I'll admit that there are weeks that I just don't feel like coming up with some creative way to use my CSA share.  Thankfully, produce that grows at the same time of year almost always tastes good together.



Our first share was a perfect combination of vegetables - leeks, lettuce, mizuna, radishes, asparagus, and strawberries - so I decided to keep things simple and incorporate most of it into a salad to highlight the textures, flavors, and freshness of the produce.

Here's yet another salad inspired by my CSA share.  Over the past year, I've gotten so much better about using each week's share more efficiently rather than attempting to make one dish with each ingredient and then buying a ton of stuff from the farmers' market or supermarket to supplement and support each ingredient.  A few weeks ago, I got all of these items (well, not the cheese or the dressing) in my share and I figured that since they're all growing at the same time, wouldn't they probably taste good together?  There was only one way to find out.

Well look who it is.  I'm back from my accidental hiatus, and I've got a ton of recipes to post courtesy of the cupcakes I made for Matt's brother's wedding and some excellent meals I've made courtesy of my CSA share.  I have no real reason for disappearing other than neglect and preoccupation with other things, but I've refocused and am hoping to get back into my regular blogging groove once again.


First up: this simple yet stunning salad.  It came together on a whim while I was searching my fridge for items to make into a pretty plated salad.

I've recently developed a minor obsession with citrus.  This may be (largely) due to the fact that, for more than a month now,  it's been freezing and snowy and slushy and gray.  When did I move to a strange hybrid of Seattle and Minneapolis?  But my daily 3 pm Cara Cara orange always seems to make me oblivious to the nasty conditions outside.


Despite of the lack of local fruit this time of year (I know there are lots of apples in cold storage, but I really cannot eat another apple for a long time - we were getting 8 pounds a week from our CSA for nearly two months and we ate every single one of them and I am surprised we did not turn into apples), February is the perfect time of year for out of the ordinary citrus: Meyer lemons and Cara Cara and Moro (aka blood) oranges.  All of them are head and shoulders above their run-of-the-mill counterparts, so I try to indulge in them as much as possible for the few weeks I can find them.

My aversion to celery goes all the way back to kindergarten, where I would get in trouble on a daily basis for scooping the peanut butter and raisins out of my ants on a log, leaving the gutted celery sticks behind. (In retrospect, I wonder why my teacher didn’t stop giving me this snack when it was very clear that I hated celery and nothing was going to make me eat it.) My distaste for fennel developed recently, but that’s because I never ate it until a few years ago. I’m not a fan of anise/licorice flavors in general and huge fennel bulbs taste really strongly of that flavor and I just can’t stomach it.

Ever since I joined my CSA, I’ve been forced to cook around the ingredients I get each week instead of coming up with ideas and then shopping for them. I’m usually fine with this, as I always cook vegetarian and therefore use tons of vegetables, but some weeks have proven challenging – like the ones where all I get are leafy greens.


Last week was another greens-filled week. Among the bounty was mizuna, escarole, and bok choy, and I had gotten Swiss chard and romaine lettuce the prior week (half of which is still in my fridge…thankfully CSA/greenmarket produce is so fresh that it lasts longer in the fridge than supermarket produce, which is already many days, if not more than a week old by the time you get it). I transformed the escarole and bok choy into a stir fry (along with some green beans – another CSA share item – and tofu) but the mizuna stayed in the fridge. It’s still there, as Matt and I were away last weekend so there went a good four meals through which I could’ve used up a lot of last week’s haul. And let’s not talk about the huge bag of apples and pears that is going to turn into mush any second now.

Words alone cannot express how excited I am to finally be a member of a CSA! I had always wanted to join but it’s not the easiest thing in the world to do when you’re single and living with roommates. Sure, I could have found a friend to share with me, but I think that 5-6 years ago, most of us (myself included) weren’t quite as into or aware of our food as we are today.



Matt and I frequently shopped at the farmers markets in Baltimore, and when I moved back to NYC two years ago, I was living alone so a full share was, again, not really the best option. I’m sure I could have easily used up each week’s share, but I was so busy with work and wedding planning that I wasn’t particularly focused on food. So now that Matt is here and life has calmed down, we are now the proud new owners of a CSA membership.

It seems that January is the month of eating well and detox, at least according to my friends and a bunch of food publications.  I guess after all the sweets and booze of December’s holiday parties, we feel the need to negate the damage with healthy foods, and salad is usually the first thing that comes to mind.

This is the first course I served for my Thanksgiving dinner. It’s a salad I’ve been making for years, but this year, I made it a little better by using gorgonzola dolce, which is aged for less time than regular gorgonzola cheese, making it milder and softer; it goes especially well with pears.