CSA Recipe | "Dan Dan" Noodles with Bok Choy

I love CSA! For those of you who don’t know what a CSA is, it stands for Community Supported Agriculture. In my opinion, it is a pretty big deal here in Wisconsin. The premise is basically that you invest directly with your farmer, and they in turn know how much to plant of their crops. You take some risk by not knowing ahead of time if the year will be bountiful, or if there will be harsh weather that dwindles the crops.

So you have your farm “share,” you receive a season’s worth of delicious farm-fresh local produce, and you support your local farming community! Also, everything is certified organic, and I like to visit the farm to greet the little sprouts. :)

CSA is a direct-to-consumer supply chain, with no middle man; just you, your farmer, and your community all together supporting the farm.

These past two weeks we have had an abundance of Bok Choy, and I will admit, I was not excited about greasy stir fry every evening. So I had to get creative. Additionally, I did not want to go out to the store to buy extra supplies, so you will see this “Dan Dan” is in parentheses because

a) I could not find Szechuan Peppers locally.

b) I didn’t want to go out and get soy/fish/sesame sauce

c) Just working with what we had in the house that could be made daily since we have so many Bok Choys hanging in the fridge

So here it is my non-authentic at all interpretation of Dan Dan Noodles that we have been eating nightly in abundance the past week and a half.

Ingredients:

Sauce:

Water, enough to thin sauce
Peanut Butter approx: 1 generous spoonful
Salt
Black Pepper & Ground Corriander Seed (mimics Szechuan pepper) enough to taste be generous
Sriracha Sauce generous dollop to taste
Splash of Apple Cider Vinegar
Splash of Maple Syrup

Ground Beef:

Around 1 pound of organic grass-fed beef (use how much you wish)
Salt
Mace
Cayenne pepper

Additional:

Bok Choy 1 head
1 pack organic Whole Wheat Ramen Noodles

To Prepare:

Mix together the sauce. Add peanut butter, salt, pepper & coriander seed, hot sauce, ACV, & maple syrup together. Add water to thin out and mix with a fork.

2. Wash & Chop Bok Choy. Turn on Water to boil.

3. While waiting for water to boil, cook up beef. (Optional the last time I added left over bone broth to the beef to add extra nutrients & collagen.) Season minimally until beef is cooked up and set aside.

4. Cook Ramen according to package.