2009 Culinarium Week 3

I wasn’t able to make use of the share this week since M and I were out of town for the better part of the week.  So A picked up the full share, and reported back what was in the box this week.

1 small bunch of radishes, 8 pcs rhubarb, ½ pint of strawberries, 1 chinese like Shanghai bak choy, 3 kolrabi, 16 asparagus, 1 bucket of green beans,  ½ pint of fresh peas, 6 green onions, 1 bunch red leaf lettuce, 1 bunch green leaf lettuce, Cabbage, 6 beets, 1 cucumber.

A roasted the asparagus, lots of salads, stir fried the greens, sauteed green beans and bok choy.

2009 Culinarium Week 2

Picked up my share yesterday consisting of:

asparagus  (~1lb), 3 zucchini, 1 cucumber, rhubarb (12oz), radishes (1 bunch), 2 bulbs purple Vienna kohlrabi, 1 bunch green onion, 1 bunch spinach, 1 bunch kale, 1 red leaf lettuce, 1 romaine lettuce, 1 green leaf lettuce, bunch of mint, 1 box of mixed greens, and 1 mystery veggie (kudos to buddies A&L for identifying this as tatsoi).

Yes that is right, mystery veggie because I haven’t identified it yet.  I don’t recall the last time I saw this vegetable in the local super market.  At first I thought it was baby spinach, but the stems are too wide.

The other item of interest was the purple Vienna kohlrabi.  I’ve enjoyed kohlrabi for many years, sauteed or even julienned raw into a salad.  There was also more rhubarb, another opportunity to perfect my rhubarb-x pies, maybe next time it’ll be blackberries.  I bought some blueberries this time around instead of strawberries to see if it would work out just as well.  We had a simple salad with the lettuce, radish, mint, and loose leaf vegetables with an orange olive oil.

2009 Culinarium Week 1

So we started this week with another CSA program from Culinarium.  The appeal from this program was two fold.  Good logistics as provided by the Culinarium store site; pick up times through out the day, which was actually easier for my work schedule, and proximity to my home base.  The other factor was the supply source, “Triple Cord Mennonite Farms – 22 organic Mennonite farm families are pooling their harvest to provide you delicious, fresh, sustainably grown produce all season long.”- Culinarium.

I signed up for the full share, splitting the spoils with my sister.

We haven’t met the farmer, Mervin Miller, yet, but perhaps one day we’ll get a chance.

Rhubarb (~2lbs), Lettuce (4-5 heads), Spinach (1 bunch), Radishes (2 bunches), Cucumber, Tomato, Asparagus (1 bunch), Green onions (2 bunches), sausages (2 packages), and 1 shanghai bok choy (I think).

We already ate some of the greens in a salad, and the rhubarb was incorporated into a strawberry rhubarb pie.  The pie dough was a No Fear recipe, which was veritably easy to make.  The orange zest in the pie recipe gave the filling a good brightness, though I did have to add extra sugar as the strawberries weren’t sweet enough.

Culinarium CSA Week 10- end of 2008 season

LARGE:
2 bunch carrot yoder- Flour’s investigating the for me
2 bunch beets zehr- scrawny units, likely going into a stew
1 pc. Asst squash zehr- round delicata striped
5 lb. white fingerlings stephen stoll
5 lb. onion, cooking yoder
1 small chicken, frozen KEG combo
Honey, 250 ml. fisher
1 hd. Cabbage – late flat dutch yoder- no kidding it was bigger than Flour’s head.

So I went and picked up my last share of the season.  I didn’t have class so I was able to go after dinner, which was a nice change from the usual rush hour madness road rage experience.  I guess this is what a regular day could be like.  I didn’t realise how much I had missed my market visits this past summer.  As the local growing season draws to an end, excluding green house farming of course, every year there is always a couple of new food related items that really stood out.  Last year was the best corn, year before was peach, and grapes before that.  I missed that opportunity this year.  However, I did find that with the CSA program, I was able to participate, though near its end, in the bounty of the local farms.  I don’t think there was a food item that really stood out this year.  The CSA program however did introduce me to many new items, such as huckleberries, delicata squash, kuri squash, and fresh beans.  The ability of the farm produce to react so differently to the same cooking methods, such as the potatoes, carrots, and corn was really interesting.  The different coloured potatoes had my sis call me asking if there was something wrong with the spuds, which was rather comical.  I recall a conversation with my aunt regarding food products in the China markets where they had to colour their carrots orange, because they looked yellow.  Then of course no one bought them, knowing they were not orange in colour.  How ironic if they had been selling yellow carrots, a variety that seems to be hard to find here, that people interpreted to be fake food.  Unfortunately, with the recent stories flowing out of China with regards to fake foods, one can’t help but be concerned about what one eats.  Rational? Who knows.  But trust in our food supply chain is very important for me, and so I am grateful that we have a strong local program that does in some small way connect the consumer to the farmer.

Chicken Korma Part II

May cooked up some chicken korma again, much to my delight. She added in some additional tumeric and paprika for extra colour. The cilantro finish was also a good touch. She switched from an 8% cream combination to a 5% cream combination to see if she could retain the same creaminess without the extra calories. The side dish of zuchinni, tomatoes, and peas were cooked by Aaron and Lenore. Over all the dish was very yummy, though May will likely revert back to a higher fat content cream for a less watery sauce. Aaron and Lenore also brought over a bottle of Chateau Lafayette Reneau 2004. It’s a crisp riesling, surprisingly not sweet, quite delightful from the usual form of this varietal. Some cheese, dinner entertainment from Flour and Lucy, tea, and brownies finished off the meal quite nicely.

Introduction to topics in blog

This blog will be about food, family, news, and plastic innovation.

I love food, not just eating, but also the creation, the taste, and the smell. It’s a mini gift from the chef, whether its wrapped in newspaper or in a banana leaf. I enjoy cooking and baking, and a discussion on food and cooking is always welcomed. I like the food sciences and the romanticism around meals equally.

Family is obvious , but likely names and places have been changed to protect the innocent.

News will entail everything from personal editorials and comments to items picked up from everyday living. If it’s interesting to you, great! If not, c’est la vie!

The first three topics makes sense, but why plastics? It impacts every part of our lives, for better or for worse, and so I think it will always be a topic of interest in the back of my mind. feel I must allow the geeky engineer side of me to speak out, lest it lashes out uncontrollably in my personal blogs.