Today starts our eleventh week of our Oakhill Organics Full Diet CSA adventure. In the last few weeks we have been offered, and have taken home pork, lamb organs, beef and beef organs, milk, eggs(1 dozen per adult),Tiger’s Eye Beans, Jacobs Cattle Beans, polenta, millet flour, corn flour, oat flour, walnuts, teff,  teff flour, Liberty apples, Goldrush apples, leeks, onions, cooking greens mix, purple sprouting broccoli, asian greens, rapini, salad mix, the last of this years Brussels Sprouts, cabbage, kohlrabi, carrots, beets, celery root, sunchokes, Crown Pumpkins, and Butternut winter squash. Being offered such beautiful edible abundance every week has made me feel so fortunate to live in this area, and really just fortunate, period. The appreciation I feel for our offerings, and the people who grow, and harvest for us, is immeasurable. These super fresh ingredients alter how I am cooking, and I am finding the need to draw from more sources to get inspiration, as odd as that sounds. One would think that the beautiful, colorful bounty laid out on our bin table every week, would be enough to fully inspire, but it is not.  We have gone through, and are coming out of the “lean” season(Winter), and I am looking forward to future inspirations,  revealing themselves through sunshine, blooming flowers, green leafy vegetables, and other Spring and Summer bounty.  I was talking to Dominic about this life experience the other day, and I told him that I did not think I could ever go back to our old ways of eating. He thankfully agreed.

I have never liked going grocery shopping at a store. I end up purchasing things not on the list and spending way too much money on things that we “need.” I have come to realize we do not really need those things. When meat was put on the list, I used to spend upwards of a half an hour pacing back and forth along the meat isle, talking to the grocery store butcher at least one time during my agonizing trip. Now, when I go to the store, I purchase only what is on the list. Thankfully meat is almost never on the list. Some of our splurges remain, bananas, oranges, and other fruit not provided by Oakhill Organics.

Today is our pick up at the Oakhill Organics Farm, so I am using up all of our leftovers, which is not a  lot.  I had one more butternut squash, some salad greens, some sunchokes, and a few carrots left from last weeks pick up. We ran out of CSA beef on Monday, so last night Dominic roasted a organic free range chicken we had in the freezer. Along with the chicken, we ate some herbed(lemon zest and chopped fresh parsley) quinoa, and some roasted CSA purple sprouted broccoli.  We had a small container of herbed quinoa left over this afternoon, so I decided to fill the cavity of a butternut squash with it and roast it for lunch. I then ate it over a bed of CSA greens, with some spicy sprouts(from last week’s Yamhill County Heritage Project food swap), and a drizzle of lovely lemon, lavender white balsamic vinegar(given to me by a friend), and extra virgin olive oil. It was delicious.

I have to get back to the roasted purple sprouted broccoli, because it is so simple, and tasty. I toss stems, leaves and florets in a bowl, and then drizzle them with EVOO, salt and pepper. Then I pour them out on a  sheet tray, and roast in a 400 degree oven for fifteen to twenty minutes. The leaves become crispy, like kale chips, the stems are a little crispy on the outside and tender on the inside and the florets and tender and delicious. My whole family loves broccoli this way. At times I wish the broccoli would stay purple after cooking it, It would give Georgia, my youngest such joy to eat roasted purple sprouted broccoli, as purple is her favorite color. Thankfully she loves it raw though.

I am a little under the weather, and did not eat breakfast, and I was very hungry when lunch rolled around, so I ate the whole squash. This roasted stuffed Butternut squash can easily feed two people with a salad though. Enjoy it for lunch or dinner with your friends and family.

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