Katie and her mental meanderings

I love asparagus and today when I picked up our weekly veg I mentioned how nice our small bunch was to the girl giving out the boxes.  Oh, great, she said, we have some day-old bunches there, help yourself.

So I did.

I thought about Parma ham and grilled asparagus but I’m not convinced you can get Parma ham here.

What’s your favourite thing to do with asparagus (apart from just eat it!)?

It’s not your screen – the carrots are really yellow – and although one beet is a normal red colour, the other one is white. The borscht I made still turned everything red.

We’ve also had sprouting broccoli – not purple, just green – but purple potatoes (from the supermarket, not the veg box), and this week, some tiny cauliflowers, about 3in across. Too small to be out wihout their mothers. I was very mean and put them in a curry, along with some radishes I couldn’t think what to do with.

The avocados are builing up – I have two ripe ones in the fridge and one huge one ripening in the fruit bowl. I think I’m going to make avocado ice cream – just cream, sugar, lemon juice and avocado flesh, freeze and stir when still a bit soft.

We also have two lots of rainbow chard. Normally I just make pasta or something but I looked up and found that cabbage rolls can be made with chard.  Cabbage rolls are a big fat pain to make (I have never tried, but it’s a bit like those round pasta rolls whose name escapes me, you have to steam the leaves first and then roll a meat/rice filling in the leaves), and this chard is quite small-leaved. However I have previously made a great layered mince/rice/tomato/cabbage casserole so I think that’s where the chard is headed.

We have entirely different seasons in Southern California to, well, England. But also different to the NE US which is where some “seasonal” cookery guides seem to be based. I heard Jamie Oliver extolling the virtues of seasonal cookery on the radio and thought, yes, but what do I do with radishes, pomegranates, and fresh dates?

Anyway I got several fresh chilis in our vegetable selection last week and the week before so, fearful of their heat, I only put 3 of them into 4 servings of chili yesterday. I should have put more in – they weren’t hot at all.

The radishes, plus lettuce and mini tomatoes from the veg box, and a cucumber and some grapes from the farmers’ market, went into a salad for a church brunch.

The pomegranates (from the farmers’ market) are probably going into a pomegranate pie at some stage.

The fresh dates I just eat.