Wednesday, June 9, 2021

June 10, 2021 - This Week's Box Contents, Featuring Garlic Scapes!

 

Cooking With This Week's Box

Garlic Scapes:
Lemon Garlic Scape Compound Butter (See Below)
Roasted Garlic Scape Hummus (See Below)
Grilled Naan with Garlic Scape Chutney





Strawberry Rhubarb Popsicles
photo from rhubarbarians.com
Welcome back to this week’s Cooking With the Box!  Things are really heating up in the valley and that means vegetables are growing like crazy!  We’ll be harvesting zucchini next week, cucumbers will follow behind shortly, and before we know it we’ll be doing our 2021 garlic harvest!  Of course we’re also in the midst of strawberry season AND we’ll likely be picking the first peas next week!  Is anyone else excited for all the delicious vegetables yet to come?!

This week we’re featuring the crazy, curly garlic scape.  You can use these anywhere you need garlic flavor, but you can also make them the center of the recipe, such as in the Roasted Garlic Scape Hummus (See Below) recipe this week.  This recipe uses nearly an entire bunch of scapes which gives it a very dominant garlic flavor.  If you want something more subtle, you can cut the amount of scapes in half.  If you like the flavor of garlic, then make it full strength!  I’ve also included a recipe for Lemon Garlic Scape Compound Butter (See Below).  This is a super easy recipe to make and a way to spread the bright flavor of garlic scapes out over multiple meals.  For a quick meal, saute a piece of fresh fish and melt some of this butter on top.

Spicy Kale and Coconut Fried Rice
This is our last week for rhubarb, and we have one chance at the overlap with strawberries!  If you have a favorite recipe using both of these ingredients, this is the week to use it.  If not, consider making an Old Fashioned Rhubarb Custard Pie or Strawberry Rhubarb Popsicles for the kids!

The kale field looks gorgeous this week and we couldn’t resist sending a bunch of the curly, crispy green kale your way.  Use it to make this simple Spicy Kale and Coconut Fried Rice or enjoy it for breakfast in this Kale,Bacon and Egg Breakfast Sandwich.  If you’re not big into kale, use it to make Lemon Kale Muffins.  Trust me, they are delicious.

These are just a few of the recipe highlights we have for you this week, but hopefully you’ll find something within the list of suggested recipes that will spark your interest with this week’s box!  In the meantime, start pulling out those zucchini recipes.  It’s almost time to start our annual zucchini marathon!

Have a great week! --Chef Andrea


Vegetable Feature: Garlic Scapes

Description: Garlic scapes are a long, skinny, curly green vegetable that is actually a byproduct of growing hardneck garlic.  They grow up from the center of the plant and we harvest them in June, about a month ahead of our annual garlic harvest.

Preparation & Use: Nearly the entire scape is edible and is best when harvested while young and tender.  You may need to trim off the skinny end near the little bulb at the far end of the scape as this portion is often tough.  The remainder of the scape is usable and tender, so they do not need to be peeled.  Scapes have a bright, juicy, mild garlic flavor.  They may be used in any recipe that calls for garlic cloves, just chop them up and add them as you would minced garlic.  They can also be grilled or roasted, pickled, fermented, and make an awesome pesto!  They are a great addition to eggs, stir-fries, pizzas, etc.

Storage: Store scapes in the refrigerator until you are ready to use them.  They’ll store for 2-3 weeks.
Garlic Scapes growing in the field.

Cultural & Historical Background: Up until the early 90’s we used to remove scapes from the garlic plant and throw them on the ground!  We were the first farm in the Midwest to start harvesting the scapes for use as a vegetable, thanks to one of our customers from Korea who asked us to save the garlic scapes for her so she could make pickles.  We thought this was odd, but saved some for her anyway.  She was gracious enough to share a jar of pickled scapes with us and that was our introduction to how delicious they are to eat!

Growing Information: All of our varieties of garlic are a type called hardneck garlic.  This type of garlic produces scapes as part of nature’s plan for the plant to propagate itself in the soil.  If left unattended, the bulbil on the end of the scape would get bigger and would eventually be so heavy it would fall down and plant itself, thereby propagating a new plant!  We’re cultivating garlic, so we plant a clove of garlic from a full sized bulb and use that as a means of growing the plant.  Since we don’t need the scape to produce another crop, we go through the field and cut them off the plant so the plant can focus its energy into producing a nice sized bulb instead of a scape.

