Zucchini Pasta with Creamy Lemon Chive Dressing

Our plans for dinner last night started out with this dish from Martha Stewart's website, but I quickly realized two crucial things: 1) there is no actual spaghetti in this zucchini spaghetti and 2) there is no way we are going to get our zucchini sliced that thin without a mandolin at our disposal. I love the idea of a dish comprised entirely of julienned zucchini, but it just was not going to happen without that important piece of equipment. Still, since I thought it looked so yummy, and was intrigued by the dressing, I decided to improvise.

True zucchini pasta will have to go into the someday file for us. For last night though, I stuck with the lemon-chive dressing and combined a half-pound of fettuccine with a half-pound of coarsely grated zucchini. Yum yum! More about the recipe modification below.

Creamy Lemon-Chive Dressing from Martha Stewart
 

Don't mind that over-toasted baguette in the picture - we had some build-your-own bruschetta with dinner last night too.

Used From Our CSA
zucchini

Steve mincing chives (and doing so quite precisely, I might add)

Thoughts on the Recipe
-We prepared the dressing recipe as it was written, and cooked up a 1/2 lb. of fettuccine.
- This step is modified from the original zucchini spaghetti recipe: I grated a zucchini, enough to get 1/2 lb., and tossed it in a strainer with some salt. I let that sit for about 15 minutes and then squeezed the zucchini against the sides of the strainer to try to get out as much water as I could. Since it was grated instead of julienned, I didn't have to be so gentle (I'm sure Martha would be disappointed).
- The pasta, zucchini and dressing (we used it all) were tossed together in a bowl. Done!
- In the end, I think this could have done with more zucchini - why not? Since we have no shortage of it right now, grating another one would not have been a bad idea, and would have stretched this dish farther.

This was a wonderfully simple dish to pull off on a weeknight. I love the lightness that the zucchini brings to it. And I've said before that Steve & I don't normally gravitate toward pasta, but I would definitely make this one again. Hooray for finding another way to work through that zucchini!

Chevre Stuffed Sweet Peppers

This recipe was a great find for someone like me, who doesn't take much creative license in the kitchen without permission. Mostly because ideas such as "stuff some chevre inside those cute little sweet peppers" don't usually come to me on their own. But as soon as I spotted this idea on Pinterest? Total light-bulb moment. This makes for a quick and easy snack, but still feels pretty high-class if you ask me. I made them on Monday night for the ladies in my small group, and I think they went over pretty well! I just have one not-so-great picture today, but definitely click through to the original recipe to see just how endearing and enticing these are.

Chevre Stuffed Sweet Peppers on bell'alimento

Used From Our CSA
mixed yummy peppers

Thoughts on the Recipe
It was hard to mess this one up. I thinned out the goat cheese with a small amount of olive oil (partly to stretch it further and partly to make it a little less crumbly), and added some salt and pepper. I ended up with a little extra after all, so probably could have roasted a few more peppers.

I definitely recommend these guys for your next dinner party or social gathering. Does anybody have suggestions for something else I should fill a tiny pepper with? Tell me please, because I'm probably too dense to think of it myself.

Stuffed Zucchini with Pesto Couscous

On Monday night we made these cute stuffed zucchini for dinner. Because we still had four of the little 8-ball zucchini in our fridge from Week 9, I didn't want to pass up the chance to try something like this. It was not a difficult recipe but involved several steps so it definitely took some time.

I ended up feeling like a lot of the work for this dish was just for the added "awww" factor of the little zucchini bowls to hold everything, because I only ate a little bit of my zucchini shell. I would just as soon have shredded the whole zucchini and made a variation of the couscous to eat on its own. Steve ate his whole zucchini, so he disagrees with me here. But then again, I think I may have under-roasted the bowls (partly because I was rushing to get it ready). If they had been softer, I might have been more on-board with the whole concept.  But you have to admit, they are pretty cute!

