Wednesday, November 17, 2021

Friends: Thank you for subscribing to The Farm Share Newsletter. Farm share season is my favorite season, and I've loved experiencing the joys — the tenderest lettuces, the spiciest arugula, the sweetest tomatoes — and the challenges — cabbage to feed the neighborhood! — with all of you these past few months.

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If you've found yourself up to your eyeballs in sweet potatoes, here's a thought: save four pounds of them for next week, and make this classic sweet potato casserole. It's an old family recipe, an orange-scented, brandy-spiked sweet potato purée buried under a blanket of brown sugar, butter, and cinnamon-spiced pecans.

This is not how I typically enjoy sweet potatoes these days. As I noted a few newsletters back, it was this sweet potato quesadilla recipe, which calls for lots of smoky spices, a heap of cilantro, and a ton of fresh lime juice that taught me to love sweet potatoes.

This sweet potato casserole does not call for any of those bright, herby accents, but if there is a time and a place for this sort of festive, nostalgic ensemble, it's on the 2021 holiday table. I hope all of your holiday preparations are going well!

Classic Sweet Potato Casserole

Here's another holiday recipe that will make good use of your farm share vegetables: Alice Waters's Potato Gratin.

It comes from Chez Panisse Vegetables, which offers a number of enticing combinations — potato with turnips or celery root or leeks or sweet potato — but I've only ever made it with potatoes. The seasonings are simple — salt, pepper, thyme, and a dash of freshly grated nutmeg — as is the braising liquid, a mixture of equal parts heavy cream and chicken stock. Topped with Gruyère and parmesan, these potatoes emerge irresistibly crispy on top and creamy underneath.

This potato gratin is a dish my mother has served at nearly every big holiday gathering for as long as I can remember. It often steals the show no matter what it's beside, turkey or otherwise.

Alice Waters's Potato Gratin

A Few Vegetable-Focused Books

In closing, I'd like to share a few books I refer to often throughout the CSA season and beyond. If you are looking for more guidance for your farm share hauls, they might be useful.

Chez Panisse Vegetables by Alice Waters
Six Seasons by Joshua McFadden
Ruffage by Abra Berens
Canal House Cooks Every Day by Melissa Hamilton and Christopher Hersheimer
The New Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison

The recipe that came to mind immediately upon seeing yesterday's vegetable share was this Favorite Cabbage Soup — it would make great use of the cabbage, potatoes, and the carrots.

Farm Share Week 23

Sweet Potatoes → Sweet Potato Recipes
Onions → Recipes Using Onions
Carrots → Carrot Recipes
Kale → Kale Recipes
Potatoes → Potato Recipes
Cabbage → Cabbage Recipes
Butternut Squash → Butternut Squash Recipes

There is some overlap in this week's share with previous weeks, so please see previous newsletters for more recipe ideas. Here's an overview of the previous newsletters: