Community Supported Spinach Cake
Our weekly CSA share kicked in yesterday and we received a ton of fresh organic produce! For those of you who aren’t familiar, “CSA” stands for community supported agriculture. This relatively new socio-economic concept changes the way food is produced, distributed and sold, creating small scale closed markets for farmers in which the consumer participates in the risk and rewards of the farm.
One of the great benefits of the CSA (in addition to receiving produce the day it is picked) is that it gives farmers more time to do what they do best –grow food. By cutting out the middle man, the farmers also receive more money for their crops and save time by not having to market produce to stores.
Earlier this year my family purchased a “share” in this season’s crop from Abbondanza. This means we receive vegetables straight from the farm each week during the harvest months.
- Create a relationship with the person who grows your food
- Help farmers -money goes directly to grower, not middle man and chain stores
- Support neighborhood businesses –be a part of re-localization effort
- Reduce fossil fuel consumption used in food transport
- Support land intensive organic farming
- Purchase nutrient dense foods
- Eat locally
- Eat seasonally
- Eat fresh food
- Receive weekly basket of produce –often same day it is harvested
Frankly, our farm share is looking great this year –although we actually only purchased a “half share,” we received more greens yesterday than I could figure out what to do with. This sent me rummaging through my recipes last night in search of culinary solutions to my vegetable overload.
The biggest “problem” was spinach. What to do with the several pounds of spinach crowding out the other greens in the veggie drawer of my fridge? Spinach cake of course!
1 ½ pounds spinach, thoroughly washed, leave stems on if they are not tough
1 cup pine nuts
3 tablespoons grapeseed oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 eggs, whisked
½ cup currants
1 teaspoon celtic sea salt
- Wilt spinach in a large covered saucepan, over low heat (do not add water) 5 minutes, until tender
- Drain and cool, then gently squeeze moisture out of spinach
- Place spinach in food processor and pulse until coarsely blended, then set aside
- In a small skillet, warm 3 tablespoons oil, add pine nuts and saute until golden brown
- Add garlic to pan of pine nuts and saute together an additional minute
- In a large bowl, combine pine nuts mixture, blended spinach, eggs, currants and salt
- Spread mixture into a greased 7 x 11 inch pyrex baking dish
- Bake at 350° for 30-40 minutes
- Serve
Makes 12 spinach cakes
This spinach recipe is based on Claudia Roden’s Tortino di Spinaci. As I have mentioned before, she is my all time favorite cookbook author. I often hear her speaking about the history of Jewish food on NPR. She is basically a food historian, as well as a culinary genius.
I hope you enjoy this dish as much as we do and that it solves your spinach harvest woes!
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Subscribe by Email to elanaspantry.com:Posted on June 13, 2008 in community and cooked veggies by Elana
you might also like: Kale with Cranberries
or Stuffed Mushrooms
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19 comments for the post “Community Supported Spinach Cake”
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Though I cannot see myself making this recipe, it does look absolutely divine.
June 13th, 2008 6:50 pm
This looks delicious!
We’ve been changing all our eating habits at my house, and I’m glad to have found your blog :)
June 14th, 2008 6:38 am
Elana!!
What a delicious combination..
I love it!!
June 14th, 2008 12:07 pm
Is http://www.eatabbo.org/ in Seattle, Wa by any chance?
June 15th, 2008 8:22 am
Ayden Thanks!
Lauraldawn Glad to have you stop by and thanks for you sweet comment.
Ya’ara -Thanks, if you make it let me know how it turns out for you :-)
Moi -It’s in Boulder, CO., though I bet you have a bunch of CSA’s in Seattle.
June 16th, 2008 8:45 pm
Elana, I nominated you for a blog award, Arte y Pico. It comes with a meme, but I chose not to do it as I’m all memed out. If you want to display the award, just copy it off this post:
http://milkforthemorningcake.blogspot.com/2008/06/how-builders-stole-my-mojo-and-straight.html
x x x
June 17th, 2008 3:50 am
This looks absolutely delicious, Elana. Do you think it would work just as well with dried cranberries or green raisins instead of the currents?
I would appreciate some advice - from Elana or any of y’all…I am going out of town for 2 days for a friend’s wedding. What healthy snacks would you bring? I am seriously considering making another batch of your amazing power bars (and not sharing them!!) :)
June 17th, 2008 11:43 am
Looks delicious! I had considered a CSA this year but I was apparently late in joining and the only one still available that had half shares didn’t really have stuff I like. Now I’m glad, because Iowa is pretty much entirely underwater and I’m sure there won’t be much fresh produce available for the rest of the season :-(
June 17th, 2008 3:19 pm
This looks great…and easy to make! If I get spinach overload I’ll most certainly try this.
June 17th, 2008 3:32 pm
Naomi -Thanks so much! Love your blog, especially the recent story of the wolf whistlers. You go girl!
~M - I like your substitution ideas for this recipe, I think they sound delicious. Per the traveling question, yes, I think the power bars would travel well. I also like to bring trail mix along with me when I go on vacation. Have a great trip!
Judith -Good decision and I’m so sorry about all of the flooding out there.
Megabeth -Thanks for stopping by and if you do make it, let me know how it turns out for you.
June 19th, 2008 6:10 pm
Love this blog!!! Great looking recipe!!! I love spinach!
June 20th, 2008 6:38 am
Tara -Thanks for stopping by and for your feedback I really appreciate it!
June 22nd, 2008 11:54 am
This recipe looks delightful. Just the type of dish I love to eat. Thank you for sharing.
September 19th, 2008 8:56 am
Great looking dish! I love how perfectly toasted the pine nuts got.
September 19th, 2008 11:32 am
Alexa -Thanks for your kind words!
Maggie - Yes, the pine nuts are just delicious.
September 22nd, 2008 9:18 am
I made a completely gluten free Rosh Hashanah dinner. The spinach pie was loved by one and all. It was even better cold the next day. My kids have asked me to make it again so they can take it in their lunch.
October 1st, 2008 3:25 pm
Sheryl,
Thanks for stopping by with this great report! I really appreciate it and I’m glad the kids liked the cake.
Elana
October 2nd, 2008 5:05 pm
L’Shana Tova Elana and guests!
I can report to you and to ~M that indeed, using cranberries instead is very yummy. Even with the corner-cutting version I made, I hesitate to admit, with frozen spinach from parts unknown. Also w/only 2 T of oil (ran out).
This is the first Elana’s Pantry recipe I have tried, and I said a little Shehecheyanu (sp?) over it. I will probably try to make a version w/sunflower seeds (cheaper and okay for my nut-allergy cousins) as well.
Not only is tonight’s edition delicious, it was pretty easy to make. And maybe other readers can relate to this — after years of replacing this or that ingredient, it was exciting to cook something that was completely cooked in the time stated in the recipe, woo-hoo!
Thanks for sharing your work…
October 3rd, 2008 7:33 pm
Hi Ninafur,
Thanks for stopping by and letting me know how your experimentation went! I really like to hear about results when people tinker.
Shehecheyanu is my younger son’s favorite prayer (mine too), so thanks for sharing with me that you used it to bless the spinach cake.
I bet the sunflower seed version will be delicious, please let me know how it turns out if you make it for the nut-allergy cousins.
Shana Tova!
Elana
October 4th, 2008 2:03 pm