Gastography

Not content to only have a monthly meat subscription, we joined the summer salad CSA from Empress Green in Staten Island. Empress Green is really something cool – it’s the first commercial farm grown within a residential development in NYC (it’s located in the space between two buildings in the Urby complex in Staten Island’s Stapleton neighborhood) and the farmers, Zaro and Asher, are committed to building something great for the community while providing educating about food and farming.

Aside from a salad CSA, Empress Green offers a flower CSA starting next month, holds a weekly farm stand open to the public, hosts a number of special events and activities (including farm-to-table dinners) and keeps bees. I’m looking forward to seeing more of what they have to offer in the coming months.

Week 1

Baby Red Russian Kale

Empress Mix (Spring mix)

French Breakfast Radishes

Dill

What I Made

I supplemented the CSA share with additional kale and spinach for my morning smoothies.

I dropped some dill in a nice little meat sauce I made featuring ground beef from ButcherBox, and young garlic, spinach and dill from Empress Greens.

I made a salad to take to a potluck out of most of the kale from the CSA share + a bunch of the dill.

I made a big lunch salad out of the Empress mix, which I had with an herbal dressing that included more dill and some kefir.

I roasted the radishes and served with butter alongside steak.

This week, I have a little kale and a hand full of dill left over.