May 20th Meal Plan

What’s on the table this week? Well, I don’t know about you, but I’ve got quite a bit of squash on my hands, and because I know that squash can be a generous bearer of fruit, I’m bracing for more of it. Fortunately, squash is a very versatile vegetable (say that three times fast!), and can be employed from sautéing to baking, and from savory to sweet. I used some squash last week, so in a bit, I’ll show how, and this week I’m going to use it in a couple of familiar applications.

The Menu

Hamburgers with coleslaw and sweet potato fries

There was a good looking coleslaw recipe in the farm email. I, personally, will be mixing mayo, vinegar, sugar, salt and pepper, until the dressing tastes familiar to my mom’s coleslaw :)

Local produce used: cabbage and carrots

Pizza night! Featuring roasted beet & gorgonzola pizza

Its not just crazy talk – I’m doing it! I’m going to use my own pizza crusts, but for convenience you can also pick up some fresh dough from a friendly bread vendor when you visit the market. Basically, I’m roasting beets and onions and topping an oil brushed crust with them and a little (or a lot) of gorgonzola (feta or goat cheese  would be good too, I think)

Local produce used: beets

Vegetable platter: squash casserole, sautéed chard and beet greens,  and black-eyed peas

If you have broccoli on hand you might add a broccoli salad to this dinner, or you could also replace the black-eyed peas with roasted turnips too.

Local produce used: summer squash, chard, beet greens, (broccoli and/or turnips)

Vegetable omelet with zucchini bread

When you sauté veggies, make extra to include in an omelet, later. For this omelet I’m going to use the vegetables from my polenta dish a couple days ago. I will give you my zucchini bread recipe below.

Local produce used: carrots and summer squash

Quick snacks: sugar snap peas and hummus or boiled egg and sugar snaps

I’m currently trying to shape-up a bit, and, no, that does not mean I’m sporting the popular Sketchers shoes. It means I’m exercising and eating smaller meals throughout the day. I’ve found that sugar snap peas are a really easy thing to grab when I feel the munchies coming on. Pairing them with a protein source helps curb the appetite for longer.

Local produce used: sugar snap peas

An idea for your herbs

I know we didn’t get any herbs in the CSA share this week, but if you have fresh herbs at home (and water them) they might be going a little crazy, right now. Such was the case with my oregano, necessitating a little trimming back and while it made a pretty center piece on my table, I thought it should be put to a culinary use. There are a thousand (maybe – I haven’t actually counted) things I could do with those herbs, but on this occasion, I chose to use them in parmesan herb crescent rolls. Once again, if you don’t want to make your own dough, you can pick some up at the market. Pizza dough would work just fine for these.

Just roll out the dough. Brush with oil or butter, and sprinkle generously with parmesan cheese and your chopped herb.

Make diagonal cuts along the shorter length of your dough, so that you end up with long triangles. Then start rolling the dough from the base of the triangle to the point. You’ll end up with something like this.

Let your dough rise for about an hour, or until double (if you’re very observant, you’ll notice in the pictures that mine are not quite doubled, and that’s because I got a little impatient. They were still delicious.) Bake on 425° for about 10-15 minutes or until just starting to turn golden.

Polenta and Sauteed Vegetables

Another one of the dinners that I did last week was the polenta with sautéed vegetables. As usual, it turned out awesome, so I thought I’d share it with you. I have to also add that this particular dish is not of my own genius, but it’s a dish that I stole from my step-dad.

You start with polenta. One can certainly buy their polenta from the store. Its often found in the same section as the refrigerated vegetarian items, such as tofu. However, for the same price as one tube of store bought, you can make enough  homemade polenta to feed and army. This is what I did. Try this recipe from the Food Network: Polenta Recipe

I added flavor to mine by replacing about 2 cups of water with broth and adding in about half a cup of shredded parmesan. You can make the polenta a day ahead of time. In fact, it grills up better that way.

When you’re ready to prepare your dinner, julienne (or to the layperson cut into matchstick-size pieces) about half an onion, one summer squash, and two carrots. Sautee in some olive oil and butter.

Cut the polenta into about ¾ inch thick slices. Brush both sides with olive oil and grill. I like to keep a cast iron skillet on the grill for things like polenta, which could easily fall through the grates. Once both sides are crisped, plate and pile high with the sautéed vegetables. Yum!

Here’s the zucchini bread recipe:

Zucchini Bread

1 ½  cup whole wheat flour

¾ tsp salt

½ tsp ground nutmeg

1 tsp baking soda

½ tsp ground cinnamon

1 cup granulated honey (dehydrated cane juice or sugar works too)

½ cup oil (grapeseed is my favorite for baked goods)

2 eggs

1/3 cup water

1 cup zucchini, grated and drained

½ tsp lemon juice

½ cup walnuts, chopped

Mix dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, mix wet ingredients. Add wet ingredients to dry. Mix. Fold in the walnuts. Pour into an oiled loaf pan. Bake at 350° for 1 hour.

And just to leave you with more pictures… I tried the kale chip recipe. They were truly awesome!

Before baking

After baking. Voila! Kale chips!