Wednesday Night, Golden Winter Soup

Produce Box:
Butternut Squash
Leeks
Potatoes

On hand:
Chicken Stock
Organic Cream from Trader Joe's
Gruyere
Fresh Bread

This is something we have made, and enjoyed, before. We saved it for the last day of the week for our produce bin since the squash doesn't spoil as fast as other items.

Monday Night, Ukranian Red Borscht Soup

Our produce box was filled with heaps, and I mean HEAPS of beets. They were beautiful, but I hate beets. What to do with beets?

Michelle suggested her Ukranian Red Borscht Soup. We are grateful she did, because - wow, it was tasty.



From produce box:



Beets

Carrots

Potatoes

Onion



On hand:

Dill

Tomato Paste

Diced Tomatoes

Garlic



Run to the store:

Sour cream

Cabbage

Saturday Lunch, Whole Wheat Rotini, Romanesco Broccoli, and Cannelini Beans

That THING that I thought was a haphazardly discarded stump in our produce box was actually THIS. (Thank you Kristin!) Romanesco Broccoli!

Here is the photo I took when it arrived (taken with my iPhone, which has the eyesight of a mole in the dark).

It was green and spiky and most people told me it was a biological weapon, or kryptonite, or solient green - but no, it is more like the love child of a broccoli and cauliflower, with spikes.

It is also very, very tasty.

Produce box:

romanesco broccoli

on hand:

whole wheat rotini

garlic

olive oil

asiago cheese, grated

red pepper flakes

basil, about a handful, roughly chopped

cannelini beans, drained

Cut the leaves off the broccoli and place in a pot of salted water (try as I might the dern thing kept floating, so good for you if you can cover the thing with water, but I gave up). I boiled it for ten minutes with a lid on the pot.

Remove with a slotted spoon and chop into pieces, throwing out the tough remaining pieces of stalk.



Set aside. Add the pasta to the same pot of water and follow directions on box. Drain pasta and set aside. In a separate pan saute 1 Tbsp. garlic with a teaspoon red pepper flakes until garlic is slightly brown. Pour onto pasta, add basil, romanesco broccoli pieces, cannelini beans. Serve topped with grated asiago cheese.

Friday Night, Vegetable Stir Fry

Items from Produce Box,

broccoli, stems removed
carrots, julienned
green beans, sliced
mushrooms

On hand:
jasmine rice, from Trader Joe's
japanese miso dressing, a Christmas gift from my friend Lindsay
ginger
chopped organic garlic, from New Season's
pepper

My toddler ate this, which is surprising since she typically shuns any rice item that is not artificially flavored.

I steamed the vegetables for about 5 minutes, then dumped them all into our wok and cooked them over medium high until tender and a bit crispy - while they cooked I added 1 tsp garlic, 3 tablespoons miso dressing, 1 tbs. ginger, and pepper to taste.

It is a fairly light meal, but we try to eat two meals a week that don't have meat - so this works for us.

Thursday Night, Chicken Noodle Soup

From the produce box:

carrots

celery

On hand:

organic chopped garlic from New Seasons

1.5 lb organic chicken from Safeway

thyme (it grows in the window seal)

organic large lemons from Safeway

1 Qt. organic free range chicken broth from New Seasons

fine egg noodles

This recipe would probably be better with an entire chicken, but since I did NOT PLAN the only whole chicken I have is frozen.

Instructions:

I sear the chicken on medium high heat with pepper, 1 T chopped fresh Thyme, about 1 T of the garlic, and 2 T olive oil until it starts to turn brown on both sides.

Then I add the broth scraping up the brown bits and reduce the heat to medium.

Next I finally chop the celery and carrots. Oh, the carrots!

They are beautful and rainbow, and the celery has dirt on it still and tastes so celery-like. I add those to the pot and simmer, helping the chicken come apart with a fork.

I add water to cover the vegetables, return it to a bowl and then add the egg noodles and the jice from the lemon. I season with remaining thyme and pepper (we use alot of pepper).

I simmer for an hour over medium-low.

Success!

loads of colors and a mystery

Oh, how magical the days are when boxes of food appear on your door. I don't have to go anywhere, I can even scratch personal hygeine completely off my list and STILL they show up.


First, the dairy order - Wednesdays via Noris Dairy.


Easier of the two boxes because eggs, cheese, butter, and sour cream are already staples that don't throw off our normal meal plans.

Still, I had to be a bit creative with the organic ground beef since we rarely eat red meat AT ALL much less in the ground form. (We had tacos. F for creativity I KNOW).

Then Thursdays we have THIS. ALL SORTS OF FUN PRODUCE LOOT!

And this is where I get OCD. I meal plan. Obsessively. Over and over and over and over again. I make a meal plan, then I revise it to make it better. As if anyone but me really cares. Alas, with a delivery of surprise produce I CANNOT plan. It is sadly INCREDIBLY exciting. And sadly very frightening to me.

So, I wait for a suprise box, and then my challenge is to make it through the week using it up and actually feeding my family.

This week our box contained:

Potatoes

An onion

Leeks

A bunch of celery

Beets

Colorful carrots

Assorted Apples

Butternut Squash

Pears

Mushrooms

Broccoli

2 large heads of lettuce

A handful of tangerines

2 Avocados

And an alien looking growth type vegetable thing.

Green Beans

A bag of assorted greens.

I am fairly certain I can compose three or more meals out of all of this. But, I am at a loss as what to do with BEETS? And the alien green spiky vegetable? Rapini maybe?

resolutions and front door surprises

When Andrew and I were in Toronto we pledged that when we moved to Arizona we were going to kick-start this healthy living regimine. We were going to eat healthy, balanced, and organic. We were going to cut out caffeine (bahahhahahaha) and work harder on fitness.

Well, when we got to Arizona we were stunned to realize that produce in Arizona is EXPENSIVE. Organic produce? Really, really expensive. We just couldn't afford it, and thus the entire pledge fell away only to rear it's head briefly around the New Year, every New Year. Again. And Again. And again.

We aren't total failures at healthy living. In fact, I happen to think we do a pretty good job. We eat fairly balanced with the largest portion of our diets being vegetables and fruits. We eat local whenever we can, and we make smart choices.

Still, we could be better and this year I took our resolution seriously and started doing some research.

Two things are our biggest obstacles. 1. Our weekly grocery budget. 2. Planning becomes harder when certain foods aren't always available.

The above poorly constructed paragraphs are all to tell you that we signed up for two deliveries. The first is a box of organic produce delivered weekly by Organics to You. After reviewing our grocery list, I think this box's price is close to what we already spend on produce. The difference is that I don't really know what I am getting every week, so that eliminates meal planning. I am really anxious about this. More so than I should be, but I keep telling myself that dinner will now be MORE ADVENTURE LESS TRADITION! The other service is a local farm that makes deliveries at no charge. They also come weekly with organic butter, milk, yogurt, eggs, cheeses, and beef. This is the biggest effect on our budget - but if we make eliminate other items on our list (spaghetti sauce, sweet-n-low), we should be able handle this as well.

This brings me to a question? Internet, how much money do you spend on groceries every week? How many mouths do you feed?