Vegetables

Zucchini Carpaccio

Chuck Grimmett1 Comment

I came across this tweet from Julia Bainbridge just as the zucchini from the CSA and our own garden were starting to pile up. They are good grilled, but I’m always on the lookout for something different because they are so plentiful this time of year.

As Julia notes, she isn’t the first to come up with this, and neither am I. Just sharing the good news in this time of beaucoup squash.

You can make a full plate with one medium zucchini or squash, which makes an excellent side dish for two people.

For background, carpaccio is usually a thin-sliced meat dish dressed with an oil, an acid, and seasonings. You can apply that same framework to other foods, basically anything that you can slice thin and eat raw. It is almost like a quick pickle, but without the sugar.

It is definitely possible to slice the zucchini or squash with a sharp knife, but using a mandoline definitely helps. Here is the one I use, but it is by no means the best or even cheapest on out there.

Here are three recent variations I’ve made:

Zucchini sliced thin with dill, parmesan, tomatoes, borage flowers, lemon juice, and olive oil.

This one is zucchini sliced longways with dill, parmesan cheese, cherry tomatoes, Penzeys Tuscan Sunset, black pepper, lemon juice, olive oil, and borage flowers.

yellow squash sliced thin with cilantro, cotija, tomatoes, lime juice, and tajin.

This one is yellow squash sliced shortways like discs, which I find easier to eat, even though it doesn’t look as pretty as if it were sliced longways. It was meant to similar to the top one with parsley added, but when I realized after I chopped it that I had grabbed the cilantro instead of the parsley, I rolled with it and made a Mexican flavored one instead: Lime juice, olive oil, cotija cheese, cherry tomatoes, Tajin seasoning and cilantro.

This third carpaccio is roughly Middle East inspired: Sumac (since I didn’t have any za’atar on hand… this pandemic has kept me from Kalustyan’s!), feta, shaved carrots, lemon juice, and olive oil.

Some tips:

  • Use whatever you have in the fridge, pantry, or garden. Don’t make a special trip to the store for this.
  • Cheese is essential, no matter what kind it is. Every single zucchini carpaccio we’ve eaten this summer has been better with cheese.
  • Make it beautiful. Take a few extra minutes to make it look nice on the plate. Food that looks pretty tastes better.
  • This is best eaten outside. On a porch or in a yard if you have one, on the roof, stoop, or local park if you don’t. This is more about getting outside and tasting summer, especially during these pandemic times.
  • Your favorite spices will mostly likely work on this! Don’t worry, just try it.
  • Leverage fresh herbs from your garden, window box, or kitchen terra cotta pot that you sometimes forget to water. Knowing that you grew an ingredient makes it taste better and makes it more yours.

Sisters Hill Farm 2018 CSA: Week 9-13

Chuck Grimmett1 Comment

I’m back! It’s been a crazy summer with little time for writing. In the past month I went to Cleveland and Charleston, Amanda went to Philadelphia and Boston, then we both went to Nova Scotia. These CSA posts were on the back burner, but now we are back home and in the swing of things. So time for a recap.

Week 9:

  • Scallions, carrots, lettuce, green peppers, cucumbers, and tomatoes: Lunch salads!
  • Tomatoes and basil: Caprese salads
  • Kale: Baked into a frittata with sausage.
  • Beets: Boiled, peeled, and frozen for later in the year.
  • Squash, eggplant, and cilantro: Maqluba
  • Squash, Cilantro, eggplant, onion, garlic, and a few carrots: Thai green curry


Week 10:

We missed it, unfortunately.

Week 11:

We froze as much as we could from this week: The beans, eggplant, zucchini and squash, peppers, beets (boiled and peeled first), and carrots. We ate the lettuce in salads, used the kale in a breakfast frittata (which we do every week), used the red onion, some garlic, and parsley for a chimichurri that we put on steak, and the tomatoes in a giant caprese salad. We cut the watermelon up to take with us to Nova Scotia, but when we learned that you can’t take fruit across the border, we had to eat 2 out of 3 containers of it while waiting in the customs line at 9:30PM.

