CSA, Week 10

This week's CSA share included:

• 2 eggplants
• 2 tomatoes
• purple carrots
• 4 ears of corn
• 2 patty pan squash
• purple bell pepper
• 4 potatoes
• 2 cantaloupe (1 with fruitlovers share)
• quart blueberries (with fruitlovers share)

Here's how we used our veggies in the past week:

• Zucchini Pie (trust me, this was delicious...much better than it sounds...like a frittata):  zucchini, onion, tomatoes
• Grilled Pork Chops and braised cabbage with apples:  pork chops from our meat CSA, cabbage
• sandwiches and salads:  tomatoes, lettuce
• Blackberry Cobbler:  blackberries and blueberries
• Squash casserole:  yellow squash, onion, zucchini (from our garden)
• Boiled potatoes:  red potatoes
• fried green tomatoes:  green tomatoes
• Tomato/basil/mozzarella appetizer:  tomatoes
• Rolled Stuffed Eggplants
• Yakinasu (Japanese Grilled Eggplant)

Yakinasu
with soy-sauce/lemon juice

All those delicious meals and we still have lots leftover:  purple cabbage, green beans, bell pepper, blueberries and blackberries, lettuce, and cucumbers!  Add to that the squash, tomatoes, purple ("green") beans, and corn we got in our DWI box.  It seemed like we've been eating lots of veggies in the past week (and lots of meatless dinners too) but we definitely have room for improvement and need to get these leftover fruits and veggies used up asap!

CSA, Week 8 and Week 9

I didn't get last week's CSA details posted so this week I'll show what we've received and what we've been cooking the past couple weeks.

Week 8 CSA Share

Week 8: 

• cucumber
• eggplant
• purple bell pepper
• purple cabbage
• 3 tomatoes
• 3 yellow squash
• 4 ears sweet corn
• onion
• 1 pint blackberries
• 2 pints blueberries (fruitlovers)

Week 9 CSA Share

Week 9:  

• cucumber
• 3 red potatoes
• 3 tomatoes
• 4 yellow squash
• eggplant
• green bell pepper
• lettuce
• onion
• green beans
• purple cabbage
• pint blueberries
• 2 pints blackberries (fruitlovers)

Here's how we used the Week 7 and Week 8 shares:

• oven "fried" chicken (Cayne had to cut our whole chicken into pieces for this one):  chicken from our meat CSA, corn on the cob (on the side) 

• fried green tomatoes:  green tomatoes (these were delicious...neither Cayne nor I had ever had them before!)

• Rolled Stuffed Eggplant (we made this twice because it was so good) -- from The Joy of Cooking:  eggplant
• Pasta Primavera:  tomato, squash, zucchini, onion, carrots, kohlrabi, green bell pepper, purple bell pepper
• Cabbage salad (From Asparagus to Zucchini Cookbook):  cabbage
• hamburgers:  ground beef from the meat CSA, tomatoes, lettuce from our garden, onion, corn on the cob (on the side)
• sandwiches:  tomatoes, lettuce from our garden
• mozzarella stuffed sausage meatballs:  ground hot sausage from our meat CSA
• tacos:  ground beef from our meat CSA, onion, tomato (BTW, Trader Joe's taco seasoning is the absolute best taco seasoning you can buy...and their taco shells are great too)
• lasagna:  ground hot sausage from our meat CSA, ground beef from our meat CSA, (squash and zucchini in one of the lasagna pans I froze)

• Coffee/Crumb cake:  blueberries
• vanilla almond fruit tart:  blueberries and blackberries
• babyfood:  yellow squash, zucchini, and pattypan squash
• I also froze some chard and kale using my Foodsaver

We still need to use the potatoes, onion, cucumber, and a few of the berries from last week but we did a pretty good job making a dent in that box.  We also have 2 heads of green cabbage and lots of tomatoes from our DWI box to use up.  Time for some BLTs and some tomato/basil/mozzarella salads!  I also need to make a new batch of pickles using the cucumbers from the past couple weeks.

