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Fresh Fork Winter CSA–week 6

Jan 052012

Today, there was no rain for our Fresh Fork CSA pick up. There was also no line at the time we arrived. This week’s package was also easier to pack than some and I think that helped. We’d rather have snow on the ground that rain coming down for our pick ups.

Here’s what we were expecting this week:

1 whole pasture raised chicken
1 lb. carrots
1 lb. Brussels sprouts (removed from stalk)
2 lb.s beets
1/2 lb. mixed organic greens
1 dozen pasture raised eggs
2 lbs. organic black turtle beans
1 smoked pork hock
1 lb. roasted butternut squash and cracked black pepper linguini

We were also expecting 1 pound of ground beef that was missed for everyone at Beachwood last time.

Here’s a group shot:

We didn’t have many eggs left and use quite a bit in everyday cooking. So, I was glad to have these in the bag this week. I also have some frozen egg beaters that I need to work into some recipes soon. Surprise, surprise, we’ll be making Harvard Beets with the beets this week.

I was originally going to make this pasta for dinner, but we had other pasta in the fridge and opted for a quicker dinner tonight. The Ohio City pasta cooks fast, but I usually make a white sauce to go with it and the leftovers were easy tonight. We’ll save that for another day this week. Everyone in our house loves cooked carrots. Now that Stephen can eat raw ones again (since getting his braces removed), we may have to discuss how to prepare them.

We’ll have the Brussels sprouts tomorrow. Last time, we let them go too long and I think they lost some of their flavor. The greens will hopefully go into salad. I’m not the biggest fan of this variety, but I need to get better of just eating them.

With pork hock and black beans in the same week, black bean soup is in order. I’ve been looking at recipes for a couple of days and haven’t quite decided on a version for us yet.

Our chicken is 7.8 pounds! That is definitely the biggest Fresh Fork chicken we have have gotten thus far. For now it’s parked in the freezer along with our ground beef.

Lastly, the warehouse did a “blow out” sale on the ham loaf. We remembered it fondly so I stocked up. It was $2 a pound. I like to describe it to people as ham based meatloaf mix. I will be making meatballs and muffin size meatloaves with some yet to be invented rhubarb honey BBQ sauce and then freezing them for meals. I’ll serve them with potatoes, different grains, pasta, etc. I like to bake them and freeze in big batches so we can get several meals out of them.

Lastly, this is the first time that I got to take photos of my CSA pick up with my new lights. I think that I have tons to learn, but it’s a huge improvement over the dark photos of recent weeks. I’m mostly intrigued by how different the wood table looks in the photos when I think I had the same lighting and camera settings for all of my photos. I think that the angle of the camera has a big impact. I think I’ll be learning how to use a tripod next. Hopefully, I’ll have a some time to experiment over the next couple of weeks.

Fresh Fork Winter CSA–week 5

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Dec 212011

Today, we had another soggy Fresh Fork CSA pick up. I think Trevor should invest in Gortex running gear for the crew, and maybe some sand bags for the tent. It was really a smooth pick up. The kids wanted to wait with me, so they ran around in the rain while I waited in line for our goodies.

Here’s what we were expecting this week:

1 tub (4 oz.) goat milk feta
8 oz. jar of brandied cherry preserves
8 oz. mixed baby greens
1 sleeve of leaf lettuce
1 head of cabbage
1 bag of Mrs. Miller’s dried egg noodles
1.25 lb.s Andouille
2 lbs. ground beef
8 oz. pak choi
2 lbs. onions
1 lb. Brussels sprouts
3 lbs. sweet potatoes
1 24 oz. loaf of apple pound bread

Here’s a group shot:

I don’t have any immediate plans for the sweet potatoes, but I’m glad that everyone in our house likes them. I’m thinking of using the ground beef in a crock pot unstuffed cabbage tomorrow. I only got one pack of beef and I’m checking on that.

