Join Debbie as she raves about whole foods, rants about chemicals and generally celebrates cooking and eating with fresh, local, nutritious foods. And sometimes she might get a little feisty….
You’ve heard it here first. Yes, that’s right: I officially will stop complaining about the piddly amounts of produce our CSA farm has been giving us this season. Today’s harvest wasn’t just plentiful, it was full of variety and fun, just like our trip to the farm.
C’mon, we got to yank out edamame plants by the roots — radicchio, too! Maybe I’m a freak, but there’s something so satisfying and well, downright therapeutic about yanking out a live plant and making off with it. It feels a little dirty… I’m a bad, bad girl….
Anyway, it’s been akin to a wedding shower around here this week… you know, ripping open all the presents and finding something to do with all of them. “Honey, what can we make tonight so we can use the bamboo steamer and the electric orange juicer?”
Here’s our harvest and the newlywed (because it’s finally the beginning of our life, together with the veggies — get it?) things we’ve been doing with them:
- 30 orange cherry tomatoes — They sit in a wooden bowl on our kitchen table, so that every time we walk by it, we can pop one in our mouths.
- One (giant!) radicchio — Nothing too impressive, but I tried a fig salad with yogurt dressing from Epicurious, and substituted lettuce and radicchio for the watercress. Definitely not my favorite recipe.
- Four ears of corn — Cooked ‘em up and served them with Trader Joe’s chili lime chicken burgers and salad. A simple, summery meal.
- As much cooking corn as we could find — I froze this, after cooking it and cutting it off the cob, so I can use it throughout the winter in recipes.
- 50 springs of basil — Some found its way into my quinoa and edamame salad, some was made into pesto and frozen to use all winter long. We usually have homemade pesto through March or so if we are diligent about making and freezing it throughout the summer.
- Four edamame plants — I cooked and hulled them and used them in a quinoa and edamame salad recipe I dreamed up.
- Chives — Again, you’ll find them in the quinoa and edamame salad.
- Mint — Way too strong in the fig salad — did I mention it was not my favorite recipe?
- Raspberries — They didn’t last a day. Best. Snack. Ever.
- Eight carrots — Owen insists on eating these whole (and he’s pretty devastated when I cut the green tops off them), even if they are too think to bite through.
- One onion — Huh. Just realized I didn’t use this yet this week, and it is so very unlike me not to use an onion in almost every recipe I make. I’ll check and see if one of my alter egos has taken over and get back to you.
- Two squash — Grilled as a side dish with the corn and chicken burgers.
- Flowers — In a chalkboard vase, on the kitchen island. They are floppy, yellow, daisy-like flowers which are kind of charming.
Was that boring to read, or do you feel like a newlywed again?
Photo Credit: Debbie McDuffee, Keith McDuffee