CSA, Week 7

This week's CSA share included:

• 1 zucchini
• 1 yellow squash
• 1 onion
• 3 cucumbers
• swiss chard (silverbeet)
• 1 green bell pepper
• 4 ears corn
• bunch of beets
• bunch of red potatoes
• bunch of carrots
• 1 pint blueberries (fruitlover's share)
• 1 pint blackberries (fruitlover's share)

And from the "free" box I picked up:

• 1 eggplant
• 3 green tomatoes
• 1 kohlrabi

Here's how we used our veggies in the past week:

• Coleslaw:  cabbage, spring onions
• Pasta Primavera:  zucchini, summer squash, red onion, carrots, cherry tomatoes

• Balsamic Marinated Beets:  beets, red onion
• Squash Saute:  zucchini, yellow squash, garlic, yukina savoy

• Veggie Stir Fry:  Bok Choy, carrots, yellow squash, zucchini, sugar peas, kohlrabi
• Blackberry Cobbler:  blackberries
• Bumbleberry Cobbler:  blackberries and blueberries
• Refrigerator Pickles:  cucumbers
• Green Bean Dinner:  green beans, onion, and CSA cubed ham

From our CSA box last week, we still have one small bunch of yukina savoy to cook.  From the DWI box, we still have lots and lots of squash, a couple zucchini, kale, chard, some blue potatoes, and 2 tomatoes.  Granted, we haven't eaten the coleslaw or marinated beets yet (they had to chill overnight and then we didn't eat them yesterday...meaning we'll try them tonight) but I think we did a pretty good job getting through most of the veggies and all of the fruit this week.  My goal for the upcoming week is to start freezing some of the greens to use in roasts and stews this winter, start freezing some of the squash/zucchini, and introduce Ethan to zucchini.

A New Kind of Blackberry Cobbler

A few days ago, I used a recipe from allrecipes.com for Blackberry Cobbler with some of the blackberries in our CSA.  This is a different style of cobbler from any I've ever made before but it is one of the highest rated recipes on the site so I decided to try it out.  I followed some suggestions in the reviews and cut the melted butter (that you leave in the bottom of the pan) in half and made my sugar syrup using 3/4 cup sugar and a cup of water.   I also used an overflowing pint of blackberries, which was more than the 2-cups the recipe called for.  The result was fabulous!  It was a perfect not-to-sweet and not too biscuit-y cobbler (that would be "scone-y" to folks in NZ). Anyway, the cobbler was so delicious that Cayne and I ate 2/3 of it the night I made it. I suppose we may be eating more fruits and veggies but we're not exactly eating more healthily...but at least we're enjoying it!

DWI Box This Week

We have so many veggies, I'm not sure what I'm going to do with all of these.  Here is a picture of everything in our DWI box this week...and yes, mom still has lots and lots of veggies left at her house to prepare!

We have 3 heads of cabbage, some chard, some kale, cauliflower, snap peas, yellow tomatoes, red tomatoes, and heaps of squash.  I hope Ethan starts liking his squash soon! 

Refrigerator Dill Pickles

When I saw that we had some bumpy-looking cucumbers in our CSA box last week, I thought they looked like they would make perfect pickles.  Unfortunately, I had no idea how to make pickles and assumed that I would need to know how to can pickles in order to make them.  Well, I decided to see how difficult canning would be, because I knew that neither Cayne nor I are big fans of cucumbers and I didn't want the cute cukes to go to waste.  As I was reading a recipe on how to can pickles and seeing all the supplies I would need (which seemed like overkill, considering I only had 3 cucumbers!) I stumbled across a recipe for "refrigerator pickles".  The recipe I found was for "bread and butter pickles", not my favorite kind -- I like Dill Pickles.  I kept looking and finally found a recipe for refrigerator dill pickles that I knew I could modify to have less sugar and more dill in the pickle shape I wanted.  I wasn't convinced my first attempt at pickles would be good, but 4 days later when I tried my pickles I thought they were excellent...a perfect flavor and very crispy!  In fact, I've already pickled the 3 cucumbers I got yesterday in our CSA.

