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My Favorite Tools For Making The Most of My CSA

Published on June 5, 2015 By Emily. Updated on June 5, 2015

Today was a day I’ve been looking forward to for a long time: our first pick up for the summer season for our CSA at Mighty Food Farm.  I can’t wait to share all the goodness we picked up today…stay tuned for that in tomorrow’s post (or check out the sneak peek on Instagram and Facebook). 

Brian and I have had a CSA membership for several years now and hardly a day goes by that I’m not working with some sort of fresh vegetable.  Though my vegetable “usage” is largely tied to the pounds of produce I pick up on a weekly basis, the list of kitchen tools below will be useful to anyone who finds themself eating a lot of fruits and vegetables, whether they’re from a CSA share, a farmer’s market or the supermarket.

My Favorite Tools for Making the Most of My CSA

Cutting boards – Fresh vegetables generally require some chopping.  I’m a big fan of large, flexible cutting boards, which I’ve purchased from both IKEA (shown above) and Amazon.

A Good Knife – One of the best wedding presents Brian and I received was a Global Santoku knife.  It gets a lot of use.  If you’re budget isn’t quite that high, I’m also a big fan of the set of J.A. Henckels knives we own.

A Good Peeler – I’ll be honest; a good peeler can be hard to find.  We’ve gone through a few over the past few years.  Nevertheless, a peeler is pretty handy for things like winter squash, turnips and the like.  (If you have a peeler you love, tell me about it in the comments!)

A Salad Dressing Cruet – If you have a CSA share, This is totally not a requirement; Brian made our salad dressing every night for years in a 1 cup Pyrex measuring cup.  Last summer, however, we opted to buy a container specifically for salad dressing.  It’s easy to make multiple servings of dressing in (it even has measurement lines on the side as guides!), shake and pour from, saving us a bit of time.

An Immersion Blender – The immersion blender gets less use in the summer, but during the winter the blender is one of my favorite things for turning root vegetables into delicious soup.

A Salad Spinner – This is one area where I feel like supermarket vegetables are especially different from CSA or farmer’s market vegetables.  Fresh from the farm vegetables can be really dirty and dirt generally does not make for a delicious salad.  I love our OXO salad spinner, which has been going strong for about 6 years. 

What are your favorite tools for making the most of your fruits and vegetables?

This post contains affiliate links.  Thanks for your continued support of Relishments!

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Comments

  1. lisa valinsky says

    June 5, 2015 at 9:17 pm

    I’m a big fan of the Oxo Good Grips Swivel Peeler! It works great!

  2. Lucy says

    June 7, 2015 at 12:48 pm

    I have a Swiss metal peeler like this one: http://www.amazon.com/Zena-Swiss-11002-Vegetable-Peeler/dp/B002XMEHZ2/ref=pd_bxgy_79_text_y – I got it many years ago at Topsfield Fair and it is pretty great for peeling large veggies.

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photo of EmilyWelcome to Relishments! Follow along with my adventures in cooking and eating in the Berkshires of Western Massachusetts.

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Emily
Last week Brian and I finally got around to hiring Last week Brian and I finally got around to hiring a sitter for a rare night out. We went to dinner at @publicna and took advantage of the opportunity with drinks, appetizers and dessert.

Pictured:
- Citrus Braised Beef Tacos
- "Chicken and Waffles"
- House Fries with Garlic Aioli
- Fried Chickpeas
- Blood Orange Cheesecake
It was no surprise that Public was close to full on a Wednesday night - everything was so good. 

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New year, new theme word! This year's word is "enr New year, new theme word!
This year's word is "enrich" and I'm really excited about it.

I've written more about this year's theme on the blog. Click in the link in my profile or follow the link below to read the post.
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#YearlyTheme #MyOneWord #2023 #enrich2023 #NewYearsResolution
It's not New Year's Eve without a Top 9 post. It's It's not New Year's Eve without a Top 9 post.
It's almost all #Berkshires content this year, which is great.
1. A pasta salad reel that took longer to create than the recipe took to make.
2. A reel from North Carolina where I could have watched birds all day.
3. The @thelazygenius book giveaway.
4.@plantconnector 
5. @berkshiremuseum 
6.@sculpture.now at @themountlenox 
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9. The #AshuwillticookRailTrail
New on the blog: My 2022 reflections on last year' New on the blog: My 2022 reflections on last year's theme word - resume. 

I was able to get back to many activities that were meaningful to me this year and I'm calling this theme a success. Follow the link below or click the link in my profile to read more.
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New on the blog: My Favorite Recipes of 2022. For New on the blog: My Favorite Recipes of 2022.

For the fourth year, I've recapped the best new (to me) recipes I made this year in the hope that they'll give you some new dishes to try. This year's list is short, but delicious. It includes @budgetbytes My Favorite Recipes of 2022
Published on December 30, 2022 By Emily. Updated on December 30, 2022

It’s hard to believe that 2022 is basically behind us. Though overall this year found me getting back to the person I want to be (post-babies and “post”-pandemic), I did not try nearly as many new recipes this year as I used to. In fact, I was pleasantly surprised to see that I’d made note of any new-to-me recipes I wanted to share in this post. This year’s list is short, but delicious. It includes recipes from @budgetbytes, @smittenkitchen and @howsweeteats.
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https://www.relishments.com/blog/my-favorite-recipes-of-2022/
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#RecipeRoundUp #BestRecipes2022 #FavoriteRecipes
@coastalmainebotanicalgardens continues to be one @coastalmainebotanicalgardens continues to be one of the highlights of all my return trips to Boothbay and their annual Gardens Aglow event continues to impress. It was great to be back to walking the gardens instead of the pandemic drive through and there seemed to be more lights than ever.  I'm already looking forward to next year.
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#Boothbay #BoothbayMaine #CoastalMaineBotanicalGardens #GardensAglow #BotanicalGarden #MidcoastMaine
It has been a while, but there is finally a new CS It has been a while, but there is finally a new CSA menu plan on the blog! Visit the link below or in my profile to see how I plan to make use of some of the @mightyfoodfarm produce seen here.
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Fall in the Berkshires is always incredible, but t Fall in the Berkshires is always incredible, but this year we've had weather that has also been outstanding. The past 2 weekends have included time at Jaeschke Orchards, the Greylock Glen, and the Ashuwillticook Rail Trail as well as stopping to photograph any random foliage I see. 
Check out the last slide for video of some feathered friends we saw on a walk.
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@freshgrassfestival continues to be one of my favo @freshgrassfestival continues to be one of my favorite events each year, and it doesn't hurt that it's just minutes away from home. Enjoying the festival with my kids is definitely a different experience than without, but it's still a good time. The weather was especially cooperative today which was great for all the laps I did around the @massmoca campus pushing a stroller. I'm already looking forward to next year.
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