eG Foodblog: Chardgirl - 21st Century Peasant

[Pan]

for photos nearly all taken by Mr. Chardgirl of our vegetables...

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That's a truly amazing set of photos, and it'll take me quite some time to get through all of them. One question: Armenian Cucumber is called a "true melon." I thought regular cucumbers were also a kind of melon. Perhaps someone could clarify what makes something a melon.

[chardgirl]

Welcome to blog world!

How old are your kids?  How do they play into the food planning?  My oldest (15) and youngest (10 today) are now taking an active part in cooking and meal planning.  Will they hate you at the end of the blog?  Mine were mighty glad when we could eat dinner after my blogs without having to take pictures first.

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I'm back from mom schleping. I'm about to make dinner, but I'll make an effort to answer all questions by the time I retire for the eveing!

My kids are Son = 10 years old, he's been in the 'all white food' phase since his sister was born, that's since Feb. 1997. Sigh. Since we've started homeschooling he's getting a *little* better. He loves fancy cheeses and cheese plates, and he helps Mr. Chardgirl on our restaurant route 1 or 2 times a week and each time they try a new fancy pants pizza place in SF (we sell to many).

Neither Son nor his 8 year old sister will come anywhere near to eating our goats, but neither of them is a vegetarian. Yes, we want them to learn about where meat comes from. They both like goat cheese, that I buy or trade for at market since the idea of the chains to milking twice a day gives me the HEEBIES. No thanks.

Our kids do make their own breakfasts and lunch, and they love 'cooking class' where we cook something new with them during the week.

I'm hoping for advice from all of YOU: My son loves rice, is interested in shrimp and salmon (esp. smoked) and he likes nori. He's PASSIONATE about all things Japanese, not just the beloved manga and anime but also the history, language and food. Well, some of the food....

What shall we cook this week with that boy?? Please advise, thanks.

Tonight's dinner is the 4:30 mystery/tour de fridge. They (Mr. Chardgirl, and Manny and Lourdes) are packing for the restaurants, so I'll go out in a moment and see what was over harvested. ("Don't touch that kale, we're oversold as it is!" "How about escarole, _________ ordered 12 heads but I called in 12 dozen..." These our our usual Tuesday late afternoon conversations.

So far the photos haven't impacted kids yet, we'll see how they feel in a week...

[tejon]

Sushi, hand rolled so he can add the ingredients he would like best? Inari is also a rather all white food while sneaking in a bit of protein in the form of the aburage wrapper. Does he like miso soup?

[chardgirl]

So, is everything you eat picked that day?  Ever break down and eat wilted old greens you find in the back of the crisper

Any plans to eat out this week or will this be all home cooked?

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Hi Nathan! Where shall we go for lunch this week? I'm open to suggestions...

You think you're jesting, you should see my vegetable crispers, it's disgraceful. So many good intentions turn into rotting stuff. and my kids get to take it all out to the compost. They dream of living in the suburbs where there's LOTS less compost to 'take out'! And sidewalks for their scooters....

Yes, plans for eating out this week include:

Wed: Mr. Chardgirl and 10 year old will do the restaurant route in SF with the better digital camera ( the suave long-haired cutie zeroing in on the dessert girls hoping for a treat while the papa drags the 25# bags of beets and celery root in the back door....): we will post their photos on Wed evening.

Chardgirl (me) and darling 8 year old sister will deliver to one restaurant in Monterey, CA and then EAT there and report back here with those photos. We're also going to the aquarium (the monterey bay one, it's incredible) but I won't likely post many if any photos of that sojourn...

Then on Saturday daughter and I will do the market: it's the SF Ferry Plaza market on the Embarcadero: we've been doing that market since it started in 199_? I don't remember! Since before kids at least, I know that much. I will post photos of Rancho Gordo and other friends at the market. Maybe daughter and I will even get away for a moment to eat a cookie or drink tea and we'll post on those too.

Then Sunday is the highlight: the Goat Roast!

stay tuned, I'm off to tour de fridge, I promise to post photos and answer more questions later. So far this is much fun!

cg

[Abra]

Oh, I forgot to ask before, are there really Flor de Junio beans? I eat a lot of Flor de Mayo, but never heard of June beans.

