Mattawoman Creek Farms CSA

Don and I already belong to the Coastal Farms online food co-op and have been very happy with it. It's a type of community-supported agriculture, or CSA, program. We pick up or orders every Thursday from our favorite local restaurant, the Cutting Edge Cafe. The food there is fresh and wholesome, and the owners, Matt and Melanie, are active in the local foods movement.

So when Melanie informed me that their restaurant was going to be a new drop-off station for Mattawoman Creek Farms, a USDA-certified organic farm on Virginia's Eastern Shore, I had to bite--pun intended! Unlike the online co-op, Mattawoman's program is a true farm share. We pay for our share of a season's produce in advance, and each week we pick up a huge bag full of vegetables, whatever is fresh and seasonal that week. We do get a day or so's notice about what is coming, along with pictures, storage, and recipe tips.

This type of CSA is for adventurous eaters like Don and me. It's not for the reticent or picky. The food is fresh and delicious, but we need to be willing to cook and eat whatever comes along. Luckily for us, I have a lot of cookbooks, including Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian. 

I'll  leave you with some pictures of today's order as well as what I've cooked with it so far. I still have kale, lettuce, arugula, a few carrots, and bunching onions to cook up later in the week.

This week's share next to a gallon bottle of vinegar to judge the size

We've been getting lots of kale and other cabbage-family plants. This kale is fresh and SWEET!

We were pleased to get some carrots this week

A few bunching onions will add flavor to salads and other dishes

A baby cabbage is the perfect size for a batch of coleslaw

We received two beautiful heads of lettuce and will be eating healthy salads for lunch!

Purple Osaka (mustard) was new to us

Purple Osaka mustard leaf. It's so spicy when raw, it made my eyes water!

Some of the kale and Osaka mustard made a nice salad along with some quinoa

The cabbage and some of the carrots and onions combined with a black radish I had on hand to make a spicy slaw

A salad spinner is great for washing, drying, and even storing greens like this salad, which features lettuce and arugula

There's almost no waste in our home. Our chickens will eat these trimmings. We also vermicompost

The smallest share at Mattawoman is meant for a family of four. Don and I are two people, so eating this many vegetables is a commitment on our part. It's a commitment that pleases the palate, though. We'd had a neighbor who was thinking of buying half our share, but it didn't work out. I wish it had!

Maybe we should invite her over to dinner.

FRESH Food at a Local Restaurant: the Cutting Edge Cafe

Medi-Veggie Sandwich and Side: MMMMM!!!

One of my favorite restaurants in Chesapeake, VA, is the Cutting Edge Cafe. It is located near Walmart off of Route 64 and Battlefield Blvd, in a plaza right behind a car wash. Melanie and her husband, Matt, own the restaurant and run it. They are active in Hampton Roads' "Buy Fresh, Buy Local" movement. Their food reflects their passion for fresh, local food. I'm a vegetarian, so I haven't tried everything on their menu, but their "Medi-Veggie" sandwich, made with fresh cheeses, fresh bread, and grilled vegetables, is to die for! I like their sweet potato fries, their hummus side-order, their sesame noodles, their salads and salad dressings, their rich and flavorful soups...

Basically, everything I've tried there has been superior to anything else I've had in town. Did I mention that Melanie bakes the bread they use? It's so good, I'm planning to buy my bread from her instead of the store. Their restaurant is not a bakery, but their bread is just as good.

Matt and Melanie's passion for local food is how I found this gem of an eatery. It's close to where I live. So when it became a pick-up point for the Coastal Farms Online Food Co-op, I arranged to pick up my weekly orders there. Until that point, I'd never really noticed the place, even though I'd driven by there dozens of times. Originally, I stopped just for the convenient location to pick up my local food orders, but once I tried one of their entrees, I was hooked! I order there at least once a week now.

I also recently found out that the Cutting Edge will soon become a pick-up point for CSA orders from Mattawoman Creek Farms, an organic farm in this area. CSA stands for  "Community Supported Agriculture." A good explanation of how this works can be found at LocalHarvest.org. The basic idea is that residents can pay a local farmer in advance for a share of the season's crops, delivered each week. The food is fresher than what residents can find in grocery stores, and the farmer makes a fair living for his (or her) hard work. This system helps to keep smaller farmers in business! Don and I are adventurous cooks and eaters, so we're looking forward to whatever comes our way in our farm share order each week.

Our first farm share order should arrive in a week or two, depending on the weather. We can't wait! Thanks, Matt and Melanie, for making these opportunities available to us, and for running a fantastic restaurant!

