Friday, 29 October 2010

Stir Fry


My daughter wanted to take this photo because she thought it would look good on my blog - I think she is right! I quite often make stir fry with some of the veg from my bag but looking back I don't seem to have posted it before. This is from a couple of weeks ago so the contents of the bag have changed slightly since then. 

The carrots, cucumber and green pepper came from the veg bag, I think the red pepper probably came from Greenshoots - a charity using gardening to work with vulnerable adults, one of True Food Co-op's local suppliers.  Cucumber works really well in a stir fry and I always include it when I have some.

The tofu is 'Taifun' brand, smoked with almonds and sesame seeds. If I can be bothered I fry it up separately to get it nice a crisp. If not  it just goes in with the veg! I usually serve this with rice with thinly sliced pieces of omelet mixed in, something I learnt in Singapore when we briefly lived there when I was young. Boil/steam the rice as normal leave it to go completely cold before frying it up with the sliced omelet and chopped green part of spring onions if available. 

Friday, 15 October 2010

Pizza

Home-made pizza is a great way of getting kids (and adults!) to eat some more veg. This one had some green pepper and cherry tomatoes from the veg bag as well as some sun-dried tomatoes in olive oil for a bit of added luxury. 

The salad is also from the veg bag and is great full of peppery leaves. 



We make our own pizza bases in a bread maker which is a really easy way of doing it but still takes about 45 minutes plus 20 minutes proving time so not one for when you rush home late from work and need something quick.

Saturday, 25 September 2010

Veggie options

I haven' t posted this week but I have still been using the contents of my veg bag. Inspired by my guest on the radio show last week from Thames Valley Vegan & Vegetarians I decided to have a vegan Sunday dinner. I got the recipe for Mushroom Bourguignon from the Simple Vegan Recipes website here. It was very tasty but I made the mistake of taking them at their word that it served 2 so doubled the quantities and now have a freezer full of leftovers - maybe vegans have bigger appetites?


My other vegetarian meal this week was a very simple mid week pasta dish. I cooked some pasta stirred in a couple of tablespoons of pesto and some fresh tomatoes and sliced runner beans (raw) and cooked for a couple of minutes  to heat through - easy and delicious.

Sunday, 12 September 2010

Simon's Saffron Potatoes

We went to the grand opening of Fielder's Farm shop on the Pangbourne Road near Theale on Saturday. It was very busy, lots of seasonal UK veg and meat, pies, cakes chutney etc from local and regional producers - I hope they do well. We picked up some partridges for our evening meal. They were delicious pot roasted with a honey, lemon juice and thyme baste.

To go with them we had Simon's Saffron Potatoes - I say they are Simon's but we can't remember where we got the recipe  so apologies to any celebrity chef we may have ripped off. To make them, scrub but don't peel the potatoes, thinly slice  and arrange in baking tray trying to keep in shape of the potatoes. (see photo). Add a good pinch of saffron, a crushed garlic clove and veg stock up to about 2/3 the height of the potatoes. sprinkle with olive oil and put in oven. They seem to work in whatever temperature oven you are using for the rest of your dinner, yesterday 200 in a fan oven and they took about half an hour - just keep an eye on them.


We also had green and purple beans from the veg bag. Boiled with a small amount of water and a knob of butter they were delicious. Sadly the purple ones go green when you cook them!







 

Friday, 10 September 2010

Spaghetti Frittata

Spaghetti frittata is a good quick mid-week meal. Very useful on a Tuesday night when I have to rush out to take my daughter to ice-hockey training. Start by putting the spaghetti on and while it is cooking make a garlicky tomato sauce with whatever veg you want to add. For this one I added sliced courgette and a handful of chopped chard leaves. The chard went in for the last 5 minutes cooking time. The sauce should be quite thick so let it bubble to boil of any excess liquid.

