solstice - a dark days dinner

Fitting to use the shortest day for a dark days meal...

We hit our winter farmer's market this Saturday, we had it in our heads to be inspired for a dark days dinner, plus get some staples (potatoes/onions etc) for the next few weeks. Oh and way too much wonderful CHEESE for family and snacking over the holidays--we got horseradish chive havarti, smoked gouda, sundried tomato cheddar....we are truly blessed with a huge variety of artisan cheese here!

I stopped at a favorite popcorn vendor for a family gift, and saw a sign for duck. A perfect idea for a solstice dinner. We stopped by another booth where a friend works and got some flour and more gifts, and threw out a spontaneous invitation to join us.

Final menu was roast duck, a cranberry/wild rice/pear and bread stuffing, roasted potatoes, canned pears from our backyard, and baguettes made partially from market wheat flour. And, our friends brought a delicious leek and potato soup, courtesy of their winter share from a local CSA farm (unfortunately didn't make it into the photo...).



Homegrown ingredients:
pears (frozen in the stuffing, canned as a side dish)
lots of herbs--garlic, thyme, sage
a few puny carrots used in the stock, ha.


Market ingredients:
Duck, from Krinke's Farm Market
potatoes and onions (misc. vendors)
wheat flour from Brantmeier Family Farm
cranberries (actually frozen from earlier in the season--for the stuffing and in the homemade cranberry mustard used on the duck).

Grocery ingredients:
minnesota wild rice
a few stalks of organic (but californian) celery.

Ooh, almost forgot dessert, which was homemade caramel ice cream--not entirely local ingredients, but the milk was Sassy cow (a very cool area dairy) along with our backyard eggs.