The day (or week I should say) has finally arrived for our last farm share. It has been 25 weeks since our share started back in late Spring! We have had a great run this year, and I would definitely say it's been the most successful farm share season we've had at Ebb Tide. I really appreciate all you folks who helped us make it happen! The farm share has been great this year in part because of our crop yields, planning, and hard work, but also because this has been such a great year of interactions with all of you, our members. Everyone has seemed happy, flexible, enjoyable and easy to communicate with.....and of course we couldn't do it without you.
If you are looking for a source of local veggies in our offseason, you have a few options. Our farm stand will remain open for at least another week and a half, until around Thanksgiving Day. Beyond that I imagine we will just be out of most things. But I think at least a few farms will be doing a Winter Farmers/Christmas market at Bayview Hall in December. Also, if you are interested in really stocking up the pantry, Georgie Smith at Willowood Farm in Coupeville is doing a really large Winter Farm share that she is dropping in our farm stand on Fridays. It is a huge box of food for I believe $50 per week, but almost all things that will store for many weeks. Her email is willowoodfarm@gmail.com.
On that note, many of the things in your share this week should store for weeks or more if you hang on to it, either in the crisper drawer of the fridge (potatoes, root crops) or a dry shelf (onions, squash)....so you can store up some Fall bounty for December if you'd like. Thanks again for your support in 2016! Look forward to seeing you again next Season! Have a happy Winter.
This week's share:
Delicata squash- These are no stranger by now. We plant as much of the delicata squash as all our other Winter squashes combined almost, so we have a lot of them. Still a big pile in the storage shed, but we will begin selling them to Willowood this week so should chip away at it. They turned out especially delicious this year, and I think they're by far the easiest squash to prepare, as you don't need to peel them.
Potatoes- Still quite a few potatoes to sell, too. I'm hoping the Orchard Kitchen will be able to take quite a few of them, but we'll also be putting a generous amount in the bags this week!
Copra onions- These are our yellow storage onions which have been in your share a time or two now. They keep very well and have a nice onion flavor that's great in a lot of recipes.
Beets (topped)- We have a smattering of beets still out in the field, and some already topped in the farm stand, so we will get them in all the shares one last time. The sweet flavor is really nice this time of year.
Black Spanish Radish- This is a new one for this year's share. These Winter radishes have greens like a regular radish, although much taller and rougher. The comparison ends there though. These radishes are large, round, with a black skin on the outside and white flesh inside. The flavor is spicy, similar to a regular radish, but the flesh is much more firm and good for cooking. You can roast them as you would other Winter roots, or it can be delicious raw if it is grated or sliced very very thin, They must be very healthy, because when I do a google search most of what comes up is supplement "super food" articles and nutritional info. Give them a try!
http://www.fromthegrapevine.com/israeli-kitchen/there-are-many-ways-slice-and-enjoy-black-radish
Kale bunch- One last bunch of kale. With the deer no longer causing trouble, our kale plants have begun to rebound and grow back after getting nibbled on. We also got some extra kale bunches from a friend's farm in case we are a bit short...
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/kale-and-apple-salad-recipe.html
Large shares:
Parsnip- Our parsnips did so well this year, I wish I'd planted more! I'm anticipating they'll be mostly gone after putting them in the large shares this week. I hadn't had much luck growing them the past few years, so I only planted a half bed. Maybe more next year!
http://www.marthastewart.com/275724/parsnip-recipes
Carrot- One last batch of carrots in your large shares this week, maybe topped this time if the carrot tops are starting to get a bit week in the Fall weather.
Parsley- Jack convinced me to not till in the parsley several weeks ago, even though some of the plants were beginning to bolt (flower). Now I'm glad we didn't, as the remaining plants are doing well and should yield a few more bunches this week! Great to add a fresh flavor to root veggies.
(And more potatoes and squash!)
Penultimate blog...
What a dramatic blog title. The share is surely drawing to an end though, as our veggies in the field are beginning to dwindle. All in all, I am happy to say I definitely did the best job I have yet this year for the Fall plantings. We still have extras of a few things, and could have used a bit more of a few others, but on the whole we had pretty much the right amount of food for the Fall this year. A few new things in the share this week, and the last time you'll get a few things in your share, including Brussels sprouts and carrots (!!!). The shares have remained pretty large, but the good news is, almost everything in these last few shares will hold for quite a while, so if you still have food from last week, set the shallots and squash in a warm dry spot in the kitchen, and everything else in a corner of the fridge, and it should still be in great shape come Thanksgiving, or beyond.
Carrots- As I said, we don't think there will be carrots in next week's share, so enjoy the last of the season! They get sweeter every week and are pretty tasty right now...
Celeriac (celery root)- The tops are great for soups, stocks, sauces and stews....the roots are great in a puree or mash...Whitney was just saying she made this last night. I prefer it with potatoes and celeriac mashed together, like in this recipe:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/celery-root-puree-236200
Brussels sprouts- These sprouts should last until Thanksgiving easily if you keep them in a plastic bag or in the crisper drawer of the fridge. They make a great side dish with the turkey! Hard to resist eating them sooner though...
Shallots- Try using your shallots in place of the onion in the celery root puree for a slightly more complex flavor.
Rutabega- Rutabegas are sometimes called "Swedes" or Swedish turnips. They are similar to a turnip, but with a slightly firmer, yellow flesh and a bit more flavor. They can be used in place of winter turnips in a recipe, or try this simple recipe that should highlight their flavor:
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/roasted-rutabaga-recipe.html
Kabocha squash- These green "buttercup" kabochas are not too different from the red kuri squash that was in your share back in October. They have a dry, flavorful flesh that is best scooped out of the skin after roasting or steaming. This variety outperformed any of our Winter squash in 2015 and we had loads of them all Fall....then this year they probably yielded the worst of all the squash and we didn't have a whole lot. Who knows why...that's farming for you, and it's one reason why we plant a lot of different varieties...when one does poorly usually another does well to make up for it.
Large Shares:
Arugula bunch- One last bunch of spicy arugula greens for the large shares....the arugula can withstand a very light frost, but once the temperatures go very far below freezing it is a goner. Often times by this point in the year our arugula would have bit the dust, but temperatures have been so mild it is showing no sign of stopping.
Swiss Chard bunch- Another crop that we will sometimes lose in an early cold spell, although the Swiss chard is quite a bit tougher than the arugula. It's nice to still have some greens besides kale!
http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/slideshow/swiss-chard-recipes
Hot peppers- We put our final pick on our Cherry bomb peppers... I have been enjoying using these in just about everything lately. They really don't add too much spice (I usually use some hot sauce or chili flakes too) but a nice peppery flavor.
More Celeriac and Brussels sprouts in the large shares this week too!
Carrots- As I said, we don't think there will be carrots in next week's share, so enjoy the last of the season! They get sweeter every week and are pretty tasty right now...
Celeriac (celery root)- The tops are great for soups, stocks, sauces and stews....the roots are great in a puree or mash...Whitney was just saying she made this last night. I prefer it with potatoes and celeriac mashed together, like in this recipe:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/celery-root-puree-236200
Brussels sprouts- These sprouts should last until Thanksgiving easily if you keep them in a plastic bag or in the crisper drawer of the fridge. They make a great side dish with the turkey! Hard to resist eating them sooner though...
Shallots- Try using your shallots in place of the onion in the celery root puree for a slightly more complex flavor.
Rutabega- Rutabegas are sometimes called "Swedes" or Swedish turnips. They are similar to a turnip, but with a slightly firmer, yellow flesh and a bit more flavor. They can be used in place of winter turnips in a recipe, or try this simple recipe that should highlight their flavor:
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/roasted-rutabaga-recipe.html
Kabocha squash- These green "buttercup" kabochas are not too different from the red kuri squash that was in your share back in October. They have a dry, flavorful flesh that is best scooped out of the skin after roasting or steaming. This variety outperformed any of our Winter squash in 2015 and we had loads of them all Fall....then this year they probably yielded the worst of all the squash and we didn't have a whole lot. Who knows why...that's farming for you, and it's one reason why we plant a lot of different varieties...when one does poorly usually another does well to make up for it.
Large Shares:
Arugula bunch- One last bunch of spicy arugula greens for the large shares....the arugula can withstand a very light frost, but once the temperatures go very far below freezing it is a goner. Often times by this point in the year our arugula would have bit the dust, but temperatures have been so mild it is showing no sign of stopping.
