This week your basket contains: salad mix (lettuce, spinach, arugula, and endive), BEET THINNINGS, cooking greens (kale and mustard greens), green garlic, and Purple Sprouting Broccoli or Chinese broccoli.

This week is kind of an in-between week. We are anxiously awaiting kohlrabi, new potatoes and peas in the next few weeks. The greens continue to produce copiously and the salad mix is delicious and tender. This is the first harvest of Red Russian kale that was planted between the overwintered endive in March. It is tender enough to eat raw. The kale and the mustard greens could be made into a greens pesto (the mustard gives it some bite).

EASY PESTO

2 cups greens

½ cup nuts (almonds, walnuts, filberts or pine nuts)

½ cup Parmesan cheese, grated

1 tsp. salt

2 cloves garlic

½ cup olive oil

Place all ingredients except oil in a food processor.  As it processes, slowly add the oil.  Continue to process until smooth. Serve over pasta or as a dip.

One of our subscribers, thecrunchyginger.com, featured this recipe on her blog about using spring greens. It’s a perfect Cinco de Mayo meal!

MIXED GREENS ENCHILADAS

2 Tbs. veg. oil

2 cloves garlic, chopped

1 onion, chopped

4 cups coarsely chopped greens

1 Tbs. butter

1 Tbs. flour

½ cup milk

½ cup grated cheddar cheese

6 corn tortillas

½ cup salsa

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Heat oil, sauté onion & garlic until golden.  Add greens in small amounts until cooked down.  In another pan, melt butter, stir in flour, add milk slowly and then cheese.  Stir until thick then mix into cooked greens.  Fill the tortillas, roll and place in a lightly oiled baking dish.  Spread salsa over and bake for 25 minutes, until edges of tortillas are crisp.  Adapted from The Cook’s Garden catalog.

 The thinnings in your basket are from beets sown in a hoop house in early February. Beet seeds are compound seeds, so no matter how thinly you sow them, you will have multiple sprouts in each location. These thinnings have tender greens and small roots with a distinct beet flavor. They are delicious in the following recipe:

 SAUTÉED BEET GREENS WITH WASABI AND GINGER

1 bunch beet thinnings

1 small onion, chopped

1 green garlic, chopped

1 small cauliflower or broccoli raab

½ tsp. wasabi paste

1 Tbs. pickled ginger, chopped

2 Tbs. toasted sesame oil

Salt to taste

Heat the sesame oil in a large frying pan.  Add the onion, garlic, and wasabi paste and sauté until the onion is translucent.  Add the chopped beet thinnings, cauliflower or raab, and pickled ginger.  Continue cooking until the beets and cauliflower/raab is tender.  Add salt to taste.  Divide onto plates and top with soft poached eggs and serve with a slice of toast to absorb the yolk and juices.

Vegetable starts should be making their way to you slowly. If you haven’t yet received your full plant order, don’t fret. Many of the warm weather crops are still sizing up. We sent along some little starts that may need some TLC before being planted, but mostly we are waiting for a little more growth in the greenhouses.

Deposits are due by 5/15. We really need to know your plans for the new subscription year if you have not already told us. We are starting to create our routes.

RHUBARB is ready. We’ll send along approx. 1 Lb. for $3.  Just email to order.