CSA Box Week Five and the Attack of the Beet!

Friday night, on the way to some good friends for dinner.  I stopped and picked up my fourth CSA box and wondered what treasures were with in.

And the treasures were...

It held a bag of mixed greens, a bag of green beans, a bunch of onions, a bunch of carrots, a pint of tomatoes, random peppers, potatoes, two apples, garlic and the worlds largest beet!

Not many huge plans for this box.  I'll eat the mixed greens as salad and on burgers and sandwiches.  I'll maybe freeze and pickle the beans and peppers  for later.  But the BEET, I will make borscht.

Collard Green Lasagna

Way back in box two there was a big bunch of collard greens. I wasn't sure what to do with them. So I searched the internet and came across a recipe for lasagna.  The recipe substituted collard greens for some of the noodles.  I never realized how easy lasagna was to make.  So here we go...

The ingredients are very simple, collard greens, no boil lasagna, ricotta, Parmesan and sauce.  My go to sauce is Trader Joe's Tomato Basil Marinara.  I use it for spaghetti and for pizza. 

 I cut down the collard's to fit the pan.

 I blanched the collards in boiling water.

The I stopped the cooking in ice water and then I dried them off.

  Let the assembly begin!

 sauce

 pasta, ricotta

 collards, sauce, Parmesan.  Then repeat!

 

The final product!.

I haven't eaten it yet.  I put the cover on and popped it in the freezer and I am waiting for a nice fall day.  When the time comes, I will bake it at 350 until done.  I wonder how it will taste?

CSA Box Week Four

Sorry everyone, I've been a bad blogger and photographer.  This is from the box two weeks ago.  I knew what everything was and mainly just ate it.  No cool recipes, just good basic food.

The box....

 

The contents....

There was a bag of mixed greens, a bag of green beans, a pint of cherry tomatoes, two onions, two cucumbers, a bunch of arugula, a bunch of dill, miscellaneous peppers,garlic, a bunch of carrots, potatoes, pears and potatoes.

I shared the mixed greens and arugula in salad at a dinner with friends and on my own.  For some reason, I thought I didn't like arugula.  Well I do,  it has nice spicy/zippy flavor.  I steamed up the green beans multiple nights as a side dish and the pears made a good addition to my breakfast. The potatoes, carrots, garlic and onions are waiting for another day.  Sadly the dill, cucumbers, and some of the peppers went to waste.  I was going to make pickles, but it never happened.  Check back in a few days for some recipes from before and this weeks box.

Box three and a long week

This has been a long week and I was really dragging when I stopped at the pick up point and the box was a little uninspiring.  Maybe after a recharge, I'll feel a bit more inspired.  But until then, behold box three....

....and the contents.....

One head of garlic (I hope it isn't rotten like the last on), 1.5#'s potatoes, on bunch of small Walla Walla onions, 1 # carrots, one bunch beets, three ears corn, 1.25#'s cucumbers, .5 #'s mixed greens, 1.75 #'s small tomatoes, one bunch radishes and 2 peppers.


 Since I'm very uninspired any suggestions would be nice.  Oh and keep you eyes open over the next few days for the post on what I did with the kale and collard greens.


Update...

I gathered enough energy to toss a quick salad.   Mixed greens julienned carrots and cucumber, salted tomatoes, peperoni, black olives, goat cheese and the magic ingredient, Aunty Lilikio Passion Fruit Vinaigrette. The goat cheese merged in with the vinaigrette to dress the salad in yumminess.  It was so  good  Dhugal even wanted some.

Kale aint so Bad

I've never been to fond of kale, not that I ever ate much of it.  I'm not sure where my aversion came from.  But guess what? If you cook it with enough bacon, it can be very tasty.

My team at work was having a breakfast party for a coworks who surrvied 25 year of job, job title, telephone number changes.  Go coworker!

