October 4, 2018 - This Week's Box Contents, Featuring Winter Squash

Cooking With This Week's Box

Baby Beets:  Wine Braised Beets with Garlic Mashed (smashed) Potatoes

Carrots:  Curried Spaghetti Squash & Chickpea Toasts (see below)

Sweet Yellow & Red Onions:  Curried Spaghetti Squash & Chickpea Toasts (see below);  Stuffed Winter Squash (see below);  Pasta with Braised Onion Sauce;  Apple, Pecan Arugula Salad; Wine Braised Beets with Garlic Mashed (smashed) Potatoes

Garlic:  Cauliflower Patties; Wine Braised Beets with Garlic Mashed (smashed) Potatoes; Romanesco Cacio e Pepe

Orange Italian Peppers:  Cheesy Fajita Chicken Bake

Poblano Peppers:  Cheesy Fajita Chicken Bake

Broccoli or Broccoli Romanesco:  Romanesco Cacio e Pepe

White or Yellow Cauliflower:  Cauliflower Patties.

Masquerade or Harvest Moon Potatoes:  Wine Braised Beets with Garlic Mashed (smashed) Potatoes

Sugar Dumpling Squash:  Stuffed Winter Squash (see below)

Spaghetti Squash:  Curried Spaghetti Squash & Chickpea Toasts (see below)

Baby White turnips:  Turnip Greens Pesto Pizza

Baby Arugula:  Apple, Pecan Arugula Salad

While we managed to skirt the first potential frost last weekend, we do find ourselves in the first week of October!  Fall is here and summer vegetables are nearly gone while fall crops are filling their void.  Sweet potatoes should be ready for delivery next week!  This week though, our focus is on winter squash.  Lets kick off our cooking escapades with the two featured recipes.  Spaghetti squash is often used in casseroles or other preparations as a substitute for pasta.  I appreciated this recipe for Curried Spaghetti Squash & Chickpea Toasts (see below) because it is something different!  You could make these to serve as an appetizer, snack, a light dinner with a salad, or even breakfast with a fried egg!  The other squash recipe featured this week is most appropriate to make with the sugar dumpling squash.  Alana Chernila’s recipe for Stuffed Winter Squash (see below) is pretty easy to assemble once you have prepped the filling ingredients and have cooked the squash.  This would be an easy recipe to prep at the beginning of the week and then just assemble some night during the week when you need to pull together dinner quickly. 

I love onions and can’t imagine having too many, but sometimes they start to pile up which means it’s time to choose a recipe where they can take the center stage.  So this week, clean up your extra onions with this recipe for Pasta with Braised Onion Sauce.  Also on Food52, I found this recipe for Cauliflower Patties.  I’m going to make these for dinner and serve them along with this Apple, Pecan Arugula Salad using the Honeycrisp Apples that are in our fruit share this week from our local Hoch orchard.

For my next recipe suggestion, I turn to Andrea Bemis’s blog, Dishing Up the Dirt.  If you haven’t read this week’s main newsletter article, please do.  I talk about Andrea’s Local Thirty challenge and her experiences with sourcing more of her food from local sources.  This is her recipe for Wine Braised Beets with Garlic Mashed (smashed) Potatoes.  Serve this on its own or Andrea recommends serving it with meat (such as a grilled steak) or lentils.  Mash the potatoes gently as this week’s potato varieties are more on the waxy side which means the potatoes may get sticky if you work them too much.  Unless you still have potatoes and/or baby beets from last week, you may need to scale the recipe back a bit as the quantities she calls for potatoes and beets are a little more than is in your box this week.  The beets are small enough that they can be braised whole. 

We’re happy to have the baby white turnips back for their fall appearance!  If you didn’t have a chance to try this recipe for Turnip Greens Pesto Pizza that we featured earlier in the spring, now’s your chance!  Of course these pretty little things are also delicious when simply steamed along with their greens and served with butter. 

So sad to see pepper season end, but before they’re gone I want to try this recipe for Cheesy Fajita Chicken Bake.  The recipe calls for bell peppers, but we can use this week’s sweet Orange Italian Frying peppers and poblano peppers.  Serve this with Spanish rice or even some simple roasted potatoes.

