Local and seasonal – the contents of this week’s boxes

This week everyone will have:
potatoes ((Burlerrow Farm, St Mabyn)
* garlic (Camel CSA)
* onions (Camel CSA)
* salad bag (Camel CSA)
* carrots (Camel CSA)
* celeriac (Camel CSA)
* swiss chard (Camel CSA)
* squash (Camel CSA)

Standard boxes will have extra potatoes plus:
* swede (Camel CSA)
* parsnips (Camel CSA)
* purple sprouting broccoli or red cabbage (Camel CSA)

* = grown to organic principles

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‘Cut and come again’ salads are worth the effort

Now I know why oriental salad leaves are so expensive in the supermarkets!

We’re cultivating an assortment of indoor-grown oriental and other baby leaves in our first polytunnel.

These “cut and come again” crops should last us until early spring (with a gap when they stop for a rest in the short, dull days of mid-winter).

There’s quite a variety - spicy red mustard, mizuna and mibuna, pak choi, curly endive, baby chard, parsley (“French” flat as well as curly-leaved) and mixed lettuce.

But it takes two or more people around two hours every Friday morning to pick enough leaves for the 35 or more weekly vegetable boxes. It requires nimble fingers and is incredibly labour intensive.

There’s one big mitigating factor about all this for the volunteer pickers. Salad leaf picking is guaranteed warm, dry work which is also out of the wind.

Arguably much more satisfactory than parsnip, leek or carrot lifting which are cold, wet and muddy jobs.

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Seasonal local recipe No 122: Curried parsnip soup

Another British cookery classic – this time from the late Jane Grigson. This was one of her favourite recipes and tastes all the better the day after you make it.

Her daughter Sophie Grigson is carrying on the tradition and makes this soup too. For the carnivores among you - it does bring out the flavour if you use beef stock, rather than chicken or vegetable.

You can substitute the freshly-ground spice mixture with a half tablespoon of curry powder or curry paste, but it’s not nearly as good as the real thing. I use creme fraiche rather than whipping cream.

Serves: 4

Preparation: 20 minutes
Cooking time: 30 minutes

Ingredients
1 medium sized onion
1 large clove of garlic, halved
1 large parsnip, peeled and cut into chunks
45 g butter
1 tbsp plain flour
A pinch of black pepper
1 litre beef stock (or chicken or vegetable stock)
150 ml whipping cream
A handful of chopped chives or parsley

For the spice mixture:
1 tbsp coriander seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
0.25 tsp fenugreek seeds
0.5 tsp dried red chilli flakes
1 tsp turmeric

Method
To make the spice mix, dry fry the first three spices in a small, heavy frying pan over a moderate heat until toasted and aromatic. Tip into a bowl and leave to cool, and then grind to a powder with the chilli and turmeric. Store in an airtight jar.

Sweat the onion, garlic and parsnip gently in the butter, with the lid on the pan, for 10 minutes. Stir in the flour and a tablespoon of the spice blend, plus a little salt. Cook for 2 more minutes, stirring occasionally.

Pour in the stock, gradually. Bring up to the boil and simmer for about 15-20 minutes until the parsnip is very tender.

Liquidise the mixture, adding water or more stock if you have any to hand, until he soup has a similar consistency to double cream. Taste and correct the seasoning.

Reheat when needed, stir in the cream and serve scattered with chives or parsley.

• More parsnip recipes from Camel CSA

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Seasonal local veg in this week’s boxes

This week everyone will have:
potatoes (Burlerrow Farm, St Mabyn)
* onions (Camel CSA)
* salad bag (Camel CSA) **
* parsnips (Camel CSA)
* leeks (Camel CSA)
* savoy cabbage (Camel CSA)
* carrots (Camel CSA)
* turnip bunch (Camel CSA)

Standard boxes will have extra potatoes plus:
* beetroot bunch (Camel CSA)
* jerusalem artichokes (Camel CSA)
* purple sprouting broccoli or swiss chard (Camel CSA)

* = grown to organic principles

** The salad bags contain pak choi, curly endive, mibuna, mizuna, baby chard and red mustard leaves

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This week’s seasonal local veg …

Everyone will have:
potatoes (Burlerrow Farm, St Mabyn)
* garlic (Camel CSA)
* onions (Camel CSA)
* salad bag of mixed winter leaves (Camel CSA)**
* squash (Camel CSA)
* carrots (Camel CSA)
* swede (Camel CSA)
* swiss chard (Camel CSA)

Standard boxes will have extra potatoes plus:
* celeriac (Camel CSA)
* beetroot (Camel CSA)
* sprouting broccoli and/or kale depending on amount of broccoli available (Camel CSA)

* = grown to organic principles

** The salad bags contain mixed lettuce, red mustard, pak choi, mizuna, mibuna, baby chard and curly endive leaves.

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Seasonal local food recipe No 121: Mincemeat

Mincemeat? A recipe for mincemeat? In a vegetable box?

