CSA life: May 28th – June 3rd
I chose this week to do a member diary, because I thought it would be a quiet and calm week after my teaching semester had ended, a week with plenty of time for cooking. But somehow I always think that, and I’m always wrong. This week my new class started, I had meetings and site visits everyday and many evenings.
That means that his diary ends up being what the CSA usually is in my house…something that has to be flexible and quick, something that is sometimes a chore, but often ends up making for the few moments of calm and pleasure in my running-around life. You will also get to watch the fun game that we play: how to use the random food items that we have collected in our house and turn them into something at least edible if not delicious. At this point, this is one of my favorite games, and I am so accustomed to cooking from a CSA share that have a really hard time figuring out what to do otherwise. You just go to a grocery store and look for things you want? Bizarre. After belonging to a CSA for 4 years, I find that rather overwhelming.
So here’s what we get at my house: James and I live together and get pretty much everything we can from the CSA. Since veggies haven’t started yet, right now, we get a berry share. We also get an egg share that we split with Caroline and a meat share that we split with Ryan & Rachael. This week was Ryan and Rachael’s turn to pick up the meat, so we didn’t get anything new, but we still had some stuff in the freezer from previous weeks. Until veggies start, the CSA is more of a wonderful dietary supplement, and we end up eating a lot more meat than we normally would. Most of the veggies in the entries below are from the Farmer’s Market or co-op. When we start getting lots of veggies each week, CSA food will be pretty much all we eat, except for a dinner or two out per week.
Monday night: Pick up — Bye bye, meat share! Have fun at Ryan and Rachael’s house!
At home, James cooked a sautee of Northwind Farms pork sausage, garlic scapes, scallions, broccoli rabe, and the little bit of asparagus we had leftover from our Grieg Farm share last week. Those things plus butter. Mmm, butter. I made rice with stock made of CSA veg and meat trimmings and scraps that I freeze and then simmer together.
Tuesday:
Breakfast: I wanted strawberries and yogurt but James ate all the yogurt. So I had strawberries and a stale roll. The strawberries prevented that from being a sad and depressing breakfast.
Lunch: Leftover sausage sautee thing
Dinner: I made too much rice to go with the sausage dish, plus a couple of our Feather Ridge Farm eggs had gotten cracked in a tragic bag knocking-over event. So I turned these items into a fried rice dish, with a little more pork sausage, , scallions, and peas. This was surprisingly quick and easy. You should make it. Just don’t put too much sesame oil in.
Wednesday:
Breakfast: I forgot to buy yogurt again. So I had strawberries and oatmeal. Better than the stale roll, but not quite the deliciousness that I know those strawberries are capable of.
Lunch: Leftover fried rice.
Dinner: Not CSA related. Another stale roll involved…you don’t want to know.
Drinks: One of my students very sweetly gave me a horrendous bottle of sickly sweet sparkling wine. In order to drink it, I pureed some strawberries and added some of this Czech liquer called Becherovka that my Mom had brought back from Prague a couple of years ago. Why? Because that’s what I had in my house.
Thursday:
Breakfast: For some reason I was starving when I woke up, so I had a sandwich with Feather Ridge Farm eggs, mozzarella cheese, and some chard. This was the last stale roll, but the eggs were so delicious that it really didn’t matter.
Lunch: Finally, I bought yogurt. Strawberries and yogurt…woo hoo! It was all I had dreamed.
Dinner: I roasted a Northwind Farms chicken, and we had burritos.
Drinks: Additional weird cocktails with that gross wine. Strawberries save the day again!
Friday:
Breakfast: I forgot to eat breakfast. Whoops!
Lunch: Leftover burrito and strawberries.
Dinner: Bruno came over and we used the rest of the chicken to make a green curry with green beans and eggplant. See how good it was?
Saturday:
Dog sitting and being lazy. No CSA cooking.
Sunday:
We have a plan. Moroccan stew with Northwind Farms beef, tomatoes, chickpeas, green beans, and potatoes.
And waiting to find out what we get tomorrow night…endless excitement!
Southside CSA 