Farm veggies, week 18

[magid]

(Yes, yes, the season's almost over. Only two weeks left.)

This week's share included:

• two sweet dumpling squashes
  
• a small pumpkin
  
• carrots
  
• twenty-two little red hot peppers, two different kinds
  
• a big bunch of big red radishes, with greens (the stalks look rather like rhubarb)
  
• a big bunch of spinach
  
• four tomatillos
  
• a small bunch of kale
  
• a big bunch of tat soi or pac choi or something like that
  
• and as many green tomatoes as I wanted

I took a bunch of the tomatoes, thinking I might try making fried green tomatoes, even without lard, or some kind of chutney, or something (an email this morning included a green tomato and pear chutney [er, recipe!] that looks nice).

Seen for sale (and certainly not bought by me!): a large cookie, with hard white frosting on it, dark lines like from a coloring book on top, defining the shape, packaged with three (special) colored pens, so kids can color their cookies, then eat them. Ugh.

Comments

[chanaleh.livejournal.com]

The coloring cookies: Yes! We saw those creepy things at Bed Bath & Beyond -- which I suppose isn't that farfetched since it's not as if they bear ANY resemblance to food items. To top it off, they were of Spongebob Squarepants. The horror!

[magid.livejournal.com]

The ones I saw were at Stop&Shop, and I have no idea what the pictures were of; I was too horrified by the rest of it to notice.

I wonder who thought this one up? "Hm, need a new twist. Kids like cookies, and kids like coloring. Hey! I know! Coloring cookies!"

And I wonder how long it'll take before they have to put warnings on the packaging, reminding people it's mostly not ok to eat ink, lick markers, etc...

[theora.livejournal.com]

My mom always makes green tomato mincemeat. It's pretty good, strong though and definitely an acquired taste.

green tomato mincemeat

[magid.livejournal.com]

Strongly sour, or tart, or sweet, or...?
Do you have a recipe, or a description of what goes into it? I don't have a clear idea of what mincemeat tastes like, since I've only seen recipes, but haven't eaten any.

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

Okay, I'll be the dissenting voice here. I actually think it's a pretty clever idea, provided the "ink" used is something based on food coloring and is non-toxic.

[magid.livejournal.com]

The ink is definitely non-toxic; I checked the packaging. Still, there are a lot of things that aren't toxic that aren't ideal to ingest.

If they had packaged food coloring in little bottles, or something, and labeled them "food coloring", I think it would bother me less. But the pens look like regular thin markers of some sort, easily mixed in with other markers (and in most houses I've been in with kids, all the markers do get mixed up).

I like the idea of decorating cookies, but crossing that with coloring books just makes me shudder, somehow. I suppose it doesn't help that I'm not particularly fond of coloring books, either (all it encourages is color choice, not any other kind of creativity, and comments about staying within the lines).

Re: green tomato mincemeat

[theora.livejournal.com]

Generally included: green tomatoes, apples, raisins, citrus of some sort, brown sugar, cider vinegar, spices. Here (http://www.jewish-food.org/recipes/gtomminc.htm) is what looks like a fairly standard recipe, but there are lots of variations if you google.

It's kind of like a thick, rather sweet chutney without the onion/garlic/hot pepper type elements. Usually goes in pies, which is why I said strong: it's tarter and heavier than you expect from a pie filling.

Re: green tomato mincemeat

[magid.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the pointer. It seems like (fruit) mincemeat is almost chutney-lite, somehow. (The original mincemeat, not really.)

Of course, if it's in the chutney family, I know I'd not think first of making pie, but putting it on chicken or fish to bake or broil.

Hmmm... it also makes me wonder what chutney pie would be like, maybe with a layer of something lighter for balance, though meringue doesn't seem right. Perhaps the surprise of eating a meld of chutney flavors rather than regular fruit would be enough, and I just wouldn't make it too thick, lest it be incredibly dense.... Must think more.