Roasted Garlic Scape Hummus

Yield:  1 ½ cups

6-7 garlic scapes
2 tsp plus 1 Tbsp olive oil
1 ½ cups cooked chickpeas (one-15 oz can)
¼ cup tahini
Grated zest of 1 organic lemon
2-4 Tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 tsp raw honey or pure maple syrup
¾ tsp sea salt, plus more to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Additional olive oil, for serving*
Smoked paprika, for serving (optional)
  1. Preheat the oven to 375°F.  Cut garlic scapes into 1 to 2 inch pieces.  You should have about 1 cup once they are cut.  Put garlic scapes in a bowl and toss with 2 tsp olive oil.  Spread them out on a baking sheet in a single layer and sprinkle with a pinch of salt.  Roast in the oven for 10 minutes, then stir.  Roast an additional 5-10 minutes or until the scapes are slightly blistered and just starting to turn brown.  
  2. Remove the roasted garlic scapes from the oven and cool slightly before putting them in a food processor.  Pulse to finely chop the garlic scapes.  Add the chickpeas, tahini, lemon zest and juice, honey or maple syrup, ¾ tsp salt, freshly ground black pepper, and 1 Tbsp olive oil.  Blend on highest setting until smooth.  You will likely need to add up to ¼ cup warm water to loosen up the mixture so it will blend to a smooth consistency.  Taste and add additional salt, lemon juice and black pepper to taste.
  3. Transfer the hummus to a serving bowl, drizzle olive oil over the top, and sprinkle a few pinches of smoked paprika if desired.  Serve.  Store any leftovers in an airtight container in the fridge for 3 to 4 days.
Recipe by Andrea Yoder

Lemon Garlic Compound Butter

Yield:  ½ cup butter

1 stick unsalted butter, softened  
3 garlic scapes
Zest from 1 lemon
Freshly ground black pepper
  1. Cut the garlic scapes into 1-inch pieces.  Add the pieces to the bowl of a food processor and chop until fine.  
  2. Add the softened butter and the lemon zest to the garlic scapes along with some freshly ground black pepper.
  3. Blend in the food processor until all ingredients are evenly combined.
Storage:
  • For immediate use, place the compound butter in a jar and store in the fridge for one to two weeks.
  • For longer storage, store the compound butter in the freezer.  To do so, roll it into logs by placing the compound butter on a piece of wax paper or parchment paper.  Roll it into a tight log and twist the ends.  You can do one large log or you can make two smaller ones.  Place the roll(s) of butter into a plastic zipper bag and store in the freezer for up to 2 to 3 months. Alternatively, you can put the butter into small jars or freezer containers and freeze it.
Suggested Uses:
  • Melt over grilled or sautéed chicken or fish.
  • Use it to sauté shrimp for scampi.
  • Use it in scrambled eggs.
  • Spread on toast, warm bread or biscuits.
  • Use it to butter cooked or roasted vegetables, such as baby turnips, new potatoes or zucchini.
Recipe adapted slightly from www.relishments.com

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Wednesday, June 2, 2021

June 3, 2021 - This Week's Box Contents, Featuring Pea Vine!

Cooking With This Week's Box

Pea Vine:
Pea Vine Vinaigrette (See Below)








Mini Red Romaine and/or Mini Boston Head Lettuce:
Seared Steak Lettuce Cups
Lettuce Cups with Stir-Fried Chicken


Asparagus Grilled Cheese Sandwich
photo from closetcooking.com
Welcome to June!  We’re approaching the end of spring and will officially welcome in the summer season in just a few more weeks.  The strawberries are just starting to ripen, the zucchini and cucumber plants are finally taking off, and the first crop of basil is nearly ready to harvest!  It’s always exciting to see what’s coming up next and this week’s featured vegetable, pea vine, is always the precursor to the start of picking peas.  Yes, peas will be coming soon but this week we’re enjoying pea vine!  I’ve included some additional recipe links to some of the member favorite recipes that we’ve featured in past newsletters.  Hopefully you will find a recipe you’d like to try with this crazy, delicious green!

This is likely our final week of asparagus, so make sure you savor every last bite!  You’ll find links to Pea Vine & Asparagus Soup with Buttermilk and Mint and an Asparagus Grilled Cheese Sandwich.  Perhaps these two recipes may even go together as a meal in itself!

Creamy Cilantro Dressing
This week’s box continues to be loaded with greens, both for eating raw in salads as well as for cooking.  The beauty of spring salads is that you can get creative with the toppings, dressings, etc.  Perhaps this week you’ll try the Pea Vine Vinaigrette (See Below) that is our featured recipe.  If you don’t care for that recipe, there are several other links to additional salad dressing options including a Creamy Cilantro Dressing.
 
Looking ahead to next week, we’re crossing our fingers that the kohlrabi will make it and we’re hoping to have enough ripe strawberries to include them in all boxes!  We’re happy to have sunny skies and temperatures in the 70’s and 80’s which will certainly help to encourage some of these upcoming vegetables to grow!
 