When the spaghetti is cooked add some olive oil and leave it to cool before adding some beaten eggs and cheese to taste. We used 6 eggs for four people. Then put half the spaghetti mixture in a pan, the tomato sauce and then the rest of the spaghetti on top. Then comes the fun bit! When is brown on the bottom you need to turn it over. The best way is to put a plate on top, turn it over so that the frittata is on the plate and then slide it back into the pan. If you've got a heavy pan you may need an assistant at this stage.

We ate the leftovers last night with a collection of other things from the fridge that needed eating up. After going on a lovefoodhatewaste workshop I've learnt to call this meal 'Tapas' rather than 'bits', sounds so much more appealing!

Sorry about the lack of photos - I've mislaid my camera.

Sunday, 5 September 2010

Simple but still delicious

One of the things I love about getting a veg bag is the excitement of opening it on a Thursday to see what goodies I've got - it's like a mini Christmas every week. Of course the flip side to this is that it can make planning Thursday tea difficult. This week a stuck my neck out and bought some Mozzarella cheese and basil - surely I would get some tomatoes in the veg bag.

I opened the bag with some trepidation....of course I had a bag of lovely cherry tomatoes so I could make my salad. Very simple, slice cheese and tomatoes, throw basil leaves on top, sprinkle with olive oil and eat.

We also had three sweet corn cobs. These are fantastic. I always try and cook them on the day we get them, just boiled and smothered in butter. So there you have it the perfect tea, quick, easy, delicious and healthy (well apart from the butter!)

Saturday, 28 August 2010

Runner Bean Puree Bruschetta

Just got back from a few days with my Dad on his small holding in Anglesey. We have been eating very well including a huge brunch before we set off home so really didn't feel like much this evening. While we were away I saw a recipe for runner bean puree in the Times. We had a bag of runner beans in the fridge from last week's veg bag but I couldn't remember the recipe and am too mean to pay to go on the Times on-line so we made it up.

We steamed the beans until tender and then whizzed to a puree with a blender. I think we would have added garlic at this stage but we didn't have any. We sliced some red onions and fried them until soft in some olive oil. The bruschetta was a thick slice of bread toasted on both sides and then brushed with oil from a jar of anchovies piled with the bean puree, onions, halved cherry tomatoes, a couple of anchovies and put back until the grill.

Yum - just want we needed after a few days of excess.

Sunday, 22 August 2010

Borough Market Feast

We had a great day out yesterday at Borough Market and came back with lots of goodies. For our dinner last night we had fried slices of giant puff ball mushroom on toasted sour dough bread - both bought at the market. Followed by Ostrich steaks with local wild mushrooms including Cep (Porcini) which my brother-in-law Jon collected from a local wood. (Exact location is of course a closely guarded secret!)

To go with it we had crushed new potatoes, using the potatoes from the veg bag. Wash the potatoes and boil them for about 10 minutes or until almost cooked. Put them in a baking tray and crush them with a rolling pin. Don't be too heavy handed, the idea is to break them up not make mashed potato. Then sprinkle with olive oil and rosemary and cook in  a hot oven (220c) for about 30 minutes or until they are cooked and crispy.

We also had the chard from the veg bag and at Jon's suggestion left it raw. I'd never thought of eating chard raw before but it was very good. Fresh tasting with crunchy stalks.

Thursday, 19 August 2010

Good to be home!

I had a great holiday in the South of France gorging on fresh apricots, peaches and nectarines. I gorged on other things too, cheese, sausisson, wine, tarts....so I walked to pick up my bag yesterday in an attempt to burn off a few of the excess calories. 

We may not have peaches growing on the side of the road but we still have some great produce in this country. I had two bags of cherry tomatoes - including some yellow ones, a lettuce, chard, spring onions, potatoes, runner beans, courgettes and a green pepper. Wow it's good to be home!