Refrigerator Dill Pickles 

1.5 cups distilled white vinegar

1 tbsp sugar

4 tsp kosher salt (or any non-iodized salt)

1 tsp whole mustard seeds

1 tsp whole coriander seeds

3/4 tsp dill seeds

2 cups hot water

1 clove crushed garlic

3/4 cup coarsely chopped fresh dill

1 sprig fresh dill

Heat the water in the microwave and add the salt and sugar.  Stir until dissolved.  Add the vinegar, mustard seeds, coriander seeds, dill seeds, garlic, and chopped fresh dill.  Cut the blossom end off the cucumber or both ends, if necessary, to make sure they will fit into your jar/container.  Cut into spears or into discs, whichever you prefer...I cut mine into spears.  Put the cucumbers into an airtight container that is not much bigger than the pickles.  I used a plastic take-out soup container.  Pour the vinegar/dill solution over the pickles, covering them completely.  Add a sprig of fresh dill to the container, cover tightly, and refrigerate.  Wait 2-3 days before eating.  Pickles will last 1 month in the refrigerator   

CSA, Week 6

This week's CSA included:

• 2 small kohlrabi
• 1 red onion
• baby carrots
• 3 squash
• 3 cucumbers
• 3 zucchini
• green beans
• yukina savoy
• blueberries
• 2 quarts blackberries (in the fruitlovers share)

Ethan wants to try a blueberry!

Here's how we used (most of) last week's veggies:

• Strawberry ice cream:  strawberries (and Hatch Dairy milk and cream)
• Roast Chicken:  squash and CSA chicken
• Chicken and squash casserole:  leftover roast chicken, squash, zucchini, carrots and onion
• Refrigerator pickles:  cucumbers
• lunch salad:  lettuce (from last week's DWI box), squash, and zucchini
• Frozen Peas:  all the peas

We still have quite a bit left over from last week (green beans, bok choy, yukina savoy, beets, and some extra squash and onions (from the DWI box).  This is partly because our CSA box has been getting fuller each time we pick it up as summer gets into high gear so I really need to figure out a good way to store some of these veggies for later use.  I'm looking forward to using the peas I froze in casseroles and soups, for example.  This weekend is the freezing/canning class at the Williamson County Cooperative Extension, so I'm looking froward to seeing how that goes.

Dinner Tonight: Mhmm...Not sure what to call this one

Tonight I made a skillet dish/soup using some of the sausage we got in our CSA and some veggies.  I thought the sausage might be like a Mexican chorizo since it was labeled as "Ground Pork Sausage...Hot" but it wasn't anything like Mexican chorizo.  It tasted good though, and I'm glad I tried this dish, considering I'm not a very big fan of sausage and I did not have high hopes for how it would taste while I was cooking it.  Cayne loved it and calls it perfect "man food".  I will admit that the sausage gave a good flavor and the kale was awesome-tasting in this dish.

Ground Sausage and Kale Skillet Dinner
1 lb hot ground pork sausage
2 large baking potatoes, sliced
1 bunch kale, rinsed and chopped
1 small onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 can diced tomatoes, undrained
1 can chicken stock
2 bay leaves

Brown the sausage in a large skillet (like you would brown ground beef).  Add the onion, potatoes, and garlic and sautee until onions are tender.  I also added a little vegetable oil because there was not much fat in our CSA sausage.  Add the chicken stock, bay leaves, and con of tomatoes.  Once the liquid is hot and bubbly, add the kale (you might have to add in batches, so that it will wilt, making room for more in the pan).  Mix everything together, cover, and let simmer until the potatoes are tender.

More Veggies... The Wades Didn't Want It (DWI) Box

My mom really wants to support local farmers so she joined 2 different CSAs this summer for 1/2 shares at each one:  Delvin Farms and Flying S Farms.  But, while she likes some of the veggies she gets in these shares, she doesn't like all of them.  Cayne told her that he would eat anything they didn't want so now we have a weekly addition to our CSA share-- her rejects!  So, she's calling those veggies The Wades Didn't Want It Box...our DWI Box.  This week we got romaine, kale, garlic scapes, baby squash, sugar peas, blonde peas, chard, and garlic in our DWI box.  This adds to my weekly challenge of cooking all these great vegetables...but I'm up for it!

We did pretty good this week using up ALL our veggies except the 2 bunches of romaine lettuce, 2 bunches of kale, and a garlic bulb.  Luckily, the greens still look great so if I use them in the next couple of days they'll still be good and the garlic will last for a while, I'm sure.   I can't believe we went the whole week without a single salad though!  Still, that's a lot of  left over lettuce...and we pick up our new CSA box tomorrow!  I've got to get cracking....or freezing!  Luckily, Delvin Farms is offering their shareholders a canning and freezing class so mom and I are signed up to take it on June 18th.

