Husk Cherries

At our CSA pickup on Monday, I was given a little box of these strange-looking things.


I had no idea what they were until our friendly farmer Hans told me they were husk cherries.

OK, if I'm being honest, I still had no idea what they were even after he told me they were husk cherries.

But I dutifully took them home (along with a copy of this blog post about one woman's love affair with the husk cherry) ... curious, of course, to try them.

In order to actually get to the cherry, you have to peel off the papery little husk they're dressed in. After I removed my first husk, I was surprised to discover the cherries weren't cherry-like at all. They were more of a translucent green hue, shaped like a tiny grape, and very firm.


I popped the little cherry in my mouth and was surprised again. I'd been expecting something sweet. These weren't sweet. But they weren't tart. They weren't ... well, pardon my inability to describe them, but they weren't really comparable to anything I'd tasted before.

In the blog post I mentioned above, the writer described the taste as vanilla pineapple. My verdict is still out on whether that's the case.

Hans says they're better than regular tomatoes, but I don't know that anything can be better than the bright red, juicy tomatoes sitting next to the husk cherries on our counter right now.

Still, the husk cherries are pretty darn interesting. And it turns out you can do more than just eat them plain like I've been doing. Like throw them in a green salad or even make a jam. Or dip them in chocolate (sounds good to me!) or bake them into pies, tarts, or cobblers. If I get a chance to bake this weekend, I might have to try one of those latter options.

Then again, I might just eat one or two here and there. They make a pretty handy snack.

If you haven't ever seen husk cherries before, don't be surprised. I learned (again, from that blog post I mentioned) that they're on the Slow Food USA "endangered" list.

I guess that makes me all the more excited that they were included in our CSA loot!

(Conservative Hubby, though, isn't all that excited. I expect he'll be sticking to the regular tomatoes.)

CSA Loot

In this edition of CSA Loot, the counter is completely overtaken by fresh greens and other treats of the vegetable variety. ... And Julie realizes that perhaps having an entire CSA share for a family of 2.3 isn't a good idea, particularly when 1 of the 2.3 refuses to eat most of the loot and when the other 1.3 still isn't quite up to her/their usual appetite.

(Butter was not counted in the 2.3 because he refuses to touch vegetables, too. Sometimes he's so much like his father it's scary.)

CSA Loot

Last fall I signed up for a CSA membership for PrairiErth Farm, an organic family farm located near L-Town.

CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. Basically, members pay upfront to "invest" in the farm for a year. Then, in return for their investment, members receive a weekly "share" of in-season vegetables. If the farm has a rough harvest of something, you might not get much. But if the farm has a particularly good season, you'll be eating organic vegetables a-plenty. It's a great way to support local family farms, to get exceptionally fresh produce, and to ensure you know exactly where your food is coming from.

I was incredibly excited to snag the last spot in the CSA for L-Town, because memberships like that are hard to come by in central Illinois.


After months of updates from the farm and (somewhat) patient waiting, the deliveries started at the beginning of May and will run through October. Our first couple of weeks, not surprisingly, have been all about the greens--lettuce mix, kale, chard, spinach, that sort of thing. And a lot of it.

We had more great greens this week--all of the above, plus some tarragon and chives.

And, better yet, the big bouquet of incredibly fragrant, incredibly lovely flowers you saw above.

Can't beat that!