CSA Meals - Weeks 12 and 13

It's normal to make a big pot of soup when your air conditioning breaks at the end of July, right? The heat of the stove certainly doesn't increase the temperature of the kitchen and surrounding rooms to the point that you just want to leave your house.

I'm not sure making soup in the summer is a good idea even with functioning central air, but I had a significant number of vegetables to work with, and wasn't creative enough to think of another use for them. I chopped potatoes, scraped corn off cobs, cut ribbons of Tex's chard, sliced carrots, and minced garlic in preparation. 

To start, I sauteed the garlic in olive oil in my dutch oven, added the carrots and potatoes to brown them a bit, and then dumped in a mixture of chicken stock, water, and some diced tomatoes that were taking up freezer space. Rosemary, thyme, and a parmesan rind went into the broth to add some flavor, and I let everything simmer for a couple of hours. When I turned off the heat (to Davy's relief), I stirred in a can of rinsed cannellini beans, corn kernels, and the chard. 

The soup rested in the fridge over night, and on Sunday, I made a cross between gremolata and pesto by blending lemon zest, basil, garlic, and olive oil to add a little bit of freshness and citrusy tang.

What I should have made, instead of soup, was something like the Vietnamese chicken salad that we ate earlier in the week. I don't have the source of the recipe, but it includes chicken, napa cabbage, scallions, cilantro, and peanuts. I added grated carrots, and the dressing contains fish sauce, sesame oil, and sugar. It's quick, light, and especially satisfying served over rice noodles.

To go with the salad, we tested out the Padron pepper method I mentioned, and it worked beautifully. 

On average, about one in every ten pepper is supposed to be extremely hot, and the bunch that we got fit that standard. The few that were spicy hit me in a surprising rush of heat and saltiness, which only made me want to eat more.

Luckily, Amy had more Padrons available this week, and Davy and I made another round on Tuesday night. In the interest of not turning our kitchen into a room-sized oven, we ate Hungarian salami, a few cheeses from Caramont, and a makeshift bruschetta with yellow cherry tomatoes and basil marinated in olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

I will admit to making pasta a few times, despite the unofficial stove ban, but all of our tomatoes were practically begging me to make fresh pasta sauces. There may have been a few tomato and feta sandwiches thrown in as well, which only require the brief, contained heat of a toaster oven.

We're leaving for the Outer Banks tomorrow, and I'm looking forward to bringing the rest of our share and using a kitchen to its fullest capacity without worrying about the temperature ramifications. Have a wonderful week!

CSA Meals - Week 11

I once participated in a conversation with a group of people, including a vegetarian friend, about why she decided to give up meat and how she went about it. She said something that's stayed with me, which was that her family didn't center their dinners around meat every night. 

It struck me that, despite the fact that I consider myself to be a healthy eater, I normally start planning meals based on the protein rather than the vegetables. Even though I think about my friend's words fairly often, I never made much of an effort to put the idea into practice.

Three or four years have passed since then, and this is the first CSA season in which I'm really noticing a difference in the way I approach cooking and eating. I'm getting better about using our fresh, weekly produce items as building blocks instead of side dishes.

We still had potatoes from Week 10 and ate them thinly sliced, off the grill. Davy always manages to season them perfectly, and they accompanied grilled tile fish and raw green beans.

Wednesday marked a turning point in the summer. I was completely worn out from the heat, and had no desire to make dinner until I saw the cover of my neglected Bon Appetit. August's cover recipe is an open-faced tomato and feta sandwich. I'm not sure why I hadn't thought of it before, but it's a genius way to feature ripe tomatoes. 

I didn't even have to go to the store to make these for dinner now that we have an oregano plant, and Davy and I both loved them. 

The simplicity of this method even allowed me the time to chop a bell pepper and cucumbers from my parents' garden to use throughout the week. For not saving that much time, I certainly felt like I'd accomplished a lot whenever I took out the prepared vegetables.

We used some of them for a chopped salad with tomato, feta, and basil alongside pork nachos, and more the next night in a salad when we ordered pizza.

