Ramp Cheddar and Brebis Cheeses

We were delighted to receive another veggie share from Harmony Valley Farm today, along with our once-a-month cheese share. Here's what was in our veggie box, along with some luscious looking raspberries (Photo courtesy of Harmony Valley Farm):

I have to confess. Now that we are getting some more 'normal' veggies (that is, things this City Girl is used to) I'm having a harder time using up the box. I think I enjoy the challenge of using up new veggies. The usual carrots, cucumber, zucchini and greens are leaving me less than excited to use them up. That's too bad. So today's cheese selection managed to provide me with that challenge.

I had already planned to make homemade pizza or calzones with some of our cooking greens from either our garden or a previous box, I don't even remember which. But we were out of cheese. So you can imagine my surprise to find out that it was also a cheese share day. Perfect! We got Castle Rock Organic Dairy's Mild Cheddar, Otter Creek Organic Dairy's & Harmony Valley Farm's Ramp Cheddar, and Butler Farm's Brebis. Hmmm.....not exactly pizza cheese. I was hoping for a nice Monterey Jack or Mozzarella in the mix somewhere. So I whipped open my How To Cook Everything Vegetarian book and found the perfect solution, which I of course in the spirit of all things Mark Bittman, modified to make it my own. Plus one extra gem I was able to tailor to my ingredients and whip up.

Ramp Cheddar Calzone

(Yes, I forgot to take a picture until all we had left was this little piece...) 2 c Brebis cheese, broken into small clumps (I used the whole container)
2 c Ramp Cheddar, grated
1-2 c finely chopped, cooked greens (Mine looked like it was probably a mixture of kale and chard. But spinach, kale, chard, or the like would all work just fine.)

1 recipe of your favorite pizza dough (large enough to make 2-3 large calzones). If you choose to make just 2 calzones, you will have enough leftover filling to make the Savory Ramp Cheddar Bread Pudding recipe below, like I did.

Roll out pizza dough into 2 or 3 rounds, depending on the number of calzones you'd like to make. Pile as about 1/3 of the filling onto one half of the dough. Fold the other half over and fold up the edges to seal. Bake all calzones on cookie sheets at 350 for about 30-40 minutes.

Have some leftover filling like I did? (I only had enough dough for 2 calzones, because I used some to also make my four-year-old a pepperoni pizza.) No problem!!

Try this:

Savory Ramp Cheddar Bread Pudding
3 c milk
4 T butter
8 slices of day old bread
3 eggs
Cheddar Cheese, shredded, enough to add to the filling (if needed) to make total filling amount equal 2 cups

Heat milk & butter in a saucepan or microwave until warmed and butter is melted. Break bread into bite sized pieces in an 8x8 baking dish. Cover with milk and let soak for a few minutes. Beat the 3 eggs and stir, along with cheese & greens filling, into the bread and milk mixture. Bake at 350 degrees for 45-60 minutes.

Enjoy!