Zucchini Pancakes

Faced with several upcoming days of mostly dinners out, I needed to tackle our remaining veggies. These zucchini pancakes were awesome, but only used one of our large zucchini. Was hoping to use both of them, but when I'd shredded one, it was a huge pile. I mostly used Ina Garten's recipe, throwing in a little feta cheese that was hanging around. Though Ina didn't say to salt & drain the shredded zucchini, some other recipes did, so I tried that. The cast iron skillet was great for these (thanks again, mom!).

Served with a simple tomato-basil relish (with some olive oil & balsamic vinegar), and a variation on the chickpeas I made last week: sauteed with onion, garlic, smoked paprika, a little balsamic, and cilantro. Nice meatless meal!

Week 8: Corn!

I'd read something a couple weeks ago on One Straw's blog that a deluge of rain devastated their current corn crop. But I guess they found something to harvest! This week we got:

White corn, yellow squash, cucumber, small purple onions, tomatoes, zucchini, bell pepper, and lettuce.

rob made an egg dish for his Thursday night casserole dinner, which we actually enjoyed for breakfast on Friday since I got home at 2am. He used some squash, bell pepper & onion, plus mushrooms, bacon & cheddar. Yum! Amy snuck a piece before we got up and declared it nom:

For dinner tonight I thought I'd make a corn salad, and when I cut the kernals off the cobs they were so sweet and crunchy I decided to leave everything raw. I also used the cucumber, tomato & onion from our box. Added a minced jalepeno, cilantro, juice of half a lime, some olive oil, salt & pepper.

I decided that burgers needed to happen with this. Namely, bacon cheeseburgers with smoked paprika mayo!

Pasta with Peas & Bacon

I think there may still be a green pepper and a cucumber floating around in the fridge, but other than that I've now used all our veggies before the next round comes tomorrow!

Tonight I tackled the peas. We got a very small handful of regular (shell) peas (I hope we get more; they were really tasty), and I guess some variety of snow peas. We got these the previous week also and I hadn't used them. I've never been a big snow pea consumer, but these looked different from what I've seen. Anyway, I figured I'd just slice up both batches and use them in pasta.

Cooked 3 slices of diced bacon, then sauteed the snow peas for a few minutes in the drippings. Added minced garlic, hot pepper flakes, salt & pepper. Added the regular peas to the boiling pasta in the last minute of cooking. Drained that, then added a blob of cream cheese to the pan with some pasta water to thin. Tossed everything together and added the bacon bits, fresh basil, a little bit of feta and a splash of lime juice. Would have preferred to have some ricotta & parmesan instead of the cream cheese & feta, but what was on hand was still pretty darn good.

The snow peas turned out well. Hard to screw anything up when there's bacon involved!

Week 7: How to use your veggies in record time

As per the last post, I was away almost all of the past week at Falcon Ridge Folk Fest. Sharif and Joanna hung onto our share and I just picked it up tonight, 2 days before the next batch comes. Some good stuff, but I needed to use up as much as possible at once:

Potatoes, shallot, some purple spring onions, two different kinds of bell peppers, zucchini, and [not pictured] cucumbers plus two different kinds of peas.

I decided that some kind of roasted vegetable melange was probably the best way to go about it--despite the fact that I really shouldn't be using the oven in the dog days of summer. But I get to use the word melange!

So, first I put the potatoes and the candy-striped beet from last week in a big roasting pan with some olive oil...

...and roasted those at 425 for about 15 min. Then I chopped up the peppers, zucchini, shallot, & onions, and tossed with more olive oil, salt & pepper, red pepper flakes and some fresh rosemary:

Added those to the mix and roasted for another 20 minutes.

While that was cooking, I sauteed a can of chickpeas with some minced garlic and smoked paprika with more olive oil (there was sort of an obscene amount of olive oil involved in this dish):

And tossed that with the vegetables, finishing with a bunch of chopped basil from our garden and a bit of balsamic vinegar. Also added some feta cheese on the plate.