Stuffed Zucchini with Pesto Couscous on Dishing up the Dirt

Used From Our CSA
8-ball zucchini
sweet corn
cherry tomatoes

basil (not from our CSA, but Steve picked it from the garden at his work. Win!)

Thoughts on the Recipe
Since I only had 4 of these zucchini and the recipe calls for 6, I two-thirds-ed the recipe. It made for some clunky conversions so I approximated just about everything. We were also a little short on basil, so it could have used more pesto. But no harm done with the final product.

No side dish on these plates, because I ran out of time to make anything else!

What are your thoughts on stuffed zucchini? To eat or not to eat the roasted shell? Would you rather go to the trouble, or just make the filling as a dish on its own?

Heirloom Tomato and Eggplant Galette

Here's a dinner from last weekend that made us feel super fancy, but surprisingly, came together really easily! Before we started our CSA this season I had never even heard of a galette. And now, two months later, I've made two different kinds: a sweet galette with rhubarb and this smart dinner version full of cheese and vegetables (and butter - oh my word THE BUTTER). And aren't they gorgeous?

Heirloom Tomato and Eggplant Galette on Fork Knife Swoon

Used From Our CSA 
heirloom tomatoes (1 from our box and 1 from the store)
eggplant

Thoughts on the Recipe
- My best advice for working with pastry dough remains some variation of: work quickly and remain calm/confident. A thin metal spatula is a great helper, too. I think our stone counter top must help a lot because it seems to always be a nice cool temperature. But even without that, this was a great dough recipe and was relatively easy to use. I rolled mine out directly on the counter and Steve used parchment paper and we were both successful on the first try!
- Since the price of Gruyere at our grocery store gave me a mild heart attack (about $9 for a tiny wedge that I don't think would have even been enough), I swiftly googled a substitute and landed on Swiss. And we thought it worked out great. Maybe next time with the fancy cheese.
- We split one of these for dinner the night we made them (which basically means we consumed heart-stopping amounts of butter), but the second one lasted us a solid three days as leftovers. And it was delicious reheated. I am such a fan of food that is leftover-friendly.

Sigh ... this is such a beautiful sight to me - is that weird?

So there you have it - a lovely savory galette. Is trying two different recipes of this pastry enough to qualify me as an expert? How about a gal-expert? (Ugh, sorry, that was terrible...)

Zucchini Corn Pancakes

Before finding this recipe last week, I don't think it would have occurred to me to make a non-breakfast pancake. Don't confuse this with the concept of eating a breakfast pancake at a meal other than breakfast (aka: brunch or brinner), which is always a great idea. But now that I've had a savory pancake, I think it's a great idea! These were a great way for us to work through some of the 8-ball zucchini and sweet corn that came in our Week 9 box. Topped with sour cream and some fresh salsa, they were just right.

Zucchini Corn Pancakes on Girl Versus Dough 

Used From Our CSA
8-ball zucchini
bicolor sweet corn

Thoughts on the Recipe
This was really so easy and straightforward. The batter came together really quickly, but cooking it all up was more time-intensive. Steve tends to be the grill cook in our house, or at least the one who is usually standing at the stove when hot oil is involved. And he made several comments about how long the pancakes were taking: at 3-4 minutes per side, it took at least 40 minutes to get through all the batter. Still, we loved these and would certainly make them again, on a night when we know we'll have the time.

Has anyone else ever made a non-breakfast pancake? It was a new concept to me, but maybe I'm just out of the loop!

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.

Pineapple Rice (on a Bed of Mizuna Greens)

In the interest of full disclosure, let me clarify that pineapples do not grow in the Mid-Atlantic (unfortunately, because how cool would that be?) and the one that this recipe centers around was purchased at the grocery store. The CSA-item that was the star of the meal was the mizuna. All of what we had was used to form the bed of greens for this Hawaiian rice dish.

Mizuna was a completely new green to Steve & I. It's known for having a mild peppery taste, which reminded Steve of horseradish. I'm not sure how it would be on its own; I find the flavor to be pretty strong. But tossed in this pineapple dressing and paired with the rice concoction, it really rounded out the set of flavors and made for a great complete meal. Brown rice is not something I normally get excited about, so I was really pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this dish.

