COUGAR Member Diary

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In the five years we’ve been Southside CSA members, we’ve frequently planned a fall dinner party in order to share some of our haul and try out some more ambitious dishes to share in our blog post. This year we did have a party, but one of an entirely different sort. Since we welcomed Elias, our seven month old, into our family, our meals need to be fast and ideally sharable with a baby. We still like to entertain, though, so our recipes this week will feature two meals from the beginning of the weak meant to take us through a few days, a few lightning fast meals, baby friendly treats, and some party food from the Halloween bash we threw for Elias’s buddies and their parents.

This week’s share

We pick up bi-weekly, and we have the veggie, orchard, berry, egg, and meat shares. We began the week with several (still fresh!) leftover items from our previous week’s pickup due to some busy schedules, stomach viruses, and time spent out of town with our families. So, some items featured in this week’s meals are from the prior week.

Included in this week’s pickup: Apples, apple cider, red and yellow onions, decorative gourds (‘tis the season), popping corn, Swiss chard, two bunches of spinach, mustard greens, and a head of cabbage.

Beginning of the week meals

We began each of the last two weeks with soups.

Last week, we used up some of our CSA veggies with a corn chowder.

For this chowder we used:

  • Olive Oil
  • 3 strips of bacon
  • 2 onions (CSA)
  • 6 cups of chicken stock (we used a stock made from the scraps of a Northwind Farm chicken, veggie scraps, and some CSA lemongrass for kick)
  • 4 ears of corn, kernels off the cob, and two ears reserved for the soup
  • 3 waxy potatoes (store bought)
  • 2 Cups of Cream
  • Salt and Pepper
  1. We cooked the bacon in a bit of olive oil, then took it out of the pan.
  2. Then, we sautéed up a few small onions
  3. When those were soft, we added the stock and the corn. We threw in the cobs for extra flavor
  4. Then we added the potatoes. When everything was cooked through, we added cream and salt and pepper to taste.

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This lasted us through three dinners! Continue reading

Stephanie Member Diary

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Holy greens this week! This is what my partner, Brian, and I got in our MimoMex Veggie and Orchard half shares: mustard greens, red mustard greens, arugula, mizuna, spinach, broccoli, cilantro, onions, baby pumpkins, a Sugar Baby pumpkin, Empire apples, apple cider.
Monday:
Usually I try to clear out the fridge before my pickup so that there’s room for CSA goods and we don’t have any leftovers to eat (which would discourage us from cooking). That didn’t happen this weekend…we had guests over and ordered a ton of takeout one night instead of cooking, so not only did we have all those leftovers, we had a bunch of veggies that I’d been planning to cook. No room in the fridge!
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Steps I took to clear out the fridge and store the share goods:
1. Drank the last of some white wine to get rid of the bottle. Need to start somewhere!
2. Finished up some takeout for dinner. No cooking tonight; clearing/storing only.
3. Cut our losses and traded some wilting cilantro for this week’s lively cilantro. Put the new cilantro in a glass with water (like a bouquet of flowers) and with a small plastic bag over the top. Old cilantro went in a bin for composting.
4. To help the rest of the greens last longer and reduce their bulk: picked out the wilted ones, trimmed off the stems, washed and spun the leaves, and packed them in plastic containers lined and layered with paper towels. Way laborious but worth it.
5. Consolidated carrots and celery with some radishes from a previous share in a FoodSaver container since they’re all supposed to be stored the same way anyway (with moisture and the air vents closed) and none of them produce ethylene.

