Once a Month Meals

So after I had a baby and went back to work at 6 weeks, we spent a lot of time trying to get into a recipe of batch cooking.  We tried to find good recipes, to come up with shopping lists and prep plans and finally I just broke down and paid for Once a Month Meals.

So I would like to post a review that is basically all of the questions my husband asked me to try to figure out why we were paying for this service:

• What are you getting?
• You get: 
• A menu plan that you can swap out the dinners you don't like for ones you do 
• A shopping list
• A prep list (things you need to do to be ready to batch cook)
• Cooking instructions (what order to cook everything in) 
• Freezing instructions 
• Can't we do this ourselves?
• The only things we were successfully able to do ourselves was create a menu plan (which was not very creative) and a shopping list.  Even keeping the cooking instructions organized was complicated because everything came from different sites.  
• Batch freezer cooking resources for vegetarians that understand protein are few and far between.  All the lists on Pinterest of freezer meals to make are just chicken and beef with different sauces.  
• Batch freezer cooking for the crockpot vegetarian recipes are downright impossible to find.  
• Isn't this really expensive?
• Really expensive becomes relative.  $16 a month saves us from ordering takeout or going out to eat, which we do more than we used to, and from eating more expensive frozen dinners from Trader Joe's or the grocery store.  Basically, the cost of OAMM is the same as one emergency takeout dinner.  
• Isn't it still a lot of work?
• Yes - you still have to do all of your own prep and chopping and assembly for freezer meals.  It's a ton of work if you follow the site the way it's written, which is one twelve hour day and a ton of prep work the night before.  That is a lot of work that I can't do with a toddler.
• If you do the custom menu and select mostly "easy assembly" meals, you can cut the prep time in half.  I have twice now prepped and assembled meals in 2-3 naptimes and post-bedtime cooking stretches.  
• How much food does it make?
• So this is the downside.  We have found that the portions are a little light, probably because the site isn't designed to build you a dinner that will allow you to have two servings for leftovers the next day.  
• Each menu makes a set number of dinners, lunches, and breakfasts.  It winds up being something like 16 dinners I think, which is less than half of a month, but we find that with a few routine quick cook meals, like fish, and then our usual dinner out at least once on the weekend and our weekly pizza night, making even as few as 6 dinners a month has been enough that we always have reserve in the freezer.  
• Are the recipes good?
• There have been a few duds, but for the most part we have liked a lot of the stuff we have made and have either ranked it "definitely make it again" (tonight's spicy seitan flautas) or "do we really have to eat the second one of this?" (tempeh mushroom stroganoff).  The only downside really is that if you've already made two of something, the other one is lurking in the freezer.  
• How do you fit it in the freezer?
• Timing, excellent Jenga skills, and not hoarding your freezer meals.  I tend to save freezer meals for a rainy day and our freezer was PACKED.  We started to eat the freezer down more routinely and not only has it made an actual noticeable difference in our lives, it means that by the time another month rolls around we are ready to batch cook again.  
• You can treat it more as a make-one-freeze-one idea, so save 3-4 of the meals you make in the fridge to eat the week after your once a month cooking day.  

The thing I will say is the most awesome is over the summer, when we had something like 2-3 weeks worth of CSA that we had done nothing with, I created a menu to use up all the eggplant, zucchini, sweet potato, etc. and we took care of all of the produce we had.  

If you are on the fence about signing up, I would definitely recommend giving it a shot and see how you like it.  

Kale Chips

Kale chips are delicious, but they are often somehow too crispy on the outside and too mushy on the inside.  Sister-in-Law Barefoot was making them a few weeks ago and we learned the secret is to cook them low and slow on about 200 degrees.  This is problematic in the summer when you don't want to run the oven, and your toaster oven doesn't make more than a single serving.  But they do cook faster - about 30 minutes on 250 (lowest setting our toaster oven has that isn't keep warm).  But otherwise, let's talk flavoring.  I found this Carolina Mustard Barbecue sauce at Harris Teeter and it makes for some really good kale chips - just enough kick, just enough flavoring.  Ironically, I hate barbecue chips, but these are pretty much the best kale chips I've ever had.

