Hello everyone! I’m still here!

It looks like I’ve seriously disappeared from the blog the last few weeks, so sorry about that!

I’ve been very busy with lots of different things. Do you want to see what’s been keeping me busy?

Since we started the CSA, I’ve been cooking what feels like 20 times more than before. Now I spend a good part of a few of my evenings cooking delicious recipes so as not to waste any of our precious vegetables. The last two recipes I made were this ratatouille and and this orzo and kale recipe.

The orzo and kale is definitely a winner and I will make it again next time I get kale in my CSA bag. The ratatouille I haven’t tasted yet but it definitely smelled and looked very good. It uses tons of vegetables so is very handy to empty out the fridge!

I’ve been working on box bags to send to the Vermont Sheep and Wool festival with yarn4socks in 2 weeks. That particular batch is almost done and will be handed over tonight. This is what my sewing table looked like yesterday morning.

I’ve added a bunch of made to order box bags to the shop as it was starting to look very bare. I will be adding more throughout the week as well.

I’ve ordered up new business cards for me. The graphic designer I worked with did a fantastic job and am very pleased with the final results.

I’ve also been doing some sewing for my quilting bee. Here are the 2 wonky stars blocks I made for Amanda. I really loved sewing those stars and I can see a wonky stars quilt in my future.

Last but not least, I have been knitting as well. I am currently making progress on my Lu. It’s going fairly fast and am a little further ahead than this photo shows. I’ve now put the sleeve cap stitches on a holder and am working on the underarm.

Of course, a little a bit of this, plus another little bit of that, with a lot of this all adds up. But it’s all fun, so I’m quite happy.

Time to get back to work!

Fruits and veggies, oh yes!

Hungry yet?

CSA Tuesday

Just because there can’t be a CSA without a Tuesday, or rather a Tuesday without a CSA.

Here is today’s loot:

6 ears of corn, one quart potatoes, 12 tomatoes, 2 eggplants, 1 bunch basil, 1 bunch radishes, a bag of green beans, and 1 pint of PYO cherry tomatoes. Not pictured: 3 small hot peppers.

We’d been getting 12 ears of corn every week for the last month so today I asked my coworker if she wanted a few ears of corn because I’d have too many. But this time I only got 6. I will be bring a few tomatoes to work though, and the hot peppers, as I’m not a fan of spicy hot foods.

I have high hopes for the remaining tomatoes; tomato, mozarella and basil salad, tomato pie (recipe similar to this), the potatoes will make delicious potato salad. With the radishes I might make some more of this (I made it last night, delicious). Last but not least, I will be attempting to make pesto with all the lovely basil  I have. I just need to pick up some pine nuts at the grocery store. I’ll let you know how that goes!

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On a totally different note, I am currently destashing a bunch of my yarns to pay for my sewing machine that broke again. You can check it out here on Ravelry. Message me there if you see something interesting. Thanks for looking!

CSA Tuesday

My observant readers will have noticed that I skipped last week’s CSA Tuesday. I did take a picture but didn’t have immediate plans for the food as we were taking off the next day for a few days in the Adirondacks. If you’re curious as to what I got, click here.

To make up for last week, here is today’s bounty. All I can say is that it was very bountiful and we’ll be eating very well this week!

2lbs tomatoes, 2 lbs red potatoes, 12 ears of corn, 2 bunches radishes, 3 hot peppers, 1 tomatillo, 4 eggplants, bunch parsley, basil, flat leaf parsley, 1 pint cherry tomatoes

Even though the temperature inside was in the 80s, I thought I’d better get started on the cooking and prepare a few dishes. I made this cheesy eggplant casserole with this week’s eggplants and the 2 from last week I hadn’t gotten around to cooking yet. I made a few mods (used 2 eggs, added a can of chopped tomatoes, and used more cheese and used leftover breading I had) and the results were quite good.  I boiled up the potatoes and will be making potato salad tomorrow night. I’m waiting for a recipe from my friend for the radishes and will be sharing it with you hopefully next week.  In the mean time, we will be eating lots of tomato salad!

CSA Tuesday

It’s late, so tonight you’re getting a photo and a recipe. Enjoy!

Click on photo for details on what everything is

I sauteed the 3 eggplants and the green squash together in a pan and made Lime Mint Iced Tea with the mint (using the recipe from here). It was very good, but yields just enough for 4 glasses. Double it if you can, it’s worth it!

CSA Tuesday

Today’s bag was quite impressive. I could barely carry it to my car!

I received some lettuce, zucchini, parsley, kale, rhubarb, cucumber, carrots, radishes, and some beans. I also received not 6, not 8 but 12 ears of corn!

I didn’t do much cooking tonight though, it was just too hot! I did cook the pattypan squash from last week and the zucchini from this week though. I made the Simple Scallop Squash Recipe from here. It was quite good!

6 weeks into the CSA, all I can say is that it’s really interesting and I’ve never eaten so well! It’s awesome getting all these fresh vegetables and challenging myself to finding recipes for all of them.

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I think this used to be a knitting blog, right? Don’t despair, there has been some knitting. I’ve been working diligently on my Milkweed shawl and am almost done. I should have it done by the weekend! I guess it helps to be knitting on only one project!

CSA Tuesday on Wednesday

I hope that  you did not miss too much not having vegetable eye candy yesterday. For those who did, here it is a day late!