I’ve never used Andouille sausage in anything before. For now, it’s in the freezer and I’ll think of something later. My husband just found a sweet potato and Andouille recipe that sounds promising. The goat cheese will disappear on crackers and toast. Cheese never lasts long in our house.

Greens disappear without much effort and these will be no exception. We need to keep our veggie intake up to balance the cookies this week.

I have all of the ingredients for French onion soup and will make it in the next day or two.

The Brussels sprouts and pak choi will make good sides this weekend.

Apple pound cake is a new one for us. I’m sure it will be eaten quickly once we taste it. The noodles will be in the cupboard for a few weeks since they aren’t perishable. We still have turkey in the freezer, so some soup may be in order.

We aren’t cooking a ham for Christmas, but I’m sure these preserves will be tasty no matter how we enjoy them. I’m considering making homemade jelly doughnuts for Christmas. Maybe they will have cherry filling.

I also splurged on extras this week. We were out of eggs and still wanting to do some baking this week. The breakfast patties were so good when we had them before, so I couldn’t turn them down. I wanted to try some local eggnog. The bacon will be in the freezer for as needed in recipes. The spinach pasta was dinner tonight. I can’t remember the individual prices, but our total was $28.

I’m excited for the holidays this week and hope to enjoy cooking a few meals at home. Eating out really does get old, but sometimes it’s definitely the easy way out.

Geauga Family Farms–Winter CSA week 5

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Dec 102011

The kids and Stephen went up to St. Noel’s today to pick up week 5 of our Geauga Family Farms CSA. Next week is the last pickup for the winter share. Today’s pickup was particularly great.

Here’s a group shot of what we received:

Let’s take a closer look:

Butternut squash, sweet potatoes

Eggs (Yeah!), garlic

Broccoli, carrots

Red cabbage, beets

Two kinds of lettuce

Wheat bread

We have quite a few squash right now. I will be baking most of them tomorrow and making squash puree for the freezer. We also have quite a few sweet potatoes. The kids really like the baked sweet potato slices, so we’ll be making them again soon.

Eggs we use in everyday cooking and they are always welcome. We have quite a bit of garlic frozen, but this is our only fresh piece. I’ll be putting it in chili this week.

The broccoli and carrots both went into Shepherd’s pie tonight. It was delicious. I used local butter, potatoes, ground beef, broccoli, cauliflower and carrots.

I don’t have any immediate plans for the cabbage, but something will come to me soon. The beets will be combined with some others in the fridge for Harvard beets.

We had some of the lettuce in salad today and will probably use the rest in a day or two. The wheat bread is almost 1/2 gone. It made nice peanut butter and apple butter toast for snacks today.

I’ll be sad to see this CSA end next week.

A Fresh Fork Market Thanksgiving Package

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Nov 232011

While I picked up my regular share yesterday, I also picked up a Thanksgiving package from my Fresh Fork CSA. There were 3 to pick from and I choose package number 1. I debated whether to get a package since we don’t usually cook Thanksgiving dinner. We go to my uncle’s house. I discussed it with my husband and we decided to try it out. Let’s just say we will be eating well for a couple of weeks.

Here’s a group shot of what we received. It was hard to get everything in one photo!

We were expecting the following:

Package 1 Contents:

Tom Turkey
Apple Pie
Sweet Potato Pie
Beets
Carrots
Candy Onions
Sweet Potatoes
Red Norland Potatoes
Shallots
Garlic
Dinner Rolls
Turnips
Cauliflower
Lettuce
Bread for Stuffing
Eggs
Winter Squash Mix
Cornmeal
Pie Pumpkin
Frozen Ohio Sweet Corn
Bacon
Braising Greens
Apple Cider
Apples
White Spelt Flour

Let’s take a closer look.

