When it comes to homemade salsa, in high tomato season, anyway, I’m usually more of a pico de gallo gal. Finely diced fresh tomato, onion, garlic, and pepper, finished with a little lime, salt, and cilantro. No cooking, but lots and lots of chopping. Last week, though, I saw Deb Perelman’s post on a three-ingredient…
Tag: vegetarian
Grilly Beans
A few Thanksgivings ago (wow, now that I think about it, it’s more like ten), I started roasting haricots verts until they blistered, then zapping them with grated lemon zest on their way from oven to table. Ever since, that’s become my go-to potluck veggie dish. In fact, I rarely prepare string (or stringless) beans any…
Polenta: When Meal Makes the Meal
Sometimes I fantasize there’s a CSA Merit Badge for incorporating multiple sharebox items into a single dish. I had a four-bagger a couple months ago. One of the winter season’s final boxes included shitake and crimini mushrooms, red sorrel, a head of garlic, and a bag of Castle Valley Mill polenta. I guess technically that’s five items….
Sting for your Supper
Stinging Nettles. What, you missed that day in Professor Slughorn‘s class? Though raw stinging nettles will indeed hurt you for a few minutes if you touch them with bare hands, you don’t need a magic wand or copy of Advanced Potion-Making to transform those-who-shall-not-be-handled into a terrific—and nutrient-dense—workhorse green. A couple-minute blanch is all it takes…
Miso en Place
My meals are often made out of sequence. Well, partially made, anyway. On the days I work the closing shift, if I want to boost my odds of eating a better dinner than carry-out slices or a bowl of cereal or a scrambled egg or two (and believe me, that happens often enough), I have to…
Meat-radish carpaccio
“Green Meat Radishes.” Huh? LFFC’s weekly share-contents email had me headed straight to Google. Turns out I did know what they were—I’d just never heard them called that. They’re a green version of the gorgeous Watermelon Relish, which—who knew?—is also called a Red Meat Radish. Raw, the flavor reminds me of Daikon, with just a…
Here Comes the Sunchoke
Our inaugural Winter Season CSA box arrived this week, and more than a couple Pennsauken picker-uppers were perplexed by the small bag of sunchokes in the shares. Also called Jerusalem Artichokes, not because they came from Jerusalem (they’re native to North America), but through a linguistic bastardization of the Italian for sunflower, girasole (“jeer-ah-SO-lay”), these…
I Cannot Tell a Fibonacci
No lie. I’d never cooked Romanesco before today. I wasn’t really trying to avoid it; it’s just that whenever it’s been an either/or option in my sharebox, I’ve always drawn a box with the “or.” But last week, I guess because there are fewer subscribers in the fall, everybody got one. Yippee! With its hypnotizing,…
Heads up: Addictive Cauliflower Pasta
Cauliflower’s been spectacular this past month here in southeast Pennsylvania. The co-op included big heads in our last couple-three shareboxes of the spring/summer season (which ended with October) – and it was the centerpiece of last week’s inaugural fall-season box. Twice now, I’ve made crispy cauliflower, roasting half a head at high heat with a…
Squashapalooza 2.0: Squash and Beet Risotto
Eight. Again. Thanks to the swap box, a few forfeited shares, and my own carryovers from the past couple weeks, I now have eight squash clogging my kitchen counter. It’s Squashapalooza 2.0: Winter Edition. But at least these cool-weather varieties don’t demand immediate consumption (or preservation) like my week-long zucchini fest this past July….
Boxing Day 