We are excited to announce that beginning on July 18 Ann Arbor’s premier wine merchant, Morgan & York (1928 Packard Road), will be receiving Treetown Vittles meal kits after 5:00 PM each Wednesday.  The friendly folks at Morgan & York will be happy to recommend wine pairings to complement our weekly menu offerings.  Whether you wish to enjoy wine or beer with your meal or not, you may now designate ‘Morgan & York’ as your delivery address when placing your order for a Treetown Vittles meal kit.  When you pick up your order, don’t forget that Morgan & York carries a fine selection of cheeses and specialty foods to complement any meal.

I hope you enjoy a lovely weekend!

We had a very busy day yesterday delivering meal kits.  Dan tuned up the shopping cart on our new website, so you will be able to conveniently and securely order and pay online.  If you have any feedback, please send us an email via our contact form.

I was browsing around the Food & Wine online recipe file yesterday for something quick to make for dinner.  I tried the Grilled Vegetable Bruschetta and it was terrific for a quick weeknight meal, so I thought I’d share it.  This simple recipe is basically grilled vegetables on pesto slathered bread,  but it is heaven when you put it all together.  And so easy.  There were baskets of local fresh basil at the Farmer’s Market yesterday, so pesto season has officially begun.  I’m a real pesto fan, we put it on almost everything in the summer.  I’m sure it would also work well in a pinch if you used store bought pesto.  I made less dressing than the recipe called for, and it was plenty.  Our kids also melted mozzarella cheese on top of their bruschetta for a hugely successful dinner.  Give it a try.  http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/grilled-vegetable-bruschetta

Enjoy the beautiful day today!

Ellen

Those of you who ordered the salmon for tomorrow are in for a real treat.  Today was a big day, we received our first shipment of beautiful, ruby red Coho Salmon from Ecofish.  The fish is only 48 hours from catch and so incredibly fresh, I know you will be able to taste the difference.   Our family had it tonight and it got rave reviews even from the kids. 

Ecofish provides only sustainable, high quality seafood from both wild and aquaculture sources.  This is the kind of product you can feel good about supporting.  Check out their website:   http://www.ecofish.com/ .  Let me know what you think. 

Enjoy your meal tomorrow,

Ellen

I thought I’d use this blog to share quick prep recipes and other helpful cooking and food tips.  One cookbook that I am using for some of my summer recipes is Peter Berley’s book:  Fresh Food Fast (Regan Books, 2004) Copyright 2004 by Peter Berley. 

Check it out, it’s a pretty book for your collection.  I think that you will find it has some wonderful recipes using common ingredients in creative ways.  It is organized by season, so you can be sure to use Michigan fresh produce that is readily available now and LOCAL.  The book even gives you shopping lists, if you’re the organized type (not me!). Speaking of LOCAL, I’ve been trying to use as much local produce in our meal kits as I can find at a reasonable cost.  If you are also getting into the ‘local’ movement, you will find the Local Harvest website an invaluable resource for tracking down local products:  http://www.localharvest.org/ 

Here is a recipe from Berley’s book that I think you will enjoy as a great summer dessert using Michigan blueberries.  Don’t let the ‘Soufflé’ scare you away.  There are no egg whites to beat, and nothing to fall!  It’s an easy, guaranteed winner you will make often.  I made it with raspberries and it was terrific.   I dusted it with powdered sugar when it cooled and it was beautiful.  Don’t try this with low fat ricotta or eggbeater, it takes all the life out of it. 

Lemon-Ricotta Soufflé with Blueberries

From Fresh Food Fast by Peter Berley (Regan Books, 2004) Copyright 2004 by Peter Berley.

½ C sugar

6 large eggs

grated zest of 1 lemon (buy a microplane zester, you will love it!)

1 pound of whole-milk ricotta cheese

1 pint blueberries 

1.  Set a rack in the lower third of the oven and preheat to 375.  Butter a 9-inch pie plate or baking dish.  Set aside 1T of sugar.  2.  In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs, remaining 7T of sugar, and lemon zest.  Add the ricotta and whisk until smooth.

3.  Pour the mixture into the pie plate and bake for 15 minutes.  Top with blueberries, sprinkle with the remaining tablespoon of sugar, and bake until just set, about 15 minutes more.  Serve warm or chilled. 

Enjoy,

Ellen

We’re finally online and open for business. After planning and experimenting, Treetown Vittles LLC is making it’s debut. A special thank you goes to our web designer extraordinaire, Dan Shields. Dan labored many evenings and weekends to bring this website to fruition. I am so grateful for his creativity, professionalism and enthusiasm. Check out his website at: http://theshieldsdesign.com

With this first posting, I’ll share how Treetown Vittles started and encourage you to explore our new website. One of our goals is to become a business that you will be proud to patronize not only because we provide a high quality product, but also because we will be a good citizen in our local community. More on this another time. In the future, I plan to use the blog to share recipes, discoveries, favorite cookbooks, cool foodie websites, cooking tips, etc. Your comments and constructive criticism are welcome.

It has been said that the best businesses to start are those that you yourself would find valuable. I started Treetown Vittles because I dreaded coming home after work to the inevitable question: ‘What’s for dinner?’ Even if you love to cook, the weekday haste of getting dinner on the table after work can take all the fun out of cooking even for a foodie. Even if I had an idea what to make, I never had all the ingredients. By the time I threw together something, we had already eaten our weight in junk food.

I’m a chemist by training (yes, I am one of the Pfizer lay-off alumni) and most chemists like to cook. I have always enjoyed food, cooking and learning about food cultures around the world. I find cooking a very nurturing hobby and an expression of caring for those with whom you share a meal. I’m not into presentation and fancy plating. I just enjoy preparing simple, beautiful, fresh, healthy food to share.

I started Treetown Vittles to offer those of you who also love to cook (and those who don’t!) a new option to prepare a real dinner at home using fresh, healthy ingredients. I always thought that if I had just a little head start, I could put a great dinner on the table pretty quickly. I just needed someone to plan a menu, shop for me and prep all the ingredients!

That’s what we do at Treetown Vittles. Each Treetown Vittles meal kit has ALL the fresh ingredients that you need to make a dinner to enjoy with family and friends in about 20 minutes. You can make a meal quickly because we did all the shopping, washing, chopping and measuring. We create interesting, contemporary menus. We give you all the ingredients and simple instructions. We package it all up in convenient sized containers (reusable or compostable, of course). We deliver it to your office in a personalized, insulated tote with a cold pack. You just put it all together at home and cook it up fresh.

Everything in the kit is fresh and there is never anything to thaw out. We use the highest quality ingredients, fresh herbs and spices and only extra virgin olive oils or canola oil for cooking. If a recipe calls for butter (sometime a little doesn’t hurt), we package it separately so you can decide if you want to use it or not. Most of our foods are low in fat and all are vegetarian or fish. All of our menus emphasize fresh vegetables and fruit. We never add preservatives or corn syrup to our foods. We feature local produce and the finest quality local artisan products whenever we can. Sounds good doesn’t it?

Please check out our website and let me know what you think. I’m very proud of the product we offer and I encourage you to give it a try. This is a new venture, so we welcome all of your comments and suggestions. We want to be the BEST at what we do, so we are all ears!

Ellen