We’re dog-sitting this weekend and I’m delighting in the company of one Mr. Panko. He’s a handsome little poodle and we’ve had a lot of fun so far. Yesterday we went to the farmer’s market in New Canaan and took a walk around town. We played and he napped a little in the afternoon and then we took a long walk in the evening. This morning I got up early, early, early and we took another long walk.


Last night, Panko afoot, I realized that there’s no way we could eat all the luscious plums in the fridge so I decided to make Jeremie’s Mom’s plum cake. It freezes beautifully and that’s what I intend to do.

getting ready for the oven:


apres oven:


Jeremie’s Mom makes this cake pareve and often serves it for Shabbat dessert but I made it dairy, so it’s sticking to coffee time or dairy meals. I love dairy meals. Later this morning we’re heading off to Forest Hills, Queens to meet up with some family and have brunch. Hopefully we’ll hit up some Kosher markets afterwords so we can stock up on el Kosher chicken. I can’t find kosher chicken wings around here. Can you believe it? Oh – ps – it’s yontev so no markets. Silly me.

The new countertops & sink come on Tuesday. I’m very excited. I’m a little worried that I won’t be able to take good pictures on the counter anymore, but such is thus.

I haven’t been writing (or taking many pictures) because I’ve been cooking. I took pictures of last week’s CSA share with Jeremie’s camera but I’m not quite sure where it’s hiding in the house. I took pictures of this week’s haul with my camera but I was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of veggies and I’m afraid it’s not very artfully arranged. After eating a little something, I got so caught up in cooking and putting the vegetables away that I forgot to take pictures of the fruit. Maybe later. Anyway, here’s the haul:


Loads of collards, broccoli, turnips with greens, garlic, chili peppers, habanero peppers, summer squash, beets, potatoes, and two pumpkins. Holy cow. Last night I made garlicy kale with kale from last week, roasted a bunch of beets for the fridge & freezer, roasted the turnips and also roasted some kohlrabi from a couple of weeks ago. We also tried to dry some peppers in our convection toaster oven but it was taking a really long time and I needed to go to bed, so I turned it off overnight. I should’ve just stayed up with it since I didn’t fall asleep until 3:30a anyway.

On Wednesdays we pick up the CSA share for the week. On Wednesdays I become infected with a strange desire to cook like a crazy person. It was only a couple of weeks ago that the 11 cubic foot freezer arrived and I’ve almost filled it. That is just nuts. Here’s what we got this week:



Leeks-1 bunch
Black Bell Eggplant -2
Lipstick Peppers-4
Lilac Peppers-2
Green Bell Peppers-2
Siberian Kale-1 bunch
Turnips w/ Greens-1 bunch
Summer Squash-6
Rosemary-1 bunch
Potatoes-1 quart or 2 pounds
Tomatoes-2

The fruit smelled so good, I was nibbling on the grapes before I even left the distribution area



Macintosh apples
Nectarines
Concord grapes

Last night I made pear butter with some pears I had from last week’s share, carmelized leek soup, potato leek soup and sauteed chard. It doesn’t sound like a lot but it was a good 4 hours worth of work.

I can’t sleep so I thought I’d put up the pictures now. Here’s what we got this week, veggie-wise:

Buttercrunch Lettuce -1 head

Slicing Tomatoes-2.5 pounds

Purple Peppers -4

Scallions-1 bunch

Beets-1 bunch

Kohlrabi-1 bunch

Black Bell Eggplant-1

Swiss Chard-1 bunch

Summer Squash-2

Lime Basil-1 bunch-small leaves with a distinctive lime flavor

…and fruit…


Macintosh Apples, Nectarines, Gala Apples, Bartlett Pears and Raspberries.

With a couple of days off from cooking, I was in the mood again tonight. I made roasted beets with two weeks worth of beets, roasted new potatoes with a few mini onions and rosemary, boiled beets with one week’s share of beets and a spicy sesame noodle salad with scallions from the share and a spicy fresh chili from last week or the week before. The noodle salad was very good and I’d definitely make it again, perhaps I’d even add more fresh chili. The fridge is full and I’m going to have to figure out what I can put in the fridge. I still haven’t done anything with the apples and peaches from last weekend, so it will be a busy Sunday cooking or freezing all of that. I will try to make myself tired thinking of that.

Saturday morning we drove 2 hours north (up 87) to Stoneledge Farm for their 10th anniversary members potluck. I made a big container of hummus and brought along a bunch of pita. There was a good selection of items for the potluck luncheon and I liked everything that I tried. There was a pig roast as well, which I didn’t partake in, though I did take a lot of pictures of it. Quite a novelty. I have all the pictures from the farm up in the photogallery.
We took a hay-less hayride around the fields and then we took a walking tour through the field with Deb, the woman who runs the farm. It was pretty awesome. After the tour, she casually mentions that we should feel free to pick anything we like. Holy moly. We ended up with 8 pounds of tomatoes (not pretty, but perfect for sauce), 9 pounds of eggplant (firm and perfect), 4 pounds of mixed peppers and 5 leeks. Saturday night I was up until 1:30 making roasted peppers, tomato sauce, indian-spiced eggplant and roasted ratatouille. Delicious! Jeremie took a bunch of pictures while I was cooking.

Sunday we drove almost 2 hours in the other direction to Glastonbury, CT to go kayaking with friends. It was a beautiful day, a bit on the chilly and windy side, but sunny and gorgeous overall. Kayaking was a blast and I’d love to go up there again. After kayaking we visited a Priam Vineyards, a local winery, and had a nice time tasting their wines. Then we popped back into the car and headed to a farm near our friends’ house, hoping to u-pick some peaches before dinner. Unfortunatly, the u-pick part of the farm closed before we got there but the store was open and we ended up getting a medium-sized basket of white peaches (around 6 lbs) and a jumbo basket of Macintosh apples (20ish lbs). Pies and applesauce, applesauce, applesauce. Because I don’t have enough to do!

