Brussels Sprouts with Bacon

I'm a fan of just roasting brussels sprouts tossed with olive oil and lots of salt at high temperatures, but I tried Ina's recipe with bacon - yum! The brussels sprouts get really caramelized and sweet and the bacon is salty. I didn't have balsamic so I drizzled them at the end with a little of rice vinegar. I'm sure the balsamic is better, but honestly, it was great with the rice vinegar too. This is a great side dish!

Ingredients:
1 1/4 lb brussels sprouts, trimmed and cut in half or in quarters if they're really big
4 oz thick bacon or pancetta, sliced 1/4 inch thick
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400.  Line a rimmed baking sheet with foil and add Brussels sprouts, pancetta, olive oil,  1 1/2 tsp salt and 1/2 tsp pepper. Toss thoroughly and spread out in a single layer. Roast for 20-30 minutes tossing once or twice, until sprouts are tender and the browned and the bacon is cooked. Remove from the oven, drizzle with balsamic vinegar, and toss. Season with salt and pepper and serve hot.

Vegetable Garden Week 4

After being away for about a month, I went back out to the country last weekend and got to see my garden. Apart from being super dry, it looked great! (Especially once I watered it.) Four of the five brussels sprouts I planted sprouted, a perfect line of beets popped up (I'll need to thin them next weekend), and all the peas had sprouted! So exciting.

Brussels Sprouts

Beets

Peas

I planted another row of beets and carrots, a row of swiss chard, zucchinis, and cucumbers. I also set up a little trellis for the cucumbers and planted some lettuce underneath.

Garden Bed #2

Jamie and I were out in Southampton with our garden plan this weekend and ready to dive into this year's garden. It feels great to be outside and working in the dirt! Very satisfying. We built a second garden bed, so it was back to Riverhead Building Supply for wood and Lynch's for LOTS of dirt and composted manure.
We found out they do free delivery, so that was great. We put the new garden together pretty quickly - after doing the first one last year, we're old hands now.