Swiss Chard bunch- Another crop that we will sometimes lose in an early cold spell, although the Swiss chard is quite a bit tougher than the arugula. It's nice to still have some greens besides kale!
http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/slideshow/swiss-chard-recipes
Hot peppers- We put our final pick on our Cherry bomb peppers... I have been enjoying using these in just about everything lately. They really don't add too much spice (I usually use some hot sauce or chili flakes too) but a nice peppery flavor.
More Celeriac and Brussels sprouts in the large shares this week too!
First November Share....
Happy Halloween! And there are just two more shares to go after this week's! Remember, if you pick up on Mondays, your last share pickup will be on November 14th. If you pick up on Thursdays, it will be November 17th. We still have some great Fall veggies left for you.
We are hoping to finish our garlic planting this week, and after that our field projects will be pretty much wrapped up for the year. We are still picking food for the Orchard Kitchen the farm stand, and you all of course, but we've now removed almost all of the crops that are no longer producing, and planted cover crop everywhere that we could. All that's left is to keep picking until the food runs out! Here's what's in this weeks share:
Gypsy peppers- The peppers keep on coming...I never want to assume we'll still have peppers this time of year, although we usually do. It sure is nice to have them, to compliment all the Winter veggies we have this week, from squash to hardy greens to root veggies...nice to have a sweet fruit in the share!
Radicchio- Radicchio is in the lettuce family, but it is a bit hardier to cool temperatures than lettuce is. It is a very important and popular crop in Europe, and has a really nice slightly bitter flavor. It can be eaten raw, but is best lightly cooked. Here are some recipes from Bobbi:
http://www.thekitchn.com/take-the-edge-o-164160
or if you still have your pumpkin from week before last:
http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/11249-roast-pumpkin-radicchio-and-feta-salad
Parsnip- Parsnips are a delicious and underrated root vegetable. They are similar and closely related to carrots, with a similar texture when cooked but definitely a different flavor. They are easy to cook with, I usually peel them, then chop them up, and then either roast, sauté, or steam them.
http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/howto/guide/top-10-ways-parsnips
Delicata squash- One thing we still have a MOUNTAIN of left is delicate squash...mostly by design. It did seem to outperform our other squash this year (every year is just a little different as far a which squashes yield best) but we also planted a LOT more of it because we wholesale it to Georgie at Willowood Farm in Coupeville, who we didn't have nearly enough delicata for last year. I haven't posted many recipes for pastas this year:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/pasta-with-delicata-squash-and-sage-brown-butter
Collards/kale- The large shares already got collards a second time, so they will get kale...small shares will get collards...either way, everyone will be getting a nice bunch of braising greens.
Leeks- These will be the last of the Fall leeks in your share! After having so many leeks last winter, I am wishing we'd planted a bit more this year. But that's okay, they've made it into the share a handful of times, and we'll still have some left to sell to the Orchard Kitchen over the few weeks, so it's aallllll good.... leeks are great in recipes with potatoes or root veggies, but they can be a star on their own if you braise them:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/braised-leeks-with-lemon-10099
Winter turnips- All shares will be getting a few of our winter turnips this week, a mix of golden turnips and the appropriately named "purple top white globe" turnip. These European turnips, unlike the Japanese Hakurei turnips from the Spring, are better for cooking. You can use them not too differently from potatoes or beets...they were once a very important crop in Europe and the U.S., but have kind of faded into obscurity. They really are delicious though, and not hard to use at all. Bookmark this page, because there will be rutabegas (or "Swedish turnips") in your share a few weeks from now! http://www.marthastewart.com/275205/turnip-and-rutabaga-recipes
Large shares only:
Beets- Some more topped red beets in the large shares this week...I'm not sure if we'll have beets in all shares again this year, or in any shares...so enjoy what may or may not be the last of our 2016 beets!
Cabbage- We have so much cabbage out in the field, I will try not to overwhelm you all with cabbage over these final few weeks! We planted a whole lot of kraut cabbage, which grew to be enormous, in the hopes of selling them to Britt's pickles for their sauerkraut...hopefully we sell them somewhere, because we have a lot of them....
http://www.thekitchn.com/recipe-roasted-cabbage-slaw-with-hazelnuts-lemon-recipes-from-the-kitchn-178256
Red onion- We still have a few bags of these red "Cabernet" storage onions left, definitely enough to add a few to the large shares this week! These onions are small, but good and sweet with good storage potential.
We are hoping to finish our garlic planting this week, and after that our field projects will be pretty much wrapped up for the year. We are still picking food for the Orchard Kitchen the farm stand, and you all of course, but we've now removed almost all of the crops that are no longer producing, and planted cover crop everywhere that we could. All that's left is to keep picking until the food runs out! Here's what's in this weeks share:
Gypsy peppers- The peppers keep on coming...I never want to assume we'll still have peppers this time of year, although we usually do. It sure is nice to have them, to compliment all the Winter veggies we have this week, from squash to hardy greens to root veggies...nice to have a sweet fruit in the share!
Radicchio- Radicchio is in the lettuce family, but it is a bit hardier to cool temperatures than lettuce is. It is a very important and popular crop in Europe, and has a really nice slightly bitter flavor. It can be eaten raw, but is best lightly cooked. Here are some recipes from Bobbi:
http://www.thekitchn.com/take-the-edge-o-164160
or if you still have your pumpkin from week before last:
http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/11249-roast-pumpkin-radicchio-and-feta-salad
Parsnip- Parsnips are a delicious and underrated root vegetable. They are similar and closely related to carrots, with a similar texture when cooked but definitely a different flavor. They are easy to cook with, I usually peel them, then chop them up, and then either roast, sauté, or steam them.
http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/howto/guide/top-10-ways-parsnips
Delicata squash- One thing we still have a MOUNTAIN of left is delicate squash...mostly by design. It did seem to outperform our other squash this year (every year is just a little different as far a which squashes yield best) but we also planted a LOT more of it because we wholesale it to Georgie at Willowood Farm in Coupeville, who we didn't have nearly enough delicata for last year. I haven't posted many recipes for pastas this year:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/pasta-with-delicata-squash-and-sage-brown-butter
Collards/kale- The large shares already got collards a second time, so they will get kale...small shares will get collards...either way, everyone will be getting a nice bunch of braising greens.
Leeks- These will be the last of the Fall leeks in your share! After having so many leeks last winter, I am wishing we'd planted a bit more this year. But that's okay, they've made it into the share a handful of times, and we'll still have some left to sell to the Orchard Kitchen over the few weeks, so it's aallllll good.... leeks are great in recipes with potatoes or root veggies, but they can be a star on their own if you braise them:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/braised-leeks-with-lemon-10099
Winter turnips- All shares will be getting a few of our winter turnips this week, a mix of golden turnips and the appropriately named "purple top white globe" turnip. These European turnips, unlike the Japanese Hakurei turnips from the Spring, are better for cooking. You can use them not too differently from potatoes or beets...they were once a very important crop in Europe and the U.S., but have kind of faded into obscurity. They really are delicious though, and not hard to use at all. Bookmark this page, because there will be rutabegas (or "Swedish turnips") in your share a few weeks from now! http://www.marthastewart.com/275205/turnip-and-rutabaga-recipes
Large shares only:
Beets- Some more topped red beets in the large shares this week...I'm not sure if we'll have beets in all shares again this year, or in any shares...so enjoy what may or may not be the last of our 2016 beets!
Cabbage- We have so much cabbage out in the field, I will try not to overwhelm you all with cabbage over these final few weeks! We planted a whole lot of kraut cabbage, which grew to be enormous, in the hopes of selling them to Britt's pickles for their sauerkraut...hopefully we sell them somewhere, because we have a lot of them....
http://www.thekitchn.com/recipe-roasted-cabbage-slaw-with-hazelnuts-lemon-recipes-from-the-kitchn-178256
Red onion- We still have a few bags of these red "Cabernet" storage onions left, definitely enough to add a few to the large shares this week! These onions are small, but good and sweet with good storage potential.
Week 22 Blog
Hi there....
Week 22, with just 3 more weeks to go after this one, and we are just starting to get to some of our true Fall crops with Romanesco, storage carrots and some celery root for the large shares in this week's share. By next week I hope we're including some parsnip, turnip and more root veggies. That said, some of our warm season crops won't stop ticking....we got a snap of cooler weather there for a bit, but it has warmed up again so these solanum crops aren't ready to quit. There are eggplants and hot peppers in all shares this week, and the last of our tomatoes in the large shares. Enjoy! And Happy Halloween....