The pies look awesome. The apple pie is made with Ohio apples and came from Humble Pie Baking. It came with instructions for a little bit of additional baking time before serving. We are taking it with us to my uncle’s house. The sweet potato pie came from Lucky’s Café. We didn’t need the pie at my uncle’s house and I didn’t need a whole pie here. So, I sent it to work with my husband this morning sans a piece. The kids and I shared a piece with lunch. It is one of the best pies that I ever tasted! I’m extra glad that it went to work with my husband today.

We hardly ever by grocery store eggs. The farm fresh ones are so good. We also like knowing where they came from. We were almost out of eggs until our delivery. We’ll use some in our waffles this weekend, my sweet potatoes for tomorrow, hard boil some and use some for regular everyday cooking. The frozen corn is a new item. This corn was frozen this summer when it was in season. I just popped it in our freezer. We probably won’t try it for a week or two as we make our way through our fresh items.

The bacon is always great. I just put it in the freezer. We’ll use some with our stuffing recipe and some with our greens. If there is any left, we’ll crumble it on our salad. We were out of apples and already have eaten some on our oatmeal for breakfast. These won’t last long in our house.

We received whole wheat flour instead of spelt. Either is fine with us. We use almost all whole wheat flour in our house, so the change was welcome. We tried a couple of rolls with dinner last night. They were very tasty and buttery. We put the rest in the freezer. My kids love bread and these will be easy to give them with lunches.

Winter squash is one of my favorite foods. It’s so versatile and delicious. These should store well and are not on my immediate radar to use up. This bread looks great. It’s intended for stuffing, but I have a feeling it may become French toast or squash inspired bread pudding instead. For now, it’s in the freezer.

The lettuce is super fresh. Some went to work for my husband’s lunch. The rest will probably be served with dinner. These heads of garlic are HUGE! We are in garlic overload this year. I’m not sure why we have so much, but if I can’t get it used soon, I’ll chop and freeze it. I mostly just need to remember to put it into dishes.

I enjoy cooking with shallots. They have a milder flavor than onions and compliment other flavors well. For now, these are being stored in our basement. Turnips will probably go into soup. I don’t have a great go to recipe for them yet.

Our local, pasture raised turkey came to us fresh from Martha’s farm. This bird weighed in at 22.8 pounds. They were just processed on Monday. Since we aren’t cooking Thanksgiving dinner and I’m interested in trying a turkey sausage recipe, we are freezing our bird in several pieces. I’ll be making some of it for dinner tonight and we’ll get many meals out of this big bird. The braising greens will get sautéed as a side in the next couple of days.

The corn meal is a great pantry item. Nick loves corn muffins and we haven’t made them much lately. They’ll be a great use for some of this corn meal, eggs and whole wheat flour. The carrots look super fresh. Everyone in our house likes carrots and we’re having them for dinner tonight.

Cauliflower is so easy for us to use. Everyone likes it. I usually do it plain, with a few seasoning or in a simple au gratin recipe. With a head here and in our regular pickup, maybe we’ll have it three different ways this week. With the beets, I’ll make a small batch of Harvard beets.

We’ll be having our fill of mashed sweet potato casserole tomorrow, so these will probably get baked into fries for lunch one day next week. The kids love them with Ozark blend and cinnamon spices.

After I got home and sorted out all of our goodies,

I realized that we were missing or short on a few items. We were missing onions, potatoes, pie pumpkin and apple cider. We were short some apples and cornmeal. A quick email to the great guys at Fresh Fork and they’ll remedy it at the next pickup. I was given an option to pick it up at another site today, but I’m in no rush. We have plenty to last us for a while.

Our pick up was not the best yesterday. It was extra busy with the regular shares, holiday packages, turkeys, pies and LOTS OF RAIN. We had to wait for a while, but everyone in line was chatting and taking it in stride. Even the kids just liked running around in the rain.

The food always tastes amazing and the people who work the truck are super nice. I already can’t wait to see what they offer for Christmas. Berkshire ham anyone?

