Thank you Norwich Meadow Farms, Red Jacket Orchards and Norwood CSA for my first CSA experience

by Elizabeth Burgos

Thank you Norwich Meadow Farms, Red Jacket Orchards and Norwood CSA for my first CSA experience.

It has come to an end as today is our last summer share pick up. I am so glad I joined this year and was able to get some amazing fresh produce every week.  I never knew what a CSA was until I asked a friend where she was getting her vegetables from.  She always posted pictures of fresh vegetables that would make your mouth water.  She told me to Google to see if there is a CSA in my neighborhood and the many benefits of joining. Not only would I be getting fresh organic vegetables and fruits, but I would be supporting a local farm too.

After some digging, I found Norwood CSA Food Co-op! The process of joining was so simple and straight forward.  I started following Norwich Meadow Farms on Instagram and was so excited and impressed on how hard they work and the information they provide about their farming. I couldn’t wait to taste the fresh fruit from Red Jacket Orchards (Apples are so sweet and crunchy). 

The main reason I joined a CSA is getting fresh organic produce from a local farm. Each week there was a new vegetable I never tried and probably would have never tried! The CSA gave me a way of trying new things. It saved me a great amount of time to just pick up my weekly vegetables rather than going to a supermarket.  It saved me money! Organic produce is expensive, the bounty of vegetables would have cost so much more at a market.  An added bonus was the special buys; I was being able to purchase eggs and yogurt.  I have an 11-month daughter and it was awesome knowing her first solids were coming from a local farm! 

What a great experience partnering up with your local community and supporting the local food system. It’s a WIN WIN.

 I am looking forward to next year :)

 

The Power of Cruciferous Vegetables

by Elizabeth Burgos

The Power of Cruciferous Vegetables

Last week was one of my favorite CSA shares because we received Broccoli and Cabbage, my two favorite vegetables!

 Both vegetables are part of the Brassica genus of plants called Cruciferous vegetables (Wikipedia).

Cruciferous vegetables are packed with nutrients, including beta-carotene, vitamin C, E, folate, fiber and minerals.

 When you Google “Cruciferous Vegetable” you will find that they are known to help prevent cancer! According to The National Cancer Institute, consuming cruciferous vegetables break down to form compounds that have been found to inhibit the development of many cancers.

Check out whfoods.com. It gives you the nutritional content of this wonderful family.

How do you use your cabbage?

 I particularly love to roast it.

I remove the outer leaves, cut the cabbage into 4 wedges and remove the stem. Depending on how big the cabbage is, you can cut them again until you have 8 wedges. Lay them on a baking sheet and drizzle olive oil with salt and pepper. My husband loves bacon so I sometimes wrap bacon around them! I use the oven at 400 degrees and check on it frequently to flip them when I see the bottom getting crunchy on the bottom.

Enjoy!

What To Do with Your Celtuce

I love that the CSA introduces me to foods that I've never heard of or tasted. At least, I love it most of the time. Other times, the unfamiliar produce rots in the back of my fridge while I curse myself for not sticking to a grocery-store run of iceberg and green beans.

This week is going to be different. This time, I'm well prepared for the wild-card ingredient. In this case, it's celtuce.

Celtuce, a varietal of lettuce, is also called “stem lettuce,” “asparagus lettuce,” “celery lettuce,” or, in Chinese, wosun.¹ One HuffPost writer describes it as "cooked leek" with "the homogeneity of a noodle and some of the crunch of shaved jicama. Its bright flavor was a little like a mix between bok choy, celery root and water chestnut, but was far milder than any of those."

Sounds tasty. But, how does one prepare it? I did some research on ways to serve your celtuce ranging from easy to adventurous. Here are 6 ways to enjoy what just might become your new favorite vegetable.

1. Chop it up and eat it

Because it's a type of lettuce and a near-anagram of lettuce, celtuce (or at least the leafy part of it) is no different from any other lettuce. To make your salad especially spiffy, try serving it with shaved nuts or with fried potato slices and pecorino, as shown above.

2. Make celtuce pancakes

Chop up your celtuce, mix it with eggs, salt, flour, and oil, fry it, and you've got celtuce latkes. 

3. Pickle it

One way to mask the flavor of celtuce is to make your celtuce taste like vinegar! On his blog, Kian Lam Kho provides a recipe for the comforting breakfasts of his childhood that featured pickled celtuce. "What makes the meal so special is the crunchy salty and sweet celtuce pickle," he writes.

4. Make a slaw

 

This looks so easy and doesn't involve any cooking. Soy Rice Fire has a recipe for solo celtuce, but I bet it'd be great with carrots, cucumber, zucchini, or cabbage mixed in, too.

5. Cook it like a noodle

Celtuce stalk has a thicker consistency, which makes it a great sub for noodles. Spice the Plate has a recipe for a ham and celtuce dish that has all the flavor of a stir fry but blanches the celtuce instead of frying it.

6. Get fancy

By and large, my searches on celtuce led to haute cuisine. Tops chefs serve it under pork fat, lamb breast, seared scallops, and Alaskan halibut a la Jordan Kahn. But my favorite, by far, is the SWEET CORN / custard, frozen uni powder, rambutan, lemongrass, chervil, young ginger, celtuce served in a fish bowl (via pocketfork, pictured above).

Go on, impress everyone you know. You've got celtuce on your side.

For more tips on cooking and eating celtuce, check out Food52.