In all shares:
Romanesco- This is the world's most unusual cauliflower...it is actually a spiral in Fibonacci's sequence, a spiral pattern that occurs throughout nature. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibonacci_number
Also, it's lime green. And it's delicious! The flavor isn't too different from cauliflower, but it's a bit firmer, easier to cut up, and does have a bit of a different sweetness and flavor to it.
http://lethallydelicious.blogspot.com/2012/01/spicy-roasted-romanesco-cauliflower.html?m=1
Eggplant- Our eggplant has been delicious for years now, but we tried a different variety this year grown by our friends at Deep Harvest in Freeland. It has been our best ever, with great production and quality and with a really nice flavor. I have been really enjoying eating it this year.
http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2014/09/stovetop-eggplant-with-harissa-chickpeas-cumin-yogurt-recipe.html
Potato- We have so many fingerling potatoes still! We will give a really generous amount of these delicious spuds and Bobbi found a nice recipe for me to go with some of the arugula in the share below...
Arugula- Here's the recipe for potatoes and arugula:
https://smittenkitchen.com/2009/03/penne-with-potatoes-and-rocket/
Bobbi has been helping me a bunch with finding recipes lately, she is really enjoying doing it and it's nice to inject some new energy and a different angle into the recipe hunt!
Hot peppers- Hope you find a way to put these suckers to good use! Mostly what we have now are the smaller red cherry bomb peppers, which are really great. They are pretty sweet, and then have a quick burst of hotness that doesn't last too long. If you don't use any of the seeds and internal ribs, then they really aren't too spicy at all.
Garlic- This is some of the last of our food garlic for the year, maybe the very last of it! It has been a good year for garlic, with much more than we had last year, but I wish we'd planted way more....maybe next year, as we begin planting our garlic for 2017 in the coming week or two...
In the large shares-
Tomato- Believe it or not, we still have a few more tomatoes still ripening off the vine in storage. They won't last much longer, so rather than have them go bad I thought it would be better to give them out to the large shares this week! I've been eating my morning toast with cream cheese and tomato with some salt and pepper on there.
Celeriac, or celery root- This is a more unusual vegetable that is great for the Fall and Winter in the Pacific Northwest. The tops can be used like celery, but more for the souping/stocking/stewing uses, they're not good for eating with peanut butter. The root is the real winner. Although it is a bit ugly, it is truly delicious, with a juicy crunchy texture kind of like jicama, but a flavor like celery. I like to slice it raw for snacking or salads, roast it in the oven as you would potatoes or beets (diced into cubes), or steam it for a while and mash it up with potatoes. Here's another website from Bobbi that might help: http://www.wellpreserved.ca/what-to-do-with-celeriac-celery-root/
Lettuce- This may be a smaller head of lettuce. I am anticipating the first decent frost coming in the next few weeks, and the lettuce won't survive it, so just as with the tomatoes, I'd rather pick them for you than have them be ruined by cold weather out in the field! Time for one last lettuce salad....
Week 22, with just 3 more weeks to go after this one, and we are just starting to get to some of our true Fall crops with Romanesco, storage carrots and some celery root for the large shares in this week's share. By next week I hope we're including some parsnip, turnip and more root veggies. That said, some of our warm season crops won't stop ticking....we got a snap of cooler weather there for a bit, but it has warmed up again so these solanum crops aren't ready to quit. There are eggplants and hot peppers in all shares this week, and the last of our tomatoes in the large shares. Enjoy! And Happy Halloween....
In all shares:
Romanesco- This is the world's most unusual cauliflower...it is actually a spiral in Fibonacci's sequence, a spiral pattern that occurs throughout nature. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibonacci_number
Also, it's lime green. And it's delicious! The flavor isn't too different from cauliflower, but it's a bit firmer, easier to cut up, and does have a bit of a different sweetness and flavor to it.
http://lethallydelicious.blogspot.com/2012/01/spicy-roasted-romanesco-cauliflower.html?m=1
Eggplant- Our eggplant has been delicious for years now, but we tried a different variety this year grown by our friends at Deep Harvest in Freeland. It has been our best ever, with great production and quality and with a really nice flavor. I have been really enjoying eating it this year.
http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2014/09/stovetop-eggplant-with-harissa-chickpeas-cumin-yogurt-recipe.html
Potato- We have so many fingerling potatoes still! We will give a really generous amount of these delicious spuds and Bobbi found a nice recipe for me to go with some of the arugula in the share below...
Arugula- Here's the recipe for potatoes and arugula:
https://smittenkitchen.com/2009/03/penne-with-potatoes-and-rocket/
Bobbi has been helping me a bunch with finding recipes lately, she is really enjoying doing it and it's nice to inject some new energy and a different angle into the recipe hunt!
Hot peppers- Hope you find a way to put these suckers to good use! Mostly what we have now are the smaller red cherry bomb peppers, which are really great. They are pretty sweet, and then have a quick burst of hotness that doesn't last too long. If you don't use any of the seeds and internal ribs, then they really aren't too spicy at all.
Garlic- This is some of the last of our food garlic for the year, maybe the very last of it! It has been a good year for garlic, with much more than we had last year, but I wish we'd planted way more....maybe next year, as we begin planting our garlic for 2017 in the coming week or two...
In the large shares-
Tomato- Believe it or not, we still have a few more tomatoes still ripening off the vine in storage. They won't last much longer, so rather than have them go bad I thought it would be better to give them out to the large shares this week! I've been eating my morning toast with cream cheese and tomato with some salt and pepper on there.
Celeriac, or celery root- This is a more unusual vegetable that is great for the Fall and Winter in the Pacific Northwest. The tops can be used like celery, but more for the souping/stocking/stewing uses, they're not good for eating with peanut butter. The root is the real winner. Although it is a bit ugly, it is truly delicious, with a juicy crunchy texture kind of like jicama, but a flavor like celery. I like to slice it raw for snacking or salads, roast it in the oven as you would potatoes or beets (diced into cubes), or steam it for a while and mash it up with potatoes. Here's another website from Bobbi that might help: http://www.wellpreserved.ca/what-to-do-with-celeriac-celery-root/
Lettuce- This may be a smaller head of lettuce. I am anticipating the first decent frost coming in the next few weeks, and the lettuce won't survive it, so just as with the tomatoes, I'd rather pick them for you than have them be ruined by cold weather out in the field! Time for one last lettuce salad....
New Farm Share!
Hope we all survived the the crazy windstorm this weekend! Things were blowing around a bit on the farm, but we all survived with no major disasters....thanks in part to Vincent, who may have saved our greenhouse this weekend. If you noticed our note in the farmstand, we also hopefully got our cash box situation all corrected after some major frustrations last week. We are really transitioning into the winter season now. with wind storms and lots of rain, as well as some cooler weather spelliing the end for many of our Summer crops. Lots of nice winter crops still to come this year though, with a handful in the share this week!
In this week's share:
Lettuce- The last of the lettuce for this year! We have managed to protect our Fall lettuce from marauding deer, and I'm glad we did. It is nice to still have it this time of year. Enjoy a final local lettuce salad of 2016! I heard recently that several local farmers have already had a frost that has killed tender crops like lettuce...fortunately, we haven't yet!
Beets- Some nice red beets in the share this week! We are getting low on beets...after having way too many last Fall, I went too far the other way and underplanted this year! Wish we had more...
Swiss Chard- Some nice Fall bunching greens. I just made some soup with stock, onions, winter squash, chard, rice, and too many other things to list.
Brussels Sprouts- This will be our first pick on the Brussels Sprouts this year! Everyone is always excited for the sprouts this time of year. This is kind of a funny recipe, but similar to how I like to prepare sprouts: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/15276/breaded-brussels-sprouts/
Acorn Squash- We ate a lot of acorn squash growing up. What I love about acorn squash, aside from their pleasantly stringy texture and nice strong flavor, is how easy they are to cook. Just cut them in half, scoop out the seeds, put some salt, olive oil, and maybe some maple syrup or brown sugar on there, and bake in a 375 degree oven for about a half hour. Or:
http://www.marthastewart.com/275063/acorn-squash-recipes
Onions- I am so glad we had the foresight to move our onions out of the greenhouse before this week! The roof of the greenhouse started to blow off in the windstorm, and some of our winter squash and storage corn got a little bit wet, but that is not too big a deal. If the storage onions had gotten wet, it would have been a real bummer and probably really would have impacted their storage life. These will be some of the first of our yellow Copra storage onions to go out this year!