Fresh Fork Winter CSA–week 3

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Nov 222011

Today, we had a rough Fresh Fork CSA pickup. It was extra busy because people were picking up Thanksgiving packages, regular shares, turkeys and a variety of other holiday items. It was also raining!

Here’s what we were expecting this week:

1 half gallon apple cider
1 quarter peck of Mutsu apples (very large, tart apples)
1 lb. nitrate free bacon
1 dozen pasture raised chicken eggs
1.5 lbs. white spelt flour
1 large white stem bok choy
1 bunch medium leeks
1 bag, half lb., of young mustard green mix
2 lbs. butter, salted or unsalted
1 lb. pumpkin sage linguini
1 head cabbage
1 head cauliflower

Here’s a group shot:

We ate the pumpkin sage linguini for dinner tonight. There’s one serving left and I’m hoping to have it for lunch tomorrow. We’ve been out of fresh apples for oatmeal the last few days, so these are welcome.

I put the bacon in the freezer. Soon, I’ll make a version of my uncle’s stuffing and it will use the bacon. The spelt flour came as whole wheat. This is fine with us since we use whole wheat flour all of the time.

I was happy to get unsalted butter this time. We don’t usually buy salted butter. I’m looking forward to trying it. I never know what to do with leeks. I’ll probably chop them up in an Asian stir fry for Stephen along with the bok choy.

We’ll have our standard sautéed greens with balsamic, garlic, salt and pepper with these greens.

Personally, apple cider is too sweet, but my husband and kids love it, so it’s always welcome. Behind all of these leaves is a head of cauliflower. Everyone in our house likes cauliflower, so it will go quickly.

Cabbage is used in the stuffing recipe that I’d like to make in the next few days. I may freeze the cabbage by blanching it just to give me time to use some of our other items up. We were almost out of eggs. I need them for my sweet potato recipe and for waffles this weekend.

We got the granola that was owed to use from the last pickup and purchased some more yogurt ($10).

We also picked up a Thanksgiving package. I’ll show it to you tomorrow! It’s late and there are still dishes left in the kitchen.

Geauga Family Farms Winter CSA–week 2

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Nov 122011

Today was our pick up for week 2 of the winter Geauga Family Farms CSA. We had a full schedule for today and I just ran up to St. Noel without the kids to pick it up first thing this morning.

Here’s a group shot of what we received:

Potatoes, bok choy

Radishes, beets

Acorn squash, apples

1/2 dozen eggs, 2 small heads of lettuce

Dozen of chocolate chip cookies

We have quite a supply of potatoes at the moment. I’ll be rotating these into our storage and trying to make a couple of potato recipes this week. I’m thinking that some kind of Shepard’s pie may be in order. The last time we got bok choy, I cooked it in the crock pot with Asian spices (ginger and sesame oil) and served it to my husband with soba noodles and pork. He liked it. The rest of the family isn’t big on the sesame flavor.

We’re going to roast radishes this week. We’re also going to make Harvard beets. I think I have 2 bunches of both in the fridge right now.

Acorn squash is one of my favorite squash. I’ve been making a rue and adding squash puree and seasonings for use over whole wheat pasta. It will be lunch a couple of days this week.

We’re still using apples in our oatmeal everyday while the season is still here.

We were out of eggs and I’m cooking my dish ahead for Thanksgiving tomorrow so the eggs will disappear quickly. The lettuce will be eaten with salad.

The cookies are GONE!

Looks like another week of great, fresh, local food!

Fresh Fork CSA–week 21

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Oct 202011

It was 45 degrees and raining when we picked up week 21 of our Fresh Fork CSA today. The tent had blown around so much, that by the time we arrived around 5:30PM, they were just all working from the truck. I think the winter pick ups have better weather than what we had today. Robert and his crew are awesome!