Every week needs a quick pasta dish and this week’s is Romanesco Cacio e Pepe, a fancy Italian way of saying simple pasta dish with cheese and black pepper!  Of course the real star of this dish is the cool Broccoli Romanesco, which is described as the “Lady Gaga of Broccoli” in the article featuring this recipe. 

And once again we’ve cooked our way to the bottom of another CSA box.  Have a great week, eat well, and get your sweet potato recipes ready for next week!—Chef Andrea

Vegetable Feature: Winter Squash

Fall is definitely in the air, nights are cool and the trees are starting to show signs of turning.  That means it’s time for us to get serious about fall vegetables...including winter squash!   We are thankful to have had a bountiful harvest this year and our greenhouse where we store them is filled with a colorful array of different varieties.  Before we go any further with delivering winter squash I want to pause and talk a little bit about general tips and info for storing and using winter squash, as well as a little more information about the varieties in this week’s box. 

First of all, lets talk about storage.  The ideal temperature for long term storage of squash is between 45 and 55°F in a dry location. This is a bit more chilly than most of your homes, so know that it’s ok to store them on your kitchen counter at a warmer temperature as long as you keep your eye on them.  You do not want to store squash in the refrigerator or in an uninsulated garage where the temperatures could dip below 45°F once winter sets in.  At temperatures less than 45°F squash is vulnerable to chill injury.  What does it mean to “keep your eye on the squash?”  If you notice any sort of a spot starting to form or any signs of deterioration, you need to intervene immediately.  A small spot doesn’t mean the squash is bad or needs to be composted, rather it means you need to eat it right away!  Just cut away the bad spot and use the rest.  If you leave it unattended, the spot will continue to grow and consume your squash….which is what we do not want to happen!  Even if you are not quite ready to eat the squash, I encourage you to cook it anyway.  Winter squash is a great vegetable to cook in advance and freeze.  It’s super quick and easy to pull precooked squash out of the freezer in the middle of the winter and heat it up to eat as a side dish or incorporate it into baked goods or other dishes.  The main thing is, don’t let it go to waste!  If I have a pile of squash on my counter, I like to bake a lot at one time….the oven is already hot and if you’re going to make a mess it’s better to clean up just once!

There are certain varieties of winter squash that store better than others.  In general, varieties with a thinner skin and higher sugar content are going to be the most perishable.  You’ll want to eat these sooner than later, usually within a few weeks of receiving them.  Some of the varieties that fit this description include this week’s sugar dumpling as well as the orange kabocha squash we delivered previously.  Soon you’ll be receiving honeynut butternut squash in your boxes, and this is another one to eat soon.  Regular butternut squash, butterkin and festival squash are usually the ones that last the longest, so these are the ones you might choose to store into winter.  You’ll notice I didn’t mention spaghetti squash.  This squash is not the sweetest variety and the skin isn’t terribly thin, however our experience is that this squash may not store as long as the butternut and festival.  While you may have a little more time, I wouldn’t recommend planning to store this one into the winter months.

Winter squash is easy to cook.  The method I employ most frequently is to simply cut the squash in half and scrape out the seed cavity.  I place it, cut side down, in a baking dish and add a little bit of water to the pan, enough to cover the bottom of the pan and come up about ¼-½ an inch on the squash.  I bake it in the oven at about 350°F until it is tender when poked with a fork.  Once tender, I remove them from the oven and flip them over so the cut side is up.  I allow them to rest until they are cool enough to handle, then scoop out the flesh.  When you scoop the seed cavity out, remember that the seeds are edible as well.  Squash that have smaller seeds that are more tender may be rinsed, dried and then toasted.  

Spaghetti Squash

There are other methods of cooking squash including roasting or steaming it.  Depending on the end result you may choose to peel the squash first.   Roasted squash is a sweet treat and can be made just as you would roast any other vegetable.  You may also choose to peel the squash and cut the flesh into pieces to add to soups, stews, curries, etc. 

This week we’re delivering spaghetti squash and sugar dumpling squash.  We grow a variety of spaghetti squash that is smaller than the ones you generally see in the store, thus it’s a bit more manageable to use and consume!  Spaghetti squash differs from other squash in that the flesh can be scraped away from the skin in strands that look like spaghetti, hence the name.  It has a very mild flavor and goes well in many savory preparations. 