Gypsy Peppers- Our peppers will just continue to get sweeter until an early frost kills them! They are really doing well so hopefully they will continue for a while.
Green Tomato- Our tomatoes are dead. Rest in peace. As I've been writing every week, it was only a matter of time after the weather turned cold and damp. We were able to put a good last pick on the plants though, getting the last of the ripe fruit and much of the green fruit that would never have time to ripen.
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/16760/best-fried-green-tomatoes/
Large Shares-
Parsley- A great herb to use with your Brussels sprouts, your green tomatoes, or with the chard. Just chop it up and add it to almost any recipe for some fresh, herby flavor.
Turnips- Our first pick on our winter turnips this week as well! With the cooler Fall weather here, it is time to roll out the winter veggies.
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/glazed-turnips-104647
Large Shares will mostly get more of everything this week! More of just about everything in the share. As we get into the Fall, when there are fewer veggies available, this will happen more!
Mid October on the Farm...
The weather took a very sudden turn there from a Summery Fall week to a Wintery one. I had quite a bit of work to do just picking up all the odds and ends that had blown around in the high winds last week. The days are getting a whole lot shorter now, too; we will work on getting some lighting in the farm stand this week so that you can find your share when you come!
With the work load slowing down, and Jack planning to take a family trip to Hawaii this Fall, we decided we should all take turns having some time off. This is my week, so I will work a bit today and then be off Island for Tuesday through Friday! I am hoping, if the weather permits, to go on an overnight adventure on my sailboat, which was given to me years ago but I'm just this year finally getting around to taking out on the water.
We are beginning to prepare for our final sizable field project; planting our garlic seed for next year's garlic. It goes in at the end of October or early November, and will take several days by the time we prep the fields, separate all the seed and get it planted. Hope to have even more garlic for next year, because other than the garlic we've held on to for farm shares and seed, we are all out already!
Have a great week!
Tomatoes- All good things gotta come to an end...I've been talking about the last days of the tomatoes for a while, and now I think they're here. "Late blight", the disease that almost always kills our tomatoes sooner or later, is spreading like wild fire with this cold wet weather. We still have time for one last big pick though!
Spinach- Can't have too much spinach in the Fall, and I can't seem to plant too much. These nice little bunches should be great for a salad or for cooking.
Carrots- After starting to worry about how many carrots we had left a few weeks ago, now I don't know what I was worrying about. We have a whole planting we haven't even gotten into yet, and the beds we're digging right now are super nice carrots.
Winter Luxury Pumpkin- These pumpkins are beautiful and delicious. The nicest eating pumpkin I've ever found, with a pretty white webbing that looks a little like decoration on the skin. As Jack and I were just talking about, while they are related pumpkins are actually pretty different from squash; while squash are all from the Americas, the pumpkin is native to Africa. This is our first year growing pumpkin on the Farm, and they've done great. Super good for a soup or stew, a curry, or baking. They should store on the counter top for weeks or months before you use them if you'd like a little Fall decoration too.
"Cabernet" Red Onions- We planted these red storage onions as a bit of an afterthought when our red onion seed we ordered didn't arrive. They didn't exactly take off after being planted late, so they are a bit on the small side, but they are a really nice red onion that should keep for quite a while and be great on sandwiches, salads etc.
Eggplant- The eggplants are always very productive in October, although as a subtropical they are also very sensitive to frost, and usually the first crop to go down if the weather gets down into the mid thirties. So far so good...we have lots of nice fruits and the nights haven't threatened to get that cold yet, although there is a chill in the air...
Large Shares:
Collard Greens- A nice bunch of our collard bunching greens. I love to eat these this time of year...use them just like you would kale, but cook them just a minute or two longer as the leaves have a bit more thickness to them.
Broccoli- I hope you're not overwhelmed after getting an enormous head of broccoli last week! This week's will be a more modest size, easy to use in a salad or stir fry.
Hot pepper- A few of our chile peppers. Anaheim, cherry bomb, poblano, or Serrano. Great for spicing up a recipe and adding some peppery flavor.
With the work load slowing down, and Jack planning to take a family trip to Hawaii this Fall, we decided we should all take turns having some time off. This is my week, so I will work a bit today and then be off Island for Tuesday through Friday! I am hoping, if the weather permits, to go on an overnight adventure on my sailboat, which was given to me years ago but I'm just this year finally getting around to taking out on the water.
We are beginning to prepare for our final sizable field project; planting our garlic seed for next year's garlic. It goes in at the end of October or early November, and will take several days by the time we prep the fields, separate all the seed and get it planted. Hope to have even more garlic for next year, because other than the garlic we've held on to for farm shares and seed, we are all out already!
Have a great week!
Tomatoes- All good things gotta come to an end...I've been talking about the last days of the tomatoes for a while, and now I think they're here. "Late blight", the disease that almost always kills our tomatoes sooner or later, is spreading like wild fire with this cold wet weather. We still have time for one last big pick though!
Spinach- Can't have too much spinach in the Fall, and I can't seem to plant too much. These nice little bunches should be great for a salad or for cooking.
Carrots- After starting to worry about how many carrots we had left a few weeks ago, now I don't know what I was worrying about. We have a whole planting we haven't even gotten into yet, and the beds we're digging right now are super nice carrots.
Winter Luxury Pumpkin- These pumpkins are beautiful and delicious. The nicest eating pumpkin I've ever found, with a pretty white webbing that looks a little like decoration on the skin. As Jack and I were just talking about, while they are related pumpkins are actually pretty different from squash; while squash are all from the Americas, the pumpkin is native to Africa. This is our first year growing pumpkin on the Farm, and they've done great. Super good for a soup or stew, a curry, or baking. They should store on the counter top for weeks or months before you use them if you'd like a little Fall decoration too.
"Cabernet" Red Onions- We planted these red storage onions as a bit of an afterthought when our red onion seed we ordered didn't arrive. They didn't exactly take off after being planted late, so they are a bit on the small side, but they are a really nice red onion that should keep for quite a while and be great on sandwiches, salads etc.
Eggplant- The eggplants are always very productive in October, although as a subtropical they are also very sensitive to frost, and usually the first crop to go down if the weather gets down into the mid thirties. So far so good...we have lots of nice fruits and the nights haven't threatened to get that cold yet, although there is a chill in the air...
Large Shares:
Collard Greens- A nice bunch of our collard bunching greens. I love to eat these this time of year...use them just like you would kale, but cook them just a minute or two longer as the leaves have a bit more thickness to them.
Broccoli- I hope you're not overwhelmed after getting an enormous head of broccoli last week! This week's will be a more modest size, easy to use in a salad or stir fry.
Hot pepper- A few of our chile peppers. Anaheim, cherry bomb, poblano, or Serrano. Great for spicing up a recipe and adding some peppery flavor.
Farm Share#19
Wow, seven more farm shares to go including this week's. Unlike in the Summer, when fruiting crops just produce more food every week, this time of year I can look out in the fields or in our storage sheds and see how much food we have left for the rest of the year; it always makes me a bit nervous at first, that we will run out of food or not have enough of something. But by now, in October, I begin to adjust and see how much we still have. I start to create plans for the remaining farm shares, and it helps me to realize that we have more than enough to fill up the bags for the remainder of this year.
I love this time of year when we have weather like we've had over the last week. A little bit of rain and some cooler nights, but lots of sun and pleasant temperatures too. And beautiful views of the mountains during the day and the stars at night! Here's what's in your share this week:
Broccoli- We have lots and lots of really nice Fall broccoli right now.. this might be the best time of year for broccoli. Although in late Spring it's great when broccoli comes on, as there aren't as many other crops harvested yet, it seems like the Fall broccoli might be a little sweeter and more delicious, and it's great for some warm dishes in cooler weather.
http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1015248-roasted-broccoli-with-tahini-garlic-sauce
Carrots- After several weeks with no carrots in the share, they are back! We have some nice ones out of a new bed, orange carrots with a sweet Fall flavor...
