Week 8 Summary

Week 8 of our CSA is now behind us. Here's an overview of how we used (or didn't use) the items we received:

Royal Burgundy Beans: the cool thing I learned about burgundy beans last week is that they lose their dark purple color and turn green when they are done cooking! How neat (and totally practical) is that? Unfortunately though, we still have almost a whole bag of these left.  I made one small helping of them while Steve was away, but hopefully we'll make some more with dinner tonight.

Dill: so if you're not pickling en masse, what's the best way to use up a whole bunch of dill? On Friday I roasted two chicken legs in a pan of the new red potatoes and carrots, and then coated the cooked veggies in lemon juice and dill for some flavor. The recipe called for a whopping 2 tsp. of minced dill, which didn't even make a dent in the bundle we got. Any suggestions?

8-Ball Zucchini: I only used one of these squash last week to make the zucchini tomato gratin, so we are still swimming in them (especially because we got about 6 more in our Week 9 box!). That's okay though because I still have plans for them, and I seriously love zucchini.

New Red Potatoes: gone! They all went into the roast veggies/chicken legs dish mentioned above and pictured below, a variation on this recipe. The whole thing turned out okay. Not bad, but a little dry, which can most likely be blamed on my incompetence with taking a recipe rogue.

Chioggia Beets: gone! All went into the chocolate beet cake I wrote about last week.

Red Leaf Lettuce: gone! Mid-week I thawed a chicken breast from one of our previous CSA weeks, and poached and cubed it so it could go into a green salad for lunches while Steve was away (since not cooking dinner every night = no leftovers to eat for lunch the next day). So good. My favorite right now is dried cranberries, blue cheese crumbles, and a vinaigrette or Vadalia onion dressing. Oh, and cashews (!), but we didn't have any on hand.

Green Cabbage: we used about half of it and I'm sorry to say I don't think the rest is going to get used. This is the recipe I tried and it was not love, at all. I have total vegetable-guilt.

White Onions: haven't used any of them yet, but thankfully they'll hold up for a long long time.

Peaches: gone! All eaten with lunches.

2 Pints Blueberries: so far we've used about half of them. I made this yummy blueberry cheesecake ice-cream as a welcome home treat for Steve (but also secretly as a treat for myself!). We half this recipe to 8 servings when we make it.

 

Chicken Breasts: gone! Both went into this barbecue pulled chicken crock-pot dish that we love. Steve tweaks the ingredients some (less molasses, more vinegar) to get more bite in the sauce and it's great.

Wings: not used yet; still frozen.


Week 8 Links
Chocolate Beet Cake
Zucchini Tomato Gratin


Week 9 is up next. Stay tuned to see how it goes!

Zucchini Tomato Gratin

Like I explained the other day, my goal this week was to try and be a good kid while Steve was away (he'll be home tonight - yayyyy!) and cook at least a few dinners and lunches for myself. A noble endeavor, when my alternative may have been relying on Lean Cuisines and/or take-out for 5 days/10 meals - ick. Especially on a weeknight cooking a meal for myself, by myself, isn't high on the list of things I'd love to be doing, so that made this zucchini tomato gratin dish a great fit because it was super quick and easy.

My only problem with this recipe is that it wasn't really a recipe - more of a "throw in some of this, and this, and maybe this too, and then 'bake' it". Not that that's a bad thing at all, but it makes my poor little diligent-recipe-following, culinarily uncreative, Type-A head explode a little bit. How much zucchini? How much cheese? How long should I set my timer for!? Gaahhh, what if I MESS IT UP!!?

Intuition in the kitchen (ha, rhyming) is way more in Steve's realm, so if he had been around he could have reigned me in a bit. But in any case, the worst thing that ended up happening was that the ratio of vegetables to cheese & breadcrumbs was way low. Like, embarrassingly low, if you compare her gratin pictures to mine. But hey, thanks in part to all that cheese and breadcrumb action: IT TASTED GREAT.

