Cabbage in flight, on its way to you.
We are tantalizingly close to the end of our season. The cold spell last week hurried us along. 13 degrees! That will do some damage. With that deadline, we pulled in all but the hardiest crops. Cabbage, celeriac, even leeks can get damaged at 13o. We are still harvesting carrots. Protected in warm-enough soil, they survived the brief cold night without trouble.
Instead, trouble came as broken machinery. Our complex carrot harvester broke down unexpectedly. This is the machine we imported from Europe a few years ago. It’s a terrific harvester but largely unknown in the USA. We had to get a replacement part flown in from Germany, routed through the North American dealer in Canada. It took over a week to travel here and clear customs. Oh, this has been a tense week. As our kids say “The intensity intensifies!”
We pulled out our trusty older carrot harvester but it’s slower and requires a much bigger crew for harvest. Plus it’s more demanding physically for all of us. The replacement part arrived this morning and we got the big harvester back in the field by midmorning. If the weather holds through Friday, we will finish every field, leaving our coolers stuffed to the gills. Wish us luck.
We are ready to wrap up this season. Then we’ll enjoy the winter, with lots of cooking and ice skating and maybe even a vacation before we start plotting next year. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving! Beth & Steve
Storage Share this week
Take one box labelled “A” and one box labelled “B”.
Things you need to know about your winter share
* Your delivery will consist of two different boxes, labeled “A” and “B”. Take one “A” box and one “B” box. The boxes contain different vegetables.
* Please pick up your boxes on the day of delivery, during the normal hours for your site.
* Outpost members, please get your boxes on Friday. This is the busiest weekend of the year for the Outpost staff, so we cannot ask them to hold boxes past Friday.
* Members at outdoor sites, please carefully put the blankets back on the boxes. That keeps everyone’s produce in good shape.
* The boxes are heavy! It’s OK to take home the packed boxes, then return the empty boxes to your pickup site within two weeks. We’ll swing back and pick them up.
Veggie List and Storage Info (Storage share, Nov. 16/17, 2017)
We hope you enjoy this shipment of veggies. Strategize to use them well, as some will last longer than others.
* These are the most perishable vegetables: green cauliflower, fennel, Romanesco.
* These are the next-most perishable: Brussels sprouts, cabbage, leeks and onions. Keep an eye on your butternut, potatoes and sweet potatoes. The last two are susceptible to drying out. Expect the largest butternuts to last the longest.
* These will last the longest: Beauty Heart radish, beets, carrots, celeriac, garlic, parsnips, shallots.
Box “A”
Refrigerate everything in this box.
Beauty Heart winter radishes, 1 or 2
Brussels sprouts, on stalk(s)
Carrots, 6 lb total
….. orange ~4.5 lb
….. yellow ~1.5 lb
Celeriac, 1
Fennel, 1 fat bulb
Green cabbage
Green cauliflower, 1 very small
Leeks, ~3 lb
Parsnips, 3 lb
Romanesco cauliflower, ~2
Box “B”
The beets need refrigeration. Everything else in this box can be stored cool or at room temperature. See notes below for more detail.
Beets, 3 lb
Butternut squash, ~4
Potatoes, russet, 5 lb
Potatoes, Satina, 5 lb
Sweet potatoes, ~10 lb
Onions, 5 lb total
….. ~1 lb red
….. ~4 lb yellow
Shallots, 3
Garlic, 3
Beauty Heart radishes (round, white with pale green shoulders and bright pink interior) – Refrigerate. The interior color is lovely. Slice thinly and add to salads, cook lightly in mixed vegetable medleys or cut into matchsticks and add to pasta salads. We enjoy grated carrot and Beauty Heart salads all winter.
Beets – Refrigerate in a bag or container. Beets will store for two months or longer.
Brussels sprouts – Pluck from stalks and refrigerate in a bag or container. Do this the day you pick up your CSA boxes. Eat within 2 to 3 weeks.
Butternut winter squash – You will receive up to four butternuts, depending on size. Store your butternut in a cool, dry place. 50 F is ideal. Do not put in a plastic bag. Expect the largest butternuts to store the longest. Inspect your squash frequently and cook promptly if you see any soft spots developing. You can cook, mash and freeze the squash for future use. I find that you can refrigerate cut raw squash for up to one week. This runs counter to the accepted way to store squash, but is useful if you want to cook just half a squash. Try microwaving your squash for one to two minutes before cutting or peeling. This softens the squash and makes a large butternut easier to handle.
Cabbage – Refrigerate. Cut off chunks as needed.
Cauliflower, green – Refrigerate in a bag or container.
Carrots, orange. Refrigerate in a plastic bag. Will keep for several weeks.
