Week 7: Holy Over Abundance!

July 24, 2010

Oh. My. Balls. This week's share was beyond ginormous. Any kind of plant eater, even a triceratops, would be 100% blown away by this haul.

Check it out:

Do you ever fill your entire shopping cart with vegetables?  Me neither, but trust me, this load would have done it. If I had bought this produce from the grocery store, there's no way I could have fit my Cocoa Pebbles into the basket--unbelievable.

The breakdown looks something like this:

3 bunches of kale (I took one from the extra pile because I'm insane)

2 bags of lettuce

3 heads of cabbage (there were a zillion in the extra pile, but I passed)

2 bunches of swiss chard

1 giant zucchini

2 onions with ginormous greens

2 yellow squash

2 heads of garlic

1 light green squash

2 pat a pan squash

11 (!) cucumbers (3 from the extra basket)

1 bag of multi-colored carrots

I also headed over to the pick-your-own section and went home with nice, fluffy bunches of basil, cilantro, parsley, mint, and dill.

I've already made a huge batch of hash browns with kale, roasted carrots (this time with onions and dill), and a nice, big bowl of cole slaw. If you want more explicit recipes for any of these earth shattering delicacies, let me know and I'll post in on the recipes page--but if not, I'll bask in my continued laziness.

Today, I want to focus on swiss chard. Here's a stock photo:

I know it's beautiful to look at, but you know what? It's disgusting.

One time, when I was a kid, my sister dared to me eat some ear wax. Let's just say that swiss chard can be held solely responsible for a really nasty flash back.

Thankfully, I learned how to manipulate swiss chard beyond the point of recognition--in the form of pesto.

We already ate one batch, but I put four more in the freezer. Apparently, it freezes really well:

The bag on the left is a double batch and the other two are enough for one box of pasta each. Thankfully, the pesto used up every last leaf of that completely hideous vegetable of the devil swiss chard.

I used my immersion blender to chop and mix 2 bunches of swiss chard, a handful of basil, a handful of parsley, a few green onions, some slivered almonds, and enough vegetable oil to give it the right consistency. Salt and pepper only help the cause.

And now, I'll leave you with some pictures of James and his new best friend, the crazy cucumber.

It's a necklace:

It's a crown:

It's a belt:

It's a mustache:

Hoo boy--it's either a noose or an Abraham Lincoln beard. Hard to tell:

Week 3: An Inside Look

June 24, 2010

Well, I thought you guys might like to see what it's actually like to go and pick up my CSA basket. I'll post some pictures of the actual fields next week. I tried to snap a few today, but it started pouring like nuts out there. I was super grateful to be the greedy consumer and not the hardworking farmer.

So, I pretty much drive through the middle of no where--for real, zero bars on the cell phone for like fifteen minutes--I take a right onto Indiana Avenue, and a left into the farm. I drive down a charming little dirty road, and try like hell not the run over a duck when I park in front of this building, the CSA house:

Over to the right, there's this cutie little barn where some sheep live. I tried to lure Barbara the Icelandic out of the barn with my good looks, but she wasn't having it:

So you walk up into the CSA house, and this is what you see:

There's no one there to take your money or to make sure that you don't perhaps just possibly sort of help yourself to an extra bok choy from the crate there on the ground. Seriously, who would do that? Who would steal from such a happy, earthy, love your mother kind of place? I sure wouldn't.

Dear Denis and Michele,

I took a bok choy from that box--it was just a little one. I wasn't sure if it was an extra, but I really didn't care. I love bok choy so much and I guess I have a stealing problem that I didn't know about until today. If you let me get away with this, I plan to up my game and swipe a big bok choy from Hannaford tomorrow. I'll let you know how it goes.

Amy

And these are the mysterious garlic scapes: 

James thinks they're antlers. I think he's gifted.

Yup. Still gifted.

I thought garlic scapes would be like a green onion with a garlicy flavor. I was wrong. They're solid, not hollow. They're curly, not straight. The have a white bulby thing in the middle, not the bottom. A much different animal to tame.

Here's a picture of the haul once we wrangle 'er up and got 'er home:

2 bunches of green onions

2 humungazoid bags of peas

2 heads of lettuce

2 bags of broccoli

2 bunches of red turnips

2 bunches of white turnips

2 heads of napa cabbage

2 bok choy

2 bunches of garlic scapes

2 bunches of swiss chard

...and perhaps some maybe stolen bok choy and romaine (really, so sorry)

Here's a close up of the garlic scapes:

And here's a picture of dinner--Ravioli with Garlic Scape and Swiss Chard Pesto:

I mixed and matched a few different recipes to come up with this pesto, but basically it's made of garlic scapes, swiss chard, olive oil, parmesan cheese, toasted almonds, salt, and pepper. And basically, it's obscenely good.

Here's a batch of the pesto from another angle: