Thursday, June 04, 2009

More tasty foods

I’m going to try and not gloat too much in my experience of the incredibly fresh and delicious food we get out of this farm, but it will be hard. Especially right now, as we’re just starting to see a bunch of things come into their own, ready for harvesting and eating. I’ll certainly be curious over the course of the season to see how certain foods really shine when eaten perfectly fresh, right out of the ground even, compared to how they usually taste after some time spent being trucked here and there and then laying in a bin at the supermarket. Of course, some foods keep very well and if you have a good quality source there shouldn’t really be any difference. And of course the subjective psychological difference of having helped to grow it can’t be ignored either.

But so far the food I’ve tried is pretty tasty. Today we pulled out a few of the ‘easter egg’ radishes that had grown to their full size and munched on them right there in field five, marveling in how sweet and rich and spicy (very spicy!) they were, and in their playful array of colors. Likewise, the arugula was delicious, pungent and full-flavored without being overwhelming (which it sometimes is for me). The strawberries I’ve already mentioned, and these have become a daily ritual at our snack time mid-morning. Touring the greens field this morning, the mustard greens were very tasty, as was the broccoli raab (which we won’t harvest for a while, until they start growing their little flower heads). Yesterday at lunch Eric made an unusual salad of bok choi, strawberries and toasted almonds, which I enjoyed quite a bit.

I suppose that soon enough I’ll be eating enough of this stuff every day that I won’t feel the need to write about every new taste experience, but right now this is very exciting for me. Next week we’ll also be harvesting something referred to as ‘salad turnips’, which I am told are delicious. I haven’t been converted to turnips yet, but I’m assured these are special, and quite different.

Anyway, I hope that all of you are getting some good, tasty and healthy food in you as well. Peace and love to everybody.

2 comments:

Nick said...

mmmm... radishes check, arugula check, .... franny has been making a goat cheese arugula salad with emmer farro, radishes, and candied pecans ... a strange sounding mix but really tasty, radishes and arugula from our garden. We are overflowing with greens at the moment. Best spinach harvest we have ever had. (she's made two batches of spanakopita)

Oh and BTW the mystery plant was none other than parsnips .... which I did not even know franny planted. I take partial blame for not knowing what mache looks like and saying that's what it was ... unfortunately we let it sit too long and it got woody, otherwise it was a really tasty root veggie.

Brian Kenney said...

Awesome. I'm really into our radishes right now, and I haven't even gotten around to putting them in a salad yet. Just eating them up.

Funny about parsnips. I pulled up a few parsnips left over from last season. They looked and smelled delicious but were definitely a little off, woody but also kind of flabby from having overwintered and probably haven frozen and thawed at least a couple of times.