veggie triage

Late night at work
+ vegetables from last week on the verge of rotting that I TOTALLY FORGOT ABOUT (eek)
+ a new share
+ gone for the weekend
= stress

I was a super ninja and triaged the shit out of my fridge and cursed myself for forgetting about the basil and frisee hidden in the back that I forgot about. See, when frisee starts to go bad, it goes bad at the very tips and it goes bad unevenly. At least, mine did. So when I was picking out all the slimy leaves, I literally had to pick through each little tendril and pluck off the slimy bits to salvage what was left. Sure, I could have thrown it out, but I'm stubborn like that (though I do feel a little scared to eat it now after having gotten all up close and personal with the rotting tips). Besides, I felt vaguely guilty about tossing my kale salad and squash from last week. So I plucked. And plucked. And plucked some more.

Same thing with the basil, except basil starts to go bad where the leaves meet the stem, which means plucking each leaf off before stripping out the slimy part. Sigh. Fortunately, the parsley was in good shape. There were no other orphaned leftovers from last week's share to handle and I promised myself to be better about handling my CSA shares going forward.

I have to say, neglectfulness aside, I'm really impressed with myself. In under two hours, I managed to handle everything. In fact, I'm so impressed, I'm going to write down my triaging thought process so I can marvel at my ability to think on my feet later.

- Cabbage and napa cabbage: these keep forever ish. Take two seconds and store those suckers in fridge.
- Onion and fresh garlic: semi-long lived creatures. I lopped off their pretty green tops, rinsed those and tossed them in my "odds and ends" soup bag in the freezer. Tossed the bulbs in the fridge. Done. (Pro-tip: fresh garlic can be stored in the fridge for a week. Cured/dry garlic should NOT be stored in the fridge or in a plastic container, as it will sprout or mold. Store those outside in a dark location, like a paper bag or covered, ventilated basket.)
- Green beans and wax beans: Rinsed, admired their prettiness for a few moments, and stored them in ziploc bags as snack food. No prep, no cook, just rinse and store.
- Cucumbers: Washed, peeled, and sliced them into snackable sticks. No cooking (notice a trend?)
- Frisee and parsley: I debated cooking these together, but was too lazy after all that plucking, so I just googled "parsley frisee" and discovered that the internet says you can eat these together as a salad. Boom, done. I also chopped up a bit of parsley to sprinkle on some leftover hummus. I've discovered that I rather like the taste of fresh parsley on hummus and pasta. Those flecks of green are so surprising when you come across them, unlike their dried counterparts, which bear an uncanny resemblance to green paper.
- Basil and zucchini: arguably the most time consuming part of my evening. I basically followed the recipe for marinated zucchini, but spent a lot of time picking out the edible parts of the basil :/ I left the zucchini to marinate in a ziploc baggie and I made the basil-garlic-lemon dressing in advance. I'll give it a taste tomorrow and see how that went. My fingers are crossed. For once, I'm actually really excited to eat zucchini.

And that's it! My share(s) are packed into bags or containers or are safely in storage, and I am ready to face the rest of my week. Oh, I also got another chicken. I now have three chickens in my freezer and I'm running out of room. I should butcher one or roast one early next week so I have something to feed my brother when he gets here. That boy will eat you out of house and home. One time, I had to go to the grocery store twice IN ONE DAY to feed him. When you live in a five floor walkup, this is no laughing matter.

TL;DR: an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, avoid cooking like the plague, and google has all the answers.

Side note: I feel like this is a weird thing to admit, but I really like the way zucchini feels when you cut it up with a super sharp knife. It's really soft, almost buttery, in texture and it looks so clean and fresh. And it's so much less messy than chopping up, say, a chicken.

CSA's at work + WSJ article!

!!! The WSJ posted an article on CSA's at the workplace!

Workplace CSA's in NYC

Love the article, wish my company would start up an initiative like this. I bet there would be a lot of interest. You know what would be even better? Being able to allocate a certain portion of Seamless dollars or health care benefits towards a share.

I like the whole idea of divvying up shares on the spot. Definitely understand the dilemmas faced by the share-splitters (for example, how exactly do you split a watermelon three ways?)

I split a share with a friend at the moment, but I pick up the share and she picks up her half from me later that evening. The problem is, I'm still at the office when she picks it up, so things like lettuce heads or 1 eggplant or 1 large onion become a bit difficult to split. And I don't exactly feel like carting in a large kitchen knife every Tuesday to my office. I feel like that would draw less than positive attention my way.

In any case, I hope awareness of CSA's continues to grow and I hope companies realize that this is a great, effective, and cheap way to keep workers happy and healthy :)

Using up CSA Share #2

Wow. I am so full of vegetables, I think I'm going to pop...

