January food

There's a handy seasonal food guide that lets you search on what produce is in season in your state during each month of the year.  I search on Virginia and then have to take the intersection of that list, the foods I like, and the foods my husband likes.  That can lead to a few problems.

There aren't many local apples through Relay, the grocery service I'm ordering from monthly, but Virginia apples can sometimes be found in grocery stores if one reads the labels carefully.  I bought a nice bag of Pink Lady apples from Martin's (part of Giant).

I still have carrots in my garden, which I should definitely use in the next month or so.  Some of them will go into soups.  I should also make time to bake yeasted ginger carrot bread (recipe version with my adaptions is posted here).

Various herbs are in season, but I'm unmotivated to purchase them because I grow a lot of herbs myself.  I still have rosemary and possibly sage that the frost hasn't wiped out yet.

Several leafy greens are in season.  Unfortunately my husband doesn't care for strongly flavored greens, especially raw.  We might have found a viable option for lettuce (see subsequent blog posts).  Last month I found that sorrel is really nice in soups with leek and potato.  A salad spinner might be helpful, since it's a pain to dry the greens after washing them.

Winter squash is in season, but I'm not a big fan of it.  I tried hard for the last couple months but am now ready to give it a rest until next winter.  The only winter squash recipe I really like is butternut squash with bourbon, browned butter, and amaretto.

With all that, my Relay order this month contained minimal produce.  Here's what I ended up with:

• Bibb lettuce (hydroponic)
• pea shoots (hydroponic)
• purple skinned potatoes
• grass fed lamb shanks
• grass fed oxtail
• trout (farm raised)
• cheddar cheese
• milk
• pasta

I won't blog about staples like pasta, but see future blog posts for how I use the produce and meats.