This first one has nothing to do with CSA, but it's definitely worth mentioning!
I had some overripe bananas on my hands, so tried out a new recipe from
BigOven.com.
Banana Crumb Muffins
Very yummy. However, it was an extremely light, tender muffin--so much so that it crumbled a bit when I spread some very soft butter on it. Probably telling me I really don't need more butter in my life.
Back to CSA Week 3 Report
I pick up my CSA deliveries on Thursday, and my daughter announced she
wanted to make pasta that night. We decided on spaghetti. She cooked the
pasta and then we both did our own doctoring. I sauteed up a
CSA zucchini with a minced clove of
garlic in olive oil, threw in some chopped tomatoes, then added the
pasta into the skillet with salt and pepper, and cooked the whole thing until the
zucchini and tomatoes cooked down just a bit into more of a sauce. Put
it in a bowl and added shredded parmesan. Yum.
Got more
CSA bok choy, and still had some left from last week. So on Sunday, I made myself bok choy soup with tofu. Didn't use a recipe, and wasn't very precise in what I was doing. It was also my first time cooking with tofu. Basically, here's more or less my process: sauteed onion and garlic, added tofu (cut into about 1" chunks) until it was nicely browned. Splashed some soy sauce and rice vinegar on it, grated a bit of fresh ginger in there for good measure. Put that all into a pot with two 32-oz containers of chicken broth (since my vegetarian daughter had no intention of even trying this one). Added some more soy sauce and rice vinegar, a very little bit of Chinese five spice powder, a very little bit of chili pepper, and just a dab of fish sauce--because a dab is all you need. Trust me on that. Not stellar, but not bad for my first time out of the gate.
Sunday afternoon I made homemade croutons using a loaf of rosemary and olive oil bread I'd picked up at the supermarket. Cut the bread up into 1/2" chunks, toss with some olive oil that had been mixed with garlic powder, salt, and white pepper, baked at 325 for about 30 mins. They were kind of crowded on the pan, so it took longer than usual to crunch them up. Got it to the perfect amount of crunchy. Very tasty.
For dinner Sunday, we used up some
CSA Romaine lettuce with a Ceasar salad. My husband and I did a grilled chicken breast on top; my daughter left hers off. Those homemade croutons were the perfect touch!
I made homemade Ceasar dressing, too--store-bought is way too salty for me. I have one of those
funky bottles that has the recipes on the side with lines drawn in for the amounts. The Ceasar salad dressing using that recipe is nice. Using fresh lemons makes a big difference, too--bright and fresh, not sour.
I also made homemade dinner rolls that night using my very own biceps, after having tossed my breadmaker due to the
Great Jam Tragedy.
I used this recipe for
"Soft Dinner Rolls" from BigOven. They were tasty, but spread out a little bit more than I was expecting. I probably could've left them in another couple of minutes to get even more brown on top, but we were hungry, and they were done even if not pretty.
We had DH's fam over for the 4th of July, and I took that opportunity to make
Chinese Cabbage Salad using a recipe the CSA farm had provided (using the Chinese Cabbage they'd given us). Yum. Toast a package of Ramen noodles and 10 oz of cashew pieces for about 10 mins in a 350 oven. Shred the cabbage. Thinly cut 1 bunch of green onions and toss the cabbage and onions together in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, prepare the dressing: Whisk together 1/2 c sugar, 1/2 c vegetable oil, 1/4 c cider vinegar, 1 tablespoon soy sauce. Right before serving, toss the noodles and cashews in with the salad, then toss it all with the dressing. The bowl was nearly empty by the end of dinner--people loved it. Next time, I may only use 1/4c sugar--it was a hair sweet for my taste but still good. Could also add in maybe some red cabbage for a little color.
CSA Week 3 report
Used: Chinese cabbage, Romaine, bok choy, 1 zucchini.
Remaining: 3 beets, 1 zucchini, 1 yellow squash, beet greens, carrots, bok choy.
CSA Week 4 Pick-up:
2 zucchini
1 yellow squash
1 green pepper
3 beets/beet greens
green beans
snow peas
3 kohlrabi (finally, kohlrabi! I've been looking at recipes since I started this--have a great idea for what I'll be making with these this week.)
I think zucchini bread is in my immediate future.
By the way--I've been playing with some free online photo editors. Many of the photos on this blog were edited with
picmonkey. Check out a collage of Food Friday photos!