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Laura & Merav Member Diary

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My roommate and I share our CSA which is a half share of veggies, eggs, and orchard. This is our first year doing a CSA and we have been loving it! Here’s how we’ve been using the share this week:

Monday: After picking up the share, we decided to make a quiche with the spinach, corn, red onion (from two weeks ago), and eggs from the share. I just used a quick store bought crust, then I just sauteed up the veggies and added them to the crust. Then poured a mixture of 4 whisked eggs and about a half cup of milk plus salt and pepper on top. We added some shredded cheddar cheese and cilantro on top, then baked. This is a quick and easy meal that also makes great breakfasts or lunches throughout the week. We served the quiche with a salad using the Asian mixed greens and the radishes.
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Tuesday: Today we had vegetarian black bean tacos. I just used some simmered black beans and served the tacos with a salad using an ear of roasted corn, cilantro, red onion from 2 weeks ago, and a non-CSA tomato. On top I used a tomatillo salsa that I had from last week that is the recipe that you guys posted a few weeks ago. It is really yummy!
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Wednesday: Tonight we had Asian rice bowls (although I served it on a plate!), kind of a mix between Japanese and Korean flavors. This meal is also a good way to use up any random vegetables you may have lying around as you can pretty much throw whatever you want in here. The base is steamed Japanese sushi rice, then I added: steamed mustard greens, sliced radishes, and a soft boiled egg all from the share, plus some sliced avocado, kimchi from a jar that I had in the fridge, and chopped scallions. I just made a dressing with miso paste, rice vinegar, and sesame oil and drizzled that on top.
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Thursday: Dinner was Was leftovers tonight but I did get around to roasting my pumpkin from two weeks ago. Just roasted in the over then pureed in the food processor. I saved it in ziplocks and will keep in the freezer until I’m ready to make a pie!
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Friday and Saturday we didn’t cook. Sunday we made a soup with the other bunch of mustard greens and lamb sausage as well as some other random veggies thrown in. We served it with bread and cheese!!

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So that’s our menu for the week. We still have some greens and cilantro that we’ll use up this coming week!

Dillen Member Diary

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This is our friend Yvonne doing her distribution service on Oct.06th. She is the one who introduced us to the Southside CSA. She gave us her share on week while she was out of town and we were blown away!

Our family is 3 people- two adults and a 4 year old. The share we got from Yvonne was a full share with Veggies, Berries, Orchard, Meat and Eggs. It was the 4th of July weekend and we had way more food than we could handle. We had a bbq party and ate all we could of the amazing food.

We signed up right away!

Knowing that we couldn’t manage the massive amount of food, we asked our friends who are the same size family as us, to split a share. We chose to sign up for Veggies, Berries, Orchard and eggs.

We go to every distribution and split it up on the spot. every week we alternate who gets the eggs.

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This is our split. Half a bunch of red mizuna each 🙂 some times we just pick who wants what more.. We will take the spinach and they take the arugula..Depends on the mood.

Monday night distro has also turned into our daughters favorite night of the week. she sees her friends, stays out late,- drinks fancy virgin cocktails. Nice energy and great light in the Woods.

So for Oct.06 share: we took home corn, radishes, red mizuna, spinach, tomatillos, poblano peppers, cilantro, a half pound of Chilliquita peppers, apples, gourds, a pumpkin and mustard greens- not our week for the eggs.

 

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We live in manhattan - its a bit of a haul. we just got a car.

So for the week of eats> Continue reading

Dana & Zoe Member Diary - Week of Sept 29

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My Husband and I have half shares of vegetable, orchard, berry, egg and meat. Below is an example of how we use up all of the goodness!!

Monday night:To tired to cook, so we spent the evening sorting our share and eating leftovers- corn and turkey leg stuffed poblano peppers with tomatillo salsa.

2 Roast chicken and swiss chard

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Tomatillo Recipes from Swift Johnson Share

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Tomatillos can be a challenge for those not used to cooking with them. Share family Swift Johnson shares their favorite recipes in this Special Tomatillo edition of the Member Diary

Here are a couple of tomatillo recipes!!
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tomatillo salsa

Roasted Tomatillo Salsa

Total Time: 15 min

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 pounds fresh tomatillos
  • 5 fresh serrano chiles
  • 3 garlic cloves, unpeeled
  • 1/2 cup fresh cilantro
  • 1 large onion, coarsely chopped
  • 2 teaspoons coarse salt

Preparation

  • Preheat broiler.
  • Remove tomatillo husks and rinse under warm water to remove stickiness. Broil chiles, garlic, and tomatillos on rack of a broiler pan 1 to 2 inches from heat, turning once, until tomatillos are softened and slightly charred, about 7 minutes.
  • Peel garlic and pull off tops of chiles. Purée all ingredients in a blender.
  • Salsa can be made 1 day ahead and chilled, covered.

fried tomatillos

Fried Tomatillos

These are SO DELICIOUS as an appetizer. Lemony and fried and super tasty! Great served with marinara or any other sauce for dipping.

