Butter Braised Farmers Market Vegetables

Traffic in Atlanta was bad enough before the president came to town to speak at the NRA convention. And it got me thinking as I navigate traffic. What if we cut one thing out of our day every day to avoid time spent in the car? I've long subscribed to Coco Chanel's less-is-more take on accessories, where you remove one thing before you walk out the door. So what if you take one thing off the calendar before you get in the car? Imagine how much more you could get done and how much less stressed you would be.

Friday night we went to a couple of gallery openings. We started at the artist Daniel Biddy's opening at Alan Avery Art Company, and it was hopping. The show was great -- it was inspiring to see how far he's come as an artist and even more inspiring to see the red dots signify that works sold. The crowd was lively, and we saw lots of old friends. Then just as we were gearing up to head to Jackson Fine Art for a photography show, someone mentioned that Marcia Wood was having an opening downtown as well. My initial reaction was, "We're out - let's do all three." But then I thought, "What would Coco do?" So we stuck with the original two-show plan instead of three. We saw great art with great friends and in no time we were elbows into a steaming bowl of mussels at Anis instead of stuck in traffic across town. I think back on the nights we would have squeezed in that third gallery only to find ourselves scrambling to get to a restaurant before it closed and dodging the death stares of servers who thought they were about to clock out.

There comes a time in most people's lives when we realize there's a better quality of folks at Starbucks at six in the morning than at a nightclub at five in the morning. That's when we hang up our dancing shoes and join the real world. Being a grown-up means usually making the right decisions. These days that means avoiding Atlanta traffic, eating well, exercising, spending time with people I love and knowing when to say no.

In today's farmers market obsessed culture, another indicator that you're an adult is when you subscribe to a CSA, or community supported agriculture. You can order a half or a whole share, which comes in the form of a box that the farm has curated from whatever's growing at that time. Jeff and I signed up for a half. For as much money we spend at farmers markets and as much time we spend cooking this seemed like a no brainer. Until we got the box. And there it sat in the fridge as we found ourselves booked every night out for dinner all week. Would Coco have signed up for a CSA? Probably not. So we found ourselves on a Sunday trying to figure out what to do with a box full of radishes, kohlrabi, bok choy, greens and turnips. Coco's got me on the little black dress. But cooking? This I can do.

Now it's clear that if we're going to do this right we can't go out to dinner every night or we'll be wasting a ton of really good food. But for tonight - we'll make up for the week's lost time and use it all at once. I've taken the turnips, radishes and kohlrabi and boiled them first then braised them in butter. The greens - all of the greens including the tops of the turnips, radishes and kohlrabi - are getting blanched and then sautéed in olive oil and garlic. And the salad will be a (wait for it!) spring salad with cucumber, avocado and toasted pumpkin seeds.

Butter Braised Vegetables

Preheat the oven to 500

I bunch radishes

1 bunch turnips

1 bunch kohlrabi

1 stick butter

salt/pepper

Remove greens and clean the vegetables well. Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and cook the veg for about three minutes. Strain and pour them into a braising pan tossed with butter, salt and pepper. Cover the pan and roast for one hour, turning the vegetables a couple of times.