[rancho_gordo]

Oh, I forgot to ask before, are there really Flor de Junio beans?  I eat a lot of Flor de Mayo, but never heard of June beans.

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Yes. A little less common and just as good, if not better.

It's fun watching people from Michoacan when they spy them. Their eyes light up and they grab them.

[chardgirl]

This photo is a little dark, but it's some of the leftover harvest from today: name those vegetables!

cg

[kellycolorado]

Ah, one of the farms from my CSA (until I moved a few months ago). The produce is truly amazing and I learned a lot from those veggie photos and the wonderful newsletters that give ideas on how to cook the weekly items.

The Bay Area has such a bounty year round. Ooh, I can't wait to see the Ferry Bldg. photos.

-Kelly

[tejon]

The greens look like escarole, and are those chioggia beets to the right? Radicchio on the back right, and the back left looks like guava, but you said vegetable, so I'll use my wild card here.

[Behemoth]

The greens look like escarole, and are those chioggia beets to the right? Radicchio on the back right, and the back left looks like guava, but you said vegetable, so I'll use my wild card here. 

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Back left are bleeding heart (aka beautiful heart aka watermelon) radishes. Very nice ones, too.

[chardgirl]

This is tonight's dinner. It was a "hurry put on the table we've got invoicing to do and the kids are hungry what's in the fridge let's try to be vaguely healthy" kind of a dinner. Once we were sitting down there was peace since tonight there was something for everyone: lots of vegetables for me, a cheese plate and tofu in shoyu for kids and olives and escarole salad for Mr. CG.

Starting with the big wooden bowl: escarole salad with grated scarlet turnips (raw, surprisingly mild) dressed with feta and ev olive oil and meyer lemon and S& P. Then clockwise from there: Smoked salmon (my son LIKES it, and it's not white, we're getting somewhere...), cooked turnip greens with garlic (give me my greens, I love dark cooked greens.), tofu in soy sauce, cheese plate with a small piece of 'amadeus' (picked up at Whole Foods while visiting relatives in the southland), an Andante fresh goat cheese, and a domestic edam I picked up at the store. Bleudauvergne's blog with her cheese plates inspired me! I'll do better after market this next weekend. And the last bowl: watermelon radishes: very mild, crunchy, and gorgeous.

BUT my camera is acting up, I'm using my older digital, I'll try to fix the programing of the better, newer one tonight before our family splits up and visits two different Bay Areas. (the boys to SF Bay area, the girls to the Monterey Bay.)

I'll continue answering questions after I get my invoicing for the restaurant route done...

cg

[rjwong]

cg, I'm finding this foodblog very educational. And I'll admit it: I'm failing the vegetable quizzes miserably.

As you continue this foodblog, would you not only give the answers but also some recipe suggestions, please? Simple recipe suggestions, just like your "hurry up" dinner tonight.

Thank you for blogging in the same time zone that I'm in (the Left Coast, that is).

[mrbigjas]

Starting with the big wooden bowl: escarole salad with grated scarlet turnips (raw, surprisingly mild) dressed with feta and ev olive oil and meyer lemon and S& P. Then clockwise from there: Smoked salmon (my son LIKES it, and it's not white, we're getting somewhere...), cooked turnip greens with garlic (give me my greens, I love dark cooked greens.), tofu in soy sauce, cheese plate with a small piece of 'amadeus' (picked up at Whole Foods while visiting relatives in the southland), an Andante fresh goat cheese, and a domestic edam I picked up at the store. Bleudauvergne's blog with her cheese plates inspired me! I'll do better after market this next weekend. And the last bowl: watermelon radishes: very mild, crunchy, and gorgeous.

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wow, that looks like a perfect dinner. exactly my kinda thing. i love those watermelon radishes, too. nice job!

[LindaK]

All these lovely fresh veggies are beautiful...and invoking feelings of jealousy and greed to those of us living in colder climates. No substantial snowfall here (yet) but our farmers markets have all closed shop until May. I'll enjoy living vicariously through your blog!

