first csa box

i finally got my hands on my csa box from ward’s berry farm on thursday. i was so excited to pick up all the fresh produce, and the combination of goodies was awesome – arugula, beeets, garlic scapes, collard greens, dill, strawberries, and spring onions. i brought them home, and didn’t have any time to use my beautiful veggies. i finally saw my husband, who’d been working very long hours, and we spent as much of the weekend outside as possible.

i made a few different types of bread this weekend, my favorite utilizing some of the garlic scapes in my csa box.

i chopped up a few of the scapes and put them into a pompe à l’huile, a sweet olive oil bread. the recipe is from saveur, and came out really well – moist, sweet, doughy and delicious.

but today…i just wanted to cook.

some of my fresh goodies were already looking a little bit sad, but my fresh little beets still looked great. i didn’t want to just throw them on top of a salad – as delicious as it always is, i wanted something more unique…and i still have a few beets left to use up anyway.

in spite of the warm weather, i wanted something warm and creamy that would use both the beets and the greens while they were still good. i opted for a beet risotto, combining several different recipes together. i love risotto but i’ve never used beets before. the combination of earthiness and sweetness was delicious, and still felt very light and summery. my beets were pretty little, so i didn’t have as much to work with as i’d originally thought – if i make this again i think i would use a lot more beets so that the flavor comes out more.

i substituted vegetable stock for chicken stock, which gave a lot less flavor – i’d love to try this again when i’m eating my normal diet again. the color of this was fun and festive, but with more beets i think it would’ve looked more vivid, almost a fuchsia color.

i’ll post the recipe eventually…after i make this a few more times and perfect it. in the meantime, here are two different recipes that i was modeling mine after. hopefully i can get my version to where i want it the next time i try it out. the key? more beets!