Tuesday: Kasha with mushroom and chickpea

Kasha with mushroom and chickpeas, served with carrot-parsley salad.

What is kasha, you ask? Well, you may also see it called "toasted buckwheat groats," but somehow that doesn't have much of a ring to it. Like quinoa, buckwheat is actually not related to wheat at all, but rather is a seed that bears some resemblance to other grains. You might encounter it in gluten-free versions of products typically made with normal wheat - but we know it best as the main ingredient in Japanese soba noodles. Kasha has an earthy, nutty flavor that melds well with mushrooms, chickpeas, and lightly caramelized onions in this dish.

Thanks to our two CSAs, we currently have more carrots than we know what to do with. We made this quick carrot-parsley salad (in a simple lemon juice-olive oil marinade) to add some fresh veggie flavor and a texture contrast to the main dish.

Meanwhile, check out the gams on this carrot:

Thursday: Step right up!

Frittata with bell pepper, zucchini and yellow summer squash, and pecorino cheese.

The frittata was nice, but that's not what we're here to talk about today. Get a load of the eggs below:



Yes - on top you see an egg that had TWO YOLKS. Two yolks, people! We understand more or less how that happened, but it's not something we had ever seen before. Kind of disturbing. Ate it anyway, though.

Tuesday: And now for something completely different

Lemongrass-quinoa pilaf with Italian cabbage and tofu.

You can probably tell from the above description that this meal was...a little random.

This dish came about because we were looking for recipes which could incorporate the lemongrass we had picked up at the market. We found a suitable lemongrass-flavored quinoa pilaf in Didi Emmons's Vegetarian Planet, and decided to substitute our mystery-varietal cabbage for the broccoli it called for. Hey, they're both crucifers, right? As it turns out, the much stronger flavor of cabbage probably didn't meld quite as well with the lemongrass as broccoli would have, even though it went well enough with the tofu and quinoa elements. In any case, the dish was certainly interesting and wholesome.

The cabbage was too pretty not to show you - the farmer we bought it from specializes in Italian vegetables, and he told us it would be similar in taste and texture to "cavolo nero," also known as dinosaur or Tuscan kale ("black cabbage" in Italian).


Feed me, Seymourrrr...feed me all night looong...

Thursday comfort food

Cream of heirloom tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwich with Colby cheese.

It's a little hot for soup, but homemade tomato soup is undeniably delicious - and heirloom tomatoes were only three dollars a pound at the market today...


Frankenstein tomato