Easy Season

This week my CSA box included:

Crustless broccoli quiche

• Broccoli (three heads)
• Red Onions
• Cucumbers (two large)
• Carrots
• Peas

That list is a little more streamlined than the original box, which included lettuce, mixed greens, and spinach but that were left behind in the swap box.

This is an easy box. I don’t need recipes for these veggies because they are pretty “normal” and ones I like. Although having a CSA share can be a fun way to try new recipes and eat vegetables that you don’t eat very often, sometimes it’s nice to keep it simple. This box is perfect for this time of year when I’d rather be at the pool than in the kitchen.

Cucumber salad

Without any need for research, I got right in the kitchen Tuesday night when I picked up the box. Before long the first head of broccoli was added to a crustless broccoli quiche. It was an easy recipe that did involve the oven, but not much planning or forethought. I also ate about half of the carrots as a snack with some hummus while I made the quiche.

Last night I still had leftover quiche, but needed a little something extra to go with it. I sliced one of the cucumbers very thin, did the same with one of the red onions, added some vinegar, water and a little sugar and I had salad to eat as a side.

Stuffed vegetable bread

Tonight I was feeling like junk food. Namely, a delivered pizza, but instead the veggies came through again. I decided to return, in a way, to the stuffed spinach bread of last week, with a baked stuffed sub. To do so, I sautéed some broccoli, plus some mushrooms and spinach I had on hand and added it to some jarred spaghetti sauce. I hollowed out some French bread and stuffed the vegetable the mixture with some mozzarella inside. I wrapped it up in foil, baked it and in about 15 minutes I had a somewhat healthier way to conquer my pizza craving.

It’s hard to say what has been my favorite dish this season so far, but the baked sandwich was right up there. It’s a good reminder that good food doesn’t always have to take a ton of effort.

Stretching Ingredients and My Creativity

Beet, feta and walnut quesadillas

Right now I’m reading, Why the Chinese Don’t Count Calories, by Lorraine Clissold. It summarizes Chinese food culture into 15 secrets. The secrets help the Chinese eat in a healthy way and still enjoy their food. Secret 2 is Think of Vegetables as Dishes. She says the Chinese give vegetables the same attention as meat. Instead of a dinner of meat with a small side of vegetables, the meal is mostly vegetables and many different kinds at that.

Secret Number 4: Eat Until You’re Full is accomplished through something called multi-dish eating. Instead of eating a few things in great quantities, they eat a lot of different things in small quantities. Instead of a plate with chicken, vegetables and a potato, Chinese diners sit down to many different plates of different types of vegetable dishes that they all share and end up taking small bites of a lot of different things.

Beet, feta and walnut spinach salad

Clissold says Western diners can do the same by putting individual ingredients on the table and letting those at the table choose to create their plate and how the items go together. Instead of creating a meal of chili and a salad, she suggests making a bowl of chili, stir frying some mushrooms, slicing up some vegetables like tomatoes or cucumbers, and roasting some chopped butternut squash, and putting it all on the table. Each person gets a bowl of rice and then digs in to a little bit of each.

In a way, I’ve been putting these two rules to work this week, first with beets and then with garlic scapes, green onions and spinach. Earlier in the week I roasted some beets in olive oil and balsamic vinegar. First I made a beet and spinach salad topped with walnuts and feta cheese. When I was still hungry after that I put the same ingredients, minus the spinach, inside two tortillas and grilled it. Both dishes highlighted the beets, which were caramelized and a bit crispy, and left me satisfied, but not stuffed.

Baked spinach with roasted garlic scapes and green onions

Later in the week, after reading a friend’s Facebook comment about her disappointment in the garlic scapes in her own CSA box, I remembered I had some of these strange things to use up. Determined to use them instead of letting them grow into some other form over the summer forgotten at the bottom of my crisper as I’ve done in the past, I decided to try roasting them.

