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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.

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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.

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CSA Bounty – Week Five

hot distribution

Well, this week brought searing heat, wilted CSA members, and serious summer vegetables and fruit!  Peaches, apricots, and plums scream “summer” to me.

peaches

plums and apricots

All the fruit has been fantastic eaten out of hand.  It would make good sorbet, too.

The vegetable I was most excited about was the fava beans.  I look forward to them every year.

fava beans

I think they are gorgeous pods, but the beans inside are even more fantastic. I shell them and then remove each bean’s outer covering, throw them into a pan containing a little hot olive oil, and cook them till they start to brown a bit.  Sometimes I cook them with onions.   Then I eat them with fleur de sel on top.  Perfection!

We got more greens – butter lettuce and curly cress.  Not much to do with them except make a salad, which I did.

butter lettuce

cress

We also got fennel – I’ll probably braise it.

fennel

Oh, and spring onions!

spring onions

And peas! Shelling peas – I made a tasty salad with them that involved mint and dates (recipe to come).

shelling peas

Lastly, we got zucchini, which was a surprise! I chose 5 perfect medium sized squash, which I will make zucchini fritters out of this weekend. I’ll probably grate whatever is left and freeze it for zucchini bread.

zucchini

So much great produce!  I just love my CSA.