Week 16 Newsletter 2015

Garlic chive flowers

 Hello Everyone,

This week I am sharing some photos that I have received from CSA members. It is inspirational to see tomatoes and pesto carefully prepared and tucked away for a later use.

Did you know.....

Tomatoes contain substances we receive as the flavor, umami, or savory, more thought of with meat and meat broths than with vegetables. Umami is one of the five basic tastes in addition to sweet, salty, sour and bitter. Umami flavor rounds out and enhances other flavors, especially salt. Other potent source of umami flavor include fish, cheese, mushrooms and fermented products such as miso, soy sauce and tamari  sauce. Umami flavor often involves glutamate, a salt form of the the amino acid glutamic acid.
Tomatoes are high in glutamate. There are other compounds including various nucleotide that also give an
umami flavor. The richest umami flavor occurs with
combination of multiple umami receptor triggering
substances.

Maybe this is why some of our favorite recipes
combine tomatoes with meat or cheese or both.
When meats are cured they enhance the umami flavor. A bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich is an example of an ultimate umami experience.

What to expect to find in your bin:

Asian Pears

Melon

Tomatoes

Fingerling Potatoes

Cucumbers or Zucchini

Onions

Lettuce

Kale

Carrots

Garlic

Here are a couple of recipes that include items you will have in your bin this week.

Ribollita

MARK BITTMAN  Time  50 minutes  Yield 4 servings

Even vegetable stews can have more vegetables. This recipe adds a pound of kale -- that's right, a full pound -- to softened onions, carrots and celery, combined with beans and tomatoes. It's simply a matter of bringing the other vegetables together in a simmer, then adding the kale and topping with the toast. The whole dish bakes in the oven for a few minutes to brown the toast with a little Parmesan.

INGREDIENTS

5 tablespoons olive oil
1 small onion, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
1 celery stalk, chopped
1 tablespoon minced garlic
 Salt and ground black pepper
2 cups cooked or canned cannellini beans
1 15-ounce can whole peeled tomatoes
4 cups vegetable stock or water
1 fresh rosemary sprig
1 fresh thyme sprig
1 pound chopped kale or escarole
4 large, thick slices whole-grain bread, toasted
1 small red onion, thinly sliced
½ cup freshly grated Parmesan

PREPARATION

Put 2 tablespoons of the oil in a large pot over medium heat. When it’s hot, add onion, carrot, celery and garlic; sprinkle with salt and pepper and cook, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are soft, 5 to 10 minutes.
Heat the oven to 500 degrees. Drain the beans; if they’re canned, rinse them as well. Add them to the pot along with tomatoes and their juices and stock, rosemary and thyme. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat so the soup bubbles steadily; cover and cook, stirring once or twice to break up the tomatoes, until the flavors meld, 15 to 20 minutes.
Fish out and discard rosemary and thyme stems, if you like, and stir in kale. Taste and adjust seasoning. Lay bread slices on top of the stew so they cover the top and overlap as little as possible. Scatter red onion slices over the top, drizzle with the remaining 3 tablespoons oil and sprinkle with Parmesan.
Put the pot in the oven and bake until the bread, onions and cheese are browned and crisp, 10 to 15 minutes. (If your pot fits under the broiler, you can also brown the top there.) Divide the soup and bread among 4 bowls and serve.

Fresh Tomato Sauce

MARTHA ROSE SHULMAN  Time 30 minutes  Yield About 2 1/2 cups

This is a quick, simple marinara sauce that will only be good if your tomatoes are ripe. If you have a food mill, you don’t have to peel and seed the tomatoes; you can just quarter them and put the sauce through the mill.

INGREDIENTS

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
2 to 3 garlic cloves, minced or thinly sliced (to taste)
3 pounds ripe tomatoes, quartered if you have a food mill, peeled, seeded, and diced if you don’t
⅛ teaspoon sugar
2 sprigs of fresh basil, or 2 teaspoons fresh thyme leaves
 Salt
1 tablespoon slivered fresh basil
 Freshly ground pepper

PREPARATION

In a wide, nonstick frying pan, or in a 3-quart saucepan, heat the oil over medium heat and add the garlic. Cook, stirring, just until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the tomatoes, sugar, basil or thyme sprig, and salt (begin with 1/2 teaspoon and add more later), and bring to a simmer. Reduce the heat to medium low and simmer, stirring often, until thick. Pulpy tomatoes like romas will usually take 20 to 30 minutes. However, if the tomatoes are very juicy, it will take longer for them to cook down. The longer you cook the sauce, the sweeter it will be. You can speed up the process by turning up the heat, but stir often so the sauce doesn’t scorch. Towards the end of cooking, stir in the slivered fresh basil and some freshly ground pepper. Taste and adjust seasonings.
If using quartered tomatoes, put through the medium blade of a food mill. If you used peeled seeded tomatoes but want a sauce with a smooth, even texture, remove the basil sprigs and discard. Pulse the sauce in a food processor fitted with the steel blade.