Weekly Local Booty - Garden Grub and CSA - August 29, 2009

It has been a wonderful, lazy weekend for us here in Mid-Missouri - a little reading, a little writing, lots of yacking, some programming, pretty much the usual. I actually read a couple of really good fiction titles this weekend - they are some of the few fiction titles that I gave decent ratings on the "Books J's Read - 2009" post. I am pretty tough of fiction as there is a lot of crap out there, it can still be entertaining, but that doesn't mean I think it is quality writing that is worth a high rating.

Moving on.

The weather has been mild, and our walk to market yesterday was probably the most gorgeous thus far. We didn't get very much, yet again, but I will be getting more grub next week to start testing out some of the "fall recipes" for the cookbook.

We got some garden grub this week too! I hate to say it, but our community garden efforts have been, well, a complete failure this year. We have 11 tomato plants and have yet to see a tomato. We've seen lots of them rot though. I don't know if it is the weather or the moisture, or just us, but the tomatoes are tiny and they crack and rot before they are even fully red. I've given up and decided to just plan for market tomatoes. If we get some from our garden - great - but I won't expect it.

Anyways, our tomatillo plant didn't disappoint. We are going to have to go back down soon as there were quite a few tomatillos that were getting close, but not quite ready to be picked.


Check out about 2 1/8 lbs. of green husk tomatillos! I've already used a couple of them in a tasty quesadilla recipe I will be posting soon, the rest are either going to go in a soup or a sauce, I haven't quite decided yet.

Not pictured are two serranos I stole from the plant on our porch. I have included them in the Garden Harvest element on the sidebar though.

And here is our week sixteen DanJo Farms quarter share veggie CSA:


Starting from the bottom left: a red and green bell pepper, three tomatoes, two gorgeous yellow summer squash, two onions, a zucchini, and an English cucumber.

Yum!

Well, I'm off to do a little writing, and of course, a little reading. Have a great weekend!

'Til next time.

Weekly Local Booty - CSA - August 22, 2009

So yeah, I have been a bit of a bum with the blog as of late - if anyone can tell. We went to the farmer's market last weekend and somewhere along the way, I completely forgot to post a local booty update, or anything else for that matter. It was a rough week, lots going on, but things are starting to settle down and I am looking forward to a weekend of reading, writing, and perhaps a bit of cooking as well. I have always loved writing and awhile back Selina and I started working on a creative writing project which really brought writing back to me, so I have been playing around with a little bit of fiction - nothing good really, but it has been a lot of fun to work on.

Anyways, we didn't get much at market this weekend - we just picked up our CSA. I am taking it a bit easy in the cooking department and our CSA was packed with goodies that all work for the rough meal plan I had going in my head. I'm thinking a nice Mexican-inspired creamy soup sounds nice...

But enough of my yammering, check our our week 15 DanJo Farms quarter CSA share:


















Starting from the bottom right: 2 tomatoes, a ripe jalapeno, a banana pepper, 4 New Mexico chiles (some ripe, one not), a cayenne, 2 sweet peppers, a yellow squash, a zucchini, an onion, and a mighty large acorn squash.

So as I mentioned earlier, we haven't been focusing all that much in the kitchen. I have been on a reading kick - if you look at the Books J's Read - 2009 post you will see how I spend a good deal of my time and have now been writing as well. Brett is working on programming a baseball simulation game he developed and is having a couple of friends help with the things needed for implementation. It is really exciting - I am so proud of him! I love seeing him so dedicated, so passionate about something he is doing. He has a really good concept for the game and it is an interface that hasn't been done yet but that fans of this genre have been interested in for years. Y'all might want to watch out, Brett could be the next big internet game designer, and you can say you knew him way back when... :-)

Maybe that will help to explain our absence in the blogosphere, we've both got our head in creative projects and often get sucked in for days at a time! But it is nice to use your mind, to be creative, and who knows what will come from it.

I hope everyone is having a good weekend.

'Til next time.

Weekly Local Booty - Garden Grub, CSA, and Farmer's Market - August 8, 2009

Yesterday was one of the hottest days of the year, so that made our trip to the farmer's market a bit less pleasant than usual, but the variety available at market during the height of summer makes all the sweating and heat worth it. We even got a bit more garden grub this week. I think our chiles are finally starting to take off, though our tomatoes are suffering horribly from "brown thumb" and too much rain.

