My CSA Passover

We celebrated Passover this year with a couple of great friends on Sunday evening (had to adjust for work conflicts on Monday evening, the official start of Passover). I hadn't participated in this Jewish holiday since I was 14 so it took some hours of pouring through search engine results to prepare everything.

I was able to use sweet potatoes, yukon potatoes, red potatoes, carrots, and apples from the farm share when cooking and preparing our meal.


The menu:
*Mock Chicken Soup from Vegetarians in Paradise
*Vegetarian Matzoh Balls from Epicurious
*Basic Chicken Broth Soup for the non-vegetarians at the table
*Potato Mushroom Kugel (pictured to the left)
*Apple Charoset
*Sweet Potato Kugel (pictured above)

Barley Brownies

This week's CSA gave me a bounty of Barley flour. I've used a whole slew of grain flours but can't recall ever using barley in baking before. So I did some online sleuthing and discovered the awesomeness of barley flour recipes! :-)

This afternoon I baked up a small batch of Bob's Red Mill Barley Brownies. I LOVE carob - both chips and powder - so this was quite the treat for my tastebuds. I used Himalayan salt instead of sea salt and added a smidgen more chopped walnuts than the recipe called for.

I'd love to find a version that doesn't include a half cup of vegetable oil, it seemed a little overkill for that much oil. Maybe I'll experiment with some oil and applesauce ratios...or do another google search.

(image Copyright David Thomson)

CSA Arugula: Chickpea Soup with Arugula

In February I tried Martha Stewart's Pasta with Roasted Vegetables and Arugula. It was delicious! I crumbled some Feta cheese on top which really ramped up the dish for me - I literally had 3 bowls of this before I forced myself to stop!

Last night I wanted to try something different with my CSA Arugula so I scoured the internet for recipes until I stumbled across Epicurious' Chickpea Soup with Arugula. Arugula, in a soup? Had to try it!

I used two of the carrots from the CSA box, a few leaves of just-picked basil from my AeroGarden, *two* cans of chickpeas, and the entire can of tomato paste (who uses only a tablespoon? what do you do with the rest of the can??). Oh, I also left off the cheese - it really didn't need it.

The soup was nice and the arugula wilted up a bit but still had a little crispness to it. I used the stick blender (thanks Uncle Ron and Aunt Leslie for the awesome wedding gift!) to puree about 1/4 of the soup which thickened the soup up just a bit.

The CSAs are coming the CSAs are coming!

For the first time in nearly a decade I'm involved in a CSA again. I'm tickled pink over it!

Back "home" in the mountains we had a very large organic garden with all of the accoutrements:
*Chickens - for fertilizer + eggs
*Goats - for fertilizer + milk
*Dogs - to chase the bears out of the compost
*Compost heap - those crunchy garden supply places have nothing on my momma's compost heap
*Recycled wooden pallets - for the potato growing boxes

At one time I signed up for a CSA that included manual labor as part of the program. You'd pay a reduced fee for volunteering a certain number of hours on the farm during peak planting or harvesting times. It was a lot of fun being shoulder-to-shoulder with other foodies while we tilled up the soil.

Alas my current home has the backyard equal to the square centimeters of the first class postage stamp with a 95% chance of shade from mid-June through September. I've become quite adept at container gardening but often the squirrels beat me to the harvest.

So here's my first box of the half share from Heavens Harvest Farm. Isn't it lovely? This is a half bushel of fresh fruit and vegetables - plenty for my partner and I for a week!

I can't wait to start trying out all manner of recipes as the CSA continues for the next 10 weeks.