Good Eats Weekly Newsletter - April 10, 2019

In Your Share This Week:

FANCY/ LOCALVORE (PURPLE)

Braising Greens, Mixed Baby Potatoes, Shallots, Sunchokes, Black Radishes, Beets, Shoots, and Kale or Chard

EVERYDAY STANDARD (YELLOW)

Spinach, Russet Potatoes, Yellow Onions, Beets, and
OUT OF THE BAG
Frozen Squash Puree

LEAN & GREEN


Mesclun, Spinach or Cress, Parsley, and Black Radishes



Pantry/ Localvore Items


Sweet Rowen Farmstead Cheese Curds: Squeaky, salty, and soooo delicious! I'm originally from Wisconsin and cheese curds are a staple item. In Vermont, folks often ask, "What do you do with them?" The easiest and best way, in my most humble opinion, is to just eat them! They are great to throw into a lunch bag or your daypack on a hike. You can also bread and fry them (in true WI style) or you can make them into poutine (in true Canada style), letting them get gooey and oozy over French fries and gravy. You could chop them up and add them to a salad, pizza, mac 'n cheese, lasagna, tacos. They're best when fresh, so I recommend eating them within the next few days.
Sobremesa KimchiSobremesa is a family-run fermented foods company located at Wild Rhythms Farm in Marshfield. There are two types of kimchi to select from, please only take one jar. If you've never had kimchi before, I suggest the "Gateway Kimchi" as it's less spicy and is a good first-timer kimchi. Kimchi is fermented cabbage. It's a probiotic, meaning it's healthy for your gut. Caitlin and Jason, the husband and wife team behind Sobremesa, recommend kimchi with eggs, using it as a condiment to top sandwiches, burgers, salads, or tacos. They love it with pork or suggest mixing it into fried rice or soup. Refrigerate it right away and it will keep for about a year.
Axel'ls Eggs: Fresh eggs from Axel McKenzie's hens!
Cheese Share: Mountain Ash from Sweet Rowen Farmstead!

Around the Farm

Spring is a time for transformation and change, when we witness the weather warming, the animals returning, the buds opening, and also when we take stock of our CSA. This spring, we're launching our new online platform! I'm excited to show it to you come May, when you'll be able to sign up for your summer CSAl
Members will have access to their own accounts. Instead of writing out checks for 17 weeks, you'll be on autopay. It's pretty slick, and I think you'll like it. You'll even be able to add or substitute items to your share really easily. There will be no separate payments for bulk orders; it'll all come out of the same pot of funds on your account!
Transferring this info and building the site is no easy feat, which is why it's taken so long. Along with the new system, we'll be packing your shares differently, which is also a big change for our farm crew. You'll have individually labeled, reusable share containers! We're still finalizing that portion of the share. Phew! Transformation indeed!
I know we're all ready for spring eating, too. Our greenhouses are changing quickly with the weather and with the arrival of our summer workforce! We'll meet them in the coming weeks. We've welcomed a few Jamaican fellows plus our Mexican amigos. Their energy and experience working at our farm has been appreciated by our year-round crew, and they've already made great progress in transplanting and seeding.
More to come! Stay tuned!
~Taylar
 

Storage Tips and Recipes

Every week we'll send you snapshots of veggies in your share. You can always find more recipes and storage info on our blog and website.
Greens: The mesclun includes claytonia, kale, shoots, spinach, and cress. The braising greens include sorrel, spinach, kale, and mustard.
Upland Cress: Use cress the same way you would watercress. Left raw, the leaves can be chopped and mixed into a salad, tucked into a sandwich, or tossed over broiled fish as a garnish. Use a food processor to blend a handful of cress with a cup of creme fraiche or sour cream and a few garlic cloves for a zesty side to grilled meats or blend into soups. Store in a plastic bag in your crisper drawer for 1-2 weeks.
Sunchokes: You might know of this plant as a beautiful yellow flower on tall stalks that blooms in summer. The tubrous roots, which appear in your shares, are also edible. Eat with or without the skin, and prepare as you would potatoes: roast, saute, bake, boil, or steam. They can be stored for a few weeks in your fridge.
Beets: We're nearing the end of our beet crop! You have the last of our gold beets or chioggias, an Italian variety, chioggias have alternating white and pink rings of color on the inside. The outside is lighter and more pinkish than traditional red beets. They are smooth and mild tasting. To prevent chioggias from bleeding their color, roast them whole then slice crosswise to show off the beautiful rings. Roasted this way, they make a stunning addition to a salad. Roast and store cooked chioggia beets separately from your red beets to prevent the chioggias from being dyed red.