The best homemade Christmas mincemeat recipe I’ve ever tasted is one of the simplest. It comes from my stained and much-thumbed edition of a cookery classic – Elizabeth David’s Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen. It’s easy to make – an assembly job really – and is a thousand times better than the sickly, glace-cherry-studded supermarket versions.

I’ve come to the conclusion that the secret of her method, which was passed on to her by a friend (the best recipes always are!), is the generous amount of chopped apple which adds chewy moistness and a delicious tang.

So why not use the apples in Camel CSA’s veg boxes this week?

Elizabeth David made her mincemeat with shredded beef suet of course, in the traditional manner, but I find that vegetarian suet does just as well. Use light or dark brown sugar – I like dark muscovado.

Make this mincemeat at least two weeks before you want to use it, to allow the flavours to mingle. This amount makes approximately six decent-sized jars. If you want less, just halve the ingredients.

It normally gets used up pretty quickly in this household, but I have kept jars of it for up to two years in the fridge. An additional splash of brandy helps.

Preparation: up to an hour
Cooking: none

Ingredients
800g sharp apples
350g raisins
350g currants
350g sultanas
350g shredded suet (vegetarian if you prefer)
350g soft brown sugar
100g mixed peel
50g skinned and coarsely chopped almonds
Half a teaspoon each of grated nutmeg, cinnamon and mace
Grated rind and juice of one lemon and one orange
75ml brandy, rum or whisky

Method
Dice the peeled and carefully cored apples. Mix all the ingredients together, adding the alcohol last. Leave the mixture to steep in a cool place for 24 hours, to allow the flavours to mingle.

Fill glass or stoneware jars that you have sterilised first – either by putting them through the dishwasher on a hot cycle or washing by hand and drying them in a low oven (but make sure they’ve cooled down before you fill them). Use screw lids or clip-on tops and store in a cool place.
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The bumper crop continues in this week’s veg boxes

This week everyone will have:
potatoes (Burlerrow Farm, St Mabyn)
* onions (Camel CSA)
* parsnips (Camel CSA)
* squash (Camel CSA)
* savoy cabbage (Camel CSA)
* carrots (Camel CSA)
* salad leaves (Camel CSA)
* turnips (Camel CSA)
* chillies (Camel CSA)
* apples (Camel CSA)

Standard boxes will also have:
* purple sprouting broccoli/calabrese (Camel CSA)
* florence fennel (Camel CSA)
* swiss chard (Camel CSA)
* beetroot (Camel CSA)

* = grown to organic principles

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Camel CSA invites food lovers to join veg box scheme

Keep an eye out for our stunning new posters designed by Emma Julian of Pickle Design in Wadebridge. 

They’re helping to spread the word about our community     grow-your-own project and  weekly vegetable box scheme in north Cornwall.

It’s a great way to support local food and save food miles! Anyone living within a 10-mile radius of St Kew Highway is welcome to join us. We grow a range of vegetables to organic principles. The weekly boxes are ready to collect by 12 noon every Friday.

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Seasonal local food recipe No 120: Caramelised carrots with gremolata

From Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s new River Cottage Veg Everyday cookbook. ‘The contrast of sweet, caramelised carrots and zesty gremolata is brilliant – and it looks good too,’ he says. Good with young, small carrots but fine with bigger ones if you cut them into long, thin batons.

Serves 4

Preparation: 5 minutes
Cooking: about an hour

Ingredients
1 tbsp rapeseed or olive oil
30g butter
500g young carrots, larger ones halved lengthways
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the gremolata:
½ garlic clove
small bunch of flat-leaf parsley, leaves only
finely grated zest of 1 lemon

Method
Preheat the oven to 180C/gas mark 4. Put the oil and butter in a large roasting dish and place in the oven until the butter melts. Add the carrots, season generously with salt and pepper and toss well. Cover with foil and roast in the oven for 30-40 minutes, until the carrots are tender.

Take the dish out of the oven, remove the foil and give the carrots a stir. Roast, uncovered, for 20-30 minutes, until they start to brown and caramelise.

While the carrots are in the oven, make the gremolata. Roughly chop the garlic on a large board, then add the parsley and lemon zest. Use a large, sharp knife to chop and mix the three ingredients together until very fine and well mixed.

As soon as the carrots are ready, toss them with the gremolata and serve straight away.

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Another box full of local seasonal veg – and fruit

This week, everyone will have:
potatoes (Burlerrow Farm, St Mabyn)
* onions (Camel CSA)
* garlic (Camel CSA)
* sweetcorn (Camel CSA)
* fennel (Camel CSA)
* calabrese/purple sprouting broccoli (Camel CSA)
* salad leaves (Camel CSA)
* swiss chard (Camel CSA)
* turnips (Camel CSA)
* carrots (Camel CSA)
* dessert apples – ‘Lord Hindlip’ variety (Camel CSA)

Standard boxes will also have:
* sweet peppers (Camel CSA)
* aubergines (Camel CSA)
* tomatoes (Camel CSA)
* curly parsley (Camel CSA)

* = grown to organic principles

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