Greetings from the Garden! This week's box has tomatoes, cucumbers, summer squash, eggplant, red peppers, red onions, celery, bok choy, cutting lettuce, melons, corn, parsley, and basil.
Field Notes - The rain Monday night was welcome! Since July each time Ken says it is getting dry and he is about to start irrigating, we get rain. Hurrah. We are glad to see it for the crops and to restore low groundwater levels.
Ken continues to plant fall crops, cultivate, and harvest. This week he added preserving to the list Monday while I was at the farmers market in Amery, Ken put up jars of tomato juice, sauce, paste and pickled peppers. The hot sauce is reducing in the open crock pot. For those of you who want to freeze or can tomatoes, call us to purchase canners.
From the Kitchen - This week's box has Asian eggplant - smaller and more tender than traditional European eggplant. There is no need to peel, salt, or otherwise tenderize it. I just rinse, slice off the stem and cook. Eggplant is the only vegetable that needs cooking. Ken often includes eggplant in his upside down pizza. He oils a pie plate, place slices of eggplant and stirs to coat with oil. He also adds other slices or chunks of summer vegetables - zucchini or patty pan, peppers, and tomatoes. He then covers the vegetables with biscuit dough and bakes until dough browns and the juice from the tomatoes boils up a bit. He
then serves by flipping the piece as it goes on the plate and voila - easy pizza.
One friend adds grated cheese to the biscuit dough - or it can be sprinkled on the hot pizza slices.
I like eggplant cooked kinpira - a style used year around in Japan with different vegetables that are in season. In summer they use chunks of eggplant and peppers about the size of a thumb. Heat a heavy skillet and toast sesame seeds. Set seeds aside for garnish. In the hot skillet, add an oil or fat that takes heat like peanut or sesame or lard. Add a hot pepper if desired. Add the peppers. Cook a bit and add the eggplant. As they reach "al dente" add a teaspoon or two of sugar to caramelize, not burn. Add splashes of a sweet wine to steam, not drown the vegetables. Finally add tamari or high quality soy sauce for a delicious sweet, salty hot glazed vegetable side dish. Garnish with the sesame seeds.
Bok choy is great in stir fry - the original ingredient in chop suey. We also like it in soups with clear broth or miso.
With the heat the cutting lettuce has more flavor - dress accordingly. Now is when I pull out onions, goat cheese, or other savory salad dressings.
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