CSA 2011 - Week 1

Summer is here! That means it's time to build a fortress of solitude out of outdoor cushions and eat lots of fresh veggies. This year we are trying yet another new farm. While there were upsides to a Saturday pickup, we also felt like we couldn't travel anywhere over a weekend last summer, and that was an issue for us. After searching around for a good sounding CSA with a local-ish drop-off point, we discovered that one of our favorite stands at the Farmer's Market was doing a CSA this year with a pick up site at the market. Since we have been saying for ages that someone should do that, how could we not sign up? It's the first time we have gotten in in year one of a CSA, so it will be interesting to see how they do. This one is starting noticeably earlier than previous ones, so I expect that in the next few weeks we will see a mix of spring stuff and storage vegetables, carried over from last year. We are also getting their fruit share, which for a blessed change is actually local fruit. That's getting folded into the main share, and in weeks with little fruit we may just see more veggies instead.

The first lettuce of the season takes the form of Baby lettuce mix. We've been avoiding having salads for the past month or so to prepare for the onslaught of lettuces, and now that it's here I am not fully convinced we are ready. A whole buncha Cilantro. We actually have a shrimp recipe that calls for a full cup of it, so we should be able to use this up. We have grown to absolutely adore rhubarb. We've already made a few dishes with the stuff we got at early spring farmer's markets, but we're still not out of recipes. This batch is going to be used for a roasted pork dish (with rhubarb and onion sauce.) Yellow stutgart onions look like slightly fat green onions, and will likely be used as those would be. Green garlic is something that I always think I should have specific uses for, but we usually end up subbing it in for normal garlic. This batch will likely end up in garlic naan.

These are the first strawberries of the season! So sweet, so juicy, so getting consumed as-is. We love Asparagus and will likely roast this batch. Champion radishes will get snacked on and eaten in salads. I've actually remembered to prepare some for a snack for tomorrow, so I am already ahead of last year when I managed to forget to do so every single time I planned to. When we were thinking about what we would get this early in the season, it did occur to me that we might see some potatoes carried over from last year. I'm psychic! These are russian blue and desiree potatoes and we'll...do something with them. We usually make a Rosti with potatoes, which is pretty much hash browns for dinner. It's OK though, because it's Swiss. All spring, our food magazines have all been full of recipes for sweet pea shoots. All spring, Mary and I have said to each other "We will never be in possession of this item" and tossed out those recipes. Now we find ourselves with a rather large bunch of them. We had some raw in salad last night, but past the smallest branches they got pretty tough, so I think I will look up a recipe online to use. Many of the recipes we tossed pointed to light stir-frying, so that's probably where we will end up. Oddly, most of our Arugala recipes are pizzas. We are planning on pizza-ing up this batch as well. This one is an odd bunch for us, because it actually has some flowers on it. Arugala flowers! Who knew?