I made a couscous  - 300 ml dried couscous  in a measuring jug then topped up to 600ml with boiling water. Leave a lid on for 5 minutes then  tip into a bowl, fluff with a fork and leave to go cold. Add couple tablespoons olive oil, juice of one lemon, chopped tomatoes, spring onions and cucumber. Fresh parsley would be nice but didn't have any so added a teaspoon of Za'atar (a Palestinian herb mix). 

Those of you paying attention will have noticed there was no cucumber in my veg bag but the one I had was local. It came from Ashtrees Farm in South Oxfordshire, one of True Food's suppliers.


Tuesday, 27 July 2010

Baba Ganoush

No I didn't get aubergines in my veg bag. We we went to the Food Festival at Elm Farm a couple of weeks ago and went to a salting and smoking workshop. One of the things they showed us how to make was putting an aubergine directly on your barbecue or gas hob leaving it until the skin is completely charred and then using the flesh to make baba ganoush. It was delicious and we decided we couldn't wait for aubergines to come into season. My justification for blogging about it here is that the cherry tomatoes and courgettes we barbecued with it did come from the veg bag.   

Baba ganoush is one of those dishes that there are lots of different variations of. The one we were shown and tried to recreate was simply  mashed aubergine with garlic, olive oil, salt and pepper and Greek yoghurt.  Ours was a too garlicky for my taste, the recipe was one clove of garlic per aubergine but our aubergines were a bit small and our garlic cloves big!

One useful tip was when the aubergine is cooked put it in a plastic bag for a few minutes and it makes it easier to get the skin off.

I'm off to France for a couple of weeks enjoying lots of lovely fresh local French food. This is a difficult time for farmers supplying veg bags as people go on ho lidayand there is always the risk they might not re-start their order when they get back. I definitely will!

Thursday, 22 July 2010

Local Lunch


I haven't blogged this week not because I haven't been using the produce in my veg bag but I haven't done anything new with it. 

I've also been busy with a new food project. I'm presenting  a show about local food on Reading's new community radio station Reading4U. It is called Local Lunch and goes out live on Thursdays 12.00 - 14.00 (UK time).   I play music and talk about what's in season, local food events and interview someone involved with local food around Reading. This week my guest was Sharon Fitton who is coordinator of a project called food4families, which helps people grow their own food.

The radio station is currently only available over the internet - we are hoping to get a broadcast licence soon. It does mean that you can listen to the show from wherever you are in the world just go here and then click on 'listen live now'.

My seasonal recipe on the show today was pancetta and broad bean risotto but I didn't want to post another broad bean risotto recipe here. If you are on facebook there is a fanpage Local Lunch.   The lovely carrots in the profile photo are from my veg bag! My guests get the added bonus of sharing my lunch so if you know anyone who would make a good guest of if you would like to come on yourself then let me know.

Monday, 12 July 2010

Helen's veg bag minestrone soup

The contents of my fridge suggested a minestrone soup  so I did a quick search for a recipe. There are thousands of variations on-line so I decided that my recipe was as valid as anyone else's. So here it is - one more to add to the thousands!

Serves 4 -5

1 onion

2 carrots

1 clove garlic

1 head of fennel

teaspoon dried oregano

1/2 tin tomatoes

handful of cherry tomatoes

750g broad beans (about 200g when podded)

75g wholewheat spaghetti

1 litre veg stock

Some tinned pitted black olives

fresh basil

(Broad beans, onion and carrots from the veg bag, fennel from The Kitchen Garden in Littlestoke via True Food Co-op))

- chop the onions and carrots in a food processor and fry gently in some olive oil

- Add crushed garlic, thinly sliced fennel  and oregano and continue cooking for a few minutes

- Add the tinned tomatoes, halved cherry tomatoes and stock.

- After about 1/2 an hour add the spaghetti

- 5 minutes later add the shelled broad beans and olives

- once the spaghetti and beans are cooked stir in some fresh basil and serve with Parmesan cheese.

