Weekly Meal Planner Using Produce from my Abundant Harvest Organics Box

The box arrived with a strong smell of fresh basil. Time to make some pesto! Pesto one of my favorite ways to enjoy fresh basil. I have been making this every time we get basil in the box. I have even been buying basil as an add-on some weeks just so I can make pesto. One of these days I need to get around to planting some of my own basil but for now I am going to keep on enjoying the fresh basil from Abundant Harvest Organics.

So what else came in the box this week?

Weekly Meal Planner Using Produce from my Abundant Harvest Organics Box

Summer has brought many yummy treasures in our Abundant Harvest Organics produce boxes! The boxes keep getting heavier every week as they are loaded down with fresh sweet corn, juicy stone fruits, delicious melons, and ripe tomatoes.

Ma must have really loved summer!

We don't eat much corn in our house since it is really just a starchy grain but when it comes in the box we do indulge. As you can see from the smile on little Jad's face he is a fan!

More corn is on its way this week along with the other usual summer goodies. I also ordered some irresistible extras this week.

So what is coming in the box this week?

Weekly Meal Planner Using Produce from my Abundant Harvest Organics Box

This lovely pie was made with last week's apriums. It tasted even better than is looks! It was a simple homemade grain-free nut crust filled with fresh cut apriums and sprinkled with palm sugar (more info on this at the bottom of the post). It is actually the first pie I have ever made from scratch! I am happy it was a success!

The Little House books describe many different home cooked pies, sweet and savory. The Little House Cookbook lists all of these in the index under pie: apple, blackbird, chicken, cream, custard, dried apple and raisin, green pumpkin, huckleberry, lemon, mince, pigeon, poor man's, pumpkin, and vinegar.

My favorite story of pie was Ma's green pumpkin pie from the book, The Long Winter. Pa took a bite and he thought it was apple pie and he wanted to know where in the world Ma got apples! I love this story about Ma, she was so creative with what she had on hand. Who says you can't make "apple" pie with green pumpkins? Ma did it and we can too. Get creative in your kitchen! Look at recipes as an invitation and then use what you have on hand to make something delicious.

On to what came in the box this week:

100% "Real"-ly Good Chicken Nuggets!

These nuggets are so moist and tasty you will think you are at a upscale cafe with gourmet nuggets on the menu when you sit down to a plate of these bad boys!

More good news: these nuggets are grain and dairy free and best of all they are easy to make!

Ma never made chicken nuggets but she did make lot of nugget like foods: cornmeal fried cornmeal mush, johnny cakes, and corn dodgers.(pages 21-23 of The Little House Cookbook).

She was also said to have sat down to a plate of Codfish balls which definitely qualify in the nugget department. (pages 31-31 of The Little House Cookbook). This recipe could actually work with fish too but I have not tried that yet. Please let me know how it goes if you do.

My kids have always loved chicken nuggets, heck I have always loved chicken nuggets too! When we went gluten free in our house chicken nuggets were definitely off the menu.

Little Pots of Gold (Veggie Meatballs)

What is at the end of this rainbow of veggies? Delicious little meatballs! Ma would have never been able to make these little pots of gold but thanks to my amazing food processor I can!

This recipe was inspired by the recipe Garden Fresh Meatballs from Sarah of  Everyday Paleo.

Here is the rainbow of veggies I include in my version. There is a lot of green for extra luck and good health!

Roasted Red Peppers

Orange Carrots

Yellow Yams

Yellow/Green Artichoke Hearts

Green Zucchinis

Dark Green Kale

Deep Purple Cabbage

Weekly Meal Planner using Produce from my Abundant Harvest Organics Box

Today was the "box" day, YEAH!

I don't have time to have my own garden so I truly appreciate this lovely gift each week of beautiful organic produce from farmers across CA. Even if I did have time to garden I would never be able to grow all of these amazing goodies.

What a wonder to see the variety and bright colors each week!. Thank you to the farmers who make it possible for my family to eat a rainbow of colors every single week!

So...What came in the box this week?

Weekly Meal Planner using Produce from my Abundant Harvest Organics Box

Last week more than half of what arrived in the box went right into my slow cooker for another rendition of a new favorite: Spaghetti Sauce Stew.

Here is a list of what came in my small box from Abundant Harvest Organics this week:

• apples
• kiwis
• carrots
• cauliflower
• Italian herb mix
• lettuce
• mache (salad greens)
• lemons
• potatoes
• broccoli
• spinach
• green garlic

Here is a meal plan using all of these items! I even included two dessert ideas this week!

Weekly Meal Planner using Produce from my Abundant Harvest Organics Box

What was in the box this week?

• apples
• pomegranates
• turnips
• lettuce
• potatoes
• rainbow chard
• Herbes De Provence (pictured right)
• winter squash
• spinach
• dill
• yu choy sum (similar to bok choy)

What to do with all this lovely produce? Here is my plan:

Spaghetti Sauce Stew

Ma would not have had the option to buy a jar of good spaghetti sauce but since I do I am happy to make my life simpler by doing just that!

