Everyone who works with me at my Bedford, New York farm loves our Marley Spoon meal kits, which include many of my recipes. They're delicious, easy to prepare, and each meal can be cooked and on the table within 40-minutes - so great after a long, busy day at work.
Every week, I order several Marley Spoon meal kits to enjoy. I cook one or two for myself, and then ask members of my team to take various dishes home to try as well. Recently, one of my gardeners took home Double-Double Burger with Animal Style Fries, our rendition of a popular meal with juicy meat patties dressed with decadent cheese, onions, and a special sauce of pickles, mayonnaise, and ketchup paired with crispy, seasoned oven fries. And, as always, all the ingredients are pre-measured, pre-packaged, and included with the kit.
Here are some photos, enjoy.
Here is the large recipe card for the Double-Double Burger with Animal Style Fries. Every Martha Stewart & Marley Spoon kit comes with this large recipe card complete with a photo of the finished dish on one side…
… And on the other, the complete how-to, step-by-step instructions and detailed photos to match. These photos help so much when preparing any meal. We make sure there are as few steps as possible for every dish. We work hard to develop every Martha Stewart & Marley Spoon meal kit recipe so it is time-saving, easy to make, and most of all, delicious.
This meal kit for four is inspired by another popular burger and fries duo. It includes four potatoes, three onions, two dill pickles, mayonnaise, a tomato, a romaine heart, cheese sauce, ground beef patties, four buns, and packets of dijon mustard. One only has to provide oil, salt and pepper, sugar and ketchup.
First, the oven is pre-heated to 450-degrees Fahrenheit.
The first step is to prepare the potatoes. All four potatoes are scrubbed clean and then cut into quarter-inch fries.
Then, the fries are drizzled with oil and seasoned with salt and pepper.
The fries are placed on a rimmed baking sheet and roasted on the upper rack of the oven until golden-crisp, about 30 to 35 minutes long.
Next, the yellow onions are finely chopped. And, do you know why onions make one cry? Onions contain amino acids known as cysteine sulfoxides. When an onion is cut, chopped, or torn, enzymes in the onion break down the cysteine sulfoxides and turn them into propanethial S-oxide, which then decomposes into sulfuric acid resulting in the irritation, stinging, and tearing that is associated with cutting onions. To cut onions without crying, try chilling them in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes first. The cold temperature will slow down the enzymes and ease the irritating effects.
The chopped onions are heated in two tablespoons of oil over medium-high heat with salt and pepper, and then cooked until browned and soft.
Then they are placed into a bowl and set aside.
Meanwhile, while some of the pickle slices are reserved for the burgers, some are chopped for the sauce and saved with two tablespoons of pickle juice.
The pickles and juice are mixed with the mayonnaise…
… along with a quarter cup of ketchup and two teaspoons of sugar.
The sauce is then seasoned to taste with salt and pepper.
Next, the tomatoes are sliced, and the lettuce is torn to bun sized pieces.
This meal kit has enough ground beef to divide into eight balls, which are then pressed into eight four-inch patties.
The skillet is heated with one tablespoon of oil over high until smoking. Then, three or four patties are put in and cooked until well browned and crusty on the bottom, about two minutes.
Mustard is spread onto the patty and then turned over so it can cook for one minute.
Here are the “animal style fries” fresh out of the oven.
The burgers are assembled – the patties, each with a stack of onions, lettuce, tomato, on toasted buns, and served with the cheese covered fries topped with special sauce and more onions. This meal was devoured in minutes. It’s delicious and mouthwatering. If you haven’t already signed up for our Martha Stewart & Marley Spoon meal plan, do so now and start the New Year with easy to prepare flavorful meals your whole busy family will enjoy! Click on the highlighted link and go to the Martha Stewart & Marley Spoon web site right now.
It's very busy and very noisy up at my compost yard - one of the most important areas on my Bedford, New York farm.
If you saw my last blog, you know my outdoor grounds crew has been gathering lots of organic debris - logs, stumps, bark and brush, and piling it all up so it can be taken to the compost yard in preparation for the tub grinder. I like to call in the massive machine once a year or once every two years, to reduce the size of our debris pile into much finer, nutrient-rich mulch. The crew and the tub grinder from Material Processors Inc. in Warwick, New York have made so much progress over the last couple of weeks.
Here are some photos, enjoy.
Our piles of debris get larger and larger every year. This is just a small fraction of what will go through the tub grinder.
All along the carriage roads around my farm are piles of organic material ready to be transported to the compost yard. It is a massive project. This pile includes large trees which had to be taken down because they were damaged or diseased.
There are also large piles of smaller branches and limbs taken off the trees before they are felled or picked up from the woodland floor after breaking and falling during storms.
For years, I’ve used a team from Material Processors, Inc. – a 30-year old company that focuses on recycling green waste, and clearing and preparing land spaces for development.
Here, they are using their own grapple and truck to help haul the bulky waste to the compost yard.
Tub grinders are extremely large and heavy, so the team delivers the tub grinder and excavator to the farm the day before to set it up and prepare it for work.
Tub grinders are named for the distinctive in-feed hopper – the large round tub, normally 10 to 14-feet in diameter and roughly six-feet deep. It is moved into position close to the wood pile. Before any equipment is used, all the controls are checked to make sure everything is in good working order.