Week 12:

We missed this one, too. Summers are tough!

Week 13:

Back home and in the groove.

  • Leeks: One will be added to next week’s breakfast frittata with a red pepper and bacon. The other I’ll roast with the eggplant, a few beets, and some garlic for a vegetable side.
  • Scallions, peppers, cucumbers, a few tomatoes, and lettuce: Lunch salads! This week’s protein was a tri-tip that we cooked in the sousvide and seared.
  • I used the basil in a pesto that I served over polenta.
  • Cantaloupe: Cut up and eaten for breakfast or a snack!
  • Squash: Roasted as a side.
  • Tomatoes: So many! 24 of them. So far I’ve used them in/on:
    • Okra, chicken, and tomato stew
    • Focaccia bread topped with tomatoes and garlic
    • Pan con tomate
    • BLTs with homemade roasted red pepper mayo
    • Salads
    • …and we still have 11 left! I plan on using those in more salads, some salsa, and probably another round of BLTs.

Roasted Jerusalem Artichokes/Sunchokes

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Jerusalem Artichokes, also called sunchokes, are the edible tubers of a particular species of sunflower with the same name. They are found in the eastern half of the United States. Once cultivated as a popular food source by Native Americans, this ginger-resembling tuber rarely graces the table of Americans anymore.

Here is a photo of the plant 🌻 they come from, courtesy of Pinterest:

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rst encountered these last year in my CSA. I didn’t quite know what to do with them, so I tried putting them in a root vegetable mash. It was terrible. I don’t think it was the particular fault of the Jerusalem artichokes, it isn’t something I want to try again.

This year I tried something much better: Roasting them. The skin is completely edible, the flesh breaks down to the consistency of a soft, mushy potato, and the edges caramelize nicely. They have a slightly sweet, somewhat nutty, earthy flavor.

Fun fact: Jerusalem artichokes are about 3/4 inulin, so if you are a diabetic, you’d do well to substitute these in place of potatoes 🥔 in your meals a few times a week. Inulin has minimal impact on blood sugar.

Roasted Jerusalem Artichokes

Ingredients

  • Small bag of Jerusalem artichokes. The bags my CSA gives out are about 12oz each.
  • 1/8 cup Olive oil
  • 1 tablespoon Rosemary
  • 1 tablespoon Salt
  • 1 teaspoon Black Pepper

Instructions

  1. Preheat your oven to 400F.
  2. Scrub the dirt off of the Jerusalem artichokes. Leave the skin on, it is edible.
  3. Cut them in half long-ways. You can also quarter them if they are particularly large.
  4. Toss them in a bowl with olive oil, salt, pepper, and rosemary.

  5. Spread them cut side down on a foil-lined baking sheet.

  6. Roast for 20 minutes. (I decided to add roasted garlic powder here at the last minute when they came out of the oven. I don’t think it was necessary and I probably won’t use it next time.)

  7. Serve.

Other flavors I think would work well with Jerusalem artichokes:

  • Butter, mushrooms and thyme
  • Butter and sage
  • Garlic and cheese (you could make these into a gratin!)
  • Bacon, cheese, and scallions. Think potato soup. These actually purée up into a creamy soup base.

Freeze Your Summer Vegetables

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When you have a garden or are part of a CSA you tend to get a lot of vegetables in at once.  If you can’t use them all right away, it is a good idea to save them for later in the year when fresh vegetables aren’t as easy to come by. If you have the freezer space, freezing your veggies is a fast and easy way to save some of those summer flavors for the colder months.

