CSA week 18 - sausage with potatoes and cabbage

Why do people make recipes that produce enormous quantities of food? "Serves four" I get but "serves eight"? Who has eight people to serve on a regular basis? Of course if this recipe explicitly said "serves eight" I would have halved it, but it didn't and I wasn't paying close attention so I'm halfway through my prep before I notice the enormous piles of vegetables accumulating.

On the plus side, there goes half my share in one go and I think it will freeze well. Also, if you poke around the website where I found the recipe, you see that it's specifically intended for slow food/local ingredient cooking; I'd feel like a jerk making it with supermarket vegetables.

So the recipe in question is this one slightly modified from Jessica Prentice's cookbook Full Moon Feast. I used a spring onion (including the green bits) instead of the leeks, dandelion greens for the generic greens, and subbed in a a turnip for one of the potatoes. I considered roasting everything to get some extra flavor but I was concerned about overcooking so I just made sure to get some color on as much of the vegetables as possible before my pan filled up and everything started steaming instead of frying.

I also threw in some Spice House Bavarian seasoning (and some parsley) since I was using bratwurst for the sausage and I wanted to localize the flavors. It could as easily been an Irish dish or Portuguese depending on the type of sausage and the seasonings.

Finally, I used some Greek yogurt instead of sour cream. It isn't emphasized in the recipe, but it really pulls the whole dish together. And pulled together nicely it did, I'm pleased to say, as I've got enough here for at least four more meals. A big pile of limp cabbage isn't much for presentation, but the turnips and red-skin potatoes do add a touch of color.

I served it over spaetzel, but I think the potatoes and turnip were starch enough so that wasn't really necessary. It's a shame my lighting was so bad on that photo, it looks like I managed to pretty up the plate, but you can't really see it. Ah well.

Coral Gables Wine and Food Festival

I did mention that I was attending this so I probably ought to say what I thought of it just in case anybody is following along and wants to know.

OK, I recognize that the point is to sell cases of mediocre wine and foul candy-flavored vodka, but some effort on the food end would have been appreciated at least for my part. On the other hand, since the only food there was a real line for was sausage subs I can see why most restaurants couldn't be bothered.

Still, I've never encountered such a mass of undercooked, overcooked, ill-conceived and more than anything else under-seasoned food. I didn't get to try everything I admit so I may have missed some gems, but the only dish that really jumped out at me as being flavorful, well-prepared and interesting was the ceviche from Novecento.

Christabelle's venison on creamy grits with a blackberry demi glaze was well done too, if a bit obvious and lost amongst the many slices of red meat on offer.

Other than that, I was deeply disappointed. I wanted to single out one or two dishes but as the list of offerings printed up bears little resemblance to what actually appeared I don't know who to blame. Somebody should have known better than to try serving a badly clotted macaroni and cheese and there was a Spanish squid stew that was inedibly past its prime but neither appear in the list. But as I said, mainly it was dull food blandly prepared. Did any of you go? What did you think?

CSA farm subscription - week eighteen

Now that's the most interesting batch of vegetables we've seen in a while. My first thought, looking at the cabbage, turnips and the potatoes from last week is to make something Irish. My second thought is that I've had that first thought before and somehow never got around to doing anything about it. Probably because Irish cooking mainly involves boiled cabbage, turnips and potatoes. Still, I'll take another look and see what I can come up with.

OK, I've had my look and I didn't care much for what I saw so nix on the Irish cuisine unless some nouvelle variation presents itself. I know the trend exists but it's so new I can't find any recipes that have filtered out.

Upon consideration, the bigger issue here is that we've got a load of winter vegetables just as the weather is about to turn tropical. This requires either thought or cranking up the air conditioner.

The other notable item today is the dandelion greens. They, along with ramps and garlic chives, are part of that questionable trend in gourmet circles of selling weeds at $20 a pound. I have no experience in dealing with them as I've never voluntarily bought any. But now that I find a fair amount of dandelion greens thrust upon me, I find that they're just another bitter semi-robust green not far distinguished from last weeks escarole. So it's the sauté pan or soup pot for them, then.

That leaves the parsley, mushrooms and peppers. Hmm...that sounds like a steak topping. I haven't had a steak in quite some time and I suppose if this is a week for hearty Winter fare now's as good a time as any for it.

Finally, we've got the star apples. They were OK fresh, but nothing too exciting. There's an interesting Filipino sherbet recipe I saw or maybe a sorbet with lime.

CSA week 17 - kabak mucveri

I had hoped to make the oil down today but breadfruit has proven elusive. I can think of a couple other likely places to check so all hope is not lost. On the other hand, it doesn't use any CSA vegetables beyond the onions so it can wait a few weeks until I have nothing else on the agenda.

Instead I made the squash fritters I mentioned last Saturday. This is a Turkish zucchini fritter recipe that I found here. If you remember my last squash fritter, that time I ran the squash through the food processor and it ended up mush. This time I shredded it by hand, salted it and drained it for a half hour (although a few good squeezes at the end did most of the work). It's still mush, but it's a mush with a much lower water content and a good bit of flavor. In another minor substitution, I used the stalk of a green onion to substitute for the scallion and yellow onion called for.

The recipe gives a choice of kasseri or feta cheese and I was rather surprised at how different they were when I found the kasseri. The feta was much more flavorful--this is the same feta I called bland last month when I made a lousy Greek salad, but it's aged very nicely--but the kasseri promised to melt much better. In the end I went half and half.

