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Produce News for September 28, 2009

 

BUGS IN PRODUCE (September 28):  You know, as we move into late summer/early fall, we’re now into early fall, during this transition time you tend to find a few more bugs in some of your row crop vegetables - row crop vegetables meaning things like your lettuces, your romaine, your green leaf, your red leaf lettuce, maybe your broccoli.  So this time of year you might find little tiny bugs in your lettuces or in your broccoli.  So what do you do with those bugs?  It’s not a big deal.  It’s just the time of year and the growers have to put up with it every single time this year so here’s what you do.  You take your lettuce or you take your vegetable, you get some…you fill up your sink with water.  Throw a whole bunch of ice in there.  Right.  Get it ice cold.  Now when you put your leaves of lettuce or your broccoli into that ice cold water, that ice cold water literally shocks those little bugs and it causes them to let go of whatever they’re holding onto.  Now if you still have a few bugs, now squeeze a little bit of lemon juice.  The acidity of the lemon will really make them let go.  I’m Michael Marks…Your Produce Man.   
 
 
TEASE:  Hey, in my next Produce Man report, how to get the bugs to let go of your lettuce.
 
MUSHROOMS (Tuesday, September 29):  Hey, before we leave September, we’ve got to talk about mushrooms because September is National Mushroom Month so we’ve got to touch on it a little bit.  Now here’s the most popular mushroom that we all buy.  It is agaricus bispores, what we call the button mushroom.  A couple things I want you to see here.  First of all, I want you to see…see how this is open just a little bit?  We call this an open mushroom.  The gills are starting to open.  This has a much more earthy flavor, so if you are using a mushroom as an ingredient in cooking, I would find mushrooms that are open.  Now mushrooms that have a completely closed gill like this one here, there is absolutely no opening, now this is going to be a nice sweet flavor, and this is what you can use when you’re going to have a salad and you want to use the mushrooms raw.  Now, of course, you store your mushrooms…if you buy them in a plastic container, go ahead and keep them in there, but once you open the container, put these in a brown paper bag and then refrigerator them.  Oh, my goodness!  They will keep so much better for you.  So earthy, so good, so mushroomy.  I’m Michael Marks…Your Produce Man.
 
TEASE: Hey, in my next Produce Man report…let’s check out the buttons – well, the button mushrooms that is.
 
 
DRIED MUSHROOMS (Wednesday, September 30): You know, I remember when I first started in the produce industry over 30 years now if I wanted some dried mushrooms like I was making a soup or I wanted a very earthy mushroom for a meat dish, you had to go to an Asian store or a specialty store and pay a bazillian dollars for it.  Well, today, you know, you walk into virtually any produce department, and you can find dried mushrooms – many, many different varities – dried shiitake, dried percini, dried wood ear, all kinds of dried mushrooms…They are so easy to work with.  Let me show you how easy.  They are very dry.  They are very hard in here.  All you have to do is put them in a little bit of hot water, and look at this.  In hot water, look how spongy that becomes again.  That’s all it needs.  Just let them steep in there kind of like your tea bag, you know.  Your tea bag goes in the hot water and it steeps a little bit.  Well, it’s the exact same thing with these mushrooms.  Now these mushrooms are ready to cook, ready to put into a salad, ready to put right along my steak.  Oh, man…I’m going to saute it with some garlic and butter.  It’s going to go over my steak.  I’m Michael Marks…Your Produce Man.
 
TEASE: Hey, in my next Produce Man report, I have a very dry topic – dried mushrooms.
 
 
ARTICHOKES (Thursday, October 1):    I tell you, these are a weapon.  In fact, I personally think you need to get a concealed weapon permit in order to have these…take them home.  Oh, my goodness!  The fall crop of artichokes are now in.  Now, I want you to come as close as you possibly can.  Come even closer, as close as you can.  I want you to see – look at these thorns.  Oh, my goodness.  These have thorns.  I want you to be extremely careful.  Now, they’re not growing a different varitiety.  It’s just the nature of the artichoke.  As it goes through the hot summer and into the fall, the artichoke just gets heavier thorns on the tips - very different than your springtime globe artichoke which the thorns…you can really touch the end and hardly any thorns at all.  So I need for you to be exremely careful.   I don’t want you to go tell your kids, “Hey, go get an artichoke for me.  Go pick out an artichoke.”  No. It’s something you need to do and handle them very, very carefully.  I’m Michael Marks…Your Produce Man.
 
TEASE:  Hey, in my next Produce Man report, I have a thorny subject to touch on - on artichokes.
 
  
POTATOES (Friday, October 2):  From Maine to Washington and virtually every place in between the diggers are out digging.  What are they digging?  They’re digging up our fall winter crop of potatoes, Russet potatoes.  These are called newly dug potatoes.  They’re different than regular storage potatoes in that they…here’s what they do.  They dig them, they wash them, and then they bag them.  Now the reason you need to know this is these are very moist.  See how moist these are?  They haven’t had time to dry out in the storage process.  So why do you care if your potatoes in a bag are moist or not?  Well, let me give you a hint.   If you left these in the bag and you walk around.  In a couple days you started smelling something.  What is that?  Well, it’s because you left your potatoes wet in the bag.  So what you need to do, you need to open up the bag and you need to just dump them out a little bit.  Let the potatoes dry out.  Then you can put them back in the bag.  They’ll store for quite a long time.  I’m Michael Marks…Your Produce Man.