Here’s what we were expecting to receive this week:

Small CSA:

1 dz. pasture raised chicken eggs
1 lb. breakfast patties
3 lbs. Yukon gold potatoes
1.5 lb. bag untoasted organic oats
1 bunch beets with tops
1 lb. fingerling potatoes
3 lbs. turnips
Quarter peck Melrose Apples

Here’s a group shot:

The tomatoes are from the missing ones last week. Nick was glad to see them. I actually had to buy eggs at the store this week, so I was happy to get them. I see some pumpkin bread and waffles in our new future.

We were low on apples this week too. I actually picked some up at the store. I’m hoping to go picking one more time, but the weather has not been cooperating. Since at least 2 members of our household eat oats for breakfast everyday, these will be gone in no time.

We have a good stash of potatoes going at the moment since we’ve gotten them in both CSAs and from our garden. I want to make a couple of new dishes, but I haven’t decided what. The breakfast patties (part bacon and part sausage) look delicious. Maybe we’ll have them for dinner with pumpkin waffles soon!

We’ll probably make soup with the turnips. My first thought was 3 pounds is a large amount of turnips. But, we can work with it. It’s not as familiar because we don’t get them often.

We have beets from our other CSA this week also. We really like Harvard beets and don’t usually make them any other way.

It’s been a great season. Next week is the last pick up for the summer CSA.

Fresh Fork CSA–week 16

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Sep 152011

Today, we once again headed to Beachwood High School to pick up our Fresh Fork CSA share.

Here’s what we were expecting to receive this week:

Small CSA:

1 pint mixed color cherry tomatoes
1 package chicken sausage (4 links, 1.25 lbs.)
1 dz. pastured chicken eggs
1 bunch carrots with tops
1 bunch turnip greens
2 ct. green bell peppers
2 ct. poblano chili peppers
1.5 lbs. Stanley plums
Either 1 hd. broccoli or 1 stalk of celery

Here’s a group shot of share:

We were down to 1 egg in our fridge, so we were glad to see these. We went plum picking this week and the plum-apple sauce turned out great, so I am making another batch.

We were gifted a bunch of peppers this week, so I am chopping and freezing away.

The chicken sausage went straight to the freezer. Trevor included several ideas for the turnip greens in the newsletter. Basically, I’ll make them like my Swiss chard and they should be tasty. I’ll probably have them for lunch tomorrow since they are taking up room in the fridge.

The broccoli looks delicious. Nick and Sally and I will enjoy it with dinner tomorrow. We got Heirloom tomatoes instead of cherry tomatoes. I got a couple of extra since mine were bad last week. I’m going to clean/chop and freeze them with some other tomatoes for a later sauce.

My kids couldn’t get enough carrots last week, so they eat these at lunch for a couple of days. I’m not sure they will even last through 2 meals.

Since I am on vacation next week and the week after, I spent a few of my credit dollars today. I put them on my account and it will be a wash over time. I picked up yogurt ($5), corn chips (2 @ $3.50) and a Camembert cheese ($8). So, I “spent” $20.

I bought yogurt at the grocery store earlier this week since we were out. I screwed up and bought vanilla. Yuck, it’s full of sugar and I can’t use it for cooking. I really like my newly found whole wheat dough recipe and it calls for yogurt. I like to keep the ingredients on hand. I was super excited to see the corn chips back. The truck hasn’t had them for sale lately. They are the best corn chips I’ve ever had. One bag was opened in the car. I bought 2 bags so there would still be some with Stephen gets back from his trip.

Today and tomorrow I am preserving food and packing for my trip. I’m trying to avoid too much last minute craziness on Sunday.

Fresh Fork CSA–week 9

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Jul 282011

Today was week number 9 for our Fresh Fork CSA. Robert who works at the truck was back today. He seems to be going better. It was nice and smooth to have him in his usual position. There was only one person ahead of us and everything was smooth at pick up.

As usual, we received our list of contents on Tuesday. It’s nice to know what we have to work with between our CSAs by Tuesday night.

