What’s In The Box with Recipe Suggestions
Green Beans: Try these green beans in one of the recipe suggestions below. Sometimes simple is simply delicious!
Pesto Roasted Potatoes & Green Beans
Summer Corn with Green Beans and Herb Butter
Orange Carrots: Turning your oven on to roast your potatoes? Don’t forget to roast your carrots too! Roasting brings out the natural sweetness in these carrots and they taste like candy!
Honey Garlic Ginger Roasted Carrots
Collards: This is the bunching green in this week’s box with large paddle-shaped leaves. In fact, the leaves are thick and durable and make a good option to use as veggie wraps.
Collard Greens with Lime + Peanuts
How To Make Raw Collard Wraps….and Suggestions for Fillings!
Raw Collard Greens Salad with Sundried Tomatoes
Make-Ahead Italian Collard Green Wraps
Collard Green & Rice Fritters with Green Pesto
Green and/or Silver Slicer Cucumbers: Cucumbers are eaten all over the world, so why not look to other cultures for different ways to use them?
Italian Garlic: For a delicious treat, gently heat a bit of olive oil in a pan and add a few crushed cloves of garlic. Remove from heat and allow the flavor of the garlic to infuse in the oil for 10 minutes or so. Steam or boil new potatoes. While it is still hot, smash them with a fork and drizzle the garlic oil over them. Season with salt and pepper and enjoy!
Sierra Blanca or Delightful Yellow Onions: We are finishing the last of the fresh white onions and starting on the first of our yellow storage onions. This week’s variety is “Delightful,” both in name and flavor. These onions are still very fresh from the field and have yet to form a fully dry skin that can be cleaned. Store them at room temperature where they’ll continue to dry down, if they last that long!
Caramelized Onion, Goat Cheese & Kale Pizza with Balsamic Drizzle
Cowboy Burgers Topped with Onion Rings
Green Bell and Italian Peppers: Our pepper fields are just starting to ripen, albeit slowly in our opinion. Every year we want to see them ripen right away, but they just take time! More peppers to come in future weeks.
Easy Cheesy Chili Mac (Oven and Instant Pot Options)
New Red Prairie Potatoes: This week’s potato variety is “Red Prairie,” a red-skinned, white flesh potato. Handle with care as the skins are very delicate in their fresh state.
New Potatoes in Garlic Cream Sauce
Crushed New Potatoes with Garlic & Herbs
Sweet Corn: This is our official first week of sweet corn season! That means it is time for our annual public service announcement: KEEP YOUR CORN COLD! The key to truly sweet corn is to keep it in the refrigerator to preserve its natural sugars. Heat, as well as extended storage, are the two factors that allow the sugars to turn to starch and diminish its sweetness. If storage space is an issue, remove the husks first and/or eat them within a day or two of receiving it!
Sweet Corn Salad with Green Beans & Hazelnuts
Summer Corn with Green Beans and Herb Butter
Tomatillos: Remove and discard the inedible outer husk. The fruit inside of the husk is entirely usable, no need to peel, remove seeds, etc. You will notice the tomatillo may feel a little tacky on the skin, which is normal. Just wash before you use them. Read more about tomatillos in this week’s vegetable feature.
Vegetable Enchiladas with Tomatillo Cream Sauce
Green and/or Italian and/or Yellow Scallopini Squash: There are other ways, aside from freezing shredded zucchini, to preserve zucchini. Consider making dehydrated zucchini chips! Either use them as a snack or add them to soups and stews in the winter.
Spicy Zucchini Lasagna with Oregano Breadcrumbs
Genius Ratatouille from Alice Waters
Small Tomatoes or Cabbage or Sun Jewel Melon: This is a mouthful of ‘or’ options this week! We are just starting to see the small tomatoes starting to ripen, as are the cabbage and melons. You will find one of these 3 items in your share box this week.
Drunken Chicken Marsala with Tomatoes
Grilled Melon & Prosciutto Pasta Salad
CHOICE—Italian Basil: Please remember that we have sent one portion of basil per vegetable share. What can you do with a handful of basil? A handful of basil adds just the touch you need to summer soups, salads, pasta, etc. Heck, you can even dress up a frozen pizza by tearing fresh basil on top of it when you pull it out of the oven!
Vegetable Feature: Tomatillos
Tomatillos–used like a vegetable, classified as a fruit, and may be used for so much more than just salsa! The fruit of a tomatillo is hidden inside a protective husk that looks like a paper lantern. As the tomatillo grows, it fills out its husk, which is how we know when it’s ready to pick. This outer husk is not edible and should be removed before you use them. The fruit inside might feel a little sticky, which is normal. Just give them a quick rinse and you’re ready to go.
We plant tomatillos with our tomatoes in two separate plantings. The plants are similar, but tomatillos are wilder and have a thick stem that seems disproportionately thick and sturdy in comparison to the fruit. However, if you could see the plants now, you’d know the plant needs that thick stem to hold up the weight of the plant as it can grow to be quite large and may be loaded with fruit!
Tomatillos may be eaten raw or cooked and have a mild, tangy flavor that is slightly fruity. When raw, tomatillos are firm with dense flesh. Once cooked, they soften and break apart, becoming more like sauce. Interestingly, they also contain pectin, which is a natural thickener that is released when they are cooked. Their innate pectin can help thicken soups and sauces.
One of the most popular ways to use tomatillos is in making salsa! There are different ways to make tomatillo salsa, also known as Salsa Verde. It may be prepared with all raw vegetables which will give you a fresh, chunky salsa. The alternative is to cook the tomatillos in a little water before blending the softened, cooked tomatillos with the other salsa ingredients. If you cook the tomatillos first, you’ll get a smoother salsa. Roasting tomatillos along with the other salsa ingredients such as onions, garlic, peppers and even limes cut in half will further develop the flavors of these ingredients, giving you yet another version of tomatillo salsa. Tomatillo salsa is delicious when simply served as a snack or appetizer along with tortilla chips, but it can also be used to top off tacos, quesadillas, make enchiladas, or served alongside your morning eggs or stirred into a bowl of black beans and/or rice.
The tanginess of tomatillos pairs well with pork and can make a delicious stew which is thickened by the pectin in the tomatillos. They can also be used to make sauces for chicken and bean dishes, blend them into guacamole, or incorporate them into soups, salads or even dessert!
Tomatillos are best stored at room temperature until ready for use. They are also very easy to preserve for use in the off-season. One option is to make salsa now and either can or freeze it. Alternatively, you can freeze tomatillos whole and raw. Simply remove the outer husk, wash and dry the fruit. Put them in a freezer bag and pop them into the freezer. They don’t retain their firm texture after freezing, so don’t be surprised if they are soft when you thaw them.
Farm Update
Food Safety inspection last week was another success! Like usual, there are places that we can get better but the inspector’s words – I use Harmony Valley Farm as a farm model for other farms I inspect. Those words are great to hear! Up next in two weeks, is our Real Organic inspection followed by MOSA (our organic certification) a week later. All this to say, we are still planting, cultivating, irrigating, harvesting, washing, packing, and planning CSA boxes as well as our Retail and Wholesale sales. Needless to say, we are definitely in the peak busy season!
