May 27, 2009
Surprise Beets
Beet Salad
Originally uploaded by kerner
I have never eaten beets before. Although most of my food-phobias come from my very picky father, I think I can fairly blame this one on my mom, who suffered through many a canned and/or pickled beet in her childhood. For as long as I can remember, she has said that the only food she doesn't like is beets.
This week and last week we got about 5 beets as part of the weekly farm share. Last week, I tossed them in the bottom drawer of the fridge (aka where odd produce goes to die) and didn't think too much about them. This week, they were a little bigger and slightly more appetizing-looking, so I decided to be brave and give it a try. What's the worst that can happen? Order a pizza, that's what. (Famous last words.)
I consulted a couple of cookbooks and decided to go for roasting the beets. I chopped the beets (2 weeks worth) into 1 in. cubes, tossed with olive oil, salt, and pepper, then roasted them at 400 degrees for about 35 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes.
I vaguely remembered seeing roasted beets on a salad with white cheese on some food blog, so I washed some salad greens (also from the farm share - I could eat salad 3 meals a day every week and probably not run out!), tossed in some homemade oil & vinegar dressing, and added feta cheese.
The result? Pretty darn tasty! Actually, roasted beets taste almost exactly like roasted sweet potatoes or carrots. Yum!
Posted by zarah at 6:33 PM | Comments (7)
May 20, 2009
Unaccustomed Strawberries
Strawberries
Originally uploaded by kerner
I'm taking a quick break from the gift knitting sweatshop to post some pictures - strawberries from my farm share last week, and teeny tiny wild strawberries growing in my yard. (Toes for scale.) I guess they're probably edible, but it hardly seems worth the trouble for a strawberry that's the size of a pea.
Life always seems especially hectic when I don't have time to myself to catch up on chores around the house and relax with crafts, reading, and some brainless TV watching. Last week I spent most of the week in San Francisco for a conference, then the weekend was busy with family activities - a baby shower for my sister and a graduation party for my cousin.
Being gone for 4 days immediately followed by all those activities made for a busy weekend, but a series of unfortunate travel delays (which ended up with me in a different airport than expected at 11pm last Friday night) created a rare opportunity for me to read an entire book in a single day. (I used to be an epic reader, but law school broke me of that habit. Too many casebooks, I guess. I'm slowly but surely getting back into the reading habit.)
Unaccustomed Earth is a book of short stories by Jhumpa Lahiri, the author of The Namesake. (Thanks to Kelli for the great book recommendations as always!) I recently watched the movie of The Namesake, and the first few stories I enjoyed comparing and contrasting the different paths that Lahiri's characters' lives took, as compared to those in the movie. The first half of the book contains unrelated stories, but they are all meditations on the themes of relationships, love, duty, and expectations. The second half of the book is several short stories that feature the same characters in various stages of their lives. I am totally a sucker for this kind of story (see Duets, Sliding Doors, etc.) so that really made the book for me.
I am happy to report that I cleared my schedule for the evening, and have made progress on several projects that I've had rattling around in my head for days: clean the craft room, catch up on laundry, take some pictures of my current knitting project, etc. I'm feeling much more relaxed just knowing that those things are done.
Posted by zarah at 7:46 PM | Comments (1)
May 9, 2009
I think Maaatha would approve
I think Maaartha would approve
Originally uploaded by kerner
My CSA started up for the summer - wahoo! This time we subscribed to a full share, instead of splitting it with another couple, so we're really going to have to eat our veggies to keep up. It has been really cool and rainy still this spring, so are mostly still eating greens from the greenhouse. I'm not complaining, there was quite a variety: Chard, Spinach, Tat soi, Pac choi Carrots, Baby lettuce, Lettuce Cilantro, Turnips, Spring onions, and Kale.
But my favorite thing of the week was my "egg share." Normally the eggs are the beautiful brown eggs that you expect to see when you buy fresh organic eggs. But this week I got one random blue-green egg, which of course immediately made me think of Martha Stewart and her fancy chickens that lay all different colors of eggs. I'm still trying to come up with a way to use that egg that is Maaaatha-worthy.
Posted by zarah at 6:33 AM | Comments (3)