Week 28 in Review

The Score
Eaters 9.5     Compost - 1     Carry Over - 0.5

This week I found myself straying a bit from the plan, due to changes in plans and changes in ingredients.  Once I had last week's bounty in hand, for example, I felt compelled to make a spaghetti alla checca with the firm, meaty tomatoes that we received.  I also had a small crop of home grown tomatillos that I needed to harvest in order to get the beds ready for a fall planting, so that sent one meal down a slightly different pathway.  The basil lost it's gusto fairly early in the week - which meant no pesto later - and some of the lettuce bit the dust as well.  All said and done, I kept things fairly simple in the kitchen this week, leaving enough time to prep the garden beds and get a good start on my fall garden.  We now have carrots, radishes, broccoli, garlic, shallots, leeks, kale and peas in the ground.  After a short mid-October heat wave, a number of the seeds have already sprouted and it looks like things are on their way!

The Best

• This chopped salad - inspired by Nancy Silverton's recipe from Pizzeria Mozza - was so good, I could eat it every day (if only it didn't require so much chopping).

The Good

• Using our garden tomatillos and garlic from the box, I threw together some chicken enchiladas after making a delicious roasted tomatillo salsa.  It was great warm in the enchiladas, and the leftover cold salsa was great with chips.  Delicious guacamole with the box's amazing avocados made for a wonderful garnish.

 

• I could eat whole wheat pasta alla checca with fresh tomatoes, garlic and basil all the time, if only my family wouldn't mind my constant bad breath.

• Our brunch was cancelled, so we lost our excuse to make watermelon mimosas, but we ate up the tomato basil quiche even though it got all little overcooked around the edges.

• The zucchini fritters were very tasty, though my frying skills still leave a lot to be desired.  The recipe suggested really squeezing all the liquid out of the zucchini, and I don't think that I got enough of the liquid out.  The outsides were nice and crispy, but the insides were a bit too wet and gooey.  

Week 25 in Review

Score
Two weeks late!

My apologies for falling off of my own program, but it has been an insanely busy couple of weeks.  Two weekends ago, we went out of town for a family wedding and were unable to pick up our box.  From there, sadly, my Year in a Box efforts went straight downhill.  With a very busy work schedule, sick kid (with a migraine 9 out of 14 days in a row), final push to finish the school garden that I've been working on, and related garden fundraiser that I needed to finish planning, meal planning and blogging sort of went out the window.  The good news is that the garden is done, and the fundraiser is happening this week.  So, back to life, back to reality, and with that, here are a few highlights from week 25!


The Best

• Not at all food related (or at least not yet), but I'm so excited that we were able to finish the school garden and open it to the students.  The kids were running around in it like it was a maze.  Up next: time to plant a fall garden in about two weeks!

The Good

• The Basil-chicken curry was delicious, but I wasn't the biggest fan of this particular Thai eggplant preparation.  Way too fishy!

• The Avocado Orange Red Onion salad was delicious: its citrus-based dressing with cumin brought all the flavors together perfectly.

 

• I was surprised by how much I liked the Black Eyed Peas recipe!  It was sort of like a gourmet version of bean and bacon soup, a favorite from my childhood. 

The Rest

• Perhaps if you like eggplant, you'd quite like this eggplant pasta salad recipe, but it didn't do much for me or the kids.  It wasn't quite broken down enough to be saucy, but wasn't firm enough to be a veggie-enhanced pasta.  It was just kind of mushy.

And then, there was the box that I skipped...

• Just in case you were curious, here's the box that I didn't document at all.  We used quite a bit of it, just not in any sort of organized fashion.

 (top) lettuce, yellow beans, sorrel, broccoli

(bottom) tomatoes, carrots, onions, red peppers, avocados, strawberries

Week 20 in Review

The Score
The Eaters - 10.5     Compost - 0!     Carry Over -0.5
If you are just tuning in, at the end of each week I provide a summary of how we did getting through the ingredients in the box.  This week, we started with 11 ingredients.

Being at home with our (so far) very good puppy created a lot of time for cooking and enjoying our summery box.  There were a few items not incorporated directly into our meals that ended up making a lovely juice, and heading into the weekend, we just have a single tomato left.  Best week of using up the box yet!  So, thanks to Olive (like the name?) for allowing me to keep up with the plan this week. 

Olive

 The Best

• The Green Bean, Arugula, potato salad - with a lemon yogurt dressing - was a fantastic summer salad.  We could eat salad like this all summer long!

 

The Good

• Second runner up was definitely the Tomato basil quiche.  Though I'm pretty sure that this is the first quiche that I've ever made, it actually turned out pretty much as anticipated.  The tomatoes were delicious and almost made the quiche taste like it was filled with a savory sauce.  

• Hard to go wrong with pizza when you have such lovely raw materials.  We made one with gorgonzola, prosciutto and Arugula, and other with fresh Tomatoes on a pesto base.  

• Nothing too fancy about this salad, but the Lemon Cucumbers were beautiful and tasty (and accompanied by Lettuce and Carrots from the box). 

The Rest

• Not much to look at, but I made a appetizing juice with Carrots and a 1/4 of the Yellow Watermelon from this week's box, as well as a leftover Grapefruit and (regular) Cucumber from last week's box. 

• Not ready for prime time yet, but I have had the sauerkraut fermenting for five days now.  It's quite an interesting process; particularly squishing the cabbage and finding how much liquid actually comes out.  Looking forward to tasting it when it's ready!