The weekend highlights were limited to two more rounds of tomato and feta sandwiches, along with leftover grilled potatoes converted into homefries, and a lemony shrimp pasta dish.

On Tuesday, I went home during my lunch break and made a salad with tomatoes, corn, avocado, hard-boiled egg, lime juice, basil and olive oil.

The salad was not only flavorful and refreshing, it also allowed me to clear several items from my fridge before they were past their prime, and not once did the thought of starting with meat cross my mind.

Fall CSA - Weeks 2 and 3

As I mentioned in my last post, I had a stomach bug a couple weeks ago. Combined with attending several concerts last week, our CSA routine was considerably disrupted, and we didn't use any of our Week 2 produce until Week 3.  Luckily, I was still on my stay-in-the-kitchen-and-off-the-couch kick, so we ate just about everything.


On Monday I made Jacques Pepin's Quick-Roasted Chicken for the second time, and this time I had enough foresight to let the butcher remove the chicken's backbone.  I love this recipe because it really is quick enough for a weeknight, which makes anything extra satisfying.  We made roasted potatoes and a salad with pistachios to go with the chicken.  The salad mix from Week 2 was very crisp, and the leaves stayed fresh for longer than usual.


The next night, after going to the market, I made carbonara-like dish with the fresh pasta (spinach and plain fettuccine and black pepper linguine).  I sauteed the cremini mushrooms, removed them from the pan, and then cooked the yellow squash with garlic and chopped homemade bacon.  

I added sungold cherry tomatoes and pasta when the squash was done, and stirred in tempered egg yolks and parmesan to finish it off.  


Unfortunately, the fettuccine was overcooked, and the noodles clumped together when I stirred everything together.  It was still pleasant to eat, and was fine leftover, but I was disappointed since I'd gotten special ingredients from the market to make dinner.  


We ate raw wax beans on the side to finish off the bag from the previous week, and had our apples as mid-morning snacks the next day.  As in the past, they were far superior to any grocery store apple available.  


On Thursday I gave eggplant another chance in this recipe for Eggplant Tian. Kerry Saretsky, the author, describes it as "easy" and "awesome," but I'm not sure I'd agree with it being "easy."  The techniques are simple enough: slicing, marinating, broiling, baking, but it took several steps to complete the recipe, and took longer than I'd like for a work night.  

As you can see, I baked it in one dish instead of four.  I was very happy with the results, and had no problem eating a few rounds of the leftovers with generous dollops of pesto on top.  This is a great way to use up eggplant, and it's almost as comforting as lasagna.  We enjoyed it with bread and a salad with homegrown peppers and tomatoes.

We munched on our green beans raw and also included them in a Saturday morning veggie scramble.  The eggs were also mixed with sweet peppers, feta, and eggs for a delicious and filling brunch.  


That afternoon, in anticipation of a special dinner on Sunday, I julienned and pickled our daikon radish and a large carrot.  

The radish emitted an not-so-pleasant odor that lingered in our fridge and freezer for most of the weekend, but it did add a nice crunch to shrimp spring rolls.  Below are a few shots of Davy's spring rolling handiwork.  We served them with a peanut butter and hoisin dipping sauce.

We also made homemade chicken pho from a recipe we made in a cooking class, and I got so caught up in preparing and eating it that I didn't take any pictures.  It also deserves its own post, which hopefully I'll have the time for at some point, but it turned out well and was comforting on a chilly Sunday night.


Monday was our wedding anniversary, and I made a simple dinner since we're going to Portland, OR for a long weekend.  I prepared two recipes from The Best Recipes in the World, by Mark Bittman: sole meuniere (made with flounder) and a braised leek and rice dish (made with bok choy instead of leeks).  

Both were subtly flavored and allowed the quality of the ingredients to really shine through.

I'll be taking Week 4 off, but plan on some Portland posts for next week!

CSA Meals - Week 10

The sun is blasting everything outside, but the plants in my garden haven't given up just yet, and luckily the CSA is still going strong.  Most of week was extremely bearable compared to the excessive temperatures we have now, and I managed to make a few different dishes with our CSA produce and Shannon's monster zucchini.  