Oh: one caveat: their hours are a little different. They started as a lunch place (open until 4:00) but have extended into some evening hours on Wednesday through Fridays. They're closed Saturday. Keep in mind their schedule before heading over.

Fresh, Local Foods for Residents in Need

I have written before about a local online food co-op here in Virginia, Coastal Farms. How the co-op works is that every six months, members pay a $75.00 administrative fee. Then, every week, there is a window open when members can order fresh produce directly from regional farmers. The ordering window is usually from 6 PM Friday night until 10 PM Monday night.

The selections are fantastic: pasture-raised meats, local seafood, local dairy products, prepared heat-and-eat meals made with local foods for busy families, honey, hand-made soaps, local free-range eggs, and nuts and produce. The order is paid for in advance through PayPal. There are drop-off points all over the region. You select the point that is most convenient for you. Then you pick up your order every Thursday at your drop-off point between 4 and 6 PM.

The newest drop-off point is the one closest to me: the Cutting Edge Cafe.Don and I hadn't even realized this fantastic little restaurant existed until it became our drop-off point. We've tried it since then, and the food is reasonably priced and delicious. We will definitely be going back.

Recently I ordered dried figs, hydroponically-grown lettuce and arugula, two different varieties of Virginia-grown apples from the western part of the state, dark-chocolate-covered peanut butter truffles for my birthday (made with goat's milk, believe it or not!), and two different pies for Thanksgiving: apple and sweet-potato. The latter has a pecan topping that looks really good.

I also ordered fresh produce for the region's needy through a new program: Pounds of Plenty. The way it works is this: co-op members can order additional produce from local farmers to be delivered directly to the Food Bank in Norfolk on Thursdays. So far I've ordered fresh kale, a salad mix, collards, and radishes.

It feels goodto supply a variety of fresh, local, vitamin-rich produce to residents who need it the most, and to help our region's small farmers at the same time.

Winter Garden Activities and Confetti Quinoa Recipe

It is now the first week in December, and the "Little Tomato That Could" is still going strong. Lows are supposed to be in the 40s and 50s this week, so I have high hopes that it will survive for the next few days. I picked a pepper off of my "Corno del Toro" pepper plant to use in a salad today, too. It was small, but tasty. I am receiving gardening catalogs in the mail and continuing to dream about what I most want to grow. I've looked into growing celery, but I am not sure how easy that is to do in Zone 7. Celery has a long growing season, dislikes hot weather, and needs cool weather, but not too cold or it will bolt. If I try it at all, it will be in the fall.

I joined an online food co-op that features local foods from Virginia, http://coastalfarms.luluslocalfood.com/ .  Reasons to join are similar to reasons to shop at farmers' markets: http://www.stylelist.com/kimberly-snyder/farmers-market_b_1118572.html?ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false for more information. I've ordered fresh Virginia apples, kale, butternut squash. I also ordered two kinds of sweet potato: "Beauregard," which is the kind most commonly served in supermarkets, and "Hayman," a white sweet potato you won't find in supermarkets because it is "an heirloom white sweet potato reputed to be the sweetest of all varieties. But with a dirt-ugly appearance, short shelf life and low crop yield, it's rarely planted these days" (http://hamptonroads.com/2009/12/eastern-shore-farmer%E2%80%99s-sweet-potatoes-add-variety-traditional-tuber). 

I am planning to make a vegan lasagna with the kale. I'm not sure what I'll do with the other ingredients yet. Today I made a black bean/quinoa salad with that pepper mentioned above plus other ingredients. Here is the recipe:

3/4 cup quinoa (or: 1 rice cup measure)

1 red onion, minced

1 small carrot, sliced very thing

1 large clove of garlic, minced

1 small corno del toro or 1/4 green sweet pepper, chopped

1 teaspoon sunflower oil

3 tablespoons coarsely-chopped garlic scapes

1 cup frozen corn

fresh thyme leaves from two sprigs of thyme

2 tablespoons fresh parsley

1/4 cup dry white wine

1.5 cups cooked black beans

3 tablespoons lemon juice

2 tablespoons olive oil

white pepper to taste

Cook the quinoa like you would white rice in a rice cooker or follow package directions. In the meantime, heat the sunflower oil in a cast iron frying pan over medium-high heat until hot. Add the onion, carrot, green pepper, and garlic, and saute for 3-5 minutes until the onion looks tender. Stir in the garlic scapes, corn, thyme, parsley, and wine, and cook, stirring, for 3-5 minutes more. Remove from heat. When the quinoa is done, mix it with the onion mixture and remaining ingredients in a large bowl. Serve warm. Leftovers can be refrigerated and served warm or cold.