Lasagna

Lasagna is one of those hearty classics that never goes out of style.  There are countless variations including vegetarian, creamy (vs. tomato sauce), and deconstructed versions.  But good, old-fashioned lasagna made with meat, cheese, tomato sauce, and lasagna noodles is a crowd-pleaser among omnivores.

Making lasagna is a bit of a production, as it requires several time-consuming steps, like making a good tomato sauce.  The good news is that you can do much of it in advance, then assemble and bake before serving.  You can even prepare lasagna entirely in advance, as it keeps well in the fridge for a few days and is great re-heated.  Lasagna also freezes fairly well, but the cheese can become slightly granular.  Going light on the cheese minimizes this problem.

Speaking of tomato sauce:  I prefer to use my own slow-cooked tomato sauce.  You'll find the recipe on this blog way back on September 24, 2010.  You can make slow-cooked tomato sauce with fresh or canned tomatoes.  Maybe you have some in your freezer from last summer?  Or you can use your favorite tomato sauce, even a prepared one from a jar.  In any event, this recipe starts with a quart of your best prepared tomato sauce.  If you like to serve your lasagna with a little extra sauce, you might want to make more.

As for the meat, you can use ground beef and/or sweet or spicy bulk Italian sausage.  I prefer a mixture that's about half ground beef and half Italian sausage, either sweet or spicy.  You can always add red pepper if you want to spice it up.  If you can't find bulk Italian sausage, buy the links and remove the casings by slicing lengthwise through the casing with a sharp knife and pushing out the sausage.

My recipe includes spinach, which I mix into the ricotta layer, and a bechamel or white sauce (in addition to tomato sauce) for the top.  Feel free to omit these steps if you prefer, but I think they contribute greatly to a more interesting, delicious, and nutritious end product.

A word about noodles:  I've made lasagna using traditional dried noodles; sheets of fresh pasta, both store-bought and home-made; and dried, no-boil noodles.  Personally, I prefer sheets of fresh pasta.  I think they have the best texture and flavor; and you don't have to pre-boil the noodles, like traditional dried pasta.  However, it's considerable extra work to make your own and I've found only a few places in LA that carry sheets of fresh pasta.  The no-boil noodles are super easy, but they are noticeable less toothsome than a good quality dried noodle.  If the toothsome-ness of the noodles is not important to you, you might like the no-boil noodles.  They are widely available at many grocery stores.

Lasagna noodles tend to be rectangular, but they come in different shapes and sizes, as do lasagna pans.  This recipes calls for three layers of lasagna noodles.  You'll have to figure out exactly how many noodles that will be for your lasagna pan.  However, a one pound or 12 ounce box of noodles should be more than enough.

The recipe below is for a 8-9" square baking dish which will feed four to six hungry people.  Feel free to double this recipe for a 9x13" baking dish or something roughly equivalent.  A deep baking dish is best.

To make lasagna, you'll need:

1-2 t olive oil
1-1/2 lbs ground beef, bulk Italian sausage or a combination
1 qt slow-cooked tomato sauce
1 bunch fresh spinach (5-6 oz)
3 C ricotta cheese
1/4 t + 1 pinch nutmeg
Freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1 T butter
1 T flour
1 C whole or evaporated milk, slightly warmed
1 C grated mozzarella cheese
Lasagna noodles to make 3 layers
Salt
Black and white pepper
Red pepper flakes (optional)

1.  Make the meat sauce:  Heat 1-2 t olive oil in a large, non-reactive skillet.  Add the ground beef and/or Italian sausage and cook over medium heat, breaking up the chunks into small pieces, until cooked through (no pink).  Remove the meat from the skillet and wipe out the skillet.  For a more uniform consistency, break up the chunks of meat with a fork or transfer the slightly cooled meat to a food processor and pulse a couple of times.

