garlic, the smelliest savior, and lazy radish tops

I've been hacking and coughing and generally trying to expel one or both of my lungs out of my chest for the last few weeks, and it's starting to drive me slowly insane. Also, my coworkers are about to quarantine me permanently. Apparently between the pneumonia, common cold, and strep throat going around my office, I caught all three. I kid (I hope).

Anyways, it's been a week since the last share, and I used up pretty much everything except the radishes and radish tops. While radishes keep for a while, the radish tops had faded a bit. If I didn't take care of them soon, I knew they'd be destined for the trash heap.

So even though I got home kind of late, I grabbed the tops out of the fridge, picked out all the older, yellowing, mushy stems and leaves, and washed them about twenty times. I hate dirt in my food more than anything else (hi clams, I'm looking at you), and these babies had some nice sandy buildup in the base of the stems. I was feeling lazy after all that washing, so I went the Korean muchim route and made some banchan to eat with lunch (quick "recipe" below).

As I was peeling garlic cloves, I kept coughing, and a thought niggled the back of my mind as I flitted around the kitchen. I eyed the garlic cloves cautiously, hopped onto google, and confirmed my suspicions. Raw garlic, like honey, lemons, ginger, oranges, and eucalyptus, is supposed to help cure colds and coughs.

I realize raw garlic smells. I realize eating raw garlic makes you smell. I also realized that my coworkers at this point, would probably prefer garlic BO over the walking cloud of germs that I've become. So I popped a garlic clove in my mouth, crunched around for a while (omg I didn't realize raw garlic was so spicy and strong and ugh), and when I couldn't take it anymore, I swallowed it down and chased it with honey. Maybe it's a placebo effect, but I immediately felt better and my coughing subsided a bit.

I went to bed with garlic breath (I brushed my teeth extra long, but to no avail). I woke up with garlic breath. I'm still coughing, but I actually feel much better today than I did last night, so I'm thinking perhaps there's something to this home remedy after all! As an added bonus, I saw a mosquito flying around my room this morning and while I didn't manage to kill it, I don't think I have any bites, which is unusual. Viruses, mosquitos, vampires, begone! lol.

Radish Top Muchim
Ingredients
- Radish tops, thoroughly washed
- Several cloves of garlic, thinly sliced or minced
- Red pepper flakes (gochukaru)
- Soy sauce
- Sesame oil*

1. Bring a pot of water to a rolling boil.
2. Drop in the radish greens and cook briefly (less than a minute).
3. Drain and rinse the radish greens under cold water.
4. Squeeze out the excess water from the greens and chop into bite size pieces. Set aside.
5. In a pan, heat some sesame oil.
6. Add garlic and red pepper flakes.
7. Once the garlic begins to turn golden, add the radish tops and stir.
8. Add a little soy sauce to taste.
9. Remove from heat and enjoy!

CSA 2013 Partial Share #1

Here we go! Official kickoff of my second CSA season :) I signed up for a partial share this year and I'm already feeling veggie envy when I compare my share with the full share. However, I realize a full share would be way, way too much for me, so I'll do my best to be content with my partial share. Besides, I technically have more this year, since I was splitting last year's share in half with my old roommate.

CSA 2013 Partial Share 1
- 1 large head red leaf lettuce
- 1 bunch cilantro
- 1 bunch spring onions
- 1 bunch Easter egg radishes
- 1 chicken*

I think I'll highlight two types of produce per share this year. One that I'm excited to see and one that promises to challenge my culinary skills (or the endurance of my taste buds...remember all the carrot tops last year? ugh.)

Winner: Radishes, though this is hardly a fair comparison.
Challenge: Cilantro. No one is surprised.

I flipped back to my CSA Share 1 post from last year and it's kind of funny looking back. It makes me glad I'm documenting my little escapades. I got lost, it was raining, and I was mildly horrified when some lady found a bug stowaway hiding in the produce.

This year's share and last year's share are similar (lettuce, radishes, spring onions, cilantro), though this year is starting out a lot lighter in terms of volume and variety (no kale yet :/). I think it's because we had cold weather so late into the spring. Perfectly fine by me, as I'm sure the rest of the season will be fantastic.

It should be pretty easy to use up this week's share. The lettuce and radishes will make for a nice salad, especially if I supplement them with some chicken. The spring onions can chill in the fridge I guess. Maybe I can make cilantro, radish top, and onion omelettes with some Wisconsin cheese grated over the top? I think I have some frozen sausage too. Actually, that doesn't sound half bad. I'll invite the girls over for brunch this weekend :)

On a side note, my window box got a little crowded, so I thinned out the seedlings last night. They were choking each other to death, but it was still hard to uproot so many of my little babies T_T For the record, baby borage leaves really do taste like cucumbers. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the basil, but I can't tell which of the sproutlings are basil and which are parsley. I have my suspicions, but for now, they remain unconfirmed. I suppose I could just google it, but where's the fun in that?! Stay tuned for more sprout updates.

