chard

Shift in Seasons

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Dear John,

Last Sunday I cooked the last of the winter squash that we had sitting on the buffet. Filled with lentils from the pantry, jalapeno and pecans from the freezer, onion and garlic from the grocery store. Delicious. What a way to finish the 2025 CSA season. In March of 2026. (And ignoring any preserved items.)

Sometime in the next week or two I hope to sign up for our next CSA. I’m hoping to switch to a different farm this year that’s currently signing up past participants. One of the things I like about the new place is their transparency about having CSA members from different incomes. There are signups for full price shares with sliding scale all the way to free shares. It’s a smaller farm, so we might not get in. In which case it’ll be straightforward enough to register with the larger farm coop that we’ve used for five years.

Meanwhile, our first 2026 trip to the garden was a week ago. We poked holes for peas, sprinkled greens on the ground, dusted Johnny jump-ups. I spied a carrot or two. Parsley from last year that looked like it was struggling after the cold. The giant rosemary we inherited with the garden may have been killed by the long cold. (I’m not feeling optimistic about dahlias in our yard that we didn’t dig up last year either. Glad we tackled the project of extracting the tubers from the plot. Next step clean and divide.)

Community Produce

  • Apple
  • Mango
  • Pear
  • Pineapple
  • Broccoli
  • Cabbage
  • Cucumber
  • Green Pepper
  • Potato

Lingering Produce

  • Leek
  • Beets
  • Daikon radish
  • Sunchoke
  • Cabbage
  • Grocery store goods: celery, carrot, onion, potato

Freezer Items in Focus

  • Corn stock
  • Fennel pesto
  • Beet puree
  • Roasted jalapeños
  • Hot peppers
  • Frozen beans
  • Shredded carrots
  • Cooked collards for grilled cheese sandwich
  • Summer stock bag
  • Frozen fruit for pies

Garden

  • Sunchokes harvested
  • Dahlia tubers downstairs too
  • Weeds coming soon. Should read up on the nettles in our yard. Pretty sure I’ve spied purple deadnettle

Open Preserves

  • Fridge still organized!
  • Fridge still not inventoried!
  • Fig jam
  • Preserved eggplant
  • Pickled banana peppers
  • Pickled fennel
  • Pickled peach
  • Curdito
  • Cran-kin-kraut
  • Fermented green cherry tomatoes

Pantry Beans

  • Yellow Split Pea
  • Split Red Lentil
  • Black Caviar Lentil
  • Garbanzo Bean
  • Buckeye Bean
  • Pinto Bean
  • Christmas Lima
  • California Corona
  • Large White Lima
  • Midnight Black Bean
  • Rojo De Suelo
  • Zipper Cream Field Pea
  • And maybe one more on the shelf?

Cook it up

  • You twisted the top off the pineapple, per the directions here. We looked at the root buds and have it drying in a jar. Will it become our next houseplant? Probably not. Will it be a cool science demonstration? Heck yeah. Anyway, I chopped up the rest of the fruit for easy snacking. And made a tea with the scraps + orange zest + cinnamon + star anise. We fancy like that.
  • I think another household didn’t take their broccoli. I know I was asked if we’d like an extra bag of broccoli and said, sure. Roasted a third of it already. Put some tiny florets in with the remaining cabbage from a prior box for an easy salad in the next few days. I’m thinking of broccoli cheddar soup. I thought that called for potatoes, but no. May toy with the broccoli mashed potatoes in Six Seasons instead.
  • Cucumber cream cheese sandwich for me! With an anchovy on top. Cucumber in fun ranch dip for you?
  • The last green pepper ended up in chili. Feel like these are also destined for soup. Though, you could also take to work with that ranch dip.
  • Which leaves cabbage as the question. My youtube algorithm just suggested a cabbage cooking video. Maybe after months of cabbage salads and fermenting cabbage it’s time to return to favorites. Tomato braised cabbage? Mushroom cabbage pasta?

Love,

Sarah

The Space Between Boxes

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Dear John,

It’s been approximately a month since we picked up our last produce box of 2025. Tomorrow, we pick up our first box of 2026. For the next bit, we’ll just have the community produce box. Approximately every other week, but maybe a little bit less.

The CSA we’ve done for the past several years offers a winter box. We decided to take some time off to catch up on using what we have. (Knowing that we’d be getting the community produce. And that we can go to the grocery store. And that we could even sign up mid-season if we change our minds.)

It is a bit of a relief to not be deciding how best to consume ALL the produce each week. Instead puzzling through how to use up bits and pieces of the odds and ends. This week collard stems got chopped, sauteed, and mixed into a pasta bake. The vegetable scrap bag was made into stock–only for me to decide that, no, I wasn’t make sweet potato soup; it was chili. The bean liquor quickly becoming the liquid for rice and the base for another soup. (The stock is still waiting to be used.)

Your mom made a comment that our way of cooking is harder. It’s true that there are times I’m jealous of the auto populating meal plan routines/calendars–like the pizza, spaghetti, and hot dogs that I knew to expect most weekends of my childhood. When I wish we could have the quick and easy dinner ready to go without the guilty background concern about whether the lettuce or tomatoes or whatever will still be good when we get to a day with enough ease to prepare them.

But there is also an ease to not needing to think about what’s in season, because it’s already in front of us. The fun of figuring out how to use a less familiar ingredient (or alternatively, an excessively familiar ingredient). I’m not making decisions about what to buy at the farmers market. I’m making decisions about how to use what we already bought.

With that said, here’s some things we’ve already bought.

Community Produce

  • Coming tomorrow!

Lingering Produce

  • Leek
  • Red cabbage
  • Pumpkin
  • Honeynut squash
  • Potatoes
  • Onions
  • Beets
  • Daikon radish
  • Carrots
  • Sunchoke

Freezer Items in Focus

  • Corn stock
  • Fennel pesto
  • Beet puree
  • Chopped celery
  • Chopped green peppers
  • Roasted jalapeños
  • Hot peppers
  • Homemade gnocci
  • Frozen beans
  • Cooked collards for grilled cheese sandwich
  • Summer stock bag
  • Frozen fruit for pies

Garden

  • Sleeping
  • Though we do have some sunchokes to dig out when the weather allows.

Open Preserves

  • Fridge still organized!
  • Fridge still not inventoried!
  • Fig jam
  • Preserved eggplant
  • Pickled banana peppers
  • Pickled fennel
  • Pickled peach
  • Curdito
  • Fermenting green cherry tomatoes

Pantry Beans

  • Yellow Split Pea
  • Split Red Lentil
  • Black Caviar Lentil
  • Garbanzo Bean
  • Buckeye Bean
  • Pinto Bean
  • Christmas Lima
  • California Corona
  • And maybe one more on the shelf?

Cozy meals

  • I’ve been trying out having a rotating cookbook on the table to thumb through at breakfast. That’s actually where I got the recipe for bean liquor and roasted sweet potato soup. And the idea for crepes with marscapone and fruit. (Thank you for Grist.) Sohla has a note of a recipe of a squash and miso soup that I want to make soon.
  • Okonomiyaki (use the sweet potato skins left in the fridge)
  • Red curry with squash

Love,

Sarah

PS If the swap box has cabbage, take it so we can make cran-kin-kraut!

Boxing Day, December 2 (and anticipating December 9)

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Dear John,

We skipped produce pickups while we were out of town. We ate radishes and peppers and carrots dipped in ranch fun dip on the road. We took squash and sweet potatoes and parsley and peppers to family and friends. But sick weeks followed by travel weeks meant we ended up with some very sad foods in the fridge. Some got tossed in the compost (applesauce that molded weirdly quickly), some got sauced (lettuce into a cream dip), some is destined for soup (chard once the Royal Coronas finish cooking).

The chill is finally in the air. I want to curl around casserole dishes and soup bowls. I also want to be able to eat soon after coming in the door and not after the oven has preheated and the casserole has baked for an hour. So, um, things to consider.

CSA Box

  • Braeburn Apples
  • Goldrush Apples
  • Gala Apples
  • Baby Hakurei Turnips
  • Lacinato Kale
  • Purple Carrots
  • Red Veined Arugula
  • Stripetti Squash
  • *Arkansas Black Apples
  • *Cranberries
  • *Fuji Apples
  • *Broccoli
  • *Carnival Squash
  • *French Breakfast Radishes
  • *Green Chard
  • *Purple Gold Potatoes

*Items are predicted for next week since I was not actually able to sit down and do this properly until Sunday.

