First things first

Here’s this week’s CSA haul. More cucumbers, more zucchini, some yellow beans, red onions (this are the first ones of the season), smaller onions, bell peppers, hot peppers (another first of the season), small onions, an eggplant, and about a gazillion tomatoes.

I’m going to save the pickles until next week, when I hope to get enough new ones to make up another batch of pickles. (The recipe I’m using calls for a gallon of thin slices, which came out to about five decent-sized cukes last time.) For the other veggies, I’m going to turn to The Vegetarian Bistro, by Marlena Spieler, for inspiration. Many of the recipes call for eggplant, tomatoes, or zucchini—or even all three—so I’m bound to find something good in there.

And here are this week’s “bonus” items. The CSA boxes are kept in a small, air-conditioned trailer, and there are usually boxes or small refrigerators with extras available for purchase. Portabello mushrooms, for example, did not appear in this week’s share but could be bought for $1.50/bag. Local meat is also available at various prices.

This week, there was a box de-greened beets, with a sign encouraging people to help themselves to what they wanted. Another sign also told people to take one of the melons outside (there was a pile of them under a garden umbrella next to the trailer). I bought a dozen chicken eggs (laid yesterday morning) for $2.50.

I may have mentioned before that my CSA is at a nearby dairy farm that, for the past fifteen years or so, has operated an ice creamery. I recently learned from Tim, the farmer who runs the CSA, that only about two percent of the farm’s daily milk production goes to ice cream; the rest of the milk is sold to a regional distributor.

He sent an e-mail out to the CSA members last week announcing that they had just invested in pasteurization equipment and would be offering fresh pasteurized milk for sale once the licensing process was complete. Happy news indeed! We, however, are a raw milk-drinking family, so when I saw Tim yesterday (when picking up my box) I asked if he’d ever have raw milk available. He said, “I can’t sell it to you, but I can give it to you,” then went off to fill a half-gallon jug for me.

As it turns out, to get a license for pasteurized milk, the farm must first get a license for raw milk. Once all that is done (within the next week, Tim hopes), they’ll be able to sell both kinds of milk. He’ll have prefilled jugs of milk available for people to buy on CSA pickup days, but since I am (so far) the only person who’s inquired about raw milk, he won’t have those ready-made but will prep them to order. I’m pretty happy about this, because currently the only place I can get raw milk around here is at a natural-foods store about fifteen minutes away—it’s not too far from us, but the travel time (and gas!) really adds up when you’re going there about three times every two weeks. (Raw milk is fresh for only seven days, so buying in one trip more than we can drink in that time isn’t an option.)

It’s been a busy weekend here.

On Friday, we celebrated our nation’s birthday by taking a trip to our nation’s first zoo. The Philadelphia Zoo doesn’t hold a candle to the zoo I grew up going to—both in terms of animal habitats and entrance fees (the St. Louis Zoo is free, whereas the Philly one is a whopping $18 for adults and $15 for kids 2-11)—but it’s what we’ve got. And Sylvia loves it, so there you go.

Yesterday morning my brother arrived for a two-day visit. He lives in Greenwich Village and almost always brings us a dozen fresh bagels that he picks up at the shop around the corner from him on his way to Penn Station. We’re so grateful for this gift, because even though it’s possible to get decent bagels where we live, nothing compares to New York bagels. (Seriously. They’re standing on the summit of Mount Everest, with all other bagels in the world stuck in the Mariana Trench. They’re that good. The other bagels aren’t jealous, though, because they’re in so much awe of New York bagels that they can’t help but admire them.)

This time, in addition to bagels, he brought a special treat that I’d asked him to find: vegan marshmallows. (Real marshmallows contain gelatin, which is made from animal bones and pig and cow skin.)* A few days earlier, I’d told him that Whole Foods stores in NYC carry them (but not any stores in my area), and because they need to be refrigerated it’s very expensive to get them by mail-order during the summer. “Don’t go to any trouble, but if you can find some, that would be great,” I told him. He took it as his personal mission to find these for us, and after visiting a few stores, scored two boxes of them (each holding about a dozen marshmallows for $7, if you can believe it). Thanks to her uncle’s efforts, Sylvia got to enjoy her first backyard s’mores yesterday evening. Which she loved, of course!

