An overload of greens, and then some. The return of root vegetable season, and the return of really healthy greens with my weekly CSA basket.
This week’s medium share had some real weight to it. The turnips, beets and radishes all came with a massive amount of greens attached. Add to that a couple of squash. It is time to dust off the recipes that use greens and squash to make a harvest meal. The easy thing about greens. They can be used in a sauté recipe, puréed, or just torn up, blanched and added to other recipes.
You can also make fancy pesto with them. Like this one. Used in my green tomato pasta. I made a close cousin to that recipe just the other day. This next batch? Will be using radish greens, basil, beet greens and scallions.
Purple beets obviously have purple “greens”. The color of this pesto should be interesting.
Add to all the goodness from the CSA basket, I found a stray gongura plant in my garden. I think the seeds washed over into my tomatoes from a neighboring plot.
Sometimes called red sorrel leaves, it has quite a reputation as a staple in many Indian diets, and is not that inexpensive to buy. There are at least 10 plots in our community gardens that have this plant flourishing.
Finally, in the greens world around here, there are the last of the green tomatoes. I harvested three pounds today, to finish off my season. A few will be bagged and left to ripen. The rest are destined to be chopped. Some for a green tomato pasta, and the rest for green tomato jam. My friend, Kirsten over at Farm Fresh Feasts turned me on to this jam. You have to take the time and make it. Slather it on a burger.
Just think. The markets are still open around here. It is also easy to head out to Larriland and pick green tomatoes. And beets. Pestos. Jams. Spreads. Soups. The possibilities are endless for what you can do with all things “green”.
Buy your root vegetables from the local farmers and make sure you use up those greens. Don’t let them go to waste.
AnnieRie Unplugged 
In addition to traditional greens, my CSA share has included salanova, a new type of lettuce, several times this year, including each of the past two weeks.
We’ve been having squash almost every day: acorn, butternut, kabocha, spaghetti, sweet dumpling, and delicata varieties so far. Next up, hubbard.
In the spirit of not letting anything go to waste, I’ve been using the Vitamix to turn squash seeds into an ingredient for soup. I’ve haven’t had any luck in making palatable roasted pumpkin seeds and haven’t tried other types.
Thanks for the shout out! I made a spicy version of Green Tomato Bacon Jam last weekend–working on ways to use it now. For an Indian-themed luncheon on Thursday I used turnip greens in a beef kheema. Got the recipe from The Spiced Life (Beef Kheema with Springtime Greens). It uses a ton of greens if you’re suffering from Greens Paralysis!