Trying out Specialty Produce

These past couple of weeks, I have tried buying some of our produce through a local company called Specialty Produce: www.specialtyproduce.com. For the everyday consumer they offer something called the "farmer's market bag". Each week it contains an assortment of fresh, seasonal produce from multiple California farms and farmers. The cost is only $20. For many, it poses a challenge and excitement as you don't know what your bag will contain until the day before it's ready for pickup. So... creativity and spontaneity is a must.

Since we had heard from a few others that it was a lot of produce to get in one week, we decided to share the bag with our friends Brad and Kristy Heinrichs. Here are a few of things I made using recipes from http://allrecipes.com. If you haven't used this site, it's great for finding recipes according to the ingredients you have.

I forgot to take a picture, but with a bunch of arugula we received we made a homemade arugula pesto sauce and put it over pasta. It was beautiful and had a nice spicy bite to it from the arugula.

This is a salad I threw together with a number of greens we received in our "bag" that I can't even begin to name. We added tangerine slices from our yard as well as some dried cranberries and walnuts (for their omega-3's).
Zuppa Toscana. This soup reminded me of something you'd find in Eastern Europe. The ingredient I was trying to use was kale. It was a yummy combo of potatoes, kale, onion, chicken sausage, broth, and a bit of cream.
Radish spread. This picture doesn't do it justice. It's a mixture of cream cheese with lots of radishes, garlic, salt and pepper. Wonderful on sandwiches and broiled bread.
Roasted beets. They were supposed to have goat cheese crumbles, but I forgot to pick it up. It was still delicious!

I can't say that we'll always buy our produce this way, but I highly enjoyed the challenge of trying new recipes and eating LOTS of greens and things I might not otherwise purchase. If you're up for an eating adventure... go ahead and give it a try!