When Davy has a band activity and won't be around for dinner, I seize the opportunity and make pasta.  Last Wednesday I ate it with sun gold tomatoes, basil, feta, and garlic, and it was spectacular - simple, sweet, and fresh.  The sun gold tomatoes are so tasty, and for someone who doesn't love tomatoes (I'm getting there!), the perfect variety to eat uncooked.

The next night I realized we had a ton of zucchini to use, and some prosciutto, so I decided to try out a version of this salad from Serious Eats.  We didn't feel like grilling, and I was using the oven for potatoes baked in parchment anyway (with basil instead of mint), so I sliced some zucchini on the mandolin and roasted it instead.

If you need to find another way to get rid of zucchini, the lentil salad is a healthy and delicious way to do so.  The thin pieces almost melted down in the dressing, and the red wine vinegar provided just enough of a bite to keep the flavors interesting.  I chopped my prosciutto and mixed it in instead of serving it on the side, and it contributed to making the dressing taste richer, which is completely worth it when you're eating health food like lentils and zucchini.

My parents came to visit for the weekend, and we welcomed them with takeout from 8 1/2 plus lime and peanut coleslaw on Friday night.  I love this coleslaw recipe from 101 Cookbooks because it's a totally different take on shredded cabbage.  It's tangy from the lime, crisp from the cabbage and peanuts, slightly juicy from the beautiful sun gold tomatoes, and very light because it doesn't have mayo.  The slaw can be eaten for several days after, as long as you don't mind if the peanuts lose some of their crunch, because the cabbage is even better as it softens.

When I made the parchment potatoes, I used every potato we'd gotten in the share because I knew they could be recycled into other meals.  We ate a them a second time in a Sunday morning frittata with zucchini, since both of those vegetables were in abundance.


After all of the glorious weekend eating (another phenomenal meal at Secco!), Davy and I were worn out.  We made a cucumber and tomato salad with feta, and decided to defrost some bread to eat with Idiazabal cheese from Trader Joe's and spicy plum chutney for dinner on Monday.  It's the kind of meal that's perfect in a heat wave, so we probably should have held off until Week 11,  though I don't think either of us would complain if we repeated it the next round of candy-like sun golds.

CSA Meals - Week 7

To kick off Week 7, we got subs from 8 1/2 and had the first cucumber and tomato salad of the year.  I never get over how such simple ingredients (cucumber, tomato, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, basil, salt, pepper) can turn into such a subliminal combination of tastes.  This year's tomato crop has been sweet and beautiful so far, perfect for my staple summertime salad.

The next night we raided the fridge to eliminate some of last week's stragglers, and wound up with kale and potato quesadillas.  The kale and potatoes were already cooked, so they took almost no time at all to make.  I need to remember that almost all vegetables taste good encased in a tortilla, warmed with cheese, and served with salsa.


Last Thursday was the NBA Draft, which has turned into a notable event in our house.  I got some frozen Trader Joe's goodies (including the transcendent fried mac and cheese balls), and made sauteed cabbage to ensure that we consumed something healthy that evening.  The cabbage, as I mentioned in Week 6, had the appropriate balance of tenderness and crunch, and with soy sauce and sesame oil, blended in nicely with the rest of our spread.


The final culinary endeavor of the week was a white pizza.  We'd obtained a beautiful piece of Brigid's Abbey cheese from River City Cellars, and I shaved several pieces off to layer onto the pizza crust.  For the next layer, I sauteed a small portion of one of Shannon's giant zucchinis with onions and garlic until the onions were transparent and the zucchini started to soften around the edges.  The vegetables went on top of the cheese, followed by a sprinkling of red pepper flakes, grated parmesan, and additional shavings of the creamy Brigid's Abbey.

We let the pizza warm up for five minutes in the oven, then added chopped tomato, and put it back in for a few more minutes.  The cheese had a hint of brown when I pulled the pizza out and sprinkled it with several leaves of amethyst basil.  