Pineapple Rice Recipe on 101 Cookbooks

Used From Our CSA
purple mizuna
scallions

Thoughts on the Recipe
- We didn't plate up the greens and rice on a big serving platter as the recipe suggests. Since we planned to have leftovers, we kept them separate until serving up an individual portion.
- We skipped the seitan, but agreed this could be good with some chicken in the mix, too!
- We ate the rice hot (vs. at room temperature)

Even though this dinner didn't feature as many CSA vegetables as I might have liked (especially for as many as we have this week!), I think I have to count it a win when we make a meal with a completely new vegetable that we had never even heard of before, and enjoy it this much. If nothing else, it's a starting point. Mizuna and I are no longer strangers.

Kale & Quinoa Salad

The first time we ever tried a recipe with quinoa in it (to make these tacos, which I highly recommend, btw) Steve came home from that week's grocery store run and said that there were a lot of different flavors of "kwin-o-ah" (emphasis on the "o") and he wasn't quite sure which one he should get. I honestly had no clue what he was saying at first, which quickly became hilarious and adorable when I realized he was talking about quinoa. And that's my funny, if not anti-climactic, story about quinoa. In Steve's defense, I will never run the risk of misspelling it since I say "kwin-o-ah" to myself just about every time I write it out. Thanks, man.

Last night we tried another kale salad recipe. And despite the common denominators of kale and chickpeas, this one is really pretty different from the chopped kale salad we tried during CSA Week 1, which is exciting. Yay for variety! And like the first kale salad, this too was delicious.

Kale & Quinoa Salad on enjoy it

Used From Our CSA
kale
scallions (in place of red onion)

Thoughts on the Recipe
- We halved this, because I did think we would have enough kale for the full version. But as I washed and chopped it, I did start to feel like it was a lot more than I initially guessed we had. So I made the full amount of dressing just to make sure we wouldn't wind up short on that. We had a little dressing leftover in the end, which will be great on any green salad later this week. In fact I would definitely make just the dressing again to have on hand on it's own - simple but it works!
- I saw the note in the instructions to add the dressing early on (to help wilt the kale) a little late in the process of getting everything ready. It's good advice and next time I'll definitely do that first, before cooking the quinoa or chopping the onion. 
- The leftovers today were great. If you plan on having any, I'd just recommend leaving the cashews out and adding them in as you eat it. Cashews get all weird and rubbery after sitting in a dressed salad for a while. Anyone else experienced this?

So there you have it: a delicious kale & quinoa salad. Let me know your thoughts if you get the chance to try it out! I'll post again soon with a Week 3 recap, and some links to other recipes we used this week that I didn't write about in detail.

Simple Green Smoothie

Today I actually have a recipe of my own to share - if you can even call it a recipe when you throw a bunch of ingredients into a blender and turn it on.

I'm pretty new to the green smoothie game (born in January out of that lovely post-holiday feeling of: i-am-going-to-punch-myself-if-i-don't-eat-something-that-is-not-a-baked-good-or-piece-of-candy-real-quick) and have only tried a few different recipes. Nothing too fancy yet. Part of the problem is that our "blender" (read: cheap novelty smoothie maker) is really not the best and every time I use it I worry that the little machine is about to take on its last frozen banana. Poor thing even struggles with the ice cubes. Maybe someday we'll front the money for something more legit, but until then I'll probably keep things pretty simple in the smoothie department.

Makes a great on-the-go snack!

Used From Our CSA
dinosaur kale

I really like the chocolatey-peanut taste of this smoothie. It's something a little different, and is a nice go-to if you don't have a ton of other fruit immediately on hand. I find this to be a good snack-size portion for me, but it could easily be doubled to be shared or serve as more of a meal replacement. It's also been a great way this week to work through our CSA kale, which we didn't make any other specific plans for meal-wise.

