2013 CSA Share Week 2

From our farm to your table this week…

Item	How to Store it	How long will it last?
beans, dried	cool, dry, dark place	months
oregano	unwashed, in fridge, in sealed container or plastic bag	~1-2 weeks
lettuce	washed & thoroughly dried (my preference) or unwashed, in fridge, sealed in container or plastic bag	~2 weeks
sweet potatoes	cool, dry, dark place	~2-4 more weeks, they’ve been in storage all winter
bok choy	washed & thoroughly dried (my preference) or unwashed, in fridge, sealed in container or plastic bag	~2 weeks
tomatoes	at room temp	~1 week

More information…
Dried Beans
You’ll find more of the same little round Mississippi Silver hull beans in your share this week.  If you didn’t cook up the beans in your first share, you can combine the two for a BIG pot of beans or a hearty stew.  One CSA member says she made a soup with the beans, sage, sweet potatoes, and rosemary, adding onion, basil, salt, pepper, ground turkey, and some of her own frozen tomatoes & green beans.  Doesn’t that sound delicious?!?!  Thanks April – for sharing the great idea for a healthy one-pot meal!
Here’s the link to the basic recipe we shared last week for cooking up the beans.

Oregano

Last year Ford and I established a raised bed for perennial herbs.  We hope you enjoyed using fresh sage last week.  This week, we’d like to introduce you to the distinct flavor of fresh oregano.  Oregano is a popular, well-known herb.   You may have used the dry version many times in your own homemade Italian dishes.  Only in the last year have I enjoyed the intense flavor from using these herbs fresh.  I’m always looking for creative ways for us to use the crops that we have on hand and, although I haven’t tried this one yet, I’m looking forward to experimenting with this recipe from Real Simple for Rigatoni with Sweet Potato, Oregano, and Parmesan.  If you don’t think you’ll have time to use the oregano while it’s fresh, you can dry it for short term storage just by hanging it upside down in your kitchen.  If you’d like to keep it for several weeks, it would be best to follow guidelines like those in Janet Bachand Chadwick’s food preservation guide called The Busy Person’s Guide to Preserving Food. She recommends drying the leaves in a food dehydrator at 110^oF for 4-8 hours (check the manufacturer’s instruction on your dehydrator just to be sure) or in a conventional oven at 110 ^oF for 6-8 hours, or outdoors out of direct sunlight for 8-12 hours.

Lettuce
This week you’ll find big leaves of fresh green lettuce that are excellent for salads or layered in sandwiches.  You’ll notice a slightly stronger, sharper flavor than typical supermarket lettuce, as is the case with many home-grown products.  You may prefer to shred this large leaf lettuce into ribbons or chop it finely and mix with other greens if you prefer milder salad greens.

Sweet potatoes
This will probably be the last time you see sweet potatoes in the share until the end of the CSA season in September or October.  There are so many ways to enjoy them!  If you’ve never tried just roasting them in olive oil and fresh herbs, now would be a great time to try.  My favorite herb for roasted sweet potatoes is rosemary.

Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Rosemary

2-4 medium sweet potatoes

1-2 Tablespoons olive oil

1 Tablespoons fresh herbs such as rosemary or thyme

Salt and pepper to taste.

Preheat oven to 400^oF.
Thoroughly scrub sweet potatoes and pat dry.

Using a sharp knife, remove any small holes or imperfections in the skin and peel if desired.

Slice potatoes into long, thin wedges.  You should get about 4-6 wedges from a medium potato.

Toss potatoes with olive oil, rosemary, salt and pepper and spread evenly on a baking sheet.
Bake for 30-45 minutes depending on desired texture and thickness of potato wedges.  Turn the potatoes once in the middle so they get nice and brown on two sides.
Bok choy
We hope you enjoyed the bok choy you received last week.  This green is a very reliable spring crop so you’ll probably see it once or twice more before the weather gets really hot.  In hot weather, lettuces and greens produce flowers and acquire a bitter taste.  Typically, you’ll only see these crops in spring, early summer, and fall.

Tomatoes
Tomato picking in the greenhouse is one of our son Finley’s favorite farm chores these days.  It is a delight to go out and harvest dozens of firm, ripe, juicy tomatoes this time of year.  When grown exclusively outdoors in our geographic area, tomato plants do not produce ripe fruit until around early July, so we hope you’re as excited as we are to be enjoying them now!  This week I’ve eaten lots of them in sandwiches, with creamy cheeses, and finely diced in guacamole.

As always, please feel free to contact me for clarification, further information, or to share your own adventures in cooking local, USDA-certified organic produce.  amanda.waterstrat@gmail.com