Vegetable Burritos

I'm a cook. I can follow a recipe and come up with the desired results. Since meeting my husband, I have even gotten better at using a recipe as inspiration and adapting the ingredients/directions to what I have on hand. My husband, on the other hand, is a chef (not for a living). He is great at looking at the ingredients before him and coming up with a scrumptious meal. I tell you this because last night my husband took the lead on dinner, and it was lots of fun to see his thought process at work. It was interesting to see how he chopped the vegetables, cooked and then combined them all in a way different from how I would do it. The results were delicious too.

He made vegetable burritos and guacamole. We have made burritos before. The previous burritos were good and really fast, but if you have little bit more time this recipe is even better. I loved the combination of vegetables with the scapes, beans and cheese. As always, our cooking decisions are driven by what is available from our farm share. Cooking radishes and salad turnips for a burrito might sound bizarre, but we really needed to eat them up. If we were head to a store to buy ingredients for vegetable burritos, we might select other things. This can provide inspiration to others needing to eat up some random veggies in the fridge. Try them in a burrito!

Vegetable Burritos serves 4
2 small bunches of turnip greens, chopped
2 small bunches of radish greens, chopped
1 bunch of beet greens, chopped
4 salad turnips, chopped
4 radishes, chopped
handful of scapes, finely chopped
1 can of pinto beans
cheddar cheese, grated
salsa
guacamole
tortillas

Saute the greens until tender. Place in a large mixing bowl. Saute the salad turnips, radishes and scapes until browned, and add to the mixing bowl. Drain the beans and rinse. Drain well and add to the mixing bowl. The heat of the vegetables will heat up the beans. Combine ingredients and mash with a fork until the salad turnips and beans break up a bit. Heat up the tortillas over the burner or in a dry skillet to soften them. Layer the cheese, the vegetable and bean mixture, salsa and guacamole in the tortilla. Roll up and enjoy.

Guacamole
1 avocado, roughly chopped
1 clove of garlic, minced
1 pinch of salt

Mash together with a fork. Serve immediately.

Some people like to add tomatoes, onions and lime, but we are purists and like that avocado flavor to shine through. Of course, you should add any other ingredients you enjoy.

Quick Burritos

Recently when my brother asked me what I had been up to, I had to admit that I had been spending a fair bit of time on food lately. Between going to the farmers' market, picking up our CSA, reading food blogs, cooking and eating, food was taking up a good part of my week. In contrast, he shared that he tries to spend as little time on food as possible. He has his regular rotation of quick meals in which burritos feature prominently. When he mentioned burritos - a light bulb went off - I could put greens in burritos. So in our continued effort to eat up all of our greens, we made burritos with greens for dinner tonight.

I grew up eating lots of Mexican food. When I lived in upstate NY, I joked that the best Mexican food in the county came from my kitchen. At that point, I would spend whole days making mole sauce from scratch, making my own tortillas and all sorts of salsas, and the list went on. This dinner was not in the same category, but it was delicious and a great healthy option for a fast weeknight dinner. We had dinner on the table within 30 minutes of walking in the door.


Quick Burritos
2 bunches of greens (we used turnip and radish greens)
2 T olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1 16 oz can of beans (pinto or black beans work well)
grated cheddar cheese
tortillas
salsa

Slice the greens into 1 inch wide strips and steam until tender. While the greens are cooking, lightly coat a saute pan with olive oil. Add the onions and cook until soft. Add the beans and heat through. Soften the tortillas by placing them right over the flame on a gas stove or in a dry frying pan. Do one tortilla at a time for a few seconds on each side. After the tortillas are warm, layer the beans, greens, salsa and cheese. Enjoy!

Tip: Our first burritos were really watery. We decided to split one more burrito, and the second time around we squeezed the moisture out of the greens and drained some of the liquid off the salsa. It made a big difference! We didn't have juice running down our arm any more.



Salsa Fresca
2 tomatoes
1 clove of garlic
1 jalapenos, with seeds and membrane removed
1/2 onion, chopped
handful of cilantro
1/2 lime, juiced
pinch of salt

Chop all of the ingredients and combine. Cover and let sit for 1 hour to let the flavors mingle.

For a smoother texture: Use a food processor to combine the ingredients. This was the route we chose this evening.