Lettuce- As soon as we get a decent frost, the lettuce will be toast...but we have lots of lettuce that is just great right now, so if the colder weather holds off for a while, it should hopefully last for several more weeks. The November shares will switch to the more cold hardy greens though, like spinach, kale, radicchio, chard and collards.
http://dadcooksdinner.com/2011/12/turkey-lettuce-wraps-thai-style.html/
Fingerling potatoes- This is a beautiful pink fingerling potato we grew a bit of this year, named "Rose Finn". They grew in all kinds of funky shapes, but they are a very delicious pink spud.
http://www.perrysplate.com/2012/11/crispy-lemon-garlic-fingerling-potatoes.html
Leeks- Leeks are back in your share...the longest, and some of the nicest leeks I've ever grown! The stalks of these plants are just unbelievable...hard to fit in our blue farm share bags though.
Tomato- With this beautiful Fall weather, the tomatoes are marching on. In fact, we picked more tomatoes last week that we have all year. We will give you a bunch this week, and hopefully we should have plenty more for the farm stand and next week's shares...
Garlic- It's been so long since garlic was in the shares! Sorry, with so much produce available in the late Summer, there was no room for it. We have some nice garlic for this week's share though. Hard to believe, beginning next week we will be planting next year's garlic!
In the LARGE shares:
Green Tomatoes- Not the ripe green zebras we grow, these are underripe green tomatoes for cooking! Fried green tomatoes are a great Fall treat, as we can see that some plants have set fruits they won't be able to ripen. Perfect for picking green, rolling in bread crumbs and frying for a great Southern side dish. Or making this shrimp salad recipe:
http://www.closetcooking.com/2014/08/blackened-shrimp-and-fried-green-tomato.html?m=1
Gypsy Peppers- More of our delicious, tart sweet gypsy peppers. I can't get enough of them this time of year!
Kale bunch- A nice bunch of kale greens to round out the large shares this week...
I love this time of year when we have weather like we've had over the last week. A little bit of rain and some cooler nights, but lots of sun and pleasant temperatures too. And beautiful views of the mountains during the day and the stars at night! Here's what's in your share this week:
Broccoli- We have lots and lots of really nice Fall broccoli right now.. this might be the best time of year for broccoli. Although in late Spring it's great when broccoli comes on, as there aren't as many other crops harvested yet, it seems like the Fall broccoli might be a little sweeter and more delicious, and it's great for some warm dishes in cooler weather.
http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1015248-roasted-broccoli-with-tahini-garlic-sauce
Carrots- After several weeks with no carrots in the share, they are back! We have some nice ones out of a new bed, orange carrots with a sweet Fall flavor...
Lettuce- As soon as we get a decent frost, the lettuce will be toast...but we have lots of lettuce that is just great right now, so if the colder weather holds off for a while, it should hopefully last for several more weeks. The November shares will switch to the more cold hardy greens though, like spinach, kale, radicchio, chard and collards.
http://dadcooksdinner.com/2011/12/turkey-lettuce-wraps-thai-style.html/
Fingerling potatoes- This is a beautiful pink fingerling potato we grew a bit of this year, named "Rose Finn". They grew in all kinds of funky shapes, but they are a very delicious pink spud.
http://www.perrysplate.com/2012/11/crispy-lemon-garlic-fingerling-potatoes.html
Leeks- Leeks are back in your share...the longest, and some of the nicest leeks I've ever grown! The stalks of these plants are just unbelievable...hard to fit in our blue farm share bags though.
Tomato- With this beautiful Fall weather, the tomatoes are marching on. In fact, we picked more tomatoes last week that we have all year. We will give you a bunch this week, and hopefully we should have plenty more for the farm stand and next week's shares...
Garlic- It's been so long since garlic was in the shares! Sorry, with so much produce available in the late Summer, there was no room for it. We have some nice garlic for this week's share though. Hard to believe, beginning next week we will be planting next year's garlic!
In the LARGE shares:
Green Tomatoes- Not the ripe green zebras we grow, these are underripe green tomatoes for cooking! Fried green tomatoes are a great Fall treat, as we can see that some plants have set fruits they won't be able to ripen. Perfect for picking green, rolling in bread crumbs and frying for a great Southern side dish. Or making this shrimp salad recipe:
http://www.closetcooking.com/2014/08/blackened-shrimp-and-fried-green-tomato.html?m=1
Gypsy Peppers- More of our delicious, tart sweet gypsy peppers. I can't get enough of them this time of year!
Kale bunch- A nice bunch of kale greens to round out the large shares this week...
Another Week, Another Farmshare Blog
Howdy,
The last September share...next week will be October already! Happy with how the farm shares are looking these days. Last year (2015) was so hot and dry that things started producing super early...that combined with some rainy weather in the early Fall meant by this time last year we had no more tomatoes or corn, and the summer squash and cucumbers were long gone. I remember feeling like the late September shares were less exciting, so I tried to plan to spread things out a bit longer this year, and the weather has cooperated. Really happy to be giving you corn one last time this week, and the tomatoes are still hanging in there and will hopefully continue into October.
Settling into some nice Fall weather, and I feel like we are ahead of the game where our Fall projects are concerned. We managed to bring in all the Winter squash from the field last week; one of the funnest Fall projects on the farm, because it involves tossing and catching the squash to get them in and out of the pickup truck. We grew about a quarter of an acre of squash, and maybe brought in a couple of tons....That was the last of our large storage crop harvests, so now our potatoes, onions, garlic, squash and pumpkins are all under cover and will be packed into the upcoming shares out of the greenhouse or shed.
This week red kuri squash will be in the shares, and here's what else:
Sweet corn- Our last corn of the year! This is our final planting that I sewed as a bit of an afterthought thinking it would be nice to have some more. I'm glad I did, as this planting has grown really well and should be great. If I remember right from back in early June, I believe this will be a white corn...it has been a great season for sweet corn, enjoy the last of the year!
Shallots- Shallots are a delicious allium crop that is kind of like a cross between onion and garlic; more flavorful than onion but useable in the same way. A must for many French recipes, great in soups, sauces and salad dressings but really usable in all kinds of dishes you would usually use onion for but want to try something a little different.
Cherry tomatoes- I didn't know if the cherry tomatoes would still be producing heavily, but they are looking better than ever and the fruit is really nice and sweet. Big heirloom tomatoes should be back in the share next week too!
Cauliflower- More beautiful cauliflower, try stir frying it, roasting it, or making some soup or stew!
Collard greens- It is collard green season! We grow these in the Fall and Winter for their excellent cold hardiness and great flavor. A classic Southern side dish with some barbeque...braised collard greens.
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/51803/kickin-collard-greens/
Hot pepper- We grew just a small amount of hot peppers, as Pacific Northwesterners are not usually too keen on them. There are Anaheim, Cherry Bomb, Poblano, and Banana peppers, and you'll get one or two of them in your share...grab a different one out of the farm stand if you prefer! Great for making salsa....and none of them are too spicy. Wish we had some cilantro right now, it's done for the year!
Red Kuri squash- One of my favorite winter squashes, these red Japanese squash have a very dry, almost crumbly texture and a nice strong flavor. Many squash improve in flavor over the weeks in storage (you might notice when you get the delicata again in a few weeks their flavor should be sweeter), but these ones are great to eat now and don't store for too long.
http://naturallyella.com/roasted-red-kuri-squash/
Large shares:
Eggplant- Bobbie found this delicious looking eggplant recipe and emailed it to me:
https://smittenkitchen.com/2016/07/eggplant-with-yogurt-and-tomato-relish/
Arugula- A bunch of green arugula in your share this week for making a nice Fall salad.
Topped beets- We have lots of big golden and chioggia beets right now, perfect for roasting. I quickly chop them into quarters or eighths, toss some olive oil and salt on em and bake on a cookie sheet at 375 for about 50 minutes....then it is easy once they cool down to peel away the outer skin if desired and then slice them up.
Large shares will also be getting a bit more shallot, cauliflower and squash!
The last September share...next week will be October already! Happy with how the farm shares are looking these days. Last year (2015) was so hot and dry that things started producing super early...that combined with some rainy weather in the early Fall meant by this time last year we had no more tomatoes or corn, and the summer squash and cucumbers were long gone. I remember feeling like the late September shares were less exciting, so I tried to plan to spread things out a bit longer this year, and the weather has cooperated. Really happy to be giving you corn one last time this week, and the tomatoes are still hanging in there and will hopefully continue into October.
