This week’s box included: This week’s box included: zucchini, yellow squash, tomatoes, mustard greens, green onions, cabbage, salad cucumbers, kirby cucumbers, radishes, broccoli (or cauliflower). You can see a photo that can help with identification on our Facebook page (tomorrow) or check out our weekly video on Instagram.
Need storage instructions? Visit our fruit & veggie home pages. Click on the pic and a new page opens with storage instructions and a list of recipes curated by Conne over the years.
————————————–
I don’t know about you, but if I face Monday night with a refrigerator that still has lots of Riverview vegetables …. I know I have to get busy. Sometimes it’s been a week when I’ve had to cook five recipes for the AJC and none of them needed what came in the week’s box. Sometimes it’s a week when we’re invited out to lunch and dinner and there just hasn’t been as much cooking as usual.
Last week was largely the former – too much cooking that didn’t use my beautiful CSA haul. So last night found me madly chopping Napa cabbage and a few mustard greens to make a big bowl of tabouli (which I wrote about last week and is totally a way to consume lots of greens without cooking) and chopping kale to make crustless quiche but in cupcake form so it’s a few bites and easy to grab when we’re on the go. (Radishes, green onions and tomatoes went into that tabouli, too. And some lettuce!)
I’m excited to see the first of the summer squash and just in time for Memorial Day, I’ve got a recipe I want to try for zucchini burgers. It looks pretty simple and we need something vegetarian for the grill. There’s no more lettuce here, but we’ll use the tomatoes from the box and substitute slivers of green onion for the onion and lettuce called for as garnish in the recipe. And I’ll substitute a few green onions for the onion called for in the burgers, too.
I think we’ve had our fill of those little crustless quiches so I’m going to try the Kale-Pesto Pasta below from my go-to recipe source, The New York Times. It calls for pasta, but that pesto sounds like it will be delicious as a dip for tortilla chips while we’re waiting for the burgers to grill.
And I think I mentioned we have dozens and dozens of cabbage recipes on the recipe section of grassfedcow.com. This chopped salad calls for red cabbage but that was primarily for the color. Your green cabbage will work fine and it needs some cucumber and radishes, too. If you have a can of any kind of beans in your pantry, you’re set. I also have some jarred roasted peppers and those will stand in for the fresh peppers the recipe calls for.
And then there’s that pretty head of broccoli. Ours will be chopped into florets and served raw with ranch dressing I make with seasoning from Taylor Mead’s Better Off Fed. You may know Taylor who is the educational chef for Community Farmers Markets. Her ranch seasoning mix is fabulous. But the Riverview broccoli page has about a dozen recipes including one of my favorites, the broccoli peanut and fruit salad that’s a riff on all those traditional broccoli-mayo-shredded cheese-dried cranberry salads your mom may have made.
Lots of great food thanks to Riverview for the long holiday weekend. I know we’ll all eat well.
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the kale ribs and stems, cashews and basil stems. Boil for 10 minutes, then add the kale leaves and cook until tender but not mushy, another 5 minutes. Add the basil leaves and stir just to submerge. Turn off the heat, then use a slotted spoon to transfer everything but the cooking liquid to a blender. (Don’t drain the pot; you’ll use that water to cook the pasta.) Set the blender aside to cool slightly.
Meanwhile, return the pot of water to a boil; add more water if a lot evaporated while cooking the kale. Add the pasta and cook until tender (or according to box directions).
To the blender, add 1/2 cup water, the garlic and the red-pepper flakes. Blend on high until very smooth. Season to taste with salt.
Reserve 1 cup pasta water, then drain the pasta. Return the pasta to the pot and add the green sauce. Stir vigorously to combine, adding pasta water as needed to loosen the sauce and help it cling to the noodles. (Sauce will thicken as it cools.) Add the lemon juice, season to taste with salt and red-pepper flakes, and eat right away.
In a sieve or colander, drain zucchini, squeezing to remove excess liquid. Pat dry. In a small bowl, combine the zucchini, onion, bread crumbs, eggs, salt and cayenne. Gently stir in chopped egg whites.
Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-low heat. Drop batter by scant 2/3 cupfuls into oil; press lightly to flatten. Fry in batches until golden brown on both sides, using remaining oil as needed.
Serve on buns with lettuce, tomato and onion.