Persephone Farm

Sustainably Grown Vegetables & Flowers – Indianola, Washington

Recipes

Chinese Cabbage for Lunch

By

Chinese cabbage with black bean sauce
Rinsed Chinese cabbage
Steaming the cabbage

Today I got a small head of Chinese cabbage from the farm. Rebecca says its “Blues” Chinese cabbage from Fedco Seeds. Fedco Seeds is her favorite seed company, both for their products as well as their vision. Fedco is a cooperative and offers a large selection of certified organic cultivars and regional heirloom varieties.

So back to lunch… I’m not a hardcore foodie, if I’m going to cook it’s got to be simple and easy, especially at lunchtime. I’m a fan of prepared condiments and sauces. In this dish I used prepared Chinese black bean sauce, and Sriracha hot chili sauce for a little spice (find both in the Asian section of your grocery store, Central Market in Poulsbo has a good selection.

Easy Chinese Cabbage with black bean sauce

  • Rinse and chop cabbage
  • Heat a small amount of water in a large pan
  • Add the cabbage and steam for a couple of minutes until it wilts and the most of the water cooks away
  • Add a couple of heaping teaspoons of black bean sauce and cook a minute or two more
  • Stir in a drizzle of sesame oil
  • Top with hot chili sauce to taste

Stinging Nettle Pesto

By

Spring nettles
Spring nettles, eat, but don't touch

Nettles? Yes, stinging nettles. The Farm is offering them at the Bainbridge Farmers market while they’re still young and tender. Use gloves to handle raw nettles. Once it’s steamed or boiled briefly it looses the sting, use nettles like other spring greens or spinach. Try some nettle pesto…

Famous food forager, Langdon Cook, has a great nettle pesto post here on his Fat of the Land Blog.

Here’s our recipe adapted from ‘Lucid Food: Cooking for an Eco-Conscious Life‘ by Louisa Shafia

1/4 pound stinging nettles
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 cup pine nuts
1/2 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/2 cup grated Parmigiano Reggiano cheese
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

  • Put the nettles in boiling salted water for 1 minute. Drain and let cool.
  • Squeeze out as much of the water as possible and coarsely chop.
  • In a food processor process the nettles with the garlic, pine nuts, oil, and lemon juice until smooth.
  • Transfer to a bowl and fold in the cheese. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Fava Bean Bonus

By

As Persephone split share subscribers, we got a bag of fat fava beans for the second week in a row. These are mysterious, possibly magical beans. Until last year I only knew of fava beans as the side dish favored by Hannibal ‘The Cannibal’ Lecter in the oscar winning “The Silence of the Lambs“. Creepy! Don’t let that turn you off to fava beans, turns out they are delicious and it’s a treat to get them fresh from the farm down the street. A bit of googling and chatting with apprentices, Caitlin and Greg inspired my fava bean lunch…

Fava beans with Walla Walla onions
Fava Beans with Walla Walla Onions

Fava Beans with
Walla Walla Onions
Shell the beans, drop into boiling water and boil for 2 minutes. Drain the water and, so you can handle them, rinse a bit with cool water. Then remove the outer skin of each bean. Just pinch the fat end of the bean and cut the small end with a paring knife. Pinch a bit more and the bright green inner bean slides out. Easy enough. Although you can eat the outer skin, the inside is the good stuff. Heat up a bit of good olive oil, add some sliced Walla Walla onions (also in this week’s box) and gently saute until they soften a bit. Add the fava beans and heat them up. Then you’re done. I added some of Judith’s fresh chèvre, and salt and pepper (oh and some Parmesean cheese too). It was lovely.

Here’s some more info on fava beans. Did you know they were the only beans Europeans ate before they discovered America and all its legumes? So says this NPR article by Bonny Wolf.

Sauteed Frisee

By

Our first full-week CSA pickup included Frisee, a wonderful salad green. Our friend, Abra Bennett, a professional chef and blogger at French Letters gave us this Frisee recipe. We thought we’d share it with you.

Sautéed Frisée

Recipe By: Abra Bennett for Persephone Farm

1  Large head very fresh frisée
1  T  olive oil
1  T  bacon fat (or use 2 T olive oil)
1  T  water
3  Cloves garlic
1  T  lemon juice
1  T  heavy cream
salt and pepper to taste

Chop the frisée, not too finely. Heat olive oil and bacon fat in a large
skillet with a tightly-fitting lid. Add the frisée to the fat in the pan,
add the water, cover tightly, and let simmer 3-4 minutes, stirring
occasionally, until thoroughly wilted.

Remove lid, add garlic, and sauté another minute or two. Add lemon juice
and sauté to combine. Add cream and sauté to combine. Taste for salt and
pepper.

The greens will be slightly bitter and piquant. They’re delicious with rich
foods like duck, pork, macaroni and cheese, or stirred into a bowl of penne.

Serves one person who really loves greens, or two more reasonable people.