Finding a good sauce can be tough. You have to read the ingredients carefully. Anything with "sugar" or "canola oil" is not coming home with me!  Nothing modified or partially hydrogenated is going to cut it either. I also don't want any added starches. I just want veggies, spices, and olive oil please. Turns out this is a tall order!

Trader Joe's makes a roasted garlic sauce that meets my criteria but it is not organic. I have found a good plain basil and tomato flavored sauce at Sprouts that was organic but I cannot remember the brand. I will update this post with this info next time I buy some. This time I used a non organic brand from Costco that fit the bill of only including real ingredients.

Recipe: Egg "Brownies"

I don't think Ma ever made these. The idea came to me when I was dealing with an oven door that only opened up 1/3 of the way.

I usually make egg muffins every Sunday to have on hand for the week. This was not going to be an option with an oven door that would not open all the way.

Jonathan and I decided to beat the eggs anyway.

Toddler Recipe: Almond Banana Flax Meal (Dairy, Egg, & Grain free)

Ma probably never made this but I am sure she did serve her babies bowls of some kind of  mush. Why? Because it its easy and delicious and fun for toddlers to spoon into their mouths!

I came up with this the other day when I was looking for something new for Jad. The requirements were something that he could try eating by himself with a spoon and it also needed to have a good amount of fat and calories.

Babies and toddlers need lots of good fat for brain development so I have been looking for ways to get more fat into Jad's diet. The mainstream way is to give your baby lots of full fat whole milk products but that doesn't work for all of us. Some of us have allergies.

Weekly Meal Planner using Produce from my Abundant Harvest Organics Box

The new box of AHO produce is here! The new box of AHO produce is here!

Sometimes I feel like a kid opening a present when I get my box each week. Thank you California farmers for the beautiful gift of healthy fresh organic food, plain and simple!

Ma grew her own but in my busy modern life this is not possible for me so I feel very grateful for all the love and time our organic farmers give to their crops. Sometimes I cannot even believe they work that hard everyday, organic farming is no walk in the park from what I can tell. So thank you farmers who sell your produce to AHO, thank you from the bottom of my heart!

From left: arugula, collard greens, & mustard greens

Here is the list of this week's treasures:

• Fuji apples
• Mountain Barlett pears
• lettuce
• watermelon radishes
• spinach
• potatoes
• collard greens
• thyme
• mustard greens
• carrots
• arugula

I also purchased these lovely add-on's this week:

• Napa cabbage
• kale
• kobocha squash
• bacon

 Here are the meal ideas for this week:

Weekly Meal Planner using Produce from my Abundant Harvest Organics Box

We did not get a box last week because Abundant Harvest Organics took a week off for the holidays. That worked out well for us because we took a trip to the mountains near Julian CA and spent a few days at the YMCA family camp over the Thanksgiving Holiday. So much fun!

Now it is back to business as usual and that means a new box of produce today!

Here is what we got this week:

Home Preserving: Chocolate Mint

Ma had preserving food down to an art but I am still learning.

I have been re-reading my copy of The Little House Cookbook these past two weeks and chapter 4 talks about preserving foods on page 36. The options were: freezing, smoking, salting, and drying. The cookbook only gets into the drying method.

Easy & Delicious: Fritattas!

Here is the secret to the perfect easy Fritatta!  We eat these ALL the time since they are so easy and yummy.

Use a skillet that can go in the oven. We have a Kirkland brand enameled cast iron skillet. It only cost about $50 which is a steal when compared to other brands!

Preheat the oven by turning the broiler on so it is ready to go.


Chop/cut up everything that will be going in your fritatta and melt your oil of choice in the skillet (butter or expeller pressed coconut oil is best). With our cast iron we use medium/low heat (# 3 out of 10 numbers)

Weekly Meal Planner using Produce from my Abundant Harvest Organics Box

There is a chill in the air and it is really feeling like fall! It definitely looks like fall in our little kitchen.

Our weekly box from Abundant Harvest Organics definitely had a fall theme as well. This is what we got:

fuyu persimmons
fuji apples
lettuce
sweet potatoes
broccoli
garlic chives (looks like blades of grass)
brown potatoes
spinach
fresh sage
carrots
beets

I also bought a lot of yummy add on items this week. Here is a list of what I bought that

7 Layer Taco Dip (Dairy & Legume Free)

Ma definitely would NOT have made this but she did not grow up eating Taco Bell as a child so she doesn't have to battle those crazy cravings!

I avoid beans these days and limit dairy to a few times a week because honestly I just feel a lot better when I do! I had a BIG craving for a taco dip the other day so I got to work on making a healthy version of taco dip, healthy by primal standards.