Tub grinders have a variety of screens for the output. The screen selection for each job is usually based on the type of material being processed and the desired end-product.
A conveyor belt transports the finished product away from the mill and then drops it in a nearby location.
Here’s the tub grinder at work on the first day. The excavator is used to pick up the material using its large “jaws grab” bucket attachment to drop debris into the tub grinder.
Notice the small pile of ground up wood – it is very small at the start.
Every time I call in the tub grinder, the crew works for nearly a month grinding up all the material from around the farm. The jaws on the excavator are huge and can pick up, move and sort several large logs or pieces of debris at a time.
Tub grinders are loaded from the top. Here, one can see a load as it is delivered to the grinder just before it is dropped.
Tub grinders rely primarily on gravity to feed the material into the hammermill at the bottom of the tub. As the tub revolves, the hammermill below, shatters the wood into smaller fragments. Here, one can see the wood in the turning machine.
Here is the continuous discharge conveyor carrying the material away from the machine and onto a mound. It is always sad to see the trees go, but I am glad they can be repurposed into usable rich materials for the gardens. When the pile gets too large, a front loader comes to manage and move the output. This is the second week – the pile of output is much larger.
This output is from a first grind – only the wood. It will go through a second grind and get mixed with horse manure and organic chicken waste to create a nutrient rich mulch.
On the left is a pile of the horse and chicken waste.
After the second grind, the mound looks like this – beautiful, dark usable mulch which we use during the rest of the year to top dress the garden beds.
The machines do this over and over, one load at a time. There is a lot of dust and occasional debris flying around – it is very important to stay several feet away whenever visiting an excavator and tub grinder at work. The team prefers to work on rainy days, which helps to cut down on all the dust. The past few days have been perfect – on and off showers from morning to afternoon. We have a lot more work to do. I’ll be sure to share photos of the finished product.
The cold, snowy, icy days do not have to be spent indoors. In fact, here at my Bedford, New York farm, we get a good portion of outdoor work done this time of year. My outdoor grounds crew is very busy with woodland maintenance - we call it "cleaning the woods."
These tasks are best done during winter when the trees are bare. The team is able to cut dead or broken trees, knock down weeds, brambles, and thorny barberry bushes, and pick up the many fallen branches. Everything is gathered and placed into neat piles along the carriage roads, so at the end all the organic debris can be chipped and spread right back into the woods. Any desirable tree trunks are set aside and cut up for lumbering, and rotten or irregular trunks are reserved for the tub grinder - everything is always put to good use.
Here are some photos, enjoy.
When I moved to my farm, I created carriage roads through the entire property, so I could drive or ride around on horseback and see the gorgeous landscape. This carriage road takes one through the woodland under tall, majestic trees.
The roads also pass over streams like this one – full of clean, running water for all the woodland creatures that visit.
This part of the woodland is in the back field. The trees on the left are dawn redwoods, Metasequoia – fast growing deciduous conifers I planted years ago. This photo was taken in the fall before the fine feathery needles dropped for the season.
But none of the views would be possible without regularly scheduled general maintenance work. Every winter, my outdoor grounds crew spends several weeks “cleaning” the woods. “Cleaning” the woods allows us to reuse and repurpose a lot of natural materials – and it makes the area much prettier. This is a pile of branches brought out from the woodland and piled neatly – many of these fell during various storms.
These are larger trees taken down because they were dead, damaged, or diseased. Many trees are ash trees infested and killed by the dangerous emerald ash borer.
This is a section of the woodland where the trees are dense. At some point, some will be taken down to make room for younger specimens.
Before the tree trunks are felled, smaller limbs and branches are removed first, so the tree is easier to take down with less of a chance to damage other plantings in the process.
Here is a tree getting pulled out and placed into a pile by the carriage road.
My outdoor grounds crew foreman, Chhiring, carefully maneuvers the trusted Hi-Lo and oversees all the work making sure everyone takes all the necessary safety precautions.
Phurba is securing another line to this huge stump, so it can be removed from the stream. Fortunately the weather has been very mild these last few days. All the snow and ice from the most recent storm has melted allowing the crew to work more safely and efficiently.
For this oak tree and various other light trees, the crew is able to use a strong rope to help direct where the tree will fall once it is cut.
Meanwhile, Pasang, who is our resident tree expert, carefully makes his felling cuts at the base of the tree.
And in just a few minutes, the tree is safely brought down.
The tree may have looked nice from afar, but its base was actually rotting. This tree could have eventually fallen and caused damage to nearby fences or other healthy trees. It was the right decision to bring it down.
Here, Pasang starts picking up the more manageable branches and adds them to the pile.
In another area of carriage road, stacks of trees sit ready to be hauled to the compost yard and the tub grinder.
But nearby, this is a vew of “cleaned woods.” It is so nice to be able to see through the woods to the field beyond.
One can really see the beauty of the landscape. Clearing out dead or overgrown vegetation will also allow remaining plants to receive better access to water, sunlight, and other nutrients necessary to thrive.
And then young, strong seedlings are planted again. Trees are so important – they provide habitat and food for birds and other animals, they absorb carbon dioxide and potentially harmful gasses, and they release oxygen.
Keeping the woodland “clean” is one way I can give back to the Earth and help create a more sustainable planet for my grandchildren, and for everyone. What outdoor chores are you doing this weekend?
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