Fresh Today from Wellspring Charitable Gardens - November 14, 2024
Fresh Today… Napa Cabbage, Sweet Potatoes, Carrots, Kale, Salad Turnips, Head Lettuce, Sweet Peppers, Summer Squash, Eggplant, Basil, Chives, Pie Pumpkins, Persimmons, Pomegranates & Tangerines
Using your Produce… by Julie Moreno
This week we have Napa Cabbage coming in our baskets. You can cook it, but it makes a great salad with a flavorful dressing. If you sauté or stir fry, cook it very quickly over high heat. If it overcooks it will get mushy. It can also be roasted in the oven or grilled. I also like to make Korean style Kimchi. If you are ready to make your own, I have found these directions to be easy to understand: thekitchn.com/how-to-make-easy-kimchi-at-home-189390. I will substitute the daikon radish with our turnips or even add carrots. If you’re looking for something quick to eat, try this salad recipe.
Fall Napa Cabbage Salad
with Almonds
½ cup slivered almonds
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
1 teaspoon soy sauce
½ teaspoon toasted sesame oil
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon honey or sugar
1-2 apples, grated about 1 cup
1 small head napa cabbage, chopped
¼ cup sliced chives or 2 green
onions, thinly sliced
2 carrots, grated
2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
1 tablespoon chopped basil
Freshly ground pepper
* Preheat the oven to 350°. In a small pan or pie plate, toast the almonds for 5 minutes, until they are light brown. Let cool. In a large mixing bowl, mix the oil, vinegar, soy sauce, toasted sesame oil, salt, honey and grated apple. Add the cabbage, green onions, carrots, cilantro and basil and mix well. Add the almonds and season with pepper. Toss again and serve.
Thanksgiving
We are grateful and give thanks for ALL - all volunteers, subscribers, partner schools, and friends of Wellspring Charitable Gardens, a community supported agriculture project. Your concern for your community and especially your neighbors who reach out in need is shown by your work, your words of encouragement, and your faithful support of Wellspring Counseling Ministries. Thank you, ALL!
Thursday, November 28, is Thanksgiving Day – a holy-day to gather with family and friends to give Thanks to God for His goodness, His grace, and His love. So that we may celebrate with as well, we will not be harvesting or produce Thanksgiving Day. Your purple WCG produce bags return filled with fresh vegetables, fruit, and herbs on December 5! Happy Thanksgiving!
Sweet and Spicy…
Sweet potatoes don’t need to be coated in marshmallows to be good. I love to combine them with spices to enhance their natural sweetness. For a simple dish, try oven roasting them. When you cube them and roast them in a single layer, they will just take about 25 minutes to be golden brown.
Spicy Roasted Sweet Potatoes
4-5 cups sweet potatoes
cut in 1-inch cubes
2 tablespoons olive oil
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground chili powder
or curry powder
¼ teaspoon freshly ground
black pepper
* Preheat oven to 400 °F. In a large bowl toss the sweet potato cubes with the oil, chili powder, salt and pepper. Lay the seasoned sweet potatoes out in a single layer on a parchment lined baking sheet. Roast for 25-30 minutes in oven or until tender. Take sweet potatoes out of the oven and transfer to a serving platter.
Metaphors of Soil and Soul…
A Taste for Fresh
by Cindi J & Keith F Martin
Years ago, my dearest friend admitted she preferred Taster’s Choice freeze-dried coffee to fresh-ground, slow brewed. She grew up drinking instant coffee, so that flavor shaped her taste for coffee. I often invited her to try fresh-brewed, but she always politely declined, saying she preferred hers. When she finally agreed, her face wrenched at the first sip. “That just tastes wrong.” she remarked blandly. Taste is like that; we prefer what we know, what’s familiar to us. Our taste for fruit and vegetables is shaped in a similar way. Many of us grew up eating “processed, packaged, or prepared” vegetables, fruits, and herbs, so we prefer frozen spinach and broccoli, canned peaches and fruit cocktail, or dried basil and rosemary to fresh. Fresh just tastes wrong. Genuine liking may be at play here, but there are those who have not yet tried to develop a taste for fresh.
Growing fall and winter produce helped me value and fully enjoy seasonal, fresh produce. You may see and taste a difference in the dark leafy greens and root vegetables now coming your way. Cold temperatures - night and day now - concentrate and mature flavors. Fresh spinach, kale, and chard have more robust and distinct tastes. Cold enhances sweetness in root crops like carrots, beets, and turnips. Cold intensifies peppery notes in arugula, collard greens, and braising mixes. Fall and winter produce also supports our physical and mental health needs in the sun-shortened seasons. Autumn pomegranates are loaded with antioxidants and winter citrus with vitamin C that defend against cold and flu viruses. Fuyu persimmons are rich in vitamin A, which builds the immune system and promotes skin health. Root crops and dark leafy greens abound in vitamins (A, B, C, D, K), minerals (Potassium, Manganese, Iron, Calcium), and fiber to boost brain function, metabolism efficiency, bone and muscle growth, stress tolerance, mood regulation, and bowel “regularity.” Our cold weather produce provides precisely what we need to withstand the colder, darker days of fall and winter.
As I reflect on the growth of my taste for fresh, I note spiritual parallels. Growing up, many of us were served processed religion, packaged rituals, and prepared rules in one formulaic feeding or another, so we never developed our own taste for fresh. Have we settled for what others say about God but have not yet "tasted and seen" for ourselves that the LORD is good? Do we believe that He is and that He is rewarder of those who seek Him? (Hebrews 11:6). Learning to enjoy fresh takes time and effort, but the rewards are worth those costs. Let us also be willing to take the time and make the effort to develop a personal preference for The One God who can fully satisfy our heart’s hunger for love and our soul’s thirst for eternity. In time, my dear friend did develop a taste for fresh ground, slow brewed coffee. Today she says, “That tastes good!”
"O taste and see that the Lord is good…"
Psalm 34:8
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