Recipe:
-4-6 leaves of kale chips, rinsed, torn into bite sized pieces
-Carolina Mustard Barbecue Sauce or some other mustard based barbecue sauce.

1.) Preheat oven to 250.
2.) Toss 2-3 tsp of barbecue sauce with kale chips until all leaves are well coated.
3.) Spread kale leaves in a single layer on baking pan.
4.) Bake at 250 for 30 minutes.

Tofu Cabbage Egg Rolls

Too. Much. Cabbage.

Tofu Cabbage Egg Rolls:
Ingredients:
-1/4 shredded head of cabbage (shredded in the food processor so it's super thin)
-1 block of firm tofu, drained and run through the food processor
-5 spice powder (or any spice mixture you like - 5 spice powder is surprisingly sweet)
-1 onion, sliced thin (I just ran it through the food processor after the cabbage)
-soy sauce (I used Trader Joe's soyaki) - probably about 2 tablespoons.
-egg roll wrappers - about 10
-Olive Oil

Oven at 400.

Process:
1. Heat olive oil in a pan on medium high heat, add in tofu and spice powder and a little soy sauce (1 tbsp) and scramble until browned.  Set aside, or push to the edge of the pan.
2. Saute onions until translucent, add cabbage and saute until soft (about 5 minutes.)  Add remaining soy sauce.
3.  Wrap filling into egg roll wrappers - if you buy the nasoya brand, they have a diagram. Basically, make an envelope, then wet the flap and close it down.  Put rolls flap side down on a greased baking sheet.  Spray the tops with olive oil
4. Bake for 15 minutes.  I flipped them at about 12 minutes to get both sides equally crispy.

Enjoy!

Cabbage Pasta

We've been getting a lot of cabbage from the CSA lately.  I don't dislike cabbage, but it's a tough vegetable sometimes.  I found this recipe for cabbage pasta though, and gave it a try.  I don't do anchovies though, so I subbed in tuna fish and it was pretty tasty.  If you also hate tuna, try the white albacore stuff from Trader Joe's - it doesn't have the same tuna-y taste.

Ingredients:
-1 can tuna
-1/2 bulb garlic (I only had four cloves, but I would definitely use at least five)
-crushed red pepper
-1 box pasta (I used whole grain penne)
-1/2 cup breadcrumbs
-1/3 cup olive oil
-1/2 head shredded cabbage (I sauted mine in the crockpot the night before - combine with butter, cook for 6 hours on low)
-salt and pepper to taste
-grated parmesean cheese

1. Cook the pasta to al dente.
2. Meanwhile, saute 2 cloves garlic in olive oil, add tuna, then add breadcrumbs and saute until golden.  Pull off burner and set aside.
3. Saute remaining garlic and red pepper in olive oil for a minute, then add cabbage.  If you haven't already sauted the cabbage, cook for 10 minutes (check the pasta and drain it, it's done), or until soft.
4. Combine the breadcrumbs, then the pasta, with the cabbage.  Toss and top with cheese.

It was surprisingly tasty, although next time I'll slice the cabbage with the food processor to get it to be more thin and uniform.  I definitely recommend trying this one out if you have gotten a lot of cabbage this year.

Smashed Reskins with Kale

I bought a bag of Kale last week, which is another reason you should never grocery shop after a 14 mile run.  I also bought a giant bag of Redskin potatoes.  And a thing of cheese puffs.  Seriously, don't do it.  We had some leftover cream from New Year's that I wanted to use up, so this recipe came from some googling (mostly of the "I wonder if people ever put Kale in mashed potatoes" variety) and also some haphazard "just use it up" testing.

