First meal of spring!

It's spring here in Austin! As you can tell, this makes me inordinately happy! We've got about a month to enjoy the cool breezes and sunshine until summer muscles its way in, and I intend to enjoy every minute of it.

I also intend to document lots of it with my snazzy new D-SLR camera, which I am slowly but surely learning to manipulate. This includes awkwardly asking farmers if I can photograph their stalls. One jokingly told me he needed to check with his agent.

In addition to the beautiful greens and radishes below, this stall was selling the season's first pea shoots! According to peashoots.com, pea shoots "have been a well kept secret for many years but they are now set to take the food world by storm and revitalise salads all around the UK!" Sounds like a very can-do, won't-take-no-for-an-answer kind of vegetable. In addition, they're very high in vitamins A and C and folic acid.The pea shoots had such a wonderfully grassy, fresh, flavor. They really tasted like spring. I wasn't in a stir-fry kind of mood, which was the preparation called for by most recipes I found, so I made a barley risotto with fresh mint (also from the market) and parmesan cheese (not from the market.) The technique for making barley risotto is similar to standard risotto, but the barley has a nutty, whole-grain flavor that I thought would balance the assertive herbal taste of the greens. I'm learning a little about macrobiotics and becoming more conscious of balancing meals, both nutrition-wise and taste-wise.

Barley Risotto with Pea Shoots and Fresh Mint
6 c vegetable stock
3 tbsp olive oil, divided
1 white onion, diced
1 1/2 tbsp minced garlic
1 tbsp minced ginger
1 tsp lemon zest
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/2 cup dry white wine (I used sauvignon blanc)
2 c pea shoots
3 tbsp chopped fresh mint
2 tbsp butter and parmesan to taste
1. Heat the stock in a saucepan. Keep warm over low heat.
2. Saute the onion in 2 tbsp olive oil for about 4 minutes, until the onion is translucent.
3. Add the garlic and ginger, cook for 1 minute.
4. Add the barley, stirring until the grains are coated in oil.
5. Add the wine. Stir frequently until the liquid is absorbed.
6. Add a ladleful of stock. Stir often until absorbed. Repeat until all the stock has been absorbed, one ladleful at a time, about 40 minutes.
7. When the barley is almost done, cook the pea shoots in 1 tbsp olive oil until just wilted, about 3 minutes.
8. Mix pea shoots, lemon juice, mint, butter, lemon zest, and parmesan into risotto.

And there's our meal! Andy made a delicious salad of sunflower sprouts, red pepper, and walnut to accompany the risotto. We ate Jesse's rhubarb crumble for dessert, which was so good we forgot to take a picture!