Cooking With This Week's Box
White Spanish Onions: Cheeseburger Onion Rings
Green and/or Italian Zucchini: Skillet Zucchini Pesto Pizza; Pasta with Smashed Zucchini Cream
Broccoli: Garlic Broccoli Stir-Fry
Green and/or Silver Slicer Cucumbers: Cucumber Mint Green Tea Popsicles; Mojito Cucumber Mint Sorbet; Fresh Green Bean Salad
Fresh Porcelain and/or Italian
Garlic: Triple Garlic Linguine (see
below); Portuguese Bread and Garlic Soup
with Cilantro (see below); Skillet Zucchini Pesto Pizza; Pasta with Smashed Zucchini Cream; Garlic Broccoli Stir-Fry
Orange Carrots: Tropical Carrot Smoothie; Carrot Cake Smoothie
Green or Purple Beans: Fresh Green Bean Salad
Red Norland or Golden
Carola Potatoes: Crispy Potato Tacos
Green Bell Peppers: Portuguese Bread and Garlic Soup with
Cilantro (see below); Crispy Potato Tacos
Jalapeno Pepper: Portuguese Bread and Garlic Soup with
Cilantro (see below)
Sunorange, Chocolate
Sprinkles, or Red Grape Tomatoes: Fresh Green Bean Salad; Crispy Potato Tacos
Cilantro: Portuguese Bread and Garlic Soup with
Cilantro (see below); Crispy Potato Tacos
Rainbow Chard: Smashed White Bean Kale Quesadillas
We’re flipping another page on the calendar this week as we welcome in
the month of August! Summer is whizzing
by, but August is also an exciting month filled with sweet corn, tomatoes and peppers so who can complain! This week
we’re going to start topping our garlic, sorting out our seed stock and getting
it all tucked away safely in the cooler.
So needless to say, garlic is at the forefront of our thoughts which is
why I chose it as our featured vegetable!
This week we have two garlic-centric recipes. The first is for Portuguese Bread and Garlic
Soup with Cilantro (see below). As with
many traditional recipes that stand the test of time, this recipe has its roots
in peasant food. This is a very fitting
for this week’s box though as it utilizes not only garlic, but also jalapeno
and bell peppers as well as cilantro. It
comes together pretty quickly as well, so it’s a good option for a healthy, quick
dinner. The second recipe is Triple Garlic Linguine (see
below). It’s a simple garlic-forward
pasta dish, but you could add other things to it such as some diced chicken
and/or chard.
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| Skillet Zucchini Pesto Pizza photo from runningtothekitchen.com |
I’ve been having fun finding and trying new recipes using
zucchini this summer. You know I love a
good, simple pizza, so this recipe for Skillet Zucchini Pesto Pizza caught my eye. I also came across this
recipe for Pasta with Smashed Zucchini Cream. Aside from some Parmesan cheese, this pasta
dish actually doesn’t have any cream in it.
The creaminess comes from smashing the zucchini and letting all the
juices come together to create the sauce.
If you didn’t have a chance to see last week’s featured
vegetable article about cucumbers, I’d encourage you to check it out. If you go to the bottom of the article you’ll
find a list of 30 recipes/recipe ideas all featuring cucumbers! So if you are running out of ways to enjoy
cucumbers, let me suggest a few things you may not have tried. Perhaps these refreshing Cucumber Mint Green Tea Popsicles or this Mojito Cucumber Mint Sorbet will hit the spot!
This week we’re picking both green and purple beans. Both varieties are more tender than our
earlier varieties and thus, better for eating raw. Growing up, we only ate green beans
cooked…rather overcooked, thus I despised green beans. It wasn’t until my adult years I realized you
can eat them raw. Now that is my
preferred way to eat them, which is why this Fresh Green Bean Salad is on the list for this week! Raw green
beans are crunchy and fresh tasting and can become a tasty simple salad with a
light vinaigrette mixed with some other summer vegetables like the cucumbers
and tomatoes in this recipe!