Wow, this was a win! Super easy too, just a bit of chopping--everything took about an hour. I also made a cucumber yogurt salad, adding the rest of those purple spring onions, some fresh mint and a splash of lime juice.

Unfortunately, rob did not get my message that food was made and came home from his open mic with a burger from Checkers. He missed out:

...but there's plenty for lunch tomorrow!

Off-topic: Falcon Ridge Folk Fest

I took a break from veggies last week to attend the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival with ilyAIMY, who got a slot in the Emerging Artist Showcase. I swear I'll tie this post in with food at the end, but...I sort of wanted to have a place to collect all the great music I discovered. Please check these folks out--some really wonderful stuff. In no particular order:

Here's two videos I took myself at the Thursday night "Lounge Stage," hosted by Pesky J. Nixon on the campgrounds. The first one is We're About 9 with Pesky & Anthony da Costa sitting in; the next is Pesky with the others sitting in:

I don't have any video of ilyAIMY's set at the main stage (yet...maybe it's out there), but on Saturday we were invited to play at the Lost & Found for the volunteers there, and someone grabbed this video. There was no amplification so I couldn't play my electric cello, but I did some harmony vocals:

The performer before us on the main stage was Bulat Gafarov, all the way from Moscow! Amazing and impossible to describe, so just watch the video:

One of my other favorite performers in the showcase was Brittany Ann, a young singer-songwriter from Philly (and though you can't really tell from this video, she bears a remarkable resemblance to my friend Karen!). Anthony da Costa was another great performer who frequently popped up in the Lounge crew and after-hours song circles. Really liked his stuff...and he's not old enough to legally drink! Gah!! Managed to find a video of Brittany performing with Anthony:

Back on the Main Stage, I really liked Brother Sun, a trio made up of Pat Wictor, Joe Jencks & Greg Greenway. Wonderful harmonies. One of the tunes they did was a doo-wop number about Fox News, which went over like gangbusters with the crowd:

Greg Brown is not someone I was really familiar with, and it took the first couple of numbers to catch my attention...but then I was entranced for the rest of the set. What an unreal bass voice and some fine writing. One of my favorite tunes was "Fat Boy Blues." There's actually a video of the festival performance up but the quality isn't great, so I picked this one instead:

Closing out the main stage Saturday night was Gandalf Murphy and the Slambovian Circus of Dreams. With a name like that, I knew I was in for...something! They were playing Friday night in the dance tent while we were watching a quiet, folksy song swap with Red Horse on the main stage, and the music and crowd cheering was overpowering the main stage! So I was looking forward to seeing them, but unfortunately I couldn't stay for all of it as we had to head back to the campground for a rehearsal. This tune opened their set:

I heard that they used to be a punk band but got disillusioned with that scene, and then got in with some folky folks and realized they were much happier, so they revamped the band for that scene! Ha!

Possibly my favorite act of the whole festival was one of the last ones I caught, Saturday night at the Budgiedome (one of the after-hours campground things). Barnaby Bright was one of the emerging artists from last year and got to play the "Most Wanted Song Swap" on the main stage this year. I missed that performance, which I think was when rob and I were collapsed from the heat. This is one of the songs the duo played at the Budgiedome. They've got some other videos up with a full band which are also great, but the duo is really something special:

There were lots of others, but those were probably my favorite. OK, I've gotta tie this in with food, so...Pesky J Nixon and the folks from the Lounge went all-out with the camping food, and fed a whole bunch of people incredibly well multiple times a day. I don't know how they brought it all with them, but this was Saturday night dinner:

Beef tenderloin, smoked brisket, and some of the best grits I've ever had. Wow! Way to make the new guys feel at home. I just brought granola bars & Ritz Bitz with me...

Anyway, Falcon Ridge was an incredible experience, and we're contemplating going back next year even if we don't get invited in a performance capacity.

