New News!

Alrighty... it's been a couple of days since the first delivery, and there's food to report on people!

Today I participated in a lovely office pot luck with some of my fellow foodie-dietitians (there needs to be a word for that...fooditian? dietoodie?). Anywho, I offered to provide the soup course for this vegetarian luncheon - an NO, dietitians are not all vegetarians, in fact one of my very best friends is extra thick bacon.  I decided to rely on the bounty of my good food box and went to work on a simple potato leek soup (the potatoes were part of my delivery, the leeks were a special purchase)... i got started a little late, and had the pot of goodies on the stovetop at about 9pm...Wednesday... 9pm...hello, Glee was on!!! I got myself wrapped up in the Quinn/Finn/Puck pregnancy scandal, and by the time I checked on the soup, I realized I was using my old pots with ill fitting lids, and being somewhat new to gas stoves, had the heat on too high...fact is... i managed to burn soup. horribly.  Thankfully, my neighbourhood 24 hr Sobeys provided me with some cranberry/cinnamon goat cheese, Balderson old cheddar, and some creamy dill harvarti for the pot luck...with a side of ontario Good Food Box pear slices... no one missed my charred soup :)  and my apologies but I failed to take a photo of the soup...on purpose.

On to this evening's meal :)

Here we have the raw ingredients:

Blue menu whole wheat spagooch (that's a Jim Mills word)
1 hot house tomato a la good food box
1 bunch of spinach a la good food box
1/2 vadalia onion
veggie broth (3/4 c. ish)
herb and garlic cream cheese (2 Tbsp ish)
leftover steelhead trout
and of course extra virgin olive oil (EVOO from now on) and salt and pepper to taste (s&p)

And the finshed product....

Quickly - Sauteed the onions in EVOO...added the broth and tomatoes...tomatoes broke down really fast, and it wasn't looking pretty, so I zipped the onions broth and tomatoes with my hand blander to make it smooth, added the cream cheese and heated until melted, then added fish just to heat through.  Meanwhile, the spaghetti is cooking in salted water.  When it's done I transfer it into a large bowl (still dripping wet with it's great starchy liqud), along with the fresh spinach, and the heated sauce/fish, and toss...the spinach cooks through just enough after a minute or so...voila.

The verdict:  eh...so so...won't replicate it...here's what I would change.

• cherry/grape tomatoes to keep their shape.
• white wine instead of broth - it was missing acidity...lemon juice would have also worked.
• marscapone or regular cream cheese... with REAL garlic and herbs
• x-nay on the out-tray. as in, no trout mixed in..maybe a fillet rested on top, or shrimp/ scallops instead, trout is just a little too strong tasting (think slightly milder salmon) to be mixing in.

So the stock of produce continues to dwindle - As far as fruit goes I've tried the oranges (a bit too tart, and impossible to peel), and the pears (a little under ripe, but perfectly tasty - check out how they arrived..look closely at the bag)

...stay tuned, the rest of the veggies are up to bat! 

Happy Cooking Y'All!!!