Some vegetables get mushy or soft after they are frozen and thawed, so they aren’t great for every use. Here are some common vegetables we like to freeze and what we use them for afterward:

  • Zucchini – Great for soups or dishes like Mushy Zucchini where it is okay that it is soft.
  • Squash – We love yellow squash in vegetable soups.
  • Green beans – Soups, steamed and then sauteed with garlic, or included in stir frys or cauliflower fried rice.
  • Cherry tomatoes – Even frozen cherry tomatoes make a killer quick pasta sauce.
  • Carrots – Soups!
  • Cabbage – Primarily sickie soup.
  • Kale – Kale holds up surprisingly well after being frozen. As long as you are cooking it, you can use it for pretty much any kind of recipe. We’ll probably saute it or add it to soups.
  • Spinach – Garbanzos con Espinacas y Jengibre
  • Bell peppers – We like to freeze red peppers for roasted red pepper and tomato soup. Green and yellow peppers we dice up and use for breakfast skillets all winter long.
  • Hot peppers – Great for chilis, stews, and sauces.
  • Pumpkins and butternut squash – We roast and puree the pumpkins and butternut squash before freezing them. We use it for soups, breads, cookies, and pies.
  • Corn – We like to cut it off the cob before freezing it. We put it in soups, use it for esquites, and other corn salads.
  • Peas – We add them to stir frys and cauliflower fried rice.
  • Broccoli and Cauliflower – These tend to get a little pushy after being frozen, so we prefer to use them in soups. Sometimes I use frozen broccoli in frittatas.

Preparation

Wash, dry, and chop your vegetables for their intended use before freezing them. You won’t be able to separate them when they are frozen, and if you wait to do it until they are thawed, they are more difficult to cut.

Vacuum Sealing

The best way to prevent freezer burn is with a vacuum sealer. These things are worth their price several times over. They completely elimate freezer burn and allow you to store things in the freezer much longert than would otherwise be possible. We also use ours to freeze meat, soups, broths, and leftovers.

Buying them on Amazon is the fastest way to get them, but not always the cheapest. For a good price, go to your local clearance store (Big Lots, TJ Maxx, Marshalls, Bargain Bin, etc). We got ours for 70% off the retail price at one of those places. It is four years old and still cranking.

Dating & Inventory

Always write the date you froze something on the packaging. I know you think you’ll remember, but you probably won’t. I’ve made that mistake more than once. Just take the extra thirty seconds to write the date on them. I also like to write what it is just incase two things look very similar.

Bonus points if you keep an inventory list of what is in your freezer. To be honest, I don’t. I do keep a list of the vegetables in my fridge, though. They have a much smaller usage window.

What I’m Doing With My CSA Shares: Week 5

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We are on the Whole 30 again this month, so we are limiting our use of these veggies a little bit. I added some non-Whole 30 options so that you don’t have to suffer with us.

  • Green Leaf Lettuce – Once again, this is getting turned into salad for lunches and a dinner side. 2 heads should last us all week.
  • Cucumbers – These will get chopped up for salads and turned into spears for snacks. If you are having dairy, I suggest slicing these and making a salad with sour cream, dill, and onions.
  • Carrots – We’ll shred a few for salads and then probably roast the rest. I might grab one for an afternoon snack. If we weren’t on the Whole 30, I’d use the tops to make some pesto and eat it with burrata cheese.
  • Zucchini – We turned a few of these into zucchini noodles with a spiral attachment for our Kitchenaid mixer and making a quick cherry tomato sauce with basil and chicken sausage. We’ll slice up the rest and roast it in the oven with some spices as a side dish. 
  • Basil – We cut half of this into a chiffonade and put it in the zucchini noodles with the cherry tomato sauce. We’ll use the rest for pesto or adding to a fresh vegetable salad. We are on the Whole 30 again this month, so we’re foregoing putting this on homemade pizza or caprese salad.
  • Scallions – We’ll include the scallions in salads, in breakfast bowls, or in carnitas bowls.

Why You Should Join a CSA

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What is a CSA?

A CSA, Community Shared Agriculture, is a system where people pay a farm in advance at the beginning of the growing season for a share of the season’s produce. Fresh produce is delivered (or picked up) once a week for the season, which usually lasts 20-22 weeks.

What are the benefits?

Healthy Eating

You never know what you are going to get. Every week is a surprise! You can, however, always count on it being fresh and high quality. CSAs allow you to make a one-time choice that enables healthy eating for the following 22 weeks. Having a wide variety of fresh vegetables on hand each week without having to make the conscious choice every time of what to buy makes cooking healthy meals easier. We definitely eat healthier during CSA season!