So this week has been crazy work-wise, and I don't think I'll have much time to do anything this weekend either, given that I'm going to the farm all day tomorrow, have to finish up a lot of work, and also still need to pack (eek!). Which meant I had to take care of my CSA share for the week...today.

If you recall, this week's share consisted of:
- spring onions
- 1 head of bok choy
- 1 bunch salad turnips with green tops
- 1 head of escarole
- 1 napa cabbage
- 2 stalks green garlic
- garlic scapes
- 1 bunch flat leaf parsley
- 1 head red leaf lettuce

I had about two hours to cook and eat dinner and prep my CSA share, so time was key. I tried to stick to "recipes" that required very little prep time and minimal dish/pan use.

Spring onions were easy - I just chopped them up and tossed them in the freezer. I tend to do this even with store bought onions because I rarely use more than one at a time. Plus, whenever I need green onions and don't feel like running to the store for some, I can just pull these pre-sliced green onions out of the freezer and toss them into my ramen, eggs, stir fry, etc. Super easy!

I didn't have time to blanch and freeze my greens, so I figured I might as well just eat them. I washed the bok choy and turnip greens and stored them in the fridge so I could cook them tomorrow.

The turnips I snacked on as I was cooking. They were so good! Remember my moment of turnip-insecurity earlier? I'm happy to report that my turnips were delicious. I peeled them and just sliced off pieces to munch on. They tasted like an interesting combination of persimmons and radishes. The similarity to a radish, I totally get. Turnips are a root vegetable, like radishes. But persimmons?! Yeah...I don't know. But I swear, that's kind of what they tasted like...

I chopped up my escarole and sauteed it in a pan with some olive oil, green garlic, and garlic scapes. I sprinkled some red pepper flakes and salt over the top and voila! Dinner!

The napa cabbage was super easy. I sliced it in half and microwaved it for 6-7 minutes. After it was nicely steamed, I just ate it one piece at a time with some rice and gochujang. Also dinner! Om nom nom.

I sliced up the leftover garlic green stem/leaves and tried frying them up in a pan with some garlic scapes. I wasn't sure if this was going to work, since the stem leaves were awfully tough. I had to toss out the inner core, since it was as hard as a piece of wood. After the sliced garlic stem browned slightly, I added an egg and turned the whole thing into a frittata-omelette hybrid. More dinner! Turned out really good :D

The parsley I still don't know what to do with. I tossed some chopped up parsley into my eggs and added some to the escarole, but otherwise, I still have about 3/4 of the original bunch still sitting in my fridge...

The lettuce is going to have to wait until tomorrow. Maybe I'll wash it and turn it into a salad for lunch on Monday.

All in all, not bad for two hours, right? That includes time spent washing dishes that have accumulated in my apartment over the last week...haha...

Bug watch: This week was better than last week. No caterpillars! I only encountered one (already deceased) spider in my escarole as I was rinsing it. It was really small too. Not a problem, although I did make sure to wash each escarole leaf individually after that.

CSA Share #2

This CSA run, I'm happy to report, went much more smoothly than the last one. No rain, no getting lost, got back to the office in less than 45 minutes, #winning, etc.

This week:
- 1 head of bok choy
- 1 head of escarole
- 2 stalks green garlic
- 1 bunch flat leaf parsley
- 1 napa cabbage
- 1 head red leaf lettuce
- 1 bunch salad turnips with green tops
- spring onions
- garlic scapes

I've decided to do a weekly roundup of the highlights of each share...
CWTC (can't wait to cook): This week's CWTC award goes to the turnips. For some reason, I've always been fascinated by the idea of turnips and turnip greens. I think one of my favorite books had a main character that lived off of turnips and bread for a while, but I can't really remember. It seems like the most plausible explanation for my mild obsession, considering my mom never cooked turnips. I remember really wanting to eat a turnip in high school, so I convinced my mom to buy one for me. I cooked it and took a bite, but it was awfully mushy and tasteless. Maybe it was not in season? Or maybe I cooked it wrong? Oh well, I'm still fascinated by them and very excited to cook and eat them. Fingers crossed that this attempt goes better than the last one!
WTF: parsley. What do I do with an entire bunch of parsley?!? I looked up recipes, but all I could find was parsley pesto or parsley soup, and I don't own anything that can puree parsley. :( I feel like it's just going to wilt into sad oblivion in the back of my fridge, which is a shame because it looks so fresh and lively...
TAV: The adventurous veg award this week goes to the garlic scapes. To be honest, I've actually eaten these before many, many times, but I didn't recognize them in their fresh, raw form. I've always eaten them as a Korean side dish called 마늘쫑 반찬 (maneul jjong). But seriously, these are my favorite. Even when I couldn't stand spicy food, I would fight the peppery taste just to relish the texture and taste of the garlic stems. I think I like eating stems in general, because I also like eating sweet potato stems. Hmm. But anyways, fresh garlic scapes are so cute! I'll post pictures when I get a chance.