Carrots, yellow. This variety is pretty AND they taste good.
Celeriac – Will store for months in your fridge. Cut off chunks as needed. Peel before using. I find it easiest to cut the celeriac into flat slices, then peel.
Garlic. Can be stored at room temperature.
Leeks. Refrigerate and eat within three weeks. Leeks are not a long-storage crop. You may need to strip off one or two outer leaves to freshen the leeks before you cook them. Your leeks will probably need washing. We finished preparing them after dark and didn’t realize how much soil was still on them.
Onions: Refrigerate or store in a cool, dark spot and protect from light. Exposure to light stimulates sprouting.
Parsnips (These look like large white carrots.) – Refrigerate in a plastic bag. Parsnips will store for two months but will darken in color. That is a harmless change.
Potatoes, Russets and Satinas – Can be stored at room temperature or in a cool spot, but must be kept in the dark so they do not turn green. A cloth or loose plastic bag draped over the paper bag will help avoid moisture loss, but do not close the plastic bag. Both types will store longer if kept cool. Around 40 – 50 F is ideal. The potatoes were grown by the Igl family near Antigo.
Russets– We got the big ‘baking’ grade so you have nice bakers for Thanksgiving. Excellent for mashed potatoes.
Satinas– These are good all-purpose potatoes, everything from roasted to potato salad. I really like this variety of yellow potato because they oven-roast so well and because they are less sweet than other yellow varieties like Yukon Golds.
Shallots – These look like small red onions, often with internal divisions into several bulbs. They can be round or oblong. Store at room temperature. This is the first time we’ve grown shallots! They seemed like a fun thing to try and have turned out nicely. Honestly, I am a novice with shallots but from what I’ve read (and eaten at restaurants) they are good in salad dressing, and caramelized and used to top dishes or sandwiches. We split some in half and roasted them with other veggies in a hot oven. They turned out mild and sweet, very nice.
Sweet potatoes – These are a mix of the Covington and Beauregard varieties. Both types have developed excellent flavor and sweetness. Some tubers have dark skins, the result of soil staining during wet weather. It’s unsightly but superficial and harmless. Store at room temperature, no lower than 55 F. Keep them on your kitchen counter where it’s easy to keep an eye on them. I like to keep ours in a paper bag so they don’t dehydrate. Cook promptly if they start to soften. The roots come in a wide ranges of sizes and all are good.
What are you cooking for Thanksgiving?
We are creatures of habit when it comes to Thanksgiving. Here are our plans so far: brined roast heritage turkey from our friends Jen and Bryce Riemer (Beth), Brussels sprouts with garlic-mustard vinaigrette (Steve), roasted sweet potatoes with garlicky yogurt dip (Sophie), glazed butternut squash (Beth), crunchy carrot-Beauty Heart salad with sesame-seed dressing (Steve), pickled onions (Beth & Ari), pickles (Beth & Ari), homemade applesauce (Ari), and apple pie (Sophie). I’ll probably make stuffing with lots of celeriac and onions but that might be overkill. We love celebrating Thanksgiving and the end of harvest season!
Menu Ideas
There are many terrific Thanksgiving menus and recipes online right now. Search any of the sites below if you are stumped about what to do with your storage share. Check out the online Thanksgiving collections soon; they get taken down quickly after the holiday.
♦ I like the lively Food52.com site. It’s a curated community site so judge a recipe’s rating and read the comments. Start at their Thanksgiving page and settle in. I want to read and cook everything on this site! Here’s a tiny subset of their current articles and recipes.
….. Thanksgiving Menu Maker
….. Freezer-Friendly Thanksgiving Dishes For the Ultra-Prepared
….. Make room for Spicy Raspberry Relish
….. The Genius Fix for Broken Gravy
….. 22 Pack-and-Go Thanksgiving Recipes
….. etc, etc.
♦ Smitten Kitchen is our go-to site for dessert recipes but has excellent veggie recipes too. Plus blogger Deb Perelman is funny. She has not posted a Thanksgiving menu yet but her recipes from last year are still accessible.
….. Thanksgiving recipe list
….. Last year, she was all about Team Casserole.
♦ 101cookbooks. Always has good vegetarian and whole-grain recipes.
♦ The New York Times has changed access to their Cooking app. They now require a paid subscription, although there appears to be occasional free access. This year, they’ve posted how to cook an entire Thanksgiving feast in a 400 degree oven, a very thorough Thanksgiving Menu Planner and many holiday-themed recipe collections, such as “Our 21 Most Popular Thanksgiving Pies“, “What to Bring to a Thanksgiving Potluck“, “Thanksgiving Casseroles” and more. If you can access it, start at their Thanksgiving 2017 page. In my opinion, Melissa Clark is the best NYT food writer. She’s practical and her dishes are always flavorful. David Tanis is my second-favorite. Recipes from Mark Bittman and Martha Rose Shulman are always worth a look.