Anyways, check out our garden grub for this week:


12 more ripe cayennes to add to our ristra!


3/4 lb. Clemson Spineless Okra. We are going to have some fried okra with brunch and I am also making an Asian dish tonight I think some of this might find its way into.

And onto week 13 of our DanJo Farms quarter CSA share:


Starting from the bottom right: long green beans, a zucchini, a cucumber, a yellow pepper, an eggplant, a green bell pepper, and beet greens.

Here is this week's farmer's market haul. I don't remember exactly what this ran us, but I know it was less than $30.


Starting from the bottom right: epazote, 6 jalapenos, a quart of spicy, beautiful, and perfectly rip New Mexico chiles, 3 red bell peppers, 6 ears of sweet corn, yukon gold potatoes, red boiler onions, two yellow onions, and 4 tomatoes. Not pictured is a bunch of cilantro that for some reason didn't make it into the photo.

We have some tasty eats in the works this week.

I hope everyone is having a great weekend - I wish it weren't almost over!

'Til next time.

Weekly Local Booty - Farmer's Market and CSA - August 1, 2009 and Some Errant Eats

The Columbia Farmer's Market runs from 8-12 every Saturday morning. We generally try to get there as early as possible for two people who like to sleep in, usually sometime between 9:30-10:00. Well, I woke up this morning to rain pouring down, only to realize that I had left our only umbrella in my office at work. Drat! So we waited awhile, a bit worried that there wasn't going to be much left at market by the time we got there, but resigning ourselves to the fact that, well, Mother Nature is going to do what she does. The rain let up and we headed to market at 11:00 to find it packed - with both people and produce.

I overheard a conversation at Brett's preferred meat vendor that the rain had driven everyone away and there was a good span of time with few patrons. Once the rain let up, folks ventured back out and it was pretty darn packed when we were there. But needless to say, we were still able to find everything we wanted. Wahoo for that!

I have been a bit lazy in the kitchen these past couple of weeks - cooking yes, but not anything very involved or for our cookbook. That is about to change this week, I've got tons of fresh and tasty ingredients to work with and an arsenal of recipes I've created for the cookbook to try out. I am getting hungry just thinking about it!

Anywho - check out our week 12 DanJo Farms quarter CSA veggie share:


Let's start from the left this week: a zucchini, two cucumbers, 2 tomatoes, some rosemary, some long green beans, a red bell peppers, and a yellow bell pepper.

And this week's farmer's market booty:


Starting from the top left: 4 ears of sweet corn, cilantro, 4 large-ish yellow potatoes, 1 lb. Sho-Me-Farms beef for Brett, squash blossoms, 6 tomatoes, 2 heads of Bogatyr garlic and 1 Georgian Fire garlic from Chert Hollow Farm, 5 fish chiles, 2 gypsy peppers, and 3 Anaheim chiles.

I had mentioned last week that I would take some pictures and do a "some of what we ate this week" post, and I did take pictures, I just never got around to posting it, so here she be.


This was something that was just supposed to be a quick, after work, weeknight meal, but it ended up being so tasty, it is going to be considered for inclusion in the cookbook.

It is black beans, with veggies and seasonings, roasted yellow zucchini, and cotija cheese.


This was my falafel plate which included homemade falafel, local feta cheese (turns out goat cheese doesn't really stuff me up), local tomato, kalamata olives, homemade hummus, local cucumbers, lettuce, pickled peppers from Selina, and a pita.


This was Brett's gyro.


Tomato bruschetta on Uprise Bakery ciabattini. The tomatoes, garlic, and onion were from the market, the basil was from our garden, salt and olive oil from the store.


And finally Brett's garlic and herb Boursin and local veggie sandwich.

Well, I am off to make some bagel sandwiches with local veggies for a quick lunch, and then I will be spending the rest of my day reading novels - one published, one from someone who very soon could be published. That is my idea of a darn fun day.

Have a great weekend everyone!

J's Song of the Day:
"Caravan" - Chet Atkins and Les Paul

'Til next time.