Have a great week and I’ll see you back here again next week!
--Chef Andrea 

Vegetable Feature: Pea Vine

By:  Chef Andrea Yoder

Description: Pea Vine is actually an immature pea plant that is harvested before the vine starts to develop blossoms.  It has a mild, sweet pea flavor and may be eaten raw or lightly cooked.  Pea vine has a bright, subtle pea flavor and, as with all leafy greens, is packed with nutrients that leave you feeling invigorated!

Preparation & Use: While the tendrils and leaves are tender, the main stem can sometimes get tough depending on how mature the plant is at harvest.  This week’s pea vine is at an in between stage.  Most of the upper stem is still tender while the mid to lower portion may be a little more coarse.  In past years we’ve had members comment that the pea vine is “stringy.”  There are several ways to deal with this issue and still extract full flavor and benefit from the pea vine.  The first option is to pick the tender leaves, tendrils and thin stems off the main stem.  You can use those in salads or lightly cook them.  Do not throw the stem away as it still has flavor that can be extracted!  You can simmer the stems in hot broth, sauces or soups to extract the flavor, then discard the stems.

Pea Vine Pesto Pasta Salad
I must admit, I don’t like to spend a lot of time sorting through a bunch of pea vine, so I typically utilize option #2 when the pea vine is more mature.  Option 2 is to blend/chop leaves, tendrils and much of the stem in a blender, food processor, or simply with a knife.  I will still discard the lower few inches of the bunch if that portion of the stem is more tough, but I typically utilize the remainder of the plant.  If you chop it very finely and use a good blender or food processor, you can add it to pesto, smoothies, soups, cream cheese, etc.  If you are using pea vine in sauces, soups or broth, I recommend rough chopping the pea vine into smaller pieces and adding it to hot broth or a sauce base.  Let the pea vine simmer briefly to extract the flavor, but don’t overcook it or you’ll lose the bright pea flavor.  Once you’ve infused the flavor of the pea vine into the sauce or broth, you can strain it out to remove it.  If you’d like to extract just a little more flavor, blend the mixture before straining it.

Pea vine goes well with cream, butter, cheese, pancetta, prosciutto, bacon and ham, lemon, lime, mint, parsley, chives, spring onions, green garlic, radishes, asparagus, and mushrooms.

Storage: Store pea vine loosely wrapped in a plastic bag in the crisper drawer of your refrigerator until ready for use.

Additional Pea Vine Recipes: Visit our website where you’ll find some of our favorite recipes utilizing pea vine that have been featured in past newsletters.  These are the recipes that have become member favorites!

Pea Vine Vinaigrette

Yield:  1 ¼ cups

2 cups rough chopped pea vine (tender stems and leaves)
3 Tbsp dijon or stoneground mustard
3 Tbsp maple syrup
4 Tbsp apple cider vinegar
½ tsp salt, plus more to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
⅔ cup sunflower oil (or other neutral salad oil)
1 Tbsp minced pickled ginger (optional)
  1. Place pea vine in a blender or food processor.  Add mustard, maple syrup, apple cider vinegar, ½ tsp salt and black pepper.  Blend or process briefly to start chopping the pea vine and combining the other ingredients.
  2. With the blender or food processor running, slowly pour in the oil.  You may need to stop and scrape down the sides of the bowl periodically.  Continue to blend until the mixture is mostly smooth and well combined.  
  3. Taste and adjust to your liking by adding more salt and/or apple cider vinegar as needed.  Add pickled ginger and stir just enough to fold it into the dressing.  Refrigerate until ready for use.
Note from Andrea: This recipe is an adaptation of Sarah Britton’s Maple-Mustard dressing, originally found in her book, My New Roots.  This is my go-to salad dressing and one I shared in a newsletter last fall.  I typically make the basic dressing in a bowl and just whisk it to combine everything.  In this adaptation I chose to make it in the blender which helps to not only chop up the pea vine, but also emulsifies the dressing so it does not separate.  

Simple Spring Lettuce Salad with Pea Vine Vinaigrette

Servings: as many as you wish

Head lettuce, washed, dried and torn into bite-sized pieces
Radishes, thinly sliced
Feta cheese, crumbled
Pumpkin seeds, lightly toasted
Pea Vine Vinaigrette (see above)
Cooked chicken, fish or tofu (optional)
  1. Adjust the quantities of the ingredients above according to the number of salads you wish to make.  Put the lettuce directly into the bowls you are using to serve the salad.
  2. Top the lettuce with radishes and feta cheese.  Drizzle or pour pea vine vinaigrette over the salad, quantity to your liking.
  3. Top off the salad with crumbled feta cheese, pumpkin seeds and protein of your choosing if you wish.  Enjoy!

