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We enjoyed a few favorites in the past week: steak fajitas with greens, spring turnip salad, and radish sandwich. If we have a bunch of greens or peppers to use, we often turn to fajitas. The turnip salad is one of my favorite things and the radish sandwich is all about good butter (we used Hope butter this time). Yum!

Steak Fajitas with Green Garlic, Radish Greens, Onion, Spinach




Spring Turnip Salad



1 fresh, young bunch of turnips, stems discarded, greens well washed and sliced into thin ribbons (1/3 inch or less), roots trimmed, peeled, and cut into 3/4 inch chunks
3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
Olive oil
Salt
1 tablespoon honey
Juice of 1 lime
1/4 cup plain yogurt or buttermilk
1/3 cup chopped fresh herbs, such as parsley, cilantro, and chives
1 cup cooked white beans
3 hard cooked eggs, peeled and sliced
4 strips bacon, cooked and chopped or crumbled
3 pieces of cornbread (your favorite recipe), cut into small cubes

At least a few hours in advance, toss the raw turnip greens with 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar, 2 tablespoons olive oil, and a big pinch of salt. Cover and refrigerate.

Put the turnip roots in a medium saucepan with an inch of water, a pinch of salt, and a splash of olive oil. Cover, bring to a boil, and boil hard, covered, until turning tender, about 5 minutes. Then remove the lid and continue to boil until tender enough to eat, a minute or two more. Drain if necessary and allow to cool.

Dissolve 1/2 teaspoon salt and 1 tablespoon honey in 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar and the lime juice. Whisk in 2 tablespoons olive oil. Stir in 1/4 cup plain yogurt or buttermilk and the chopped herbs. Taste and add salt, vinegar, or oil if necessary.

Dress the beans with 2 tablespoons of the yogurt dressing. Spread some greens on each plate and top with egg, beans, bacon, steamed turnips, and cornbread. Serve extra yogurt dressing on the side.


Radish Sandwich

Radish and Pea Shoot Sandwich

I didn't make it to the store to buy fancy butter for the radish sandwiches but they still turned out well. All we did is butter some lightly toasted (homemade) bread, top with sliced radish and pea shoot and voila!



This is our first time having pea shoot and it's quite tasty! It tastes a lot like peas, imagine that? It's not so easy to bite through the pea shoot which was a little problematic for the sandwich. Mike said he would have enjoyed a little more flavor on the sandwich but I thought it was good as is.

Box #3

We're finishing up Box #3. The contents?

Asparagus
Ramps
Parsnip
Sunchoke
Spinach
Salad mix
Green Garlic
Egyptian Walking Onion
Spring radish
Rhubarb
Sauté Mix
Garden Herb Packs

We went to the cabin for the holiday weekend and took a few items with us. We used the spinach salad to make a spinach, strawberry and onion salad with a poppyseed dressing. Delish!



Also while at the cabin, we made sunchoke dip with half of the sunchokes. Not my favorite recipe. Too bland and the texture wasn't right for me.



So far, the best use of the sunchoke was sunchoke pancakes (like potato pancakes). I think cooking sunchokes at a very high temperature so you get them nicely brown and crispy is the way to go. With the sunchoke pancakes, we had the asparagus with poached egg, ramp biscuits, and radish.





Sunchoke (jerusalem artichokes) Pancakes
via What's in the box

1 small onion
1 ½ pounds of Jerusalem artichokes, scrubbed
1 large egg, lightly beaten
½ cup of all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon of pure maple syrup
1 tablespoon of walnut or hazelnut oil (Optional) -- I used hazelnut
1 ½ teaspoons of kosher salt
1/8 teaspoon of freshly ground black pepper
A pinch of cayenne
1/8 teaspoon of freshly grated nutmeg
¼ cup of vegetable oil, or more as needed
1 tablespoon of butter

Using the shredder attachment, grate the onion in a food processor or through the largest holes of a hand grater, and transfer to a large bowl. Do the same with the Jerusalem artichokes.

Add the egg to the bowl and stir with a wooden spoon or spatula until well blended. Add the flour and stir in lightly; do not overwork. Add the maple syrup and the nutmeg, if using, and season with the salt, and the black pepper, cayenne, and nutmeg. Form into 8 or 9 equal pancakes, about 3 inches in diameter and a ½ inch thick. Place each pancake on a cookie sheet lined with wax paper.

Heat the vegetable oil and butter in a large heavy-bottomed skillet or on a griddle over medium heat. Working in batches, cook the pancakes until golden brown, about 5 to 7 minutes per side. You may need to adjust the heat as you work to avoid browning the outside of the pancakes too much before the inside cooks through. If the pan or griddle gets dry, add up to one more tablespoon of oil. Place the cooked pancakes on a plate lined with paper towels to drain, and cover loosely with foil to keep warm until ready to serve.

From Second Helpings from Union Square Cafe by Danny Meyer and Michael Romano

Ramp Biscuits from Bon Appetit April 2009

• 3/4 cup chilled buttermilk
• 3/4 cup thinly sliced trimmed ramps (bulbs, stems, and green tops)
• 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) chilled unsalted butter, cut into pieces
• 1 large egg, beaten to blend (for glaze)
• 1/2 teaspoon coriander seeds, cracked
  

Preheat oven to 425°F. Mix buttermilk and ramps in small bowl. Mix flour, baking powder, salt, and pepper in processor. Add chilled butter to processor; using on/off turns, cut in butter until fine meal forms. Transfer flour mixture to medium bowl. Add buttermilk mixture; stir until dough forms. Turn dough out onto lightly floured work surface and press out to 7-inch round, about 1/2 inch thick. Using 2-inch-diameter biscuit cutter dipped in flour, cut out rounds. Gather dough scraps; press out to 1/2-inch thickness and cut out additional rounds. Transfer dough rounds to baking sheet. Brush biscuit tops with some of egg glaze. Sprinkle with cracked coriander seeds. Bake biscuits until golden brown, about 20 minutes. Cool on rack. Serve slightly warm or at room temperature.

The last (and I mean last, we're not getting anymore) of our ramps, we made Ramp and Green Garlic Pasta.



Fantastic recipe. Simple and delicious. Even Owen liked it!