Just a note on the broad beans, because I wanted to cook them in the soup I took off the inner skins before adding them. This was very time consuming!  What I normally do is cook the beans and then take off the skins which is much easier. I think if I made this again I would boil the beans separately, take off the skins and then add them to the soup. The photo shows a broad bean before and after taking off the inner skin. If you do want to do it when they are raw I found the best way was to hold it by the stalk bit (on the bottom of the bean in the photo) nick the other end with my thumb nail and then squeeze the bean out. 

 

Saturday, 10 July 2010

Onions

I had a beautiful bunch of onions in my veg bag this week. I was listening to Gardeners Question time a couple of weeks ago and they were saying that onions this year have very thick necks. You can see from the photo that the ones  I've got do have thick necks almost like large spring onions.

That is one of the things I love about getting a veg bag - you get things as they come out of the ground they are not discarded because they don't meet the supermarkets idea of what consumers want.

Inspired by my bunch I searched for onion recipes and found a whole website dedicated to all things oniony run by the British Onion Producers' Association. Did you know that onions are supposed be an aphrodisiac? Egyptian Pharaohs' celibate priests were forbidden to eat onions because of the potential effects on their libido! I tried their recipe for falafel and while they were very tasty I had my usual problem with falafel that they don't hold together and I end up with a general mush. If anyone has had any success with making falafel then please let me in on your secret.

Thursday, 1 July 2010

Carrots Galore

We had a bit of a carrot glut this week, not only did I have some old ones left over from previous weeks'  veg bags and some lovely new ones in this week's but my mother-in-law has gone on holiday and emptied her fridge into ours including ... more carrots.

The mission was to use carrots and we did well out of it. Saturday night we had different salads including a carrot one. This was grated carrots with an olive oil vinaigrette and the addition of sunflower seeds and roasted cumin seeds. We had the oven on for the quiche to go with the salads so popped the cumin seeds in for a couple of minutes - if the oven wasn't on I'd have done them in a dry pan or under the grill. 

I forgot to take a photo and as you can see there wasn't much left at the end!


The new carrots we roasted whole with a sprinkling of olive oil, some garlic cloves and more cumin seeds to go with our Sunday dinner roast shoulder of lamb. 

Saturday, 26 June 2010

Broad Beans


I was very excited to find broad beans in my bag this week. I love everything about them, the process of podding them, the fresh smell, the beautiful pale green colour and the delicate taste. I was busy on Friday night so I decided to make myself a quick broad bean risotto before rushing off to a meeting and then to the pub. It ended up taking a bit longer than I anticipated and I was a bit late for my meeting but "sorry I'm late, I was waiting for my broad bean risotto to cook" is a pretty good excuse in my book!

We had some frozen homemade chicken stock so I decided to use that which had the added advantage of making space in the freezer. We are pretty good at freezing left overs so as not to waste anything but at some point you have to use them. I made a risotto with arborio rice, just adding an onion, some black pepper and a slug of cider vinegar. The vinegar went in after adding the rice and before adding any other liquid and it added a lovely sharp taste to the risotto. I boiled a handful of frozen peas and a similar amount of podded broad beans. They were so small and fresh that I didn't need to take off the outer skins. They only needed 3 minutes cooking - in fact 2 would probably have been enough but the peas weren't ready. 

When they were cooked I mixed them into the risotto with some fresh herbs (chives, parsley and basil - just what I  happened to have available). Delicious!


Thursday, 24 June 2010

Shopping miles

My veg bag is delivered to a local neighbourhood rep and we then have to go and pick it up from there. This reduces food transport miles and is part of Tolhurst Organics minimising their carbon footprint. Reducing overall food miles though relies on customers using sustainable transport to pick up their vegetables. We are all used to worrying about food miles but forget that the distance we travel from home to do our shopping can be a significant component of food miles. Ac cording to the cabinet office report, Food Matters, 13% of the carbon emissions caused by food transport are accounted for by consumer vehicles. 