Once Sylvia was in bed for the evening, a few friends came over for some serious geeking out. Nine of us played a board game until 2 a.m. Yeah, I’d say we had a good time.

I also managed to get a lot of knitting done. Last night I finished knitting one new piece, and this morning I seamed it; it just needs a few more embellishments. Right now, I’m blocking Sylvia’s new sweater and hope to finish it up (finally!) this evening. A more detailed knitting update—with pictures—will be forthcoming later this week (I hope!).

I hope all of you, too, had a great weekend!

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*A few years ago, the excrement hit the fan in the vegetarian world when it was revealed the Emes Kosher Jel, which had marketed itself as a vegetarian gelatin substitute, actually contained animal gelatin. (CNBC did a story about this: part 1, part 2.) The few companies that made vegetarian marshmallows using Emes products went out of business, and since then only a handful of companies in the world have figured out how to make vegan marshmallows.

The broiled eggplant we had for dinner last night was…well…meh. My taste buds weren’t thrilled by hot mayonnaise, but the mayo and Parmesan did do a pretty good job of dominating the eggplant flavor.

A few people commented in the last post that they love eggplant, and a few recipes were mentioened. If you have a favorite you’d like to share, please do! Remember, I’m expecting to get a lot of eggplant this summer…

In the meantime, here’s last night’s recipe, in case anyone wants to try it.

Broiled Eggplant with Crunchy Parmesan Crust

Ingredients:
—oil for greasing a baking sheet
—mayonnaise
—eggplant, cut into 1/4″ slices
—freshly grated Parmesan cheese (about 1/2 cup)

Directions:
1. Preheat broiler. Lightly oil a baking sheet.
2. Spread mayonnaise sparingly on both sides of each eggplant slice, then dip the slices in the grated Parmesan cheese, thoroughly coating sides.
3. Arrange the slices in a single layer on the baking sheet.
4. Place under the broiler until golden brown—about 3 minutes.
5. Flip the slices and broil until golden grown and crunchy on top—about 3 minutes more. (The eggplant will become soft, with a crunchy outside.)

Last week’s CSA box (which I didn’t photograph or write about before it was eaten) was good. But it pales in comparison to what we got this week.

Enclosed was a recipe for broiled eggplant. I’m not a huge fan of eggplant (something I didn’t admit to myself for years—after all, vegetarians are supposed to like eggplant, right?), but this recipe involves coating sliced eggplant with mayonnaise, covering it with grated fresh Parmesan, and broiling it. I’m intrigued. I think we’ll try that tonight. I hope I like it, because something tells me we’ll be getting a lot of eggplant from our CSA. (I suspect the free recipe is a “get ready for the onslaught of eggplant” warning.)

We took Sylvia strawberry picking (at a local pick-your-own place) last year, shortly after she turned two. For months she’s been excited about returning there and has talked about it constantly. And yesterday we went.

We came home with about eight pounds of strawberries and just under ten pounds of rhubarb. Sylvia ate strawberries pretty much nonstop while we were in the field, but fortunately they didn’t weigh her, too.

Jan and I joined a CSA a few years ago but did not have the best experience with it. (We love the idea of the CSA, but this particular implementation had some problems.) Last year, a local creamery started a CSA, and after hearing good things about it from pioneering friends, we decided to sign up for it ourselves this year.

The location just can’t be beat: it’s literally about five minutes from my house. And I did mention that it’s a creamery, right? So yeah, we’ll probably be picking up freshly made ice cream there from time to time, too.

We picked up our first box of produce for the season yesterday. Here it is, laid out on the counter. (The basil wasn’t in the box but was purchased at a farmer’s market.) From left to right: a huge box of strawberries, half a dozen eggs, a head of red-leaf lettuce, a ginormous bag of snow peas, two zucchini, some beautiful pencil asparagus, a ton of scallions, a fresh onion, and about a pound of button mushrooms. We ate most of the strawberries for dessert last night and plan to grill the zucchini this evening. Yum!