2.  Return the meat to the skillet.  Add about 2 C of slow-cooked tomato sauce.  The consistency of this mixture should be thick, not runny.  Heat over low heat and simmer for about 10 minutes or longer, if you need to cook off some of the moisture.  Taste and adjust the seasoning with salt, black pepper, or red pepper flakes, if you prefer.  Turn off the heat and set aside.  If you're planning to assemble the lasagna later, this thick meat sauce can be cooled and refrigerated for later use.

3.  Make the ricotta-spinach mixture:  Trim the stems off the fresh spinach, compost the stems, and wash the leaves well.  Cook the wet spinach over low heat in a cover non-stick pan until completely wilted.  Transfer the spinach to a strainer and press out the water.  Turn the cooked spinach out onto a cutting board and coarsely chop.

4.  Put 3 C ricotta cheese in a medium bowl.  Stir in the cooked and chopped spinach.  Add a few tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan cheese and 1/4 t nutmeg (or to taste).  Season with salt and white pepper to taste.  Set aside or refrigerate for later use.

5.  Make the bechamel sauce:  In a small saucepan over low to medium heat, melt 1 T butter.  Add 1 T flour and cook for about 1 minute.  Slowly add the warmed milk, whisking briskly to prevent lumps from forming. [If you do get lumps, you can strain the lumps out of the sauce.]  Add about 1/4 C grated mozzarella cheese.  Stir until melted.  Season white sauce with 1 pinch of nutmeg, salt and white pepper to taste.  Set aside or refrigerate for later use.

6.  To assemble and bake the lasagna:  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Prepare lasagna noodles (if necessary) according to package instructions.

7.  Spread about 1 C slow-cooked tomato sauce in the bottom of the baking dish.

8.  Put one layer of lasagna noodles on top of the tomato sauce.

9.  Put the thick meat sauce on top of the lasagna noodles.  Sprinkle about 1/4 C grated mozzarella cheese over the meat sauce.

10.  Cover the meat sauce with another layer of lasagna noodles.

11.  Spread the ricotta-spinach mixture over the second layer of lasagna noodles.

12.  Cover with the third layer of lasagna noodles.

13.  Cover the third layer of lasagna noodles with 1/2-1 C slow-cooked tomato sauce.

14.  Stir the bechamel and pour over the tomato sauce.  [You may not need to use all of it.]  Sprinkle some grated mozzarella cheese and/or grated Parmesan cheese on top, if desired.

15.  Place in preheated oven and bake until the lasagna is hot and the top is bubbly, 30-40 minutes or longer if you started with cold ingredients from the fridge.

16.  Take the lasagna out of the oven, cover it with a foil tent, and allow it to rest for about 10 minutes before serving.

This week's bounty included:

From County Line Harvest South:  Chard, arugula, and kale;

From Jimenez Family Farm:  Japanese turnips, onions, acorn squash, russet potatoes, broccoli, spinach, cherry belle radishes, and cabbage;

From Drake Family Farm:  Chevre;

From K and K Ranch:  Pink Lady apples and navel oranges;

From Silver Lake Farms:  Rosemary and sage.

Enjoy!

Shelley

Classic Spinach Salad with Raspberry Vinaigrette

The fresh spinach we've been getting lately has been beautiful; and it's good for you, too.  Spinach is loaded with vitamins and minerals and is delicious raw or cooked.

Today's recipe is a classic spinach salad with crumbled bacon and hard-cooked eggs.  No worries if you don't eat bacon, just use your favorite bacon substitute, or leave it out altogether.  Toasted walnut or pecans are tasty alternatives to bacon.  Sun-dried tomatoes would be another way to go.

But bacon is the traditional choice for this salad, so if you're going that route, get high quality, thick-cut bacon, cook it crisp, and crumble it or chop it coarsely.

This recipe is easily doubled.  For two servings use:

1 bunch fresh spinach
4 strips thick-cut bacon
2 eggs
2 T thinly sliced red onion
salt and pepper

For the raspberry vinaigrette:
2 T olive oil
2 T raspberry vinegar
1/4 t honey or agave syrup

1.  Triple wash the spinach, making sure you remove all the dirt.  Spin dry.  Remove and compost the stems.  Tear the leaves into bite-sized pieces in a large bowl.  Set aside.