A Chance to Be Creative

We hate wasting food, so we always get creative and use as much as we possibly can every week. I ramp up my canning, preserving, freezing, and broth-making during CSA season so we can enjoy the abundance of great flavors during the winter, too.

Eating New Things

A CSA will expand your food horizons. How often would you choose to buy sunchokes, kohlrabi, rutabagas, tatsoi, or patty pan squash at your local store? How often do you even see those things on the shelves? Local farmers often grow heirloom varietals that are tastier and more exciting than what gets shipped in to grocery stores. Did you even know there were dozens of kinds of garlic? Have you ever tasted a green tiger tomato?

Getting Closer to your Food’s Source

This will be the fifth year that Amanda and I have participated in a CSA. For the last two years we’ve been part of one from the Peace and Carrots Farm. Farmer Laura Nywening delivers to the Yonkers Farmers’ Market on Friday afternoons. Almost everything is picked on the same day it is delivered!

Laura stayed around the market after her delivery a few times and it was fun picking her brain about the farm. She taught me all about hardneck vs softneck garlic, the Rocambole varietal she grows (which is excellent), and we talked about saving seeds. She is passionate about growing the tastiest, healthiest produce and using sustainable farming practices. We love knowing where our vegetables come from, who planted them, and who picked them. We even get to follow the farm’s progress on Instagram!

What do you get? What does it cost?

In 2016 I decided to keep track of everything we received during the season. I looked up what each of these items would cost if delivered from Peapod, a local delivery service. I picked the price for organic items when I could find them and searched other sites when there were items Peapod doesn’t sell.

We paid $495 at the beginning of the season (which breaks down to $22.50 per week). According to my unscientific analysis, the awesome stuff we received from Peace and Carrots Farm would have cost us around $612 from Peapod. An extra $117 worth of organic produce is nothing to sneeze at!

Here is my data. I’m sure it is slightly off because I collected it by hand in an unstructured way, but it is in the ballpark. I recorded some week late from memory and we missed two weeks because we were traveling, so I estimated by copying either the previous or following weeks.

Here is (roughly) what we received over the 2016 season:

Item Quantity
Acorn Squash 2
Arugula (bag) 5
Beets (bunch) 4
Bok Choy 5
Broccoli 2
Broccoli Rabe 2
Butter lettuce 2
Butternut Squash 1
Cabbage 3
Carrots (bunch) 5
Celery (bunch) 2
Chard (bunch) 3
Collards (bunch) 1
Cucumbers 21
Delicata Squash 4
Eggplant 5
Fennel bulb 1
Flowering Sage 1
Garlic (head) 2
Garlic Scapes (bunch of 3) 2
Grape tomatoes (pint) 10
Green beans (bag) 2
Green Leaf Lettuce 9
Green peppers 34
Green tiger tomatoes 16
Heirloom tomatos 8
Hot peppers 56
Kale Bunches 10
Lavender (bunch) 2
Long Island Cheese Pumpkin 3
Mint (bunch) 1
Muir Lettuce 3
Onions 22
Oregano (bunch) 2
Patty Pan Squash 2
Pie Pumpkin 1
Poblano Peppers 14
Potatoes (bag) 6
Radish bunches 6
Red Leaf Lettuce 7
Rutabaga 4
Sage 1
Scallion bunches 6
Spaghetti Squash 1
Spinach (bag) 1
Sugar Snap Peas (bag) 3
Sunchokes 1
Tatsoi (bunch) 2
Thyme (bunch) 1
Tomatoes 31
Turnips (bunch) 4
Zucchini 47

 

Here are photos of 8 of the 22 shares. Peace and Carrots farm always sends a great variety! I grabbed these photos of of their Instagram because I forgot to take my own. Some data collector I am! (Also, corn must have been one of the weeks I was out of town because it isn’t in my sheet. Bummer.)

 

Find a CSA Near You

You need to sign up before the growing season starts, so you have about a little over a month left.

If you are near Chester or West Point, NY, sign up for the Peace and Carrots Farm CSA.

