June 16, 2006
kohlrabi, strawberries, calendula, oh my!
I thought I had bok choy, but it was really kohlrabi -- a totally different vegetable with which I have absolutely no familiarity. When you google "kohlrabi recipe" you get a surprising number blogs with the same refrain: "I bought this sputnik-looking veggie, but when I googled for recipes I couldn't find any."
In the end, I did find a recipe -- one that called for cooking the kohlrabi in large amounts of butter with large amounts of onion for 25 minutes, then creating a creamy sauce with flour, milk and butter. I sprinkled it with salt, pepper and nutmeg. It was good, but that was mostly the butter and cheese talking.
If we get more next week, I'm either going to make a salad with it or stir fry it. Kohlrabi has a thick outer skin, but once you peel that off it's sweet and tastes a lot like peeled broccoli stems. I don't want to drown that flavor in dairy.
Every Wednesday through October, Ben and I have signed on to get a box of mystery produce from Sun Gold Farm, through its community supported agriculture program. We paid $255 upfront, and the farmers bring a big tub into the city for us to pick up near our home.
This week, we ate the strawberries first. They were sweet, moist, bright red, and had barely just been picked when I brought them home. Hood strawberries have the shortest shelf life in the world, acording to the farmers, and can't be found commercially as a result.Ben and I have agreed are the best strawberries we've ever had.
We've still got crimson tide lettuce, sugar pop peas, garlic buds and rhubarb to eat our way through. And we received a calendula plant; I'm not quite sure what to do with it.
Posted by Courtney_Sherwood at June 16, 2006 06:23 AM
Comments
John and I are going through this same thing with our CSA box. Our partners told us about the kohlrabi up front though. She said peel it and eat it like jicama, in a salad or straight, like the veggies you eat on a relish tray. We have bushels of green leafy things of every description, and let me tell you we are not getting through it all. Strawberries make me itch, too.
Posted by: Sue at June 16, 2006 03:50 PM
If you managed to keep that plant alive....calendula has good properties for the skin, not sure if it's the leaves (like an aloe plant) or the flowers but its in a lot of 'soothing' or 'calming' herbal beauty products.
Posted by: Rian at June 18, 2006 01:26 PM
The comparison to Jicama is a good one. We generally slice into sticks and eat with ranch dressing. If you do want a great but simple side dish that isn't over-cooked and smothered in cheese, try this one:
Sautéed Kohlrabi:
2 Kohlrabies
1 medium onion, diced
1 tsp. salt
2 Tbsp butter or oil
1 Tbsp fresh herbs of your choice (thyme, chives, sage, etc.)
Grate Kohlrabi, place in a colander and sprinkle with a little salt. Heat butter over medium heat, add onions and sauté a few minutes. Rinse Kohlrabi a little, add to pan, reduce heat to low, cover and cook 10 minutes. Remove lid and increase heat and cook another 2 minutes to reduce liquids. Serve.
Note - I like it better diced, not grated. Cook a little longer if dicing.
Posted by: Tina at July 31, 2006 10:48 AM