cooking outside of the box!

What did you cook this week with your bountiful box of vegetables? Tell us all about it!

your stories

this week I ate some brussels sprouts for the first time in my life.  they did not kill me.  in fact, I liked them.  don’t tell anybody.

What the heck to do with that big green crinkly thing in the box? And anyway, what IS it? Oh, a Savoy cabbage. After I got over my initial fright, I decided to try Alison’s pesto & potato recipe for it. It was so great I ate the whole head by myself!

oops! (for the previous comment) Kale, not chard!

I made sweet potato/black bean burritos with carmelized onions and chard.  I used canned black beans & Taco Loco tortillas, but everything else was from the box.  Slow roasted sweet potatoes are from heaven as it is, but add in the onions/black beans, and the fact that burritos are a tidy little package—Yippee.  Oh, and this is only the second time I’ve cooked chard.  It’s very easy to prepare and is rather innocuous.  I can see myself throwing it into anything.

I was confused and expected a “pumpkin pie” instead of the pie pumpkin. I made the pumpkin pie and it is the best I have ever made. Thanks for challenging me.  I am excited about this weeks box. Diane

I made a stir fry with the carrots, onions, celery, and brussel sprouts (I used the methods mention in the recipe included in the box to partially cook them) and some left over chicken, and I also made the roasted beets with a few substitutions because I didn’t have some of the ingredients.  The guys said it was good.    The meal on a whole was sweeter than I expected, but very good.

I wasn’t sure what to do with collard greens until I found a great slow cooker recipe in “Secrets of Slow Cooking” by Liana Krissoff.  Not having a ham hock or bone to hand, I substituted dried chipotle pepper to get the smoky flavor.  To my surprise, collards stand up very well to the long cooking and are delicious with the garlic, vinegar, and spice in the recipe.

I was hunting for some salad dressing for lunch today and saw your “lemony dill vinaigrette” recipe hanging on the fridge (Glacier Grist Issue #1). 

It took just minutes to whip up, and was SO GOOD.  It turned my modest romaine lettuce & carrot (from the box, of course!) salad into a special treat!

I just ate the “brussels sprouts with mustard & caper sauce” for lunch! Dan and Meredith cooked it while I was out running, and what a delicious meal to come home to! Thanks, too, Taughnee, for the brussels sprouts I horked out of your birthday box (and thanks for taking my beets! ha!). As if you had a choice!