Community Produce

  • Onions
  • Potatoes
  • Carrots
  • Apples
  • Oranges
  • Cucumbers
  • Zucchini
  • Green Pepper

Things in the fridge and on the counter

  • Asian pears
  • Apples
  • Reddening cherry tomatoes
  • Celery
  • Greens: Lettuce
  • Chard
  • Beets with greens
  • Sweet potatoes
  • Leeks
  • Sunchokes

Picked at the Garden

  • Closed for the season? At least I haven’t stopped by
  • Though we should try to do a final clean up of our plot
  • Maybe there’s some more parsley? Or collards?

Open Preserves

  • Fridge still organized!
  • Fridge still not inventoried!
  • Fig jam
  • Preserved eggplant
  • Pickled banana peppers
  • Pickled fennel
  • Pickled peach
  • Curdito
  • Fermenting green cherry tomatoes

Pantry Beans

  • Yellow Split Pea
  • Split Red Lentil
  • Black Caviar Lentil
  • Garbanzo Bean
  • Buckeye Bean
  • Good Mother Stallard
  • Pinto Bean
  • Christmas Lima
  • California Corona
  • And maybe one more on the shelf?

Cozy meals

  • We walked in the door at 5:15. We considered ordering delivery, but that requires it’s own decision tree. I made the chickpeas and pasta while you unloaded the rental car. Solid meal from the pantry, yes please. Since then we’ve made dragon noodles with carrots and the remaining leaves of cauliflower or broccoli. Crispy potatoes with the aforementioned lettuce cream sauce.
  • We have three pumpkins and another three squash currently serving as decor. They are overdue for being eaten. Chop one, roast, and serve with the tahini yogurt sauce a la Ottolenghi and Tamimi. Pumpkin Parmesan from the Good Food Cook Book? A curry with tofu? I’m trying to think what else I want to eat that will be better with whole pumpkin/squash chopped than puree and kinda thinking puree for the freezer/muffins/soups/pies/pasta sauce sounds reasonable. But then make puree in either oven or instant pot or crock pot. (I should use the better squash for puree for the cheesecake that looks so tempting.)
  • At Thanksgiving, you saw a kid’s magazine with a spread of cucumbers topped with cream cheese and pretzels or pickles or berries. We should put the cucumber to use.
  • I was trying to remember what baked rice dish surprised me last year with how well it worked. Remembered correctly that I’d texted it to a friend–not as a link but photo from a cookbook and found the Golden Carrot Bake in Simply in Season. Wouldn’t you know it, we have plenty of carrots right now. Also saw the kimchi rice bake, which is probably better for a rushed weeknight.
  • Zucchini feels harder to deal with when there’s snow in the air. Zucchini and pepper and some beans for a chili? A zucchini dal? Or with the royal coronas in a pizza beans set-up? I think the pizza beans if we have time, but the dal if I want to come home to an already made meal. The trick of cooking the rice and the dal at the same time seems worth trying at least once!
  • Speaking of the instant pot, we are at the time of year where I switch to oatmeal breakfast. Definitely going to be tossing a handful of cranberries into the pot with the oats and water. As a reminder, 1 cup of oats + 2.5 cups water + 15-20 minutes at pressure.

Love,

Sarah

PS If the swap box has cabbage, take it so we can make cran-kin-kraut!

Boxing Day, July 22

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Dear John,

Our current CSA is the combined efforts of dozens of farms. Which means we often don’t have an overwhelming amount of a vegetable in a season. I think the last was the fall and winter of large sweet potatoes. (I’m still waiting for the month of watermelon this year.) Though, I think we also started getting smaller boxes after that and maybe that is a contributing factor?

I finally used the last leaves of the Napa cabbage. Which means with this delivery we have three heads of cabbage, all different varieties, in the fridge. Clearly we are not making enough slaws. Or okonomiyaki. Or balsamic cabbage noodles.

I think it’s time to ferment. Saurkraut here we come. ‘Tis the wrong season to make cran-kin-kraut. But we have new carrots. Let’s make curtido! Maybe one day we’ll make pupusas to go with them.

Today’s Box

  • Shiro Plums
  • Yellow Peaches
  • Athena Cantaloupe
  • Gold Zucchini
  • Orange Carrots
  • Pink Chard
  • Red Cabbage
  • Red Tomatoes

Things in the fridge

  • Sunchokes
  • Lettuce
  • Cabbage: Napa Cabbage, Green Cabbage,
  • Onion, Garlic
  • Peaches, blueberries

In the Garden

  • Basil by the bundle
  • Pinches of parsley
  • A few cherry tomatoes
  • One eggplant, that was still on the green side, oops
  • Collards
  • Blackberries enough for a cobbler
  • Sunflower! Dahlia! Calendula!

Open Preserves

  • One day we might organize the cabinet.
  • Another day we might organize the fridge.
  • Then we might know.

Pantry Beans

  • Split Red Lentil
  • Good Mother Stallard
  • Rio Zape
  • And more tucked on other shelves…

Keep the meals coming

  • I wish I knew what our tomato harvest was going to look like. Right now, I’m feeling pessimistic. Let’s savor these tomatoes in slices on BLTs; with pesto and mozz; maybe on grilled cheese though I’m not sure I want even that little heat applied to them. Later in the month, I bet I’ll go for salads. By September, maybe, I’d choose to cook these to the tomato risotto. Now, I want the burst juices of red sunshine.
  • It’s not a year to make pie. I want pie. The crust is work though and storebought doesn’t have the top crust and it’s not a year to make pie. We made a blackberry cobbler–batter 50/50 rice and buckwheat flours. Had some for breakfast with yogurt. Would repeat. First though, let’s try a blueberry-peach crisp.
  • We have so much basil coming in. I think that means we have to use the chard in the peanut butter + basil + banana + chard wrap. As weird as it sounds. I remember it being good? Also, make more pesto. And then more pesto.

Love,

Sarah

PS Freeze the pesto.

Boxing Day, May 27

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Thank you for taking the photo. Next time, can you take the netting off the berries so we can see the prettiness?

Dear John,

We had a low-key weekend planned. Not much beyond procuring seed starts and getting them in the ground. I’m writing this on Sunday night and am very grateful that tomorrow is a holiday so we can go back to the garden tomorrow to get the last of the starts in the ground. Well, the last of the purchased starts. Tomatillos were out of stock, so we’ll go back for them later.

This year we have a variety of cherry tomatoes and one or two larger; sweet peppers because we still have hot sauce in the freezer and I didn’t see jalapenos; a bunch of eggplant that who knows whether they’ll do better but the sound fun; a single cucumber; another attempt at ground cherries. We have more basil and parsley than I know where it will fit. Undoubtedly some will end up at the house. Something might end up in the community herb plot. Worst case, maybe we leave something on the porch of one of those neighbors who has a curbside herb plot?

As the tomatoes and peppers and eggplant went in the ground, I had to remind myself that it was okay to pull up plants we had. The peas were always expected to be pulled when the tomatoes went in. The radishes are being poked in the ground wherever in part because they’re quick growing and if they get yoinked out early, it doesn’t feel like a disappointment. I didn’t expect to need to pull the greens, and may well plant some more soon. Perhaps we try to transplant a calendula or two to our house and put in some chard or collards down there? Or give up on the dream of strawberries in favor of beets? They both stain fingers pink!

Regardless part of me feels disappointed that we’re unlikely to have much to harvest the next few trips to the garden. I type, blatantly ignoring the carrots that will need to be harvested when the tomatillos come. And the peas that are remaining between the tomatoes for a bit. And the radishes that did not get pulled yet. And the fact that we’re already getting blooms for a tabletop posy. And that the raspberries in the community brambles were beginning to pinken. It’s our fifth year planting in this plot and I’m hoping for some fun surprises.

Today’s Box

  • Green Kale Swapped for Beets
  • Green Romaine Lettuce
  • Napa Cabbage
  • Red Scallions
  • Strawberries

Things in the fridge

  • Sunchokes
  • Rhubarb
  • Green Garlic

In the Garden

  • Peas and their plants
  • Radishes, ready to pick
  • Baby Radish Greens
  • Two baby beets and their leaves
  • Carrots + so many greens
  • Chard, Collards, Mustard?
  • Calendula

Open Preserves

  • Still to be done.

Pantry Beans

  • Also still to be done.

