I am not a fan of Tuesdays. For me, Tuesday means no yoga, no gym, and having to rush out of work to pick up my CSA share, which is inconveniently located nowhere near any of the trains or busses that head to my apartment. And it always rains. Every Tuesday, it seems like I have too many obligations, and absolutely no time for myself.
The main root of my Tuesday problem is probably my attitude toward picking up my CSA share. I leave my office in a rush, go out of my way, take an unfamiliar train, and add a vegetable share and a fruit share to my already-heavy load of handbag and tote/lunch bag (and whatever else I needed to bring into Manhattan for the day). I invariably get my work clothes wet or dirty, and then I have to walk everything home at the end of a long day. My husband doesn’t get out of work in time to pick it up, so it ends up being my job every week. At this point, the very idea of picking up the CSA share makes me grumpy (given, in a very First World problems kind of way).
The problem with Tuesdays is not the CSA share, though, it’s me. I love my CSA. I love supporting a local fruit farmer and a local vegetable farmer. I love knowing that I’ll have fresh, seasonal organic produce every week. I even love that we members of the CSA are taking a risk every year—I believe that paying a farmer in advance for taking the chance to plant another season of crops is important, and has a positive impact on the survival of small farming culture. The CSA lessens the time I spend at the grocery store, and makes me a more creative cook. It’s completely unfair that being a big ball of stress translates into hating to pick up my share.
So, I’m taking back Tuesdays and reaffirming the CSA love. Instead of being wound up about what I can’t do and what I need to get done, I’m going to make the most of what I can do, namely, deciding to spend a weekday evening in the kitchen without guilt. I need to pick up the CSA share, and I need to get the fruits and vegetables cleaned and stored, but I don’t really need to try to fit in anything else.
Last night, in celebration of the CSA bounty, I made potato leek soup and a batch of chocolate chip cookies. Per usual, I tinkered a bit with my regular recipe (a veganized recipe based on http://www.worldpantry.com/cgi-bin/ncommerce3/ExecMacro/nspired/sunspire/recipeall.d2w/report#sccc), and came up with nothing short of a miracle: chocolate chip cookies that taste just like a certain married-to-the-prairie mall brand. Nothing makes a rough day better than any kind of cookie fresh from the oven, but sometimes you just really want a mall cookie:
Mrs. Mountain’s Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies:
* 1 cup (2 sticks) margarine, softened (I use Earth Balance Buttery Sticks)
* .5 cup light brown sugar
* .75 cup granulated sugar
* 2 tbs of flax mixed with 5 tablespoons of water (an egg replacer)
* 1.5 tsp. vanilla extract
* 1.5 cups all-purpose flour
* .5 cups whole wheat flour
* 2 tsp baking soda
* .5 tsp sea salt
* .5 bag vegan chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 350 F. Mix flax with water and set aside. Using a stand mixer, cream together softened margarine and sugar. Add flax mixture and vanilla to the sugar/margarine, and mix thoroughly. In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, and salt. Whisk together. Add the dry ingredients to the wet in batches, mixing until the dough is uniform.
Mix in vegan chocolate chips. Drop a tablespoon or so of dough at a time onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Bake for 9-11 minutes. Cool on a wire rack.
This recipe makes about 60 tiny cookies. Be warned, they spread out—my cookies from last night spread completely together, and now they’re all square.
Hey! What is this CSA-thingy you’re talking about?
http://www.justfood.org/csa