2.  Fry the bacon in a skillet until crisp.  Drain.  Then crumble or chop coarsely.  Set aside.

3.  Hard-boil 2 eggs.  To hard-boil eggs, place them in a pan with cold water to cover.  Bring to a boil over medium heat.  Turn off the heat.  Cover the pan.  Wait 10 minutes.  Drain.  Cool in a cold water bath.  Then peel the eggs and chop or mash them with a fork.  Set aside.

4.  Make the vinaigrette:  In a small bowl, briskly stir or whisk together the olive oil and raspberry vinegar until combined.  Stir in the honey or agave syrup.

5.  Pour the vinaigrette over the washed and dried spinach.  Add the red onion.  Toss to distribute evenly.  Season the spinach with salt and pepper to taste.  Go easy on the salt, as bacon is salty.

6.  Add the crumbled bacon and eggs.  Toss again.  Serve.

You can cook the bacon and eggs ahead of time.

Fruit is a nice addition to this salad.  Dried cherries, pomegranate seeds, or chopped tart apple are delicious, as are fresh raspberries, in season.

Today's bounty included:

From County Line Harvest South:  Baby white Tokyo turnips, red beets, arugula, rainbow chard, and rainbow baby carrots;

From Jimenez Family Farm:  Russet potatoes, cabbage, winter squash, cilantro, broccoli, spinach, yellow onions;

From K and K Ranch:  Pink Lady apples and navel oranges.

Enjoy!

Shelley

Spinach, Kale and Feta Pie

It's high season for leafy greens, and today's box was over-flowing with many beautiful examples. You just may want to enjoy a lovely salad made from red leaf lettuce, mizuna, spinach, parsley, radish, carrots, and one of last week's avocados that may be ripe by now. A squeeze of fresh lemon juice, a sprinkle of fine olive oil, some crusty bread and a glass of wine might be the perfect dinner this evening.

If you you'd like to have a little more adventure in the kitchen, try this Spinach, Kale and Feta pie based on Spanakopita, a traditional Middle Eastern dish. It's a little bit of a production, but well worth the effort.

2 T olive oil
1 large onion finely chopped
1-1/2 lbs spinach and kale, washed, mostly dried and chopped
1/2 C chopped green onion
1/4 C chopped fresh parsley
1/3 lb crumbled feta cheese
1/2 C ricotta cheese
2 eggs, lightly beaten
freshly ground nutmeg
salt and pepper to taste
melted butter (about 1/2 stick, more if necessary)
10 sheets (12" x 18") phyllo*

1. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 9" x 12" baking dish. Set aside.

2. In a large skillet over medium heat, saute the chopped onion in olive oil until translucent, about 1-2 minutes, stirring occasionally. Don't let the onion brown.

3. Add the chopped spinach and kale and saute until well-wilted. Add the green onions and parsley and continue cooking, turning the heat down, if necessary, until all or most of the water has evaporated. The mixture should still be moist, not completely dry. Cool slightly.

4. Add the crumbled feta, ricotta, and eggs. Season with freshly ground nutmeg, salt and pepper to taste. Stir well to combine. Set the filling aside while you prepare the phyllo.

5. Take 10 12"x 18" pieces of fresh phyllo dough. Cut them in half to make 20 12" x 9" pieces, and stack them. [Or cut phyllo to fit your pan. Whatever size, you'll need 20 sheets cut to fit.] Phyllo dries out easily, so work quickly and keep the phyllo stack covered with a dish cloth while you work.

6. Line the buttered baking dish with 1 piece of phyllo. Brush some melted butter on the phyllo, then stack another piece of phyllo on top and brush it with butter. Repeat until you've put 10 sheets of phyllo in the pan.

