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By sally, on August 29th, 2010
A few weekends ago Graham and I escaped the weird wintry cold of the Berkeley summer and went to check out the farm where our CSA box comes from. For several months we had been getting notices in our vegetable box about Saturday farm tours and decided the time was right to go and see where our food actually comes from.
So we drove a little over an hour north of here to our farm, which sits in a valley surrounded by beautiful rolling hills dotted with majestic oak trees. At the farm we enjoyed a picnic lunch while listening to a local band. We checked out some fig trees and said hello to a few farm animals before stepping on to the tram for the official tour. The tram that they had rigged up to a tractor took us to various parts of the farm—through some fields, past where they pack the CSA boxes, and finally to the huge tomato patch.
Apparently not everyone who comes to the farm gets to go to the tomato patch. Most are taken to another part of the farm where they can pick some greens and maybe an eggplant or two. But as it turns out the other part of the farm had been cleaned out by the last CSA delivery, so they took us to pick cherry tomatoes in the usually off-limits tomato patch.
According to our tour guide the patch is prime real estate for snakes, so it is not the best area for visitors. However, in order to give us the experience of picking something on the farm, they had been checking and clearing the area of snakes during the days before our visit. Feeling a little bit reassured, we carefully ventured into the patch and picked some gorgeous and oh so tasty cherry tomatoes.
With two baskets of cherry tomatoes from the farm and another two baskets that had been delivered the day before in our CSA box, we were in tomato heaven! One of the first things I thought to make with our bounty was a tomato, basil, and mozzarella salad—so simple, but yet so tasty. With another basket, I made a tomato sauce for pasta, and the rest went into a sauce for some eggplant croquettes that I’ll share the recipe for next week. On Friday, our CSA delivered another basket of tomatoes, so lucky for us the summer tomato fest will continue…
Tomato, Basil and Mozzarella Salad
1 basket of cherry tomatoes, cut in half
10-15 fresh basil leaves, sliced into strips
8oz fresh mozzarella cheese, cut in bite-sized pieces
olive oil
salt and pepper
In a large bowl, mix together the tomatoes, basil, and mozzarella. Drizzle with a few tablespoons of olive oil and season with salt and pepper.
Tasty Easy Healthy Green Recipe Ratings:
| Recipe Report Card |
Notes About Recipe Ratings |
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Tasty Rating
Four Chefs (Delicious!)
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The key to this super simple and delicious recipe is fresh ingredients. Of course it doesn’t hurt to have tomatoes picked from the vine the same day you make your salad! |
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Easy Rating
Five Easy Chairs (Just Press Cook!)
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A little bit of chopping and mixing and your done! |
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Healthy Rating
Three Apples (Average Nutritional Quality)
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Although I could probably eat this salad every day, it is probably not a good idea. Mozzarella is lower in fat than other cheeses, but you end up eating a good amount of it in this salad. |
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Green Rating
Four Leaves (Mother Earth Approved)
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The tomatoes and basil were both from the farm and the mozzarella and olive oil were organic. |
By sally, on August 22nd, 2010
I’ve heard it said before that eating pimientos de padrón (or padrón peppers) is like playing a game of Russian roulette—you never know how spicy a pepper is going to be until you take a bite. Yep, some of these little guys are spicy and some are not. In my experience most of them tend to be on the milder side, but every once and a while you’ll get one with a real kick.
Preparing padrón peppers is super easy, but finding the actual peppers can be a challenge. They show up at our farmers market from time to time, but when I went last Friday they were already sold out. Luckily I ran into some of these illusive peppers at a local grocery store though.
I’m not sure how easy padrón peppers are to find outside of the San Francisco Bay Area, but if you are fortunate enough to come across some, give this simple and fun recipe a try!
Pimientos de Padrón
- 1 cup padrón peppers
- olive oil
- flaky sea salt
Heat a skillet over medium-high heat. When the skillet is hot, add enough olive oil to cover the bottom of the pan. Allow the olive oil to heat up for a few minutes and then add the peppers. Cook until the pepper skins begin to blister and brown, stirring occasionally. The peppers can char quickly, so watch them carefully. Once the peppers are done, remove them from the pan and sprinkle them with flaky sea salt.
Tasty Easy Healthy Green Recipe Ratings:
| Recipe Report Card |
Notes About Recipe Ratings |
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Tasty Rating
Four Chefs (Delicious!)
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Most of these peppers have a lovely mild flavor and are very tasty browned in olive oil and topped with a little salt. |
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Easy Rating
Five Easy Chairs (Just Press Cook!)