Ingredients:
1 cup kale, washed, de-stemmed, and chopped into small pieces.  The smaller the better. 
4-5 redskin potatoes, cut up into 1 inch pieces
5 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup heavy cream (if you don't have any, just use milk)
1/2 cup milk
salt
pepper
olive oil
Parmesan cheese (optional)

Procedure:
1. Boil a pot of water, toss in potatoes.  Let cook for 20 minutes or until tender and mashable.  Drain.  Mash (you can mash them later, but as I was mashing them later, I thought, "gee, I should have mashed these first.)
2. Heat a big pan (or use the mashed potato pan) with olive oil, saute garlic until slightly golden. 
3. Add kale, saute until bright green. 
4. Add potatoes, heavy cream, and milk.  Stir together until everything is well mixed.  If you did not mash the potatoes before, mash them now. 
5. Add salt and pepper to taste, serve topped with Parmesan and enjoy! 

Chard and Red Cabbage

We had chard and red cabbage to use tonight, so I made these:

Chard Risotto (really good - the chard doesn't taste bitter at all. I'm not sure how that happened.  I used less chard than this called for.)

Sauteed Red Cabbage (I liked this a lot, but my entire kitchen is now red.)  It had a sweet, crunchy taste to it.

Happy eating!

Sweet & Sour Stir Fry

This week in the CSA, we got radishes and bok choy.  Also, cabbage, kale, and arugula.  And another sweet potato.  I'm a little CSA-weary these days, but we haven't had time to go to the farmer's market since the beginning of August, so thank goodness my sister keeps showing up with fresh veggies on Tuesday.  This week, we are sort of overrun with leafy green things, and I am feeling the need to cook everything so nothing goes bad.  (Suggestions for things that freeze well are appreciated.)

Tonight, I finally used up some tofu that was on it's last legs, the radishes, the bok choy, and an onion to create a simple but delicious stir-fry.  If you are afraid of bok choy, don't be.  I was freaked out at first too, but it turns out it is easy and delicious.  Same goes for the radishes.  This was super easy and I'm really pleased with how everything tasted.

Ingredients:
Tofu (I used a 2-block pack from Costco, but you could probably just use one) cut up into 1/2 inch dice and drained
1/4 cup Sweet and sour sauce (I used about a half cup, but was using 2 blocks of tofu)
1/4 cup Soy Sauce (all liquid measurements are approximate, you want a mixture that is a little runny but still thick)
2-3 cloves Garlic
1 onion
1 bunch radishes, cleaned, trimmed and cut into quarters
1 bok choy, cleaned, separated from stalk and with leaves trimmed off and set aside (just cut them off and put the leaves separate from the white part)
More soy sauce
Olive oil
Brown rice or starch of your choice (I throw the rice in the rice cooker first, since it takes so long.)

Procedure:
1.) Heat olive oil in a pan on medium-high.  Add the tofu and allow to cook until edges are crispy (this took around ten minutes, during which I chopped everything else.)
2.) In a separate pan or wok, start the onions cooking over medium-high heat.
3.)  Once the onions have softened, add the radishes.  Allow them to cook for about 5 minutes with the onions.
4.) Mix the soy sauce and sweet and sour sauce together.  Add to tofu. Turn to medium-low heat.
5.) Add the bok choy to the  onions and radishes.  Add about 1/4 cup of soy sauce to the mix and allow to cook over medium-high heat for another 5-10 minutes.  Radishes should taste crunchy but fork easily.
6.) Once the radishes are edible, add the bok choy leaves and stir into the mixture.  Cook 1-2 minutes more, until leaves are just wilted.
7.) Serve tofu and veggies together over brown rice.

CSA Routine

Sorry for being so MIA lately, I got a new job and it comes with a commute and a somewhat more harried lifestyle than the last job.  Also we've been throwing together meals at the last minute, rather than really planning, and then I'm too tired to remember what goes in them.

