Tempeh and Tatsoi

This photo is from the recipe blog of Joan E. Marrero (email), CSA Director for J. R. Organics in Escondido, CA 85 acres under organic cultivation by  Joe Rodriguez, Jr.


For the September 17th delivery, Glade Road Growing expects to include tatsoi, broccoli, bell pepper, onions, cilantro, and summer squash.  YUM!  If you don't know, tatsoi is an Asian green, also known as Spinach mustard, Spoon mustard, or Rosette bok choy, but it's a bit more delicate than regular bok choy and works really well in recipes calling for wilted greens.  You can also eat it raw as a salad green.  Here's a recipe you can try.

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Serves 4

Cut one package (8 ounces) of tempeh into strips.  If you prefer, you can use a package of tofu cut into 1/4 " cubes, or 2 cups of cooked chicken or cooked beans (or a combination of chicken and beans.)

Wash tatsoi and dry on a clean kitchen towel.

Unless you already have some from a prior time, toast 1 TB or more of sesame seeds in a cast iron skillet until they just pop.  You can store any extra in a glass spice  jar after they cool.

Smash, peel and mince 2 fresh garlic cloves and 1 TB fresh ginger root.  In a small bowl, make a slurry of   1 1/2 tsp of corn starch and an equal amount of water.  In the bowl whisk together the garlic and ginger and slurry with:
1 TB miso
1 TB brown sugar
1 TB lime juice
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

In a cast iron skillet, heated and lightly coated with extra virgin olive oil, saute tempeh or tofu over medium heat for 5-7 minutes per side, or until golden brown. Remove from skillet. Re-coat skillet with oil and add tatsoi; once wilted, add sauce. Reduce heat to low and cook just until sauce slightly thickens.

This is cook served over cooked brown rice or Japanese soba noodles mixed with chopped cilantro or parsley. Divide greens on plates. Top with tempeh or tofu. Drizzle with remaining sauce, and sprinkle with sesame seeds. Serve immediately.

If you are making this recipe with cooked chicken or beans, fold them in as sauce thickens and cook until warmed through.

Moroccan Squash and Eggplant Stew

Photo by Kana Okada for Epicurious (website)


The September 10 farm share for Glade Road Growing is slated to include Salad turnips, Greenstar organic salad mix, eggplant, garlic, delicata winter squash, and a poblano (a mild chilli pepper.)  Here's a recipe to try.

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Yield: 6 servings

Coarsely chop  3 cups of onions.
Crush and finely chop two cloves garlic.
Finely chop 1/2 TB of fresh ginger
Slice 2 cups of carrots (about 1/4 #)

Cube 3 cups of delicata squash.  To do this,  run the squash under warm water and scrub away dirt with your hands. If there are any hard spots on the squash, you can scrape them off with a butter knife.  With a sharp knife, cut delicata in half lengthwise. This should be easy; the squash is more tender than butternut and just as sweet.  With a spoon scoop out the seeds and discard or save and  prepare like pumpkin seeds.  Cut each delicata half into 1/2 inch segments and peel, creating moon-shaped pieces that have slight bumps around the curve.

Cube 3 cups of eggplant (about 1 #)
Slice poblano or sweet pepper in strips.
Slice 2 cups of summer squash (about 1/2 #) (optional)
Chop 2 large vine ripened tomatoes or equivalent (about 2 cups--you can used diced canned when not in season)


Measure out these spices:
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground turmeric
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp cardamon
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes if you are using a sweet pepper, rather than the poblano
1/2 tsp paprika (optional)


Chop 1/2 cup cilantro or mint.
Thinly slice 1/2 cups of whole raw almonds


If you have a dutch over, you can use one pot or you can saute in a cast iron skillet and transfer to a stainless steel pot (at least 3 quarts in size) for cooking.

Saute onions in extra virgin olive oil for 2-3 minutes until translucent.  Add garlic and spices, stirring continuously. Saute the vegetables in the order given, so that the starchier ones will cook the longest.  Cook until the color deepens.  Stir in 3 cups of cooked, rinsed and drained garbanzo beans or 1/ 1/2 beans and 1 1/2 cups diced roasted chicken, along with half a cup of raisins and the almonds.