So how do I pick up my veg bag? It used to be easy as it was on my cycle route home but since starting a new job I don't work Thursdays and  have to make a special effort to collect it.  It is 0.9 of a mile from my house to my local rep (I just checked on Google Maps!) so not too much of an effort. Usually I cycle, either with my bike trailer or just stuffing it all into a rucksack. If I'm feeling like I need the exercise I walk. For the last three weeks I've been covering for holidays so I've been working Thursdays and have picked up the bag in the work van. It does seem a little extravagant to arrive in a refrigerated transit van to pick up one bag of veg but it is on my way home - honest!



Monday, 21 June 2010

Beetroot Tzatziki


More lovely beetroot. This week I made some beetroot tzatziki. I got the recipe from a fantastic book I was given for my birthday. Its called Forgotten Skills of Cooking by Darina Allen. It tells you how to make your own butter, hang game and make your own chorizo. I haven't done any of these things I'm afraid! It also has some straight forward recipes like this tzatziki, although it was supposed to be something you did with your home-made yoghurt. 

It was very easy, just mix together all the ingredients and chill. I was a bit worried about grating cooked beetroot, I changed into some old clothes before I started, but wasn't too bad in the end. The end result was a beautiful bright pink colour.

110g beetroot, cooked and grated 

8 tablespoons natural yoghurt

2 tablespoons fresh mint, chopped

salt, pepper and pinch of caster sugar

Monday, 14 June 2010

Carrot muffins


Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall had a selection of savoury muffin recipes in the Guardian a couple of weeks ago. They all looked delicious but as I had some carrots in the veg bag I thought I'd give the carrot and spinach ones a try. You can see the recipe here. I didn't get any Spinach in my veg bag but I managed to buy some local spinach from True Food Co-op.

They looked great but weren't 100% successful. My fault, no reflection on the recipe. I forgot the salt which I think they did lack although I wouldn't have used the 1 1/2 teaspoons the recipe said. I also didn't add the seeds as I didn't have any. The main problem I had was that I couldn't get them to cook properly. The recipe said stick a cocktail stick in them and if it comes out clean they are ready. Mine never got to the clean cocktail stick stage even when the tops were almost too hard to get the stick through. In the end I took them out of the oven and they did firm up when they cooled so maybe I was applying the criteria a bit too strictly. I also had a mini muffin pan but normal size muffin cases so I wondered if that might make a difference to the way they cooked. 

Having said all this they were tasty and I'll definitely try them again with the salt, seeds and smaller muffin cases (or a bigger pan!)

 

Monday, 31 May 2010

Beetroot Is Back

There isn't much of the year when you can't get UK grown beetroot but the last few months have been beetroot free. I must say by January I find it hard to get inspired by the weekly beetroot but it is always exciting when the first new ones arrive. These looked prettier when they first arrived as they had the stalks and leaves attached. I cut them off because apparently they keep better without them. You can use the leaves in salads but they don't keep long.


I decided to make a classic beetroot, walnut and goats cheese salad except I substituted a local sheep's cheese, Wigmore, that is soft like a Camembert but with a more tangy taste. I scrubbed and then boiled them (don't peel them until after they're cooked or the colour drains out). The very tiny ones only took 15 minutes but the larger ones about 30. Once they were cooked and cooled I sliced and put them on some peppery rocket that also came in the veg bag. I drizzled them with a dressing made with a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar and 2 tablespoons olive oil. The cheese and toasted walnuts were then just sprinkled on top.

I found a good blog with a posting about beetroot (or beets - it's American) while looking for ideas. I particularly like the advice about not calling the doctor the first time you go to the loo after eating beetroot!

Friday, 28 May 2010

Onions and Cook Books


I had some onions in the veg bag this week. According to the Tolhurst Organic website they are bought in but must be from the UK as they don't import any of the veg. They were an unusual shape - slightly flattened. They smelt gorgeous really fresh so I used one last night in a stir fry - the Dutch ones I had in the cupboard could wait. 

