I've been researching CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture) of all sorts. I knew there were CSAs for general produce, but did you know that there are now shares of flowers, herbs, eggs, seafood and even meat?! Living here in Connecticut, we've been really spoiled. Stew Leonard's has a location near to us, and we've been buying nearly all of our meat, and most of our produce, there. (Click over if you've never heard of Stew's. They are the World's Largest Dairy Store. They process their own dairy, from their own cows, in their flagship store in Norwalk, Ct. They butcher their meat from animals they raise themselves. Oh, and they have singing animatronics scattered throughout the store, so that's cool too. Heh.)
After looking at the CSAs, I talked with my husband...and he expressed a (very valid!) concern that I would not use all of the produce that the Fruit Fairy would bring me. Umm...ouch. (I have a history of reaching for the baked goods when I'm hungry, instead of the fruit, so the fruit gets thrown out after a few weeks...but the baked goods, somehow, never even get stale. *ahem*.)
To try to gear up to a more veggie-centric mindset, I sat down with him last night and tried to come up with meals for the rest of the week.
Here's what we have to work with:
2 heads of romaine lettuce
1 pound of green beans
4 russet potatoes
4 pounds of red potatoes
2 pounds of carrots
2 small crowns of broccoli
5 pounds of strawberries
4 pounds of oranges
Oh, and a batch of gorgonzola dressing from Sunday night that is WAY bigger than I expected it to be. Anyone local need some dressing? It only lasts for three days! Oy. What am I going to do with three cups of dressing?!
Her's what we came up with!
Monday: Cheese and Broccoli soup, with french bread (today is baking day!) and a green salad with homemade gorgonzola dressing.
Tuesday: Half a roast chicken (I found a half chicken in the freezer. Weird.) with roast red potatoes and steamed green beans.
Wednesday: Twice baked potatoes with gorgonzola dressing. (This might just be mashed potatoes instead, since the dressing is mostly sour cream and milk, with a little mayo.) Probably a salad this night, too. (This could also become gnocchi with a creamy gorgonzola sauce. Heh.)
Thursday: Carrot, sugar cane soup, with pork chops, spicy green beans and rice.
Friday: Costco night! We usually eat pizza before buying our big stuff for the week. I'm out of yeast (*gasp*) so I'm going to be really upset if I forget to buy that this week!
Saturday: Maybe I can convince Lo Gung to cook this night? (Honey? *batting eyelashes*)
Sunday: Usually MEAT, of some sort. Tuesday of this week marks 7 weeks until we move, so I've got to start getting through the stuff in the freezer! We've planned on not buying any meat between now and June. We've got enough packed away where this shouldn't be a big deal.
The oranges and strawberries will be snacks throughout the week. (My kids, unlike me, are GREAT about eating fruit.)
So...what are you eating this week?
Our family is so big and we go through produce so quickly that we now buy a lot of our produce from Costco. I haven't researched the individual growers or the shipping methods but we have learned to use it all up before it goes bad and it is greatly improving the way we eat. I almost picked up Subway for dinner last night but new that if I did several items would go bad in our fridge. So instead I rushed and threw together an awesome salad, braised some carrots, cut up some fruit and served it with some quick spaghetti. Having to use it before it goes bad keeps me on my toes and motivates me to cook instead of getting take out.
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