Making the most of our garden rearrangements, erm, harvest

  • At this point we have a handful of peas (not overwhelmed by the thirty some odd plants I planted). Enough for snacking but I’m not feeling the need to do more than eat them raw.
  • I am, however, experimenting with eating the pea leaves. They’re most just chewy enough that I don’t want them in a salad. Feel like it’s either stir-fry them, pesto/sauce them, or put them in an all the greens curry.
  • Well, all the greens except the carrot greens. Those have been getting chopped and mixed with nuts and cheese for the carrot top pesto for weeks now. Put it on a cracker/toast. Add some more cheese. Call it lunch. Tonight I also made a carrot top salsa verde with a back of the fridge pickle juice and some cashews. Think it’ll be yummy on eggs or a grain bowl. Maybe hummus/white bean dip bowl?
  • The mustard greens aren’t quite enough to make me want to curry them. So probably putting in a stirfry thing. Maybe as simple as getting into a fried rice. Maybe it’s the turmeric coconut rice. Something was eating the chard, so we have more stems than greens. Those can be tossed in whatever too.
  • I swapped out the kale for a pack of beets. I’m not sure which of the Six Seasons beet salads to make. Pistachio butter and grated beets? Roast and add avocado and sunflower seeds? Or the end of the citrus and olives? Honestly, probably the last one because there’s some lingering grapefruit that should really be consumed.
  • We’re getting lots of supermarket strawberries these days. I’m taking the tops and macerating them and tossing on lettuce dressed with vinegar. Chevre is a bonus. Radishes were a fun addition.
  • Which will leave the Napa cabbage as the lingering green vegetable. I’m already thinking about the gingery slaw that might be sent to work in your lunchbox. Or okonomiyaki for dinner. Or probably both of those and then a half dozen other dishes because it is cabbage after all.

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, May 20

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Dear John,

Writing a headnote did not happen this week. Ooops.

Today’s Box

  • Baby Green Bok Choy
  • Green Chard Fennel
  • Green Garlic
  • Red Scallions
  • Rhubarb

Things in the fridge

  • Sunchokes
  • Rhubarb
  • Lettuce

In the Garden

  • Radishes
  • Carrots
  • Chard
  • Peas

Open Preserves

  • Still to be done.

Pantry Beans

  • Also till to be done.

Food dreams

  • Mulberries are on the sidewalks! Maybe this is the year to make mulbarb jam again.
  • It’s spring allium season. I think it might be time for triple threat galette. We didn’t make it for Easter this year, but we can still celebrate.
  • So it’s mostly a question of how to use bok choy this week. Honestly, I like the veggie but I might swap it if there’s something else in the box.

    *breaks to look for inspiration*

    I’VE GOT IT! Let’s try Hetty McKinnon’s sheet pan gnocci with bok choy and scallions! And one of these days let’s check out her cookbooks from the library. Her dumpling salad is one of my quick and easy lunches when you’re not at home.
  • First chard of the season. And I expect more. (Cause there are a couple of plants coming up in our garden.) Peeping over at an earlier post about favorite ways of using greens. First thought that comes to mind is that peanut butter, banana, chard wrap. We don’t have basil yet, but I might be musing in that direction,
  • Nevermind. We swapped the CSA chard for fennel. Another casserole?

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, September 26

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Dear John,

Between catching Covid and stomach bugs and broader health stuff….it has not been a month for cooking. Naps, yes. Kitchen, ugh, no.

We’ve made some meals that used our produce–tomatoes in blackened shrimp pasta, salads with tomatoes and carrots and peppers, pears and brie. Peppers are in need of dehydrating, because they have not been cooked quickly enough.

Today’s Box

  • Bosc Pears
  • Smokehouse Apples
  • Leeks
  • Mixed Yummy Peppers
  • Red Kale
  • Red Leaf Lettuce
  • Stripetti Squash

Things in the fridge

  • Watermelon
  • Plums
  • Asian pears
  • Lemongrass
  • Celery
  • Greens: Cabbage, chard, lettuce
  • Squash: Acorn, white acorn, Robins Koginut

In the Garden

  • Habaneros, jalapenos, fish peppers, other peppers, many peppers
  • Rainbow chard
  • Dried beans
  • Edamame
  • Beets
  • Parsley if we want
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Dahlias and cosmos and gomphrena for the table

Open Preserves

  • Preserved eggplant
  • Lacto-fermented blueberry jalapeno hot sauce
  • Pickled kale stems
  • Pickled fennel stems
  • Radish kimchi
  • Green tomato chutney
  • Tomatillo salsa
  • Cran-kin kraut
  • Cranapple chutney
  • Watermelon rind dill pickles
  • Probably still more uninventoried

Garden glimpse

We pulled the tomatoes and tomatillos. We have clover seeds ready to go (you’re understandably wary of rye), but haven’t gotten the cover crop sown yet. Hopefully later this week we’ll be well enough to make it over to the garden and get them in the ground.

Meals that sound yummy

  • We have a backup of squash. Last week brought lemongrass and I found two squash–lemongrass soups. This roasted squash lasasgna has been sounding so good and I bet we could totally put half in the freezer (which is looking rather lower on pre-made meals at the moment). I think we treat the stripetti like spaghetti squash and make more baked squash bowls.
  • This week’s box isn’t coming with potatoes, but a potato leek soup sounds pretty good. Maybe I’ll pick up potatoes at the grocery store.
  • Lettuce has been going in side salads. Honestly, that still sounds good. Yummy peppers and the last of the tomatoes to join.
  • One of the meals from the freezer that hit the right spot for me was the chard quiche. If there’s a day with energy to make a crust and a filling, then making a quiche either with chard from the garden or kale sounds delicious. And freezing slices if we manage to make two.

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, August 29

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Today’s Box


  • Fruit
     *Black Muscadine Grapes – NC
     *Little Sweetie Cantaloupe
     *Yellow Seedless Watermelon


  •  *Bicolor Sweet Corn
     *Green Beans
  •  *Mixed Yummy Peppers
     *Spaghetti Squash
     *Yellow Straightneck Squash

Things in the fridge

  • Watermelon
  • Plums
  • Peaches
  • Celery
  • Greens: Cabbage, chard
  • Green plums (might want to check on them)

In the Garden

  • Habaneros, jalapenos, fish peppers, other peppers, many peppers
  • Tomatillos
  • Tomatoes
  • Ground cherries
  • Rainbow chard
  • Dill seed
  • Parsley if we want
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Calendula and cosmos and gomphrena for the table
  • Communal figs if we want

Open Preserves

  • Preserved eggplant
  • Lacto-fermented blueberry jalapeno hot sauce
  • Pickled kale stems
  • Pickled fennel stems
  • Radish kimchi
  • Green tomato chutney
  • Tomatillo salsa
  • Cran-kin kraut
  • Cranapple chutney
  • Watermelon rind dill pickles
  • Probably still more uninventoried

Garden glimpse

We are having pepper success this year! Maybe we bought more plants? (I’d have to go back to the garden journal to check.) But more importantly we have them in an area where they aren’t being overshadowed by the taller plants.

Maybe we can add eggplant to that section in the future?

Cooking things down, before we leave town

  • So, with lots of hot peppers, comes lots of hot sauce? I have a pint jar with ~cup of peppers fermenting on the table. I made a serious eats hot sauce. And we still have a five cup container of peppers in the fridge.
  • It’s a lot of green beans. I’m copying from last week. Maybe the usual way with tofu. Maybe a variation. Oh! Maybe in a curry. It’s been a while since we’ve done a curry and now I want that. Add some peppers and some squash?
  • I was wondering how to do the corn and then looked at smitten kitchen and now I know. (Though corn enchiladas sound good too.)
  • I grabbed an extra spaghetti squash. You know how I like the baked spaghetti squash bowls. Bet we could do one with chard?

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, August 15

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Today’s Box

  • Italian plums
  • Yellow Seedless Watermelon
  • Athena Cantaloupe
  • Cubanelle Peppers
  • Italian Eggplant
  • Red Cabbage
  • Sungold Cherry Tomatoes
  • Yellow Wax Beans

Things in the fridge

  • Watermelon
  • Plums
  • Peaches
  • Grape tomatoes
  • Bell pepper
  • Celery
  • One lemon cucumber
  • Fennel bulb
  • Greens: Cabbage, kale, collards, chard
  • Green plums (might want to check on them)
  • Green tomatoes (starting to pink)

In the Garden

  • Neighbor’s zucchini
  • Habaneros, jalapenos, and a few more peppers
  • Tomatillos
  • Tomatoes
  • Ground cherries
  • Rainbow chard (didn’t harvest on Saturday, but it’s there)
  • Dill seed
  • Parsley
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Calendula and cosmos and gomphrena for the table
  • Communal figs if we want

Open Preserves

  • Preserved eggplant
  • Lacto-fermented blueberry jalapeno hot sauce
  • Pickled kale stems
  • Pickled fennel stems
  • Radish kimchi
  • Green tomato chutney
  • Tomatillo salsa
  • Cran-kin kraut
  • Cranapple chutney
  • Watermelon rind dill pickles
  • Probably still more uninventoried

Garden glimpse

Saturday we had a garden workday–focusing our efforts on the communal areas instead of our plot. We did a quick harvest before we left. (I didn’t pick a bouquet, nevermind deadheading for the flowers.) When we got home from the garden, we weighed the produce we picked from our plot. Not quite ten pounds! The water from the tomatoes and tomatillos adds up. Good thing some of our cooking shrinks it way down.

