Weekly recipe ideas for Thursday, June 16th

by Brie

Fruit, like plums and pears, do make great snacks but they make even better additions to dinner. On a hot night try making a plum chicken salad or roasted plum and spinach salad. And as a side dish caramelized carrots and pears sounds delicious!

 



Green beans are a great side dish to serve with dinner. From the simple, serving them either steamed or roasted, to the more creative, honey cashew green beans or sweet and spicy green beans, they make a great accompaniment to most meals. Green beans can also be served in the main meal, like this green bean masala or this green bean mushroom casserole.

Green onions (also known as scallions) are milder then most other onions. They can be cooked or used raw as a garnish. Add them to sesame orzo with charred scallions or stir-fried tofu. For a lovely dinner make honey glazed pork with scallions and carrots or chicken with rice, broccoli and scallions.   

Spinach is a favorite salad ingredient. If you are wanting to try out some new salad recipes consider cranberry spinach salad or honey curry spinach salad. Our spinach will be chopped up and added to some phylo to make a spinach pie.  

These are some of the ideas on my menu plan this week. What are you cooking?

Brie loves eating food and is learning to love cooking food. She also blogs about motherhood at Capital Mom and about Ottawa with kids at Kids in the Capital.

Thursday, April 14th: Cooking with collard greens and rutabaga

by Brie

This week's box offered some great fruit for snacking, like a bag of Pink Lady apples, navel oranges and Bartlett pears. The fruit would also be lovely tossed with the lettuce, cucumber and avocado we got. Maybe in a balsamic vinaigrette dressing for a fabulous spring salad.

Avocados and mangoes also make for a great salad combination. You could also serve them together with pork chops or salmon. Add a tomato and some black beans and you have a southwestern tasty meal-sized salad! Avocados are a great fruit for snacking or in dishes due to their high potassium content (they have more than bananas!) and are also rich in vitamin B, E and K.

I have come to love all forms of greens, like kale, spinach and Swiss chard but I'm not as familiar with collard greens. Considered a staple vegetable in the Southern United States, where it is often served with ham, it can also be substituted for other greens in your favorite recipe. Spanakopita with collard greens maybe? Collard greens would be great served with the potatoes that came in the box this week or in a lentil soup.

Rutabagas are a turnip cousin. Low in calories, they are also a good source of Vitamin C , folacin and fibre. Often served as a side dish, they can easily be prepared as a mash similar to mashed potatoes. Rutabagas can also be roasted and boiled. You could even try them in smashed potato and parsnips or stew.

Potatoes are such a versatile, and tasty, vegetable. Full of vitamins and minerals, the potatoes in our box this week would taste great baked with zucchini and peppers or in a cold potato and cucumber soup.

These are some of the ideas on my menu plan this week. What are you cooking?

Brie loves eating food and is learning to love cooking food. She also blogs about motherhood at Capital Mom and about Ottawa with kids at Kids in the Capital.

Thursday, March 10th: Making muffins and roasting vegetables

by Brie

Our box this week arrived after dinner and the kids had to open it as soon as we dragged it into the house. They they had to sit and eat half the strawberries. I managed to snag one for myself and it was good!




Some anjou pears arrived in the box which means I will be making my favorite spiced anjou pear bread. This bread recipe has been one of my best discoveries and is perfect for taking visiting. It also got me thinking about how I could bake with the grapefruit. Grapefruit muffins anyone? And because we go through muffins like crazy in this house I am also going to turn the big bag of carrots into spiced carrot muffins. I like to make the mini muffins and freeze some to be pulled out when needed for snacks.

There were two greens in the box this week, Swiss chard and spinach. I am going to cook the chard with chick peas and fresh tomatoes and serve it with quinoa but you could also try a chard and goat cheese pizza or spicy Thai vegetable soup. I am going to try making these spinach brownies. The spinach would also be tasty in this curried lentil and spinach soup.

Whenever I see little potatoes in my box I always want to sprinkle them with some sea salt and roast them. Yum. You can't go wrong with roasted potatoes. I have the same urge with yams, but cut as fries. But they would also be great baked and served with cream cheese. The beautiful cauliflower will end up being roasted with sea salt and thrown into my favorite soup recipe. For something different you could try a cauliflower cheese pie or cauliflower curry.

This is what's on my menu plan this week. What are you cooking?

Brie loves eating food and is learning to love cooking food. She also blogs about motherhood at Capital Mom and about Ottawa with kids at Kids in the Capital.

Thursday, February 3rd box: Baking with fruit and roasting vegetables

I have been looking forward to our food box all week! And knowing what was coming just made me more excited.