It was an aesthetically pleasing pizza, and also loyal to the season, which made it all the more satisfying to devour.  As long as the tomatoes continue to be this wonderful, I'm going to try to use them in dishes that aren't (all) salads featuring them with cucumber.

CSA Meals - Week 6

Most people are aware that mint is easy to grow, and that it's a highlight in mojitos and desserts.  What came as a surprise to me is that it can be a subtle and welcome addition to savory dishes, even in a non-jelly form. 


On Saturday, Davy and I grilled some extraordinary red snapper from Yellow Umbrella.  To accompany the fish, I made braised kale with onions and potatoes baked in parchment.  The potatoes were prepared based on a recipe from The Splendid Table's weekly newsletter, which they reprinted from At Elizabeth David's Table: Classic Recipes and Timeless Kitchen Wisdom.  

It's a simple combination of new potatoes, butter, salt, pepper, and two mint leaves.  The mint contributes just a slight amount of coolness to the buttery potatoes, though they don't need much of an enhancement to be delicious.


Coincidentally, the other recipe I tried last week was also from The Splendid Table's weekly newsletter.  The "Salad of Beef with Lime, Chili, and Mint" appealed to me because of its similarities to my beloved rice noodle salad.  Its flavors are inspired by Laos, so there were some major differences in taste, but this salad is just as refreshing and wonderful in its own way.  


The mint and hot pepper balance each other, while the vegetables add crunch and sweetness.  I wasn't thrilled with the rice noodles I got (and I forgot to take pictures of the salad with the noodles), but otherwise I really loved this dish and want to make it again and again.  The cabbage from our share is tender enough to eat uncooked without tiring out your jaw, and the spring onions added just the right amount of bite to the meat.  

My only tip is to store the salad separately from the noodles so that they don't get too soggy.  And also, make an effort to try mint in a new way while it's growing (or taking over) in your backyard.  You won't be disappointed.

POTATOES IN PARCHMENT

Adapted from At Elizabeth David's Table: Classic Recipes and Timeless Kitchen Wisdom 
(Enough for 4 people)

Preheat the oven to 375°F.

Clean approximately 24 very small new potatoes, and halve or quarter any larger potatoes. Place them on a large square of parchment paper on a cookie sheet.

Add 2 leaves of mint, a little salt and 2 tablespoons of butter to the potatoes. Fold the paper in half, and then crease the edges to seal the packet.

Let the potatoes cook for about 35 minutes.

SALAD OF BEEF WITH LIME, CHILE AND MINT INSPIRED BY LAOS

adapted from The Splendid Table weekly newsletter
Serves 4 to 6

Noodles:
• 1 pound wide or linguine shaped rice noodles
• 4 quarts boiling water

Dressing:
• 1 large garlic clove, minced
• 2 teaspoons grated fresh ginger
• 2 packed teaspoons brown sugar, or to taste
• 1/4 teaspoon each salt and freshly ground black pepper
• Juice of 1 large lime
• 1 tablespoon Thai or Vietnamese fish sauce (nuoc mam)
• 2 tablespoons water

The Salad:
• between 3/4-1 lb. flank steak, seared on the grill then diced
• 4 scallions or spring onions, thinly sliced
• 1/3 cup fresh cilantro leaves, torn
• 2 jalapeños, minced
• 2 small cucumbers, peeled, seeded and cut into thick sticks
• 1 carrot, peeled and cut into sticks to match the cucumber
• 1 cup coarsely shredded green cabbage
• 1/3 tight-packed cup whole fresh mint leaves

Garnish:
• Lime wedges

1. Cook noodles according to box directions, and rinse with cold water when they're finished
2. Heat vegetable oil a saute pan over medium high heat and add the flank steak when it's hot.  Stir for a minute, add the onions or scallions, and continue stirring until the meat is cooked to desired doneness.  Turn off the heat and leave the pan on the burner.
3. Blend the dressing ingredients in another large bowl and toss with the vegetables.  Add the meat, stir to combine, and serve accompanied by a bowl of the rice noodles.
4. Take a small amount of rice noodles and spoon the salad over them. Squeeze on lime juice to taste.