Sugar Dumpling Squash

The other squash in this week’s box is sugar dumpling squash.  This is one of our sweetest most flavorful varieties.  This one is delicious just baked and served with salt, pepper and butter!  It’s also a good one for stuffing, and is a good one to use in this week’s recipe for Stuffed Winter Squash. 

There are so many different ways to incorporate winter squash into your diet this fall and winter, so we encourage you to get creative and try some new recipes.  Soups, stews, curries, simple purees, gratin, root and squash mashes, roasted, incorporated into ravioli, pasta dishes, baked goods, pies and desserts.  The list could go on.  If you find some recipes you like, we always appreciate it when you share them with us!

Stuffed Winter Squash

Yield: 4 Servings

2 sugar dumpling or festival squash, cut in half through the stem and seeded

2 tsp olive oil, plus more for rubbing the squash and oiling the dish

¾ tsp kosher salt

6 oz chorizo, sweet sausage, or bacon crumbled or cut into small pieces

1 medium red onion

1 cup chopped apple (1 to 2 apples)

Freshly ground pepper

2 cups sliced tender greens (spinach, tat soi, kale, Swiss chard), cut into ribbons

4 fresh sage leaves, coarsely chopped

2 cups cooked millet, rice, or quinoa

½ cup grated Cheddar cheese

1. Preheat the oven to 375° F.  Rub the flesh of each squash half with olive oil, and oil an ovenproof dish or baking sheet.  Sprinkle the whole baking dish with ½ tsp of the salt.  Lay the squash flesh side down in the dish and bake until it is very tender when pricked with a fork, 30 to 40 minutes.  Remove the squash from the oven and raise the oven temperature to 425° F.
2. Meanwhile, heat the remaining olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat.  Add the meat and fry until browned.  Remove from the pan and set aside.  Add the onions to the hot oil and cook until soft, about 3 minutes.  Add the apple, remaining ¼ tsp salt, and pepper, and cook for another minute.  Add the greens, sage, cooked grains, and reserved meat.  Cook for another minute, stirring to combine, and remove from heat.  Taste, and adjust the salt and pepper if needed.
3. Turn the cooked squash over in the baking dish so it is flesh side up.  (Be careful, as steam will escape when you turn it.)  Scoop the filling into the cavity of each squash half, piling it into a mountain so that it holds as much as possible.  Sprinkle with cheese and bake until the cheese melts, about 10 minutes.

Recipe borrowed from Alana Chernila’s book, The Homemade Kitchen.

Curried Spaghetti Squash and Chickpea Toasts

Yield: 6 servings

1 spaghetti squash (2-3 if small) (about 2.5# pounds), halved and seeded

¼ cup plus 2 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 onion, chopped

1 carrot, finely chopped

1 Tbsp ground coriander

1 ½ tsp ground cumin

½ tsp crushed red pepper

½ tsp finely grated orange zest

1 ½ tsp Madras curry powder

One 15 oz can chickpeas, drained

½ cup water

½ cup chopped cilantro

Grilled peasant bread (Italian or French Bread)

Toasted pumpkin or squash seeds, for serving

1. Preheat the oven to 350° F.  Place the halved spaghetti squash cut side up on a baking sheet and brush the cut side with 2 Tbsp of the olive oil.  Season with salt and black pepper.  Roast the spaghetti squash for about 45 minutes, until the flesh is tender and lightly browned in spots.  Let cool slightly.
2. Meanwhile, in a large skillet, heat the remaining ¼ cup of olive oil.  Add the chopped onion and carrot and cook over moderate heat, stirring, until they are just softened, about 5 minutes.  Add the coriander, cumin, crushed red pepper, grated orange zest and curry powder and cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 1 minute.  Add the drained chickpeas and the water and simmer until the vegetables are very tender and the liquid has evaporated, about 5 minutes.
3. Using a fork, rake the squash into strands; you should have about 2-2 ½ cups of squash.  Add the cilantro and squash to the curry and season with salt.  Serve the curried squash over grilled bread, garnished with toasted pumpkin seeds.

Recipe by Jonathon Sawyer as published in Food & Wine annual cookbook 2012.