Weekly Meal Planner using Produce from my Abundant Harvest Organics Box

Since I do not have a garden of my own like Ma, I get the next best thing: A weekly box of organic fresh picked produce from California farms through the wonderful company called Abundant Harvest Organics.

If you are reading this and you live in San Diego please take a look at the website to learn more and see about signing up. It is the best price for the amount of food you get and you will not find anything fresher in the stores. The best part is that you can feel good knowing that the farmer was also paid more money by selling the produce this way. You pay less than the prices in the store and the farmer gets paid more money, I would call that a win win!

Every week here on my blog I will be providing weekly menu ideas using the produce that came in the box that week.

Easy & Delicious: Baked Squash!

I love squash but honestly I do not have the time to wash it, cut it, gut it, peel it, chop it, just to be able to cook it! Luckily I figured out a way to get the same creamy hot baked goodness with limited prep time: just poke some holes it, throw it on a foil lined baking sheet, and bake the darn thing whole!

The results have been impressive! So far I have tried this with a BIG almost 6lb kabocha, a small pumpkin, and a HUGE spaghetti squash.

The baking time depends on its size and thickness of skin, but the temp I always use is 350 degrees.

For the kabocha I poked some deep holes in the top and cooked it for 1 hour. Then I flipped it over and cooked it for 30 minutes more.

When it came out I let it cool and then I sliced it like pie and easily scraped off the seeds and stringy parts. There was so much that I cut it all in slices and stored the extra in the refrigerator.

It was great for a quick snack for the baby, or a yummy treat for me. To warm it back up you can take out a slice and cover it in coconut oil or butter and throw it under the broiler for a little bit.

The other great thing about baking the squash whole this way it the benefit of warming your kitchen or in my case the kitchen and living room. There are some bonuses to having a small house sometimes!

This is also a great way to collect all of your squash seeds to save for roasting!

Last night I warmed our house baking one of our decoration pumpkins left over from Halloween. I poked some holes in the top and baked it 45 minutes and then turned it on one side and baked it for about 20 minutes more.

As you can see from the pictures below Jad was VERY happy about his fresh pumpkin treat this morning! I even threw some of it into an omelet I made him for his 2nd course and he happily gobbled that up too. I am sure Ma would approve!

Smoked Clam Chowder (dairy and corn free)

I had some tins of smoked clams hanging out in my pantry so I decided to put them to use! I always love clam chowder but I don't cook with much dairy or corn at home since it does not seem to agree well with some of the  members of our family so I needed to come up with some new ideas. I found some canned coconut milk and a sweet potato in the pantry too and decided to use these. Then I looked in my Abundant Harvest Organics box and found some zuchinni, carrots, and onions. I always have homemade chicken broth on hand in my deep freezer and while I was getting that I found a bag of frozen chopped kale. I am in love with kale so I decided that was going in too! I did not have celery like you find in some clam chowders so I put in extra zucchini.

The results were pretty tasty! I think the smokiness of the clams gave it a really good twist. Jad ate it for dinner the first night and then breakfast, lunch, and dinner the next day. He would close his mouth to other things, he only wanted the tasty chowder! I wasn't complaining since all the ingredients were organic and full of fiber and vitamins and the clams are a great source of iron and protein too.

Ingredients:
Fresh or dried thyme
1 can coconut milk (or you can use 2 cans if you want it extra creamy)
2 cups chicken broth (homemade is best!)
3 cans of smoked clams
1 big sweet potato
zucchini and or summer squash 
celery (or bok choy or extra zucchini or other summer squash)
expeller pressed coconut oil
kale
salt and lemon pepper for seasoning

Instructions:
Chop up the onion and saute it in your soup pot in the coconut oil

While the onion is cooking chop up the rest of your veggies. If you are using bok choy save the leaves on the side with your Kale an just add the chopped stem to the pile of chopped veggies.

When the onions are soft and a little caramelized add the rest of the veggies (except the kale) and the Thyme to the pot. Then pour in the coconut milk and the chicken broth.

Bring everything to a boil. Then reduce the heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

Add in the kale (and bok choy leaves if you are using those) and simmer for another 5 minutes.

Then add in the smoked clams and all the oil in the can with them. Simmer for 5 minutes more.

If you have an immersion hand blender use it to puree just some of the soup to thicken it. Alternatively you can pour some of the soup in a blender and puree it and then pour that back into the pot.If you want to eat the clams whole in the soup add them after the puree step.

Crack some fresh sea salt and lemon pepper on top when you serve it into bowls.

Enjoy!

I am going to make this again tomorrow but this time I am going to use yu choy and summer squash because that is what I got in my recent Abundant Harvest Organics box along with some kale I ordered as an add-on.

Ma would have always used what was on hand and what she had growing in the garden. I am trying to make things simpler for myself by doing the same. My garden just happens to be what I get from many different farmers in California who put things in my weekly Abundant Harvest Organics box!

If you try this with any variations please share your results in a comment!