Recipes

Sunchoke and Potato Gratin
This recipe comes from a blog whose writer first tried sunchokes in their CSA basket. If you're new to them too, this sounds like a great family-friendly way to try them out!
1 garlic clove
10 sunchokes (about golf-ball sized), sliced thin
2 medium russet potatoes, peeled and sliced thin
2 shallots, sliced thin
1/4 cup milk
1 cup grated fontina cheese
salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Spray a 9×9 ceramic dish with cooking spray. Cut the garlic clove in half and rub the cut sides onto the dish. Discard garlic.
Layer the potatoes evenly in the dish covering the entire bottom. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Layer the sunchokes evenly covering the potatoes. Sprinkle the sliced shallots on top of the sunchokes – and sprinkle again with salt and pepper. Pour milk all over the vegetables. Sprinkle with the fontina cheese.
Cover the dish with tin foil and bake for about 45 minutes. Take the cover off and bake for an additional 15 minutes. Make sure the sunchokes are soft – if not cook a little longer.

Simple Roasted Sunchokes
.5 pound sunchokes, sliced into half-inch rounds
.5 pound potatoes or carrots, sliced into half inch rounds
2 Tablespoons oil
1 TB lemon juice
Sprinkle with dried Rosemary or thyme
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Toss the sunchokes with the oil & lemon juice. Sprinkle with the herbs. Bake in a shallow gratin dish with the herbs for thirty to forty-five minutes or until done. (Pierce them with the tip of a knife. They should be mostly tender but offer some resistance. Don’t let them get mushy.) Sprinkle with salt and pepper and serve immediately.
Roasted Beet, Shoot and Sprout Salad
Serve this salad with a slice of the focaccia on the side for a light lunch or dinner, or serve it as an accompaniment for a heartier meal. Serves 4.
1 TB apple cider or white wine vinegar
1 TB minced shallot (optional)
sea salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
1/4 tsp sweet paprika
pinch cayenne pepper (optional)
1/8 tsp ground cumin
1 TB freshly squeezed lemon juice
6 TB sunflower or extra virgin olive oil
4 small to medium roasted beets, chopped in 1/2" pieces* 
2 cups mixed sunflower and radish shoots
1 cup sprouted beans
1/4 cup crumbled feta
1 TB toasted pine nuts
To make the dressing, combine the first 8 ingredients in a food processor. Taste and adjust seasonings to your liking. Toss together the beets, shoots, and sprouts. Sprinkle with cheese and pine nuts. Drizzle with desired amount of dressing. 
Baby Greens with Roasted Carrots and Potatoes
This is a wonderful early spring salad. Note that you may want to separate the beets and potatoes before cooking unless you want pink taters.
For vinaigrette
1/2 tablespoons tarragon white-wine vinegar
1/4 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 cup olive oil

For salad
2 medium carrots
1 lb small new potatoes (about 1 inch in diameter) or fingerlings (1 to 1 1/2 inches long), scrubbed well
1 teaspoon olive oil
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 bag shoots mesclun mix
1/3 cup fresh basil, chives or other fresh herbs
Whisk together vinegar, mustard, salt, and pepper. Add oil in a slow stream, whisking until emulsified. Put oven racks in upper and lower thirds of oven and preheat oven to 425°F.
Chop potatoes and beets into 1" chunks. Toss beets and potatoes with oil and salt in a small baking pan and roast in lower third of oven, shaking pan occasionally, until veggies are tender, 25 to 30 minutes. Add potatoes and carrots to all greens and herbs. Add vinaigrette and toss gently to coat.
Sauteed Onions
This recipe from Martha Stewart will work for either your yellow onions or shallots.
Coarse salt
1 1/2 pounds onions or small shallots, peeled
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 teaspoon finely chopped fresh thyme
Bring 6 cups water to a boil in a medium saucepan; add salt. Boil onions until softened, about 4 minutes. Drain, and pat dry. Set aside.
Heat butter and oil in a large saute pan over high heat, stirring to combine, until butter melts. Add onions, and cook, stirring occasionally, until browned, about 4 minutes. Reduce heat to medium-low; add thyme, and season with salt. Cover, and cook until onions are tender, 4 to 5 minutes. Serve warm.

Need to Skip a Week?

You can donate your share to the food shelf, receive a second share the following week, or receive a credit on your account. We ask for one week's notice.
Sorry, no changes to the week's delivery after 8 am on Monday of that week.
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Questions? Contact Taylar, goodeats@petesgreens.com

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