An improved box of veggies

After completing our three weeks of the Spring Share from the local CSA we decided that it wasn't meeting our needs. We were getting way to much leafy greens which we didn't know what to do with. We aren't rabbits and can only eat so much lettuce-y stuff.

So, we studied the website and decided to try ordering a "Healthy Box", which looked like it had a lot more variety. One of the nice things with the Healthy box is that you can order it whenever you want--every week, every other week, every month. We could even set up a recurring order that automatically charged to our bank account, but I've always been a bit weary of money coming out of my bank account without me actually paying something. I'm always worried that the money will come out before I get paid and will overdraw my account, or I'll forget to subtract it from the register and buy something I don't have the money for. So, I think we'll be sticking with the bi-weekly orders, which give us enough veggies and fruit for about a week and half.

Unfortunately we don't get to eat that many meals at home together (Heather has crazy work schedules), so most of the ingredients last us long enough that we just purchase a new box every two weeks.

Check out the goodies this time around!


We can even order produce, extra items, and meat from the farm. Last week we ordered eggs and a chicken and this week we ordered a cantaloupe. Except for the fact that both weeks they have forgotten to put in the extras and have had to deliver them later in the week, the prices are good and the product is great.

We have made quite a few Jamie Oliver recipes this week, including another roast chicken. Thankfully I didn't overcook it this time and it came out perfect! Now we've got extra meat for lunches this week which is great. I've also made Jamie's stewed ginger rhubarb which is tangy and delicious with yogurt or on the strawberry shortcake we made for my birthday. I also made homemade granola which came out really good. I just might have to make another strawberry rhubarb pie, too, since we keep getting rhubarb and we just got a pint of fresh strawberries. Can't wait for that one!

Peas!

We have picked our first produce from our vegetable patch--a handful of peas!

Given how few plants we actually have in our garden, I don't know if we'll ever produce more than enough for a few bites each, but its still fun to see the final product--doesn't taste too bad either! We've added another row of chicken wire to give the peas something to grab onto and grow upwards and they seem to be liking it.

Our squash is flowering, so hopefully we'll get some fruit out of that. I'm not sure that our cucumbers will give us much because they're looking pretty puny, and our basil and parsley hasn't grown very quickly. We did thin out the herbs the other day, but I wonder if we've done something wrong because we planted them two months ago and don't have anything usable yet.

In other news, we have a new addition to our family which we'll blog about shortly.

I'm off to my weekly yoga class, after having spent the last hour outside reading while the cats lounged in the sunshine. What a beautiful day!

Amazing 20 Minute Meal

Last week Jennie and I decided to try Jamie Oliver's Quick Salmon Tikka with Cucumber Yogurt--we're glad we did! It was amazing. The most amazing part is that such a good, wholesome dinner only took 20 minutes to make. I was really impressed by how quick the meal was. Especially because I'm usually the one who complains that I'm hungry and it's late and that we don't have time to make something healthy so we should just grab something quick--which often times is not as healthy. Luckily for me, the quick meal skeptic, Jamie Oliver's book has a whole section titled 20 minute meals.

The process was really easy. Just heat up some Naan, cut up cucumbers and a pepper and mix with some plain yogurt and then brush the salmon with tandoori paste and brown it on each side. The completed product was fabulous.


The only minor hiccup with the process is that Jennie bought a little too much salmon :) The recipe called for 14 oz of salmon, which for some reason Jennie thought meant 1.4 lbs! The salmon was really good though so it wasn't too much of a mix up, but next time we'll probably just go with the 14oz.

A Silver Lining

I think I may have found a silver lining to Central New York...

Summer...

It took forever for Spring to hit Syracuse at all (we're talking almost June), but since then we have been blessed with some extremely gorgeous weather. And the locals say that it only gets better. A good friend has family here and says they refuse to travel in August because the weather is so nice.

Actually, I first noticed the shift on "Rapture Day", when I spent a glorious afternoon at the park, the air warm, the sky blue, the clouds unbelievably white, the water gently lapping the shore line, a good book in hand, and excellent paths to walk for miles. I had to stop and wonder if I actually had been raptured because the day was so perfect it could have been my heaven.

It seems to be a general consensus around here that you should spend as much time out of doors as possible. I think we were all so sick of being cooped inside all winter that the moment the ice and snow were gone and there was even a hint of summer in the air, people took to their porches, the streets, and the parks like lemmings. If I could spend every minute of these glorious days outside I would (darn jobs!).

The most noticeable difference between spring/summer in Central New York vs. Virginia/DC is the lack of humidity. I have never spent a summer in a place were the air is so comfortable. I even spent several lunch hours outside in the sun on 90 degree days and barely broke a sweat. My hair actually stands a chance here!