Ingredients
- 2-3 pieces of kale, stemmed (or 2-3 handfuls of fresh spinach for a milder flavor)
- 1/2 frozen banana
- 1 T natural peanut butter
- 1 T cocoa powder
- 1/2 c. almond milk
- 4 ice cubes

Blend all ingredients together and add more almond milk as needed, to get your desired consistency.

My advice is to cut and peel the banana first and throw it in a plastic container or bag in the freezer. Your future self will thank you when you are not trying to peel a rock hard, ice cold banana. See the above picture and learn from my mistakes, because half the time I forget to do this and it is never pretty.

Do you have a favorite green smoothie recipe? Feel free to share in the comments.

Roasted Rhubarb Jam

I had a revelation this weekend. I feel like there are so many plant foods in the world that are botanically a fruit, but nutritionally, we think of as a vegetable (tomato, cucumber, avocado, squash, etc). On the other hand, I can only come up with one botanical vegetable that we tend to classify, cook, and eat as if it were a fruit: the lowly rhubarb.

So since fruit wont be part of our CSA deliveries for another week yet, I was pretty jazzed that Steve could swap for this fruit-ish vegetable last week. As a great lover of dessert I wanted to spend some time in the kitchen cooking up something sweet! We got roughly a pound of rhubarb, and I found two intriguing recipes that each called for that amount. So I made the obvious choice and decided to make a half-recipe of each of them (totally obvious and not overkill, right?).

Rhubarb recipe #1, this roasted jam, was executed on Saturday. And it was good. Make you wish you didn't half the recipe good. I can happily affirm that this is awesome on vanilla ice cream, and it's awesome on toast (I took a cue from last week's tartines and spread some ricotta first - perfect).

Roasted Rhubarb Jam on Simply Scratch

Used From Our CSA
rhubarb

Thoughts on the Recipe
- This one was pretty straightforward. I didn't have the vanilla sugar (and have actually never made/used it before), so I followed her suggestion and just added in some vanilla bean paste with the sugar.
- After it cooled I put it in our mini food processor to get the sauce consistency.

This is a recipe I would definitely return to (and make a bigger batch of) in a future where I have more rhubarb on hand. I am saving my other half-pound for now because this weekend I have plans to attempt a half-size galette. Wish me luck...

What's your favorite thing to make with rhubarb? My mom sent me a rhubarb sangria recipe yesterday that looked pretty fun! Do you know of any other vegetables that we actually tend to think of as being more fruit-like?

Tortellini & Spring Vegetable Salad

This will be the last meal I share detailing our use of Week 1 items, because today Steve is picking up our Week 2 box (I heard a rumor there was rhubarb in the swap box today and I'm a little giddy about it)! I have an upcoming post planned to summarize our first week eating from the CSA and how we did with each of the items we received. That might be of interest to those who are curious about the real world practicality of this kind of service (myself included).

So, this spring pasta salad was a big winner for us. Steve said this was his favorite thing we made in Week 1. I thought the tortellini and goat cheese went great against all the veggies, and the simple oil & vinegar dressing was perfect. It came together so quickly and easily, and delivered far beyond what I was expecting, taste-wise. Best. case. scenario.

Tortellini and Spring Vegetable Salad on the kitchn

Used From Our CSA
asparagus
mixed greens (thrown in with some leftover grocery store baby spinach we also had on hand)
French breakfast radishes
red scallions (in lieu of chives)

Thoughts on the Recipe
- We used the frozen tortellini we had on hand, which was cheese (rather than pesto).
- I skipped the peas altogether. Fresh peas sounded good, but since we didn't have any, the idea of buying them frozen just to add them in with a bunch of other fresh, delicious things just didn't sound appealing. And peas aren't something we normally keep on hand for other recipes, so I just thought why bother?
- Leftovers assessment: It was ... okay. Definitely much better fresh. I actually ended up picking out the radishes at lunch the next day because I thought they really took on a bad, bitter flavor. Does anybody know why that might be? Is that a thing that radishes do once they've been cut?

