Small CSA Share

• 2# black turtle beans
• 1 bag corn chips
• 1 # chorizo sausage
• 1 bunch green onions
• 1 bunch cilantro
• 1 head red leaf lettuce
• 1 head either baby bok choy or 1 bunch swiss chard (depends on stop)
• 1 head jumbo white stem bok choy
• 1.5# red slicing tomatoes (approximately 3 tomatoes)
• 1 lb. snow peas

Large CSA Share Small contents above plus:

• 1 head cauliflower
• 1 bunch red kale
• 1 lb. snow peas
• 2 ct. zucchini
• 1 package chicken brats

It’s hard to get a shot that shows all of the items in a large:

I’m getting ready to leave on vacation, so I’ll be prepping the lettuce for my husband to eat in salads.  I’ll be cooking the cauliflower for a side dish tomorrow and/or for Stephen to eat while the kids and I are gone.

I’m going to make soup or a stir fry with the bok choy.  I’ll use some of the peas and onions in that dish.

I put the meats in the freezer.  I’ll probably cook up the chorizo tomorrow.  I will probably make a cold salad with quinoa, chorizo, onions, cilantro, lime, etc.  We’ll pack some for the road this weekend and leave the rest for Stephen to enjoy.  The brats will magically disappear while I’m away with the kids or we’ll enjoy them in July.  The last time I made the brats, I simmered them in beer on the stove.  They were quite tasty.

I still had a couple of zucchini in the fridge, so I am making my fritters with them tomorrow.

I’m soaking the beans tonight so I can cook them tomorrow.  I’ll use some of them and the cilantro in the quinoa salad and freezer the rest.

I haven’t decided on the kale yet.  I just got a kale recipes book in the mail today, so maybe I’ll be inspired to cook something new with it.  The beets were subbed for some of the peas.  They are getting added to a few I have in the fridge for a pickled beets recipe that looked promising.  I hope to make them tomorrow.

We often buy these corn chips as extras, so they will disappear quickly.

Once again, the truck didn’t have any of our favorite yogurt with them, but I was able to pick up some of our favorite granola and milk while we were at our stop.

I’m glad to be going on vacation, but I hate that I’ll miss all of the fun CSA contents for the next two weeks.

Here’s a group shot of what we received:

Let’s take a closer look:

Leaf lettuce, apples

Loaf of pumpkin bread, potatoes

Butternut squash, red leaf lettuce

Bok choy, collard greens

Beets

Aside for some mandarin oranges from yesterday’s Whole Food sale, a few potatoes and a couple of onions,  we were out of everything fresh.  So, today’s pick up was welcome in our fridge.

Both of the lettuces will go into salad.  I’m thinking of using some leftover chorizo and beans and making some type of Mexican inspired salad.  The apples will go into oatmeal.  When we have apples available, we use them in our oatmeal.  The rest of the time we use frozen or home-canned fruit.

Half of the pumpkin bread is already gone.  It’s extremely good.  We’ll have the potatoes as part of dinner one night this week.  Since butternut squash is one that can be peeled, I’ll probably roast it in chunks with cinnamon, pepper and olive oil.

I’ve been making Asian bok choy for Stephen with garlic and sesame oil.  He seems to like it and it gives him an Asian dish.  Sesame is not really my thing.

I haven’t decided on a collards dish yet.  We’ve tried several.  It’s still hit or miss on whether we like the end product.  Clearly, I need a consistent go to recipe for them.

We haven’t made Harvard beets lately, so I’ll be making them this week.

Originally, we were supposed to get eggs each week.  They have new chickens and the production has not been as anticipated.  I was surprised that we didn’t get them this week since we didn’t have a pick up last week.  But, I have more than a dozen left from our other CSA, so we aren’t out yet.

We also placed an add on order for a half gallon of local maple syrup ($25).  I’ve been reading up on making maple coated pecans and some eggnog type of beverages that used maple instead of sugar, so I thought we should stock up.  It’s hard to believe that new maple syrup will be available in less than 4 months.

It’s nice to be stocked back up on fresh items.  It’s hard to believe that there is only 2 weeks left of this short winter CSA.

First off, here is the group shot. I’ll bet we could measure how big the week’s harvest is by how high we have to hold the camera to take this picture. The camera was pretty close to the ceiling today.

“I’m ready for my closeup,” cried the kale, and I was happy to oblige.

Red Russian kale, bok choy

Garlic, sweet potatoes

Apples (mixed varieties), carrots

Parsley (mix of flat leaf and curly), green beans

Red leaf lettuce, onions

Bell peppers, little peppers (I don’t know yet if they are hot)

Eggplant, yellow squash

Tomatoes

Using this up with Lyn away is going to be a challenge. My cooking skills have rusted a bit in recent years, with the grill more my specialty than the stove is. The parsley says “tabouli”, which could use some tomato and onion as well. The kale and bok choy I will saute, with some balsamic vinegar for the kale and some sesame oil for the bok choy. We will surely have some delicious salads as well.

Thanks for visiting! Lyn will be back tomorrow.

Here’s what we received in our family share (not pictured are raspberries):

Let’s take a closer look.

Red raspberries, green leaf lettuce

Red leaf lettuce, large onion

Yellow squash, zucchini

Tomatoes, broccoli

Pickling cucumbers, beets

Green onions, kohlrabi

Potatoes, sugar snap peas

Cucumbers

This looks like a pretty easy week to use everything.  I may freeze the onions, but I suspect everything else will be used as we prepare meals this week.