CSA Week 14
This week you MAY have carrots of any color, pak choi, apples, tomatoes, onion, peppers, hot peppers, peaches?beets?winter squash?leeks?
How many weeks of peaches have we seen? I don’t even know now! I wish I had a handle on the varieties so I could have been sharing that with you weekly, but I don’t know beyond the yellow or white fleshed, freestone- not freestone. I do have a handle on this week’s apple varieties which include: McIntosh, Molly Delicious, Redcorts, and Cortland
Bok choy, bok choi, pak choy, pak choi, napa, Chinese cabbage…what’s what? Well, bok/pak choy/choi are the same but different from the napa/Chinese cabbage which are the same (I think I wrote about that last week). And it’s not even that simple, because there are dozens of specialized varieties within each category. I’m no expert, believe me! I had quite a long conversation through a translator at the greenhouses this Spring with a lady looking for what I think was a type of choi that must have looked something like some seedlings we had. I was kinda banking on a green stemmed choi. Anyway, when the gentleman translating for her looked up the specific word she was calling the choi, it simply translated as “vegetable”. That brought on giggles from all involved. LOL. Without any of the seed catalogs handy that specialize in Asian veggies, we could not examine varieties very well. I love the Kitazawa Seed catalog for that very purpose! They offer at least 20 varieties. Directly from them:
“This graceful vegetable with Chinese origins has spread throughout Asia and beyond, developing a wide range of varieties. The most typical Pak Choi features dark green leaves atop white spoon-shaped upright stems. Stems vary considerably in thickness and shape, and in some varieties they are green. One variety produces a rosette of dark green leaves close to the ground. There are specialty pak chois that have frilly leaves to light yellow-green color. The slight mustardy flavor of Pak Choi makes it a delightful addition to stir-fries, soups, noodle and meat dishes, and salads, if the young leaves are used. In China, the coarser leaves are often pickled. Some Chinese cooks also dip the leaves in boiling water and hang them out to dry in the sun for several days. Drying enables this highly perishable vegetable to be stored for winter months. Asian cooks use the entire plant at many stages of development.”
We grow mostly what is categorized as “white stemmed” pak choi including Tatsai and Joi Choi, but we also grow the “green stemmed” Mei Qing and Tatsoi, and the “red-stemmed” Red Tatsoi, Dahong, and Purple Choi.
YIKES!
Now do you want to hear about carrots? 😉
Recipes
I saw this in Eating Well when I was convalescing this week with my first (and with God’s Grace, my last) cold of the season. It looked fairly decent, so I’ll be trying it out when my sense of smell and taste return 😉 I bet it would be good with some buffalo chicken strips on top! If any of you make it, be sure to let me know if it was any good. Ha
Blue Cheese-Veggie Slaw, Eating Well
-
- ½ cup crumbled blue cheese
- ¼ cup chopped flat-leaf parsley
- ¼ cup buttermilk
- ¼ cup mayonnaise
- 2 tablespoons cider vinegar
- 4 cups thinly sliced cabbage
- 1½ cups thinly sliced red bell pepper
- 1 cup shredded carrot
- ¼ cup salted roasted sunflower seeds
Carrot, Apple, and Horseradish Salad, Gourmet | November 1992
| Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less but requires additional unattended time.
Yield: Serves 4 to 6 2 1/2 cups coarsely grated carrot In a bowl stir together the carrots, the apples, peeled and grated coarse, the sour cream, the horseradish to taste, the parsley, the lemon juice, the sugar, and salt and pepper to taste and chill the salad, covered, for 1 hour, or until it is cold. |
If you still have that Napa laying around – or use your choi instead…
Quick Stir Fry Chinese Cabbage
- 2 TB oil (not olive)
- 1+ tsp minced ginger (optional)
- 2 cloves minced garlic (optional)
- few pinches red pepper flakes
- Shredded cabbage
- other veggies if you have on hand (shredded carrot, turnip, kohlrabi, thinly sliced onion or pepper)
- 3+ Tb soy sauce
- sprinkle rice vinegar
This is so simple to throw together! The cabbage is featured, but any other veggies you have laying about are supporting characters! Shred or slice very thinly everything. Heat oil in large skillet (by all means use your wok if you’ve got one!), add onion, ginger, red pepper flakes, stir around a minute, add cabbage, garlic and any other veggies. Stir around until wilted. Remove from heat, drizzle with soy sauce and rice vinegar, cover and let rest 2 minutes and enjoy!
My full complete “recipe”: Cook 1lb ground sausage; when browned, add oil if needed and continue with above recipe. Usually I serve with rice 🙂
What are all y’all cooking these days?! Send me your recipes, please.
Farm Dirt
We have been doing more with CSA deliveries to businesses and workplaces. Some of you reading this are part of that already. Some of the places we drop off fully packed CSA bags include college campuses, industrial parks and coffee shops. If you find a postcard in your box/bag/hand please think about it as an option at your own workplace and then pass it on. If you already get CSA delivered to your workplace (you know who you are) please pass it to a coworker and encourage them to subscribe for 2020 (ooh, scary) OR share with a outside friend who would benefit from a CSA drop at their workplace. Thanks in advance! 🙂
If you were missing any House Finches, look no further, they are all here! Apparently the resident adults all had bumper crops of chicks because the parents bring them in hoards to the feeder now – I have never seen so many. I’m delighted, really. As a constant student of the wildlife on the farm, and especially at my window, I can only assume everything was optimal for at least the Finches, and that makes me happy.
The leaves are starting to color up a little out this way. It is a nice time to visit the farm because it is reasonably cool and pleasant for walking around. I’ve been awful about having maps on hand, and now that first crops have been tilled under and new crops in their place, the maps are not accurate. BUT, I will leave maps out on my bench in the yard to serve a a guideline of where are property extends to 😉
No one responded to last week’s question polling for interest in having potato or winter squash harvest days, so I’ll take that as a “not interested” LOL. Meanwhile, stay tuned for gleaning – hopefully that won’t be a thing until later in October. Gleaning is an opportunity for CSA members to glean (gather whatever may be left behind after the main harvest) at the farm when a killing frost is imminent. Stay tuned for a special email or facebook posting.
Eat well,
Geneviève Stillman