But, after a couple weeks of this, we are finally making the CSA work with our hectic lifestyle.   We get our CSA share on Tuesday nights, and the routine is to immediately come home and prep the food.  This includes:
-chop onions - I do them into strips and into a dice, for different recipes
-tear up Kale leaves into bite sized pieces for making kale chips; wash and put away (I store them in tupperwares lined with paper towels)
-green beans/snap peas get washed and trimmed so they are ready to use
-lettuce gets cut up, washed, and stored in the salad spinner, so handfuls can be grabbed and put into salads
-beets get washed and if time permits, roasted and cut into slices or cubes
-cucumbers get sliced for easy snacking (although this week's cucumbers are a little bitter)
-everything gets cataloged and we talk meals for the rest of the week, even if we don't make a formal meal plan (last week, we said, "okay, let's do stir fry, eggplant pasta, and tacos for weeknights"; this week it's "lets try this weird zucchini thing and maybe do a risotto and tacos")

We still hit the farmer's market on weekends for the things we know aren't coming in our CSA share, or the things that we know we'll need more of than is coming in the share.  That gets us through Sunday/Monday meals, and gives us veggies to supplement our meals.  We still haven't perfected it though, like I really wish I had bought eggplant when I saw it on Sunday at the Farmer's market, but we're getting closer.  I suspect by next year, we will be old hats at this and have our routine perfected.

Even if we don't continue to have a CSA, it makes sense to be doing this after we get back from the farmer's market, but usually on Sunday we are rushing off to one place or another and don't have the time.

Anyone else like to pre-prep their food? Any tips to share re: washing, storing, or pre-cooking?

Spinach Arugula Pesto Lasagna

The first time I had pesto lasagna, I was in Rome.  It was amazing.  The kind of experience that ruins regular lasagna for you.  Handmade, fresh pasta, pesto, cheese...hello, lover.  I tried to duplicate it when I got home, but it just didn't work.  So this week, when our CSA share came in and we had arugula, garlic scapes, and spinach, I found a recipe for arugula pesto in Dishing Up Maryland.  I modified their pesto recipe a bit, and then was going to just do boring pasta, but we had lasagna noodles and I thought pesto lasagna might just be the ticket for a celebratory dinner after my first day on the new job.

Lasagna takes a long time to prep, so I probably shouldn't have decided that.  This recipe is inspired by a Cooking from the Garden recipe that we made for Valentine's Day and we didn't eat until nearly 10pm that night. Nonetheless, here is a great recipe for using up a whole heap-ton of veggies.  We were lucky to get ALL of Sister Barefoot's arugula (and far too selfish to share any of the delicious lasagna), but all is still a bunch, not a specific amount, so guesses are approximate here for quantities.

Ingredients:
For pesto:
1 bunch arugula
1/2 bunch spinach
4-6 garlic scapes (can probably use whole cloves of garlic)
1 tbsp pine nuts, toasted at 350 for 10 minutes
olive oil

For lasagna:
8-10 no-bake lasagna noodles
2 cups parmesean cheese
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp flour
3 cups milk
Salt and pepper, to taste

Process:

1. Wash all greens, put in a food processor.  Process until chopped up into tiny bits.  Add pine nuts.  Add olive oil until it looks like pesto.  
2. Melt butter in a large skillet over medium heat.  Add flour. Cook for 1-2 minutes until smooth.  Add milk.  Stir frequently, wait for it to thicken.  
3. While waiting for the sauce to thicken, soak the lasagna noodles in water.  
4. Once sauce has thickened, line the bottom of an 8x8 pan with noodles.  Add pesto.  Add cheese.  Pour sauce over top.  Add more noodles, pesto, cheese, and sauce, until done.  If you run out of sauce at the top, just grate on some more cheese. 
5. Bake at 350 for 20 minutes with foil, and then another 15 without foil.  (Our 8x8 pan actually fits into the toaster oven, which cooks it much faster and doesn't create as much heat in the kitchen on really hot summer days, so that's another thing to love about this recipe.)  

Enjoy!  I would be interested in making this recipe with additional vegetables and maybe not quite so much cheese.  I was thinking zucchini or roasted eggplant, but what new and interesting vegetables would go well here?  

Chard-pea-barley Risotto

I had an odd craving for risotto tonight, and I knew we needed to use up the chard we got from the csa, so I wondered if it would go well in a barley risotto.

