Friends share food

David Sedaris tells this great story about being a drug addict, and how when your life revolves around drugs, you start to realize that all your friends are addicts and dealers.

I'm glad to say that our best friends have been around since before we became hard-core foodies. But seeing how much food permeates every conversation and event, you'd think it was the glue. This is true on both sides of the family—that is, with groups of friends I met through Patrick as well as those he met through me.

So when our close friends Don and Sarah hosted a potluck picnic to celebrate their return as newlyweds from three years in Boston, Pat and I had to make something special. Food as a gift, you know? What better gift than the food we value most: our CSA stash. We knew our boxmates, Marcos and Jamie, were thinking the same thing and starting with exactly the same resources. Our two households' results could not have been more different.

Pat and I were inspired by Marcos and Jamie's summer slaw, a slaw without mayo that's perfect for warm days at the park. We transfered that concept to a potato salad, expanded to include all the delicious, colorful roots we recieved in last week's box. I cut the roots into chunks, barely boiled them and added a big fistfull of fresh herbs from Marcos and Jamie's garden, Driftless garlic and onions, plus balsamic vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper. I couldn't resist the local theme and added great northern beans as a little food pun, even though they were canned beans from who-knows-where. I call it welcome home salad, and it needs more dressing. (If you make about a six-serving bowl, make like half a cup of dressing.)



Marcos and Jamie went a completely different direction with this gem from the Joy of Cooking: zucchini-carrot cupcakes with ginger-cream cheese frosting.



Check out the fluffy centers. If it were a contest, they cupcakes would have won.