♦ Finally, remember that we can use Local Thyme recipes all winter. Check them out for Thanksgiving ideas. Send me an email is you need the registration information.
Do you have favorite menu sites for fall and winter recipes?
If so, please share in a comment!
RECIPES FROM LAUREN
SHEET PAN CHICKEN WITH ROAST VEGETABLES
Recipe adapted from Food 52
I love the ease of this recipe. It uses one baking sheet and and a couple large bowls and comes together effortlessly while you do the dishes or tidy up. Honestly, the hardest part will be slicing the cabbage and fennel! If you feel like getting a second sheet pan dirty, throw some extra roast veggies on there and stock up on roasted veggies for the whole week! Carrots, sweet potatoes, parsnips, celeriac, potatoes and/or butternut squash would all go well with this tasty meal. Lauren.
Serves 6-8
Takes 1 hour
1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil
1/4 cup olive oil + more for drizzling
3 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 tablespoon sriracha, optional
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
8 pieces chicken, bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs or drumsticks (or a mix)
1/2 head cabbage
1 head garlic, separated and peeled
1 large fennel bulb, cored and cut into 1-inch wedges
3 leeks, white and pale green parts only, cut int 1-inch thick slices
- Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
- In a large bowl combine oils, soy sauce, vinegar and sriracha. Place chicken in a second large bowl. Sprinkle generously with salt and pepper. Pour 1/4 cup of the oil mixture over the chicken and let is marinade while the oven preheats.
- Cut the cabbage in half through it’s core. Set half aside for later use. Cut half you are using through to core again and keep slicing until you wind up with many wedges (all no thicker than 1-inch). Add cabbage to first large bowl (with remaining sauce not chicken) along with peeled garlic cloves, fennel, and leeks. Season with a bit of salt and pepper.
- Drizzle baking sheet with olive oil and add chicken. Spread it out evenly so not crowded and roast for 10 minutes. Remove pan from oven and nestle chicken with vegetables– tucking it under if necessary. It will feel like a lot. That’s fine! Roast for 25 minutes longer. Remove pan from oven and transfer chicken to a platter to rest. Also remove garlic if it seems to be beginning to brown at all (will depend on the size of your cloves). Continue roasting veggies for 10-15 minutes until juices have reduced and edges of veggies have caramelized ever so slightly.
- Serve veggies and chicken together with any residual sauce. Season with salt and pepper as desired.
.
JAPANESE VEGETABLE PANCAKES (OKONOMIYAKI)
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen
There is a chance that some people won’t get as excited about vegetable pancakes as me, but I swear I could eat them every single dang day. They are the perfect combination of crunchy, hearty, healthy, fresh and fried. They can be a side of a meal or a whole meal and despite all the chopping that goes into them, come together rather quickly. If you have a mandolin, this is a great time to use it.
And again, the recipe is pretty flexible. Feel free to swap in any other root veggies (in similar quantities) for the sweet potato, carrots and parsnip. Lauren.
Takes 45 minutes
Serves 4-6 (more if it’s a side dish)
1 pound Brussels sprouts, ends trimmed and very thinly sliced (you will want about 4 cups sliced sprouts)
1 medium sweet potato, peeled and julienned (about 4 cups)
2-3 carrots, peeled and julienned (about 3 cups)
1 parsnip, peeled and julienned (about 1 cup)
1 shallot, peeled and very thinly sliced
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
2/3 cup flour
4 large eggs
Vegetable oil
- In a large bowl combine Brussels sprouts, sweet potato, carrots, parsnip and shallots. Sprinkle with salt followed by flour and stir until flour coats vegetables. Stir in the eggs until mostly smooth.
- Heat a heavy large skillet over medium high heat. Coat the bottom with oil and warm until hot but not smoking. Drop 1/4 cup spoonfuls into the pan (about 4-5) so they do not crowd. Gently press the pancake down until almost flat. Cook until the edges begin to brown, about 3 minutes and then flip. Cook for 1-2 minutes until other side browns. Remove to paper towel to drain grease.
- Add more oil in between batches and continue cooking until no more batter remains. Feel free to keep the first ones warm and crisp in a 250-degree oven while you cook the rest.
- Serve warm with tangy ketchup (below), spicy mayo or other favorite Asian dipping sauce.
.
Tangy Ketchup
1/2 cup ketchup
2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
2 tablespoons honey or maple syrup
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
2 teaspoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
Combine all sauce ingredients in a small saucepan and simmer until smooth and thick, about 3-5 minutes.