I thought I photo of some onions wasn't very exciting so I'd give you a nose at some of my cook books. These are the smarter hardback ones the more dog-eared paperbacks are in the kitchen.

Sunday, 23 May 2010

Using the bean sprouts 2

It had to be a BBQ in this lovely weather and that gave me a chance to use the punnet of bean sprouts that came in the veg bag as an accompaniment . These are not the bean sprouts you have with Chinese food they are the sort you get if you sprout your own beans so you get the bean and the sprout. These were a mixture of lentils, chickpeas and other beans. I looked up a few recipes and a some of the ones for sprouted chickpeas said to cook them so I boiled them for a couple of minutes and then drained them and put then in cold water. I added half a chopped red pepper, a couple  of table spoons of chopped parsley, half a red onion finely chopped and made a vinaigrette with cider vinegar. They were good. "surprisingly  good" apparently! 

 

Saturday, 22 May 2010

Chilli to the rescue

Thursday night I made a rice dish with some leeks, red peppers, brown rice and red lentils. I thought is was tasty but a bit worthy. Neither of the children ate it and I ended up with loads left over. There was too much to throw away and I've vowed to stop using the freezer as some where to store stuff we don't want to eat before throwing it away two years later. So I got some Cumberland sausages I'd bought at the  Real Food Festival  out of the freezer (a good use of it!) and tarted  up the rice to go with them. I mixed in some ricotta cheese and fried a chopped fresh red chilli and then added the mixture to the pan with the chillies. It was much nicer this time and one of my children ate it.

Thursday, 20 May 2010

Using every last bit

We had a leg of lamb for Sunday Dinner and after using what was left on Monday night spiced up in wraps, I boiled the bone to make stock. Just added some pepper corns, old bit of celery, parsley stalks and dried herbs. At the same time I put a handful of black turtle beans to soak in cold water. I then made some soup with a leek (from the veg bag), the stock, beans and a few bits of lamb meat.

When I reheated it for lunch I added a chopped potato which thickened it up nicely. It was very tasty, far too good to share - I've hidden the rest at the back of the freezer for lunches when I'm on my own.


Tuesday, 18 May 2010

Spring Greens and Chorizo

Today I used the spring greens from my veg bag. They've been in fridge since Thursday but were still in good condition. Here's what I did.

Ingredients -

  • 1 tea spoon corriander seeds
  • 3 spring onions sliced
  • 2 cloves garlic finely chopped
  • 175g spring greens sliced (thick ends cut off but included most of the stalks) 
  • 100g chorizo cut into 1cm chunks
  • glug of sherry (10 ml?)

Melt knob of butter in a pan that has a lid and gently cook the coriander seeds for a minute of so until they start to smell nice. Turn up heat and stir fry the spring onions, greens, garlic and chorizo for a couple of minutes. Add the sherry turn the heat as low as possible and cook with the lid on for about 5 minutes. 

I served this with creamy mashed potatoes. This amount wasn't really enough for 4 more like 2 or 3. We filled up on bread and cheese which as we happened to have some local Wigmore cheese in the fridge wasn't too much of a hardship. 

Sunday, 16 May 2010

Recycling bags

One of things I love about my veg bag is that it is a good way of reducing packaging. Most of the veg comes loose in the bottom of the bag with somethings, like spinach, in clear plastic bags. The green heavy paper bags that the veg comes in are also reused. I say they are reused but this obviously depends on customers returning them. I was ashamed to find a big pile of them in my cupboard this week (see photo). I did take them all back and exchanged them for one full of lots of green things - spinach, chard, spring greens and salad as well as the usual potatoes, leeks and carrots. 