Yesterday I picked up this lovely bag full of vegetable goodies:

Some lollo lettuce, 8 ears of corn, some yellow, white and red beets, some patty pan squash and 2 pickling cucumbers.

Promptly after arriving home I put some water to boil to cook the corn, heated up the oven to bake the beets and make some kale chips with last week’s kale. I used House on Hill’s Road’s kale chips as modified in this post. They were really good and DH and I gobbled them all. I definitely will be making more. It’s easy and a great way to eat kale!

I have yet to decide how to prepare the patty pan squash but I do love to look at them! I completely stumped as to what to do with the pickling cucumbers. Anyone has a suggestion besides actually pickling them? Do they taste good raw???

My landlords have a little garden in our backyard where they’re growing tomatoes, herbs and various other unknowns. I went out today to get a few pictures. The beautiful zucchini flowers that were fully open a few days ago were gone due to heavy rains but there were still quite a few buds unfurling their petals.

I also took photos of these flowers. I’m not sure what they are, but they sure were pretty.

And here’s a study in greens of some future tasty tomatoes!

Are you hungry yet?! I know I am : )

CSA Tuesday Week 5

Like every week, today was CSA pick up time. The bag was much heavier then usual, due to a few ears of corn at the bottom of the bag.

I received some lettuce, kale, parsley, corn, rhubarb and a zucchini. I also got a pick your own pint for raspberries, which I promptly went and picked. I have quite a few scratches on my arms but I also have some lovely raspberries to eat!

When I got home I thought that a zucchini quiche would be quite good. I tried finding one without a crust and found this one. It’s in French but I’ll have a translation for you below.

Sorry, I didn’t think to take a picture before we had dug in!

Zucchini quiche

Ingredients:

2 zucchinis
125 grams of flour, or, I believe 1.25 cup
2 cups milk
3 eggs1 cup shredded gruyere (I used italian blend because that’s what I had)
1 teaspoon curry (I didn’t use any of that as I don’t have any)

Steps:

Wash zucchinis, chop into cubes and reserve.
In a large bowl, mix together the flour and half the milk. Stir until homogenous. Add eggs one by one and then add remaining milk. Add salt, pepper and curry. Add cheese and zucchinis.
Pour mixture into a 12 inch pie dish (spread zucchini evenly) and add to preheated oven (36oF) for 40 minutes.

Note: my pie dish was much smaller so I ended up cooking my quiche for about 1 hour and a half. The quiche was still a bit wet, due to the water content of the zucchini but the egg mixture was cooked through.  DH wasn’t sure at first but he liked it so much he had seconds!

You could add tomatoes, chopped up bacon and customize the quiche any way you like it. Enjoy!

CSA Tuesday Week 4

Today’s pickup was more bountiful than the last weeks and is going to provide for lots of tasty meals.

We got a zucchini, 2 beets with lots of beet greens, 2 lettuces, some kale and some parsley and super yummy smelling basil. We can also go pick more peas, strawberries and now in season raspberries. Although, from our experience this past Sunday picking our share of strawberries and peas, there isn’t much left of both of these!

The recommended recipe tonight was a beet and greens salad. The beets were cooked in the oven at 350 degrees for about an hour until they were tender. I peeled and quartered one beet and laid it on already dressed salad greens and then sprinkled it with crumbled feta cheese (the recipe called for goat cheese but I didn’t have any).

This last Sunday, DH invented a very tasty lemonade and I made more tonight to go with our supper. I’m sure this lemonade has been done many, many times before but it was a first for us, and maybe also for you! I use the recipe on the back of my bottle of lemon juice for the basic lemonade (1 cup sugar, 1 cup lemon juice for 2 quarts water) and then add raspberries and chopped up strawberries.

It’s a really refreshing drink and the raspberries and strawberries add a nice extra to the basic lemonade. I’ll definitely be making more!

Last but not least, we had a very tasty dessert of fresh berries over greek yogurt with a drizzle of honey. I used some of the strawberries and raspberries that we picked on Sunday and added some store bought blueberries. Yummy!

Later this week, I hope to cook up the kale and beet greens into something delicious, I’ll keep you posted!

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Sewing machine ETA: I brought my sewing machine at my local sewing store (were I bought my machine) and dropped it off so it could be looked at later that day. After a $60 repair it is now back home and I am very, very glad.

CSA Tuesday

Another Tuesday, another CSA!

Today’s bounty is very, very green.

I received collard greens, kale, lettuce, parsley and swiss chard. I also, like the past 2 weeks, can go pick a quart each of peas and strawberries, and I’m looking forward to doing this on Sunday.

There is always recipes included with our share and this week one of the recipes was for a kale and white bean soup. Conveniently, I had all the ingredients and in the pot they all went. About an hour later, I had the most tasty soup. With a bit of bread and some parmesan cheese, nomnom.

My version of the white bean and kale soup:

In a big pot, cook a small onion’s worth (white and/or red onion), red pepper flakes and 2 minced garlic cloves in some olive oil.
Add 4 cups worth of chicken or vegetable stock. Bring to a boil.
Add 5 to 10 chopped kale leaves, bring to a boil and simmer for about 15 minutes until the kale becomes tender.
Add 2-3 cans of drained white beans, cook for an additional 10 to 15 minutes
Season to taste
Serve over a slice of crusty bread and garnish with some grated parmesan cheese
Enjoy the deliciousness

Tomorrow I’m looking forward to another delicious green salad with some lettuce, spinach and some radishes!