Zucchini Tomato Gratin on Proud Italian Cook

Used From Our CSA8-ball zucchini

I also could have used the white onions that came in our Week 8 box, but I so love Vadalia onions, therefore I didn't want to sub those out. And of course we are getting cherry tomatoes next week (go figure), but this time around they had to come from the store.

Thoughts on the Recipe
- Since we don't have any oven-safe skillets at home, I used a medium-size Pyrex dish for this, which worked fine.
- I just used the various cheeses and breadcrumbs that we had on hand, which didn't match her recommendations, but thankfully for me this kind of meal is very forgiving, as I learned.
- I would definitely make this again, and next time I won't be so nervous about getting it wrong. I would also up the vegetable factor for sure, to stretch it a bit farther, because it makes great leftovers.

Chocolate Beet Cake

As I mentioned yesterday, I was (and still am) daunted by the beets and the cabbage that we got in our Week 8 box. I did get some really great suggestions on facebook though for how to make use of both - yay and thank you! So somehow I feel like I cheated a little, but when I was scrolling Pinterest for recipe ideas and saw one for a chocolate beet cake, I repinned it right away and didn't look any further for ideas. And I think I was so relieved to see the word "cake" that it also didn't occur to me to browse around for other cake or dessert ideas that used beets. Now I know that there are a lot out there, and some variations that look really good! So all that to say that I can't vouch for this recipe in particular; I literally tried the first one I found.

My mom always says that beets taste like dirt, and I think I agree with her. I haven't yet written them off entirely, but I have to say that I even found the process of boiling, peeling and dicing these guys to prepare them for the batter to be pretty distasteful. They boiled for 20 minutes and by the end of it, the whole kitchen smelled like the ground! The aroma during baking was much nicer, once the chocolate was in the mix too, but by then I wasn't expecting much. My first few tastes put me on the fence, but this cake has really grown on me throughout the week. I would say it does have a bit of an earthy flavor to it somewhere in there, but it works.

Chocolate Beet Cake on Gourmet Heartbeat 

Used From Our CSA
chioggia beets

Thoughts on the Recipe
- I was short on beets, and had only one and a half of the two cups the recipe calls for. It worked out okay, obviously, and probably gave me less of that earthiness I mentioned above. I added a little extra applesauce to help make up the volume.
- The recipe recommends a bundt pan for this cake, which would have been very cute, but we don't own one. Instead I divided the batter in two and used my loaf pan twice. I guess I could have also halved the recipe, but then I wouldn't have been able to use up all the beets! I watched it closely, but the baking time ended up being about the same.
- Yes to chocolate chips! I love the texture they give to a chocolate cake. I was generous with them.

So now I can say I've baked with beets. We are slotted to get some more in Week 9, so let's see if I get brave and actually try a savory dish next time, or if I just stick to putting beets in baked goods from here on out.

Week 8 Delivery

Welcome to CSA Week 8! Here are the items we received in our box last Thursday:

Vegetables
royal burgundy beans (bag, semi-hidden next to the dill)
dill
8-ball zucchini (they are round! so cute)
new red potatoes
chioggia beets
red leaf lettuce
green cabbage
white onions

Fruit
peaches
2 pints blueberries

Chicken
breasts
wings

Week 8 presents itself with three interesting challenges. The first challenge is that Steve is away Monday through Friday of this week, leading a sleep-away camp for work. Typically, if he's working late or doing an overnight for work, I won't cook dinner, but instead will scrounge around for leftovers or treat myself to something like Chipotle. It provides a nice excuse to get out of the kitchen (and do something super productive instead, like watch Netflix). But for five days in a row, that's not going to fly. I did kind of front-load our meal plan so I was able to hoard some leftovers by the end of the weekend, but I'll still be cooking for myself at least a couple of times this week.

Challenges number two and three are the cabbage and beets, which are both filed under the "don't love" heading for Steve and I. I've already made use of the beets, and will share this week what we made and how it went (we may have cheated...?). I also tried a recipe on Sunday night that used about half the cabbage, and IMO it was not good. Steve called it "edible", and I don't think that response qualifies it as a success. But I am excited about all of our other Week 8 items and have some fun plans this week!

I'd love your ideas for preparing beets and cabbage in the comments!