October 28th, 2009 by Margie
Dear Vegetable Husband Customer,
The rain is giving a little break for us to harvest our food for this week. Whew! There will be a fair amount of dirt in the greens because of all the rains so be sure to wash them extra good before cooking. The sweet potatoes have an extra layer too since we were still harvesting them from the mud this morning. We have several items this week. The beautiful dark dwarfed bok choy is from Camille and Brooks’ farm this week and the hardy broccoli leaves are from Jason at Full Moon. This is the first harvest of each. Welcome to the colder crops. You can cook your broccoli leaves as you would a thick kale or collard. I will sear mine in a skillet with one hot pepper and a little oil. These are quite a treat and in the next week or so we will get the broccoli flower!
We definitely have an Asian flare to the basket this week so I got as much Chinese eggplant as I could and this will be the last good harvest of eggplant. I know some of you are more than ready for me to say that, but you will miss it when it is gone. This week there is a super easy bok choy recipe and if you have not made the eggplant curry yet, I highly recommend it. The pak choi is a close relative to bok choy so you can add this in together or cook each differently. They can both be eaten raw too. The stems are yummy used like celery. Your pak choi is from Neil Taylor’s farm and is in a bag while the dwarf bok choy is loose in the basket. Below is your list of goodies for this week:
Chinese / black beauty Eggplant
Pak choi
Dwarf bok choy
Mixed Variety of Sweet Peppers
Heirloom Green Onions
Sweet Potatoes
broccoli greens
Cilantro
Hot peppers
lemongrass
Garlic
Your Vegetable Husband crew will be volunteering to help greenplate.org raise funds and awareness this next Monday, November 2nd at the Eat Green/Drink Local fundraiser. Join us and celebrate the Atlanta restaurants and chefs committed to sustainability. Greenplate is working hard for a cleaner environment for all of us by helping restaurants act responsibly. I have included a card in your basket. Check it out! …and remember, I’m always happy to talk food.
Namaste,
Margie Thorpe
October 14th, 2009 by Margie
Dear Vegetable Husband Customer,
This week, once again, we are swimming from farm to farm to harvest our produce. Hoping to see lettuce soon, but so far, the heavy rain has destroyed the young lettuce crops for now. What we are enjoying are the beets! This week, we get a nice bunch of beets again from Full Moon Farm. You’ll also see beautiful breakfast radishes from Sundance Farm. Your beet tops can be cooked along with your radish tops in a sauté. Those are delicious and great for you.
This last week, I made possibly my favorite dish of all time with this eggplant & sweet peppers recipe. I encourage you to give these vegetarian stuffed peppers a try. It uses four of your ingredients from this week’s basket and it won loads of praise in my house! I can’t wait to do it again.
The muscadines are from Steve Miller Farms this week and when I sorted them, they seem much softer than we are used to getting. They just picked these yesterday but they were very ripe on the vines. I would suggest eating them soon or cooking the grapes down for a really good preserve. You need very little sugar to make a wonderful winter treat from muscadines.
Below is your list of goodies for this week:
Italian Black Beauty Eggplant
d’Avignon French Breakfast Radishes
Mixed Sweet Peppers
Beets with tops
Sweet Potatoes
Muscadines
Butternut Squash
Basil
Garlic
I feel fortunate to have such a close understanding of what all goes in to the availability of food. Struggling through heavy rain or extremely dry climates this year has taken its toll on crops that were abundant last year this time. It really makes me thankful for every beautiful bite I’m able to enjoy. I hope you cherish your bounty, and remember, I’m always happy to talk food.
Namaste,
Margie Thorpe
October 10th, 2009 by Margie
Hey Everybody - big thanks to the New Yorker for this wonderful read. Check it out!
newyorker.com/fiction/poetry/2009/09/28/090928po_poem_berry
October 7th, 2009 by Margie
Dear Vegetable Husband Customer,
“Not yet, next week, …soon”….were some of the comments heard as I called our farms this week. Much like a cute child enters an awkward phase of growth, the farm fields are in a transition. We are still seeing some summer crops like, yes, the eggplant and zucchini this week from Grace Farms in Middle Georgia. With those come the fall crops such as this week’s beets from Full Moon and butternut squash from Steve Miller’s farm.
As we leave the summer and enter into the fall crops, we can look forward to lettuces and dark leafy greens as well as more of the winter squash. For now, we are thankful that between many farms circling the Atlanta area, we have a lovely basket of veggies this week. You might notice there are no apples this week. I am still on a desperate hunt for organic fall apples for us. And if they are out there, you will have them. Below is your list of goodies for this week:
Eggplant
Butternut Squash
Zucchini
Sweet Potatoes
Beets
Mixed Hot Peppers
Sweet Peppers
Basil
I have to share this with you; Don’t wait until tomorrow for the attitude or habit you can have today. This morning was a miserable drive through wrecks and rainstorms to our farms. That coupled with the lack of crops had me incredibly frustrated. Unfortunately, my frustration was seeping out on others around me. As the sun came out driving into Athens, I realized that today is the best time to be in a great mood and be thankful for the food and the friends that are around us. I hope my story can help remind you to stay in the now. And remember, I’m always happy to talk food.
Namaste,
Margie Thorpe
