Planning for Produce

I have a problem. I can’t turn down a great deal on good food. Specifically, at the Farmer’s Market. The sight of all that beautiful fresh produce just overwhelms me. Especially in the summer, when the tomatoes are piled high and the herbs are so fragrant, they call me from two aisles over.

 At my Farmer’s Market, in Sugar Land, Texas, we have a wonderful farm that comes every weekend, Gundermann Acres. They offer a share box every week, similar to a farmer’s co-op. The crucial difference is that I don’t have to sign up and pay for it at the beginning of the season. I can decide every week whether I want a box or not. This fits my life so amazingly well, because with only a family of three, I can’t always go through an entire box every week. As you can see, there’s a LOT in one of my boxes. The only extra I bought was extra tomatoes, because tomatoes are delicious. And the price cannot be beat: $25. Yes. $25. If I went to my grocery store, even my wonderful ALDI, and spent $25 in produce, I would get half of that amount. With a well-stocked spice cabinet, and some carbs like rice in the pantry, this type of box could easily feed my family for the week by itself. 

So, when confronted by a huge assortment of produce from the farmer’s market or the co-op, some of which may be unfamiliar or at least out of your comfort zone, what do you do? This could also be a box of food gotten from a food pantry. Do you panic? I know I used to. The first few boxes I got were always an exploration of “what is this” and “what the heck do I do with that?”.

 Now, I have a better idea of what I can do, and how to plan. If I’ve said it once, I’ll say it a million times, you cannot save money feeding your family if you do not meal plan. Here’s how I do it: 

Step One: spread out all your new goodies and take a picture. Then put them away properly. Here’s a great chart from the American Heart Association showing where to store your produce. Hopefully, you cleaned out your fridge before you went to the market!

 Step Two: make a list of what you have and about how much, referring to the picture. Don’t forget anything!

 Step Three: Go through your list and start matching up recipes. Try to find recipes that either use all of one type of vegetable, or recipes that use portions of lots of different vegetables. For instance, my favorite greens recipe will use anywhere from two to four bunches of greens and salads will often take care of half a head of lettuce, plus a cucumber or two, tomato, carrot, some pepper, some cabbage, and maybe some broccoli, depending on my mood.

 Step Four: Eventually, you will probably get to a point where you’re just not sure of what to do with a particular vegetable. For me, my learning curves involved turnips, beets, radishes (especially watermelon radishes), greens, napa cabbage (they’re just so HUGE), fennel, kohlrabi, and grapefruit (which is the only thing I will ask to substitute, because NO ONE in my house will eat it no matter how much sugar I put on it).

 This is when I usually start looking through cookbooks and Pinterest. If you do this often enough, or join a Farmer’s Co-op, you will eventually find a go-to recipe for each of your trouble veggies. Like, when I see beets in the box, I know I’m baking brownies. When I see radishes, I know I’m pickling them with carrots and peppers and cauliflower (sooooooo good on tacos!). And when I get greens, my son gets super excited because he knows his favorite recipe with bacon is going to be on the menu.

 What kind of strategies do you have for dealing with a box of produce?

Hugggggggggs,
Scout