Romaine -1 head
Red Sail Lettuce-1 head
Slicing Tomatoes-1 quart basket or 3 pounds
Biscayne Peppers-4
Lipstick Peppers-2
Chili Peppers -4 mildly hot
Jalapenos
Scallions-1 bunch
Louisiana Long Green Eggplant-2
Orient Express Eggplant-2
Genovese Basil-1 bunch
Beets-1 bunch
Potatoes-1 quart or 2 pounds
Tomatillos-1 pint or 3/4 pound
Cilantro-1 bunch

Wednesday night I roasted up the chili peppers and the tomatoes. I was planning on making roasted tomato soup but the tomatoes were so good on their own that we’ve just been eating them as a meal/snack/condiment. I think I’ll make some tomatillo salsa this weekend if I can find the time. Maybe tonight.

The raspberries were out of this world.

Tomorrow we’re heading up to the source of all this organic goodness, Stoneledge Farm in South Cairo, NY. It’s up just north of the Catskills, if I recall the map correctly. They’re having a 10th Year Celebration Farm Visit with draft horses and wagon rides around the field, a Pig Roast (eek), walks around the field and a big pot luck luncheon. I haven’t decided what to make. I want it to be something that will feed a fair number of people yet be ok in the car for two and a half hours.

We bought a freezer for the basement so that I can preserve some of this goodness for the winter and so that we can deal with the veggie load a little better. So far we’ve got some soup in there, some chopped eggplant and some butter (good brand on sale last week). Yesterday I went to the Westport Farmer’s Market during my lunch break and bought 7.75 lbs of eggplant, which I charred and cleaned last night. Tonight I’ll do all the chopping and I’ll package it for the freezer. Super yum.

I thought I was going to use last weekend to catch up on things but no such luck! Tropical Storm Ernesto rolled through here on Saturday and knocked our power out for about 36 hours. We kept the fridge and freezer closed and luckily everything stayed frozen.

So here’s what we got in last week’s vegetable share:

Cabbage-1 head
Beets-1 bunch
Summer Onions-1 bunch
Red Sails Leaf Lettuce-1 head
Romaine-1 head
Edamame-1 bunch
Tomatoes-3 pounds or 1 full quart
Sun Gold Cherry Tomatoes-1 basket
Lipstick Red/Green Pepper-shaped like a Pablano but sweet, an heirloom-4
Green Bell Pepper-4
Black Bell Eggplant-1
Potatoes-2 pounds or 1 quart basket
Basil-1 bunch

And the fruit:

Here’s what I made:
tomato sauce with these tomatoes, plus some from my garden
vegetable soup
pepper-corn casserole
eggplant and tomato sauce with turkey meatballs
pear cake

CSA Week 11

I am going to use this upcoming long weekend to get back in to a place where I’m not constantly trying to catch up.

Here’s what we got last week:
ed Sails Leaf Lettuce-2 heads
Romaine-1 head
Edamame-1 bunch
Opal Basil-1 bunch
Tomatoes-3 pounds
Sun Gold Cherry Tomatoes-1 pint basket
Pablano Peppers-4, mildly hot
Green Bell-4
Biscayne-4
Black Bell Eggplant-1
Potatoes-1 quart
Rosemary-1 bunch.
Shiro Plums, Red Clapp Pears, Peaches

Last night I made an amazing pasta dish with the eggplant and fresh tomato puree made from the last of the CSA tomatoes and some of the uglier tomatoes from my garden. I had a bunch split on the vine, not sure if it’s from too much sun or too much rain or something else entirely, but what’s ugly eatin makes delicious sauce. The plums were very good but they don’t hold a candle to the amazing peaches and pears. We’re going to get a freezer so that we can preserve some of this bounty and better deal with the load.

I did a lot of cooking today and my feet are tired! Early this morning I roasted 5 eggplants on the grill for “Grandma’s Chopped Eggplant”. Once the eggplant were nice and charred, I took them off the grill and seperated the smoky flesh from the crispy skins. The hot mash cooled down in the fridge for several hours and then I whirled it in the food processor. Grandma usually does all the cutting by hand but we discovered last weekend that the food processor does almost as well. That made three large vacu-bags for the freezer. Yum.
Next up was “Mom’s Gazpacho”. We love gazpacho and whenever we order it out at restaurants, it’s never quite as good as the recipe we have. I made a big pitcher all with veggies from the CSA.
Today we got the email letting us know what would be in next week’s share. We’re getting 4 more pablano peppers and I haven’t yet used this week’s four, so I started looking for recipes. In my Whole Foods Market cookbook, there was a good sounding recipe for a Chili Rellieno Casserole which just happens to take 8 pablanos. Perfect! I’m planning to make it on Wednesday after we pick up the share. One of the ingredients for the recipe is Adobo sauce, either from a can or from the recipe included in the book. That recipe called for 2 ancho peppers (dried) and I just happened to have 3 left from the second week of the CSA, so of course I used all of them. It’s so nice to use things up. The adobo is incredibly spicy but in a rich and delicious way, though calorie-wise it’s not rich, rather than an I’m-going-to-die spicy way. Super tasty.
I’m getting tired just typing all of this! I made two more dishes tonight: a delicious two cabbage soup (green cabbage, red cabbage, onions, carrots, garden fresh tomatoes, fresh dill & seasonings) and a cabbage salad with the remainder of the red and green cabbages, a few carrots and an onion in an Italian vinegrette. I’ll be taking that for lunch this week. Oh! I almost forgot! I made banana pudding too.
Now, time for sleep!