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Very easy recipe. Just be careful not to let the peppers char too much. |
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Healthy Rating
Four Apples (Healthy, Wealthy, and Wise)
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If you are not too excessive with the oil and salt, these peppers are not damaging. |
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Green Rating
Four Leaves (Mother Earth Approved)
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The peppers were local and organic and the olive oil was organic. The salt has a label that says it is an organic food federation approved product, but it was produced in England. |
By sally, on August 15th, 2010
Let’s talk about herbs—fresh herbs. I have mixed feelings when it comes to fresh herbs. On the one hand, I love them—they can add zest and zip to all sorts of dishes. On the other hand they kind of scare me. Sometimes I feel unsure about the quantity of herbs I should add to dishes. How much is too much? I’m also a little insecure when it comes to which herbs go well together. Can you mix together thyme, sage, rosemary, and dill and still end up with something edible?
Because my love for fresh herbs trumps my fear, I recently decided to be bolder with my use of herbs (receiving a gift of several large bunches of fresh herbs, also forced me to be a little bolder). I’ve been throwing fresh herbs into all sorts of dishes and experimenting with different quantities and mixtures and to date we’ve loved the results.
One of our favorite recent “herby” recipes was for biscuits. These biscuits were an experiment to see what happened when I added large quantities of several types of fresh herbs together. What ended up happening was something fantastic! The chubby little biscuits were bursting with zesty herb and savory cheese flavor. Just thinking about them makes my mouth water! Why not give them a try and experiment with your own herb mixture?
Fresh Herb and Cheese Biscuits
Adapted from Food Network’s Down Home with the Neelys
For the cheese, I used a mixture of pecorino and manchego cheeses, because that’s what I had on hand. Feel free to mix up the recipe with different cheese or a different mixture of herbs. The fresh dill was delightful though…
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary
- 1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme
- 1 tablespoon chopped fresh dill
- 1 tablespoon chopped fresh oregano
- 3/4 cup grated cheese
- ½ cup milk
- ½ cup non-fat Greek yogurt
- 2 tablespoons butter, melted (optional)
Preheat the oven to 350°. In a large bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, salt, sugar, and cayenne pepper. Fold in the herbs and cheese and then add in the milk and yogurt. Mix together until everything is just incorporated.
Using a large spoon, scoop out dough and place onto a parchment paper lined baking pan (or lightly oiled baking pan). Brush the top of the biscuits with a little melted butter. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until the biscuits are golden brown.
Tasty Easy Healthy Green Recipe Ratings:
| Recipe Report Card |
Notes About Recipe Ratings |
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Tasty Rating
Four Chefs (Delicious!)
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The fresh herb and cheese mixture was a winning combination! |
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Easy Rating
Four Easy Chairs (ABC, Easy as 123…)
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A super simple and very quick recipe. If you are a fast herb chopper, you could have fresh biscuits in 30 minutes or less. |
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Healthy Rating
Two Apples (Surgeon General’s Warning!)
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This recipe could be made healthier with some whole-wheat flour. The cheese and butter topping add some saturated fat to the mix as well. |
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Green Rating
Four Leaves (Mother Earth Approved)
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The herbs were all local and organic and with the exception of the cheese, most of the remaining ingredients were organic. |
By sally, on August 8th, 2010
We’ve got zucchini coming out of our ears! Well maybe it’s not that bad, but lately we have had a steady stream of zucchini coming in our CSA box. It started with just one or two small zucchini in the box and now we are getting five or six large ones. If we were zucchini lovers this won’t be a problem, but unfortunately zucchini doesn’t top our list of favorite vegetables.
However, since we try not to let vegetables go to waste, I’ve been trying to find recipes that use up a lot of zucchini but do not result in tasteless mush on a plate. So I’ve been hiding zucchini in cookies, under cheese and with today’s recipe, in pancakes!
Pancakes happen to be one of Graham’s favorite foods, but I think he was a little leery of having zucchini pollute the pancake batter. Nevertheless, in the end both of us thought the pancakes were good and we’re happy that the taste and texture of zucchini did not come through in the cakes. While I can’t see myself running out and buying zucchini to make this recipe again, it is a good option if more zucchini happen to come our way.
Turkish Zucchini Pancakes
Adapted from Bon Appétit, January 1996
The original recipe calls for about 2/3 of a cup fresh dill and parsley. I had chives and a little sage on hand, so I used that instead. To serve, top the pancakes with a little garlic yogurt sauce (Graham also liked a little mustard as a topping—but I’m not so sure).
- 3 medium zucchini (roughly 1 lb), shredded
- 1 cup chopped green onions
- 4 eggs, lightly beaten
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon pepper
- 1/2 cup flour
- 6-7 sage leaves, minced
- 2 tablespoons chopped chives
- 1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese
- 1/3 cup chopped walnuts
- olive oil
Garlic Yogurt Sauce:
- 2/3 cup low fat Greek yogurt
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- salt and pepper
Mix shredded zucchini with about ½ teaspoon of salt and place in a colander. Let the zucchini drain for about 20-30 minutes and then transfer the zucchini to some paper towels. Wrap the zucchini in the towels and squeeze out remaining liquid.
