Twice lately I've fixed something different for The Old Man to eat.  Once it was because my daughter gave me some big Portobello mushrooms she found when she went grocery shopping.  She's a vegetarian, and she explained how one stuffs these saucer-sized shrooms with some tasty mixture, bakes 'em in the oven for 20 minutes or so, and tops 'em with marinara sauce.   Since TOM and I are not vegetarians I stuffed 'em with a mixture of my own devising that included some meat.  And since my mixture included a roux made with tomatoes, onions, green peppers, and celery, I left off the marinara sauce.  The Old Man liked getting something 'new' for supper.

Several nights later, he got something 'new' again, when the weekly crop box had contained most of what is needed to make ratatouille.  I'd made it once or twice before, but this time I took Beatrice Okangas's suggestion in her cookbook, Heartland, to make wells in the large baking dish full of the ratatouille, and add an egg to each one, topped with grated Parmesan cheese, for a further 20 minutes of baking.   The Old Man thought it made a tasty supper dish.

Those two instances made me remember how it's worthwhile to offer something 'new' (or at least infrequently seen on the table)to those for whom one cooks.  A bonus is that it gets the cook out of the rut she slides into when cooking for years on end!

And both sound delish, Bonnie!  I love portabella mushrooms and find them very versatile.

After I searched out a recipe to use when I found a BIG ol' rutabaga in my Crop Box a few weeks ago, and it turned out The Old Man liked it (!), I decided to do an 'encore' when I found parsnips in last week's Box.  The recipe I found was for Parsnip-Carrot Soup,  in one of Beatrice Okangas' cookbooks.  It called for chicken stock, shredded parsnips, shredded carrots, a bit of lemon juice, salt and white pepper, and a one-inch piece of ginger root.    I made it for supper yesterday, and was pleasantly surprised when not only did The Old Man like it, but I did, too.   There was enough left over that my older daughter, a vegetarian, could have a moderate portion.  She was pleased with the soup, glad to have the recipe, and now knows what to do with the parsnips included in her Crop Box.

But I still don't like Swiss chard!!

That's one reason why I love my CSA; every box has something new or unusual to try.

I get maybe six cooking mags and am always finding new recipes to try; my DH complains/jokes that sometimes he'd like to see some dishes repeated more often :).

We get lots of chard, but I do not find it very different from so many other leafy greens.....maybe more in texture .