If you are near Yonkers, NY, sign up for the Peace and Carrots Farm CSA through Groundwork Hudson Valley.

There are CSAs all around the US, so find one near you through LocalHarvest.org!

If you do join one, spend some time getting to know the farmer and learning about what you eat. You will appreciate your meals on a deeper level.

Whole 30 Breakfast Bowls

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During our Whole 30, one of our go-to breakfast options on weekends were bowls of delicious veggies, meat, and eggs. We usually only eat two big meals on weekend days, so this is larger and more filling than a breakfast we’d eat during the week. It fills us up and keeps us going until dinner.

The Basic Formula

Vegetable and/or Starch Base + Meat + Eggs + Avocado + Toppings. This simple formula yields a lot of variation:

  • Vegetables: Brussels sprouts, broccoli, carrots, kale, cauliflower,  onions, peppers, and fresh beets all make great veggie bases for breakfast. We love buying some of each of these, chopping them up, and mixing them together. If you have a grating attachment for your food processor, that makes it easy. Also check if your grocery store sells these items pre-chopped. It might be just a little more expensive, but it makes healthy breakfasts a breeze. Sautee these items in your the skillet with a little olive oil for 5-10 minutes over medium high heat.
  • Starch: About half of our breakfast bowls have either sweet potatoes or regular potatoes in them. We either shred them with our mandolin, grate with the food processor attachment, or finely dice them before cooking them in the skillet with a little fat over medium high heat for 20 minutes. You can also roast them in the oven at 400F for 20 minutes if you prefer that.
  • Meat: Bacon or sausage. We chop it up finely, throw it in a skillet, and cook it until it is crispy. Make sure your bacon and sausage doesn’t have sugar if you want to stay Whole 30 compliant. Sometimes we use leftover carnitas, ham, or turkey. Use what you have!
  • Eggs: I like my eggs either soft-scrambled or fried. I use Gordon Ramsay’s scrambling method and J. Kenji Lopez-Alt’s frying method.
  • Avocado: We prefer Hass over Florida avocados.
  • Toppings: Toppings vary: Sprouts, homemade mayo, cheese (only if you aren’t doing a Whole 30!), radishes, cilantro, scallions, hot sauce, etc. Put on whatever you like!

Here are some examples of breakfast bowls we’ve consumed over the past month:


This is really just another variation on the weekend special, but it has been a go-to for us during and after our Whole 30. We even made it for dinner once.

Sous Vide Asparagus

Chuck Grimmett2 Comments

Asparagus is so easy to make in the oven, so why should you make it in a sous vide circulator?

  • More intense asparagus taste.
  • Easier clean up.
  • Same length of prep and cooking time.

Sold? Here’s what you need and what to do with it:

Just looking for time and temp suggestions?  175F (79.44C) for 15 minutes will give you asparagus that is still firm with a bit of bite left in it.

Ingredients

  • 1 lb of fresh asparagus
  • 3 tbsp olive oil
  • Zest from one small lemon (or half a large one)
  • Salt and pepper

Instructions

  1. Trim the tough bottom part off of the asparagus stems.
  2. Put the trimmed asparagus in a bag with the olive oil, lemon zest, salt, and pepper.
  3. Seal the bag (vacuum seal or ziplock with the water displacement method).
  4. Cook in the sous vide water bath at 175F (79.44C) for 15 minutes.
  5. Remove the asparagus from the bag and serve immediately.
Asparagus in the sous vide circulatorsous vide asparagus with lemon zest

Sous Vide Corn on the Cob

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Do you want incredibly easy, delicious, self-buttering, minimal clean-up corn on the cob? If you have a sous vide circulator, look no further.

  1. Take 2-4 shucked cobs of sweet corn and seal them in a bag with a few tablespoons of butter. Or, if you don’t have a vacuum sealer, put them in a ziplock bag and use the water displacement method to remove the air before sealing it.
  2. Cook them in your sous vide water bath for 30 minutes at 182F (83.3C).
  3. Take the bag out, cut it open, and serve!
Fresh cornCorn sealed with butter
Corn in the sous vide water bathSous vide corn!

Chuck eating corn