I cut the scapes into two-inch pieces and did the same with my remaining green onions and poured a bit of olive oil on them. I roasted them until they were brown and almost crispy. They tasted amazing, almost like chips, and I was tempted to eat them just like that, but wanted to be a little more creative.

I put them in the chopper until they were broken into small pieces. Then I added them to a pan with about two big handfuls of spinach and sautéed the spinach. Next I added some milk to the pan and scraped up the remaining brown bits. I added a pinch of Parmesan and transferred the spinach mix to a baking dish and baked it until the liquid was almost absorbed. The baked spinach was wonderful with the roasted scapes and onions adding an extra level of flavor to it.  

I spread a little of the extra roasted scapes and onions on some bread and toasted it in the oven and served it with the spinach. With the other half of the portion, I hollowed out a piece of French bread and stuffed the spinach inside. I wrapped it in foil and baked it for about 10 minutes, something I’ll be doing again.

Stuffed French bread

I’ve only started to read about secret 5 so I’m hoping to learn some more rule I can put in practice this CSA season.  The book also has a few recipes, which I want to try, but even if I don’t, I’m looking forward to cooking more creatively this season, thanks to the book.

Ready, Go - Week 1

I picked up my first box of veggies this week. I had big plans for my first box, which didn’t pan out. During the off-season I meant to research new recipes I wanted to make this summer and organize them into a blog post I could refer to throughout the CSA season. Instead they are in the usual places, in stacks of pages ripped out from magazines and saved as favorites on my computer. I also wanted to recategorize the recipes posted on my blog by vegetable, but that never happened either. I also read a great book on organic farming, Turn Here Sweet Corn by Atina Diffley, and meant to write a review of that.

 Oh well. I may return to those projects this summer, next fall or next winter, but for now it’s on to the vegetables I’m picking up every two weeks. Here’s a list of what I received this week:

• Kale 
• Beets
• Green Onions
• Garlic Scapes 
• A number of different types of lettuces/greens 
• Carrots 
• Broccoli 
• Salad Turnips 
• Cucumber 

On Tuesday, after I picked it up, I put the kale to use right away with some leftover pasta I had in the refrigerator. I don’t really have a recipe. All I did was sauté the kale with some thinly sliced garlic scapes until it was cooked down. Then I added some store-bought pesto to the pasta, stirred in the kale mixture and topped it with some grated Parmesan. It was quick and simple, but tasty.

I’ve eaten most of the rest in variable salads in the past couple days. The surprise of the box was the salad turnip. The Two Onion Farm newsletter described these as “extremely tender, juicy, and sweet, with just a hint of mustardy, turnipy taste.” They also called them the most delicious vegetables they grow. They were absolutely right. I peeled one so far and ate it raw. The flesh is more tender and moist than other root vegetables and the taste is very mild, but distinct. I can’t wait to eat the other one.

Finally, tonight I decided to put a few of the beets to use. I traded some of my greens for more beets, thinking I was going to make some beet burgers. Since I haven’t had time yet, I decided to try a new recipe. I was gone all day, so soup in the crock pot won out. Although I didn’t follow the directions exactly for the Roasted Beet and Potato Soup, it was a nice surprise. When I came home tonight my house smelled almost like I’d been cooking tomatoes all day. The beets were an unexpected acidic compliment to the potatoes. 

So even though I didn’t do all the planning I wanted, the CSA season has started out well. I’ve learned to love a yummy new vegetable, eaten a number of healthy dishes and found another new way to like beets. I shouldn’t be surprised. It’s what CSA season is all about.

One Squash Two Recipes

I’m always intrigued by those articles in magazines where you make one chicken and eat for a week. Not because you’re eating leftovers, but because you use one main ingredient over and over again in multiple recipes. I’ve seen a number of themes played out with a whole chicken or a roast, but since the I cook meat that’s pre-portioned, de-boned and skinless, those articles have never done me much good.

