Skates, pink bicycles and lettuce

My first pick up day for my CSA and I am unreasonably excited.  Trolling the produce aisle in the grocery has become depressing - too many things I make too many times or things strange to me I don't know their names or how to prepare them.  My family is a little gun-shy when I try unfamiliar vegetables given the celeriac root sauce I made one late autumn.  It was vile but they lovingly choked it down anyway.  Now they wince when alien food shows up on the plate.  We have one family rule I have never wavered from - "You have to at least try it."  This applies to more than just dinnertime but it's the only time they cringe.  So I knew there would be no wincing for dinner last night as we would have farm fresh familiar produce dished up in some ingenious way filling our plates and bellies.  Boy was I wrong.  As I arrive at River Crest Farm on a spectacularly sunny Thursday, I spy an adorable pink retro bicycle with an oversize basket affixed to the front jauntily cradling a riotous bunch of fresh flowers - something straight out of a travel brochure for Martha's Vineyard.  "That must be Betsy's bike, my CSA buddy," I think to myself.   I open the creaky back door to the chilled wooden hut reserved especially for CSA members picking up their bounty.  Inside are a few shelves filled with small bunches of green things - but I'm not entirely sure what those green things are.  I make out some rosemary and lettuce- familiar garden fare.  Beside the giant, oversize scallions is what appears to be some curly green roping of some sort and beside that some fresh garlic bulbs.  Next are what appear to be radishes but these are pink and very long - not the cheerfully round and red variety I'm used to.  What do I do with this strange collection of horticulture?  I'm seeing a salad in my future but once again, not much else.  Maria tells me the green ropes are called skates - the long curly tops of the garlic root.  "Ah, I see, aaaaaannd what exactly do I do with them,"  I ask.  "Steam," she says.  "Just a little steam and some salt."  I'm guessing it's something everyone is going to have to eat even if only in self defense (bad breath).  Since I'm sharing my CSA with Betsy the garlic root has to be cut in half which makes for a very pungent ride home but inspires me to whip up a quick pesto with the garlic, radish greens and a little lemon - yum!  That's going straight on a pile of steaming pasta for dinner tonight - along with that fresh salad I'll be using everything else for save the rosemary - we'll use that for a loaf of fresh baked bread.  Great.  Now that tonight's dinner is taken care of and my next CSA pick up is next Thursday - what about the rest of the week?  Sigh - time for a run to Trader Joe's.  I always get good inspiration there.

A barrel of monkey wrenches

Funny thing about monkey wrenches - you never know what they're going to do or when life is going to throw one your way.  After spending so much time organizing, planning, cleaning, researching, clearing, planting and eating - it seems we may be relocating this summer to another state.  Sooooo what does that mean for my garden and all my prep work?  Do I leave it for the next owner to cultivate or not - do I continue to spend time and money nurturing and growing food for someone else to harvest?  The past few weeks have taken me away from my computer and this blog to  rather clean, prep, repair, paint and stage my house.  As any homeowner can tell you, one little thing leads to the next - a never-ending supply of fix-its to be done.  As my garden grows and the weeds get higher than the vegetable plants, my efforts to clean up our plates has gone back to the grocery store variety organics.  My CSA is not open yet (but soon!) and farmers markets and farm stands definitely have more to offer these days than just a short month ago.  So what's a girl to do?  I've spent so much time setting myself up for home grown harvest throughout the year it would be a shame to waste my efforts and not continue whether the new owners are gardeners or not.  I figure I'm going to count my successes thus far and plan to start again in our new space when that happens - sort of cross that bridge when I get to it instead of trying to cross an imaginary one now.  I've pared down my grocery bill by buying fresh every few days and planning ahead for the number of eaters I can expect at the table.  Sometimes that changes so I swap one night's plan for another which seems to be working pretty well.  Fewer left overs unless I want them, fewer things going in the trash and the compost bin.  Having to keep the house tip top for showings sucks a lot of my time otherwise used for tending the garden and the fridge but I found just as I had with the garden that an ounce of planning was worth a pound of catching up - once the major work is done the maintenance is much easier.  Attacking those weeds now that the house doesn't need as much of my attention is going to be a big task - some of those suckers scare me! - but I figure it'll be worth it as much of my produce will start to bear soon. 

We're already getting bowfuls of juicy strawberries we've managed to keep from the birds and old man Aldo continues to be a source of inspiration with all the tempting things thriving just over the fence.  My flower beds are in full bloom - heady with the scent of my earlier labors - hopefully I'll see those tomatoes before I hit the road for Jersey!