GRAND OPENING: Cultured Butternut Squash

POST #858
Back to the fermented butternut squash I told you about several days ago.

This was “opening night”!  WOO-HOO!
I want you to know that I have squirmed every day and night since I put that stuff up.  Because of the smell the fermenting gave off, I was afraid I had put in too much garlic, and then I worried I had put in too much jalapeno.  I had already started planning what I could do with it if I couldn’t eat it straight out of the jar.  (I’ve never gone through so much agony over a ferment before)

Well, tonight was the night I decided to open it up.  Tentatively, I took a heaping forkful out and put it in a bowl. Even more tentatively, I took a small forkful in my mouth!

Oh my!  Heavens!  Goodness! Woo-hoo! Oh boy! Wow!  This stuff beats tomato salsa in sweet flavor.  The squash is soft (the way I had hoped it would be — easy chewing), and the flavor is …. pickled!  Amazing!  I did not put any vinegar in the mix, but you’d think I had, from the bright, sweet flavor.  The garlic is not overwhelming, and the jalapeno just gives a mild zing.  I love that vinegary taste, for sure.

I combined it half and half with a “TuNo” mix, and ate a big bowl of it.

I can see grinding this up fine and making a spread to put on other food, or sandwiches, or use as a dip.  I could use it as a soup base.  I could use it as a salad base and add some sprouts (that reminds me, I need to make some new lentil sprouts).

Suffice it to say – this stuff is yummy!

This is stuff I could get hungry for all over the place  (and I don’t get hungry for much).

I will have to start a couple of new jars at least by tomorrow, because I want to show off this stuff and give it to my next-door-neighbors, people who have helped me or given me stuff, and some people I really don’t like (must do something to resolve the karma).  They will get the next jars!  This stuff is all for me!

Meanwhile, except that I am full, I would go right back to the kitchen and eat some more of this stuff. It is really good.

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BUTTERNUT SQUASH FERMENT

POST #853
I read a recipe for butternut squash kimchi, but I did not have any ginger on hand, and I couldn’t be sure that I would enjoy eating the pieces (I’m a very lazy chewer), so I decided to put the butternut squash through the food processor, but only grate it up coarsely (i.e., this is not my usual applesauce-textured concoction).

I can never leave well enough alone, and, for the most part, I am convinced that garlic and jalapeno improve just about anything in sight.  I took a handful of garlic (maybe ten cloves) and a medium-sized jalapeno, and whizzed them in my Magic Bullet to mince them quickly, then, as I packed the squash bits into the quart jar, I layered in gobs of garlic-jalapeno mince.  

I mashed down the squash as much as I could, then mixed a cup of water with 1 cap of probiotics and 1 t sea salt.  Poured as much of it as I could into the jar, stuck a chopstick down through the packed squash and poured some more brine into the jar, then capped it with one of my new plastic re-usable jar lids.

Today, when I looked, about half the bowl the jar is sitting in is filled with juice.   Good. That tells me that the ferment is busy.   

This being an experimental batch of squash, I sure hope that it will turn out and that I will like it.

LAST NIGHT’S SQUASH SOUP

LAST NIGHT’S SQUASH SOUP

I had a sunshine squash left over, so I peeled and cut it, washed the seeds to dehydrate, and set about to make a soup.  I developed the recipe as I went, and, of course, I did not write down anything, so here is the basic idea of the recipe.

I put in

• @ 2 T extra virgin olive oil
• @ 4 C chopped squash
• @ 1 T green Thai curry paste
• @ 1 C cashews, soaked, drained, soak water saved
• @ 1/2 C dehydrated tomatoes, soaked, drained, chopped, soak water saved
• 1 onion, peeled and chopped
• 1/4 C sauerkraut

1. I added everything to the VitaMix and processed it, adding a little more water to give it a creamy soup texture.
2. Because there was so much, I ended up having to divide it in half for final processing.
3. To serve, I sprinkled a little tomato powder on top.

CSA WINTER SHARE INFO: What it is about, what might come

Here is how my winter CSA Share is supposed to work, according to the newsletter announcement:

WINTER “VEGETABLE” SHARE
20+lb share each delivery
$28 per delivery
5 deliveries
$140 TOTAL PRICE

1 – Week of December 15th
2 – Week of January 5th
3 – Week of January 26th
4 – Week of February 16th
5 – Week of March 9th

Contents of share may include:
Butternut Squash, Sweet Potatoes, Potatoes (white & yellow varieties), Carrots, Red Beets, Celery Root, Rutabaga, Watermelon Radish. First share may include: Cabbage, Kale, Leeks (depending on the weather– no guarantees on this!)

I also signed up for a Mixed Apple Share ($21.25 total for 3 lbs per delivery) and 2 Cider Shares ($20 total for 1/2 gallon per delivery). It came out to a little over $200 for December through March organic fruit/vegetable/cider delivery. All I will have to get from the market will be greens and onions, as I see it. (I have a boatload of dehydrated tomatoes from the summer tomato share.) Oh, but I have already finished 1 of the cider bottles. Yum!

I got the job of “coordinator” (or whatever they are calling it) of the Winter Share Distribution, which is at a local community center. Yea!!! One of the interesting things about the job is that I have to count people and children, so that the center can get funding. Good! Probably more than half of the members come in bearing children. Some come with three or four. Good numbers!