But over the weekend my own “cook once eat many times” idea took hold. It started on Saturday when I roasted a butternut squash in preparation for making Butternut Squash Ravioli recipe using wonton wrappers instead of pasta. The recipe appeared in the Wisconsin State Journal the day before. I had all the ingredients, including a butternut squash from one of my last CSA deliveries.

After the squash was roasted, I put it in the refrigerator to cool before I’d finish the recipe either later that day or Sunday. I didn’t feel like getting back to it until Sunday morning, when I added the ricotta, sage, nutmeg and Parmesan and mashed it all together. After that I put it back in the refrigerator for later.

I worked up an appetite for ravioli at dinner by Christmas shopping most of the afternoon. Luckily it didn’t take long to fill and cook the ravioli. I made or dinner and lunch today, but stopped after that. I figured the ravioli would taste better if I filled and cooked them right before dinner today.

I strayed from the original recipe, skipping the sage cream sauce it suggested and instead opted for browned butter with some garlic in it along with some toasted walnuts. The dish was as wonderful as I imagined, and tasted just as good today for lunch.

But by then the idea of stretching my creativity by making a different recipe with my butternut squash mash had taken hold. I wanted to make something that didn’t require a trip to the store, or at least too many ingredients I didn’t already have on hand. Because I always have black beans, they came to mind first. I knew black beans and squash paired well together, having used them together in at least one other recipe. Add them together with the corn tortillas I also knew I had and quesadillas it was.

I didn’t have any feta cheese on hand, a good substitute for Mexican cheese like queso fresco, so I did have to stop at the store, but it only took a few minutes. I was amazed at the number of different choices, but settled on quesadilla, which I assumed would be perfect for my quesadillas.

At home with the squash already cooked, the quesadillas were easy to make. After spreading it on the tortilla, I topped with some beans and cheese. In only a few minutes I had a yummy and pretty healthy meal. Plus by changing it up a bit, the squash ravioli won’t go from really good to really boring by eating it too many days in a row.

Dreaming of Next Season

So it’s been awhile. I was surprised when I came back here today to see that my last post was at the beginning of October. Since then I’ve been cooking all the fall vegetables that have been appearing in my CSA box.

There’s been lots of squash, some potatoes, bunches of leeks, kale, and carrots, plus beets, broccoli and Brussels sprouts too. I’ve managed to eat it all, so I guess I’ve been too busy cooking to write.

Sadly, though all things must come to an end. I realized that as I picked up my last box of vegetables for the season last Tuesday. In a few days I’ll have eaten them all and the CSA season will close for the year. Then I’ll have to make due with what I’ve frozen and begin dreaming about next season. But before I do that I wanted to be sure to capture two new favorites from the last month.

The first, Orecchiette With Braised Kale And Cauliflower, was good enough to be served at an Italian restaurant. I made only a few substitutions, including cutting out the currants and substituting chiocciole for orecchiette pasta, because I couldn't find it. I also planned to substitute almonds for the pine nuts, but forgot to add them before serving and found it was just as good without them. The recipe was a little more complicated than I usually make, with a few ingredients I don’t tend to have on hand such as anchovies, but completely worth the effort.

The second, Ravioli with Brussels Sprouts and Bacon, which I made this week, was from Real Simple. The Brussels sprouts are shredded and tossed with bacon, pecans and a little vinegar before serving with the ravioli. Again, this is a restaurant-quality dish, if I do say so myself, but a little less complicated than the orecchiette.

Of course both dishes are pasta-based, so it’s no surprise they turned out wonderful, but the addition of the farm-fresh vegetables made them even better. I could make these dishes again over the winter with store-bought produce, but I doubt they’ll be the same. Instead, I’ll dream about having them both next summer.

A Lentil Surprise

For as long as I can remember I’ve been trying to recreate my favorite dishes at one of my favorite Middle Eastern restaurants in Madison, Shish Café. The recipe is mujadara, deceptively simple from the description on the menu: lentils and bulgur wheat, topped with sauteed onions, served with yogurt.