Settling into some nice Fall weather, and I feel like we are ahead of the game where our Fall projects are concerned. We managed to bring in all the Winter squash from the field last week; one of the funnest Fall projects on the farm, because it involves tossing and catching the squash to get them in and out of the pickup truck. We grew about a quarter of an acre of squash, and maybe brought in a couple of tons....That was the last of our large storage crop harvests, so now our potatoes, onions, garlic, squash and pumpkins are all under cover and will be packed into the upcoming shares out of the greenhouse or shed.
This week red kuri squash will be in the shares, and here's what else:
Sweet corn- Our last corn of the year! This is our final planting that I sewed as a bit of an afterthought thinking it would be nice to have some more. I'm glad I did, as this planting has grown really well and should be great. If I remember right from back in early June, I believe this will be a white corn...it has been a great season for sweet corn, enjoy the last of the year!
Shallots- Shallots are a delicious allium crop that is kind of like a cross between onion and garlic; more flavorful than onion but useable in the same way. A must for many French recipes, great in soups, sauces and salad dressings but really usable in all kinds of dishes you would usually use onion for but want to try something a little different.
Cherry tomatoes- I didn't know if the cherry tomatoes would still be producing heavily, but they are looking better than ever and the fruit is really nice and sweet. Big heirloom tomatoes should be back in the share next week too!
Cauliflower- More beautiful cauliflower, try stir frying it, roasting it, or making some soup or stew!
Collard greens- It is collard green season! We grow these in the Fall and Winter for their excellent cold hardiness and great flavor. A classic Southern side dish with some barbeque...braised collard greens.
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/51803/kickin-collard-greens/
Hot pepper- We grew just a small amount of hot peppers, as Pacific Northwesterners are not usually too keen on them. There are Anaheim, Cherry Bomb, Poblano, and Banana peppers, and you'll get one or two of them in your share...grab a different one out of the farm stand if you prefer! Great for making salsa....and none of them are too spicy. Wish we had some cilantro right now, it's done for the year!
Red Kuri squash- One of my favorite winter squashes, these red Japanese squash have a very dry, almost crumbly texture and a nice strong flavor. Many squash improve in flavor over the weeks in storage (you might notice when you get the delicata again in a few weeks their flavor should be sweeter), but these ones are great to eat now and don't store for too long.
http://naturallyella.com/roasted-red-kuri-squash/
Large shares:
Eggplant- Bobbie found this delicious looking eggplant recipe and emailed it to me:
https://smittenkitchen.com/2016/07/eggplant-with-yogurt-and-tomato-relish/
Arugula- A bunch of green arugula in your share this week for making a nice Fall salad.
Topped beets- We have lots of big golden and chioggia beets right now, perfect for roasting. I quickly chop them into quarters or eighths, toss some olive oil and salt on em and bake on a cookie sheet at 375 for about 50 minutes....then it is easy once they cool down to peel away the outer skin if desired and then slice them up.
Large shares will also be getting a bit more shallot, cauliflower and squash!
Fall is here.....Week 17
Wow, Week 17 already. As my favorite farm blog post was titled, "Time Flies When You're Having Farm". It is now officially Autumn (or will be soon) with the Fall equinox on Wednesday. It is amazing how quickly the days get shorter this time of year. While many people are mourning the end of Summer, I spend the crazy weeks of July and August looking forward to this time of year, when things are mellowing out a bit but the weather is often still really nice.
We had quite a bit of rain this weekend, so we will probably be more or less done irrigating for the year! That saves a lot of time and energy. It also really helps the cover crop I wrote about last week, which was beginning to grow but drying out quickly, and would take a ton of work to irrigate. It may spell the eventual end of the tomatoes, but we did put our sheeting back up over the tomato rows before this weekend in the hope that it would prolong their life through the next few weeks.
The Summer crops gradually give way to Fall crops...first winter squash in the share this week(!), a very poorly named vegetable, as they are planted in the Spring, grow through the Summer and are eaten primarily in the Fall. Vincent calls them "hard squash", I think a better name. Still melons, tomatoes, and peppers from our Summer plantings....
Here's what's in this week's share.
Celery- I am very proud of the celery we grow on the farm, even though it doesn't seem to be a customer favorite. It isn't quite as blanched and crunchy as the grocery store stuff, but it actually tastes like something! Great for soups, stews and sauces, as well as snacking...
Spinach- It has been a long time since spinach was in the share....late Summer the spinach just never seems to grow quite as well or last as long, and so we never seem to have enough of it. Happy to have a beautiful bed of it coming on now though.
Delicata squash- If you don't know these squash, you're in for a treat. The skin is thin and edible so they don't need to be peeled, and the flavor is great. I usually cut them in half longwise, scoop out the seeds, and slice them into crescent shapes pieces about a half an inch wide. Then I toss them in oil and salt and bake them on a cookie sheet for about 30 minutes at 375. They're delicious!
Ailsa crag onions- Soon we will be getting into more of our Fall alliums, with storage onions, shallots, and more leeks and shallots on the way. But we have so many of these Ailsa crag sweet yellow onions, and they're still so nice, we couldn't resist putting them in the share one last time!
Gypsy peppers- More of our tasty sweet gypsy peppers, getting more color and flavor now as time goes on. I was making a potato dish for breakfast this morning and wishing I had a few of these in the kitchen! They are so good.
Heirloom tomatoes- The tomatoes continue! I would really like to keep them going for at least two more weeks to make it into October! At some point we may decide to pick them really hard and let the greenish fruit ripen up in the greenhouse if it seems like it won't survive out in the field....
Melon?- We grew a delicious cantaloupe type melon that is just ready for harvest now...I'm hoping we have enough to give everyone a half a melon (at least) in their share...fingers crossed...
Large shares:
Broccoli- Wow, we have some really pretty broccoli right now. It is so good this time of year! We made broccoli the other day in a cheese sauce...not exactly health food, but really satisfying as a side dish!
Scarlet runner shelling beans- These are a special treat, beautiful purple and black speckled beans that cook up nice and plump. Chef Vincent buys them from us and loves to cook them in the Orchard Kitchen...I am going to ask if he's willing to share his recipe. These beans need to be shelled from the pod, a bit of a project, but because they are fresh and not completely dry they don't need to be presoaked...if you boil them in plenty of water for just 30 minutes or so they should be nice and tender. I will have to cook some up myself to see exactly how long it takes.
Purple carrots or topped beets- A nice Fall root vegetable to round out the large shares, depending on what we have enough of....
We had quite a bit of rain this weekend, so we will probably be more or less done irrigating for the year! That saves a lot of time and energy. It also really helps the cover crop I wrote about last week, which was beginning to grow but drying out quickly, and would take a ton of work to irrigate. It may spell the eventual end of the tomatoes, but we did put our sheeting back up over the tomato rows before this weekend in the hope that it would prolong their life through the next few weeks.
The Summer crops gradually give way to Fall crops...first winter squash in the share this week(!), a very poorly named vegetable, as they are planted in the Spring, grow through the Summer and are eaten primarily in the Fall. Vincent calls them "hard squash", I think a better name. Still melons, tomatoes, and peppers from our Summer plantings....
Here's what's in this week's share.
Celery- I am very proud of the celery we grow on the farm, even though it doesn't seem to be a customer favorite. It isn't quite as blanched and crunchy as the grocery store stuff, but it actually tastes like something! Great for soups, stews and sauces, as well as snacking...
Spinach- It has been a long time since spinach was in the share....late Summer the spinach just never seems to grow quite as well or last as long, and so we never seem to have enough of it. Happy to have a beautiful bed of it coming on now though.
Delicata squash- If you don't know these squash, you're in for a treat. The skin is thin and edible so they don't need to be peeled, and the flavor is great. I usually cut them in half longwise, scoop out the seeds, and slice them into crescent shapes pieces about a half an inch wide. Then I toss them in oil and salt and bake them on a cookie sheet for about 30 minutes at 375. They're delicious!
Ailsa crag onions- Soon we will be getting into more of our Fall alliums, with storage onions, shallots, and more leeks and shallots on the way. But we have so many of these Ailsa crag sweet yellow onions, and they're still so nice, we couldn't resist putting them in the share one last time!
Gypsy peppers- More of our tasty sweet gypsy peppers, getting more color and flavor now as time goes on. I was making a potato dish for breakfast this morning and wishing I had a few of these in the kitchen! They are so good.
