We joined a farm share this year and have a lot of some things, I’m looking for creative options.
Turnips?
Zucchini, I have a fantastic zucchini bread recipe, but cannot eat that much bread in a week, or I can, but should not! Can I shred the excess and freeze it or will that results in mush?
We have a plethora of raspberries, but that’s a delight and they freeze well.
How about you?
I shredded zucchini last year and put it into ziploc bags and froze it. It worked just fine in zucchini bread I baked over the winter. Doesn’t matter if it’s mush when you toss it into a bread mix.
One year, I baked a bunch of zucchini bread and froze that. It freezes very well.
Turnips? We never have any extras if those because we just don’t take them…at all.
Our CSA allows us to swap things. So if they have a lot of something, I’ll take half and then substitute something else they have grown. But some CSAs don’t allow swapping.
We also discovered that a 1/2 share gave us a plentiful amount of veggies. A full share was just too much…and that was even with 4 of us living here.
I haven’t done it myself but have read that blanching the shredded zucchini before freezing will help it not get mushy.
I also have a savory zucchini recipe that freezes well:
Chop the zucchini in 1/4 inch dice
In a large bowl combine the diced zucchini with 1 egg per 1 zucchini, a sprinkle of flour, pinch of salt and pepper, and 1/4 c bread crumbs. Mix until well combined. If it is too dry, add another egg.
In a non stick pan, heat olive oil over medium heat. When the oil is hot, spoon the zucchini mixture into the pan to form small “pancakes”. Saute until they start to brown and flip (roughly 5-7 minutes). Make in small batches so the oil stays hot. Drain the zucchini patties and place on paper towels to absorb the excess oil. Place layers of wax paper in between the patties prior to freezing.
Raspberry season ended last week and I am making jam. Great little gift for friends and relatives. I already gave out more than 20 jars and still have a lot in the freezer. My dad and sister have dried fruits and veggies with good results.
Chop zucchini, add to a pan with reheated Costco meatballs, add your favorite pasta sauce. Cook. Serve with shredded parmesan. Better than noodles.
Make ratatouille and freeze that.
Freeze chopped zucchini then use in the above described dishes.
Turnips are great in roasted veggie medley (with carrots, apples, parsnips, celery root, and fennel).
I’d freeze the zuchinni. This is one of my favorite zuchinni recipes http://www.agardenforthehouse.com/2015/07/angelic-zucchini-fritters/
Can’t help with the turnips.
I generally freeze raspberries whole but if I had a chance to dry some I’d do some of those too. Jam is always an option and doesn’t take a lot of specialized equipment.
I think it is required by law that anyone who grows zucchini must take it to work and leave it on the counter in the break room.
A slave to your farm share!! Very familiar with this…
I have had my best luck freezing finished foods, especially breads and soups, rather than the ingredients themselves. We did go through a lot of zucchini by cutting it like noodles and sautéing it then tossing it with Trader Joes peanut vinaigrette. A healthy alternative to Chinese peanut butter noodles (and even the most veggie phobic eat about one medium squash each per meal!)
I’m challenging myself to learn new things with this 1/4 farm share, like the turnips. We are getting hakuri turmips, kinda trendy, I’ve sauteed them with carrots and a bit maple syrup. I saw turnip greens in the store, but have not yet enjoyed anything I’ve made with these.
I enjoyed this zucchini bread at the restaurant and had seen her cookbook so have been trying this recipe, the lemon zest, the ginger (I do heaping teaspoons!) is so good. I’ve tried it with coconut oil and with corn oil, but olive oil seems to be best.
http://notwithoutsalt.com/olive-oil-zucchini-bread/
Where I live, lots of people have fruit trees. So we usually trade crops, like a bag of my grapefruit for a bag of your lemons, etc.
Food pantry. They love getting fresh produce.
Anyone have an idea for cabbage? I have two large heads and I can only eat so much cole slaw.
Stuffed cabbage…and it freezes very well.
Cabbage sautéed with onions, garlic, shredded carrots, and a splash of pasta sauce. Add your favorite spices, and it can be a good side dish for any meat.
Hakurei turnips are delicious raw in salads.
For cabbage, “lazy stuffed cabbage” works very well for me. Cut and boil cabbage and process it in food processor until there are no more large pieces. Add ground meat,cooked rice and your choice of spices, form balls, brown them (or not) and bake or stew in tomato sauce. The resulting meatballs are very tender and cabbage is practically undetectable.
Borscht!
turnips, potatos, pears gratin (no, really!)
we fry turnips with potatos, or mash them w potatos. They are great roasted, but it’s too hot for that right now. I’ve not liked them much once they’ve been frozen, so I puree them with caulfilower, freeze that, and use it as a soup base in the winter.
@bookreader Budgetbytes has a good beef and cabbage stir fry. I substitute ground turkey for the ground beef. Recipe calls for half a cabbage, and the recipe is enough for us as a main dish. Reasonably spicy.
Cabbage is the ultimate filler for stir fries and cooks down quite nicely. Slice thin, fry sticks of marinated meat, onion, carrots or red peppers and the cabbage, add noodles. Oyster sauce and chili with garlic are my easy sauce additives.
Or look on line for recipes for pad woon sen, which is a Thai use for greens and cellophane noodles. Any green can be used in this recipe in large volumes, more than the recipe calls for.
Cabbage also keeps in the fridge for a long while, so don’t worry about immediate use.