7. Spread the prepared filling on the buttered phyllo. Smooth the top, then cover with the remaining 10 pieces of phyllo, brushing more melted butter in between each piece and on top.

8. Bake at 350 until the top is golden brown and the center is cooked through about 30-40 minutes. Cut into squares and serve hot, room temperature, or cold. Leftovers, if there are any, make a nice lunch; or they freeze well, too.

**Phyllo, also called filo dough, is available frozen in most markets and fresh in some Middle eastern markets. If you are using frozen dough, be sure to defrost it thoroughly in the refrigerator before you use it.

At the pick-up this afternoon, I heard that some avocados are taking a long time to get ripe. That's normal. However, you can hasten ripening by putting avocados in a brown paper bag with a banana. Ripening fruit gives off ethylene gas which is a ripening agent. Bananas are picked unripe, so they emit a fair amount of ethylene gas while they ripen in your fruit basket. You can capture this natural ripening agent and put it to good use with your avocados. It'll still take days to ripen a hard avocado, but you can cut the ripening time by a third or even in half.

This week's bounty included:

From Underwood Family Farms: red leaf lettuce, kale, spinach, mizuna, baby bok choy, napa cabbage, Easter radishes, yellow carrots, Cilantro, parsley, tangerines and a Zutano avocado.

From Rancho Santa Cecilia: those divine satsuma mandarines and 2 Haas avocados.

And from Silver Lake Farms: radish shoots and 2 kinds of chard shoots. Yum!

Enjoy!

Shelley

Persimmon & Spinach Salad - From Jennifer's son's school lunch program

From shareholder Jennifer:

Hi Tara,
I'll be picking up my first box today with my kids, I'm looking forward to it.
I've been searching for a good way to use persimmons. Mostly I find desserts but this recipe (I'll be trying it this weekend) comes from, believe it or not, the lunch program from my son's public school:

Persimmon and Spinach Salad

3 cups spinach, washed
3 medium "Fuyus" Persimmons, sliced
1/4 cup dried cranberries
1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
3 tablespoons 100% orange juice
2 tablespoons Rice Vinegar
1/2 teaspoon salt

In a small bowl, combine oil, orange juice, rice vinegar and salt for dressing
In a large bowl, combine spinach, persimmon and cranberries
Toss with dressing and serve

Jennifer: yay to the good peeps at your son's school for feeding developing brains with real food. Tara

Spinach Salad with Fresh Raspberries and Raspberry Vinaigrette

young squash from McGrath



Here's what Farmer John had for us in Silver Lake this week:

Avocados
Oranges
Daikon
Kabu turnips
Celery
Squash blossoms
Kohlrabi
Yellow wax beans
Tuscan kale
Curly kale
Chard
Arugula
Dandelion greens
Lemon basil

And here's what Tara brought down from McGrath Family Farm, certified organic growers in Camarillo:

Carrots
Spring onions
Beets
Haricot verts
Chard
Romaine lettuce
Spinach
Strawberries
Raspberries
Squash

Speaking of strawberries, here's a strawflower from Tara's garden.

If you happened to choose the spinach this week you probably noticed how unusual it looks with its small triangular leaves and deep red stems. I believe it's a Bordeaux variety. And because it's young and tender, it's perfect for a spinach salad. A traditional spinach salad with crisp, crumbled bacon and hard-boiled egg makes a tasty lunch or supper. I like to toss in some onion and avocado, too.

A more delicate salad is built around spinach and the beautiful red raspberries that were available as an option today. If you need more greens, you can add more spinach or use any combination of the arugula, dandelion greens, or the tenderest romaine leaves that tastes good to you.