Cooking things down, before we leave town

  • I made two types of salsa this weekend. Please note that when they are pulled from the freezer, they would both benefit from some cilantro.
  • I also made this ratatouille over the weekend. We got more eggplant today and I intend to make more ratatouille tomorrow. That should make a dent in our tomatoes and peppers and zucchini as well. Last time I added one habanero that was threatening with some bad spots. The oil was surprisingly spicy. Do it again!
  • We’re just about to finish off the last cabbage in lunchtime salads. Hurrah! Let’s do it again with this one.
  • These are the plums to dry for prunes. Because we have plenty of other fruit and enough other veggies that I’m not buying cauliflower to try out the recipe I want to test from Pulp.
  • Beans and tofu. Maybe the usual way. Maybe a variation.

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, August 8

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Dear John,

Our next home project is on the horizon. (Pun intended.) As I finish brainstorming meals, you’re reaching out to different contractors to see about getting quotes for solar panel installation. As a child of the 90s who read and re-read 50 Simple Things Kids Can Do To Save the Earth, as an adult who now attends climate action protests, hopefully as an elderly adult far in the future, it feels really exciting to be able to make this visible step toward taking care of the planet.

It’s weird to enter the pricing process with a clear favorite, but part of me hopes that the bid through our community’s Solar Switch group is the clear winner. I really like the idea of group purchasing! I like feeling like part of a bigger effort, even if I’m not meeting with the other neighbors buying this year. It’s the type of action that gives me hope. And as I keep being reminded, the way through this is hope-fueled work.

Today’s Box

  • Orange Seedless Watermelon
  • Plums
  • Yellow Peaches
  • Banana Peppers
  • Collards
  • Green Bell Peppers
  • Italian Eggplant
  • Red Grape Tomatoes

Things in the fridge

  • Cinnamon Basil
  • Plums
  • Donut Peaches
  • Nectarines
  • Peppers: Green bell, banana
  • Bottom halves of Centercut Squash
  • Celery
  • Cucumber and lemon cucumber
  • Fennel bulb
  • Greens: Cabbage, kale
  • Red Potatoes
  • Green plums
  • Green tomatoes (starting to pink)

In the Garden

  • Early peppers. Another couple Cochiti and fallen Habanero.
  • Tomatillos
  • Tomatoes are here!
  • A few ground cherries
  • Rainbow chard
  • Dill seed
  • Parsley
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Calendula and cosmos and gomphrena for the table
  • Communal figs

Open Preserves

  • Preserved eggplant
  • Lacto-fermented blueberry jalapeno hot sauce
  • Pickled kale stems
  • Pickled fennel stems
  • Radish kimchi
  • Green tomato chutney
  • Tomatillo salsa
  • Cran-kin kraut
  • Cranapple chutney
  • Watermelon rind dill pickles
  • Probably still more uninventoried

Garden glimpse

Tomatoes are here!

Team Tomato

  • If this keeps up, we’re going to need to make some tomato sauce/paste to can/freeze. But for this, the first week of tomato bounty, we are savoring them. The classic tomato sandwiches. The spiced tomato salads. Panzella made with cornbread so you can enjoy too. In tacos. With eggs. On sunchoke burgers pulled from the freezer.
  • Speaking of the freezer….tomato ice cream? This feels like the time in high school when we were thing to figure out how to use up a bunch of cushaw. Turns out pumpkin ice cream is really a thing. Why not tomato?
  • The cherry tomatoes are tempting to go ahead and pickle. Copy the copycats of a restaurant dish that I still dream of?
  • Two weeks worth of bell peppers getting stuffed. (Adding extra tomatoes and chickpeas to the Greek filling mix from Help! My Apartment Has a Dining Room.)
  • Banana peppers finally getting pickled. If there are extra, stuff them with cheese?
  • The cinnamon basil-lime cookies were good. Make more and freeze the dough.
  • I think there’s a good chance we’ll pick some zucchini from our neighbor’s plot while they’re out of town this week. If we do, I want to use the eggplant for ratatouille. If we don’t, the eggplant tomato cheddar stacks from Simply in Season.

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, August 1

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Dear John,

It’s counterintuitive that after having all the guests over the past week we have more lingering produce than usual. But between buying extra veggies for lunch nibbles and pre-preparing dinners, there wasn’t as much focus on using up the CSA and garden food. Some chard stems and green tomatoes made a chutney that was offered on the potato bar. Cooked chard leaves were offered with the pasta sauce. Tomatillos were chopped with lime juice and a pepper to top tacos. That was about it for three days?

Now I’m having the post-visit energy collapse. It feels entirely possible that we’ll order takeout an extra day this week. Possibly pull out a freezer meal without freezing a new one. All to say, watch out. Next week may get to overwhelming amounts of produce needing to be used if we’re not intentional.

Today’s Box

  • Donut Peaches
  • Nectarines
  • Centercut Squash
  • Green Beans
  • Green Bell Peppers
  • Mixed Heirloom Tomatoes
  • Sweet Onions
  • Cinnamon Basil

Things in the fridge

  • Plums
  • Watermelon
  • Sweet corn
  • Banana peppers
  • Celery
  • Cucumber and lemon cucumber
  • Red Spring Onions
  • Fennel bulb
  • Greens: Cabbage
  • Turnips?
  • Red Potatoes
  • Green plums
  • Green tomatoes (starting to pink)

In the Garden

  • The first cucumber!
  • Early peppers. Think Cochiti but maybe Fish.
  • A couple tomatillos
  • More tomatoes. Both ours and from the neighbors.
  • A few ground cherries
  • Rainbow chard (but gave half to the neighbors)
  • All the Genovese basil
  • Flowering dill if inspired
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Calendula and cosmos and gomphrena if we want another bouquet
  • Communal blackberries and figs

Open Preserves

  • Preserved eggplant
  • Lacto-fermented blueberry jalapeno hot sauce
  • Pickled kale stems
  • Pickled fennel stems
  • Radish kimchi
  • Green tomato chutney
  • Tomatillo salsa
  • Cran-kin kraut
  • Cranapple chutney
  • Watermelon rind dill pickles
  • Probably still more uninventoried

Garden glimpse

Sad news this week. Our basil looks not great. I’m not sure if the browning is due to stress from heat and lack of hydration or a fungus.

I fear the fungus.

One plant was totally dead. I pulled it and another two that were browning. One last batch of pesto for us. And not planting basil in the same section next year out of an abundance of caution.

Team Empty The Fridge

  • Chop tomatillos + tomatos + pepper + salt + lime for the tacos that were dinner.
  • The potato green bean pesto salad
  • Cinnamon basil and lime cookies.
  • Need to pickle the banana peppers. (Just as we finished off last year’s batch.)
  • These bell peppers look good for making stuffed bell peppers. I’ve had this tab open for long enough that I forgot it existed. Calls for lamb, so we might not go that direction though!
  • I want panzanella and the spot that I picked up lunch from today didn’t have any. So expect to make that one of these days while you’re at the office.
  • I want pizza. Can we pizza? It’s hot, but not as hot as it’s been. (These are the weeks I miss apartment complexes gas grills.) Squash and red sauce and cheese and garlic. Corn and tomatoes and pesto and feta.

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, July 25

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Also grabbed a savoy cabbage and some banana peppers from the swap box.

Dear John,

It’s a week of visitors. We’ve got plans for a pasta bar night, a taco bar night, and a potato bar night. Dips and crackers and veggies for lunches. And letting the hotels cover continental breakfasts.

We’ve got a red sauce and a green sauce (pesto from the basil above). Squash and corn taco filling. Black beans cooked up. Chard sauteed. Hummus hummed and dips ready to blitz.

