squash

Boxing Day, August 19

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A garden bounty this week.

Dear John,

Beach day. Swimming pool. Garden time. Church. Faire.

Pesto. Fig jam. Preserved eggplant.

It was an exhausting weekend. It was wonderful.

Today’s Box

  • Nectarines
  • Red Seedless Watermelon
  • Yellow Peaches
  • Mixed Carmen Italian Peppers
  • Mixed Heirloom Tomatoes
  • Orange Carrots
  • Italian Eggplant
  • Yellow Straightneck Squash

Things in the fridge

  • Sunchokes
  • Roma tomatoes
  • Cabbage: Red Cabbage, Green Cabbage,
  • Nectarines, Plums, Pears

In the Garden

  • Basil by the bundle
  • Parsley
  • Mitsuba yanked from the ground because I saw the flowers and thought weed before I remembered it was intentional planting. Ooops
  • Handful of cherry tomatoes and ground cherries
  • Figs
  • Few peppers that I don’t remember anything about
  • One eggplant
  • One radish
  • One tomatillo
  • Collards
  • Sunflower! Dahlia! Basil Flowers! Zinnias! Feverfew! Okay, some of those are from the yard. Pretties!

Open Preserves

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

Pantry Beans

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

Can we cook this week? Maybe!

  • Ratatouille! It’s happening! The temperature is cooler and we can turn on the oven for three hours. If we can find a day where chopping and then stirring every so often over three hours is reasonable. Plus side, ideally it will use a surplus of veggies, be yummy, and freeze well. I’m hearing the siren call of a polenta/grits base.
  • Bacon, Basil, and Tomato sandwiches using the basil leaves that are as large as lettuce leaves. Small lettuce leaves, but still.
  • While the oven can be on, I want to make pizza too. Pesto pizza? Maybe. Tomato sauce pizza? Not opposed.
  • Also while the oven is on, roast eggplant and make a baba ganoush. Or the eggplant dip from the Indian cookbook.
  • I keep looking at the parsley vase and thinking of soba eggplant noodles topped with parsley. Or tabbouleh made with fonio.
  • The plums that haven’t been eaten should just go on the dehydrator. She says as if the processing step is easier. (It is not.)
  • More curdito. It’s been delicious on tacos and quesadillas and crackers. And hey, we just got carrots and we still have cabbage.

Love,

Sarah

PS Freeze more pesto.

Boxing Day, October 28

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Offcamera, frustration at the squash that had been on display and is now rotting. Oooops.

Dear John,

It has been a whirlwind of a week. Right now I am tired and hungry-ish and don’t really know what’s in the fridge except that the only leftovers are a half-cup of macaroni noodles. Which does not a meal make. But may be enhanced into a snack? I will skip further preamble in order to peruse ingredients from the comfort of the couch.

In This Week’s Box

  • Asian Pears
  • Honeycrisp Apples
  • Celery
  • Cubanelle Peppers
  • Delicata Squash
  • Ginger
  • Red Beets
  • Spinach
  • Sweet Onions
  • White Kohlrabi

Garden Potential

  • Starfish pepper
  • Deciding how long to wait on the final jalapenos
  • Lombok peppers
  • Last of the tomatillos, for real
  • Volunbeans for drying
  • Tomato, possibly to ripen on counter

Still in the Fridge

  • Apples: Gala, Empire, Jonagold, U-pick, Granny Smith
  • Bartlett Pears, Asian Pears, Bosc Pears
  • Greens: 1/2 a cabbage, 1/2 bunch collards, Savoy Cabbage, Romain lettuce, Dandelion, Red leaf lettuce
  • Herbs: Fennel tops
  • Leeks
  • Cherry tomatoes
  • Tomatillos
  • Broccoli
  • Edamame
  • Baby Hakurei Turnips
  • Peppers: Yummy, Lombok, Starfish, Banana, Jalapeno, Carmen
  • Carrots
  • Squash: Delicata, Red Kabocha, Spaghetti, Robins Koginut
  • Garlic
  • Potatoes: Blue, Sweet
  • 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
  • Radish kimchi
  • Sunchoke relish
  • Green tomato chutney
  • Sour cherry chutney
  • Freedom berry jam
  • Apple sauce
  • Apple butter
  • Quince jelly
  • Probably still more uninventoried

Things we’ve already eaten

  • Tacos! Braised collard stems with scrambled eggs and tomatilla salsa. Sweet potatoes and black beans with the fermented habanada jalapeno hot sauce. Take-out from the place near the canoe launch.
  • Tomato sauce (butter and garlic and sage and one red pepper) with macaroni noodles
  • Sweet potato and greens (mostly turnip, some spinach) gratin. Roux from here.

Things we may yet eat

  • Soup of the week: Smokey beetroot and pistachio soup from Midnight Chicken.
  • Or mix roasted beets with yogurt. Maybe adding some fresh ginger at the end?
  • Squash pizza. With the pickled peppers? With goat cheese and lemon slices? With blackberries (from the freezer)?
  • Remember a couple of weeks back when I was thinking of apple slaw. The recipe I was remembering then is kohlrabi and apple and ginger and we have all of those right now. Perhaps I will go prepare some for lunch.

Love,

Sarah