CSA Weeks 10 & 11

Week 10: summer squash, cherry tomatoes, green peppers, eggplant, cucumbers, snap beans, cantaloupe. 

Another week with no fruit share (le sigh), everyone got a cantaloupe or watermelon? Unsure, as our newsletter said we would be getting a watermelon and I got a cantaloupe. I don’t mind cantaloupe, but I much rather get a watermelon. The summer squash and eggplant was cut up and froze to make a soup later.

Never ate eggplant, don’t really want to try it in its own recipe. I am already having difficulties to sticking to healthy eating the past few weeks; I don’t want to make things harder. The cherry tomatoes were sinfully delicious, as I ate most of them right from the pint. I am starting to feel like perhaps a CSA is not for me. I’d rather not pay for so much squash and zucchini, as it is not my favorite. I am not quite sure I am seeing the value for the price and another week with no fruit share is not making me happy, especially since they seem to have enough to sell at their Farmer’s Market stand, but not to give to us who prepaid? Perhaps I am being over dramatic as it has been an emotionally draining week.

Week 11: summer squash (more!? Ugh), tomatoes (finally!!), a pepper, basil, a cucumber, a walla walla onion, corn, green/yellow beans, broccoli Fruit Share: Melons

Letter to the editor

Hello,

I saw your request for individuals who are participating in a CSA crop share. This is my first year participating in a CSA share. I signed up with Olden Produce back in March, after a couple of Twitter friends had mentioned how much they enjoyed it. I read their excited tweets all last summer and saw the pictures and blog posts about how wonderful it was and I was hooked. I signed up for the ½ farm share, fruit share and late season produce share. This cost me around $600, with the early bird pricing. Not including the late season produce share, I am spending roughly $27 a week on whatever they decide to give me.

The season started out wonderfully, the strawberries were like crack and having fresh produce pesticide-free was exciting; however, it has become quite daunting. Some weeks it feels like a chore, zucchini and summer squash again?? There has been 2-3 weeks, where I have received nothing in my fruit share, yet their Saturday morning Farmer’s Market booth in Oshkosh is full of melons and berries, yet I get nothing? They send out weekly newsletters, the past few weeks touting that I should buy a bushel of tomatoes for canning, yet, I received only 2 tomatoes one week and none the last (except for a small pint of cherry tomatoes)…instead I got MORE zucchini, MORE summer squash and an eggplant.

It is only my husband and I in the house and we both work full-time. I have been working hard on eating better/healthier, but constantly having the same items to cook (in which we were never a big fan of in the beginning) is difficult. I love the concept, I love buying local, I am willing to spend the extra dime (or $10 bill) on these things, but I hate wasting. Some weeks we are so busy with work, volunteering and other activities, that I don’t have time to cook, or if we are out of town, the produce just sits. Having a CSA forces to you to plan ahead and lots of freezing of items. I don’t anticipate getting a CSA again next year. Instead, I will shop at the Farmer’s market and get what I like, when I want it and how much of it.

CSA Week 6

Week 6: bell peppers, banana peppers, cucumbers, sweet corn, zucchini and Georgia peaches

Ugh, more zucchini?? I am running out of ideas to use up the zucchini. The banana peppers are SO good smelling and we had one of them on a home-made pizza, yum! The peaches are not as juicy and flavorful like I hoped. wah.

Week 5 CSA

CSA Week 5: cabbage, zucchini, patty pan, cucumber, sweet corn.. No fruit share. #sadpanda

CSA Week Box 4

Box 4: garlic scape, zucchini, cucumbers, beets, snap peas, patty pan squash, 10lbs & 1 pint of Michigan blueberries

New Challenge

Sunday, yeesh.Another lazy day.

I had less than 1,000 steps around 6pm. Super pathetic. I decided that since it was July 1, I NEEDED to get my ass moving and start the month right. Luckily, I had been too busy napping to munch the day away, so my calorie intake was horrible.

First up, attacking dinner. I knew I needed to use some of my CSA goods.

Box 3: MORE zucchinni, Kohlrabi, head lettuce, MORE garlic scapes and kale.

I was excited about the kale since I heard such wonderful things; however, I am not a cook and this is not a cooking blog. Let’s just say, Nate was disgusted by my zucchini, kale, garlic scape, ricotta, noodle bake. I was less than impressed as well. Especially since I was stuck with 6 300+ calorie servings.






I didn’t let my failed dinner stop me from being active. I hopped on the treadmill, put on the Kardashians and proceeded to speed walk for an hour to get 8,000 steps. Then I did the stairs. I ended the day with over 10,000 steps and my 10 flights of stairs. YAY ME.

Outside the Box

CSA.. It is forcing me to step outside the box.

CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. At the beginning of the year, I blindly forked over cash to a local farm. Starting last week, I started to receive a half share of in season produce and a full share of fruit.

Week 1 included: snap peas, mixed greens, rhubarb and leeks. Fruit: Strawberries
Week 2 included: MORE snap peas, zucchini, swiss chard, popping corn, garlic scape. Fruit: TONS of strawberries

I am SO sick of snap peas. God I hope I don't get anymore. The leeks were a disaster in my chicken stew, hard as a rock! Apparently, I was supposed to soak them? The swiss chard tasted like dirt. A friend told me  in the future when soaking to add a splash a vinegar.

I have never even heard of garlic scape before! That tasted wonderful in stir fry. I made a garlic scape & swiss chard pesto (sans pine nuts) and froze it for later. I am not used to all this cooking and I am scared it is going to get bad before I eat it!

Lastly, the strawberries have been like crack. SOO yummy. They gave me SO many that I had to share the last bunch as I had already froze a ton and didn't want them to go bad before getting to enjoy them. The three friends I shared with raved and raved about how wonderful they were. I now have 3 favors to call in sometime.

My favorite thing to do with the strawberries is to cut the tops and add a dollop (or two) of whip cream. ~125 calorie dessert.