Today’s Box

  • Athena Cantaloupe
  • Little Baby Flower Watermelon
  • Plums
  • Bicolor Sweet Corn
  • Gold Grape Tomatoes
  • Lemon Cucumbers
  • New Red Potatoes
  • Sweet Basil

Things in the fridge

  • Herbs: Hyssop?, basil
  • Celery
  • Cucumber
  • Red Spring Onions
  • Fennel bulb
  • Greens: Cabbage, Kale,
  • Turnips?
  • Green plums
  • Green tomatoes

In the Garden

  • First of the tomatoes!!
  • Maybe a couple of ground cherries
  • Rainbow chard
  • Basil leaves getting pinched with flowers
  • Flowering dill if inspired
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Calendula and cosmos and gomphrena bouquet
  • Communal blackberries

Open Preserves

Garden glimpse

Dahilas and mint from a neighbor. Mixing up our bouquet.

I picked the first of our tomatoes, the Oaxacan Jewel. They weren’t beefsteak size, but they are a pretty gold.

Meals between visitors

  • Melon + cucumber + chickpea salad from Pulp
  • Spiced tomato + white bean and onions + yogurt herby cucumbers salad from Six Seasons
  • Raw corn + tomato + herbs salad from Six Seasons

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, July 18

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The board looked a lot skimpier when it was just the peaches and blackberries. Thankfully, the missing vegetable share found its way back to us.

Dear John,

Let’s talk cabbage salad. Because when I said that you should take cabbage salads to work it wasn’t with the intention that you eat the same salad every day. It was the thought that shredding cabbage and a few other veggies is a fairly easy prep you can do at the beginning of the week. Mix up a few dressings, think through a few bonus toppings, and then you can choose your own adventure. For instance:

The Six Seasons Caesar with hazelnuts and croutons.

The Budget Bytes crunch with craisins and peanut dressing (yes, I realize I am mixing and matching two different cabbage salads from her)

The Pulp lentils with peaches and a dried herbs vinaigrette.

Hummus dressing with chickpea croutons

Not yet tried, but eyeing the Mediterranean Dish’s mustard dressing.

Also eyeing Leanne Brown’s Banh Mi Salad. We could prep tofu in advance, I think.

We have tried (and liked!) Smitten Kitchen’s cabbage and lime with peanuts. She also has cabbage and apple and walnuts (maybe more fall than summer) and a date + feta version.

Today’s Box

  • Blackberries
  • Yellow Peaches
  • Bicolor Sweet Corn
  • Green Beans
  • Green Kale
  • Slicing Cucumbers
  • Yellow Straightneck Squash

Things in the fridge

  • Herbs: Hyssop?, basil
  • Celery
  • Peaches
  • Bit of blueberries
  • Red Spring Onions
  • Fennel bulb
  • Greens: Cabbage, Beet
  • Carrots, turnips, beets
  • Green plums

In the Garden

  • The first ground cherries
  • Rainbow chard given away by the bagful
  • Basil leaves getting pinched with flowers
  • Flowering dill if inspired for pickles
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Calendula and cosmos and gomphrena bouquet
  • Purple plums and green apples and black berries from the shared spaces
  • Green tomatoes from the compost pile

Open Preserves

Garden glimpse

The tomatoes may need to be re-staked. They’re nearly falling over. I’m hesitant to damage roots and yet more wary of toppled over plants. (And very excited for them to come in.)

The volunbeans have shot straight up. One plant has reached all the way to the top of its pole and is coming down the cucumber scaffolding.

The peppers are looking promising. I’m hopeful that the set-up this year gets them better light and better yield.

The dahlia, planted late, is up and pinched. It will probably be a while before it starts to bloom. But it gets better light and is in better soil than the ones at our house, so it might catch up quick.

Eating now (aka clear counter space for Six Seasons)

  • Celery cucumber salad from Six Seasons (alternate adaptation here).
  • We will be eating the corn tomorrow Either as raw corn salad (alternate) or as creamed corn.
  • I really want to try the peach cornbread with coconut shrimp from Pulp.
  • We’ve been having success with the zucchini tuna melts. I think my body wants more meat. Can definitely try it with the squash instead.
  • Green beans with celery. (alternate) Does the herb patch at the garden include tarragon?
  • Probably kale instead of cabbage in a salad from above? Unless we go for the original kale salad.

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, July 11

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At the beginning of the box life there are more “wait, what is this?” moments. Learning all the different greens that are given, for instance. A decade of on-and-off, but mostly on CSA–half of which we’ve also be gardening in one community or another–three of them with this particular set of farms, that feeling is pretty rare. But I saw blue hyssop on the predicted contents list this week and the only thing I could think of is “Purge me with hyssop and I shall be white as snow.”

I know the Bible is a compilation of many different types of texts, but I generally think of Psalms as the poetry/music collection. Not a cookbook.

Masterclass mastered the SEO. So…..I dunno. Use as one of our herbs of the week? Toss in a salad with the cabbage? Blend with yogurt or hummus for a dressing? Sneak into the morning smoothie?

Today’s Box

  • Blueberries
  • Yellow Peaches
  • Watermelon
  • Blue Hyssop (unless it’s mint. Or sweet basil. But it doesn’t look like either of those.)
  • Celery
  • Gold Zucchini
  • Malabar Spinach
  • Red Cabbage

Things in the fridge

  • Cherries
  • Peach
  • Red Spring Onions
  • Fennel bulb
  • Greens: Cabbage, Chard, Collard, Beet
  • Carrots, turnips, beets
  • Green plums

In the Garden

  • Rainbow chard
  • Basil leaves getting pinched with flowers
  • Dill flowers
  • Calendula flowers still getting dried by the trayful
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Calendula and cosmos bouquet

Open Preserves

Garden glimpse

We hadn’t touched last week’s chard when we went by the garden this weekend. So bare minimum thinning for this week’s harvest.

In lieu of garden flowers, a picture of the new color of cosmo that popped open at home. Hello pink petals! Hello yellow center!

Meals to make to celebrate summer

  • This is the spinach that I much prefer cooked. Maybe we mix with some rice or quinoa and stuff a zucchini or two? Or involtini.
  • Celery and fennel salad.
  • ‘Tis the season for blueberry peach pie.
  • A few beet reds snuck into a smoothie and I think I liked it? Expect a repeat. After I finish my cucumber innards muesli (made with the seeds scooped out of cucumbers before making a salad last week).
  • We haven’t used those collards for too long. How about a salad?

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, July 4

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Dear John,

The fireworks are echoing down the street. I’m wiped from watching parade in the summer heat. You’re in the kitchen making everything neat.

Today’s Box

  • Blueberries
  • Dark Sweet Cherries
  • White Peaches
  • Fennel
  • Red Beets
  • Red Spring Onions
  • Slicing Cucumbers
  • Yellow Patty Pan Squash

Things in the fridge

  • Cherries
  • Watermelon
  • Peaches
  • Fennel bulb
  • Greens: Cabbage, Chard, Collard
  • Carrots
  • Green plums

In the Garden

  • Green beans from neighbors
  • Rainbow chard
  • Turnips + greens
  • Radish + greens
  • Beets + reds, beet + greens
  • Sad looking ending the pea season
  • All the lettuce (17 slugs, 1 earwig)
  • Basil leaves getting pinched with flowers
  • Dill flowers
  • Garlic chives weeding forever
  • Calendula flowers getting dried by the trayful
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Calendula and cosmos bouquet

Open Preserves

Garden glimpse

We pulled the peas, and planted beans to take over the tent. Two volunbeans, four from the soup pack. Harvested the last of the spring planted radish and turnips. I’m debating if we plant something else short there, or wait for the cucumber and strawberry to spread as they grow.

The beans we planted (two weeks ago?), have all popped up. The chard keeps getting thinned, so even though it’s growing, I feel like we might not be totally overwhelmed. Nevermind how loaded the bike was before we left.

I checked the internet’s horticulture wisdom and realized we needed to prune all of our tomatoes – it’s an indeterminate year.

