 2008, p. 96)

1 lb new potatoes, quartered
1 lb smoked trout, broken into smaller pieces
3 tb white wine vinegar
2 tsp dijon mustard
1/4 cup snipped chives
10 oz arugula
handful of radish sprouts (or any other crunchy sprouts)
olive oil
salt + pepper

1. preheat oven to 450F. toss potatoes with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. place on baking sheet and roast until tender, about 25 minutes (longer if larger pieces).

2. while potatoes are cooking, whisk together vinegar, mustard, chives, 2 tb olive oil. season with salt and pepper.


3. toss arugula, potatoes, smoked trout pieces, and a little bit of vinaigrette. bon appétit!

as you see, i still need to work on my lighting set-up. these lovely shots look like a last quarter of the moon :)




and sorry that some of you may have three copies of this post in your feeder reader! that's the way blogger sucks, huh?