Thanks so much for the happy birthday wishes, everyone! (And yeah, Jan is really great!) Here’s a photo of one of those cupcakes. To answer the question Chris posed on a comment on the previous post, Jan did not manage to hide the tell-tale smells. I just didn’t figure out what they were.

After I got Sylvia up and dressed on Tuesday morning, we were ready to head downstairs when I thought I smelled some sort of baked goods. I called Jan and asked him if he’d had cinnamon-raisin toast for breakfast that morning. He, of course, denied this and added that I must be imagining things and how weird it was that I would call him to inquire about his breakfast.

There were other signs, too. In the kitchen a little later, Sylvia pointed out a brown smudge on the floor near the dishwasher. “That’s from the cream puffs,” she announced. (She and Jan had made chocolate-covered cream puffs a couple of weeks earlier.) I thought, “I can’t believe that chocolate spot has been there for two weeks, and I haven’t noticed it until now.” Yup, I had no clue whatsoever.

Last night, my local knitting group met at 7 p.m. for our weekly get together. At about 7:45, I felt someone poke me on the side and looked down to see Sylvia standing there. I did a double-take. Maybe it was a triple-take. She’s usually in bed by 8. What was she doing there?

Then I saw Jan appear with some boxes in hand. My friends were grinning madly, and Jan said, “Happy birthday!” Sylvia, unable to contain the secret any longer, shouted, “Cupcakes! Cupcakes!”

With help from Gina (who communicated with the other knitters), Jan had planned a surprise birthday celebration for me. My birthday is still a little over a week away, so I had no idea this was coming. He woke up at 4 a.m. yesterday morning to bake (and clean up afterward, to hide the evidence), and I slept through it all—even the KitchenAid mixing!

We enjoyed the chocolate cupcakes with chocolate glaze and mascapone icing (Jan is a terrific baker, and everything he makes both looks and tastes great), had a little video chat via Skype with one knitting friend who’s in Belgium for a couple of months, and (once Sylvia headed home to bed after inhaling her cupcake) even did a little knitting. I had a great time!

I really enjoyed reading the entries for the cookbook contest! And I especially loved the recurring theme of “here’s an awful meal I made for someone I love…who ate it without complaint.” So sweet!

The winner (determined by writing names on pieces of paper and randomly choosing one) is Deb at Chappy’s Mom! Congratulations, Deb! And thanks to everyone who posted their stories!
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I feel I ought to share my own tale of culinary tragedy. Well, I’ve made many mediocre meals, but there are two true disasters that come to mind. The first was when I was in high school or so and was instructed to roast the (then-thawed) whole chicken my mom had pulled out of the freezer that morning. This was in my pre-vegetarian days, but even then I think I knew less about meat preparation than I do now. I seasoned the chicken, put it in the pan, and put it in the over…all without removing the bag of stuff (giblets? guts?) from the interior. (I didn’t even know it was in there, much less that it had to be removed.) Yeah, we did not end up eating chicken that evening…

The other disaster involves literally burning the teflon off a non-stick pan while trying to stir-fry something. I’ve actually done this twice. (And I’ve since learned that teflon does not like being covered with oil that is then heated to a very high temperature.)

Dogwood buds do indeed look like E.T. heads (and chickpeas). In just a few weeks the ghost trees in my neighborhood will be making their (fleeting) appearance.

Whenever the seasons turn, I love seeing other people’s blog posts—and photos—about these changes. Back in February a guy in Portland was talking about forsythia blooms, last month someone in South Carolina showed off the daffodils in her yard, and right now I’m telling you all about my dogwoods.

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Don’t forget to enter my cookbook contest. (Please! I need to find a good home for these books!)

Real-life/local friends are eligible to enter. And though the thought of rigging the draw so I don’t have to give any money to the USPS is tempting, rest assured that local friends have no more chance to win than far-off ones.

And if your own shelves are groaning under the weight of too many cookbooks and you don’t want to enter the contest, that’s fine. But please do feel free to share your tales of cooking woes and triumphs!