Meals to make to celebrate summer

  • Internet browsing brought me to a newsletter with a series from Pandemic Part I. There’s this salad that looks great for cleaning out bits and ends. I made it last week and it was a hit. Not sure it’s calling me again so soon, but wanting to save.
  • It’s been so long since we made smashed cucumber salad. I miss it. We are making it this week. (I spied the first baby cucumber fruiting today. Maybe we’ll have some of our own to harvest.)
  • And the patty pan squash means it’s time for my annual making of the roasted squash and herbed chickpeas from chocolate & zucchini.
  • Green beans and tofu?
  • We just tossed fennel pesto that had gone moldy. So we can make some again. But learn from our mistakes and FREEZE it. Also, toss fennel on a salad of lettuces + peaches + toasted pecans.
  • How to use this week’s beet greens? (The beets will keep. Fine dice and roasted. Sliced on pizza. I’m not worried about them.) And what about the supply of chard? Last week brought a quiche with a mix of parm, cheddar, and gouda. Another quiche, but this time with chevre sounds potential. Honestly, it’s been a bit since we had pizza. That sounds kinda good. So does having it with pasta in a tomato sauce.
  • Last thought, if we have extra cucumbers, maybe this salad but with fennel.

Love,

Sarah

PS The wedge salad was as good as I dreamed and makes me want to get iceberg lettuce again. The toppings we used–roasted beets, toasted nuts, green onions, parsley, blue cheese dressing–feel so similar to my autumnal salads. But those are served with kale and that makes all the difference.

Boxing Day, June 27

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Dear John,

The days where it rains, those are fine. We can sit on the porch and still feel a bit of space from being outside. The days when we’re sick, not great. But being inside feels appropriate then. And we can sit on the porch and feel sun on our face. (Can you tell I like having a porch?)

But these days where it’s smoky. When the haze obscures the view down the street. When we put on masks to go outside, and try to stay indoors. They get hard.

The concerns of climate change continue to mount.

We advocate for change at a structural level. We have conversations and try to model small shifts at a social level. And we do what we can to care for each other. To share abundance with it comes and to buffer blows as we are able.

Today’s Box

  • Red Seedless Watermelon
  • Yellow Peaches
  • Fava Beans
  • Green Cabbage
  • Iceberg Lettuce
  • Thumbelina Carrots
  • Sugar Snap Peas

Things in the fridge

  • Blueberries
  • Watermelon
  • Cherries
  • Radishes
  • Peas
  • Fennel bulb
  • Greens: Cabbage, Chard, Collard
  • Green plums

In the Garden

  • Rainbow chard
  • Turnips + greens
  • Beets + greens
  • Peas for the sampling–snap, snow, and shelling
  • Lettuce, when we’re ready
  • Basil leaves getting pinched with flowers
  • Dill flowers
  • Calendula flowers getting dried
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Calendula and cosmos and oregano bouquet supplemented by Black Eyed Susans someone tossed in the compost

Open Preserves

Garden glimpse

We’re wrapping up the turnip and radishes from the spring plantings. They’ll be back in a couple of months. Expect we’ll be pulling the pea plants soon, so we can be a second batch of beans in the ground. (The first batch have all sprouted! And there was rain so I think we’re looking promising.)

Meals to consider and pickles to prep

  • Good news. I pickled a pint of cherries and that salad only used a cup, so we get to have the snap peas and pickled cherries salad again.
  • Last week’s watermelon rind + dill flowers + garlic have started a slow ferment down in the basement. It was so easy! The hardest part was peeling the rinds. They taste like dill pickles! Expect more experiments all summer long.
  • Toast + almond butter + chevre + cherry halves
  • I snuck a leaf of the iceberg lettuce that had fallen loose in the box. And promptly spent the whole walk home day dreaming of a wedge salad with a good blue cheese dressing. Maybe we can roast some beet lardons to be a topping instead of bacon?
  • Fava bean pistachio pasta. (Make stock with the pods?)
  • Grits ‘n greens
  • Carrot top pesto
  • We may keep using the cabbage as easy grab and go salad fixings. But if we need a heartier dinner, I’m leaning toward caramelized cabbage noodles.

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, June 20

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Dear John,

Summer means interns. And this year, interns in residence (vs remote). So for the first time since March 2020, we have five days a week working separately. I was so stressed out when work-from -home began. Too much together time! This side I was anxious about the time time apart. What can I say? Change is scary.

Spoiler: It’s been fine. We need to make sure you take salads to the office so we don’t get too much of a backlog of produce. Buying your favorite of carrots and celery is just too much with the CSA and garden plot producing.

Today’s Box

  • Dark Sweet Cherries
  • Mini Watermelon Seedless
  • Broccoli
  • Green Zucchini
  • Red Romaine Lettuce
  • Sugar Snap Peas

Things in the fridge

  • Blueberries
  • Breakfast radishes
  • Fennel + stems still waiting to get pickled
  • Lettuce
  • Greens: Cabbage, Chard, Collards, Kale, Lettuce
  • Zucchini
  • Green plums

In the Garden

  • Rainbow chard
  • Radishes + their greens
  • Peas for the sampling–snap, snow, and shelling
  • Lettuce, when we’re ready
  • Basil leaves getting pinched
  • Calendula flowers getting dried
  • Beets if we want them
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano
  • Calendula and cosmos and oregano flowering for a wild bunch of a bouquet

Open Preserves

Garden glimpse

As I type this part, on Wednesday, the window is open to the porch and the cool breeze that accompanies rain is teasing round my shoulders. We need the rain. The plants were doing better than I expected when I last got by to water them with the hose. But spigot is not the same as a good, daylong sprinkle.

Meals to consider and pickles to prep

  • Between the CSA and the garden, I think we’ve tipped the line to a chard bounty this year. We’re pickling some stems. I asked some friends for their favorites to add some variety and got suggestions for green shakshuka and quesadillas on the stove to maximize crispiness. I saw a recommendation for a chard salad a la the kale salad that Joshua McFaddan popularized. There’s also chard hummus, but I wasn’t especially impressed with the white bean and beet green dip last week, so maybe we save that for later in the year.
  • This week’s zucchini looks young and tender. Perfect for eating in a salad where it’s mandolined, salted, and dressed. Use the basil flowers that I pinched at the garden.
  • And we could combine the chard and the zukes if there’s time for a more involved cooking project.
  • A mix-up meant that we didn’t get our cherries last week. So we got a special delivery of two weeks worth of cherries this week. We could devour them by the handful, no problem. But I’m excited for the excuse to try the snap peas and pickled cherries salad.
  • While we’re mixing the pickling brine, go ahead and make a batch of radishes. They’ll be great on tacos later.
  • Maybe time for the oven roasted broccoli with lemon and feta? Though, tossing it all in a blender again is still a quick and easy way to consume a lot, fast.

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, June 13

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Dear John,

At a party this weekend, I passed on a bag containing the last of the dahlia bulbs we thought were likely viable. To be fair, there’s still a package left to be taken to the post office. And the package to your brother is puttering around the postal system–at least now it looks like it’s in the right zip code. I am late sending my parents the last of the calendula seeds. But also thrilled to have grown things to the point of sharing no only the produce but hopefully some future plants.

Guess the next test is if any of it actually grows for anyone.

In the days when the sky is eerily orange. When the rain is too little, or far too much. When the heat keeps me inside with air conditioning (that helps me now, but maybe only makes everything worse?). When I find another dead bee as I water the plants. It’s hard not to obsess about the challenges of creation.

So we care for our flowers. And try to share a bounty of blooms. Continue the work. Share life’s glories.

Today’s Box

  • Blueberries
  • Dark Sweet Cherries
  • English Peas
  • Green Cabbage
  • Green Kale
  • Red Leaf Lettuce
  • Red Chard

Things in the fridge

  • Breakfast radishes
  • Fennel stems waiting to get pickled
  • Lettuce
  • Collards
  • Zucchini
  • Green plums

In the Garden

  • Lettuce, still pretty, still with slugs. And earwigs
  • Radishes + their greens
  • Turnips + their greens
  • Beets + their greens
  • Rainbow chard
  • Calendula flowers getting dried
  • Peas for the sampling–snap, snow, and shelling
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano

Open Preserves

Garden glimpse

You found cucumber starts! We got more stakes! So there’s now a mound with bush pickle cukes where the turnips and a couple of calendula plants used to be. And a mound with a trellis and burpless cukes where the edamame was. I attempted to transplant the edamame to the center of the new bean tent. Soup beans by the thick poles, volunbeans by the thinner ones.

So….I think we’re done planting for a little bit. Time to let things grow. Hope for rain. And tend what we can in the meantime.

Meals to consider

  • So much chard getting thinned. Let’s consider the chard and PB banana wraps. They’re a curiosity to me.
  • Beet greens in the turmeric ginger rice. Radish and turnip greens and the bitter greens with chickpeas. More chard with pasta? Mix the greens, creams, and eggs?
  • The snap peas and shelling peas got shelled, zapped in the microwave. There was enough for us each to have a spoonful. We don’t have much more of the snow peas, but maybe we can add them to a stirfy.
  • Summer rolls with lettuce or chard, and all the other veggies?

