Chicken Meatballs with Garlic Scape Pesto

Ground chicken and garlic scape pesto makes a flavorful meatball. Serve this tasty Spring treat over pasta, in a meatball sub, as an appetizer or on a pizza!

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Garlic scapes are one of the weirder items in the Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm share box. They are a strange green hook that packs a mild garlic flavor into a curlicue shape, shown below. I think they're one of the best savory ways to kick off a new growing season and I hope to share the love with you.

When I get garlic scapes in the farm share they are usually accompanied by loads of greens. Spinach, salad mix, cooking greens . . . all of these are more fragile than the hardy garlic scape. While I need to perform Vegetable Triage to ensure none of the delicate greens go to waste, I can toss a bag of garlic scapes into the crisper and remember it in a week without any problems. Once I've gathered all of the season's scapes, I make a massive batch of Garlic Scape Pesto. You can find my Garlic Scape & Pistachio Pesto recipe here. I freeze this pesto in small amounts to use throughout the year, whenever I want to add a flavor boost to pizza, or muffins, or even meatballs.

Help! I just got my CSA farm share. Now what do I do with it?

Practical advice for folks eating from a farm share including the three questions of Vegetable Triage and what to do when you bring your farm share into your kitchen.

A typical early Spring farm share--plenty of greens, peas, radishes, onions and garlic.

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Take a deep breath. I'm here to help.

It seemed like such a great idea, back in the cold dark days of winter, to sign up for a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm share. A weekly box of fresh local vegetables and fruits? I'm in! Now reality is setting in. You've got a fridge filled with unfamiliar produce and the clock is ticking down to the next farm share day.
Before you're tempted to chuck it in the trash (gulp!) or swirl it down the disposal (noooo!) or toss it on the top of the compost heap (BTDT!) please read on.

Every day, some Thing in life can be overwhelming, but you get thru it by breaking The Thing down into smaller chunks. This applies to grief, term papers, and parenting as well. In terms of your farm share, this means you need physical, or at least mental, Vegetable Triage when the produce first arrives at your house.

The Three Questions of Vegetable Triage:

1. What can live outside my refrigerator?
2. What can I prep so I'm more likely to use it?
3. What do I need to use up first?

Garlic Scape Pesto & Ricotta Muffins #MuffinMonday

These savory muffins are flavored with garlic scape pesto & ricotta cheese. They bake up quickly for an easy bread to serve alongside pasta, chicken, or fish.

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Ever make a main dish and think at the last moment, "you know, some hot bread would be great with this"? That's one of the reasons I like muffins--they come together quickly (as in, thrown together while an entree is baking) and usually require just pantry ingredients. Simply pop them into the already hot oven and a few minutes later you've got yourself a hot bread to accompany your meal.  Take that, yeast breads!

I envisioned these muffins alongside a plate of lasagna, spaghetti & meatballs, or a crock pot pizza casserole where the pesto-ricotta combination can enhance the entree. They'd be terrific with my Pesto Ricotta Baked Swai recipe or my Chicken Spinach Artichoke Pesto Pasta recipe. When I made them I was just craving a savory quick bread I could slather in buttery spread and snarf down while standing in the kitchen with my wiener dog, Vincent, at my feet catching the crumbs. True story! These muffins assuaged the craving.

I was not interested in having a full pan of muffins to feed a larger group--I just wanted enough for our family--so I filled my muffin cups much fuller than usual. The resulting large muffins took a few more minutes to bake, but Vincent and I didn't mind. This recipe could be stretched into a dozen if you make them smaller than I did.

the wet ingredients

Seasonal eaters will delight in the inclusion of garlic scape pesto in this recipe. If you know what it is and you've got some--go for it. If you're not sure where in the grocery store you'd buy garlic scape pesto, let me give you a Top Tip: it's not there. Use a prepared pesto instead, and check out this Garlic Scape Recipe Round Up to learn more about the wonders of garlic scapes.