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When I picked up my bag from the Rolling Prairie Farmers Alliance this week, I scored a couple of real treats—okra and raspberries—along with the unsurprising (and always welcome) tomatoes and green peppers and “salad mix” (mesclun), a sign of the changing season.

I was very excited about the raspberries. I didn’t expect to get any this year due to our horrid spring warmth then freeze. I asked Paul Johnson, the delivery coordinator at my pickup site, how these had survived.

He explained that most raspberries work on a two-year cycle, where they produce canes one year and fruit on the canes the next year. These raspberries, though, are from plants that produce canes and fruit the same year. Since their canes weren’t yet exposed, they survived the freeze. I think I’ve got that right; I wasn’t taking notes. In any case, it just goes to show that if you ask questions, you might get a little knowledge along with your food at the CSA.

I know what to do with raspberries—eat them. I had half of them an hour after I got home. These don’t seem quite as tart as some, but they are firm and tasty and beautiful (and organic).

Okra, though, is interesting and sometimes puzzling. Though my dad grew up in the South, my Midwestern mother never made okra. My childhood okra experience was the dreadful mushy and odd-looking stuff in Campbell’s Chicken Gumbo soup.

My next memorable okra experience was about 20 years ago when a neighbor gave me a jar of pickled okra she’d made. Oh, boy, I thought, teeth gritted, having somewhere along the line become familiar with okra’s sliminess. Oh, boy, indeed! They were sensational! Crisp, nicely flavored!

Since then, I’ve had okra numerous times in my Rolling Prairie bag. Seems like I usually wind up slicing them and tossing them in stir-fries. This time, I decided to make the simple Creole Okra from Craig Claiborne’s New York Times Cookbook. (I don’t know if it’s in the newer editions; I was using the original 1961 edition) Essentially, it calls for sauteing some minced onions and green peppers, adding sliced okra, then adding a couple cups chopped tomatoes and simmering about 20 minutes.

For the time’s sake, I decided to use canned tomatoes (and also because I like savoring my fresh tomatoes, sliced) but realized just as I was about to dump them into the pan that I had a can of tomatoes with hot chilies. I figured, what the heck? and added them anyway. Might make them a little zippy. (I used a store brand, but it’s the equivalent of Ro-Tel tomatoes, which people in parts Midwest and Southwest are familiar with, but evidently they aren’t universal.)

Well, I’m not sure what Craig Claiborne’s tasted like. Good, I’m sure, but this okra was great! You can still get the pleasant okra flavor, but the hot peppers make the mixture a lot zippy, and the tomatoes seem to take the slime out of the okra. Here’s the modified recipe. I suspect you could just cook the okra in the tomato mixture and it would be great.

Not-Creole Okra

• 2 tablespoons olive oil (Craig used butter or bacon grease)
• 1/4 cup minced onion
• 2 tablespoons minced green pepper
• 1 1/2 cups sliced okra
• 1 (15-ounce) can tomatoes with hot chilies

Heat oil in heavy pan. Add onions and green pepper; saute a minute to soften. Add okra. Stir a minute, then add tomatoes. Stir, then cover and simmer 15 minutes, until okra is tender but firm. Makes 4 servings.

It’s great with rice or noodles, and would make a great topping for baked fish, or you could cook fish in the mixture and have a non-Creole gumbo.

I still have some okra left. I think I’m going to try a single jar of (unprocessed) pickled okra. What the heck?