Spinach Salad with Fresh Raspberries and Raspberry Vinaigrette

For each meal-sized serving or for 2 side salad servings:

2 C gently packed, washed, dried and trimmed spinach broken into bite-sized pieces
1/2 C washed and dried red raspberries
1/4 C crumbled goat cheese
2 T chopped toasted walnuts
1 scant T thinly sliced red onion (optional)
1 T raspberry vinegar, or more to taste
1 T extra virgin olive oil, or more to taste
salt and pepper to taste

1. Toss gently the spinach or greens, raspberries, goat cheese, walnuts and onion in a salad bowl.

2. In a separate small bowl or cup, briskly mix together the raspberry vinegar and extra virgin olive oil.

3. Drizzle dressing over salad. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Toss again to distribute the dressing over the salad.

Raspberry vinegar is available at many grocery stores and some specialty food stores. You can make your own by pouring hot white wine vinegar over slightly mashed fresh raspberries and allowing it to steep for 4-5 days, then straining out the raspberries. A quart of vinegar to about 1 C of raspberries will work just fine. Remember, the sweeter the raspberries and the nicer the white wine vinegar, the better your raspberry vinegar will taste.

Enjoy!

Shelley

Our First CSA Recipe

October 14, 2009

From CSA'er Treven:

Hi Tara,

Here are a couple of recipes. These recipes were created from improvising dishes w/ the goal of using as many of the vegetables as I could from the CSA box. They're informal and hopefully clear enough for people to follow.

VEGETABLE AND BEAN SOUP

for the soup base:

2-3 Tablespoons of olive oil
1/2 cup finely diced onions
1/4 cup finely diced carrots
1/4 cup finely diced celery
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
salt and pepper to taste
1 x 28 oz can of diced tomatoes
4-6 cups of chicken or vegetable broth

vegetable additions - whatever you have on hand (or remove whatever you dislike) but these were mostly from the CSA box week #1:

3-4 celery stalks chopped
2-3 carrots peeled and chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
2 cloves of garlic (unpeeled - you can fish them out later)
1-2 cups of broccoli, chopped
2 x 15 oz cans of beans, rinse and drained (kidney, cannelini, black, or mix)
1-2 cups of chopped spinach
1 bunch of chopped purslane

Directions:

1. heat 2-3 Tablespoons olive oil in a heavy stock pot on medium heat

2. once oil is heated, add minced onions, minced carrots, minced celery, salt and pepper and cook until softened about 5-7 mins

3. add bay leaf and fennel seeds and cook another 1-2 minutes; usually, until fragrant

4. add the canned diced tomatoes and chicken or vegetable broth, bring to a boil

5. add chopped vegetables: onion, celery, carrots, garlic, broccoli,
beans, and if needed, more salt and pepper; bring to boil (if the soup
seems too chunky, you can add more broth or water)

6. once it starts to boil, turn heat to low and let simmer, covered
for 20-30 mins (or until all the vegetables are tender and cooked
through)

7. towards the end, add spinach and purslane, cook for another 5 mins.
again, if needed, add more salt and pepper to taste

When you find the bay leaf, remove and toss it. For the cloves of garlic, if you are a garlic fan, you can squeeze whatever is left of the garlic out of the skin and smear on toast or mix into the soup.

To make this a meal in itself: add 1/2 to 1 cup cooked barley or brown rice to each bowl before serving

other options, if you have it on hand:
* add other types hearty vegetables: corn, potatoes, parsnip, zucchini, or squash in step 5
* in step 7, add 2-3 tablespoons of minced parsley


SPINACH, BEET, WALNUT AND GOAT CHEESE SALAD

1 cooked beet
goat cheese to taste
baby spinach
your favorite balsamic vinaigrette (I like Trader Joe's balsamic dressing but you can make your own or use whatever you have)

to boil beets
1. trim leaves of beets, leaving 1 inch attached
2. bring water to boil, salt the water
3. add beet, lower the heat, and simmer for 30-45 minute, until knife tender
4. remove from water, let cool until you can handle it
5. peel beet - should be easy to remove after cooked

prepare salad - in proportions to your liking:
combine a few pieces of chopped beets, handful of spinach, some goat cheese, and a few pieces of walnuts; toss with vinaigrette; and serve.

Thanks,
Treven