Blood, Bandages, and Beet Greens...

I'm a pretty lax parent when it comes to crying kids.  When a kid comes wailing through the front door, my first question is, "Are you bleeding?"  If the answer is "No" my usual response involves the words, "You'll" and  "survive."  Blood gets antibiotic cream and bandages.  Splinters get ice cream.

I stocked up on bandages today.  We're having a party Saturday.  With kids.  At our last Summer party every single kid hit the dirt at least once as the evening wore on, including my youngest who bit it while heading full speed down our steep driveway.  There was blood.  I even had to dig half a tree stump out of the thumb of one of our best friends, who's driver's license claims he's a grown up though his personality reveals a different story.  I can't remember if we scrounged up any ice cream for him or not...

Since this is party week, I am generally preoccupied with planning and details, and invitations, and table cloths, and party games, planning, and seating, and planning, and wondering where in the heck all my time went so my whole decision making process is scattered to the wind right now.  Fortunately, tonight's dinner is staring me in the face every morning when I look out my bedroom window.  

As you can see, our garden is coming along nicely, though it looks pretty scraggly.  The slugs have been voracious this year and the birds have eaten every carrot seed I've planted (twice!) as well as all the slug bait!  Twice!  Then there was the deer who snuck in one afternoon and at an entire chard plant (the largest one, of course).  The result is two empty rows in the middle where the carrots should be, another two rows containing three sad slug bitten miner's lettuce, and a fantastic lopsided end of the garden full of beans, peas, tomatoes, and potatoes bursting forth and making me hopeful for a later season harvest.  But in the middle, between the blank rows, I've got a few chard plants, a couple of beets, a little purslane, and a massive amount of kale. 

I love growing greens in my garden because they (usually) perform the best of any plants in my limited sunlight and because you can eat them right away.  No need to wait for a seed or a fruit to form, just pick a leaf and you've got a snack.  The sight of these greens staring me down every morning makes me think of my very favorite way to eat them: Veggie Quesadillas.

Kale, beet greens, chard, spinach and purslane rinsed and ready to be spun.  You can use any greens in this you want, one of my favorite additions is finely shredded raw beet.  Carrot would be great in this, too.  The ratios in this can be edited based on what you have, this is just a general guideline.

Vegetable Quesadillas
Yield:  4


1 bunch kale
1/2 bunch chard
3-5 beet leaves
6-8 spinach leaves
1/2 large onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 package mushrooms, sliced
1 C shredded mozzarella cheese
4 tortillas
salt and pepper to taste
olive oil
Two large skillets

Wash, spin, and roughly chop greens.  Heat the olive oil in one skillet and sauté the onion until slightly browned.  Add garlic and cook till fragrant.  Add mushrooms and cook until browned.  Last, add greens and sauté until they have wilted slightly.  Salt and pepper to taste.  Load tortillas with greens and top with cheese, fold, and toast lightly in second pan just until slightly brown and cheese has melted.

Review:
My whole family loves this and you know that's sayin' something when my boys will eat it!  I recently served this as a side to some grilled chicken and the meat eaters were very pleased.

Sorry this is sort of a scattered, droopy post.  I've lost my mind, you see...