Ingredients:

  • Tomatillos
  • Flour
  • Egg
  • Breadcrumbs or cornmeal
  • Salt and pepper

Preparation:

  1. Mix salt and pepper into a cup or two of flour
  2. Whisk a couple of eggs
  3. Fill a small bowl or plate with breadcrumbs or cornmeal.
  4. Slice tomatillos into 1/4 inch slices
  5. Dip tomatillo slices in flour on both sides then shake off the excess. Then dip in egg on both sides.
  6. Finally, dip both sides in bread crumbs or cornmeal and fry in vegetable oil.
  7. Eat while hot!

 

Brock Member Diary - Week of Sept 15th

This week our vegetable share was: acorn squash, eggplant, tomatillos, poblano peppers, serrano peppers, tomatoes, lemon grass, onions, and kale. We also have a half berry share, which was a bag of apples, a pumpkin, and a (decorative?) gourd.

There are only two of us, and we try to use up or prepare and freeze everything each week. Our strategy is to eat the most perishable items first, and keep the more hardy veggies for later in the week. We didn’t get around to eating the acorn squash yet, but maybe we’ll be inspired next week.
To start, we decided to roast all of the peppers and the tomatillos in the oven to make a green chile stew with chicken. After they were roasted, we removed the seeds and ribs of the chiles, blended them with some chicken stock, and added the puree to some onions that were cooked in a little olive oil, and some shredded poached chicken. We ate this over rice with some cilantro and lime, and it was definitely a little spicy, but we enjoyed it.
Our next project was a snack of kale chips. We tore the kale into pieces, tossed it with some olive oil and salt and cooked it in the oven at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes.

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Meeshka Member Diary

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We split a Half Monty Deluxe between three households. Two of us have been part of the Southside CSA, so we generally know that once the blueberries start, you are in blueberry heaven for a few weeks, so we use a quick recipe to make some easy breakfast muffins.

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Wallace Shawn Member Diary - Week of June 23rd

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We are Maria, Quentin, and Hawkins (the cat). This is the first summer we’ve signed up for a CSA and we couldn’t love it more! The two of us pick up full berry and vegetable shares (orchard share to come!!).

This week we got four quarts of strawberries, four stalks garlic, two stalks of red onion, three stalks of white onion, a cute plastic bag of flor de calabaza, one bunch mizuna and one of Swiss chard, two pounds of snap peas (one from Greig Farm and one from Miromex) and a pound of mixed salad greens. We ran through most of it this week save for some leftover onions and garlic. And we’ve been able to lug everything back to our home in Ridgewood in three canvas tote bags.

Though we’ve planning to make strawberry preserves the way Maria’s grandmother likes to, this time we ate through all 4 quarts by Wednesday afternoon! Last week, we somehow managed to restrain ourselves enough to save a quart for a batch of strawberry biscuits… but not this time around.

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For breakfast, we often make scrambled eggs served on tortillas with some scraps of green veggies. This week we used cilantro and sugar snap peas. Both of us bring lunch to work during weekdays and we’ve been happily throwing the mixed salad greens on our turkey sandwiches for extra crunch. Yum! Continue reading

Marcel Forrest Member Diary - Week of June 16

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Marcel Forrest - We have a half share of veggies and eggs that feeds me (Jason) and my boyfriend (Marcel). I was so excited as this is my first year as a member of the CSA and my first share of veggies! I came to distribution not sure what to expect and was delighted by the variety.

This week’s haul
● 1/2 lb lettuce
● 1/2 lb baby bok choy
● 1/2 lb english peas
● 1/2 pound garlic scrapes (yea!)
● 1 bunch swiss chard
● 1 bunch cilantro
● 1 bunch garlic (4 pieces)

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One bag is enough to carry everything home.

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