In a large bowl, mix together zucchini, green onions, eggs, and salt and pepper. Slow mix in the flour and continue stirring until it is well incorporated. Fold in the herbs, cheese and walnuts.
Heat a few tablespoons of olive oil in a large skillet. When oil is hot, drop heaping tablespoons of the batter several inches apart in the pan. Fry until golden on one side and flip the pancakes and fry the other side until golden (about 3 minutes per side). Transfer pancakes onto a baking sheet and keep warm in the oven.
For the yogurt topping, mix together the yogurt, garlic, salt and pepper in a small bowl.
Tasty Easy Healthy Green Recipe Ratings:
| Recipe Report Card |
Notes About Recipe Ratings |
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Tasty Rating
Three Chefs (Average Tastiness)
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Graham and I are not zucchini lovers, so we thought this recipe was good, but not great. We were also a little divided on the walnuts in the recipe. Graham thought there were too many, but I thought they added a nice flavor and crunch to the pancakes. |
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Easy Rating
Three Easy Chairs (Average Difficult)
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Not a super difficult recipe, but it does take sometime to prep the vegetables. |
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Healthy Rating
Three Apples (Average Nutritional Quality)
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These pancakes do have a lot of zucchini and onions, but they are pan fried and have added fat from the feta cheese. |
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Green Rating
Five Leaves (Absolute Green)
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The zucchini, eggs and herbs were local and organic and most of the other ingredients were organic. |
By sally, on July 31st, 2010
I was lucky enough to have one of my best friends, Lisa, come up to visit and help me celebrate my birthday last weekend. She and I have been friends since before we could talk and have kept in touch ever since, even though we’ve often been living in different cities and even sometimes different time zones…!
While Lisa was here we reminisced about old times and laughed about how much influence we had on each other growing up—we liked to play the same games, wear the same clothes, both had a big crush on Brad Pitt (maybe still do!), and we even liked and disliked the same food. Since I am a tad bit older than Lisa, I like to joke that she was the one always copying me.
But Lisa really did copy me when it came to tomatoes. I think she probably happily ate them as a little girl, until I started telling her just how gross they were. Yes, I had a strong dislike for tomatoes growing up—I would even say that I hated tomatoes. Tomato sauces didn’t seem to be a problem, since I inhaled pizza and ketchup. I did, however, pick out every chunk of fresh tomato from my food and for years wouldn’t eat sliced tomatoes in my sandwiches. Lisa, of course, did the same.
Over the year’s my taste in food has changed and apparently so have Lisa’s. We both now really like tomatoes. My mom always said that would happen—one day we would realize that we liked tomatoes and regret all the years that we wouldn’t eat them. I can’t speak for Lisa, but I wouldn’t say that I really regret not eating them. I certainly do take advantage of the opportunity to eat them now though.
I was even excited when several tomatoes came in our CSA box recently. Along with the tomatoes there was a cucumber and red bell pepper—a perfect combination for gazpacho! If you haven’t tried gazpacho, it is a chilled soup that is usually made from raw vegetables. I’ve had a few different types of gazpacho and the ones I like best have a spicy kick to them. If you also like some spice, give the gazpacho recipe below a try…
Spicy Gazpacho Soup
Adapted from Real Simple, July 2010
I love gazpacho with lots of garnish, so I saved a few cucumber and pepper pieces for topping. I also added a little diced avocado and a few croutons as garnishes.
- 3 medium tomatoes
- 1 small zucchini
- 1 small cucumber
- 1 small red bell
- 1 can (4 oz) of green chilies
- juice from half a lime
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- salt and pepper
Roughly chop the tomatoes, zucchini, cucumber and bell pepper. Put the chopped vegetable into a blender and add the chilies, lime juice, and olive oil. Blend until smooth and add salt and pepper to taste.
Tasty Easy Healthy Green Recipe Ratings:
| Recipe Report Card |
Notes About Recipe Ratings |
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Tasty Rating
Four Chefs (Delicious!)
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Cool and refreshing with a little spicy kick—just the way I like it! |
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Easy Rating
Four Easy Chairs (“ABC, Easy as 123…”!)
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Not much to it, just chop a little and blend. |
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Healthy Rating
Five Apples (My Body is My Temple!)
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The soup is all vegetable goodness with just a little bit of olive oil. Careful though—too many non-vegetable garnishes can decrease the health rating. |
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Green Rating
Four Leaves (Mother Earth Approved)
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The only thing that keeps this green rating from being a five is the little can of chilies and the lime. All of the vegetables were local and organic. |
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