CSA Tuesday

 Another great week from our CSA.  I am a day late posting, gotta love those sinus headaches that

put you out for the count.  I laid down with the intention to rest my eyes in the dark for a short

amount of time.  Next thing I know the alarm clock is going off and it is 5am. 

We got: Red Irish Potatoes, tomatoes, onions (not pictured), field peas, cucumbers,

a large watermelon and 3 lbs of ground beef (not pictured)

Did you nab anything good at the farmer's market or your CSA this week?

Ciao! Amy 

Menu Plan Monday 8/5 - 8/11

Here's the menu plan for this week. 

We have a busy week ahead, I tried to keep is simple and use items we have on hand.

Roast chicken, butter beans and fresh corn on the cob

Sirloin tip kabobs with veggies & mushroom bread using homemade french bread

(I'll post the recipe soon)

Flounder, baked potatoes 

Lasagna (from a previous freezer cooking day)

Philly cheese steak hoagies and pita chips

Grilled pork chops, herbed potatoes

What's on your menu plan this week?

Linked to Org Junkie Menu Plan Monday , On the Menu Monday at Stone Gable

Thanks for visiting. Ciao~ Amy  



Freezer Cooking Saturday

I had a lot of produce to process today.  I spent about 4 hours cooking today.

I scoured the internet looking for recipes to help me use up the produce.

I still have a few squash to use. 

Here's what I made today:

Chunky Tomato Bisque Soup

Stuffed Summer Squash

French Bread

Chopped Colored Sweet Peppers

Banana Peppers

Butter Beans (they got froze before pictures were taken)

Chunky Tomato Bisque Soup

I pulled a few things from several recipes and did the

mad scientist kitchen thing and created this. 

I left it a bit chunky instead of processing it smooth. This recipe turned out great.

Ingredients:

3-4 pounds of tomatoes peeled

(I placed them in boiling water for 30 seconds and skinned them)

2 T sugar

1/2 -1 t of oregano

1 stalk celery minced

1/2 small onion finely chopped

3 cloves of garlic, minced

1 T butter

Saute the garlic, onion and celery in butter until tender in a nice size pot.

Take skinned tomatoes, they will be soft, sqush with your hand

 and place in pot with veggies.

Add sugar and oregano.

Simmer for 2 hours, or until condensed down.

Bag and freeze.

When ready to eat. Thaw, add 1 cup of milk, cream, etc and heat through.

Made 2 meals worth.

Stuffed Summer Squash

I had a lot of squash to use up. This was stuffed with Homemade Italian Sausage 

that was frozen last weekend. I also added a small can of mushrooms and

some of the tomato soup that was simmering. 

They will be topped with some cheese and heated up in the oven for a quick meal.

Made 2 meals worth.

French Bread

This French Bread recipe is from the Gourmet website.

It was a little more involved than the french bread I usually make, but turned out wonderfully.

Crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside. 

As you can tell there may have been some samplers in the kitchen when this came out of the oven. MMM!

Chopped Colored Peppers

We bought 9 colored peppers at Aldi.  Brad helped me chop them up for the freezer.

*Not pictured: Froze banana peppers and 2 bags of butter beans from our CSA box.

Ciao Amy ~ 

Homemade Italian Sausage

We enjoy Italian Sausage on pizza and in Italian Dishes from time to time. 

I ran across a recipe for Homemade Italian Sausage and tweaked it better fit our likes.

The end result was excellent.  We make batches and freeze it for use throughout the month.

Let me know what you think...

Homemade Italian Sausage

2 pounds ground pork (or lean ground turkey)

1 T salt

1 T ground fennel seed *

* (start with whole seeds & grind them in a spice grinder, mortar & pestle, or the back of a spoon)

1 1/2 T paprika

1 T finely minced fresh garlic

1 T sugar

1 t black pepper

3 T apple cider vinegar

Mix everything together and saute or grill until no longer pink.  This is great with peppers and onions, topping for pizza, in spaghetti, etc. We usually take 1 pound of meat and divide into thirds.  The sausage is very flavorful, it does not take a lot to add a lot of taste.

You can cook and freeze or freeze after mixing everything together.