Thanks for following along with our first week of CSA adventures. I can't wait to see what Week 2 brings!

Grilled Asparagus Tartines

I was totally smitten with this simple appetizer/side dish. Steve liked these too, but not nearly as much as I did, and I think I know why: this to me totally feels like something you would be served at a classy garden party or bed and breakfast. Where's my floppy sun hat? Personally, I can easily get behind food that is both delicious and makes me feel fancy, but I can see why Steve might not be so excited about that prospect.

Grilled Asparagus Tartines on Panini Happy

Sidenote: this website is completely devoted to recipes that can be made using a panini press. We don't have one ourselves, but I still think that concept is pure genius. Although we have been known to use our George Foreman Jr. to make paninis before - because we're resourceful (or maybe just desperate) like that.

Tartine: a fancy French open-faced sandwich topped with spreadable ingredients.

Used From Our CSA
asparagus
red scallions

I'm half counting the bread here too. It was not part of our CSA, but we grabbed it a few weeks ago at a local bakery for about $4. Then we cut it into thirds, froze them all separately, and collectively it lasted us two weeks - so good. We will be doing that again soon!

Thoughts on the Recipe
- If yesterday's chopped kale salad is the perfect make-and-take, dish, these tartines are the opposite of that. In my opinion, this is the kind of thing you want to pull off the skillet (or panini press, or grill), assemble as quickly as possible, and shove in your mouth while it's still hot and therefore at optimum levels of deliciousness. Is that allowed?
- These ended up being a little overboard on the oil for us, but I think it had more to do with our pesto than anything. Pesto is so easy to make but we got a small jar from the store this time around (whomp, whomp ... I know), and it was pretty oily. So next time I'll be more sparing with the oil when toasting the bread, unless maybe I have some homemade/less oily pesto.
- I sprinkled on a bit of kosher salt with the pepper.

We had these with a chicken dish we've made before, which we were able to use our CSA chicken breasts for. Check that recipe out here if you're so inclined (it's a work-intensive dish, but we enjoy it from time to time): Crispy Parmesan Chicken on The Comfort of Cooking. Together, they made for a delightful weekend dinner.

Chopped Kale Salad

The first recipe I made using some of our Week 1 ingredients was a total hit. We have actually already made it twice for two different dinner gatherings with friends. It seems to have been a hit with them, too! I will definitely return to this recipe in the future.

Chopped Kale Salad on What's Cooking Good Looking

Kale is not something we cook with regularly at all. But when I spotted this recipe online a few months ago, I thought it looked so delicious that I pinned it right away, knowing we would probably get some kale in our CSA. I mean, just look at the photos on her site - they make this dish look a heck of a lot more appetizing than mine do. The sweet in the chickpeas, mixed with the crunch of the almonds, creaminess of the avocado, and the awesome dressing (I loved the taste of ginger in there) all came together to make this a fast favorite. And the kale makes a perfect backdrop to the flavor/texture party that's going on here.

Used From Our CSA
kale (used half the bunch each time, so it's all been used now: wahoo!)
Egyptian walking onion/red scallions (used in place of green onion the first and second times respectively; both were fine substitutions)

Thoughts on the Recipe
- I think you can easily get away with 1/4 c. or less of sesame seeds. But I always feel like recipes call for more sesame seeds than are really needed. They are not cheap! We have had luck in the past getting a bigger, less-expensive bottle of them found with the Asian food, rather than the tiny bottles that are shelved with the other spices.
- I know it's not a CSA item, but avocado is never an "optional" ingredient in my book. It elevates everything!
- I loved that ginger flavor in the dressing so much, and will probably add more next time I make this. Why not?
- This was the perfect dish to make and take. We tossed the dressing in right before leaving home and it held up great.
- Leftovers are really important in our home, so I also think it's worth mentioning that this was still great on day two. I probably wouldn't hang on to it much beyond that.

Still great on day two!

I now have one kale recipe in my pocket that I feel confident about. What's your favorite thing to make with fresh kale?