Yet again and again I’ve tried to make that dish to no avail. In my search to recreate it I learned it was a staple of many countries of the Middle East and had a number of variations, some with rice or groats, and using different spices from allspice to cumin.

First I varied the spices, but all of them seemed to overpower the dish. I began to wonder if a different type of lentil would make the dish. The lentils in the Shish Café’s dish seemed small, but not tiny, and held their shape much better than the lentils I was used to buying. I switched to smaller green, pardina lentils, and found them a better match for the texture, but the taste was still off.

Next I set my sights on the onions. They really are the best part of the dish. They are soft and caramelized with the right amount of olive oil. But try and try as I might I just couldn’t get those right either. I fried them in olive oil and either they were not done enough, or fried to a crisp. Neither matched the perfect soft, sweet combination of the mujadara at Shish Café.

So for a while I’ve given up on trying to recreate the recipe, vowing ordering it at the restaurant instead so as not to ruin my affinity for it. Instead I use lentils in other ways as I was tonight, for a recipe of roasted fall vegetables and lentils.

And that’s exactly where I discovered the secret to to mujadara. It isn’t the spice. It isn’t the lentils or even the bulgur. It is the onions. But not carmelized. Roasted.

The recipe I set out to make was simple enough: roast squash, carrots and an onion and serve them over cooked lentils in a sauce of cider vinegar, Dijon mustard, and olive oil. But when I took the first bite of lentil and onion I discovered a nice surprise. I had finally made mujadara.

Now next time I visit Shish Café I can discover a new favorite. I’m sure it won’t be long until I’m trying to recreate that.

I Wanted Pizza, but I Ate This Instead

My craving for pizza hasn’t abated since this summer. Today seeing someone eating a piece of leftover Uno’s pizza at lunch set me off. I forgot about it for most of the day, but saw the box in the recycle bin at the end of the day when I threw my soda can in there.

Before the pizza box incident I was planning to make spicy carrot soup with the carrots I received in yesterday’s CSA box. On the drive home the battle waged between carrot soup and pizza.

“I could order the pizza and still make the soup tomorrow.”

“But carrot soup would be healthier.”

“But I really want pizza.”

“It’ll take too long to make soup.”

I finally made my choice in my kitchen with the carrots in one hand and the phone in the other. Not so much because I thought the carrot soup would be better, but because I wanted to prove to myself I could cook a healthy meal in about as long as it took for the pizza to arrive. I might even be surprised about how good the soup would be.

I put the phone down and began peeling and chopping the carrots while the water boiled. After that I chopped an onion, minced a clove of garlic and sautéed them both in a spice mixture of cumin, ginger and cinnamon.

In about 15 minutes both the carrots and onions were tender and I was way ahead of the pizza guy. Until I took out my new immersion blender. It wasn’t new, but new to me, a hand-me-down from my sister’s kitchen. I hadn’t used it yet and thought this would be the perfect occasion.

Since I was in a hurry I didn’t bother to read the directions. How hard could it be? Not hard exactly, I found out, but rather a bit messy. I glossed over the “immersion” part of the name and ended up with splatters of orange puree all over my kitchen. But never a slow learner, I got the hang of it after lifting it out of the bowl without turning it off about 10 times. Finally, on number 11 as the soup was done, I managed to remember to turn it off before lifting it out of the bowl.

With only an additional 5 minutes added on for searching out splatters and wiping them off my wall and countertops my soup was almost done. I had one final step. I didn’t want to be too virtuous so I topped it with some chopped cashews and it was ready to serve. All told from refrigerator to table it took about 30 minutes.

And it was very good. So good, I wasn’t craving pizza anymore. One other benefit was the wonderful aroma the spices left behind. When I returned from an after dinner walk they greeted me at the door. That’s something a pizza box can’t deliver.