There was a lot of fruit in this week's box, which is great because we love to eat fruit, but after making an amazing Anjou pear bread recipe last week I am tempted to hide the fruit away and not let anyone eat it. I may just save it all for baking! The navel oranges would be great for this orange yogurt phyllo pastry dessert, bananas foster are my idea of a treat, I could eat this grapefruit pudding cake with a spoon and if the pear bread doesn't interest you how about some pear cake. If you want to get more creative with the fruit you could try orange, lemon and grapefruit marmalade (perfect for using both the oranges and grapefruits), fennel and orange salad (don't you love it when a recipe lets you use two items from your box) or even, wait for it, creamy banana lettuce salad.

Maybe it is the cold and snow, but all I want to do is roast some vegetables. I will be making my favorite roasted cauliflower soup (which doesn't have to be vegan if you use cream or milk), but I was also tempted by roasted cauliflower with cumin and coriander or even the spicy cauliflower recipe. The snap peas from this weeks box are going to tossed into this sesame maple roasted tofu recipe, although they would also be good cooked with ginger or lemon. I am also going to make the campfire potatoes (in the oven not the BBQ), but the potatoes would also be lovely in a scalloped potato and fennel recipe or a kale potato puree.

I have decided to try some different recipes with the zucchini and Swiss chard. I am hoping the kids will like either the cheddar zucchini fritters or cheesy broiled zucchini. I am going to make a rainbow chard pie for dinner with friends this weekend, but I am sure it would be just as good cooked up with garlic and lemon or with roasted beets.

This is what's on my menu plan this week. What are you cooking?

Brie loves eating food and is learning to love cooking food. She also blogs about motherhood at Capital Mom and about Ottawa with kids at Kids in the Capital.

Thursday, January 27th box: soup, more soup and kale my kid will eat

by Brie

After the great box last week I could not wait for this week's delivery. We ate so well last week! And having the box helped me in coming up with our meal plan for the week. I used what we got and built around it, shopping on Saturday for the extras I needed to supplement my recipes.

This week I am focusing on soups. I am fighting a cold and, well, with the cold weather outside soups are a perfect meal in my mind. The acorn squash and apple soup recipe I made last week was amazing. I took it to dinner with friends and it was a hit. I don't know if it was thanks to the organic apple, the only sweetener, but it was like eating candy! I am tempted to make it again using the butternut squash that came this week. I have also been thinking about trying out some butternut squash soup recipes. I like this one for the combination of orange juice and ginger with the squash.

My all time favorite soup is French onion soup and it was my first thought when I saw the 3 lbs bag of red onions in the box. I have never tried making the soup with red onions, but I found this recipe and I am going to give it a try. If I had more onions I would be adding roasted red onions with butter, honey and balsamic vinegar to my meal plan and making a side of pickled red onions to go with burgers.

I am pretty sure the pint of grape tomatoes we got will be turned into salsa with the fresh cilantro and red pepper that also came this week. My husband loves to made fresh salsa with a vinegar, sugar and garlic vinaigrette. But. But, I may hold off and try these sautéed cherry tomatoes with garlic and basil or baked cherry tomatoes as a side dish one night this week.

The hardest choice this week was deciding how to use the big bunch of kale. I never used to know how to cook kale, but then I discovered a kale pizza recipe and I was hooked. It is really versatile and can use used in place of other greens, like spinach. I have heard good things about baked kale chips, and I will try them one day, but after making a zucchini phyllo pie last week (and my four year old eating three servings) I have decided to try a kale version of spanakopita. If you wanted to you could try making a squash and kale phyllo pie. I am going to see if I can get my girl to eat three servings of these kale phyllo triangles.  

The box this week had some broccoli, a big bag of Gala apples, some Anjou pears and Satsuma mandarins/ tangerines. While we are big fruit eaters in the house, and I expect the kids and I could work our way through it all, I have decided to set aside the pears and try making spiced Anjou pear bread. I love raisin bread and thought this would make a great bread to take to visit friends.  

This is what's on my menu plan this week. What are you cooking?

Brie loves eating food and is learning to love cooking food. She also blogs about motherhood at Capital Mom and about Ottawa with kids at Kids in the Capital.

Organic Harvest Box for March 12

Sadly, there is no Organic Harvest Box photo this week - we were out for dinner celebrating my six year old's birthday, got home late and I totally started putting the produce away instead of taking a picture. If you're not a regular customer of Life Organic, you'll just have to trust me when I say it looks FANTASTIC!