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Recipes are Road Maps…Learning to Cook Intuitively and Finding Joy in the Kitchen

By Chef Andrea

A few of the cookbooks I added
to my collection last year.

There’s probably been a cookbook or food magazine beside my bed for more than 75% of the nights I’ve slept on this earth, maybe more.  I am that person who actually reads the cookbook, you know the introduction and thoughts the author shares before you get to the recipes.  I also enjoy reading the introductions to recipes where the author shares little tidbits of info like how the recipe came into existence or ways to alter it with different little tweeks.  Yet despite all the cookbook studying, I have to say it’s a bit of a rare moment when I actually follow a recipe exactly as it’s written.  I’m more likely to do so when I’m baking or making a recipe for the first time from a culture I’m not familiar with.  In the case of baking, it’s different than cooking.  A person will do well to respect the laws of nature which include the ratios of baking.  But cooking is a different ball game and there’s plenty of room to improvise and personalize a recipe to make it your own.  And that is the topic of today’s conversation—learning to cook intuitively, and hopefully having a little fun doing so!

I realize my audience ranges from longtime, experienced cooks and CSA members to the other end of the spectrum with individuals who are still finding their way in the kitchen and learning what it means to eat seasonally from a CSA box in the Midwest.  Plus there’s all of you who fall somewhere in between.  There’s a place for all of you at this table, so pull up a chair and lets talk.

End of Summer Vegetable Ragout
What is a recipe?  It’s a list of ingredients accompanied by a list of instructions for how to bring those individual ingredients to life.  It’s a map to guide you along the way, but the actual journey is up to you.  In the beginning as you are first learning to cook, or if you’re making a recipe for the first time, it is advisable to follow recipes.  This helps you learn the path, but once you know the path you can start to veer from it.  If you don’t have a basic knowledge of cooking, this is a good place to start.  As you read a recipe, start looking up the words you don’t understand or know.  What does it mean to saute or braise?  What is a “chiffonade of basil” or what should you do when a recipe tells you to “reduce a sauce to half.”  You could go to cooking school to acquire this knowledge, or you could just dive in and get started with cooking.  As the recipes you make start to come alive, you’ll quickly start to build your knowledge of some of these basic cooking skills.  Honestly, the best way to learn how to cook is to actually do it!

One of my longtime mantras is “Never Be Intimidated by a Vegetable.”  The same goes for cooking.  Yes, some recipes can seem intimidating with their long list of ingredients and/or a long list of instructions.  If you are feeling intimidated by a recipe, it’s ok to choose something that seems a little more approachable.  No one expects you to be a gourmet chef and honestly, some of the best food you will ever make may be the simplest to prepare.  If you start with good ingredients, you don’t need to do much to it.  Many vegetables taste great simply prepared with salt, pepper and butter!  Honestly, this is how I cook many vegetables, including the sweet little baby white turnips and asparagus we’ve been enjoying this spring.

Caramelized Fennel and Beet Pizza
I’ve had members tell me things like “I made your recipe, but mine didn’t look like yours.”  You know what, that’s ok.  Ten people could prepare the same recipe and it could turn out 10 slightly different ways.  Just remember that “Life is Research!”  There are no failures in the kitchen, only opportunities to observe and learn.  Honestly, one of the best ways to learn about food is to watch and see what happens.  In culinary school I never wanted to make mayonnaise because I was so afraid I would mess it up and it would break.  And then one day my friend and cooking partner insisted I make the mayonnaise.  “No Donnie, I can’t make it.  I’ll mess it up!”  Donnie refused to make it which left me with no option except to try.  I did, and I broke the mayonnaise.  My worst mayonnaise fear had been realized, and man did I feel liberated!  I did it, I messed up the mayonnaise!  That day I learned how to recognize the signs of what mayonnaise looks like right before it’s about to break.  I learned how to prevent that from happening and I learned how to fix it if I did mess it up.  Did I fail that day when I messed up the mayonnaise?  No, I conquered it!

Squash and Poblano Quesadillas
While it can be fun to explore new recipes, sometimes it’s good to stick to some tried and true, good old reliable recipes.  If you’re just learning to cook and/or learning how to eat out of a CSA box, I encourage you to find a few basic recipes that you can master.  The beauty of cooking with the seasons is that your ingredients will always be changing, so even if you make the same five-ten recipes all the time they’ll never be the same.  For example, find a recipe for a stir-fry sauce that you like.  Maybe it’s a teriyaki sauce or an orange sauce.  The stir-fry sauce will always stay the same, as will the basic procedure for making a vegetable stir-fry but you can adapt the preparation each week to include whatever vegetables are in season!  The same goes for things like quiche, pizza, quesadillas, scrambled eggs, etc.  Don’t waste time searching for new recipes all the time, just stick to the ones you know and like!  Remember, recipes are there to guide us, but you can learn to substitute ingredients that are similar.