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| Smashed White Bean KAle Quesadillas Photo from runningtothekitchen.com |
One of our awesome CSA members posted this recipe for Smashed White Bean Kale Quesadillas in our Facebook Group. It’s a simple
recipe, but a good one for a quick, easy, yet filling dinner option. Really you can use any green in this recipe,
one member suggested she was going to use last week’s amaranth greens which
made me think of making these with this week’s chard!
I hope you’ve been enjoying the fresh potatoes, I know we
have been! This week I want to try this
recipe for Crispy Potato Tacos. This recipe calls for Russet potatoes, but I
think a waxier potato such as the Red Norland or Gold Carola potatoes we’re
sending this week would be a better option.
I would also suggest adding some sautéed green bell peppers to the tacos
and top it off with quartered grape tomatoes and cilantro from this week’s box.
Looking for something different to do with carrots this
week? How about turning them into this
refreshing Tropical Carrot Smoothie! Many carrot drink recipes call for carrot
juice which means you lose the fiber—no good!
This one blends the whole carrots with strawberries, mangos and other
frozen fruit. Perfect! Or, if you prefer a creamier drink, try this Carrot Cake Smoothie.
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| Garlic Broccoli Stir-Fry photo from omnivorescookbook.com |
Looking for a simple side dish?
Try this recipe for Garlic Broccoli Stir-Fry. It would actually go well with these Cheeseburger Onion Rings. I know I always tell you to slice the onions
thinly, especially when serving them raw.
This recipe, however, is an exception to that rule. You make thick slices of onion and then pull
the rings apart. Press ground beef and a
piece of cheese inside the onion ring, bread the whole thing and fry it. You end up with a crispy coated burger
wrapped in a slice of onion with gooey melted cheese oozing out the
middle! Ok, it might be a little messy
but it sounds kind of fun and these white onions are the perfect onion for this
application!
That concludes this week’s cooking chat. Have a great week and I’ll see you back next
week, hopefully with recipes for using edamame and more tomatoes!—Chef Andrea
Vegetable Feature: Garlic
By Andrea Yoder
“In all of its many forms and in kitchens around the globe, the lusty and pungent allium garlic is the flavor of comfort.” This is the opening line in an article entitled “The Glories of Garlic” published in Saveur magazine October 9, 2014. Garlic is one of the oldest cultivated crops and has made its way around the globe to permeate and enhance the cuisine of cultures all around the world. In Spain it’s used to make Ajo Blanco, a chilled garlic and almond soup. In Argentina it’s a key ingredient for making chimichurri, a fresh sauce or condiment consisting of parsley, oregano, garlic and red wine vinegar that is commonly served with grilled meat. In Chinese cuisine, garlic is an integral part of the base of many dishes along with ginger and scallions. In France, garlic is used to make aioli, or rather a fancy name for homemade garlic mayonnaise. These are just a few examples of how important garlic is to our diets, no matter where we come from in this world. So this week we are featuring this staple ingredient that we strive to include in every CSA box throughout the season, in one form or another!
Garlic is a big deal crop for us, partly because we like the challenge of growing it, but also because we value having it available and we use it in meals throughout the entire year. We start off the season with green garlic, then move on to garlic scapes, then fresh bulb garlic and finally, dried garlic that can be stored throughout the fall and winter. We value garlic for its flavor, but also for its health and medicinal value. It’s antimicrobial, antifungal, antibacterial…..basically, it’s good medicine. Richard swears by a good raw garlic sandwich to ward off something as simple as the common cold. Perhaps including garlic in your diet daily is a good dose of prevention and gives your immune system the daily boost it needs to keep you healthy!
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| Italian Garlic |
While we have several different varieties of garlic, we have two main types that are our “workhorse” varieties. These two varieties are Italian and Porcelain. At the farmers’ market we are frequently asked “What’s the difference between the two?” I don’t think the flavor of these two garlic varieties are much different, but perhaps you’ll detect some subtle differences. The thing that sets these apart in my kitchen is the size of the cloves. Garlic forms a bulb or head of garlic that contains individual pieces of garlic called cloves. Italian garlic forms more cloves per head than porcelain, but the cloves are smaller. Porcelain garlic, on the other hand, has fewer cloves per head but the individual cloves are bigger. We use a lot of garlic in our household, so I tend to gravitate towards porcelain garlic simply because it means less peeling! You can tell the difference between the two not only by the size of the cloves, but also by the color of the skin. Porcelain garlic has pure white skin with just an occasional streak of purple while Italian garlic has more reddish purple coloring.
