Category Archives: CSA

cubanelle peppers, white and purple eggplant, basil, potatoes, peaches, tomatoes, kohlrabi stems? and 2 jars of honey.

when I first picked up the share I thought maybe I had grabbed something fancy and not meant for me! the giant bunch of basil and the 2 jars of honey threw me – but the farmer posted to her blog that she’d traded for some south jersey wild flower honey. it’s unpasteurized, too, which means I’ll have to be a little faster about eating it once it’s open. it looks SO GOOD.

Now I’m wondering if I can “grill” peaches on the broiler or should I invest in a grill pan. I asked my friend jesse in his new cooking blog (which is super! awesome! a must-read!) cause y’all know what’s good with honey: grilled peaches. Dizam!

I’m still due for the tomato-eggplant risotto from world vegetarian. my copy of the book came while I was at the beach. And I am going to visit a friend in bklyn who recently gave birth on sat., so I want to bring her something to eat too.

leftovers:
week 6: beans.
week 7: cabbage, eggplant, green pepper, cranberry beans.
week 8: potatoes, beets, radishes, mint, basil, hot peppers, chard, purple and thai eggplant.

I had to toss the chard and the beans from week 5 but brought all the tomatoes with me to the beach and ate them up. I am hoping to go to a bbq on sat. where bringing some kind of elaborate cabbage dish would be appropriate. And I MUST cook the cranberry beans because they are so weird and good sounding.

potatoes, beets, cubanelle peppers, radishes, mint, basil, tomatoes, hot peppers, chard, peaches (!), purple and thai eggplant.

leftovers:
week 5: chard
week 6: oregano, beans.
week 7: cabbage, eggplant, green pepper, cranberry beans.

I never ate that lettuce from week 4 and had to toss it this morning. I can’t remember what happened to the chard from week 5, and also, I think that week 6 beans were overlooked when I made bengali style beans from world vegetarian this week and they might not be happy anymore.

I didn’t make the tomato/eggplant risotto from world vegetarian this week like I meant to, but I will do that when I get home. it might not be BEST to keep eggplant over a week, but it works. I’ll use the rest of the eggplant for baba ganoush, just to get it all cooked.

also: this week I discovered (thanks, joy of cooking!) that cubanelle peppers are actually ITALIAN peppers and that they can be substituted with bell peppers in recipes. So I made a really yummy feta cheese/roasted pepper spread, and also some delish sauteed peppers (saute with olive oil, toss with red wine vinegar until evaporated, remove from heat and add chopped mint and garlic). I was able to use up the cubanelle peppers from weeks 6, 7 and 8. excellent!

I’m going to be away from monday-wednesday, but am going to try to get back to nj on wednesday im time to get my veggies. yay! I’m taking all my tomatoes with me and I stuck the last of the bengali beans into the freezer, I hope they come out ok. And I’ve already eaten all the peaches, they were So Good.

corn, cabbage, tomatoes, basil, cubanelle peppers, thai hot peppers, 1 eggplant, 1 green pepper, cranberry beans, other beans, and a magnificent onion.

week 4: lettuce, oregano
week 5: cubanelle peppers, hot peppers, chard, and pea pods
week 6: kale, corn, basil, oregano, cubanelle peppers, beans.

I only have a little corn left from week 6 b/c I’ve been eating it raw for lunch, and I really do need to check to see how the lettuce is doing. I ought to cook all the cubanelle peppers (dunno how yet) and all the beans this weekend. also, kale. and chard. ha!

all that cooking last night was totally worth it. In honor of stacey’s cooking blog devoted to world vegetarian by Madhur Jaffrey and also my northern neighbor and friend who’s been cooking from it a lot lately, I requested the book from the library and it is AMAZING. it should be required reading for all csa members. it is about 4 inches thick and includes all kinds of vegetables and best of all, it’s indexed really really well. I’m absolutely going to buy a copy of my own.

so, all that hot sweaty cooking I referred to last night culminated in this beautiful stuffed eggplant dish:

which is not only one of the best tasting but the easiest eggplant recepes I’ve ever made. I’m pretty scared of eggplant because it can be so bitter, but this was brilliant! It was good after I made it and it was even better today at lunch. I might eat it again for dinner. Supertasty.

this week, thankfully, was not that big:

I got kale, corn, basil, oregano, tomatoes, thai eggplant, purple eggplant, cubanelle peppers, beans.

leftovers:
week 4: lettuce, oregano, radishes
week 5: corn, cubanelle peppers, hot peppers, purple eggplant, chard, green pepper, and pea pods

I cooked up all the potatoes and watercress into this amazing watercress and potato bubble and squeak which I ate with poached eggs. it was SO TASTY. like gourmet hash browns. Yum.

I also chopped a lot of the veggies (cucumber, peppers, radish) and brought them with me to work and then to rachel’s house, where I left them (sadly) in her fridge.

