This week you can look forward to:Korean Daikon Radish,Baby Red Cabbage,Rainbow Carrots,Baby Fennel, New Red Potatoes, Sweet Corn (the first of the season), Cured Sweet Onions, and Red Leaf Lettuce.
Korean Daikon Radish- Wondering what those large white, oval, tubers are in your share? Wonder no longer… Those are Korean Daikon Radishes. They have a firm crunchy texture and milder tasting flavor when compared to the purple daikon radish or the watermelon radish. Add them to any dish for an extra crunch or check out the recipes Chef and Nutrition expert, Jacque, provided. Take your pick or try them all…
Spiralized Daikon Radishes: Remove root and stem end from Daikon radishes. Place a large Daikon radish on spiralizer. Create long thin strands according to spiralizer directions. Use as a snack, side dish or garnish for salads or use in any of the following recipes.
Probiotic Daikon Radishes (AKA Pickled Radishes): Wash a quart mason jar with hot water. Place 1 teaspoon fresh dill, 2 garlic cloves, 2 hot peppers, cardamon or other favorite herb in bottom of jar. Add enough cut, cubed, julienne or spiralized Daikon radish to fill the jar, packing just slightly. Combine 1 cup vinegar, 1 cup water, 2 teaspoons sugar and 1 teaspoon salt. Pour vinegar mixture over radishes to fill the jar with in ½ inch of the rim. Place on counter for several days or until radish is brined. Store in refrigerator up to several weeks.
Roasted Vegetables: Cut Daikon radishes and other root vegetables such as carrots, turnips, red potatoes into chunks. Toss with 2 tablespoons olive oil, 10 fresh sage leaves, salt and pepper. Place on parchment covered sheet pan and Roast at 400 degrees for 20 to 30 minutes or until tender, stirring twice.
Spring Rolls with Daikon Radish: Combine 1 cup each of shredded radish, carrot, cabbage or other favorite vegetables with 3 tablespoons soy sauce, ½ teaspoon grated ginger and 1 teaspoon Sirachi sauce. Add 1 cup rice noodles softened according to package directions. Roll up about ¼ cup of vegetable mixture in spring roll wrappers and seal with a bit of water.
Baby Red Cabbage- Raw purple cabbage is often chopped up and tossed in salads, it makes for a beautiful contrast. The color is also great to decorate tacos with. Tip: Lemon juice helps preserve the color when cooking it.
Rainbow Carrots- The taste between different colored carrots isn’t extreme, yet there is some bit of difference. It’s subtle and it mainly shows up when you eat them raw.
Orange Carrots – Contain about 4 times the USDA recommended dose of vitamin A and lots of beta-carotene. They are just a tad earthy and quite sweet, good raw or cooked.
Purple Carrots- Have an intensely sweet flavor, often a touch of bitterness that can sometimes have a little peppery side note.
Yellow Carrots- They have a mild flavor with hardly any of the earthiness of other colors of carrots, and they’re notably a bit sweeter than orange, red, or purple carrots. They work particularly well roasted or glazed (cooked in a pan with a bit of butter and sugar.) -The Spruce
Baby Fennel- Baby fennel, that’s exactly what it is. Fennel has a similar taste to that of anise, and is one of the primary ingredients of absinthe. Baby fennel is harvested before it grows its large bulb; the bulb we are familiar with. On baby fennel, the bulb is small and immature but still very tasty. Chop it up and put it in stir fry or try it in the chowder below. The fennel fronds make for a great garnish or try them sprinkled in a salad or on top of a soup.
New Red Potatoes- We use the word “NEW” referring to a potato that was just harvested rather than ones that have been out of the ground for a long time or ones that have a thicker skin that you peel. Not these babies, they have ever so thin skin you don’t have to peel them, just give them a good wash and prepare as you wish. The weather we’ve been having this past week makes me want to snuggle up and eat some comfort food. I asked our Jacque if she had and idea of some kind of corn and potato chowder that she could share with me:
Corn and Potato Chowder
¼ cup chopped onion
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 cups cubed potatoes (with skins if desired)
½ cup water
1/2 cup cubed Daikon radish
1 cup fresh cut corn
¼ cup flour
4 cups milk or cream
1 teaspoon salt or to taste
¼ teaspoon pepper
2 tablespoons minced, fresh parsley
1 tablespoon minced, fresh thyme
4 small fennel fronds as a garnish if desired
Sautee onion and garlic in oil until tender. Add potatoes, water and radish. Cook on medium heat until potatoes are tender, about 10 minutes. Add corn. Stir a small amount of the milk into the flour to make a smooth paste. Stir into vegetable mixture. Stir in milk and seasonings. Cook over medium heat until mixture starts to thicken, stirring constantly. Garnish each serving with fennel fronds.
Sweet Corn- The first of the season. You might find that some of the cobs are pretty small and there is a good reason for that. First off, it is the first of the season so it is very small. The kernels have not developed to be the size that you would normally expect from a piece of corn. On the flip side, this makes it sooo delicious to eat raw. I saw Jaime take a bite of raw corn. I looked at him like he was crazy and he, knowingly, urged me to try it. I was amazed at how sweet and delicious it was. Since then, I rarely cook corn from our farm anymore. The other reason they are so small is due to our quality assurance measures, most if not all organic corn grown in Florida will have worms in it. As unappetizing as that may seem, it is the truth and do you blame them? As Matt says ” I don’t want to eat any corn that a worm wouldn’t want to eat.” That being said we take extra measures to free the corn of any worm or worm damage by lopping off the top of the corn before it gets to our customers.
Cured Sweet Onions- These are the same sweet onions you know and love from the past few weeks but they have been “cured” for 4 weeks in our dry storage . The outer translucent yellow or beige like peeling is in-fact the outside layers of
the onion that have dried up. Most onions you find in the supermarkets are this way. No need to store these in your fridge they like a dark dry place somewhere away from moisture.
Red Leaf Lettuce- Our Red Leaf is nutrient dense, flavorful, and adds vibrant color to any salad mix.
Try a very simple vinaigrette recipe pairing for your lettuce, like the one
Chef Amy Secol recommended –Classic Vinaigrette Dressing.
Peace, Love & Good Clean Food -Shani