Here's how we used up all the veggies (and a little of our meat CSA) this week:

• Chicken Curry Dinner:  cauliflower and swiss chard (aka:  silverbeet to you Kiwis)
• Chicken and Veggie Casserole:  squash, carrots, spring onions, and broccoli
• Pork Stir Fry:  pork (from the meat CSA), spring onions, bok choy, carrots, garlic scapes, garlic, sugar peas
• Frozen Peas (to use later in the year):  Blonde peas 
• Chicken Tikka Masala:  spring onions, squash, garlic scapes, English peas, red and yellow chard
• Strawberry Tea Bread:  strawberries (we ate most of strawberries fresh though)

Dinner Tonight: Bok Choy and Pork Stir Fry

Cayne, stir frying the veggies

Tonight we used meats and veggies from our 2 CSA farms to make a stir fry.  I prepared all the veggies and the stir fry sauce and Cayne did the cooking.  It tasted so good!  The Peaceful Pastures pork was super flavorful and the fresh veggies were superb, as usual.  Our stir fry included squash, carrots, garlic scapes, spring onions, bok choy, garlic, and some ground ginger.  I made up the stir fry sauce based on a recipe I found online and it was delicious.  It didn't look like the recipe made very much but it was so flavorful that it ended up being the perfect amount.  After cooking the meat and then the veggies, Cayne pushed everything to the side of the wok to heat and thicken the sauce before stirring it all together.  Then we served it over some rice.

Stir Fry Sauce
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp fish sauce
2.5 tbsp chicken broth
2.5 tbsp white wine
1 tsp sugar
4 tsp corn starch

Thickening up the stir fry sauce

Dinner Tonight: Broccoli Squash and Chicken Casserole

Tonight I decided to use up the broccoli, squash, and carrots from our CSA in a casserole.  I had found a basic recipe to follow online at Food.com but ended up changing it up quite a bit.  It tasted great...being a casserole I think you could put anything you wanted to in it though!

Squash, Broccoli, and Chicken Casserole

1 cubed, cooked chicken breast
1 head of broccoli, cut into florets

2 yellow squash, chopped
3-4 carrots, peeled and chopped
1/2 to 3/4 cup chopped onions (I used spring onions)
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 beaten egg
1 3/4 cup extra sharp cheddar cheese, shredded
4 tbsp melted butter
1 can cream of mushroom soup
4 slices swiss cheese
1 1/2 cups breadcrumbs
fresh chives to sprinkle on top
salt and pepper to taste

Mix the melted butter, mayonnaise, egg, cream of mushroom soup, salt, pepper and shredded cheese (it's OK that it's not melted) together in a large bowl.  Add the vegetables and chicken.  Stir to mix.  Pour into a greased casserole dish (2 qt size) and top with the swiss cheese slices and then the bread crumbs (you can also melt some butter and mix with the breadcrumbs before baking for a crisper top).  Bake at 350 degrees until bubbly, about 30 minutes.  Sprinkle fresh chives on top.

BTW -- the Jones Mill Farm
Pain de Champagne tastes awesome!

Dinner Tonight: Spring Salad of Arugula with English Peas, Radishes, and Strawberries

Ethan playing with food but not eating it...yet.

I found this recipe while searching for something new to do with our CSA radishes: Spring Salad of Arugula with English Peas, Radishes, and Strawberries | Earthbound Farm Organic | Recipes for Delicious and Healthy Food. It looked delicious and I had almost all the ingredients. I bought a Trader Joe's Champagne Vinagrette the last time I was there so decided to forgo the vejus dressing in favor of using our new dressing and decided that instead of arugula we could use our CSA mizuna, supplementing with some red romaine if necessary. We also had the English peas and strawberries from our CSA.  So, all I really needed was walnut oil, goat cheese, and a baguette.

The salad was delicious!  The goat cheese croutes were absolutely fabulous.  I will have to try these with other dishes.  I think marinating the cheese in the walnut oil gave it a great subtle flavor but a good olive oil would taste almost as good.  The mizuna was good too -- earthy but milder than arugula...I just cut off the ends of the leaves (some of stalks were a little thick) before tossing it in the dressing.  Oh, and Trader Joe's Light Champagne Vinaigrette gets two thumbs up and was the perfect complement to the fruit and veggies in this salad.