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, June 6

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Dear John,

Happy Birthday! It was around this time two years ago that we got our garden box built and filled with the starts we got from the neighborhood seedling shop. Which makes me feel better about not yet having gotten a cucumber start yet this year (hopefully we’ll find one soon!). Or bought poles for this year’s bean tent. Nevermind, plant the beans around the tent. We do however have peas coming up around their tent. So, y’know, there’s plenty going on.

Today’s Box

  • Cherries
  • Mini Red Seedless Watermelon
  • Strawberries
  • Broccoli
  • Green Romaine Lettuce
  • Green Zucchini
  • Green Chard

Things in the fridge

  • Breakfast radishes
  • Fennel (I think just the tops)
  • Some bitter greens from the neighbors
  • Red Lettuce
  • Collards
  • Scallions, Green Garlic, Garlic Scape. Honestly not sure what all is in the green alliums bag
  • Green plums

In the Garden

  • Lettuce, so pretty, so many slugs
  • Radishes + their greens
  • Turnips + their greens
  • Baby rainbow chard
  • Calendula flowers gracing our table
  • Rosemary
  • Oregano

Open Preserves

Garden glimpse

The peas flowered! And they formed pods! We might get to eat some! Maybe!! Not many mind you. But any is still exciting.

Meals to consider

  • Chard + chevre omelettes
  • Chard spaghetti a la Six Seasons. And with the goal of having enough leftovers to make the frittata.
  • Fennel salad dressing to go on salads of lettuce and turnips. Perhaps with some diced watermelon tossed on top.
  • I see the zucchini and the Six Seasons tuna melt is gonna happen. So many other good things to do, but that one is calling.
  • Meanwhile, I’m not immediately yearning for one broccoli recipe or another. It’s the time of year when I’ve often done the velvety broccoli and feta pasta. So maybe that that’s the way.

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, April 6

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So many onions. Such an easy staple to use, that I’m not even going to pretend to look for recipes for them.

Dear John,

Easter dinner is upon us. Macaroni and cheese. Biscuits. Triple threat galette. Simple salad. Some sort of lemon cake, or cake with lemon curd, or lemon cream tart. Friends. Family. Seemingly straightforward. With luck, we’ll have leftovers to carry through a busy week of work. (Time to raid the freezer if we don’t!)

Today’s Box

  • Asian Greens Mix
  • Broccoli Rabe
  • Cilantro
  • Onions
  • Orange Carrots
  • Rainbow Chard
  • Red Radishes
  • Spinach  

Things in the fridge

  • Cranberries
  • Chioggia Beets
  • Purple Daikon Radishes
  • Italian Parsley
  • Spinach
  • Yellow Carrots
  • Yellow Onions
  • Robins Koginut Squash
  • Shallots
  • Sunchoke
  • Red Beets

In the Garden

  • Garlic chives
  • Rosemary
  • Dahlia bulbs

Open Preserves

Quick meals for busy days

  • We have cilantro. We have chard. You know what to do.
  • Simple salads. Greens + carrots + radish. Add quinoa and a miso-tofu dressing. Add beans and the leftover oregano-lemon dressing. Switch it up for greens + beets + grapefruit + blue cheese.
  • Really the broccoli rabe is the thing that isn’t essentially a salad or soup staple these days. I vote pizza.
  • And we should see if that squash is still good…. It’s been a minute. Stuffing it would be a solid dinner.

Sarah

Boxing Day, February 23

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The return of greens. Chard and lettuce and mix. Don’t worry, we still have plenty of roots.

Dear John,

In the time between when I started this draft and, ahem, starting the next draft we had some produce experimentation. We dug up some sunchokes from our pots–surprisingly easy to clean off the the soil. I guess the potting mix is better aerated than our yard. The pizza was delicious and I am eagerly anticipating the burgers.

We also split our dahlia tubers. Sorted between viable and edible. Washed and peeled a few of the latter. Sauteed in butter with salt and pepper. They felt more like radishes than potatoes. Decent chip though. Not a food I’d seek out (bred for looks as it were), but might as well with the ones that are otherwise destined for the compost pile. I’m scheming what pickling we might attempt.

Today’s Box

  • Asian Greens Mix
  • Baby Hakurei Turnips
  • Gold Beets x2
  • Purple Daikon Radishes x2
  • Purple Viking Potatoes
  • Rainbow Carrots
  • Red Chard

Things in the fridge

  • Cranberries
  • Parsley
  • Half a parsnip
  • Half a cabbage
  • Chioggia Beets
  • Purple Sweet Potatoes
  • Robins Koginut Squash
  • Black Futsu squash (from the farmers market)
  • Shallots, onions

Open Preserves

Home meals

  • The greens look so perfect for salads. We should make a dressing and keep it simple and on the side. Chop a turnip. Add some fruit. Maybe add some roasted beet wedges. Toasted pumpkin seeds. Oh look, it’s a meal size salad now.
  • I’m cheating cause you already made it, but twice baked potatoes. (We should have used the turnip greens for that instead of the frozen spinach. But whatevs. It was yummy cozy.) Prep them all and freeze what we’re not eating for that meal.
  • The radishes are calling for a fried rice situation. At least that’s how I’m feeling at the moment.
  • But some of them can go in okonomiyaki. With that half cabbage from the last box.
  • Swiss chard and sweet potato gratin? (Unless we do the sweet potatoes discussed last week.)
  • Purple potatoes for gnocci!

Love you,

Sarah

Boxing Day, January 26

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Our box. Minus the black turnips. Plus extra sweet potatoes and parsnips.

Dear John,

Last week, someone on the neighborhood listserv started a thread sharing lifehacks. The first responses were about grocery lists and meal planning. Bulk cooking sauces and dressings on weekends to prepare for the week ahead. Making meals large enough that leftovers get packed in lunchboxes. Having regularly occurring menus. Which a reminder that, I can still tell you that growing up Saturday morning is pancakes, Saturday dinner is pizza, Sunday morning eggs, Sunday lunch spaghetti, and Sunday dinner hot dogs and popcorn.

I contributed using a melon baller to core an apple. Truly it works quickly, and then you have a half ball of core to toss in the apple core bag in the freezer.

Because, the apple core bag, is definitely one of our more recent tricks. Apple and pear cores (and other fruit), tossed in a bag in the freezer until you have enough to make jelly and mostarda or chutney. I opted not to put that one the listserv though. It feels a bit of an advanced cooking to reduce waste move. I’ll share with you, here, though.

It led to a fun discussion of our other hacks:

  • Freezer scrap bags: In addition to the apple cores, we have kale and green stems that become pesto, veggie peels become stock, and one day I might figure out the secret of saving Parmesan rinds for stock
  • Second curtain rod over the far side of the shower for hanging washcloths to dry
  • Family account on one password with shared passwords
  • Cryptomator + shared drive for secure file sharing across computers
  • When mood is bad, eat something, drink water, and go for a walk and talk.
  • This blog for sharing the menu planning process

Speaking of….

Today’s Box

  • Beauregard Sweet Potatoes
  • Black Radishes
  • Celery
  • Parsnips
  • Rainbow Chard
  • Robins Koginut Squash
  • Scarlet Turnips
  • Shallots

Things in the fridge

  • Cranberries
  • Rutabaga (picked up from last week’s swap box leftovers)
  • Black Futsu squash (from the farmers market)

Open Preserves

Home meals

  • Sweet potatoes topped with celery and shallot and cheese. This recipe is a better fit for this box than I remembered!
  • If we want something salad-y, I think the turnips are the first thing to try. I don’t know scarlet turnips! Maybe shave them and some apples and do a mustard dressing? We can also try grating the rutabaga.
  • Two weeks ago, we made the parsnip soup with celery relish from Six Seasons. Honestly, it’s worth a repeat.
  • Oh, root vegetable tangine sounds really fun. Aka it would do exactly as titled and mix up our routine. And we have preserved lemon waiting to be used!
  • That blog had an older post that reminds me we can make gnocci with the root veg. We’re out of our sweet potato gnocci, so that’s tempting. But maybe one of the four pounds of rutabaga goes to that? We already have grocery store potatoes on hand.
  • Last week, I used the last fall squash in a winter chili adapted from Simply in Season. This one looks like it’d be fun to stuff, but maybe play on that theme? Beans and cheese and some canned tomatoes and spices with heat.
  • I was debating how to use the chard–it’s not quite a salad green but I wanted to get the crunchy freshness of barely cooked greens. I think returning to the pandemic winter favorite of turmeric rice with greens is the way to go. (You know if it came a week we had cilantro, I’d be making that soup.)