While I was picking out my produce from the crates of vegetables, I saw another bug (a fat, snot-colored, slimy-looking caterpillar) in a head of Napa cabbage. The man in front of me, who was acccompanying his girlfriend/wife/very good friend, spotted it and amusedly said, "This stuff really is organic isn't it?" Haha...

Free Bird Farm doesn't grow organically certified veg (partly because certification is a hassle, especially for smaller scale organizations and farms), but they do note that they try to stick with organic methods as much as possible. So yes, it is essentially organic. And the sad reality is that organic veg has a higher probability of ending up with frequent live protein supplements embedded in it. Yeck.

Fortunately, I don't think I have any bugs in this particular share (though I might be sadly mistaken). I'll find out when I get around to washing my produce. I just haven't had a free minute all week (thank you work), but none of the produce will go bad in a day or two, so I don't feel too bad about leaving it to languish away in the chilly depths of my fridge.

Preview for the next post: unless I get some free time to cook, my next post will probably be about the field trip to the farm! Every year, my CSA organizes a trip out to the Free Bird Farm, where we get to meet the farmers, tour the farm, help harvest a little bit, and get to know everyone. I guess this is the most visibly "community-esque" part of the CSA experience and I'm really excited. The trip is on Sunday from 7:30am (eek!) to 7 or 8pm. It's an all day trip since the farm is located about 4 hours away by car, so it'll be quite a drive. I'm looking forward to napping the whole time. I haven't roadtripped in a while and this might be just what I need. I've been feeling really closed in and claustrophobic from all the buildings lately, so a little fresh air and countryside should help with that. Plus, I'm going home (to Arizona) in a week too, so that should help as well. YAY!

CSA Share #1

Our CSA share pickup times are 5pm to 8pm, but I obviously need to be at work during that time. However, I figured I would plan out my CSA rendezvous so that I could grab my share, drop it off, and be back at work in about 30 minutes. A good plan - a great plan.

Of course, life doesn't go according to plan. For starters, it was raining.

Remember a few posts ago, how I waxed poetic about the rain? Yeah. All well and good in theory, but slogging through puddles was a bit less than fun. Especially since I was slogging and hopping awkwardly over puddles in heels. I'm just glad I managed to not sprain anything vital. Graceful, I am most definitely...not.

Once I made it to the pickup building, I took an elevator to the 5th floor, where the distribution was supposed to be taking place. I ended up on a floor with rows of numbered rooms. I walked down one hall, then another, looking for the "conference room," only to realize halfway down the third hall that I was wandering through a hotel. Wrong building.

I went back to the elevators and waited patiently for the elevator to bring me back down to earth so I could continue my CSA quest. I say patiently because the elevators (there were two!) took about 5 minutes to reach my floor. If I wasn't sure before, I was sure now: this was an old, decrepit building, and I was probably safer walking up and down the stairs than risking the elevator. But I'm lazy, so I just waited for the elevator.

Once I was safely on the ground, I went through a pair of double doors and asked the nice gentlemen at the front desk where the conference room was. They pointed right and said through those doors. I went right. I climbed a flight of stairs, only to realize it led straght to a locked door on the second floor. I went back to the nice gentlemen and inquired politely where the conference room was. This time, they pointed left. I thanked them and went on my way.

Once I went through the door on the left, there were two hallways and multiple doors. I went right. Nothing. I backtracked and went left. Eureka! Elevators! And the people coming out of the elevators were holding plastic bags full of green leaves. I was getting close. I could feel it!

This time, the elevators were slightly faster, but I was surrounded by sweaty people in a hot, dank elevator. We also stopped at every floor. My offended nose informed me that this was rather unpleasant, and this CSA share had better be worth it...

Upon reaching the fifth floor, I went left and for the first time all day, I had guessed right the first time. The conference room was straight ahead! (Okay, I cheated. I went left because that's where all the other people with bags of vegetables were coming from. But I still went the right direction the first time, which I think is remarkable regardless of the circumstances surrounding the decision. Plus, it shows my strong deductive skills.)

CSA Share #1

I walked in, initialed my name on the sign-in sheet, and went down the row picking out my vegetable allotment for the week:

- 1 bunch frisee

- 1 head romaine lettuce

- 1 bunch Easter Egg radishes

- 6.5 oz mixed baby salad greens

- 1 bunch red spring onions

- 1 bunch arugula

- 1 bunch kale

- 1 bunch cilantro

It all looked so good and so fresh, I wanted to start munching away at the table. But that would have earned me some odd stares and possibly an escort out of the building (plus a mouthful of dirt), so I restrained myself and packed away my shares into my plastic bags.

