Got CSA?

I’ve been inspired by Venessa and Adrienne to try and document a few of the meals I base on goodies from our CSA.

Last week was the first CSA, and since this is New England, it was greens, greens, a turnip or two, more greens and some rather anemic strawberries. No matter. This week already showed a bit more variety, which tonight’s kitchen reflects.

Got turnips? Got kale? Got no idea how to incorporate both into a meal? You’ve got Vegan Linda’s turnip and kale soup, with a twist. The twist in the form of slightly overripe grape tomatoes, paprika,a can of tomato paste, twenty something cloves of garlic and a liberal pinch of rosemary infused sea salt.

This is what it looked like before I stirred in some already cooked arborio rice.

We’re fortunate to have a fantastic little Italian market, Capone’s, at the bottom of our hill. Max and I have been shopping on foot quite a bit this week, and picked up the rice, and a bar of dark chocolate infused with earl grey tea earlier this afternoon.

Speaking of arborio rice, this week’s CSA also included a small head of cabbage, which I decided to use to whip up a make-as-you go batch of meatless stuffed cabbage. I happened to have a tube of Gimme Lean sausage style in the fridge, so quickly browned the faux meat in a blob of Earth Balance spread, olive oil and the last two garlic scapes from this week’s CSA. Next year, I may add garlic to my container garden–more on that later—simply to gorge on the delicate, flavorful scapes.

I steamed the cabbage until I was impatient enough to deem it tender, ripped off the leaves, and stuffed them with the Gimme Lean mix, and some of the aforementioned arborio rice. I briefly considered making my own tomato sauce, but a scan of my shelves unearthed a dusty container of Muir Glen chunky tomato sauce. I covered the cabbage, dug into the fancy sea salt, sprinkled some ground pepper and tossed the whole shebang into the oven.