Answer: yes.  Loosely based on this recipe.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup pearled barley, rinsed
• 1/2 bunch chard (about 5 stems)
• 1 onion
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1/2 - 1 cup peas
• 1/4 cup shredded Parmesan
• 1/2 lemon, juiced
• 4 cups water or stock 
• 1 cup dry white wine (optional) 

Procedure

1. Dice onion and chop garlic.  Heat olive oil on the stove in a pan.  Start heating water or stock (I use an electric kettle).  
2. Saute onion and garlic until translucent.  Add barley and saute for 1-2 minutes.  (You can also toss in a tablespoon of soy sauce.)
3. Add the white wine, and once it is absorbed, add the water slowly, until barley is tender.  
4. While barley is cooking, chop up the chard into teensy tiny bite sized pieces.  Rinse or defrost the peas.  
5. Once barley has pretty much cooked, add the peas and chard. Add lemon juice.  Allow to cook for ~1-2 minutes.  
6. Serve with Parmesan cheese and enjoy your healthy dinner!  

Things to do with chard and arugala

Our biggest hesitation with signing up for the CSA share was the amount of greens that we knew would be coming our way in June.  Sister Barefoot, our CSA partner, does not care for arugula, so I know we're getting a lot of that, and we also know we're getting more than enough (read: any) chard.  So when we go through cookbooks now and look for recipes, we tag ones that have arugula and chard, and look forward to making them this summer.
Here are a few I've tagged -

Black Eyed Peas with Chard and Soba Noodles - p. 140, Fresh from the Vegetarian Slow Cooker
Arugala Pesto - p. 32, Dishing up Maryland
Shepherd's Pie with Chard-Lentil Filling - p. 171, Meat Lover's Meatless Cookbook
Cherry Tomato, and Black Bean Salad with Spicy Lime Vinaigrette - p. 201, Big Green Cookbook
Whole Wheat Pasta with Arugula - p. 176 Cooking from the Garden

We'll also be following the Baltimore Sun's Dining at Large blog, which features guests posts about Living in the CSA, and this local farm's blog which includes recipes about vegetables that are currently in-season.  The farm we are getting our CSA through has some recipes, but a relatively unappetizing selection considering how popular their CSA is.  I'm just saying, I think a forum which allows people to ask, "WTF do I do with the sh*tton of beets I got this week?"  would be helpful.

Any more resources for me?

To CSA or not to CSA

Sister Barefoot got a CSA share last year and Mr. Barefoot and I watched jealously as she received fresh radishes, arugala, tomatoes, squash, and other veggies.  Okay, we weren't so jealous of the chard.  Chard is a little....gross.

So now we're trying to decide whether we want to get a half-share of the same CSA this year.  Is having fresh tomatoes and zucchini (zucchini bread!) worth the possibility of getting way more chard and kale than we can handle?

Part of figuring this out is to go through my cookbooks and see what recipes intrigue me.  I have a recipe for kale chips, which sounds a lot like eating that seaweed that you wrap sushi in.  Also chard frittata, which sounds like a pretty good way to mask the chard flavor.  I'm hoping to start making more casseroles, and I think casseroles are probably a great use for greens.

The pros of a CSA seem to be:
1.) Fresh, organic, locally grown vegetables come to us
2.) Don't have to go to the farmer's market every week
3.) Supporting a local farm
4.) Expand our horizons and eat different, crazy vegetables - and more of them, since we definitely don't eat enough vegetables.
5.) Approximately $13 a week, which is similar to what we spend on produce

The cons are:
1.) Vegetables we might not like at all, but feel like we have to eat all of since we've already paid for them.
2.) Don't get to go to the farmer's market every week (although I reminded Mr. Barefoot we could just go for the handmade mini donuts.)
3.) Harder to menu plan, since we won't know what we're getting until Monday night.
4.) Might end up with too many vegetables, and end up throwing things away.
5.) We could just take that $13 a week to the farmer's market and buy produce.

Do you have a CSA?  Would you recommend it to me?  Do you have any suggestions for great recipes for greens?  What can I do with chard?