Cooking Experiment – Weeks 5 & 6
Posted by Red | Filed under Everyday, Food
The summer keeps going; so does the food. We just finished up week 6 (can you believe we’re 6 weeks into the proper summer? because I cannot) with the CSA.
Week 5 was bountiful as always. The photo includes the produce in the box as well as a few items we picked up at the Wedge to round out the meal.
Notice the little brown bag in the back? Birchwood Cafe granola. Yum. Week 5 left us with a changing of the team. Due to a toddler who decided it was better to go to bed at 6:30p, one of the households had to drop from the experiment. No problems whatsoever because this summer is just that – an experiment. Didn’t work for them. Next summer should be better when Mr. Abi is 3.
So week 6. Ah, challenging week 6. The replacement household had a canoe trip that came up last minute. The other half of my household was sick. Household #3 was only half there since Mr. Nick ran off to the deep south for a bit of vacation. So two people tackling the box of food… This box of food:
new potatoes, carrots, pearl onions, zucchini, cucumber, raspberries, broccoli, red mustard and more! Menu set at Vegetarian Lasagna, green salad, potatoes and chives, and a Raspberry/Blackberry pie for dessert.
Now, remember how I said there were just two people cooking? So I prepped the pie before he came over (just a pretty thing!).
Two people, cooking for tweleve, three hours on a hot Thursday evening. Conversation was good. Food turned out fair. I could really use a large saucepan (one size larger than my current one). Prepping veggies takes so much out of you. A two-basin sink is my dream.
My co-chef left at 9:30p with his household’s worth of food. I packed everything else up and then, well, looked a bit tired, worn out, and just hot.
So things I learned from week 6.
- To do these meals, you need three people on kitchen duty.
- It isn’t as fun with just two people doing the planning, shopping, prepping, cooking, cleaning, packaging, and socializing.
- There is still food for the replacement household in my fridge – they never came to get it. This is not acceptable.
- My raspberry/blackberry pie needed a bit more cornstarch and sugar in the filling – was runny and a bit too tart for my taste.
- That Thursday night left me exhausted for Friday.
I’m looking forward to week 7. Everyone should be back in town and feeling fabulous. Time to continue the learning of doing this community dinner thing…