Vegetable Enchiladas
You’ll notice many recipes include things like “Salt, to taste” or lines like “adjust the seasoning to your liking.”  What exactly does this mean?  It means it’s hard to tell someone exactly how much salt or pepper a recipe will need.  Yes we can ballpark it, but the final adjustments to seasoning really need to be done in the kitchen using your own senses.  This is why it’s important to start to learn more about how different ingredients can change the way food tastes.  Why do we salt food?  Because salt helps to wake up our taste buds and enhances the flavors within a dish.  You seldom want food to taste “salty.”  Rather, you want food to taste balanced.  If you taste something and it tastes “bland” or is just lacking in flavor, it may just need a little more salt.  When you add salt to a dish, make sure you incorporate the salt and then let it set for a few minutes so the salt can dissolve.  Give it another quick stir and then taste the food again.  If you skip this step, you can easily add too much salt to a dish!  The other type of ingredient you may want to use sometimes to adjust the seasoning in a dish is some kind of an acidic ingredient such as vinegar or lemon juice.  Acidic ingredients also help to wake up our taste buds.  If you taste a dish and it tastes “flat,” it may benefit from adding a little splash of some type of acid.  This concept hit home and finally made sense to me when I was in culinary school.  I was in one of my first skills classes and I was making a basic lentil soup.  I seasoned it to what I thought was “perfect” using salt and pepper and then took it to my chef instructor to taste.  She agreed, it was a pretty good lentil soup.  But then she told me to go get a bottle of sherry vinegar.  I brought her the vinegar and she added just a little splash to the soup.  I stirred it in and tasted it again.  Wow!  Everything in the soup came alive with just that one little addition.  So what do you do if you aren’t sure what a dish needs and you don’t want to mess up the entire thing!?  Separate a little portion and play with it.  Add a little salt, add a little acid and see what it tastes like.  If you find something you like, try to replicate it with the rest of the dish.

Apple Turnip Quiche
Cooking is an essential skill we all need in order feed ourselves.  I fully acknowledge that there will be days when making a meal, cleaning the kitchen and doing what it takes to feed yourself and your family will feel like a chore.  That’s the reality of life, but I do hope there are more days when the kitchen is more like your happy place, a place where you can retreat to at the end of the day and actually find joy in the process.  As you gain confidence, build your skills and start to assemble your own collection of recipes you enjoy making, you’ll also likely find yourself cooking more intuitively.  You may reference a recipe, but then you might start to just cook using whatever ingredients are in season and following your own instincts with how to prepare the food, build a meal and do the final steps of seasoning.  So remember, recipes are here to guide us, not restrict us.  Have some fun, get creative and enjoy the process of creating food.  If you learn something along the way, I hope you’ll share it with our membership in our Facebook Group so we can celebrate along with you and learn from each other!

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Wednesday, May 26, 2021

May 27, 2021 - This Week's Box Contents, Featuring Baby White Turnips!

Cooking With This Week's Box

Green Garlic:

Potato Onions:

Asparagus:

Baby Spinach:

Rhubarb:

Salad Mix:

Purpella Radishes:

Hon Tsai Tai:

Baby White Turnips:
Vegetarian Carbonara with Baby White Turnips & Greens (See Below)

Baby Bok Choi:

Mini Romaine Head Lettuce:

Welcome to another week of Cooking With the Box!  This week our focus is still on looking for more ways to utilize greens, especially the greens on this week’s baby white turnips.  This week’s featured recipe for Vegetarian Carbonara with Baby White Turnips & Greens is a vegetarian take on the traditional Italian pasta dish called Carbonara.  Carbonara is a pasta dish that utilized beaten eggs and cheese along with lemon juice to create a sauce that lightly coats pasta.  Traditionally it also includes some type of cured meat such as pancetta or bacon, which adds significant richness to the dish.  While I really like traditional carbonara, I feel like it can be a very heavy dish.  This is why I was intrigued by the bacon-free version I came across at alexandracooks.com.  I used her base recipe and adapted the recipe to include turnips, mushrooms, and smoked paprika.  I like to use smoked paprika in dishes where I want a little bit of smoky richness without using smoked pork products.  If you have greens building up in your refrigerator or if you are not sure what to do with the tops on the turnips and radishes, this is a great recipe.  You’ll turn a big pile of greens into hardly anything!

We’re excited to welcome rhubarb into our spring line up this week!  While it’s most commonly used to make rhubarb pie, it can be used in a whole host of other applications, both savory and sweet.  In addition to the lentil dish I provided a link for, rhubarb can also be used in stir-frys, barbecue sauce and so much more!  You’ll find some of these types of recipes if you visit our searchable recipe database.  Rhubarb is also an easy vegetable to preserve, so if you aren’t in the mood to use it this week, consider checking out the link for how to freeze it.

Cannellini Beans with Spinach
photo by Eva Kolenko for epicurious.com
We continue this week with our greens-rich selections.  If you didn’t have a chance to read last week’s article entitled “It’s Time To Eat Your Greens!” I would encourage you to do so this week.  Greens are packed with nutrients and give us energy and vitality.  In this article I share some tips and tricks for how you can include them in your meals and diet.  Last week we also featured a simple recipe for Greens & Green Garlic Pesto that we used to make a pasta dish.  This base pesto is very tasty, especially the second day.  Last week I used it throughout the week as a spread on our sandwiches for lunch, in scrambled eggs for breakfast, and just spread on crackers!

I hope you enjoy another tasty week of spring cooking.  It won’t be long before we start moving into some of our late spring/early summer selections.  Last Sunday we picked the first (and only) slightly pink strawberry.  Depending upon the weather, there’s a chance we’ll be picking strawberries within the next week or two.  We also have our eye on more head lettuce, cilantro, garlic scapes and spring scallions.  If you have not yet joined our private CSA Facebook Group, I encourage you to do so now!  So far this year there have been some excellent posts with great ideas for recipes and how to use all the items in the box.  It’s also a great place to ask questions and get input on recipes and cooking ideas.

Ok, that’s a wrap for this week!  Have a good week and I’ll see you again soon!---Chef Andrea

Vegetable Feature: Baby White Turnips

By:  Chef Andrea Yoder

Description: Baby white turnips are a classy little vegetable we often describe as being “pristine.”  They are classified as a salad turnip and are tender with a sweet, mild flavor.  Both the roots and the green tops are edible and may be eaten raw or lightly cooked.  Compared to the common purple top turnip or other storage turnips we grow in the fall, salad turnips are much more mild and subtle in both flavor and texture.  So if you think you don’t like turnips, at least give these a try!

Preparation & Use: To prepare baby white turnips for use, separate the roots from the greens and wash both well to remove any dirt.  Salad turnips have such a thin exterior layer, they do not need to be peeled.  They are delicious eaten raw in a salad, or just munch on them with dip or hummus.  You can also cook these turnips, but remember to keep the cooking time short as it doesn’t take much to cook them to fork tender.  You can simply sauté them in butter, stir-fry or roast them.  The greens may be added to raw salads, or lightly sauté or wilt them in a little butter.

Storage:  To prolong the shelf life, separate the greens from the roots with a knife and store separately in plastic bags in your refrigerator.

Growing Information:  We plant baby white turnips for harvest early in the spring and again in the fall when the growing conditions are cooler.  We harvest them while they are still small and tender, when the sweet flavor matches their delicate appearance.  The other turnips we grow in the fall are meant for storage purposes and have a thicker skin compared to the thin skin of a salad turnip. Baby white turnips also mature much faster than beets, carrots and fennel, etc. so they are a very important part of our spring menus until the other root vegetables are ready for harvest.

Vegetarian Carbonara with Baby White Turnips & Greens

Yield:  4 servings

12 ounces pasta (fettucine, papparadelle, linguini, or any small pasta that holds sauce well) 
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 ½ cups baby white turnips, medium dice
1 ½ cups cremini or white button mushrooms, medium dice
½ cup thinly sliced green garlic
½ tsp red pepper flakes (optional)
½ tsp smoked paprika
8-10 cups greens, roughly chopped*
1 tsp salt, plus more to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
2 large eggs
½ cup grated Parmesan cheese, plus more for serving
1-2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice, plus more to taste

