CSA Week 12

Last week's CSA went well, though we did have our second (or third, depending on if you count our willful disposal of the first grape leaves) bit of CSA produce expire before using. The juvenile celery that we got wilted almost immediately, and my placing it upright in cold water did nothing to revive it. The crab apples were successfully integrated into a summer fruit crisp along with the apples from the share, which was delicious if a bit overly sweet.

Sadly, the grilled pizza was a bit of a letdown. I am not sure if I under-kneaded it, or if it just had too high a content of whole wheat flour, but it never really developed gluten and didn't really rise during grilling. It also got quite soggy once the sauce was added, and partially disintegrated on the grill. I am not saying we won't try it again, but we will use a different recipe next time.

On with the show.

Two pounds of roma tomatoes will get turned into a topping for pizza (based on the Cook's Illustrated pizza bianca recipe) and maybe sauce.

Acorn squash is slated to get stuffed for lunch today, we'll see how that goes. The stuffing has turkey sausage in it, so it can't be all bad.

Would anyone like some sage? Because we have a ton. We plan to make a couple three dishes that call for it (white bean dip, a pasta dish, and chicken saltimboca) but will still likely have a ton leftover. We're going to try drying it, so that'll be an adventure.

Zucchini and a pattypan squash are both going into zucchini bread. Putting the squash in that isn't exactly cannon, but what else are we gonna do with one small one?

More garlic to add to our ever growing collection. We did make a rub for grilled chicken that took 8 cloves, so at least we are only up a half a head this week.

Pears and more crab apples will probably go into the same fruit crisp we did last week. Mary had one of the pears and reported that it was very tart, so that should help offset the sweetness of the crisp itself.

Red and cubanelle peppers

This? Is a really effing big boc choi. I should have thrown a small child or yardstick in for scale, because this is a seriously mutantly large vegetable. We'll probably do a stir fry kind of thing with this, since that seems to be the prominent way to cook it.

French breakfast radishes still look just like fingers and taste just like radishes.

Potatoes will be keeping all the garlic company in our pantry. I've looked up a technique for making crispy hashbrowns, and I also want to try making potatoes with onions and bacon (sort of a variation on lyonaise potatoes), so at least we have some plans for this batch.

Arugula will join the little bit we have left over from last time. It's got such a strong taste that only a little can go into salads without blowing us away. Maybe we'll look for a soup or something that can take it. We have a pretty mild spinach soup that might benefit from the sharpness.