I know that pears are often a regular part of the Harvest Box, and we usually just gobble them up instead of cooking them, because they are so sweet and delicious, but I wanted to share a few pear recipes with you. I urge you to give them a try, pears add a rich, wonderful flavour to any meal. I've shared this before, but this Fresh Pear and Curry Pasta is a family favourite of ours, and not at all difficult to make. I also have my eye on this Pear Stuffed Chicken with Walnut Rice as a lovely meal incorporating pears.

With this warmer, spring-like weather we're having, why not fire up your barbecue and whip up some Grilled Bartlett Pears - they are totally delicious! Bartlett Pear Muffins are a great choice for the bakers out there, and this Ham and Cheese Sandwich with Bartlett Pears is a fantastic new twist on ham and cheese sandwiches.

I came across some great green bean recipes this week, but I have to be totally honest with you. I am not really a fan of adding green beans to a "dish" of any sort. I really enjoy green beans just slightly cooked (still crunchy!) and sauteed with olive oil and salt and pepper. These Sesame Green Beans are delicious and so fast and easy to throw together. For the more adventurous green bean lovers, take a look at this Fassoulia - Green Beans with Ground Beef, Lemon, Green Bean and Celery Salad and Country Green Beans. Be sure to let me know if you give any of these recipes a try!

Kale is another food I prefer to be just cooked simply, like this recipe for Sauteed Kale - easy and delicious! I also like the looks of this vegan Red Kale Pasta as well as this Rustic Red Kale and White Bean Soup. And I'm hoping to try this Braised Kale with Pancetta this week - to break out of my comfort zone.

I absolutely adore fresh Heirloom Cherry Tomatoes! They're so colourful and tasty. I often toss cherry tomatoes in pasta . . . like in this Penne with Fresh Ricotta and Heirloom Cherry Tomatoes or Egg Noodles with Heirloom Cherry Tomatoes. They are also great chopped up as a salad - just toss with some olive oil, goat cheese, herbs and salt and pepper. I also found this
Heirloom Cherry Tomato, Fennel and Arugula Salad with Goat Cheese Dressing - definitely more elaborate but well worth the effort!

Enjoy your week and be sure to check in next time . . .

Harvest Box for October 16

Welcome to the new Life Organic Recipe Blog! Check in here each week to find helpful tips and recipes for all the food in your Harvest Box. Not a customer yet? No problem, you can find more information and sign up for delivery service in Ottawa at the Life Organic website.

Life Organic delivers "fresh Harvest boxes filled with delicious seasonal organic fruits and vegetables, and other ethically produced foods straight to your doorstep. They are committed to high quality; source as much as possible from local growers, ensure that farmers receive fair prices for their produce, look after the environment and always strive to keep customers absolutely delighted with friendly and convenient service".

Ready to take a look inside this week's Harvest Box???


That big green leafy stuff is Baby Kale - here are some easy ideas to use for your kale. One of the tastiest and simplest ways to cook kale is to saute it in a frying pan with a bit of oil (add onions or garlic if you like). Kale is full of nutrients and is a fabulous source of vitamins C and A . . . you're doing your body a favour by eating this stuff!

Here is some great information on washing and cooking with leeks. My favourite way to cook leeks is in soup, and you can find a whole slew of leek recipes at www.leekrecipes.org. This Potato Leek Soup is one of the my family's favourite recipes . . . and is a hearty, warm treat on a cool fall day.

Looking for a new way to use up your squash? I use any type of squash in this Roasted Apple and Acorn Squash Soup. It's rich and filling and incredibly healthy!

I've got this Chilled Squash and Carrot soup on my radar as well. Looks delicious and I can only imagine how decadent the flavours of squash and carrot mixed together will taste.

Although I am usually a little boring when it comes to asparagus (I often just roast or grill the stalks and serve them with a little olive oil and salt and pepper), there are dozens of asparagus recipes I'd like to try out. Here are a few to get you started!

Asparagus and Cashews
Asparagus with Brie
Asparagus Wrapped in Proscuitto
Asparagus with Poached Egg

Although these are more work than I might ever have time for, check out these Shrimp, Pork, and Sugar Snap Pea Spring Rolls! What a unique way to use up your sugar snap peas and this is definitely worth a try if you are having people over and want to completely impress them with your culinary expertise.

My kids don't boast the most impressive palates for veggies, but they are dedicated to their daily bowl of raw carrots. They love them raw, or slightly cooked, alone, or with a side of dip.
But if you're interested in getting a little creative with this week's carrots, try this absolutely to-die-for Carrot Cake, or this Velvety Carrot Soup.

Ready to gobble up those tasty bosc pears in your box? Why not try something completely different this week and add them to a healthy dish of Fresh Pear and Curry Pasta. It's super easy and very delicious!

Be sure to check back next week for new ideas for your weekly Harvest Box.