  1. Boil a large pot of salted water and cook pasta to al dente according to package instructions.  When the pasta is cooked, remove 1 cup of the pasta water and set it aside before you drain the pasta.  
  2. Meanwhile, heat the olive oil in a large sauté pan over medium heat.  When the oil shimmers, add the turnips, mushrooms and green garlic.  Sauté for 5-7 minutes or until the vegetables are tender but not completely cooked.  Add the red pepper flakes and smoked paprika.  Stir to combine and sauté an additional 30 seconds.  
  3. Add the chopped greens to the pan and sprinkle with 1 teaspoon of salt and freshly ground black pepper.  Continue to cook over medium to medium-high heat until the greens wilt down. Use tongs to flip the greens around periodically to help them wilt.  
  4. While the greens are cooking down, prepare the carbonara sauce.  In a medium bowl, beat the eggs, then whisk in the parmesan and 1 Tbsp lemon juice.  Slowly whisk in ¼ cup of the reserved pasta water.
  5. Once the greens are wilted down, reduce the heat to low and add the drained pasta to the pan.  It’s important to reduce the heat before adding the egg mixture.  If the pan is too hot the eggs will scramble instead of making a nice, smooth sauce.  
  6. Pour the egg mixture over the pasta and vegetable mixture.  Stir to combine and simmer, stirring frequently for 5-7 minutes or until the eggs and cheese have formed a light sauce that evenly coats the pasta.  Taste and adjust the seasoning with additional lemon juice, salt and freshly ground black pepper.  You may also wish to add a little more pasta cooking liquid if the sauce seems too “tight” or thick.  
  7. Once seasoned to your liking, serve warm with grated Parmesan as desired.
*Note:  You may use any greens you have available.  I suggest using the green tops from the turnips along with spinach, radish tops, hon tsai tai, bok choi or sauté mix.  Basically, anything that will wilt down into this pasta dish will work!  It will seem like there are a lot of greens, but once they wilt down the quantity will be appropriate for this dish.

Recipe based on “Weeknight Carbonara: No Bacon, Loaded with Greens” from alexandracooks.com.

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Wednesday, May 19, 2021

It's Time To Eat Your Greens!

Gorgeous Red Swiss Chard

By Chef Andrea Yoder

“Cooking with whole foods simply means choosing foods that are in their natural state or as close to it as possible.  When it comes to finding the motivation to get into the kitchen and cook, what could be more inspiring than seasonal, fresh ingredients from a  bunch of newly picked deep green kale or a rich orange winter squash …..These beautiful foods don’t need much preparation to turn them into a nourishing, flavorful meal….Real whole foods are brimming with flavor and vitality and the innate intelligence to improve your health.”—Amy Chaplin from Whole Food Cooking Every Day

Sometimes in life, it’s best to keep things simple, and simplicity is the approach I like to take when talking about “greens.”  I didn’t grow up eating “greens.”  That term, in my world, referred to the bunches of collard, mustard and turnip greens that held this foreign space at the end of the produce wet rack at the Kroger’s grocery store where my mom did all her shopping.  Those were things other people (although I wasn’t sure who those “other people” were) purchased, not us.  As far as “leafy greens” went, we stuck to the safe things like iceberg lettuce, cabbage and the occasional bag of spinach.  When I went to culinary school I was exposed to a few more “greens.”  Well, actually not that many more, but I did actually learn how to cook those collard greens! It really wasn’t until I came to Harmony Valley Farm that my world of leafy greens exploded!  Now I can’t imagine living a year without hon tsai tai, bok choi, nettles or overwintered spinach.  My body craves greens in the spring and throughout the year.  One of my favorite leafy greens is Swiss Chard.  I swear I can feel my body incorporating all of this green’s nutrient density into my cells as soon as I eat it!  While I can easily navigate leafy greens now, after many years of exposure, I do remember when I was intimidated by all these different greens and as I looked at them I didn’t see anything simple about them.  What part do I eat?  Do I eat them raw or cook them?  Do they need a long cooking time or a shorter time?  How do I incorporate them into my meals and recipes?  If you have some of these same questions or find the bunches and bags of greens getting pushed to the back of the refrigerator every week, then I hope you find some value in this article along with some tools to empower you to more fully utilize the greens in your CSA box this year.  If you’ve been eating greens for years, but are in a rut and looking for some new ways to incorporate them into your meals, I hope you’ll find a few ideas in this article to spark your creativity and expand your repertoire. 

Richard in a beautiful
field of collards

First of all, why is it even important for us to eat “greens?!”  I could answer that question with a very simple “Because they are good for you!”  That is a true statement, but I’ll expand just a bit on that thought.  Leafy greens are nutrient powerhouses and contain a whole host of vitamins, minerals, fiber, phytochemicals and antioxidants.  Simply put, the nutrients contained in leafy greens give us vitality, energy and are incorporated into all parts of our bodies where they contribute to our vision, enhance bone health, protect our hearts, impact our brain function, prevent cell damage, decrease inflammation, minimize the effects of aging, contribute to healthy skin, hair and nails, and the list goes on!  If you would like me to write a more detailed article about all the specific nutrients contained in leafy greens and their health benefits, please send me an email and let me know.  For the sake of this article, though, I think you get the point that this class of leafy green vegetables are very important for our health, wellness and vitality. 

Leafy greens also serve a unique role in a seasonal midwestern diet, especially during the spring!  Our early season boxes are loaded with greens ranging from spinach and baby arugula to unique perennials like sorrel and nettles.  We are fortunate enough to have some type of green available for most of the growing season.  Salad mix and spinach in the spring and fall, chard and amaranth in the summer along with carrot and beet tops and kale.  In the cool of the fall, we welcome savoyed cabbages, tat soi rosettes, and radicchio!  I’ve only touched the very tip of the iceberg for the number of different “greens” we grow, eat and share with you throughout the CSA season! 

