Posts Tagged ‘Napa Cabbage’

CSA2 Week #10

Wednesday, August 24th, 2011 by virginia

We had another heavy week of produce, so I was glad that Josh was the one to pick up our CSA share this week. The tote bag we use to carry our stuff was packed to the brim. I was glad to see a lot of variety though, and not just multiple pounds of one item. This week our share contents included:

Cucumbers – 1.75 lbs
Squash – 1 each
Asian Melon – 1 each
Napa Cabbage –  1 each
Shisito Peppers – 0.6 lbs
Tomatoes – 2 lbs
Tomatillos – 0.35lbs
Greens – 1 lb
White onion – 1 ea.
Broccoli – 0.8 lbs

Chard, onion, cucumbers, tomatillos, broccoli, tomatoes, Asian melon, squash, shisito peppers, napa cabbage

I’m intrigued by the shisito peppers because when I was looking for padron peppers in NYC, I read that shisitos are a common substitution for padrons. Maybe we’ll pan fry these in olive oil and sprinkle them with sea salt to make our version of pimientos de padron, on of our favorite tapas.

The napa cabbage we got this week is HUGE. I still hope to make (and post about) lions head meatball stew with it. It’s such a tasty meal served over white rice, and the leftovers usually last me a week.

I was kind of disappointed that we got chard again this week for our greens. I had commented early on in the season that we got a lot of kale last year and not so much chard, and this year we’re getting lots of chard but not a lot of kale. We made collard chips one week but I have still yet to make any kale chips!

I still haven’t used the tomatillos from a few weeks ago, and so I hope they’re still good. Combined with this week’s batch, hopefully I’ll have enough to make a decent amount of salsa verde. They’re really quite small. We also didn’t get a ton of broccoli this week, just two small heads. Maybe I’ll try stir frying them with some green beans.

I’m not sure what to do with all the cucumbers. We still have some from last week as well, and I’m a bit pickled out at this point. Any suggestions?

CSA2 Week #5

Wednesday, July 20th, 2011 by virginia

Wednesday is upon us once again, which means it’s CSA time! This week, Josh and I picked up our share together, which made things go a bit more quickly. We were pretty excited that we got a few new items this time. Our share contents included:

Beets – 1 lb
Napa Cabbage – 1 each
Fennel – 1 each
Greens – 1 lb
Peppers – 3 each
Squash – 3 lbs
Cucumber – 1 lb
Broccoli – 3/4 lbs

Chard, peppers, cucumbers, fennel, napa, broccoli, squash, beets

I was a bit disappointed that we only had chard for our greens, as I was looking forward to getting some more kale. Nevertheless, the chard is gorgeous as usual, and I made a gratin last week using the chard stems. It was a big hit with Josh and a great way to use up the stems we would otherwise throw away.

For the squash, we picked out a big, round green squash and a flat UFO squash. I’ll probably end up roasting those and making a soup out of them. The beets will also be roasted, and perhaps the fennel.

I’m hoping to make a lion’s head meatball stew with the napa cabbage. I made some last year but never posted about it, and I think it’s a delicious recipe worth sharing. I know I keep saying that I want to post recipes, and I promise I’ll get around to it eventually!

CSA Week #11

Wednesday, August 18th, 2010 by virginia

We got a note from the farm this week apologizing for some of the spoiled produce we’ve been seeing, and explaining that the cause is the weather. I understand the difficulties that they’re dealing with, it just pains me to have to throw food away but I’m sure it pains the farmers even more.

We had another week of heavy produce, and this time it was Josh who had to carry it all home by himself. This week our vegetable share contents included:

Tomatoes – 3 lbs
Melon – 1 each
Napa Cabbage – 1 each
Greens – 1/2 lb
Squash – 2 lbs
Carrots – 1/3 lb
Cucumbers – 2 lbs
Corn – 2 ears
Beets – 1 lb

Heirloom tomatoes, beets, greens, napa cabbage, squash, carrots, corn, cucumbers, melon on top

The tomatoes were much better this week, and Josh found three huge heirlooms that look juicy and ripe. For the greens, he picked up some swiss chard with yellow stems this time instead of the red stems. He also picked up a different kind of squash that is big and round, with bright yellow skin and green trim on the edges.

The fruit this week also looked MUCH better, and I was really happy with what we got. The fruit share contents included:

Nectarines – 3 1/2 lbs
Peaches – 3 1/2 lbs

Nectarines and peaches

These also look sweet and juicy, and only one peach was spoiled out of the whole bunch. We’ll have to eat these quickly though as they’re super ripe. I’ll have to look into some peach dessert recipes. Cobbler perhaps?

CSA Week #9

Wednesday, August 4th, 2010 by virginia

It’s week #9 of our CSA share, and we’re really starting to feel overwhelmed! Our fridge is absolutely jam packed with vegetables and fruits right now, and we’re scrambling to eat everything before they spoil. Not to mention we’re going away Friday for a long weekend, and when we come back next week, it’ll be time to pick up yet another batch of vegetables/fruits.

No, I’m not really complaining. I love having so many different kinds of produce on hand, and we’re having a great time experimenting with things that we’ve never cooked before. We’ve already made two new recipes tonight, which I’ll talk about more shortly. This week our vegetable share contents included:

Squash – 1 1/2 lbs
Cucumber – 2 lbs
Eggplant – 1 each
Asian Melon – 1 each
Carrots – 1 lb
Napa Cabbage – 1 each
Tomato – 1 lb

Squash, asian melon (in the back), eggplant, napa cabbage, carrots, cucumbers, tomatoes in the middle

I combined the cucumbers from this week and the larger ones from last week to make Julia Child’s famous baked cucumbers recipe (I mistakenly said braised cucumbers earlier!). Definitely an interesting outcome, which I’ll be posting about soon. We also made a gorgeous ratatouille with some of the squash and the eggplant we got last week. Yet something else to post about!

Fruit-wise, our share this week included:

Peaches – 2 1/2 lbs
Apricots – 1 pint
Plums – 1 pint

Plums, apricots, peaches in the back

We got four decently sized peaches, but I don’t think it was 2 1/2 lbs worth, so perhaps they changed it but I didn’t notice. Oh well, not a big deal. We have an insane amount of apricots and plums in our fridge, so I think we’ll be taking a bunch with us on vacation. I can take fruit if we’re flying domestically, right?

Also, if anyone knows what an asian melon is, or how to cook it, please let me know!