Strawberry Tea Bread

Strawberry Tea Bread

This afternoon I made some strawberry tea bread using some of our CSA berries.  This is a recipe I made once a long time ago and loved but then forgot about.  All these spring strawberries reminded me of the yummy-tasting bread so I had to try it again.  I think the ground hazelnuts really give it a great punch, although I'm sure you could also just add hazelnuts to the mix and it would be just as good.  The other great thing about it is that you can bake it in your bread machine, which must use less energy than having your oven turned on for an hour (and I think it keeps the kitchen cooler, too...although maybe a newer over would be just as good at that).

Strawberry-Hazelnut Tea Bread

1.5 cups strawberries
2/3 cup softened butter
3/4 cup sugar

2 eggs (at room temperature)

1 tbsp milk
1/3 cup ground hazelnuts
1 1/3 cup self rising flour, sifted

1. If using a bread machine, remove the dough hook from the bread machine pan.  Line bottom of loaf pan with baking paper or wax paper (I used aluminum foil).  Spray with baking spray or grease and flour the pan.  
2. Hull and coarsely chop the strawberries.  
3. Cream the sugar and butter together.
4. Add the eggs and milk to the butter/sugar mixture.  
5. Mix the ground hazelnuts with the flour and gently fold it into the wet ingredient mixture.  
6. Gently add the strawberries and fold in.  
7. Spoon into the pan.
8. Put pan in bread machine and use "Bake" setting.  Bake for about 50-55 minutes (I baked for 60 min).  Or, use a 350 degree oven and bake for 60-70 minutes.  Check for doneness by inserting a wooden skewer into loaf -- it should come out mostly clean when the bread is done.  
9. Cool for 2-3 minutes in the pan and then transfer to a wire rack to finish cooling. 

This was a great desert for our Broccoli Cheese soup dinner! :)  

Solid Food: First Month = Epic Failure

Ethan "enjoying" his sweet potatoes this afternoon.

We've been trying to feed Ethan solid food for just over a month now and the results have been awful! Sweet potatoes are the only thing he will eat and he will only eat them sometimes. On a good day, we can get him to eat almost 1 ounce of pureed sweet potatoes. Most days, we are lucky if he gets 2-3 spoonfuls of sweet potatoes down. I try to time his solid-food feedings for when he is awake and not starving (if he's too hungry, all he wants to do is nurse). We try different times of day and different foods. So far he has sampled rice cereal, apples, avocados, bananas, sweet potatoes, and carrots. He likes the rice cereal OK but the sweet potatoes are by far his favorite. The apples were the worst experience (I tried them twice, the first time mashed and the second time pureed). We ended up having to hose off the stroller the second time he tried apples, so we definitely won't be trying those again for a very, very long time. It has been a very frustrating month and it seems that we've wasted a lot of food. Perhaps it is time to take a break from feeding the solids and try starting again in a couple weeks.

This is his "I hope you're finished trying to feed me" look.

First Solid Food (Rice Cereal)

Ethan was happy after his first "meal" of rice cereal. 

Today, after getting back from the zoo, we decided to (finally) give Ethan at small taste of solid food.  The pediatrician had told us we could start giving him some food anytime after 4 months, but we decided to wait until closer to 6 months to give him his first spoon-fed food.  Today was just a test, really, to see how well he'd take food from a spoon and he did surprisingly OK.

We only gave him a 1/2 tablespoon of rice cereal mixed in 1.5 tablespoons milk, so it was pretty runny but thick enough to scoop up with a spoon (and make a mess on Ethan's face).  He really got into it and wanted to grab the spoon after he had eaten a few spoonfuls.  Most of the cereal made it into his mouth too (although it may not look that way in the photos).  He did a pretty good job of getting the food off the spoon as well, although Cayne and I have a lot to learn about holding the spoon so that he can eat off of it!  Our next phase has started...more solid foods will be on their way in the coming weeks...once we (as parents) get the hang of this spoon-feeding thing!

Ethan has no idea he's about to get food!

He always likes to watch us eat...but this time, the food is for him!

He's not too sure about that first bite!

Now he's getting the hang of it.

My turn to feed him!