10/09/08 CSA SHARE: What I got

I could not report on what we were going to get because the farm would not tell us.  This is what I did get:

RED BATAVIA LETTUCE….1 hd
TOMATOES…………………2 pc
LEEKS……………………….2 pc
BUTTERNUT SQUASH…….1 pc
ACORN SQUASH………….1 pc
BABY BOK CHOI…………..2 hd
SAVOY CABBAGE…………1 hd
CAULIFLOWER……………1 hd
CARROTS………………….1 bunch

I also got a small bag of mixed apples and pears.

ACORN SQUASH TODAY

I went after the acorn squash today.  I have two, so I decided I could experiment with one of them.

First, I figured out how to peel the booger.  I halved it, and scooped out the seeds (I’m dehydrating my squash seeds — I read somewhere that they are the same as pumpkin seeds, and so I am experimenting with that concept– we’ll see)  Then, I cut each half into quarters and attacked the quarters with my German-born vegetable peeler (I really thought it might break, because the squash was really hard to peel, but, in the end, I had success!)

This time, once again, the slice of squash I took tasted nutty.   I threw half of the squash in the food processor with onion, red bell pepper, black pepper, garlic, Spike, and a very little olive oil and processed it all into almost mush.  I found that I could make little balls, so I used them in the salad mix I made.  They still turned out very sweet.

I’ve read some recipes for squash patties that suggest mixing with sunflower seeds — I think I may try that with some of the other half of the squash (which I saved in the refrigerator).

I think that, with the other acorn squash, I will just go with the sweet and make a pie or just a “pudding” with some walnuts or some almond cream, or something.  Maybe some cinnamon? (My room-mate says the squash tastes like sweet potato — NOT!!– but it IS that kind of sweet)

I still have a “sunshine” squash that is the size of a medium-size pumpkin… so I will be experimenting for a while.  Soup??  Pie???  Squash burgers????  The world is my oyster!

10/02/08 CSA SHARE (happy birthday to me!) what they say we will get

Thursday is my birthday. Maybe I will put a bow in my hair when I go to pick up the share. (I’d like to have one of those birthday girl tiaras, but I don’t know where to get one.)

This is what they say we will get:

RED OAKLEAF LETTUCE…………..1 head
GREEN CRISP LETTUCE……………1 head
BABY SALAD TURNIPS…………….1 bunch
LONG RED PEPPERS
BELL PEPPERS……………………….1 piece
Red, Yellow or Orange
BABY BOK CHOI……………………2 pieces
SWEET DUMPLING SQUASH……. 2 pieces
SUNSHINE SQUASH……………….1 piece
BROCCOLI or SPINACH…………..1 bunch
RED TOMATOES
CHERRY TOMATOES………………1 pint

Oh please let me get spinach, not broccoli.
I guess it is squash season.  Not a problem… Can do.
Now I see where they have been hiding the lettuce.  We went almost the whole summer without much, if any, and, now, last week we got some, and this week we get more.
Thank heavens for peppers.  I keep hoping they will send a spicy one, but they apparently don’t have those kinds of seeds.  Oh well.  That is why God gave us markets and supermarkets.

Thank heavens I have finally finished dehydrating the 40 lbs. of Roma tomatoes.  It did not seem to take as long or be as hard as last year, even though I had less time to do it in this year, owing to my weird schedule.  Whatever. …. I have two big bags of dried tomatoes.  I think I want to put some in olive oil and see how that works, so I am prowling for a little jar to use for my experiment.

Yum!  More tomatoes and cherry tomatoes.  Those cherry tomatoes are just like candy.

9/25/08 CSA SHARE: what they said we’d get and what I got

This is what they said we would get and what I actually got:

CHIOGGIA BEETS…….1 bun. got CARROTS
RED TOMATOES……..3 pcs.
CHIVES………………..1 bun. *
PARSLEY……………….1 bun. **
ACORN SQUASH……..1 pc.
BUTTERCUP SQUASH..1 pc.
POTATOES…………….4 lbs.
RED PEPPERS………….3 pcs.
BELL PEPPER…………..1 pc.   (yellow)

I chatted with the volunteer about the squash. I think they look like what they call pumpkin in Latin markets.  He said they were different, but they look the same to me. I’ll have to cut them and fool with them, and make something out of them to know.

* I traded the chives for more peppers
** I traded the parsley for beets — I got four small beets with iffy
greens. I want to see what these things look like before I shred
them

8/27/08 CSA SHARE: What I Got

I’ve been having an unusual summer, so I haven’t been posting as much as I think I should.

Anyway, here is what I got

RED TOMATOES…………………….4+ lbs! (About 4 tomatoes)
Plus, the woman who was emptying her box next to me just asked me if
I wanted her tomatoes, so that was 4 more, and then I found 3 in
the trade box
CHERRY TOMATOES …………….1 pint
CARROTS……………………………1 bunch
GREEN CRISP LETTUCE………….1 head
BOSTON RED LETTUCE………….1 head
EGGPLANT………………………….2 pieces
LONG GREEN PEPPERS ………….4 pieces
SUNJEWEL MELON – I traded this for a watermelon
BABY WATERMELON…………….1 piece
ZUCCHINI………………………….2 pieces
YELLOW SQUASH………………..2 pieces

Yum! I love tomatoes!!!!!

I should get around to posting some recipes…. I know the lettuce will go into smoothies with the tomatoes.