Halfway through my perusal of the red spring onions (such a pretty color!), the woman next to me found a large bug in the pile of frisee I had just been sorting through.

Lady: Oh hello! What are you doing here?

Other lady: Is that a bug?

Lady: Yeah, let me just take him outside. Come here little fella! I'm not gonna hurt you. Come here!
Other lady: Wow, he's a big one!
Lady: Aww come here, little guy! Aww he's scared!

Me (in my head): UHHHHHHHHHH.

Fortunately, I'm not the squeamish type except when it comes to cockroaches and millipedes/centipedes. Earwigs freak me out too, but those I can deal with. I used to play with potato bugs and collect earthworms. And I caught scorpions and released them outside in the name of humane-bug-treatment. So I wasn't completely unsympathetic to the lady. But at the same time, I think 5+ years of living in super-urban environments has made me a bit less capable of mentally dealing with bugs, so I decided to speed through the CSA pickup line and pray that the bug would remain terrified long enough for me to escape into the elevator before the bug-savior managed to catch him. I wasn't exactly keen on the idea of sharing a cramped, dank, humid SLOW elevator with our lovely bug-savior, the bug, and a couple of sweaty strangers who might not take kindly to the ongoing bug-rescue.

I grabbed my spoils and fled out the door, willing the elevator doors to shut before bug-savior came barreling through. Fortunately, my prayers were answered and I was on my merry way down to the ground floor sans bug.

Walking home was a trial, as I tried to balance my umbrella, bag and vegetables while hopping around puddles in my heels without crushing my delicate salad greens and arugula. Fortunately, I'd had the foresight to pack away my delicate greens in my purse, so they were somewhat more protected than the plastic bags banging away at my knees as I jumped and skipped my way home.

I dumped the vegetables into individual plastic bags after admiring them for a few minutes, shoved them in my fridge, and ran back to my office. Total adventure time? 45 minutes. Not bad, but next time I'm hoping to shave that down to half an hour.

After seeing this week's share, I'm thinking a salad spinner would be really handy. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with everything just yet, but I've got a few ideas. The radishes will make a nice snack or salad addition, and I can use the spring onions and cilantro in spam fried rice. I've invited one of my friends to come eat salad with me on Friday night and she happily accepted. Since she just moved to the city, all she has in her pantry is spam. Ergo, spam fried rice. I can't use all the cilantro though (and my roommate hates it), so I'm not sure what to do with it. We'll see...

I'm really excited about the kale though! Lovely, gorgeous kale leaves that will make beautiful kale chips. Woo!

  

KALE CHIPS?!

And I'm thinking that sauteed radish greens and frisee would make lovely additions to our salad/spam fried rice dinner. We'll see!

Frisee: wilted?

 Anyways, it's late, I'm out. I think I'll hold off on washing anything until Friday and cross my fingers that the cilantro and greens stay fresh. Not worried about the radishes or kale, but a little concerned about the baby salad greens. I always feel like Friday is so far from Monday (or Tuesday, or Wednesday...), but this Friday in particular feels like it can't come fast enough.

More pictures of this week's haul:



Radishes! So cheerful and bright :)



So happy :)

Crazy work weeks

If I have more weeks like this at work, I have no clue how I'm going to balance picking up a CSA share and dealing with washing/chopping/cooking my portion. Every day, I've been getting home past 3am. The only respite I had was the weekend, where I managed to at least sleep in until 11am on Saturday and noon on Sunday. Still stuck at work until the wee hours though.

Don't get me wrong - I knew it would be like this before I started my job. And I don't mind, most of the time. But it's making me a bit worried about the summer/fall with regards to the CSA program.

When work gets really crazy, not only do I not have time to handle even basic daily responsibilities like laundry, I don't even have the appetite to ingest anything beyond caffeine, sugar, caffeine, and more sugar. Stress and lack of sleep wreak havoc on my body and I become unable to eat anything that's not a simple carb. Even the type of simple carb degenerates from fructose to glucose as my stress levels mount. I have a stash of perfectly decent apples, bananas and pears at my desk, but they go untouched in favor of cookies and chocolate.

When things calm down a bit, I'm going to take some time to think of things I can do in advance to keep myself from feeling pressured by joining a CSA. Buying tupperware en masse might be a good start.

Also, I'm planning on moving out from my current apartment mid-July. Trying to figure out if this will be an issue. I don't think so, because I'm always at work during CSA pick up times anyways and the pick up location is close to my office. If I pick up my share during work and bring it to the office, I imagine I can hold onto my share and just take it home with me later. I'm glad I picked a CSA close to work so that relocating doesn't have as big of an impact on my ability to pick up my shares.

I wonder what people do if they sign up for a CSA share and then have to move halfway through the season?

Also, how do people manage to hold down a job AND feed a family / deal with kids? I can't even take care of myself properly. -__________-