All Shares:
Beets- It's been a while since beets were in the farm share, and we've got a lot of them, so we'll give you a mix of our red, gold, and chioggia beets this week. If you still have some carrots in the fridge:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/beet-and-carrot-salad-with-curry-dressing-and-pistachios
Lettuce- After a few weeks of lettuce hiatus, it's back in the farm share....hopefully the deer don't get into the field to chomp it down before we can pick it. Our high fence lines do a pretty good job of keeping the deer out through the growing season, but when it gets this dry and all their other food sources start to peter out, they get very motivated!
Tomatoes- The tomatoes are ramping up, we seem to get a little more each time we pick them. Just this week we topped the plants to encourage them to set and ripen more fruit, and stopped watering them, which should encourage ripening and make the fruit more flavorful. If you have tomatoes in pots or in a super dry spot in your garden you wouldn't want to do this, but their roots go incredibly deep by the time the plants get mature, so ours should have no problem finding plenty of water deep down in the soil.
I love to have toast or a bagel with cream cheese and tomato slices, salt and pepper when the tomatoes are in season. And we've got a long ways to go, knock on wood...hopefully several months of tomatoes in our future.
Melons- Melon time! Very exciting. Our melons came on very early and very suddenly this season, so I think we should be able to put a full melon in each share! Most will be "Visa", our green fleshed Galia melons that are a bit earlier, but there will be a few Charentais french cantaloupes and maybe a few other cantaloupes mixed in too. A great breakfast or dessert this time of year!
Melons are fun and challenging to pick, usually they change colors a bit when they are ready, but then a gently tug on the vine reveals whether or not they "slip", or release when they are fully ripe. They make for heavy crates though, and heavy farm shares.
http://www.marthastewart.com/search/results?keys=melon%20recipe
Summer squash- Still chugging along, the summer squash show no sign of stopping yet. If you're sick of grilled or sauteed squash, you could try doing a quick pickle for something different.
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/nancy-fuller/quick-pickled-zucchini-3539077
Scallions- These scallions were direct sewn in the Spring, rather than transplanting starts, and they have grown up beautifully and are the perfect size right now.
Small Shares:
Cauliflower-Large shares just got cauliflower last week, so I thought we'd just put it in the small shares this week....lots of cauliflower in the field right now!
Large Shares:
Carrots- It is not such a bad thing to have too many carrots, as they hold well in the ground until it's time to dig them up. But boy, we have a lot of carrots in the ground right now! See the recipe above for beets and carrot salad...
Green peppers- The first pick from our pepper plants...these green peppers will eventually turn red if left on the plants, except the plants set so many fruits early in the season that they have trouble ripening them all. By thinning for some green peppers it actually can help the plants a bit, and you get some delicious green peppers to show for it.
Basil- Bobbi made a delicious and simple basil dip this week by just blending up some basil, yogurt, salt and pepper and i think olive oil and garlic in the blender. It was great with raw veggies like carrots, cauliflower, beans and cucumber.
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/basil-flatbread-with-roasted-tomatoes-and-basil-oil-5710
Kale- We haven't had as many braising greens as usual in the large shares of late, so I figured some Lacinato kale would be nice.
In the heart of the farming season now, and I think everyone is having a great time. It has been a bit warm and muggy, and of course very smoky at times out in the field lately...but mostly it just makes me grateful to be farming here on Whidbey and not somewhere that experiences real Summer heat. Angela, our farm intern, is from Las Vegas, where it was recently 116 degrees or something crazy like that. I can't imagine. I actually enjoy warm and even humid weather for the most part, but I would not enjoy farming in it, not to mention all the bugs!
It is great to get a few weeks of warmer Summer weather, to help ripen the tomatoes, corn, and peppers and melons, to feel motivated to go jump in Goss Lake as much as possible, and we have been taking longer lunch breaks to be in the shade for a bit. But after being impatient for the Summer to come throughout our cool Spring, I'm usually starting to look forward to the Fall by the time September rolls around.
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