On the subject of cardoons, I've ever cooked with them but have seen them mentioned often in Italian cookbooks as a vegetable traditionally served raw with bagna cauda. Sounds yummy to me.

[racheld]

I LOVE this!!! I MISS my big garden down South---we had about a three-acre home vegetable/watermelon/cantaloupe garden, and I'd love to do that again.

Cardoons!!! I discovered them in a seed catalog, and raised several crops. We loved them. All our plants are gone now, save for a pot of indestructible parsley by the back door. It should make several giant salads before a killing frost.

And re: the Glorified Rice recipe...that WAS 4 Tablespoons sugar? I hope, I hope.

[chardgirl]

The granola looks great....so it's peanut oil, honey, cinammon, oats, and...

Could you share the recipe (please)?

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Ok, I finally took a look at recipe gullet. I hope it's easier than it seems to add, I'll pm snowangel tomorrow or even call her and in the meantime:

My granola recipe is very simple:

4 cups of oats (or seven grain or similar cereal)

1 cup oat bran (or wheat germ or?)

2T ground flax seed (optional)

1 Cup more or less of toasted walnut or other nut pieces

2-3 teaspoons of cinnamon

pinch or more of salt

dried fruit: raisins, cranberries, blueberries, chopped apples or apricots...

mix all of the above together then

1/4 Cup honey

heated in a small pan with:

1/4 cup (or less) of oil: any will do: mild olive oil, safflower, butter, etc.

then pour this hot mixture over the dried mixture (above) and then eat as is or toast it some in a mild (325? degree) oven for a few minutes. I like mine fairly toasted, I have a friend who likes hers more 'raw' tasting.

I think I need to get to know Recipe Gullet....

[chardgirl]

ohhhhhh.... cute cabrito and i'm sure tasty.

funny one of chufi's posts and yours mentioned chioggia beets - maybe johnnybird would eat and enjoy that if i could find them . 

thank you for blogging and i'm sure some wonderful vege will make their appearances.

as far as your homeschooling - do you work with your local library for resources ?

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Yes, we have plenty of chioggia beets right now: you can mandolin or grate them into a green salad or on their own: try using johnnybird's favorite salad dressing and add green onions and some toasted walnuts. OR the other great way for any beet including the pink and white striped chioggias is: roast them after quartering and tossing with oil and salt in a medium oven for 45 or so minutes. YUM. you can eat these hot or cool and make a salad out of them.

Yes, we use the library lots and lots. My kids (human) are also enrolled in a public school 'independent study' school where they have their own library (no late fines!) and a few art/pe/science/ writing classes a week as well. it's the best of both worlds for us.

[chardgirl]

Chardgirl, with all that specialty produce you must be doing some biz with certain restaurants, or is that the job of brokers to whom you sell?  Are you tight with the Jamaican and/or Middle Eastern places that serve goat dishes?

edited to add: if I just read slower I would know the four reasons why you have goats BEFORE typing embarrassing posts here. Heel, johnnyd, heeeeel!

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We sell to many certain restaurants, all our favorites. The restaurants in SF that we sell to meet certain criteria: they pay on time (a must for a small farm like ours: we don't have day jobs or trust funds, this is it!), they are excited about how fresh our stuff is, and their willing to work directly with the farm. It takes a bit more work for chefs to make 2-10 calls than the one easy (but more expensive, usually) call to a produce broker. We don't sell to produce brokers at all. OK, Mr. Chardgirl finally broke that solid rule last month when his watermelon radish crop came off beautifully: we simply have WAY WAY too many and they are gorgeous. So our friends at Greenleaf took pity and bought as many as they thought they could possibly sell.

Otherwise, I'm the broker and the farmwife! I send a fax and email twice a week, then I take the orders, then I print them up, then our crew (mentioned in a previous post) put the orders together, then Mr Chardgirl and son make the deliveries. We've been looking for a driver for a while but that's tall order these days....

I do the one farmers market at least 75% of the time, and friends help out with that occasional Saturday off my body and life crave...

This Saturday I'll be there with my ladybug apron on!