I noticed too late that the recipe called for shallow frying in a flat pan, but I don't think deep frying did any harm other than to the aesthetics. The fritters were quite mild, but gained flavor as they cooled. Even around room temperature they never really burst with flavor, but at least you could tell they were made with squash. The original recipe suggests pairing with a lemon-garlic-yogurt sauce and grilled meats which are both good ideas. The mild fritters' flavors were emphasized by the contrasts. The suggested garnishes of tomato, olives and hard-boiled egg seem like they'd work too if I had remembered about them. I'll try them with the leftovers later.

On the whole not bad, but not fabulous. I do wish I could have tasted the dill and parsley. Maybe if I boosted the fresh herbs with dried in the next fritter I make.

CSA week 17 - Sweet and sour chicken gizzards and shrimp

I found the time to throw together a quick stir fry tonight mainly because I somehow managed to spend way over my budget on a simple dinner out last night.

Now for those of you going "ugh. Sweet and sour gizzards," I'd like to point out that not only is deep-frying the quintessential gizzard preparation, it is a traditional meat for sweet and sour dishes. And anyway, it's no more or less icky than any other chicken meat. It's just a different sort of muscle.

While the stir fry was quick, it was actually little complicated. Sweet and sour dishes are generally made in three parts.

1. Deep fried protein.
In this case the gizzards and shrimp. I tossed both in a Tablespoon of cornstarch, two Tablespoons of soy sauce and a bit of salt. If I had more time I would have preferred a more substantial batter, but this was fine. There was a particularly nice effect on the shrimp as the batter got caught in the legs and shell and crisped up.

2. Stir fried vegetables.
I used the leftover heart of the mei qing choy (which was still in great shape after all this time. I'll have to remember to keep a head around in the future), a tomato from a couple weeks ago (just on the verge of going off), the bottom of the stalk of a spring onion from this week, a pepper of some sort that I had around and some canned sliced water chestnuts. I didn't bother to clean out the wok after emptying out the deep frying oil so the stir fry ended up a bit gritty, but it was tasty grit so I don't really mind. When the vegetables were nearly done, I threw the protein in to get them warmed back up and everything mixed up.

3. Simmered sauce.
The sauce was 1/2 cup sugar, 1/2 cup white vinegar, 3/8 cup water heated in the microwave to dissolve the sugar along with a handful of pineapple chunks from the freezer. I boiled that for about a minute and then added a mixture of 1/2 Tablespoon cornstarch, 1/2 Tablespoon soy sauce, a few shots of hot sauce and a 1/4 cup water. Once it came back to a boil it thickened up and everything was done (except for the rice I forgot to make).

Easy and mighty tasty, but man did I make a mess of the kitchen.

A slight delay (for CSA)

I had hoped to jump right back into my cooking groove this week, but it looks like I'm going to be working evenings the next couple of days and then going to the Coral Gables Wine and Food Fest on Thursday. Add to that working a bit late today followed with an exceptionally crowded and frustrating grocery shopping expedition and all I'll have made before Friday is a salad.

But Friday should prove interesting and just in case anyone is actually looking here for ideas for what to do with their CSA share I wanted to point out this idea while you still had your callaloo to use (unlike me. I opened his refrigerator yesterday to discover that my callaloo had wilted and blackened like a Nazi at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. You guys with full shares have had a bit of practice; how are you storing this stuff?). I had been poking around on-line looking for an alternative to callaloo soup or crab and callaloo both of which include okra which I don't feel up to just now. I mentioned pepper pot on Saturday I think, but it turns out I was thinking of another recipe with the same name: Caribbean pepper pot doesn't really appeal.

I found some more interesting recipes when I learned that callaloo is also called dasheen. In particular, I thought the recipes for Oil Down looked worth a try. From what I can tell, the Grenadian version has callaloo, but the Trinidadian version doesn't. It's pretty simple: salt meat of any description simmered with breadfruit, coconut milk and aromatics (and maybe some dumplings) until all of the coconut is absorbed except a bit of oil down at the bottom of the pot. I think the sort of salt pork we can get here is fattier than what the recipe authors are thinking of, but the salt cod we can get should be fine and I did find salt beef at my local Publix that should work. I've never had breadfruit before so I'm looking forward to trying it.

CSA farm subscription - week seventeen

Well, my lazy week rapidly turned into my eating very badly week which then transformed into my lying in bed quite ill week. Perhaps it was a case of fresh produce withdrawal.

I'm still not feeling my best so when I look at this week's share I'm less inspired than somewhat queasy. Luckily, the only item out of the box that needs immediate attention is the callaloo. I think I've seen salt beef at Publix so I should be able to make Jamaican Pepper Pot soup (Urgh. I can't think about food now. I need a lie down. More later...)

OK, I feel a bit better now. I learned recently that dill is part of a traditional herb mix from Barbados so I'd like to use the fresh dill in that, probably with fish.

The squash isn't big enough to stuff (which I wanted to do two weeks ago but got sidetracked by the zucchini salad). I have an interesting Turkish zucchini fritter recipe that should work well enough with the squash substituted in.

That leaves the staples: lettuce, potatoes, tomatoes and onions. The potatoes I'm going to save; they really aren't very healthy, organic or not, so I don't want to eat a bunch all at once. They should store fine in the pantry. The onions and tomatoes I'm sure I'll find some use for without much effort. The lettuce I took in a spirit of pure optimism. Maybe I'll make another version of lettuce soup or maybe I'll just hold onto it for a while to occasionally look upon with regret.