Week 11 in Review

The Score

Eaters - 10.5    Compost - 0     Carry Over - 0.5

The produce bins in the fridge are almost completely empty. That hasn't happened in a long while. It's a sign that a) we ate up most of what was in last week's box, as well as the heads of lettuce from the previous week, and b) we are really getting to the point where meal planning is resulting in consumption that matches what we're buying. Don't get me wrong: this whole project has taken up quite a bit of time and really required us to plan ahead and shop with purpose. That said, we have wasted less food over the past few months than I can ever remember, and I'm glad for that. Our freezer and pantry isn't bursting at the seams, since we're trying to use up ingredients that have been sitting around for a long time and we buy what we need. That is freeing up space that I hope we'll be able to better utilize with the produce coming from the box, and sooner or later the garden. The more that we embrace this whole experiment, the more we learn that there are so many ways to can and freeze the good stuff so it can be available later! 

The Winner

• The only unfortunate thing about this week's winner is that the bacon wasn't the stuff that my husband is currently working on (curing a piece of pork belly from our meat CSA).  Who knew a BLC (bacon, Lettuce, Cucumber) was so fantastic?  The spiced, minted mayo (with Green Garlic) put it over the top, and was a huge hit with the entire family.

The Good

• The Lemon Basil chicken salad made for some delicious holiday weekend sandwiches, accompanied by some warm homemade baguettes

• The strawberry jam was simple, but has been quite a treat.  As I was making it, I kept thinking that we'd have a year's worth (a baker's dozen half-pints), but at the rate we're going through it, I'm not so sure.

 

• The Orange and Beet salad was both beautiful (using the dark red leaf Lettuce) and tasty.  Next time I'd add a little blue cheese for both color and flavor.

• Forgot to take photos of the Lemonade and the hot Spinach artichoke dip, but both we're huge hits with dinner guests over the holiday weekend (and the latter was so tasty using fresh, vs. frozen, spinach).

The Rest

• This spaghetti recipe got a big thumbs down from both of the boys.  It got a 'Mom - I really like kale, but the Swiss Chard just makes everything taste weird in this.'  Unfortunately, I sort of agreed with his review.

Week 10 in Review

The Score

Eaters - 11    Compost - 0     Carry Over - 1

Once again, we have lettuce carrying over into next week. It sometimes seems funny to me that the one vegetable we most commonly ate in the past is the one that is often the last to get eaten up these days. A boring old salad just doesn't seem to be cutting it these days. What did get made this week seemed to be all about balancing and playing with different aspects of the ingredients: sweet and sour, umami and salty, chewy and tender, hearty and light. Though not a lot got made as compared to a typical week, what did get made was all quite yummy. 

The Winner

• Though not officially 'from the box,' we all love the blueberry meyer lemon marmalade that was made out of berries from our weekly trip to the farmer's market, as well as lemons from our backyard. For more on the fun we had making marmalade, have a look at blog entry Lemon Drop! 

The Good

• Our weekend dinner straight from the farmer's market was our first dinner eaten outside this year! The grilled Zucchini and Zebra Potatoes were the perfect accompaniments for a juicy barbecued steak.

• Crispy prosciutto was delicious with the spinach and basil. This frittata was the best one yet.

• Simply sauteed Sugar Snap Peas with Green Garlic were a great addition to fresh Basil pesto pasta. The heartiness of the whole wheat pasta rounded out the dish quite nicely.

The Rest

• Experimenting in food preparations continued last weekend. In addition to the fantastic marmelade, we tried a second batch of pickles, along with some yogurt and fresh bread. We liked last week's pickle recipe better, the yogurt was a bit runny, and the bread didn't rise quite like it seemed it should have, but it was still a really fun couple of days of cooking!

Week 9 in Review

The Score
Eaters - 10.5     Compost - 0     Carry Over - 1
Lots of amazing eats this week, fueled by a lot of amazing spring goodness!  I had a chance to make a few things that I've never made before (pickles, fresh berry pie), and all in all had a week of really successful recipes.  Nothing was overly complicated or time consuming, and for the first time in this process almost every recipe was eaten and enjoyed by all.  We still have a bit of lettuce left over, but I'm hoping to use that up in my lunch tomorrow.  Other than that, we've put away quite a bit of produce this week.

The Winner

• This was a tough one, but I have to say that the Strawberry almond challah french toast tasted like something that you'd get in a fancy restaurant for brunch, but was super easy to prepare.  Just remember, substitute almond extract for the vanilla in the recipe, and sprinkle with some slivered almonds for french toast that tastes like an almond croissant.

The Good

• Last week's Basil was so fragrant, and the leaves were larger than any basil I've ever seen.  With such perfect raw materials, the Basil pesto pasta with Zucchini and mint was a huge hit with both our family and the visitors that we had over for dinner that night.

• Also a big hit (not surprisingly) was the fresh Strawberry pie.  With perfect berries, not much effort was needed to turn out an amazing end product.

• Easy to make, good to eat.  The homemade garlic basil dills were so much easier to make than I ever would have imagined, and (though designed to be kept in the fridge, vs. stored long term) only required a day of waiting before eating.  Thanks to my sister-in-law for the pickling advice for this newbie!  One jar is already gone, so we'll need to be revisiting this recipe when we get more Pickling Cucumbers in our box.

• Oh, Sweet Onions.  How sweet you are.  The grilled sweet onions in contrast with jalapeno jack cheese made for a yummy yet simple quesadilla.

• This Spinach salad felt a bit like a deconstructed omelet.  Fresh, crunchy spinach with some hard boiled eggs and bacon, topped with a vinaigrette, seemed much heartier than a salad typically would.

The Rest

• The sesame chicken with Sugar Snap Peas was good, but the peas looked a little brown by the time recipe was done.  The whole thing could have used a bit of a 'kick', too.  

• This Zucchini bread is delicious, but I still can't get over that the recipe calls for 3 cups of sugar and a full cup of oil.  Even doubling the zucchini (which increased the cooking time by about 10 minutes), I'm left feeling that this 'vegetable' bread is really just fat and sugar.