Our first farm share is still several weeks away, but our family looks eagerly towards fresh greens again after a winter of pre-packaged salad.

In additional to empty aisles in the TP and cleaning products sections, the lettuce section of our local grocery stores has also taken a hit during this uncertain time. The result? Pickings have been slim, or nonexistent.

On one shopping run, the Chaplain sent me a photo from our bulk foods store of the empty shelves were the lettuce should have been. That day, he came home with a really sad bagged salad with limp iceberg and romaine lettuce. It was all they had.

We’ve had better luck with coleslaw, and so for the past couple of weeks, we’ve been buying cabbage almost exclusively. It has been much fresher than its limp brethren.

As we wait for farm share season, I want to share my favorite coleslaw recipe, from my mom, by way of the Amish, by way of the internet, with a few Red Herring adjustments.

You’ll need:

• 1 cabbage (purple or green), cored
• 1 medium onion (optional)
• 2-3 carrots (also optional)
• up to 2/3 cup white sugar (Sometimes I skip the sugar, depending on how good the other ingredients look – a huge, juicy CSA cabbage doesn’t need much help to be amazing)

Grate the carrots by hand or with a food processor.

To keep the crispness of the cabbage, try using the slice function on the food processor to get a nice thin cut that doesn’t macerate the cabbage. You can also hand slice or shred it.

The Slaw Dressing:

In a saucepan, combine:

• 1 cup vinegar
• 3/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp celery seed
• 1 tsp mustard
• 1 tsp sugar

(I often use real celery instead of celery seed, or celery root from our farm share, which can be sliced and frozen to be used later)

Bring to a boil and cook for 3 minutes.

Allow to cool completely.

Toss to coat.

Refrigerate overnight to marinate.

We rarely have the patience for that last step, but it sure does taste good on the second day.

Alternate: Carrot Slaw

• Grate 3 large carrots
• Add 3 oz. of dried out raisins (crappy for eating but perfect for soaking up dressing)
• Add 1/4-1/3 c. white sugar
• Stir in half of a batch of dressing.

I save the second half of the dressing in the fridge in a glass jar for use on salad, but if that doesn’t suit, the dressing recipe can be halved.

I also make the dressing on its own for just for salad.

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Coleslaw, I’ve found, does not photograph well. So here is the only picture of this recipe I can find, a batch made with green cabbage. It would have looked prettier with purple cabbage and carrots, but in the interest of sharing the goodness sooner rather than later, I’m posting what I’ve got.