*Poultry share will be delivered every odd week plus one extra on the last week (total of 12 birds).

CSA Share #15

I just had the best damn apple of my life. Excuse my language. Now I know I haven't been around that long (relatively speaking), but I have eaten more than my fair share of apples in my lifetime. I love apples. Every time I see a new variety, I have to try it. I am very picky about the freshness of my apples, but otherwise, I'm open to trying anything and everything.

This week's fruit share included Macoun apples and as a reward for volunteering at this week's distribution, the coordinator let me poach an apple from the leftover pile. I didn't expect much of it, which made my first delicious bite all the more surprising... Anyways, I'll make a separate post dedicated to the Macoun Apple Experience - yes, it really deserves its own separate post.

In the meantime, this week's share and my sneaky plotting ways to use it up without eating salad all week:

CSA Share 15:
- 1 bunch radishes
- 1 bunch green onions
- 1 bunch dill
- 1 bunch mixed "braising" greens (kale, tatsoi, green and red mustard, hon tsai tsai)
- 2 red bell peppers
- 2 jalapenos
- 2 pounds plum tomatoes
- 2 cucumbers
- 1 head Romaine lettuce
- 1 head red leaf lettuce

CWTC: jalapenos! I've been craving something spicy lately.
TAV: Mixed braising greens. These look incredibly beautiful, with a variety of green and purple stems and gorgeous veining patterns on some of the leaves and bright, tender green leaves poking through. They intrigue me. I have never heard of tatsoi or hon tsai tsai and I have never cooked fresh mustard leaves before. I didn't even know there was a red variety. I love that Free Bird Farm incorporates Asian-style veggies into our shares (e.g. Thai basil, bok choy, hobak). Yay!
WTF: Dill. :( These herbs are killing me. What am I going to do with this much dill?! I still have my cilantro too. FML.

Brainstorm area:
This is me thinking out loud. Welcome to my brain. HA.

I have two lemons in the fridge and some cilantro. The rest of my share has (thankfully, finally) been consumed, with the last sad remnants of the lettuce from last week straggling into my lunch and dinner salads today. No more salads please...

I suppose the lettuce is best in a salad, since I don't have time to grill or cook them this week. I can throw some radishes, cucumbers, and tomatoes together and make a decent lunch and dinner for myself. That leaves the braising greens, bell peppers, jalapenos, green onions, and dill. And radish greens.

The braising greens can become dinner for later in the week. The radish greens can wait in the fridge until next week. The green onions and dill can be mixed into some cream cheese for a nice savory spread.

I can also mix the dill with lemon juice and Greek yogurt for a tasty yogurt dip that I can pile into pita loaves. !!! I am brilliant. I can stuff the pita loaves with yogurt dip, shredded lettuce, cucumber and tomato for a yummy Mediterranean style vegetarian sandwich. I am so genius. That's how I'll use up my leftover veg next week.

The leftover green onions and dill can be tossed into chicken soup for lunch next week. (I still have several Ziploc bags of frozen chicken soup in the freezer, so this is really perfect).

Too bad I don't have potatoes. Then I wouldn't be stuck wondering what to do with all my dill. Ah well, maybe next time.

CSA Share #13 and Radish Greens

Slow on the updates in spite of a long weekend... I have a few posts in reserve and will update accordingly when I get the chance.

In the meantime, this week's share:
- 2 red bell peppers
- giant lovely mess (10oz) of arugula (or rocket, as it's known in the UK)
- 1 bunch spring onions
- 1 bunch Italian basil
- 3/4lb green beans
- 1 bunch radishes
- 1/2lb soybeans!
- 2 large tomatoes

CWTC: soybeans! I don't think I've ever had fresh soybeans before. Only frozen. This should be interesting, and fun.
TAV: Radish greens. Typically something that gets thrown out, but I was determined to make them edible in my quest to reduce food waste.
WTF: Arugula. I love it. But what do I do with this much of it? Maybe I can saute a plate of arugula and top it with a fried egg?

Radish Greens
Wasn't sure what to do with these, as they didn't look very appealing, especially with bug holes eaten through nearly all of them. After washing them very well and chopping them into small pieces, they looked considerably more appetizing.

I chopped up and froze the green portions of the scallions for later use, but I reserved the bulbs for my radish greens. The scallion bulbs were about as big across as a quarter, so they probably were more like onions than scallions at that point.

I sliced two cloves of garlic, the reserved onion bulbs, stray basil leaves, and sauteed them in a pan over medium heat. I added the chopped radish greens fairly quickly. I used a dash of fish sauce, rice vinegar, and a drizzle of sesame oil to finish off the dish, which actually turned out quite nicely. I think it was the seasoning that did it. Sesame oil is a nice counterpoint to root vegetable greens, with the nutty flavor balancing the bitterness of the greens. It's similar to using bacon when cooking turnip greens, but more subtle.

Pretty pleased with myself :)