Red Radicchio late in the Fall

Not only are “greens” good for you, but they are also versatile, interchangeable, flavorful, and most of them could be considered, in my words, to be nature’s fast food!  So lets transition now into using greens.  What are you going to do with all these greens?!  Salads, that is the typical answer, and not a bad one.  Salads are an appropriate use for greens that are tender and more delicate such as head lettuce, salad mix, baby bok choi and anything else that fits this profile.  Some greens such as kale and collards may also be used in raw salads, but their leaves are a bit more thick and really should be massaged or made in advance of eating so the leaves can be softened by the acidity and fat in the dressing.  I like to keep a bottle of salad dressing in the refrigerator.  If I need a quick lunch or dinner, I’ll put whatever salad greens I have in a bowl along with any other season vegetables I can eat raw.  I toss it with dressing and add a little protein such as hard-boiled eggs, leftover chicken, nuts, etc.  This literally takes me just a few minutes to assemble and I feel so good knowing I didn’t trade my health and well-being for the convenience of eating a processed, ready-made meal.

Want to know how to make a big pile of greens disappear in just a few minutes?  Cook them!  I like to add handfuls of greens to hot pasta dishes, stir them into fried rice or vegetable stir-fry.  You can also add them into scrambled eggs and egg casseroles.  A big fluffy pile of greens will wilt down into a small handful when you add heat.  You can steam greens, sauté them in a touch of oil, or just let them wilt in the heat of hot pasta, rice, beans, lentils, etc.  Greens that have tender leaves will cook down in just a few minutes.  Thicker leaves will need a little more time to become tender.  So if your supply of greens is starting to build up, this is the way to make them disappear quickly without throwing them out!

Red Lentils with Winter Squash and Greens

Another method I like to use to incorporate greens into our meals is to turn them into pesto.  Yes, I know that pesto is traditionally made out of basil, pine nuts, Parmesan cheese and olive oil.  While traditional pesto is good, it’s ok to steal that concept and apply it to other fluffy green vegetables.  You can make pesto out of nearly any green or leafy herb.  As for the pine nuts in traditional pesto, you can easily substitute almonds, sunflower seeds or another similar item in place of the pine nuts.  You can also very the type of oil and cheese you use.  Once you have a bowl of pesto, you can tuck it away in the fridge and use it to create a lot of things throughout the week including pasta dishes, spread it on sandwiches, wraps, etc or use it as a dip or condiment to accompany grilled steak, sautéed fish or roasted vegetables. 

Wilted greens can be incorporated into a lot of other cooked recipes such as meatballs & casseroles.  Now this isn’t a way to “hide” vegetables, but rather a way to kick up the nutrient density of a meal by working the greens into other things!  You can also blend them into smoothies, drinks and soups.

Pistachio Kale Pesto

When I’m super short on time and need to get dinner on the table in 10-15 minutes or less, I turn to greens because they are quick-cooking, versatile, yet nourishing.  So, never feel like you need to trade your well-being for convenience.  You can still make nutrient dense meals in a tiny bit of time.  Some of  my go-to methods include scrambled eggs or egg casseroles to which I add a lot of wilted greens.  I also like to make veggie wraps, quesadillas and toasted sandwiches.  With just a few simple ingredients like slices of cheese, leftover chicken, deli ham and spreads like pesto or salsa, I can throw together some pretty tasty creations packed with greens and other vegetables.   Don’t be afraid to cook without a recipe, just follow your intuition, keep it simple and use what you have!

Don’t be afraid to use convenience items from time to time as well.  While I prefer to cook with whole foods and make everything from scratch, there are some days when I really benefit from a little bit of added convenience.  For that reason I keep a few frozen pizzas, some frozen tortellini and boxed mac-n-cheese available.  If we’re really pressed for time, I can pull out one of these convenience items and augment them with other vegetables.  I’ve never been big on boxed mac-n-cheese, but I have to admit I kind of like it with wilted greens, diced salad turnips, sweet peppers, etc added to it.  I load up frozen pizzas with wilted greens, dollops of greens pesto and other vegetables.  There are ways to eat well even in the busiest of times!

I hope these ideas will help to get your own creative ideas flowing and spur you on to turn to leafy greens as a base ingredient in your diet.  I invite you to share your tips, tricks and strategies for incorporating greens into your diet in our private Facebook Group where we can all learn from each other.  This is an exciting class of vegetables to explore and your body will thank you for it!

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