In Your Share (Nov 14th edition)

I am very excited to announce our new partnership with my friend Katherine Deumling from Cook With What You Have. Starting this week, she is going to provide cooking tips, notes and recipes for everything in your CSA box! I originally met Katherine because she was on the Slow Food Portland steering committee they year I was selected to go to the Terra Madre conference in Turin Italy. What an amazing experience! I have been a Slow Food member and advocate ever since. It was also the start of a lasting friendship with Katherine. I have posted several times about her classes and often link to recipes on her blog. When she offered this option for our CSA members I couldn’t resist. I’ll continue my usual blog posts, but Katherine’s packet will provide you with a whole new level of inspiration for cooking all those beautiful vegetables!

Download your NEW Recipe Packet here!

This week your share may include…

  • Cauliflower or Broccoli: Your choice of cauliflower or broccoli. The white cauliflower variety is Candid Charm and the green ones are called Panther. The broccoli variety is Arcadia.
  • Cabbage: These nice big heads are really sweet & tender so they’ll make a great slaw. Try grating some kohlrabi, celeriac or rutabaga in with it too. I also think that on a cold fall evening there is not much better than braised cabbage. Try this recipe for cabbage with onion & poached egg inspired by Cathy Whims at Nostrana.
  • Celeriac/Celery Root: An ugly gnarly root with a lovely delicate celery flavor. This is an entertaining article about celeriac (though he doesn’t have very nice things to say about celery) and it includes a great recipe for Celery Remoulade (Céleri Rémoulade)
  • Celery: I love home grown celery. It is not quite as tender as the pampered ones grown down south, but it has much better flavor. It will make a fabulous Thanksgiving stuffing and also be a great addition to turkey soup. The variety is Utah Improved, which we like because it’s tasty, productive, and open pollinated too.
  • Onions, Candy: Most sweet onions (ie. Maui & Walla Walla’s) do not last very long in storage. Candy is the exception to that rule so now we can enjoy beautiful sweet yellow onions well into December.
  • Kohlrabi: In the winter we grow two giant varieties – Kossac and Superschmeltz. Unlike other kohlrabi, these can get BIG and still stay sweet and crunchy. I cut a few bulbs today for a friend who had never tasted kohlrabi and they likened it to jicama – except better!
  • Parsley: When we are blessed with these big beautiful bunches of flat leaf Italian parsley I treat it less like an herb and more like greens ie. chard, spinach, kale. I often chop up some of the greens and saute them as soon as I get home. They’ll keep in the fridge for up to a week and they’re ready to add to pasta, soup or eggs at any time. This makes the fit in the fridge much better too!
  • Rutabaga: This year the only variety we are growing is Gilfeather because it is so much better than any of the others we’ve tried! It is part of the Slow Food Ark of Taste, which catalogs delicious foods in danger of extinction. Mr. Gilfeather, the breeder, called it a turnip, but the lumpy root and coarse greens place it firmly in the rutabaga camp. Rave reviews and a recipe here.
  • Winter Squash: We’ll have mostly Acorn squash but there may be a few Pie Pumpkins available too.

Coming soon… Kale!!