Love you,

Sarah

Boxing Day, April 26

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Spring is green indeed. All the leaves blended together, so went artsy for the photo.

Hi John,

It’s a new CSA season! We’re at a new site, picking up on Tuesdays (after a pandemics worth of Thursday pickups). We’re back to getting a small box every week instead of splitting every other week.

Meanwhile, we’re getting back to the garden plot. Despite our rapid abandonment of the plot once we were under contract, some plants survived the winter. We have some spinach that’s finally mature enough to start picking. The cilantro that I started from seed, survived the transplanting and the season, and is thriving. The carrot seeds that never took off last fall, are actually growing this spring. The garlic that we planted at the end of fall, looks to be coming up. The dahlia returned, despite not harvesting the tuber for safer preservation over the winter. And of course the rosemary and oregano are thriving.

We’ve planted short rows of radishes. Spattering of a mix of stir-fryable greens. A bean tent with a variety of peas. Dill, though I’m not sure if what’s coming up is volunteers or from our seeds. A half border of nasturtium. Planning on buying starts for the basil and tomatoes and tomatillos and peppers and maybe a cucumber or three. Hoping the ground cherries have self-sown, as promised/threatened. We’ll see what the season truly brings.

In This Week’s Box

  • Green Garlic
  • Green Kale
  • Red Butterhead Lettuce
  • Red Chard

Still in the Fridge

  • Strawberries (farmer’s market)
  • Cranberries
  • Mushrooms
  • Greens: Lettuce, Cabbage, Microgreens
  • Black radishes, Purple Daikon radishes, Winter Radishes
  • Potatoes: Sweet
  • Jerusalem Artichokes

Growing in the Garden

  • Spinach
  • Radish sprouts as we thin them
  • Radishes
  • Cilantro (as we want)
  • Weedy wild onions (if we trust our nose)

Open Preserves

  • Preserved eggplant
  • Dill pickle juice
  • Lacto-fermented green cherry tomatoes
  • Lacto-fermented blueberry jalapeno hot sauce
  • Pickled banana peppers with oregano, basil, and black pepper
  • Plain pickled banana peppers
  • Pickled fennel stems with orange
  • Spicy pickled fennel stems
  • Radish kimchi
  • Sunchoke relish
  • Green tomato chutney
  • Applesauce
  • Cranberry orange marmalade-ish
  • Probably still more uninventoried

Meals for now, meals for later

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, April 14

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So many greens! (All the more so because we gave up this week’s sweet potatoes. We got dandelion greens and lettuce last week.)

Dear John,

Happy Easter! We walked to the cemetery this morning for Sunrise Service. As we snuck out of our house, a neighbor was across the street scattering eggs for a hunt. (Kid is two, you don’t really hide them yet.) The sign at a church we passed illuminated a “Happy New Year!” message, and while I know it hasn’t changed in months, spring really does feel like a resetting of the calendar. We found our place in the gathering crowd. The trees had confettied the graves with pink petals–a celebration of life in the midst of death. The promise that life continues, beyond all our fears.

In This Week’s Box

  • Cilantro
  • Green Cabbage
  • Green Kale
  • Green Romain Lettuce
  • Mixed Winter Radishes
  • Red Scallions
  • Rainbow Chard

Still in the Fridge

  • Asparagus (farmer’s market)
  • Strawberries (farmer’s market)
  • Cranberries
  • Celery
  • Greens: Dandelion, radish, kale
  • Black radishes, Purple Daikon radishes
  • Turnips
  • Potatoes: Sweet
  • Jerusalem Artichokes

Open Preserves

  • Preserved eggplant
  • Dill pickle juice
  • Lacto-fermented green cherry tomatoes
  • Lacto-fermented blueberry jalapeno hot sauce
  • Pickled banana peppers with oregano, basil, and black pepper
  • Plain pickled banana peppers
  • Pickled fennel stems with orange
  • Spicy pickled fennel stems
  • Radish kimchi
  • Sunchoke relish
  • Green tomato chutney
  • Applesauce
  • Cranberry orange marmalade-ish
  • Probably still more uninventoried

Meals for now, meals for later

  • As soon as I post this, I’m heading to the kitchen to start a galette of onions and scallions and goodness. (Goodness=cheese.)
  • I bought asparagus and strawberries at the farmers market and will probably be buying more strawberries. We’ve made the asparagus lemon pasta from Simply in Season, which needs to be done at least annually. Maybe easiest to roast the rest? Maybe use on flatbread/pizza? Maybe a quiche?
  • We used up the last cabbage in okonmiyaki. And, while it feels weird to do the same thing immediately, it was a successful enough meal series that I’m absolutely okay with a repeat.
  • Beans and greens. Let’s do the dandelion + miso + beans from Cool Beans. And maybe also a version of the Hoppin’ John Pilaf.
  • I tempted to try a preserved daikon radish recipe. I didn’t buy any on my latest run to Hmart, but I did get goji berries and the recipe uses them both with congee.
  • Debating the favorite chard and cilantro soup. It’s known and good and I have plenty of stale bread at the moment. May be convinced to switch to a lentil version though.
  • We got some potatoes from the store. Twice bake’em, stuffed with kale and scallions and cheese?

Love,

Sarah

Boxing Day, February 3

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Not pictures, sweet potatoes we left for the box sharers.

Hi John,

The boxes are fewer, though it still feels like they surround me in most rooms. The kitchen is inching towards usability, and in fact gets cooked in most days. At least the counters mostly make sense. We haven’t figured out a good place for dishes to go between being washed and dried, but I could clear a space to pose for this week’s produce picture.

That said, my summary of the past few weeks is that for someone who wants to be less consumption focused, I sure am spending a lot of time shopping. Both you and the friends who have heard this comment remind me that there’s good reason for that. We’re at a confluence of life transitions. Getting furniture now that fits the house we expect to be in for years makes sense. For instance, we’re currently on the lookout for the right kitchen island/cart. The cabinets don’t actually have a place that fits most pots and pans. Or the baking sheets. It’s a bit of a problem. While a kitchen remodel is probably in the long-term plans for the house (along with figuring out better insulation in that space), it’s not the top priority. So, we get to figure out what we can add that will make the existing facilities more functional. A 44 inch kitchen cart sounds promising.

In This Week’s Box

  • Cilantro
  • Kossak Kohlrabi
  • Rainbow Carrots
  • Rainbow Chard
  • Red Radishes
  • Purple Top Turnips

Still in the Fridge

  • Apples: last of the season
  • Cranberries
  • Greens: Red Cabbage
  • Celery
  • Carrots
  • Parsnip
  • Black radishes
  • Red beets
  • Squash: Spaghetti, Butternut
  • Potatoes: Sweet, Purple
  • Sunchokes

Open Preserves

  • Preserved eggplant
  • Dill pickle juice
  • Lacto-fermented green cherry tomatoes
  • Lacto-fermented blueberry jalapeno hot sauce
  • Lacto-fermented habanda jalapeno hot sauce
  • Pickled red onion
  • Pickled banana peppers with oregano, basil, and black pepper
  • Plain pickled banana peppers
  • Pickled fennel stems with orange
  • Spicy pickled fennel stems
  • Radish kimchi
  • Sunchoke relish
  • Green tomato chutney
  • Freedom berry jam
  • Cranapple
  • Probably still more uninventoried

What to eat

  • We’ve already discussed that next time you are making soup, consider making one and a half recipes so you’d use all the parsnips instead of leaving a single, half pound, parsnip in the fridge. That said, I’m thinking some sort of shepherd’s pie situation is in order. Probably want to buy some mushrooms for it. Consider having the topping include kohlrabi as well as potatoes.
  • Oh! Buy enough mushrooms to use some more in the Freekeh, Mushrooms, Turnips, and Almonds recipe from Six Seasons. We’ll substitute another grain, of course. Perhaps sorghum? Or maybe change it to French lentils.
  • Chard and Cilantro means we get to make this soup again! Bonus for using some of the dried volunbeans.
  • Confession: I haven’t touched the beets. I think it might be time to roast, puree, and freeze. (To be added to hummus or yogurt or the beet pistachio soup from Midnight Chicken at some later date.) Maybe save one or two to shred for a salad with carrots and walnuts and some citrus. This might actually be sounding good. Use up the rest of the cabbage to go with it or nah?

Sarah