Chard & Sausage for Dinner & Breakfast

Finally getting around to using the chard from last week. First up was a pasta dish:

Browned some Italian sausage, added onion (also from last week), garlic, red bell pepper, some hot pepper flakes, and the chopped chard (including stems). Saved some of this mixture for tomorrow's breakfast. Then added a splash of half & half and tossed with linguine. Parmesan would have been nice but I didn't have any, so I used a little bit of sharp cheddar.

For breakfast the next day I used our red potatoes for home fries, with shallot, parsley, a little bit of rosemary from our garden, and smoked paprika. Also got to break in my new iron skillet (thanks Mom!):

Used the sausage-chard mixture to fill an omelet, and hel-LO Saturday breakfast!

New Things! And a rob casserole!

Week 6 brings lots of new veggies and zero leafy greens!

Green pepper, cucumber, zucchini, parsley, shallots, peas, beets and potatoes.

And since this incorporated onion from last week, it counts for the blog...rob made a casserole! I was presented with a cookbook for my birthday and instructions to pick out a recipe each week that rob will make for Thursday dinner. He's willing but trepidatious...but this was delicious! Ground beef, beans, onions, tomatoes & spices, with a corn muffin + corn + cheese topping:

Go rob!! Susan, you would be proud....

Broccoli - Red Cabbage Slaw

Not sure if this is a slaw or salad...but regardless, with the temperature at about 137 degrees today, turning on the stove/oven was not an appealing option. So, this happened:

Pretty red (purple?) cabbage...

...a good amount of raw broccoli, with lots of broccoli stems (when I was a kid, I would only eat the stems and my sister would only eat the florets. I guess that worked!)...

...the rest of the red onion from this week and part of a red pepper (the broccoli stems, onion and pepper were sliced on the mandoline, which is more fun than it rightly should be), a handful of dried cranberries...

...made a dressing of about 1/4 cup each mayo & plain Greek yogurt, apple cider vinegar, dijon mustard, sugar, salt, pepper and "red & black" (thank you Susan!), and also added some chopped toasted walnuts. OK, I did turn the stove on to toast the walnuts...

My dilemma was what else I was going to have for dinner, but then Amy uttered those three little words: "I'm ordering Chinese." Bingo. So this goes with General Tso's chicken, right?

Raw Beet Salad

OK beets, you've failed me for the last time...

After the chewy beet chips, I had to redeem myself with this week's beet. It's the same candy-striped "Chioggia" variety. I thought I'd try something raw, and there are a fair amount of raw beet salad recipes online...including from Mark Bittman, who usually doesn't fail.

So I once again whipped out the mandoline and sliced the beet on the slightly thicker side (did peel it this time, which wasn't too hard--and the Chioggia beets really don't stain)...

Then cut the slices into julienne:

Then dressed with olive oil, cider vinegar, dijon mustard, maple syrup and some fresh mint. Oh, and added some thin slices of the red onion we got.

The beets were so sweet and crunchy...if you can find these gems, raw is recommended!

Week 5: Onions!

New stuff this week--two kinds of onions, and red cabbage:

We also got broccoli, a couple kinds of lettuce, ruby chard, and beets. Lots of red/purple things!

Roasted Broccoli, Pesto Bread, Sausage + Peppers & Onion

Tonight's dinner:

-Roasted broccoli (just tossed with olive oil, salt & pepper, roasted at 400 for about 15 mins)
-Basil pesto spread on bread & toasted
-Italian sausage, peppers & the onion we got this week

Pretty simple, but good. Had this with a glass of Syrah from Elk Run Vinyards in Mt. Airy, MD where my band played recently. Part of the pay was taking home a bottle. Works for me!

So here's to eating and drinking [mostly] local. But now I need a nap.

