Member Diary – Week #1. Suz & Lon.

Diary Entry: #1 Tuesday, June 16^th Dinner for 2 @ 8:50PM

Dear fellow Southside CSA’ers,

We are super excited to be the first contestants to contribute our blog-like diary entries for the first week of vegetable distribution. I know everyone must be as thrilled as we are that the season has begun. Lon is the master chef that has improvised these fantastic meals using the first week’s vegetables and herbs. We hope you are inspired to make these meals for yourself because as the professional taste tester in the house, they are deslish!! XOXOXO Suz + Lon McCaffrey

Seasoned Bass Filets served atop a warm Tomato garlic-scape mushroom ragout + a spinach salad dressed with lemon juice & olive oil

Ingredients:

2 Bass fillets
1 bunch of spinach chopped
3 roma tomatoes diced
8 or so crimini mushrooms
3 medium shallots; 2 diced small for the ragout + the remaining shallot slice for the spinach salad
2 garlic scapes (The top halves for roasting with the fish and the bottoms halves julienned for the ragout)
1 or 2 lemons
Fresh Thyme leaves pulled off the stems
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Salt + pepper to taste
Vodka or white wine

*Veggies from the CSA noted in green

Set oven to broil. To prepare the 2 fillets, place them in whatever you’re going to broil them in. Pour a couple of tablespoons of olive oil over each filet. Sprinkle thyme leaves, salt, pepper and some fresh lemon juice over the top of each fillet. Cut two garlic scapes in half. Place the half with the bulb because it’s pretty. Set the fish aside.

At the same time heat a couple tablespoons of olive oil in a good sized sauce pan over medium/high heat. As soon as the oil begins to shimmer add salt, pepper and the remaining half of both garlic scapes julienned.

Stir the garlic scapes with a wooden spoon so they don’t burn or stick to the bottom of the pan. Cook them until they tenderize – about two minutes You can tell when they’re done when they begin to change color. Add the diced shallots and keep stirring. Add a bit of thyme. Add the roma tomatoes and continue to periodically stir the ragout.

Put the fish under the broiler. It is very important to carefully keep one eye tuned to what’s happening in the oven as it will cook rather quickly. About 6 minutes if that. Overcooked fish is terrible and you will know when the fish is ready if it flakes under the tines of a fork.

Now the sauce should be at a nice simmer. Stir often. If you have booze in the house, you can add a bit of white wine or a couple of dashes of Vodka. The alcohol will make the sauce taste like it’s been cooking for far longer than it has but that is absolutely optional. Cook the sauce a bit and then add mushrooms. Squeeze ½ a lemon in and cook the sauce down.

As the sauce is simmering away, let’s make the easy and delicious spinach salad. Wash the spinach.

Let’s make the dressing… About ½ a cup of olive oil, 1 lemon and 1 shallot. Add salt and pepper to taste. When it’s the perfect balance toss in the spinach and voila, your salad is perfect

All should be ready to plate. Take the fish out and it will cool a tad while you prepare the plates with everything else. Scoop a nice bed of ragout onto both plates for the filet to fit nicely on. Put a healthy portion of the spinach salad that is already dressed onto each plate. Add the filet’s on the bed of ragout and voila!