Hellgate CSA Week 16

CSA Week 16 collage

This is week 16 of the CSA – that means we’ve been at this for about four months! We did skip a week because of Independence Day, but still. Four months! Awesome.

Last week’s share didn’t get documented, mostly because of laziness (yes, it happens). However, I will tell you – we got corn! I froze the niblets for winter. We also got an acorn squash, some seckel pears, and it was the second week of tomato shares.

I ordered another 25 pound box of plum tomatoes, which I think were actually romas. I used part of that tomato share for my tomato dehydrating project. I used the rest to can crushed tomatoes – 11 pints! I can imagine a tasty winter soup of tomatoes, corn, peppers, and chicken, made with my delicious and nourishing chicken bone broth.

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Nourishing Nectarine Crisp

nectarine crisp

I love fruit crisps. They are a perfect alternative to the more complicated fruit pie – there’s still warm sweet fruit and spices involved, just with a delicious sweet topping instead of a more neutral pastry underneath.

I’ve been making fruit crisps for a long time. Usually I rely on the fruit crisp recipe from my favorite cookbook, Fields of Greens, by Annie Somerville. Somerville opened one of my favorite restaurants in San Francisco, Greens. I first ate there when I was a practicing vegetarian – the food is amazing and the views are spectacular, looking out the big windows toward the Golden Gate Bridge.

Even meat-eating friends at that time loved Greens. No one felt like anything was missing.

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Hellgate CSA Week 13

CSA Week 13
What we got this past week in our Hellgate CSA share

This week was marked by a huge fruit share – awesome. Summer veggies are still with us, but fall arrived with some amazing crispy apples and succulent pears. In total, we got:

2 pounds of tomatoes
1 eggplant
1 pound green beans
1 pound peppers
1 bunch leeks
1 head lettuce
1 pound plums
2 pounds peaches
1 pound nectarines
2 pounds apples
2 pounds pears

I’ve been enjoying the tomatoes in quesadillas, with patties of turkey sausage (from the CSA), and I’ve also eaten them with the eggplant and peppers for a delicious saute (punctuated with home grown basil). I’ve been snacking on the apples and pears. The nectarines turned into a fruit crisp, the recipe for which I’ll post next week – it’s all naturally sweetened, with sprouted flour in place of the white flour.

I may end up making another shrub with last week’s peaches – needless to say, things got crazy last week, so no Week 12 will be posted.

Here’s to continued good eating!

Hellgate CSA Week 11

Collage Week 11
Week 11 in our CSA

This past week brought us many delicious vegetables and fruit. We got:

1 pound japanese eggplants
2 pounds tomatoes
1 bunch leeks
1 head lettuce
1 pound summer squash
1 pound green beans
2 pounds apples
1 pound nectarines
1 watermelon (missing)

Sad news about the watermelon – it kind of died. Hard to describe, but it was very sad. I’ve also been on an apples and peanut butter kick, which is a terrific, satisfying snack.

The tomatoes went into tomato jam. Everything else has been eaten as is, sauteed and such together – all these summer veggies go so well together! Except the lettuce, which is languishing in the fridge. So much lettuce.

Hellgate CSA Week 7

week 7 csa collage
Week 7 share from our CSA

This week’s share was a bit more modest than last, but still full of amazing fruits and vegetables. We got:

1 bunch beets
1 pound zucchini
1 head red leaf lettuce
1 pound string beans
1 bunch carrots
1 bulb fennel
1 cucumber
2.5 pounds red plums
2 pounds nectarines

The carrots came with the fronds, and I’m looking into ways to use them. They could be good!

I was considering lacto fermenting the fennel with carrots, but I’ve read that fennel can get bitter in the fermentation process, with lots of shrinkage after a few days. Carrot fennel slaw I think is in my future, instead.

The fruit continues to be amazing and I am loving eating the plums with raw yogurt for breakfast. Jenny from Nourished Kitchen recommend poaching yellow plums in honey-vanilla syrup, and I bet these red plums would also be great that way.

We’ll be eating salad with the lettuce as opposed to the no so successful lettuce soup I made last week.

Zucchini will be eaten with tomatoes from my garden!

Summer is amazing.

Hellgate CSA Week 6

csa week 6 collage
Week 6 share from our CSA

This week in our CSA we moved full force into stone fruit season – yum. Nectarines and peaches made their debut, which made me really happy. There’s also lots of green stuff this week. We got:

1 bag of snap peas
1/2 pound of zucchini
1/2 pound of cucumbers
1 head of lettuce
1 pound of wax beans
1 bunch of spring onions
1 bunch of sorrel
1 pound of yellow plums
2 pounds of nectarines
2 pounds peaches
5 apples

I’ve already eaten the lettuce head. A recipe for a lettuce and mint soup arrived in my inbox, so I tried it. I must admit, it’s only ok. But ok enough to continue eating it over the next few days. I like drinking it out of a mug. I was able to use the onion heads in it, too. I also made a simple salad of chopped cucumber and onion in sherry vinegar and olive oil, with some hot peppers added.

I may pickle the snap peas again, and perhaps even make lacto-fermented dilly beans with the beans. Or saute them with garlic and ginger for dinner this week.

The peaches have been great in raw yogurt, and the plums are awesome for simply snacking on.

The way life has been moving at this point in my life, summer really will be over in the blink of an eye. Hard to believe we’re already at mid-July. September is just around the corner. I plan to enjoy the high summer bounty as long as possible and really savor it.

CSA Bounty – Week Six

CSA Bounty Week Six

This week we got a wonderful variety of vegetables in our veggie share, and some delicious stone fruit in the fruit share.  I decided to display them in a grid this time.  From top to bottom row, left to right:

lettuce, green beans, spring onions, carrots, cucumbers, plums, nectarines, peaches, mint.

I forgot to take a picture of the zucchini!  This week I got a large one, which I’ll use to put in zucchini muffins most likely.  The zucchini from last week went into zucchini fritters.  I’ll post about them at some point, after I tweak a few things.

distribution on a humid cool day

The weather was better than last week – not great, but better.  It was much cooler, thanks to thunderstorms that passed through this afternoon.  It’s still humid, though, and a heat wave is expected this weekend.  I have hopes that it won’t be as intense as last time.

I have plans to make a sorbet out of some of the stone fruit.  Perfect for hot weather!

Additionally, I got a chunk of chevre and some ground pastured beef.  Looking forward to having hamburgers tomorrow!

And finally, our dry bean and grain share was this week and the most striking thing was the oats.  I don’t think I’ve actually seen whole oats before.  They look perfect to sprout – I’ll have to look into a grain mill attachment for my Kitchen Aid.  Or, perhaps I will eat them as hot cereal.  I also came across a recipe for a sprouted oat milk, which is intriguing.