Loot: Week 3 and How All These Weeks Are Running Together

This week at the farm stand we found more turnips, carrots, zucchini, summer squash, basil, more peas, lettuce, kale, and shallots.

You may have noticed that in the pesto pasta dish yesterday, there was fresh basil. Where did the basil come from, you may ask. It came from our week 3 loot. There are two possible explanations for this. One is that we're time-traveling vegetable-eaters, hopping week to week all summer to find the best ingredients for our favorite recipes. This is the cooler explanation, and the one I would prefer you believe.

The other explanation is that we're posting a couple of weeks after we are getting, cooking, and eating all these vegetables. And that some weeks, take-out sounds really good, so the vegetables are waiting (patiently, of course, because everyone knows that vegetables are patient) for us to get to them. Which gives rise to interesting combinations of vegetables that wouldn't be otherwise possible (you know, unless we went to the store and actually bought them).

For example, the garlic scapes from week 2 were photographed, mentioned in the loot post, and never discussed again. You'll see them pop up again in week 4, in a very tasty dish along with the shallots and summer squash from this week, and more garlic scapes and summer squash we have yet to get in week 4. So there you have it. Time-traveling vegetables.

Loot: Week 2

Week 1 of our CSA experience went well. We ate well, had fun, and got through all our vegetables.

Week 2 was a little tougher. This is for quite a few reasons, none of which are particularly interesting, or related to the CSA. Jobs, small children, real life kind of stuff. We didn't feel much like cooking, so we took week 2 a little easier. Used simpler recipes, ordered some takeout (and wrote blog posts way after the fact).

Regardless of how we felt all week, the bounty from the CSA continued. We got fennel, beets, garlic scapes, red russian kale, cilantro, frisee, snap peas, cabbage, and of course a beautiful bouquet. None of these are particularly unfamiliar or difficult to prepare, so they're perfect for a lazy week.

The Loot: Week 1

Our vegetable share for week 1 was surprising.  Having never been a part of a CSA before, we were not sure what to expect.  More specifically, we were not sure how much to expect.  Certainly, it was not this much:

What a bounty!  We have green garlic and chives, kohlrabi and turnips, arugula, fava beans, a head of lettuce, and the biggest bunch of kale I've ever seen.  Granted, I've never cooked kale before, so it's possible that kale simply comes in very large bunches.

We also have a flower membership.  Every week we will bring home a bouquet of fresh-cut flowers.  (This may or may not be the primary reason that I wanted to do this in the first place.)  This week there are sunflowers, orange poppies, and a lot of unidentified white, yellow, and blue blossoms.  The photo doesn't do it justice.