This Week's Share - 8/18/10

It had been a few weeks since I was able to go to the CSA pick-up, so I had a lot of fun selecting our veggies last Wednesday. Here's what was available:

• Basil
• Green Peppers
• Chili Peppers
• Onions
• Tomatoes
• Carrots
• Greens
• Summer Squash/ Zucchini
• Beans
• Broccoli

I took the broccoli and the onions, and J kept the greens, the chili peppers, and the basil (since we grow our own). I picked a pint of tomatoes that were heirloom varieties - I wish I had taken a photo of them before we ate them! Oops. They were very tasty, but a little mushy...

For my half of the summer squash, I picked one yellow squash and one patty pan squash. If you've never had a patty pan squash, you should definitely try it - they're not only fun-looking, they taste great too! We made grilled veggies and grilled tofu with the squash, some leftover zucchini, and some onions and peppers. YUM!

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Wow!

Ok, apparently I've let almost a whole month go by without posting. I'm sorry to all of you loyal readers out there - the past few weeks have been a bit of a whirlwind! I promise to make it up to you though...

Here are some photos of a pasta dish that Dan and I made the other day using CSA veggies - including broccoli, green pepper, onion, as well as Moon Glow tomatoes from our friend K's garden*. Moon Glow tomatoes are orange (no, those aren't peppers in the photos below!), have low acidity compared to other varieties, and have a relatively long shelf line. They were really tasty!

*Our good friends K and S visited us this past weekend from Ohio, and we were delighted to share lots of the tomatoes they brought along! Her garden is amazing - hopefully she'll send along some photos and I'll post them here so you can appreciate it also. She also does a lot of canning; we were able to enjoy some strawberry ice cream topping while they were here, and there's a jar of peach preserves in the refrigerator that's calling to me...

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Corn and Edamame

Tonight's dinner featured corn and edamame as side dishes, and they were both great!

Inspired by a dish that we've had multiple times in Asian restaurants, we prepared the edamame by steaming it and then sprinkling salt on the outside of the pods. You eat it by sucking the beans out and get the taste of salt along with it. YUM!

We've actually really been enjoying the corn from the CSA - whatever they're doing, they're doing it right!

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This Week's Share - 8/3/10

Kale

Basil & Tomatoes

Zucchini


Edamame


Eggplant

Onions

Corn

Broccoli

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Taco Night

I forgot to take any photos of last night's dinner, but the tacos we made were so tasty that I had to at least tell you about them!

I like buying Ortega Whole Grain Corn Taco Shells, and I usually keep some on hand for when we get a craving for tacos (like yesterday).

Again, this is another recipe where you can really improvise and add whatever you want to the meal. Here's what we used last night:

- Diced tomato from the CSA, seeds removed
- Refried beans
- Morningstar Farms Grillers, cooked with taco sauce as the liquid
- Diced fresh avocado
- Shredded cheese

You can also use diced onion, lettuce, black beans, or whatever else you're in the mood for! We've also made really good tacos with ground turkey, although then I can't put cheese on them, and that makes me sad.

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R & J - Chicken and Veggie Pancakes

Lemon-thyme chicken and carrot/pepper/zucchini pancakes:

So impressed that J roasted an entire chicken! Also, I have been told that these pancakes are great, I'll try and get the recipe for you...

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Sauteed Green Beans

These green beans from the farm share were amazing. I love eating raw green beans, so I had to sample a few before making this recipe, just to make sure they were safe to eat! (wink, wink)

Dan actually made me stop eating them raw because he said there wouldn't be enough for the recipe. Oops!

Here's how to make them -

1. Cut ends off green beans and set aside. Chop 1-2 cloves of fresh garlic (you can mince it, but chopped seems to work better in this recipe) and fresh basil.

2. Heat olive oil in a medium saucepan, and add green beans. While green beans are cooking, toast walnuts in a small dry saucepan (you can also use pine nuts, but I keep forgetting to buy them!). Make sure to watch the walnuts carefully so they don't burn, and stir occasionally.

3. Once green beans are almost ready, add garlic to the saucepan and continue cooking.

4. Combine green beans and garlic with walnuts and basil, and serve! YUM.

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Roasted Carrots

This was a great way to showcase our rainbow carrots from this week's share! It was also a very simple recipe -

1. Peel and chop carrots. (we had to supplement using baby carrots because there wasn't enough with just the rainbow carrots, but they weren't nearly as flavorful.)


2. In a medium bowl, combine carrots, olive oil, and salt and pepper to taste.

3. Coat a small baking dish with olive oil (I used our olive oil spritzer, but you can also just pour a little into the dish and spread it around). Make a single layer of carrots in the baking dish.

4. I used the broiler setting on the oven since we were making the tofu as well, but you can also roast them in a high oven (approximately 400 or 450 degrees) for about 20-30 minutes. Toss them once while cooking.

Voila!

PS - K, thanks for the idea for these carrots, and for the green beans! You rock.

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Broiled Tofu

We've made tofu this way before, and it comes out really good and very flavorful. I wasn't always the biggest fan of tofu, but after we learned how to cook it properly, it's opened up a whole new world for us. Our version of broiled tofu is based on this recipe from Martha Stewart.

One piece of advice - cut your tofu thinner than you think you should (even into more pieces than this recipe says to). We didn't cut it as thin this time as we have in the past, and it never really got crispy on the outside. The flavor was amazing though, so it didn't matter all that much.

PS - Our new house has an electric oven, but we're both used to cooking with gas. The broiler in electric ovens is on the top of the oven, just in case you were wondering! That's all I'm going to say about that. :)

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Broiled Tofu, Roasted Carrots, Sauteed Green Beans... YUM.

We made this meal for dinner the other night, and it was DELICIOUS! The flavors all melded together really well, although I do have to say that the carrots were my favorite part. I'll try to recreate the recipes as best as I can in a few separate posts, but here are some photos:

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