Thursday, 13 May 2010

Bubble and Squeak

I know bubble and squeak is supposed to be a way of using up cooked potato and cabbage but in a world where you can buy it as a ready meal cooking cabbage and potatoes specially doesn't seem so strange. In fact we do it quite often and always follow Ainsley Harriott's recipe from 'Gourmet Express'. You don't really need a recipe for bubble and squeak but this one is good. You fry some onion and garlic and then add your cooked potato and cabbage. When the crust forms on the bottom you add Worcestershire sauce and stir it up so all the lovely crispy bits get mixed in. You repeat the process twice more. A great way to get kids to eat cabbage without complaint.

Tuesday, 11 May 2010

Carrots with pasta?

Having a veg bag is a bit like being on ready steady cook - you have to make something out of what you've got.  I've got carrots, leeks, cabbage and potatoes. Tuesday night it has to be something quick as we have to eat early. What I came up with was pasta in a tomato sauce with leeks, carrots and flavoured tofu. I chopped the carrots up small so that they would have time to cook. They were still a bit cruchy but I thought that was nice. I still have three carrots left as I only put one in because my daughter was watching me cook saying “you can’t put carrots in pasta!”


Monday, 10 May 2010

Real Food Festival

On Friday I went to the Real Food Festival at Earl’s Court. This is a celebration of small scale producers making traditional craft food products. As well as the pies I came home with cheese, bacon, sausages, smoked mussels and chorizo. Oh and chocolate brownies that were definitely the best in the show because I sampled them all to make sure! 

While I was there I listened to the Rude Food rants. Rude food is a cereal company and they’ve started a tradition of soap box rants at food festivals where people with a passion for food talk about their favourite subject for 5 minutes. I went because my friend Porridge Lady was ranting (about oats of course). What caught my attention in relation to veg bags schemes was Henrietta Green’s rant about local food. She was making the point that as “local” becomes a marketing tag we need to be clear what we mean when we talk about local food. It needs to be about more than just distance. If you lived next to a coke factory would that make it local food?  It needs to be about using ingredients sourced as locally as possible, about sustainability and treating people (and animals) fairly. In terms of veg bag schemes there are a number of national ones and they offer great produce but why not check if there is a small farmer in your area who would  appreciate your regular support. It is great feeling that you know the person who grew the food you are eating.

Saturday, 8 May 2010

This weeks bag

I pick up my bag on a Thursday but this week I didn't pick it up until about 11 pm as I was busy helping get Reading's first Green Party councillor elected (Yeh!!).


I thought I'd do an inventory as this is the first new bag since I started the blog. There were potatoes, leeks, carrots, a cauliflower, spinach, salad and cabbage. No onions - until I started getting a veg bag I hadn't thought about onions being seasonal. 

So far all we've used is the cauliflower. I went to the Real Food Festival yesterday and came back with some yummy pies that we had with cauliflower cheese. Not the most imaginative thing to do with cauliflower but still good. 











Wednesday, 5 May 2010

Using the bean sprouts

We are in the middle of the hunger gap at the moment - the period when the winter veg has finished but the summer veg hasn't come in yet. This means that veg box schemes often have to supplement with produce that hasn't come from their farm, or even close for a month or so. We have been getting a box of mixed bean sprouts in our bag most weeks and I must confess I struggle to use it and ended up throwing last weeks away. (That is a terrible confession and I felt really bad!). I don't know why I find it difficult because I always enjoy them when I do eat them. This week I'm determined to use them and last night was very organised and prepared lunch to take to work with me today. I sliced and fried some spring onions with a handful of the bean sprouts, some chilli and soy sauce. I mixed it with some cooked rice and had it cold for lunch. I've still got two thirds of a box to use though!



Tuesday, 4 May 2010

Leeks and Leftovers

I collect my veg bag on a Thursday so by this time of the week I'm looking to use up what is left. Today I it was leeks and thought they would go well with the leftovers from Sunday dinner. Pretty special leftovers. We had pork tenderloin from Laverstoke Park in cream and mustard sauce. I sliced up the left over meat and fried it with the veg bag leeks, added the rest of the cream and stirred it all into some pasta.