Heirloom tomatoes- The tomatoes continue! I would really like to keep them going for at least two more weeks to make it into October! At some point we may decide to pick them really hard and let the greenish fruit ripen up in the greenhouse if it seems like it won't survive out in the field....
Melon?- We grew a delicious cantaloupe type melon that is just ready for harvest now...I'm hoping we have enough to give everyone a half a melon (at least) in their share...fingers crossed...
Large shares:
Broccoli- Wow, we have some really pretty broccoli right now. It is so good this time of year! We made broccoli the other day in a cheese sauce...not exactly health food, but really satisfying as a side dish!
Scarlet runner shelling beans- These are a special treat, beautiful purple and black speckled beans that cook up nice and plump. Chef Vincent buys them from us and loves to cook them in the Orchard Kitchen...I am going to ask if he's willing to share his recipe. These beans need to be shelled from the pod, a bit of a project, but because they are fresh and not completely dry they don't need to be presoaked...if you boil them in plenty of water for just 30 minutes or so they should be nice and tender. I will have to cook some up myself to see exactly how long it takes.
Purple carrots or topped beets- A nice Fall root vegetable to round out the large shares, depending on what we have enough of....
Fall is here.....Week 17
Wow, Week 17 already. As my favorite farm blog post was titled, "Time Flies When You're Having Farm". It is now officially Autumn (or will be soon) with the Fall equinox on Wednesday. It is amazing how quickly the days get shorter this time of year. While many people are mourning the end of Summer, I spend the crazy weeks of July and August looking forward to this time of year, when things are mellowing out a bit but the weather is often still really nice.
We had quite a bit of rain this weekend, so we will probably be more or less done irrigating for the year! That saves a lot of time and energy. It also really helps the cover crop I wrote about last week, which was beginning to grow but drying out quickly, and would take a ton of work to irrigate. It may spell the eventual end of the tomatoes, but we did put our sheeting back up over the tomato rows before this weekend in the hope that it would prolong their life through the next few weeks.
The Summer crops gradually give way to Fall crops...first winter squash in the share this week(!), a very poorly named vegetable, as they are planted in the Spring, grow through the Summer and are eaten primarily in the Fall. Vincent calls them "hard squash", I think a better name. Still corn, tomatoes, and peppers from our Summer plantings....
Here's what's in this week's share.
Celery- I am very proud of the celery we grow on the farm, even though it doesn't seem to be a customer favorite. It isn't quite as blanched and crunchy as the grocery store stuff, but it actually tastes like something! Great for soups, stews and sauces, as well as snacking...
Spinach- It has been a long time since spinach was in the share....late Summer the spinach just never seems to grow quite as well or last as long, and so we never seem to have enough of it. Happy to have a beautiful bed of it coming on now though.
Delicata squash- If you don't know these squash, you're in for a treat. The skin is thin and edible so they don't need to be peeled, and the flavor is great. I usually cut them in half longwise, scoop out the seeds, and slice them into crescent shapes pieces about a half an inch wide. Then I toss them in oil and salt and bake them on a cookie sheet for about 30 minutes at 375. They're delicious!
Ailsa crag onions- Soon we will be getting into more of our Fall alliums, with storage onions, shallots, and more leeks and shallots on the way. But we have so many of these Ailsa crag sweet yellow onions, and they're still so nice, we couldn't resist putting them in the share one last time!
Gypsy peppers- More of our tasty sweet gypsy peppers, getting more color and flavor now as time goes on. I was making a potato dish for breakfast this morning and wishing I had a few of these in the kitchen! They are so good.
Heirloom tomatoes- The tomatoes continue! I would really like to keep them going for at least two more weeks to make it into October! At some point we may decide to pick them really hard and let the greenish fruit ripen up in the greenhouse if it seems like it won't survive out in the field....
Melon???
Large shares:
Broccoli- Wow, we have some really pretty broccoli right now. It is so good this time of year! We made broccoli the other day in a cheese sauce...not exactly health food, but really satisfying as a side dish!
Scarlet runner shelling beans- These are a special treat, beautiful purple and black speckled beans that cook up nice and plump. Chef Vincent buys them from us and loves to cook them in the Orchard Kitchen...I am going to ask if he's willing to share his recipe. These beans need to be shelled from the pod, a bit of a project, but because they are fresh and not completely dry they don't need to be presoaked...if you boil them in plenty of water for just 30 minutes or so they should be nice and tender. I will have to cook some up myself to see exactly how long it takes.
Purple carrots or topped beets- A nice Fall root vegetable to round out the large shares, depending on what we have enough of....
We had quite a bit of rain this weekend, so we will probably be more or less done irrigating for the year! That saves a lot of time and energy. It also really helps the cover crop I wrote about last week, which was beginning to grow but drying out quickly, and would take a ton of work to irrigate. It may spell the eventual end of the tomatoes, but we did put our sheeting back up over the tomato rows before this weekend in the hope that it would prolong their life through the next few weeks.
The Summer crops gradually give way to Fall crops...first winter squash in the share this week(!), a very poorly named vegetable, as they are planted in the Spring, grow through the Summer and are eaten primarily in the Fall. Vincent calls them "hard squash", I think a better name. Still corn, tomatoes, and peppers from our Summer plantings....
Here's what's in this week's share.
Celery- I am very proud of the celery we grow on the farm, even though it doesn't seem to be a customer favorite. It isn't quite as blanched and crunchy as the grocery store stuff, but it actually tastes like something! Great for soups, stews and sauces, as well as snacking...
Spinach- It has been a long time since spinach was in the share....late Summer the spinach just never seems to grow quite as well or last as long, and so we never seem to have enough of it. Happy to have a beautiful bed of it coming on now though.
Delicata squash- If you don't know these squash, you're in for a treat. The skin is thin and edible so they don't need to be peeled, and the flavor is great. I usually cut them in half longwise, scoop out the seeds, and slice them into crescent shapes pieces about a half an inch wide. Then I toss them in oil and salt and bake them on a cookie sheet for about 30 minutes at 375. They're delicious!
Ailsa crag onions- Soon we will be getting into more of our Fall alliums, with storage onions, shallots, and more leeks and shallots on the way. But we have so many of these Ailsa crag sweet yellow onions, and they're still so nice, we couldn't resist putting them in the share one last time!
Gypsy peppers- More of our tasty sweet gypsy peppers, getting more color and flavor now as time goes on. I was making a potato dish for breakfast this morning and wishing I had a few of these in the kitchen! They are so good.
Heirloom tomatoes- The tomatoes continue! I would really like to keep them going for at least two more weeks to make it into October! At some point we may decide to pick them really hard and let the greenish fruit ripen up in the greenhouse if it seems like it won't survive out in the field....
Melon???
Large shares:
Broccoli- Wow, we have some really pretty broccoli right now. It is so good this time of year! We made broccoli the other day in a cheese sauce...not exactly health food, but really satisfying as a side dish!
Scarlet runner shelling beans- These are a special treat, beautiful purple and black speckled beans that cook up nice and plump. Chef Vincent buys them from us and loves to cook them in the Orchard Kitchen...I am going to ask if he's willing to share his recipe. These beans need to be shelled from the pod, a bit of a project, but because they are fresh and not completely dry they don't need to be presoaked...if you boil them in plenty of water for just 30 minutes or so they should be nice and tender. I will have to cook some up myself to see exactly how long it takes.
Purple carrots or topped beets- A nice Fall root vegetable to round out the large shares, depending on what we have enough of....
Week 16 Blog Post
Let's see....everything is going well on the farm these days. Last week we were able to get over an acre planted into cover crop, which you may see coming up if you keep an eye on the field near the farm stand over the next week or two. The clover and ryegrass we planted will grow through the Fall and Winter to be plowed under in the Spring. We got the seed in while the soil was wet enough to germinate it....now the only problem will be if it stays really dry and the cover crop needs to be watered! This time of year I find I don't know whether to hope that it rains or stays dry....
Have to apologize to some of you Thursday members...we ran a bit low on radishes when we were picking on Thursday, so some bunches were a bit skimpy, and a few people got hakurei turnips instead of radishes. Sorry about that! The shares are beginning to transition into some Fall vegetables, with Leeks in the share this week and some more Autumnal crops on the way for next week....
This week Bobbi (my wife) helped me out by finding some recipes to put in the blogs. She using some different websites than I do looking for recipes, so it's kind of a fresh take!