In her honor I made mini kale and bacon quiches.  Boy was it easy!  The important thing to remember is the ratio of milk and eggs, 2 eggs to a cup of milk.  I have found many recipies try to make cooking to hard.  Most quiche recipies call for cream and whole milk, I had neither.  I finally found a blog that explained how quiches work and advised the type milk product doesn't matter and guess what, they were right.  Since I can't drink milk anymore I don't keep it in the house, so I used what I had, powdered nonfat milk and it worked fine.  There is no real recipe, just remember 2 to 1 and bake at 350 degrees.

Remove the stems from the kale

Start sauteing some chopped bacon

Add the kale to the bacon and cook down

Until it looks like this, wrap it in a dish towel and squeeze the daylights out of it.  I forgot to do this and the quiche was a little wet.

Put some cheese (mine was frozen) in the bottom of a mini muffin tin.

Add some of the kale and bacon mixture

Mix 2 eggs with 1 cup of milk and whisk until frothy. I added salt and pepper, the salt was unnecessary.  I also mixed the egg mixture, one batch at a time, since I had no idea how much I needed.  I think used a batch a half.

Pour the egg mixture over the kale and cheese

Bake it at 350 degrees for about 15 mins

Yummmmmmm!

The reviews from my coworkers were pretty good and I don't think they were just being nice. In total it took about 30 to 45 mins, start to finish. It was really quick.  I think there are more quiches in my future.  I have also read they freeze well.

Peter Piper......

.....picked a peck of pickled peppers.  Well not peppers not anywhere close to a peck, but I did make some pickles.  My last CSA box came with a couple cucumbers. I new I wasn't going to eat them before they spoiled. So I made pickles.  In a few weeks I should know how they turned out.  In the mean time enjoy,

I found the recipe at Food in Jars a blog I enjoy reading.  Check it out at www.foodinjars.com/2009/08/garlic-dill-pickles/

CSA Box Number Two

I picked up my second CSA today on the way home from work.  Peeking out from under the giant leaves were some gorgeous looking strawberries and a heirloom tomato.

As I unpacked the box this is what I found.

A bunch of beets, 2 bunches of carrots, a head of cabbage, 2 tomato, a bunch of kale,a bunch collard greens, potatoes, an onion, a head of garlic, a bunch of basil, and 2 cucumbers.

I have to admit these are two of the stranger cucumbers I have seen.

Since I was starving and the smell of basil was driving me nuts, I made a quick batch of  Pesto.  I made the recipe up.  Basil, olive oil, garlic, parmesan cheese, almonds, and sea salt.

 Viola, Pesto!

Slice up one of the beautiful tomatoes that came in the box.  Then sprinkle on some salt, toast a slice of home made bread, spread with left over pesto and finally top with some melted mozzarella cheese and boom! A great a easy dinner.

One last thing, I now have a head and a half of cabbage.  Should I try kimchi and if so do anyone out there have a easy recipe?

First Go

The first thing I made from my first ever CSA box, you ask? Lets see if you can guess.

Why yes, Cole Slaw.  You're a winner!  It made a nice accompaniment to the crab boil we had for family brunch.  I also made some jam from the remaining raspberries in the box. I haven't tried the jam, but it should be good. Since I'm not a huge lettuce fan I gave it to a lettuce loving co-worker.

CSA Adventure Week One

I just picked up my first CSA box and what greeted me, right on top?  Raspberries! Needless to say many of them didn't make it home.  Also included was one bunch of basil, some sort of lettuce, 3 bulbs of garlic, 2 bunches of carrots, a head of cabbage, a bulb purple  kohlrabi,  a bunch of beets and a bunch of mystery greens.

The Box

I'm thinking I make a coleslaw out of some of the cabbage, carrots and kohlrabi for family dinner tomorrow.  Maybe I'll make some pesto out of the basil. I love roasted beets, so I'll roast those.  I will have some kohlrabi left, should I try to make some pickles out of them.  The lettuce will be used for salad or given away. 

The Haul

Can you help me identify the mystery greens I have an idea, but I'm not certain.  I'm hoping that the CSA forgot to include a list of what I got and I would have to play guess the vegetable every 2 weeks.

 

What am I?

If you have a suggetions on how to use all these yummmy veggies, give me a shout out.   Keep you eyes peeled for the result of my my cooking.