CSA: It begins

frugalwife — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 19:10:23 +0000

I decided this year that my husband and I were going to participate in a CSA. For those that aren’t familiar, CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. It pretty much guarantee’s a farm that they’re going to have someone to buy their crops. And the great thing for the farmers is that they get their payment early in the year so they have the money they need when they’re doing the planting.

I found the farm we decided to patronize by going to http://www.localharvest.org/csa/. They have a pretty good search feature to find farms that are near you or have delivery spots near you. The farm we get our veggies from is Erehnow Farm. Since there is only 2 of us, I wanted a farm that would do a partial share. I was afraid that we would be overwhelmed with vegetables and they would go to waste.

So you might be wondering, if you’re so frugal why did you pay over $300 for 5 months of veggies? In this case it doesn’t have anything to do with money. You see, I’m not much of a veggie person. In fact, I could never eat another vegetable and be content. There in lies the problem. Turns out veggies are good for you! A body needs them to stay healthy. Plus my husband loves them and has been pestering me to buy some. This was my way to force myself to cook with vegetables. And a way to force myself to cook with vegetables that I wouldn’t otherwise buy.

We had our first few weeks already. I haven’t blogged about them sooner because most of what we had was green leafy things. Here’s what we have gotten so far (that I can remember):

Lettuce! (many, many kinds and colors)
Kale
Brocolli
Green Onion
Garlic Scapes
Garlic
Basil
Strawberries
Raspberries
Sour Cherries (more to come on these!)

It’s been pretty neat so far. I can’t wait until we start getting into things like corn and beans. They’re my favorite when they come from the garden.

Recipe: All-American Mini Meatloaves

frugalwife — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 00:52:16 +0000

I made these totally awesome Meatloaves the other night. I wanted to try the recipe because it claimed that you could have meatloaf in 30 minutes and that greatly intrigued me. Most recipes I’ve seen take an hour or more to put together and bake. I haven’t eaten meatloaf in a great while because of that. This recipe lived up to it’s claim. It was ready in 30 minutes time.

My Recommendations

Freezability: A double-batch of these can be made to freeze for later. These reheat, after being frozen, extremely well. My only recommendation would be to make a half batch of the glaze to put on the meatloaves at the diner’s discretion after they have been reheated. I reheated them in the microwave and so they retained some of their moisture.

Cooking Notes: When browning the second side of the meatloaves, I would recommend not browning them too much. My loaves continued to brown as they are baking in the oven.

The Recipe

Recipe from The Best 30-minute Recipe from the Editors of Cook’s Illustrated

Serves 4

MEATLOAVES

17 saltine crackers, crushed fine (about 2/3 cup)

1/4 c. whole milk, plus extra as needed

1/3 c. minced fresh parsley

3 T Worchestershire sauce

1 large egg

1 1/2 T Dijon mustard

1 t onion powder

1 t garlic powder

Salt and ground black pepper

1 1/2 lbs. meatloaf mix

2 t vegetable oil

GLAZE

1/2 c. ketchup

1/4 c. packed light brown sugar

4 t cider vinegar

1. Heat Oven: Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 500 degrees

2. Mix and Shape Meatloaves: Stir cracker crumbs, milk, parsley, Worcestershire, egg, mustard, onion powder, garlic powder, 1 t salt, and 1/2 t pepper together in large bowl. Add meatloaf mix and combine until uniform. Press mixture into 4 oval loaves.

3. Brown Meatloaves: Heat oil in 12-inch nonstick skillet over medium-high heat until just smoking. Brown meatloaves well on one side, 3 to 5 minutes. Carefully flip loaves over and tidy up edges using a spatula.

4. Top with Glaze and Bake: Meanwhile, mix glaze ingredients together until smooth, then spoon over top of loaves. Transfer skillet to oven and bake until centers of loaves register 160 on instant-read thermometer, about 15 minutes. Serve.

Frugal Wife » food

CSA: It begins

Recipe: All-American Mini Meatloaves