Farmshare, Week Two

[leahbobet]

It is CSA day!  I am posting on CSA day!  A little late, mind, since there was a birthday party to attend tonight, but nonetheless this is two solid weeks of actual reportage.  Shocking.

---

As you may recall, last week's spoils were:

1 Dancine Lettuce
1 bunch assorted herbs
1 quart baby greens
1 bunch asparagus
1 bunch green Onions
1 bunch rhubarb
1 pint black shell beans

1/2 pound chanterelle mushrooms
1/2 dozen duck eggs
Pumpkin/sesame seed red fife crackers

--and while we are not as far through that as we were with Week 1 (due partially to it being stupid, stupid hot out most of the week and not really wanting to cook because it made heat), we have done credibly, if not always well.




I look all pink and delicious, don't I?


This is where most of the rhubarb went: Week 1's, and over half of Week 2's, and then most of the asparagus and some green onion bulbs besides.  In fact, it made me feel downright housewifeian: Two pots going on the stove while I made croutons with some home-baked bread in the oven, and a whole timing thing that only worked out because P. made it in the door with the baby spinach just in time.

Alas, that for all that work, it wasn't very good.

I mean, it wasn't terrible: It just wasn't very good.  It had a strong rhubarb and slightly onion flavour that wanted for roundness and depth.  We dumped a bunch of Parmesan cheese in it to attempt rescue, ate our dinner, and kind of learned our lesson on that one.  Pink soup, you were meh.  We will not make you again.

Rhubarb failure continued with Friday's breakfast, rhubarb and blackberry french toast (we had decided we needed to start using eggs already).  This is not pictured, because I cannot be assed to photograph my food when I've just rolled out of bed, but P. apologized for it and deemed it FailToast, so I gather he was not happy with his creation.  Rhubarb is not kind, guys.  Also, when we're using French bread for this, we will henceforth use more eggs.

Things picked up Saturday night, which is also, sadly unphotographed.  Having worked a hot long day at the bookstore, I came home and promptly passed out face down for a nap, and P. put together a really very good stirfry out of the rest of the asparagus, green onion, green garlic, chanterelle mushrooms, baby bok choy (last of that fruit market stuff!) and some tamarind, oyster sauce, etc.  It was basically a veggies cleanout, and it was delicious because my head hurt and I was starving and yum.

The other thing we learned that night is that pink grapefruit drizzled with a touch of buckwheat honey is basically the best thing on earth.  Guh.

Then on Sunday we went to our local for brunch and didn't cook some more.  Here's my best-beloved P. performing the typical behaviour of his species while I harass him with a camera because he just looked very sweet that day.




Serious tea is serious.


By the time we got back to cooking food it was Tuesday, and we had some eggs to use like a mofo, so I baked some green onion bread and made fancy egg salad (a whole whack of duck eggs, green onion, green garlic, mayo, honey, capers, and some of the herbs from the Week 2 batch).



Open-faced sandwiches seem to be a thing now. Also, salad is good.  And I don't know why the cow looks like he's coming out of my sandwich.

The egg salad sandwich was another of those eight-minute super simple things that tasted really, really good: We piled some baby greens and tomato on top of those suckers and it was pretty much done.  The salad, which is what we did with the Dancine lettuce, the rest of the black morels, some chanterelle mushrooms, and a bunch of the baby greens -- plus some almonds and strawberries that were fading -- was also nice and cold and pretty simple.  I still have a bit left in the fridge.



The laziest dinner.

Since we were continuing all lazy and leftovery: In going through the fridge earlier this week I discovered, among the various frozen food things my roommate left behind when she moved, a package of Loblaws hamburgers.  And well, they were frozen, and they were there, so we thawed them and Wednesday's dinner was hamburger time.

This did actually manage to use CSA food: the rest of the baby greens, more of the interminable green onions and garlic, and that's the last of the chanterelles up there caramelized, with some red onion.  The ketchup is actually CSA too: Made by one of the farm families and bought as an extra in Week 1.  The mustard isn't, but it's locally made at a preserves store in Kensington Market, and was worth the five bucks, as it is amazing.

Hamburgers themselves: strictly okay.  Toppings?  Awesome.  Next time we want burgers I'll just get some ground beef and make them, instead of eating things my roommate left in the freezer because they are there and free.

Dessert, however, was a highlight:



Heh heh.

Just some fruit that was about to go: mango, apricot, strawberries, and blueberries.  But I also poured some Chartreuse in, and let it soak for a while.  And...yo.  Also: Damn.

The crackers, again, got eaten in and around things.  There is no photo evidence of them as yet.  But they were good.

---

So for a kind of lazyfaced, too hot, low-maintenance week, we didn't do too badly.

The leftovers:

Assorted herbs
1/2 bunch of green onions
2 or 3 pieces of rhubarb
Shell beans, which I didn't even touch
1/2 dozen duck eggs

--and our provisions for Week 3:

10 Garlic Scapes
6 pieces Rhubarb
1 quart strawberries
Green Onions
Lettuce
Dill

1/2 dozen duck eggs
Oyster mushrooms
Cheddar, paprika, and spelt crackers

Goat milk cheddar, which was not included in our share, but they had some there and the price was right.

We are thinking fish.  And something to do with that damnable rhubarb that'll probably involve caving and making a pie.

And that has been This Week in Local Eating!

Comments

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Actually the cow looks like she's pooping in your sandwich, but I'm not even going to think that.

...Oh. Too late.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

Cow is modest. :)

[lenora-rose.livejournal.com]

Rhubarb is tricksy, therefore we try our darnedest to leave it to desserts. Some of this looks nom.

I've occasionally wondered about farmshare stuff in WPg, but not hard enough to ask my husband his opinion. (He is chief cook)

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

If you have one, I recommend it: It's really done wonders for the way I eat, and I was already someone pretty aware of how she ate, both health-wise and ethically.

Also it's kind of the maddest game of Iron Chef there is. :)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I have noticed this about being an experienced cook: hardly anything is bad per se, as in "throw this out it is not food any more" bad, but occasionally it takes all the experienced cook skills to get an idea to "edible, whatever." I'm glad the stuff other than the soup wasn't like that.

Me, I am on Use Up The Radishes duty this week. Asparagus, easy; sugar snap peas, no problem. But damn, this is a lot of radishes.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

...very true. I don't think we've made anything truly vile in a long time. Huh.

(And, on thinking about it, I find I don't mind the occasional Failure Mode dinner every so often. It means we're staying ambitious, if that makes sense?)

Radishes! Chop 'em up into sticks with some carrot, pickle in vinegar, salt, and sugar, delicious sorta-do chua forever?

[casacorona.livejournal.com]

Rhubarb can be cooked up like applesauce, and frozen. It freezes well. Then you can have rhubarb as a condiment, or in a pie, or on ice cream, all winter.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

...ooh. This is good knowledge. Thank you. :)

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

My pink soup is rhubarb and beetroot, and it is much pinker than your pink soup. Whether it tastes better I can't say, but *I* like it. Sometimes I add some fresh ginger, sometimes I don't.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

Actually, I feel like beets or something would ground that a little: the problem I have with rhubarb is how astringent it is with nothing at the bottom. Maybe I should try that if we get more next week/I don't turn these ones into crisp or something after all.