The Plan:
Day 1: Fried rice with radish greens, green garlic, and scallions
Day 2: Giant salad with mixed greens, arugula, chickpeas, salami, and olives
Day 3: Homemade pizza, leftover salad
Day 4: Cheeseburgers, Herb potato salad with lovage and scallion
Day 5: Egg salad sandwiches with scallion and radish, Green smoothie (using spinach/salad mix)
Day 6: Tacos
Day 7: Beef Pot Roast, Mashed potatoes and sunchokes
This meal plan was curated using local foods that are in season now or preserved during the peak growing season in the U.S. Midwest. The plan is an exact replica of what our family is eating this week unless we are out of town. Meal plans are developed using whole foods and my meal planning system (click here!) and are meant to be healthy and easy to prepare. Most recipes will take no more than 30 minutes of active cooking time. Occasionally meals may require all day slow cooking, advanced prep, or some oven time. Recipes are provided when available. I sincerely hope this will help with your own meal planning!
Pantry Shuffle:
Out of Storage: (preserved when in season and coming out of my root cellar, freezer, canned, or dehydrated stash)
- Ground beef and beef roast from Mastodon Valley Farm meat share
Into Storage:
- Nothing this week
Notes: How you can help the bees
By this point you have probably heard about the massive loss of bees worldwide. Colony collapse is a common phenomena with farmers losing 40% of their honey bee colonies in 2018 alone! A lot of this is due to changing climate, increases in wildfires, chemical sprays, and loss of habitat (urbanization).
A movement that was started by Plantlife in the UK is now gaining traction in the US to target one way that we can personally help the bees. No Mow May. What that means is that those of you with lawns take a break from mowing or reduce your mowing in the month of May to increase the number of flowering plants that are needed for many pollinators, including bees. This small change has been shown to have a large impact on increasing the bee population.
I know there are lots of people out there who aren’t really keen on these buzzing insects, but truth be told they are essential for our food supply. No pollinators = no food. Those almonds you love, fall apples, a thriving garden. All of these things are dependent on bees.
Now if you are thinking about cutting back on mowing, that also means you need to avoid spraying your lawn with weedkillers and pesticides. I don’t do this anyways on my lawn, but if you do, delay your spray to allow the flowering plants to survive and feed the bees.
My small village is participating in No Mow May and I intend to join. Permission to not mow the lawn?!? Count me in! There will be violets, dandelions, and clover galore and it will be beautiful! Check with your city to see if they are participating. Our village has lawn care rules so yours might too. The rules were suspended for the month so that whoever would like to participate can do so worry free.
I hope you too will participate in No Mow May and help save our bees. Not all heroes wear capes!
CSA Breakdown: For those of you also using Keewaydin Farm, here is a breakdown of how I will use each piece of produce this week. See the first CSA post for details of how I structure the plans.
- Salad/spinach Mix – reserve a little for tacos and a big handful for a smoothie, then put the rest in a giant salad
- Lovage – herb potato salad (tastes a bit like celery)
- Mustard Greens – giant salad
- Arugula – giant salad
- Green Garlic – fried rice
- Overwintered Potatoes – herb potato salad and mashed potatoes
- Green Scallions – 2 for egg salad, 2 for potato salad, the rest in the fried rice
- Multicolored Radish – cut off the greens and add to fried rice. Radishes will be sliced for egg salad and for lunches
- Sunchokes – boiled with potatoes and mashed
