Introduction

Welcome to my new blog- Cooking the Bucket.  This will be my second summer receiving a produce subscription from Seeds and Spores farm.  Every Wednesday afternoon, I pick up my bucket of fresh from the farm, local, organic produce.  It’s like Christmas once a week!  My goal is to use as much as possible and waste nothing.  It’s too good and too expensive to let rot in the fridge!

However, I have quite a few challenges before me:

Challenge One: I don’t always know what the vegetables are and what I am supposed to do with them!  What is a garlic scape really?  What can you do with fresh chard?  What is the best use of a pickling cucumber when you don’t have the first clue about how to make pickles?

Challenge Two:  My kids can be picky eaters!  I have two young children.  Bryce will be four very soon and Bailey just turned two.  Bryce is what I would call a spirited child- strong-willed, persistent, energetic, sensitive, frighteningly intelligent, confident, and very, very particular.  He is a challenge to feed.  He would live on chicken quesadillas, garlic noodles, and chocolate if I let him.  Picky is an understatement.  Nothing green will willingly pass this child’s lips.   His food groups are carbs, sweets, and meat.

Challenge Three: Time.  Time is always a challenge.  As an elementary school teacher I am blessed to have the summer months to be at home with my children.  But trying to be a culinary master with two small helpers isn’t always possible.  I have to sneak in my prepping and cooking between diaper changes, nap times, battles over who had what first, all while trying to keep the rest of my house in some semblance of order.

Ready?  Here I go!