03 November 2007

CSA Week 22 - Tomatoes, Strawberries, Squash and Kale

We finally turned the heat on on Wednesday, the same day that I picked up a quart of tomatoes from the CSA. And yesterday, there were strawberries at the greenmarket. Local strawberries! In November! I bought 2 pints. How could I pass them by? But, what strange weather it's been.

  • Potatoes (~3 1/2 lbs)
  • Cauliflower
  • Toscana Kale
  • Beets (3, ~2 lbs)
  • Salad Mix
  • Tomatoes (quart)
  • Red Onions (3)
  • Parsley

Brave girl that I am, I finally tackled a squash - one of the acorn squashes from a week or two ago. It smelled revolting while I was scraping the seeds out, it smelled disgusting in the oven, it smelled nauseating while I was spooning the pulp out of the shell. But I persisted and made Pinknest's pumpkin bread - without icing, with some whole wheat flour, with dried lemon peel instead of fresh orange rind, and with freshly cooked acorn squash in lieu of canned pumpkin. It's terrific. Even the girl and the husband had some. Of course, it's not really bread. It's cake. There's no two ways about it.

For dinner tonight, I may try a recipe for the black kale that was in the Times last week - a salad of raw kale with a garlicky cheese-laced dressing. Then again, it's blustery and raw, and salad might not be in the cards.

7 comments:

Julia said...

Strawberries? I wants them, my precious, I wants them.

And I love squash. Love it, love it, love it. More to the point, my sister made yummy squash soup yesterday, and I am going to get the recipe. Interested?

josetteplank.com said...

I love kale.

It's dirty, kinky just how much I love kale.

thirtysomething said...

Yum. I LOVE squash. Especially butternut and acorn. Perfect winter comfort foods - all hot, savory and aromatic. Just, yum.

BipolarLawyerCook said...

I love tuscan kale, and that salad is good. (I made it right away. Yep. Kale nerd.) But it's wonderful stewed with onions in olive oil, and sundried tomatoes or black olives stew along nicely, too. Great with fresh parmesan on fresh lemon juice and red pepper flakes too. Mmm. Now I'm hungry.

Janet said...

Strawberries? I'm jealous. Although we still have yellow raspberries on our bushes. It's the craziest thing. Every time we go outside the toddler says, "bappies" and heads back to where the bushes are because she loves eating them right off the canes. I follow pessimistically stating that they are probably all gone. So far I'm always wrong.

It's weirding me out.

Julie McCoy said...

I rather enjoyed sauteed kale with miso. I think Eileen serves hers with dried cherries.
Meanwhile, although I only tolerate butternut, I do rather enjoy acorn squash. Lately, I'm all about soup:
Hack a squash into chunks and scrape out seeds. Put in a roasting pan, drizzle with olive oil, throw in some whole unpeeled garlic cloves and thyme branches, add salt and pepper (if you're lucky, you have the hook up to get kick ass salt from France). Cover with foil and bake at 375 for about an hour. Meanwhile, core & chop 2 small apples, 1 carrot, and some onion. Saute in a sauce pan. Once squash is baked and cooled, peel it, chop it and add to saucepan, along with the peeled roasted garlic. Add about 3 cups broth. Simmer about 15 minutes and process with immersion blender. Add some 1/2 & 1/2. Let me know if you need me to come out and make it for you.....

thrice said...

One of the tricks that I learned from "The Sneaky Chef" was to use whole wheat pastry flour in lieu of white flour. I have to say that I can't taste the difference. I made a strawberry-rhubarb crisp and was quite disturbed, when there wasn't any left, when I went for seconds.

Have you also tried http://www.epicurious.com? I feel like I don't need to buy another cookbook again. Except of course, for "The Sneaky Chef."