[chardgirl]

I have a brown thumb, but I lived on 150 acre farm for a year and managed to grow three small rows of silver queen corn, peas that I trained to climb up the corn stalks, tomatoes and yellow squash. I was shocked that I managed to grow and produce wonderful tasting vegetables. I wish I had some property here for a small vegetable garden.

I know that the vegetable on the right (my other left ) is romanesco broccoli. Is the other one celeraic?

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yes, correct on both counts. I also miss gardening: now that we have a farm I don't garden! We do have lovely vegetables all the time though, I enjoy that...

[chardgirl]

Oh hurray, home!  I lived for a long time in Pacific Grove and Carmel, so you're right in my old neighborhood.  I'm also a longtime CSA member, and volunteered selling my farmer's stuff at the farmers' market this past summer, so I know I'm going to love your blog.

The world's best celeriac recipe is one I got from Paula Wolfert's new Southwest France book, and involves a puree of 2 parts celeriac to one part apples, simmered in milk until tender, then pureed, with a little cream if you like.  That's it.  We;ve been eating it steadily for the past month, even my husband, a non-vegetable person.  Cardoon, though, that's another story.  It's hard to make then taste like anything.

Beautiful romanesco!

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I'll be in Pacific Grove tomorrow! and I'll try your celeriac recipe this week, I wonder if I could use pears instead?? That's what I have around right now.

Stay tuned, we're having 'cardoon class' tomorrow night.

cg

[chardgirl]

Do you make recommendations to restaurants, or do they just ask for what they want?  How many CSA boxes do you do each week, and how do you decide what goes in them?  Lots of details, please.

And thanks for blogging.

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Yes, we send out an availability to the restaurants, usually with a little note like: "chef's Challenge this week: how much cardoon can you use??" etc.

We do our CSA with another farm and we average about 900 members. But since we're two farms doing it, I only claim 450!

How do we decide what goes in the box? Sister Wife (the other farm's CEO, child schlepper, bookeeper, and farmwife) and I are the beta CSA members: what we like goes in the box, within reason. I've made a rule about radicchio: "Only once a decade, please" because of the negative phone calls we get. Folks like fruit and corn and tomatoes and sweet carrots... We do our best to make a well rounded box. We've not missed a box or newsletter since starting 8 years ago... Farmer Boys make their planting schedules months in advance. Before starting the CSA we did many farmers markets so producing many varied, consumer friendly interesting variety crops was already old hand for him.

[chardgirl]

Good night for now. One of my favorite nightcaps is above: a pot of fresh mint tisane or fresh mint tea.

I'll answer more questions tomorrow. We need to get to bed early since half of us need to get up at 3am to start the restaurant deliveries and 25% of us should get up soon after then to catch up on paperwork while the youngest 25% gets her charm sleep.

cg

[msfurious1]

I'm having fun reading this wonderful blog. Beautiful vegetables and really cute goats.

I first time I had cardoons was about 25 years ago. They were prepared by my Italian MIL. She got her supply from a neighbor (nice Italian old man) who had a small garden and grew them. I think that they are very easy to grow and in Italy, grow right along the roadside.

My MIL trimmed them of the prickly leaves and strings and then blanched the stalks. She cut them into about 4 inch pieces and dipped them in egg, then in flour and shallow fried them. A sprinkle of salt is all it needs. Delicious.

[mizducky]

Wow. Cool blog!

I well remember my first adventure with cardoons. It was back when I was living in Boston, and my housemate of the time and I would do the rounds of Haymarket every Saturday. We had a habit that, when we spied some item we'd never seen before, we'd buy it on a whim and then try to figure out what the heck to do with it. We saw some cardoons and they blew our minds--we figured they looked like mutant giant dinosaur celery from Mars--so of course we had to get them. I recall getting all the strings out of the stalks was a bit of a pain in the butt, and that whatever recipe we were working from (I think it was from the old Joy of Cooking) mentioned parcooking them in acidualated water, but beyond that I can't remember a blessed thing about the cooking or eating of them. But the look of them sure did crack us up.

[mochihead]

Oh my goodness!!! You're making me miss living in Nor Cal again, when I used to go visit the local farms and markets every weekend! I wish I could be there again - I would love to have the chance to cook with some of your wonderful produce!