Beet Chips Experiment

Because we'd gotten the striped beets again, I thought beet chips would be fun to do to show off the pretty colors. I even found myself passing by a Williams Sonoma, so I picked up a mandoline for the thin slicin'. I didn't bother peeling the beets, as the peels seemed pretty thin (and mostly I just didn't want to bother). As predicted, they made really beautiful slices:

I tossed them with some olive oil, put them on a parchment-lined baking sheet, and sprinkled with salt & pepper. I'd looked at several recipes online, and some said to bake at a very low temperature for an hour or more; some said to do about 20 minutes at a higher temperature. Almost all the recipes said to watch them closely as they could burn easily. So, I put them in at 325 for 20 minutes, and removed the ones that were getting really done. I probably baked them about 10 minutes more and it looked like they were getting pretty browned. Most of the recipes said they wouldn't be crisp out of the oven, but they'd crisp as they cool. So, I waited...

And they didn't get crisp. I put them in the oven a little longer, then waited again...but they remained pretty chewy. Even left them out overnight, but...nope. I'm guessing I used too much oil, but I'm not quite sure what happened (the slices were pretty thin with the mandoline). Also, I think I used too much salt & pepper for my taste...couldn't really taste any beet. But rob's been munching on them through the day, so they're edible...just not great. And yeah, they're not as pretty as the raw slices:

Slightly more successful was tonight's dinner. The basil was on its last leg, so I made pesto (with walnuts instead of pine nuts). Also made the kale salad for the 3rd time...but since we didn't get much kale, I used up all the swiss chard from last week and this week.

I think I like it better with all kale, but it was still pretty good. Used lemon juice instead of cider vinegar and it was a little too tart. Also didn't have any goat cheese so I used shaved parmesan. Like the goat cheese better. And didn't use any oniony things, which I missed. But still, it's ridiculous how good this salad is.

So all we've got left from this week is broccoli, an onion and a bit of lettuce...but the lettuce is looking a bit sad, so that may have to go to waste.

Pasta with Roasted Cauliflower

Found a delicious way to use this week's and last week's cauliflower. I've never roasted cauliflower before, but it sounded easy and a lot tastier than boiled/steamed cauliflower. Indeed it is!

I cut the cauliflower into fairly small florets, and tossed it with olive oil, some chopped rosemary from our garden, salt & pepper. Spread out on a baking sheet and roasted at 400 for about 20 minutes, stirring once through. Turned lightly crispy and brown in places.

Meanwhile, I sauteed a chopped onion and a couple big cloves of garlic in olive oil, with a healthy pinch of red pepper flakes. Added in the cauliflower and tossed this with "Conchiglioni" pasta (little conch shells).

Threw in a little bit of the pasta cooking water, grated parmesan, and some of the basil we got this week. Was going to add some lemon juice, but I forgot...that would have been a nice addition. It was still pretty tasty. Might also try roasting this week's broccoli. Too bad that requires use of the oven in this summer heat!

Week 4: Veggie Fatigue?

Wednesday night, rob and I were driving home after a long day of work, and the "whaddya want to do for dinner?" question was posed. I said, "Well, what do I have in the fridge?...cauliflower, mustard greens and Swiss chard." Both of us went "eh, none of that really sounds appealing." We went to Panera.

Still, none of that remaining stuff from last week has been eaten (got home at 1:30am last night), and the slaw I made quickly became soggy gloop. And now we have this week's box:

More beets, more cauliflower, more swiss chard, more kale, more lettuce, broccoli, onions, and a bunch of basil (the latter of which would be more exciting if it wasn't already starting to turn brown, and if we didn't already have 3 basil plants growing in the garden). I saw a post on One Straw's blog that they had some more things ready and their CSA folks would be getting more stuff besides greens, but...not quite this week!

So yeah, I think I've got a bit of the veggie fatigue. I'm sure it'll pass though. We're going out of town for a day and a half and then we're home for 2 days, so hopefully I'll get some inspiration.