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| Porcelain Garlic |
In its raw form, the flavor of garlic can be very strong, spicy and even might burn a bit if you eat a big piece! Some people really like this bold, strong garlic flavor. Others may find raw garlic too pungent for their palate, so for those individuals I recommend enjoying garlic either sautéed, fried or roasted. Cooking releases some of the pungent sulfur compounds, mellows the intensity and even sweetens it up a bit. You can roast a whole head of garlic in the oven until the cloves are soft and golden, then pull the cloves off the head and squeeze the soft, roasted garlic out of the skins. You can also peel garlic in advance, toss it with oil and roast it in the oven or cover it with oil and slow roast it to make garlic confit. The benefit of the latter is that you end up with a flavorful garlic oil as well as roasted garlic cloves!
This year’s garlic has been drying in the greenhouse for almost three weeks now and it’s finally ready to start removing the tops and sorting. We have a big job ahead of us over the next two weeks as we sort out our seed and get everything moved from the greenhouse to the cooler for storage until late December. This week we encourage you to try some more garlic-forward recipes as we embrace this beautiful vegetable, celebrate its recent harvest and look forward to enjoying garlic throughout the remainder of the season!
Triple Garlic Linguine
Yield: 4-6 servings
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| photo from saveur.com |
1 head garlic, plus 10 cloves (7 thinly sliced, 3 minced)
1 cup olive oil
½ tsp crushed red chile flakes
12 oz linguine
4 ½ cups chicken stock
½ cup grated parmesan
2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
2 Tbsp roughly chopped parsley, for garnish
Kosher salt, to taste
- Heat oven to 350°F. Slice garlic head in half crosswise and set cut side up on a piece of aluminum foil. Drizzle with 2 Tbsp oil and 2 Tbsp cold water; wrap into a tight package. Bake until tender, 1–1 ½ hours.
- Heat remaining oil and the sliced garlic in a 1-qt. saucepan over medium; cook until garlic is golden, 4–6 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, transfer garlic chips to paper towels to drain; set ⅓ cup oil aside. Reserve remaining oil for another use, if you like.
- Heat reserved ⅓ cup oil, the minced garlic, and chile flakes in a 14” high-sided skillet over medium. Cook until garlic is soft but not golden, 2–3 minutes. Add pasta and stock; bring to a boil. Cook, using tongs to stir pasta occasionally, until liquid is almost evaporated and pasta is al dente, about 12 minutes. Unwrap roasted garlic and squeeze cloves into pasta. Add parmesan, lemon juice, parsley, and salt; toss to combine. Garnish with reserved garlic chips.
Recipe borrowed from saveur.com.
Portuguese Bread and Garlic Soup with Cilantro (Açorda à Aletejana)
Yield: 6-8 servings
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| photo from saveur.com |
4 cups roughly chopped cilantro leaves and stems
7 cloves garlic, peeled
1 large green bell pepper, stemmed, seeded, and roughly chopped
1 serrano or jalapeño pepper, stemmed, seeded, and roughly chopped
Kosher salt, to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
½ cup olive oil
½ lb crusty bread (such as a baguette or French bread)
8 cups chicken stock
4 eggs, lightly beaten
- Pulse cilantro, garlic, bell pepper, serrano/jalapeño, salt, and pepper in a food processor until roughly chopped. Add oil; purée to a smooth paste. Place ½ cup of paste in a bowl. Add bread and toss to coat; set aside.
- Heat remaining paste in a 6-qt. saucepan over medium heat; cook until fragrant, 2–3 minutes. Add stock and bring to a boil. While stirring constantly, slowly drizzle in eggs; cook until eggs are just set, about 1 minute. Remove from heat and stir in bread mixture; serve hot.
Recipe borrowed from saveur.com.
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