Wednesday, October 3rd, 2012
Central Park East - (below) - 7:00am

Good morning!  Twas a dark and foggy morning.  I always love these particular trees (bottom photo) at this time of year.  They're huge ovals of green leaves that, when the season starts to turn, begin to turn bring yellow in specific little patches.  The middle photo is a maple, which is already entirely orange. 

I'm loving the vegetables I'm getting in my CSA shares lately.  While I can't get enough zucchini,  eggplant, basil, and tomatoes in mid-summer, I LOVE the types of greens and root vegetables that come in to season around this time of year.  We've been getting beautiful kale (Blue and Siberian - blue is my favorite so far).  We've also been getting tons of winter squash, which I'm learning how to make.  Butternut is my favorite variety so far but I have some Delicata to try something with this week.  There have also been potatoes and lots of beets.  Here's the thing....I like beets.  I like them peeled and sliced very, very thin and then made into a salad with goat cheese, walnuts, and balsamic.  When you roast them, something odd happens.  They just taste weird to me - kind of too sweet for a roasted vegetable - which I expect to taste savory.  I have about 2 lbs left sitting in my fridge waiting for me to figure out what to do with them - which I will do something with them - they're so damn healthy.  I welcome your suggestions.  Finally, we just got back Bright Lights Swiss Chard.  MY FAVORITE vegetable.  SO beautiful and such a great green - like Kale it stands up to some abuse.  You can let it sit in the fridge and it doesn't wilt or turn brown, it's hearty, it's tough, and it fares well just marinating it in some garlic & olive oil and sauteeing it down, it can be thrown into soup, too.  

This is what it looks like.

Pretty, huh? 

Ok, well I've nerded out about vegetables enough for one morning.  I can't help myself I love them.  When I went to pick up my share yesterday, Sofie and Bear were with me and they were straining and pulling to crunch up any spare leaves or pieces of cauliflower that had fallen to the ground - they like veggies, too ;) 

Have a great day!!