In dutch oven or large pot combine all ingredients with 1/2 cup of tomato juice or water.  Cover and simmer on low heat until all the veggies are tender.  If you'd like this stew will be good served over cooked couscous, brown rice or quinoa or it can be eaten as just the stew, garnished with cilantro.

How to Cook a Whole Freedom Ranger Chicken

Photo of Glade Road Growing's Freedom Rangers. 

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When Sally Walker of Glade Road Growing asked if I knew how to cook chicken I thought, what nice Jewish girl DOESN'T?


The easiest ways to cook a whole chicken are stewing, baking and roasting.  If you are feeding friends or a family, you may be able to eat the whole chicken...a 4.5 pound bird of this breed yields about 2 cups of white meet and two cups of dark meat (and about 1 cup of schmaltz, i.e. rendered chicken fat--the high fat content of this breed keeps the chicken from drying out while roasting.) 

Otherwise, you can pick the meat off the carcass and refrigerate what you plan to eat in 3 or 4 days and freeze the rest  for later. In subsequent entries, you will find more recipes for the left-over chicken (which can alternately be made from raw chicken if you joint the whole chicken with a sharp knife or poultry shears.)  They are:
Easy Creole Chicken Gumbo
Spicy Chinese Eggplant and Chicken 
Spicy Chinese Chicken and String Beans
Tatsoi and Chicken (substituted for  Tempeh)

As I wrote earlier, I went ahead and stewed the first chicken in a crock pot, since it had been frozen.  I will never use a crock pot again.  Instead I'd suggest you stew in  in the oven in a covered casserole or if you don't want to heat up the oven, even stewing in a pot on the stovetop would have been a better choice.   If you have large enough cookware you can stew it whole; if not, joint it as shown at the above link. 

I roasted the fresh chicken un-stuffed for about 40 minutes in a convection oven (which in addition to being faster, takes less  electricity and doesn't heat up the house so much as a conventional oven.) But since I suspect most of you only have a conventional oven, here's a recipe adapted from another nice Jewish girl, aka, the Barefoot Contessa, Ina Garten, who uses bigger birds.

A 4½ - 5 lb  bird from Glade Road Growing will take about an hour and 15 minutes at 425 degrees F.  (Some folks prefer to roast at 375 degrees F for 1½ to 2 hours.  A 4 pound bird about fifteen minutes less.  Add another 20 minutes to the cooking time for a stuffed bird.  All these times are approximate.  What you want to do is roast it until the juices run clear when you cut between a leg and thigh, which is the part that takes the longest to cook.

Beth's Company's Coming Oven-Roasted Chicken (photo from Amy Giles (her 2009 blog post)

Thickly slice one large onion
Cut 4 carrots into 2-inch chunks
Cut 4 stalk of celery into 2-inch chunks
Half  one pound of baby red or Yukon gold potatoes (or  cut larger potatoes to appropriate size)
(Garten uses a bulb of fennel cut into wedges instead of the potatoes and celery)
Peel and smash 5 large cloves of garlic.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

Rinse a 4- 5 pound Glade Road Growing Freedom Ranger chicken (which comes without giblets) inside and out.  Use poultry shears or a sharp knife to remove excess fat, skin, wing tips and neck and set aside in the refrigerator for when you make a stock of the roasted chicken's bones. Pat the outside dry and liberally salt and pepper the inside of the chicken.  Place  the garlic in the cavity.  Brush the outside of the chicken with extra virgin olive oil and salt and pepper. (Garten uses butter, but my mother was raised Orthodox, so I can't make myself do it...)

In a roasting pan, place veggies and toss with salt, pepper and more olive oil.  Spread over the bottom of the pan and place the chicken on top.  Roast until the juices run clear when you cut between a leg and thigh.  Remove the chicken and vegetables to a platter and cover with aluminum foil for about 20 minutes. Slice the chicken onto a platter and serve it with the vegetables.