Sharing the Share

I'm making an effort to describe how we use the CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) share we get each week. I showed pictures of the farm during our end of season party last year in this post. This CSA and others work by having a farmer paid early and up front to buy his seeds and employ his workers with the promise that shareholder will receive a portion of the crop each week. What you receive is based on what is growing well. Shareholders benefit in wonderful years and take the risks with the farmer in times of drought or blight.

 This is our 5th year of doing a CSA with 2 different farmers and we've never been disappointed. It has really expanded the kinds of vegetables we eat. I had to do quite a bit of cookbook and recipe searching the first time I got fennel and turnips and so many greens. But now I can whip up so many different things no matter what arrives. I've become very experimental and capable.

Here is a photo of last week's box unpacked. It includes fava beans, turnips, lettuces, cucumbers, beets, carrots, chard, summer squashes, fennel, cilantro, fresh garlic and some other herbs. This is a typical early summer box. But it will be very different in a few weeks in full summer with tomato and eggplant. Fall brings other root crops and winter squashes. The produce changes week by week throughout the season.



My lunches for much of the week looked like this perhaps with a cheese or egg sandwich added if I was very hungry. There are veggies from the share, peas from our own garden, blue cheese crumbles. I dress it lightly with balsamic vinegar.



One of the first nights I made veggie pancakes with squashes, carrots, garlic, cilantro with potatoes, onion, eggs, flour, salt and pepper added from the pantry.

Ingredients are shredded by hand with a box shredder.

 

Frying about 5 minutes per side in vegetable oil. I drain them on paper towels and they are great served with apple sauce, salsa or sour cream.

 

Another night was greens with pasta and sausage. Sadly, I was too anxious to eat, and forgot to take a photo of the completed dish. But here are the chopped ingredients: turnip greens, beet greens and chard. In the glass pot are onions and fennel sliced. I saute 1/2 lb sausage from the farm across the street, add the onions and fennel when there is no pink left in the sausage. When those are soft I add the greens and steam for just a few minutes. While all that's going on, I boil a pound of pasta. It gets added to the veggie/sausage mix along with romano cheese. YUM! This is a common and flexible recipe for us. This feeds our family of 4.



Here's a salad night finishing up what's left before today's share comes. Three salads plus eggs with cheese.  There's shredded carrot salad with raisins soaked with a little orange juice and honey. Squash sauteed with a few peas and green beans from our garden, and green mix with roasted beets.