Last weekend I was in San Diego for the grocery co-op conference. I got back, and now we’re leaving again for the librarians’ conference in New Orleans. Yesterday I took in Rach’s orphan produce ‘cuz she’s traveling a lot too – we had a smoothie made from her strawberries & a banana for breakfast this morning – and I froze the rest of the bananas. Tonight I’m trying to use or preserve the rest of what’s in the fridge. Mark picked up my CSA box last Thursday, and he & Ethan ate the strawberries that came in it. But the farmers’ market was “a blizzard of strawberries” according to Mark – I’m going to freeze the strawbs he got there. I made a big stir fry the other night, that was pretty good, asparagus, sugar snaps, carrots, squash, red onion, daikon radish, dried shitakes, mustard greens – but I didn’t quite get all the grit out of the asparagus. I picked all the mushrooms and sugar snaps out and ate them cold for an after-work snack. Now I need to go figure out what to do with chard, the remaining mustard greens, several types of lettuce and 2 summer squash – I think much if it will be going into veggie stock – and the last of that stir fry can probably get stocked, too.
I ended up having a salad with the oldest lettuce, some red romaine, topped with tuna and egg and I kept adding stuff – almonds & grated Parmesan, salt & pepper. That leaves two bunches in the fridge, to keep till next week. Sometimes it seems like if the lettuce is a bunch or a whole head, it keeps best if rather than washing it, you keep it intact – the outer leaves wilt & die, but they protect those nice tender core leaves that you can eat for a salad later on. I took the veggie drawers out of the fridge to wipe out as I emptied them and I thought I wasn’t going to get them back in. I had to take out the glass shelf that sits on top of the drawers, and the glass dropped out, but thankfully it didn’t break. I think/hope I got the fridge put back together right, now. I blanched the chard & mustard greens – they’ll probably wind up in a pasta, also next week. And I made a big batch of veggie stock, with parsley and a bunch of oregano, and baby carrots, and garlic scapes, and not sure what all else – smells good. I composted the gritty stirfry. Now I want ice cream with chocolate sauce.
