Monday, June 7, 2010

Kefir Dressing, Slugs & Bugs, and Broken Glass

This week we got our first delivery from our CSA (Community Supported Agriculture).  Do you know about CSA's?  You buy a "share" in a local farm & then each week you get a box of what was harvested from the farm.  You can find out about CSA's in your area by going to www.localharvest.org

In our delivery was a bag of mixed salad greens, so I decided to make my homemade Ranch Salad Dressing.  But this time instead of yogurt or sour cream and buttermilk, I used just kefir.  I've been making kefir with both coconut milk and goat milk lately, which had made it more mild than the cow milk I have used.  I also replaced the dried chopped chives and the dried onion in the recipe with chopped fresh green onion (also in our CSA delivery this week).  It tasted great & good for my tummy too!  Throw some roast chicken on there & that's lunch or dinner for me!

Now, if you need a picture to remind you to always thoroughly wash your greens, I've got one for you.  I threw my bag of greens in the salad spinner & this is what I found in the bottom afterwards...

That's about a 2 inch slug there- what do you think, does he look a little dizzy?  Now, what I also should have done is carefully washed each leaf, not just toss it in the salad spinner & be done.  Because you see, a few days later I was eating one of those chicken salads, and as I got to the second to last bite my front teeth felt something I thought was a chicken bone.  Instead, I pulled a little black beetle out of my mouth.  YUCK!  Thankfully it was hard & stayed whole- legs & all.  So gross though & slightly traumatizing.  But that is organic & fresh from the farm right there- wow!

I also wanted to let you know, if you're wondering, what I ended up doing with that jar of broth that broke in the freezer. (That has been keeping you awake at night, right?)  Well, you can rest easy now: I solved the problem.  I decided to keep the broth frozen and break the rest of the glass off.  I do not recommend this to anyone, because after all, dealing with broken glass is dangerous!  And in fact, if my husband had been here I'm sure he would not have let me do it- but I did.

I ran it under hot water for a minute to loosen the broth from the sides of the jar.  One of the broken pieces of glass came off at this point.  Then I layed it out on several paper towels and used a hammer to fracture the rest of the jar so it would come off.  I ran it under hot water again & the pieces began to fall off.  Here are the pieces I collected from the sink (again, dangerous, I know).
 

The outside of the block of broth melted under the hot water, also washing away any little shards of glass with it.  I made sure to run it for a good amount of time.  When the broth was clean I just put it into the pot I'm going to use for the soup so it could continue thawing in the refrigerator.
This seemed like the best way to salvage my broth- what do you think?  I really do have a problem with throwing away food!


Tomorrow I'm going to share with you a recipe for Dark Chocolate Coconut Fudge... yum!

Enjoy!
Lisa

This post is a part of Tuesday Twister at GNOWFGLINS.

6 comments:

  1. I'm sorry this is off topic, and I'm sure you've been asked before, but where was that picture taken at the top of your blog?
    Beautiful!!!

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  2. Hi Jen, I don't mind you asking :) I took that picture from our hotel room: Treasure Island, Florida (on the Gulf Coast) January 2006. We had our 15th Anniv. & I wanted to go someplace warm. Funny thing is, the weather ended up being sooo cold (for Florida) while we were there!

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  3. Thank you! We travel to Florida from time to time. We'll look into it : ).
    Jen
    BTW - good for you for taking the steps to save your precious broth! I would have done the same thing : ). Too much work goes into a great broth to just toss it!

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  4. My jars always break in the freezer. I've lost more quart sized wide mouth ball jars that way, not even funny.

    I usually line a colander w/a thin dishtowel, let the broth melt into the colander which drips into a bowl I've placed underneath it.

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  5. @Paula- that is a good idea, although my broth is pretty thick because I puree veggies/fat/organs into it, so I thought something like that might not work... I'm def. not using any of my "good" glass in the freezer anymore. Maybe someday I will learn to can & that would solve the problem!

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