Here’s what we were expecting:

Small CSA:

1 package Mild Italian Sausage links, 4 to a pack
1.5 lbs apricots
1.5 lbs Red Haven peaches
1 dozen pasture raised chicken eggs
6 ears Mira 301 Super Sweet corn
1 candy onion
1 head leaf lettuce
1 lb green beans
1 bunch kale, either Curly or Black Tuscan

Here’s a group shot:

Apparently, the Italian sausage is really good. I don’t think we’ve had it yet. Always happy to see peaches.

We still have onions to chop and freeze and the corn is already gone.

We were almost out of lettuce, so I see a couple of salads in our future. I don’t think I’ve ever had fresh apricots and certainly not local ones. I’m looking forward to having one at breakfast.

Curly kale might make for another batch of kale chips, The last batch was ok, but I’ve read a few other variations lately and may have to experiment again this weekend. I’m in love with local eggs and just used our last two yesterday, so these were especially nice to get.

Everyone in our house likes green beans.

In addition to our small, we purchased 2 packages of chicken brats. These were $7 each. They were amazing when we had them in our box a few weeks back. We’re having company next weekend and I stuck these in the freezer for grilling. We also paid for our cream cheese ($5) that we picked up 2 weeks ago.

I’m happy that we had a week off of squash and tomatoes. I still have some to use up from our Tuesday CSA pickup. Next week we are “on vacation” from Fresh Fork and I hope that gives us a little extra time to regroup and make sure we are caught up in the fridge.

Geauga Family Farms CSA–week 2

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Jun 212011

Today was the second pick up for the Geauga Family Farms CSA. As usual, we had no idea what we would receive. A newsletter comes out that gives us an idea of what we may receive, but I usually don’t see it before our pickup. Today was the second pick up and also the second time the truck was late. Both times, it arrived before we did, so we haven’t had to wait for them. I’m not sure what will happen next week since we want to come to the farm visit. Maybe I’ll enlist some assistance from my husband. Even with an on-time truck arriving at Whole Foods by 4pm, it will be tough to pick up, store and get to the farm by 6pm.

Here’s what we received:

Let’s take a closer look.

1 bunch of kale, 2 containers of strawberries

2 tomatoes, 1 dozen eggs

garlic scapes, green onions

pickling cucumbers, lots of lettuce (3 bags with 4 heads total)

Here’s our plan of attack:

This week, we plan to have several salads with the lettuce. I’ve been making spelt and quinoa and also using beans in some salads. I’ll pickle the cucumbers. I’m glad I stocked up on the spices for them. I’ll need to double check our vinegar stock. Some of the onions and garlic scape will be used in a batch of taco filling and the rest will be used in a sauté with mushrooms for the top of burgers or chopped and frozen. There aren’t too many of them, so that might all got in the taco filling. The tomatoes will go in the taco filling also. I’ve been making baked oatmeal, scrambled eggs and hard boiled eggs so the eggs have been easy to use in a timely fashion. Also, they have a long shelf life. We just picked some strawberries and made jam today, so these will most likely get eaten. If we feel like we have too many, we’ll make some strawberry ice cream or freeze them for later.

So, I’m left without a plan for kale. It’s an item that we only received twice last year, and I don’t have a “go to” dish in mind. Some quick searching in Google gave me lots of ideas. Now, I have to think about it. We have plans to eat dinner away from home Wednesday and Thursday , so kale will have to be lunch for us one day or for dinner on Friday. I’m leaning toward steaming it with vinegar, garlic scapes and green onion.

Update on last week:

Since the bread was opened for a snack on the way home, Nick, Sally and my husband had no trouble making sure it was eaten. The bok choy went into an Asian tofu stir fry along with some of the garlic scapes and green onions. The eggs were used in regular cooking and the cucumber and lettuce were used in salads. Some of the strawberries were eaten and the rest went with some others we had to make jam. The rest of the green onions and garlic scapes went into a Mexican filling for salad.

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