It's been kind of crazy week to start this. Here's how it's been:
Thursday: Jude came with me to the farm to get our food. I invited Sam, but he said "No, that's boring!" C'est la vie. Jude was excited to come along because there are three goats and he wanted to feed them (grass pulled up from along their fence). He did, the goats were delighted, and when we left they bleated mournfully. But about the veggies. Here's what we got:
- strawberries
- tokyo bekana (leafy green cabbage)
- red leaf lettuce
- green head lettuce (butter lettuce?)
- radishes
- japanese turnips
- dill
- green onions
- swiss chard
Friday: We went downtown to Shedd Aquarium (awesome!) and picnicked with the gulls. We used a little lettuce our sandwiches but otherwise did not make use of the veggies. Then date night - dinner out.
Saturday: I don't remember what happened Saturday. Everybody ate strawberries but I'm not sure we did much with the other stuff.
Sunday: Celebrate Father's Day with a tokyo bekana, green onion & red leaf salad with some strange warm dressing that involved cider vinegar, brown sugar and turnips. It tasted pretty good but it was weird. The tokyo bekana, however, is lovely. It has a little cabbage flavor but it's leafy like lettuce. Very mild.
Then Ben left for St. Louis. He's doing graduate work at the seminary and will spend two weeks there every June/January for the next several years. He went last June but I went to the hospital and then he accepted the call to Bethel and it's all a dim memory now. He didn't take a class in January because I was still doing chemo. Life always seems to be more involuntarily interesting than I'd like.
Monday: Now I'm on my own with these veggies. My kids are good with broccoli and green beans, but leafy greens and radishes are not their speed. I think I had a salad. We were also getting ready to send Sam off on a trip to California.
Tuesday: I drove Sam to a halfway point between here and Louisville to meet my dad. Sam is now at the front end of a huge adventure trip to California with my parents and my 11-year-old nephew. They will spend a week visiting my aunt & uncle and seeing the sights of L.A. My dad likes radishes, so I took a few with me. He ate them straight up, just like a rabbit. Sam took a bite of one and spit it out.
Wednesday: Here we are, 24 hours to go, and I have several radishes and turnips, half a head of lettuce, and the whole bunch of chard to go. For breakfast I had a radish and butter sandwich. Surprisingly good. Tonight I will make a simple pasta sauce with the chard. Salad for lunch with a few turnips and I think we're set.
Come home, Ben! You need to eat with me!
2 comments:
If your boys like mashed potatoes, you might want to try the good Norwegian tradition of boiled turnips and potatoes mashed together with butter and cream. Works with rutabagas as well. (Boil separately; mash together.)
The schedule and accompanying urge to use up the produce were the best parts of a CSA for us. You do end up eating better when you know your fridge is going to be filled up again soon. You know you wouldn't be eating chard tonight under any other circumstances, right?
Last year we split a share with friends, so we got a box every other week. It worked well with vacations, plus we still got to go to the farmers' market on our off weeks.
I have to admit, however, that most of our radishes ended up as compost.
Ditto on the mashed turnip idea - we did that a while ago and my kids actually liked them :).
Post a Comment