Fall CSA: Week One

November has come and gone, and I for one am thankful. I love November. It is the one month where I purposely drive myself a little nuts and spend hours obsessing over imaginary beings. Every November, for the past six years, I have participated in NaNoWriMo.  I laugh, I cry and I debate on killing off characters, just to move the story along, and when all else fails I write about food.  This year’s story had me working on my word count until the second to last day, which means I was remiss in my blogging duties, along with a lot of other duties.  The first week of December is my catch up week, and then the rest of life resumes and I realize how behind I am in everything else and start to panic. Deep breathing exercises are wonderful.

In my enlightened creative state of mind of the NaNo zone, I agreed to be part of a fall CSA that started in December.  Every week for the next several weeks I will be receiving fall and winter produce. In my brain this sounded like a really good idea.  I would get a bunch of root vegetables that I could use at my leisure.  At least that is the way that it played out in my head.  That is not the case.

Week One- Two Red Onions,  One bigger than my head Chinese Cabbage, one Acorn Squash, winter greens, a baker’s dozen of sweet potatoes and a half dozen red apples.

While there were potatoes in the mix, I had completely forgotten that squash is a winter supplemental, and Acorn Squash is a new territory for me.  I don’t consider myself a chicken when it comes to trying new food, but I sometimes need a little bit of prodding. I like squash for the most part, or at least that is what I told myself as I chopped it in half, scooped out the seeds and baked it until it was squishy, and then ate it. It was good.  I would not have guessed that it would be a cross between a sweet potato and a butternut squash; I was expecting a nuttier flavor, like Swiss cheese. I hate Swiss cheese, and a Swiss Cheese flavored squash sounds horrible to me. Thankfully Acorn Squash doesn’t taste like that.  I feel like I passed a week one challenge, by eating the Acorn Squash and am now ready for the Week Two box.  Or at least I think I am ready.