Bittersweet bounty

This week was the last week for our vegetable csa pick up. If you remember last year, I am always very sad when it ends. My csa takes away the planning of veggies in my house. For a blissful five months, I barely have to buy veggies at all. Or think about what veggies I should buy. All I have to do is pick them up! Or pick them from the garden. :-)

Anyway, for the last few weeks (I can't believe I didn't think of this earlier! File under 'definitely will do next year!'), I have been buying the seconds from the farmer. And canning them! It has been so much work- overwhelming at times, depressing at others- but oh, so worth it!! And what a blessing.

My goal is to can 50 quarts of tomatoes every year. And every year I fall dissmally short. Last year, I may have gotten to 25 or thirty. The year before, I don't think I even broke twenty.

I haven't counted yet this year, but it is a lot. A.lot.

But Saturday I picked up the last of the season's seconds for a very reasonable price, and now I am throws of the last canning of the season. It is a blessing. And sad, too, knowing there won't be fresh tomatoes again until next july.

So here are some pictures of my kitchen and my tomatoes. And now, back to my regularly scheduled programming: canning.

:-)

Green Bean Casserole

We keep getting green beans from our CSA.  Green beans seem easy enough.  My small problem-- my husband doesn't like green beans.  Not steamed up with butter and salt, anyway.  Usually when I get them, I will wash, cut and freeze them for soups in the winter.  Vegetable soup is a favorite at our house, and we eat it almost every week in the winter.

Well, tonight, I had TWO bags of green beans in my fridge (from last week and this week)... my in-laws were coming for a visit, and I (1) needed to use up my green beans and (2) needed to cook more food than usual.

I really like green bean casserole, but I don't use condensed soups OR those crunchy delicious onion thingys any more.  But, I had a hankering for green bean casserole. Oh, and did I mention that it was already 5 o'clock?  The rest of dinner was slated to be done around 5:45, so I needed to come up with something quick.  Luckily, Chris rinsed and de-stemmed the beans earlier in the day, knowing that I was going to use them. :-)

A quick google search brought up "Grandma's Green Bean Casserole."  It was four or five down on the list, but it was the first one that didn't mention Campbell's. Also, it says 'Grandma' in the title, which makes me automatically trust it just a little bit more.

I adapted Grandma's Green Bean Casserole to fit my ingredients and my time frame, and this is what resulted:

Janet's Green Bean Casserole
4 cups fresh green beans
2 TBS olive oil
1/4 cup chopped onion
2 TBS flour
3/4 tsp salt
1 cup yogurt
panko bread crumbs

Wash, de-stem and cut green beans into 1-2 inch pieces.  Steam until desired doneness (about 10 minutes for nice and soft). While beans are cooking, heat a cast iron skillet (or any 8" pan with tall sides) with the olive oil in it. Chop onion. Add onion to the oil. When onions are soft, sprinkle flour in the pan and whisk until smooth. Sprinkle in the salt.  Add the cooked green beans and the yogurt.  Toss to combine evenly.  Sprinkle generously with panko bread crumbs.  Put the top on the pan, turn burner to low, and simmer until dinner is ready.

This casserole was simple, flavorful, and quick.  I like that it didn't go in the oven, taking extra time and heating the kitchen more.  Also, the kids liked it-- ate their beans with no complaints, and all the adults had seconds-- except Chris!  :-)

ps. if you noticed, the original recipe calls for shredded cheddar, which would have been pretty good, but I didn't want to do one more step!  And cheese makes a lot of things more delicious, but in my opinion, it wasn't even missed in this recipe.

pps. I recently bought my first bag of panko bread crumbs, and while they are rather processed, they are certainly much better than the crunchy onion thingys I mentioned earlier! I will definitely be using them from time to time in the future to add some extra crunch to our meals.

Garden Bounty

Why I love summer:

Okay, well one of the reasons I love summer anyway.  :-)  Most of this was picked tonight from our garden.  There are a few tomatoes from our CSA thrown in there (maybe four), but other than that, it's all homegrown!

ps. see that cute, tiny potato right out in front?!

Liquid Lunch

Today is so hot!  I wasn't particularly hungry at lunch, and we ate breakfast somewhat later than usual.  So, I took a tip that I got sometime last summer at Life In A Shoe, and I made us a smoothie for lunch.  I added things that I knew were healthy and would fill us up.

Yesterday we picked up our first CSA of the season, and I have lots of veggies to use now!

Our smoothie started with some beet greens (about a cup).  I have never used beet greens before, but I read someone's post on facebook who said she had sauteed them, so I thought, 'why not use them any way that I use spinach?' So, they went in our smoothie.  I saved some to saute too, because I want to try them. :-)

Next, I added ice cubes so when I buzzed it up, it would be cool and refreshing. Then I added two bananas.  They are filling and sweet, so I didn't add any sweetener!  For some staying protein, I added about 2TBS of peanut butter.  For deliciousness, I added a scant 2 TBS of cocoa powder, and I finished it off with about 2 cups of raw milk.

I swirled it all around, and it made about 4 cups of delicious smoothie.  I was worried the beet greens would make it unappetizing-- that they would have a very strong taste and the kids wouldn't go for it, but that didn't happen.

This was a great smoothie for a hot day.  I know my kids got some healthy things in them, and that they will not be hungry for awhile. I feel great after having greens for lunch-- not tired and ready for a nap-- at least not as much as I usually do!

What do you eat for lunch on a hot day?  Or do you just skip it all together?