CSA weeks 2-4

Thought of the Day…Do vegetarians eat animal crackers? ~Author Unknown


Summer brings great local produce. I’ve talked a few times about belonging to a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program at a local farm. I’m really behind in posting the CSA updates, so I’ve combined weeks 2-4.


Week 2 our bounty was strawberries, lettuce, cabbage, broccoli, fresh onions, and a sunflower plant.
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I planted the sunflower plant before we left town. As you see from the above picture, it was a bit droopy. When I planted it, I staked it upright.
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Week 3 we received lettuce, cabbage, broccoli, Italian parsley, strawberries, beets, and a arugula plant.
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Arugula has a spicy, nutty flavor.

Since I received cut herbs, I did the same thing with the Italian parsley that I did with the cut basil when I made pesto. Snip the ends at a angle, put in a glass jar and place in the window.
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I used tore the lettuce and rinsed dirt off in salad spinner. Because the CSA farm does not use pesticides so my rinse was to get the dirt off. Yep, dirt. The produce you get in the grocery store does not necessarily have dirt on it, but when we get the CSA produce it is within a day of getting plucked from the ground and delivered.
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If you don’t have a salad spinner, I highly recommend getting one. Ours is an OXO*. It also came with a berry spinning bowl. There are different kinds available.


Week 4’s bag included lettuce, cabbage, fava beans, strawberries, blueberries, kohlrabi, and an chive plant.
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The blueberries were AWESOME! I have to plant blueberries… I eat at least a cup of them a day. The kohlrabi is a sweet vegetable meant to be eaten raw, like a radish or turnip. Peel the bulb and eat plain or with a little dip or salt.

Fava beans require work, but are pretty tasty. First you slice oven the pod.
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…Then peel the rubbery coating from the actual seed. CSAWeek04-2-2010-07-11-06-38.jpg

You can see the size of the actual fava bean compared to a dime.

*This is not a paid advertisement, I just really like it.