This week's CSA

I was actually in North Carolina when the CSA share was picked up, therefore don't have pictures. This week's take was a bit more eclectic. Onions, zucchini (a lot!), blueberries, cherries, a huge amount of spinach, bread, and soap.

Since I came back late Saturday, I am not quite sure what I'm going to do with all this food. My standby dinner is rice or cornbread, seasoned beans for protein, and then whatever veggies need to be consumed, sometimes steamed, sometimes sauteed in garlic and olive oil, and often served with plenty of butter.

This week's CSA

My friend and I joined a local CSA - ours is Breezy Willow Farm in Howard County. We joined totally last minute - the saga of the joining and our friend who ditched the project is long and pretty boring. No experience with this CSA, but I'm psyched for something different - and one thing I very much like is that they don't pre-pack (and pre-squish) the coolers.

Here's this week's take:



That is, kale, salad greens, beets (with their delicious greens), red potatoes, broccoli, eggs (I love the cool colors), squash, and green beans. In the back there is some cranberry pecan bread from the Breadery, and there were some blueberries not shown.

Strawberry sorbet

How to make strawberry sorbet.

Ingredients:
A whole lotta strawberries.
Lemon juice to taste.
Sugar to taste.




Okay, really, it's that simple, but here's what I did this time.

Ingredients:

4 cups of strawberries, cleaned and hulled.
1 cup of sugar.
1/4 cup of lemon juice (the strawberries were very sweet).


Method:

Toss together ingredients.
Puree ingredients or toss into a blender and buzz until smooth. I use a stick blender to puree. Some may try and run the mixture through a food mill or sieve, but I don't get that.
Chill the mixture well, about 6 hours.
Freeze according to your ice cream maker's directions.

Eat!

Strawberry Ice Cream

Strawberry Ice Cream - with nods to the many recipes I've read over the years. This is darker than the usual pink strawberry ice cream.

Ingredients:
4 cups strawberries, measured then hulled and halved / quartered
1/4 cup white sugar
pinch of kosher salt
1 tablespoon lemon juice
4 cups half-and-half (or 2 cups whole milk and 2 cups heavy cream!)
6 egg yolks
3/4 to 1 cup white sugar (to taste)
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar

Method:


Wash the strawberries, then hull.
Cut the strawberries into halves or quarters, depending on size.
Note, if you are using Maryland strawberries in season, you will likely need only halve the fruit.
Macerate strawberries in sugar, pinch of salt, and lemon juice.




Scald half and half
Whisk egg yolks and sugar together in a bowl, until they are well mixed, the mixture is light in color, and has increased in volume. Temper into hot half and half



Cook custard over medium to medium low until it coats back of spoon.








Meanwhile, reduce balsamic over medium heat about half (depends on your vinegar!) in big skillet
Increase heat of skillet to high, toss in strawberries, and let them bubble away!
Try not to swoon.
Now, here's the question - do you like chunks? I really prefer smooth ice creams to chunks, however, I have a strawberry loving human at home who adores chunks. So chunks it is. If you like it smooth, just puree the strawberry balsamic goodness and add to the custard base.

Strain the balsamic strawberry goodness into the custard. Push a bit. Set aside (and chill) the chunks of strawberry left.






Mix the custard base and the balsamic goodness together well.
Strain into another vessel. Unless you're a grand master, you will have some scrambled egg in there. If you never get scrambled egg, well, you're a better woman than I am.
Chill both parts 8 hours +
Prepare according to your ice cream maker's instructions.
Let harden in freezer. Don't let anyone lick the ice cream maker bowl - tongues will stick.

Community Supported Agriculture

Community Supported Agriculture ("CSA") refers to programs in which community members purchase shares of a farm (or group of farms) output. Basically, you pay for a share of what's grown, though you don't know

How to make pasta

This is dead simple, but a lot of my friends are "amazed" when I do it, and many ask me to teach them how to make pasta. I'm somewhat afraid that the magic will be lost after I post this, but, eh, it had to go sometime. If there's interest, I will post how to make vegan pasta, which is either blander (just ignore the egg) or slightly more complex (replace the egg). As is often the case in Nina-land, the hard work is done by the kitchenaid. I have an actual pasta machine, but you can get the kitchenaid attachment. Actually, it's totally easy to make up the pasta *without* the kitchenaid, but I'm pretty lazy. Good results also can happen by simply tossing into the kitchenaid, switching it on, and ignoring it - but following these directions yields a better texture. I often make all semolina pasta, but Human # 1 claims it upsets his stomach, and a 50/50 AP flour to semolina is best. Pasta made with only AP flour tastes bland to me, but hey, try it out and do what tastes best to you.

Also, in my NOT so humble opinion, the best way to eat fresh pasta is garlic and olive oil, a touch of salt and a crackle of pepper - and *nothing* else. But the rest of my family likes sauces.

Ingredients:
3/4 cup semolina flour
3/4 cup AP flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
3 tablespoons olive oil
~ 2 tablespoons water

Method:
Mix together flours and the salt.

Mocha Angel Food Cake

This isn't local, but I had egg whites left over from the ice cream making process. Human # 3 loves angel food cake. Human # 1 hates angel food cake, but tolerates angel food cake if it's chocolate. Human # 1 thinks it fundamentally tastes low fat - though I just fix that by covering it with whipped cream.

The recipe is adapted from the Joy of Baking, another one of those things I put together years ago as an easy weekday thing.

Ingredients:
1 cup egg whites
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons cocoa
2 tablespoons hot coffee
1/2 cup sifted cake flour


Method:
Oven to 350 F
Egg whites to room temperature
Mix sugar, egg whites, salt, and cream of tartar.
Beat to soft peaks. There are lots of great ways to do this, including dividing the sugar, etc. but really, the kitchen aid takes care of it for me.
Dissolve 3 tablespoons of cocoa powder in 3 tablespoons hot coffee
Temper the chocolate / coffee mixture with the stiff peaks - add about 1/2 a cup before remixing
Mix together tempered coffee / chocolate / egg mix and stiff peaks
Fold in sifted cake flour GENTLY!
Prep a half sized angel cake / tube pan. Mine is silicone, but I still always butter and flour it, since I've had the non-stick constantly stick!
Place in half sized angel / tube pan. If silicone, place on a cookie sheet, or else disaster will result.
Bake in oven until a toothpick comes out clean - about 30 minutes.
Immediately remove from cookie sheet. Let it cool a bit, then take it out of the pan and let it finish cooling on a plate.
Serve cool or cold, with whipped cream or powdered sugar if you like.

Strawberries!!

I love strawberries. Real strawberries. Tasty, yummy, wonderful strawberries. Not those red watery things that taste like nothing. Luckily, we went strawberry picking at Larriland Farm, and picked about 20 lbs. Of course, this was while my toe was still dislocated, so it wasn't exactly pleasant. However, strawberry season is too short to worry about things like pain.

We ate a bunch of strawberries out of hand, both plain and with sweetened whipped cream (I always add a bit of salt to it, something about the salt makes the sweet even better). I made an ordinary and not very good strawberry pie that was gelatined. But I made some extremely tasty (if I do say so myself) strawberry sorbet and strawberry ice cream. Posts to follow.