I stuck the rest of the beans I’d boiled into the freezer, and I blanched some of corn and will cut it off the cob and freeze as well. and the beets, well, I boiled them and have eaten maybe 1/2. there are still some left, but I took them off the list of leftovers.
I used up all of the thai eggplant and one of the hot peppers and this weeks basil by making roasted eggplant with basil lemon oil. and I’ve got a cut tomato to eat for lunch. I’m so excited that they’ve started to come in! I love tomatoes. SO GOOD.

corn, beets, cubanelle peppers, hot peppers, kermit/thai eggplant, purple eggplant, chard, basil (from the take what you want bin), a cucumber, green pepper, and pea pods (I think).

week 2: potatoes

week 3: potatoes

week 4: potatoes, green peppers, lettuce, oregano, radishes, watercress

tonight I need to do things to potatoes, watercress, and also use up the avocados I bought earlier in the week. maybe this watercress quac, though I think the watercress avocado salad looks good too. oh, and look: watercress bubble and squeak! that uses watercress AND potato. perfect!

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Because of the 4th of July, I picked up my share on friday last week. That kind of puts the pressure on my as far as eating up this weeks veggies!

pictured are 2 bags of watercress, potatoes, kale, chard bok choy, lettuce, beans, beets, and basil and parsley – just enough for a nice pesto. I don’t usually make pesto with parsley but I’ve been told that’s how you’re supposed to do it. I have a nice sack of pine nuts at home so I’ll do that tonight.

leftovers:

week 1: some radishes
week 2: potatoes, radishes, sage

I used the week 1 and week 2 cabbage to make 2 cabbage salads: with the week 1 dill I made a dill vinegrette for a coworkers bbq weekend before last, and that same weekend I used the rest of the cabbage and the cilantro to make a lime cilantro vinegrette. they were both awfully good. sadly, though, a head of cabbage is too much for one person to eat. happiily, I got to share the salads with my coworkers and with my family.

I used the week 2 swiss chard and beet greens to make a chard gratin:

notice the ritz cracker topping? super. I love cracker toppings.

and I had used up all the beets on my amazing beet salad.
I just finished all of week 2 lettuce today. So unless I eat a whole head of lettuce tomorrow, I’ll be behind on lettuce again for next week. oh well. that’s the way that the csa goes sometimes!

I got swiss chard, potatoes, radishes, sage, cilantro, lettuce, purple cabbage, arugula, and some incredibly big beets.

last night I cooked all the (wk 2 and wk 1) beets and made a salad ala aurora and jesse with granny smith apples, drunken goat cheese, and some balsamic vinegar/tiny bit of olive oil. I have an incredibly huge container of this beet salad in my fridge. I also made some indian food so I could put chopped cilantro onto it. yum. and I picked up the pine nuts, so tonight I’ll try the same arugula dish only it will be potentially 10,000x better.

so many veggies to eat up!

leftovers:

week 1: some radishes, cabbage, dill.

I am going to use the cabbage from last week and this week up this weekend (need to find a good non-coleslawy cabbage salad recipe). best case is a salad that includes the dill or potentially sage. I need to also find something to do with the chard that I can also do with the beet greens – the radish greens from last week went to my worm food stash, and I’d like to actually cook the beet and radish greens this week. they’re pretty healthy but not hugely flavorful, sadly.

I had the first pick up of the CSA season yesterday:

radishes (with greens), beets, lettuce, cabbage, chard, dill, small potatoes, arugula.

I ate all the arugula for dinner and lunch today:

I tossed spelt pasta with wilted arugula (in garlic and olive oil), some romano cheese, and nate’s “meat” balls. I really wished I had pine nuts, but I guess I’m all out.

The CSA is on the other side of my house from work now that we’ve moved offices, so it takes about an hour to get there. which is a huge bummer. I might work from the other office on wednesday but I don’t really want to! Anyway, I’m hugely excited that the season has started.

this is, as far as I know, the last week. At least, it’s the last week I have a photo for!

kale, cabbage, potatoes, butternut squash, delicata squash, lettuce, and possibly sage.

There was a shipment of winter veggies but I don’t have a photo of that. it was mostly hard squash, some sweet potatoes, and some regualar potatoes. it was great.

almost to the end!

swiss chard, eggplant, potatoes, corn, tomatoes, cukes, radishes, and some kind of herb in a bag that I don’t recall right now.

another week I didn’t document well:
radishes, eggplant, habenero, jalepeno, yellow squash, hot peppers, potatoes, tomatoes, corn, and a pattypan squash.

Can’t remember what I got. This is about when I started to lose ground with the CSA. I think it’s kale, green pepper, tomato. patty pan squash, eggplant, hot peppers, and cabbage.

basil, sage, yellow squash, little onions, tomatos, basil, kale, green peppers, frying peppers, cucumber, cabbage, potatoes, purple eggplant

the shares are getting smaller, but that’s fine too. and also, LOOK at these gorgeous sunflowers:

when I showed up Farmer Susan said Hey, are you going straight home? then I’ll go cut you some flowers. How beautiful! they lasted for nearly 2 weeks, but they were THIRSTY and drank a lot of water.

week 9: parsley, potatoes, a whole-lotta tomatoes, yellow squash, zuchinni, corn, eggplant, I think?, green peppers, kale, tomatillos, hot peppers.

Wk 10 I was at the beach, so I asked Kathleen to pick up my veggies for me. I took the corn, zuchinni, squash, and green peppers to the beach. The tomatillos I stuck into some quacamole. The eggplant from this week and wks 7 and 8 I made into baba ganoush and brought down as well. YUM.

leeks, peppers (all kinds), tomatoes, potatoes, zuchini, yellow squash, eggplant, basil, sage, and flowers, too (not shown)!