Overall, the days are often like a little piece of heaven for me and its easy to see why people live here (or other Winter-dreary cities with amazing Summers like Portland, OR). I bet the first settlers (non-native, of course) probably arrived in the summer and were in for a rude awakening come November. There also seems to be a danger of the harshness of winter fading into the background--kind of like a woman 'forgets' the pain of childbirth after its over. There's some term for it I can't seem to remember, based on the Roman underworld's river Lithe, where the deceased drank from the river and forgot all about the pain of their previous life.

I've decided that I need a good yearly dose of this wonder weather, and a few good parks to enjoy it in. The requirement has quite decidedly moved its way to the top of my 'where shall we settle' checklist. Now the key is to find a location that boasts the same glories of summer with a more tolerable winter.

Camping in the Adirondacks

We had a lot of fun in the Adirondacks over Memorial Day Weekend. Although, things could have gone a bit smoother...

When we first got to the campground we realized that it had been raining and we did not pack the tarp--fail. Then while we were attempting to set up the tent it started to pour! We had to finish putting the tent up in the pouring rain or it would have filled with water so we got soaked--fail.
While it was raining though we got to enjoy a few rounds of car Yahtzee.
And luckily the rest of the weekend the rain wasn't too bad--it mostly rained while we were sleeping and surprisingly our tent held up well without any tarps.

We had planned on hiking about 10-15 miles on the Northville-Lake Placid Trail--it's a 133 mile trail that travels throughout the Adirondacks. On our first attempt to find the trail head we were unsuccessful. We followed the signs to a dead end road and then there were signs everywhere that it was private property. We were really confused and not sure where the trail began so we drove about a mile down the road to another trail head--fail. We got our CamelBak's on and headed down the trail, only to find that about a quarter of a mile in the trail was completely flooded. It was probably covered in about 2 feet of water and there was no way to get around. We had to head back to the car and set out for our third back up plan--fail.

We had driven by a trail head sign for Panther Mtn. just outside of our campsite so we decided to check that out. We knew it was going to be a short hike, but at this point we figured a short hike was better than no hike. The trail was actually pretty challenging--it was like climbing up a steep, slick, riverbed. We had to climb over a lot of debris and fallen trees and at some points we weren't sure we were still on the trail, but when we got to the top it was all worth it.
We could see the lake that we were camping on as well as a couple of other lakes.
We had lunch up on the rocks and hung out for about an hour before making the journey back down the mountain. Because our hike ended up being so short we decided to drive around and explore the Lake Piseco area, as well as the town of Speculator and Lake Pleasant.

Our last day in the Adirondacks we got up early, packed up camp and hit the road before 10:00am. We knew we wanted to go up and check out the Lake Placid area, mostly because the 1980 Winter Olympics were held there. It was about a 2 hour drive through some really beautiful scenery and when we arrived we were very glad we'd made the journey.

The town of Lake Placid is a very cute little downtown area. We ended up doing a wine tasting and walking around a bunch of shops as well as grabbing lunch at the Lake Placid Brewery. It was pretty cool to see all of the memorabilia/remnants of the Winter Olympics.
Overall it was a great camping trip and a great weekend. We're hoping to be able to go backpacking for a night in July.

What's in the box?

We got our first CSA produce box last week and we're expecting our second round today. I'm guessing we were a little late on the sign up list last week because our box didn't contain what it was suppose to.

Suspiciously missing from our box was Mint, Oregano, Dino Kale, and Red Mustard Greens. What we did get was a HUGE bunch of Asparagus, Rome apples, Rhubarb, Grindstone Farm Lettuce, Spinich...and about four other kinds of lettuce and salad greens. We're not even sure what some of them were, but we chopped them up nonetheless.

Getting all of this produce was fun. Our good friend Rachel came to visit last Thursday and the weather was gorgeous so we grilled up some chicken, corn on the cob, and asparagus and I made a strawberry rhubarb pie for dessert. I was even able to use a leftover hazelnut crust that I had made for a Martha Stewart recipe at Thanksgiving and kept frozen for just the right occasion.

We took the rest of the asparagus camping with us and had enough to enjoy the fire roasted greens with our meal twice.

The salad greens have been the trickiest thing for us so far, partly because we were off camping for four days after we got them and now some of the greens are starting to wilt and not be as good. We did use the spinach in some pasta and an egg scramble.

I plan to make applesauce with the Rome apples this week and we're hoping for a more varied box in our delivery today. I would like some more fruit.

After we finish up our three weeks we'll reevaluate what we got verses what we ended up spending at the grocery store in supplements, along with looking at the other options from the farm, and see which route we want to go. For this coming week we've already spent our usual budget at the store, even with the home produce delivery, but I think some of that is due to us having to shop before we got our next box. We had to plan menus without knowing what we might have to work with, but yesterday was the only chance we'd have to go until Saturday and we needed food for lunch. We might have to start doing our shopping on Saturdays.