All Shares:
Corn- Sweet corn is back in all shares this week, with our next planting going strong now and lots of ears to pick. Last year our corn all came on so fast and early that we had no corn left to pick by mid September...I'm happy that this year we still have more sweet corn for the next several weeks!
Tomatoes- We "rogued" (cut out and removed) some plants that were starting to show signs of disease, and now with nothing but sunny days in the forecast, I am feeling good about the short term future of our tomato patch....with any luck we should continue to pick them for the rest of the month and into October.
Eggplants- I hope you're enjoying the eggplants in your share....this week I think we'll give you a slightly larger amount of them so that you can make a larger eggplant dish. http://www.thekitchn.com/8-simple-ways-to-cook-with-eggplant-154794
Lettuce- After a few weeks without lettuce, our next planting is on now and ready to be back in your shares for some nice lettuce salads.
Red potatoes- Last year was the first season we planted potatoes, and we didn't plant nearly enough and also had some pest issues that meant a lot of our spuds ended up unusable. This year has been much more successful, with many more tubers in much better shape.
http://damndelicious.net/2014/07/23/garlic-parmesan-roasted-potatoes/
Leeks- We grew some beautiful Fall leeks this year; I only wish we'd planted more of them. This time of year we are done planting, so I can see what we have left for the Fall and always begin wondering if we planted enough. We will certainly have plenty of leeks to put in your share a few more times. Here's another link from Bobbi, this one on how to clean your leeks once you get them home:
http://www.thekitchn.com/quick-tips-how-to-clean-leeks-54713
Parsley- a little bunch of parsley greens to round out the share....great for pepping up a dish.
In the Large Shares Only:
Cauliflower- What a nice run of cauliflower we've had this year. I didn't used to plant cauliflower for August and September harvest, having read in gardening books that it does poorly in the Summer. This is probably true of most of the U.S., but not here in the maritime Northwest where temperatures stay pretty cool. In fact, the late Summer cauliflower seems to be as nice as any we've had!
http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/spicy-cauliflower-stir-fry/
Strawberries- The strawberries, after being pretty negatively affected by the rains of a few weeks ago, combined with slowing down with the shorter days we're now having, looked to be closing up shop for the Summer. They are putting on a bunch of new flowers now though, and with some sun we are hopefully in for a bit of a renaissance. If it continues, I'll try to get berries back in small shares too in a future week!
Swiss chard- Our Fall bunch greens have rocketed into production and are producing some really nice greens for your shares this week.
Have to apologize to some of you Thursday members...we ran a bit low on radishes when we were picking on Thursday, so some bunches were a bit skimpy, and a few people got hakurei turnips instead of radishes. Sorry about that! The shares are beginning to transition into some Fall vegetables, with Leeks in the share this week and some more Autumnal crops on the way for next week....
This week Bobbi (my wife) helped me out by finding some recipes to put in the blogs. She using some different websites than I do looking for recipes, so it's kind of a fresh take!
All Shares:
Corn- Sweet corn is back in all shares this week, with our next planting going strong now and lots of ears to pick. Last year our corn all came on so fast and early that we had no corn left to pick by mid September...I'm happy that this year we still have more sweet corn for the next several weeks!
Tomatoes- We "rogued" (cut out and removed) some plants that were starting to show signs of disease, and now with nothing but sunny days in the forecast, I am feeling good about the short term future of our tomato patch....with any luck we should continue to pick them for the rest of the month and into October.
Eggplants- I hope you're enjoying the eggplants in your share....this week I think we'll give you a slightly larger amount of them so that you can make a larger eggplant dish. http://www.thekitchn.com/8-simple-ways-to-cook-with-eggplant-154794
Lettuce- After a few weeks without lettuce, our next planting is on now and ready to be back in your shares for some nice lettuce salads.
Red potatoes- Last year was the first season we planted potatoes, and we didn't plant nearly enough and also had some pest issues that meant a lot of our spuds ended up unusable. This year has been much more successful, with many more tubers in much better shape.
http://damndelicious.net/2014/07/23/garlic-parmesan-roasted-potatoes/
Leeks- We grew some beautiful Fall leeks this year; I only wish we'd planted more of them. This time of year we are done planting, so I can see what we have left for the Fall and always begin wondering if we planted enough. We will certainly have plenty of leeks to put in your share a few more times. Here's another link from Bobbi, this one on how to clean your leeks once you get them home:
http://www.thekitchn.com/quick-tips-how-to-clean-leeks-54713
Parsley- a little bunch of parsley greens to round out the share....great for pepping up a dish.
In the Large Shares Only:
Cauliflower- What a nice run of cauliflower we've had this year. I didn't used to plant cauliflower for August and September harvest, having read in gardening books that it does poorly in the Summer. This is probably true of most of the U.S., but not here in the maritime Northwest where temperatures stay pretty cool. In fact, the late Summer cauliflower seems to be as nice as any we've had!
http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/spicy-cauliflower-stir-fry/
Strawberries- The strawberries, after being pretty negatively affected by the rains of a few weeks ago, combined with slowing down with the shorter days we're now having, looked to be closing up shop for the Summer. They are putting on a bunch of new flowers now though, and with some sun we are hopefully in for a bit of a renaissance. If it continues, I'll try to get berries back in small shares too in a future week!
Swiss chard- Our Fall bunch greens have rocketed into production and are producing some really nice greens for your shares this week.
Week 15
The weather has been a trial lately....we made a bit of a desperation move and covered our tomato trellises with painter's plastic to keep the rain off of them....it seems to have worked, I removed the plastic earlier today and the plants looked great. We are trying to ward off Late Blight, a fungal disease which will kill the plants and thrives in cool, damp weather. Unlike many Puget Sound farms, we don't grow any of our crops in greenhouses or hoophouses. This is not entirely by choice; more just that I didn't have any greenhouses lying around, and have been able to grow crops pretty successfully without them and so I haven't been in a hurry to spend thousands of dollars on something I didn't really need. But last year when it began raining in late August our tomato plants went down fast....and it's made me much more nervous this year. Last year, though, it was so hot that the plants began fruiting much earlier, and were already pretty spent by this time. This year the plants seem to be very strong and healthy still, and just getting going, so I'm hopeful that we will have many more weeks of tomatoes. Also, the weather report, which initially looked like it would rain all this week, seems to be improving every time I look, so that doesn't hurt either.
In this week's share:
Heirloom tomatoes- Speaking of tomatoes, we should have some nice ones for this week's share. Being under the plastic helped keep the rain off the plants, but also I think stimulated them to ripen a bit, so it looks like there should be plenty of nice tomatoes this week.
Gypsy peppers- The gypsy peppers are so great...the plants are loaded with fruit, and the flavor is so good. Here is a webpage that doesn't have a ton of info, but has some links to some other good articles about how to use gypsy peppers....apparently they're especially popular in Northern California, which I didn't realize...http://www.thekitchn.com/what-can-i-do-with-gypsy-peppe-119538
Kale (Lacinato)- We are in the midst of clearing the fields and plowing in a lot of our Summer plantings to make room for Fall cover crop....that means we will be planting larger stands of grains and legumes to grow through the winter months and add fertility to the soil. But before we tilled in the Summer kale we thought we'd put it in the share one more time, so here you go!
Carrots- I'm very happy with the look of the Fall carrot beds...the roots seem to be densely planted, but not too dense to where they aren't able to size up. Looks like we will have lots of carrots over the next few months. http://www.marthastewart.com/274839/carrot-recipes
Ailsa Crag onions- These are the same yellow onions that have been in your share before, but now they have been brought in and dried down in the greenhouse for the last few weeks. They should store at room temperature for several weeks the way they are now. They are a sweet onion, though, so the flavor is nice and mild, but they won't keep for as long as storage varieties.
Radish- We have a new planting of radishes coming on. This time of year I love to have a cold dinner with some cheese and crackers and mixed vegetables like radish, carrot, cucumber, sliced peppers and tomatoes...in fact that's pretty much what Bobbie and I had for dinner tonight.
Lemon cucumber- I am hoping we will still be harvesting enough lemon cukes to give everyone at least one or two in their shares this week. The Summer squash and cucumbers are already beginning to slow down their fruiting quite a bit with the shorter days now.
Large Shares Only:
Melon- Large shares will get another of our Galia melons this week...while we are past the main burst of ripe melons, there are still some more coming ripe every day. We also planted a cantaloupe variety that hasn't even begun to ripen yet....I am hoping they do before it's too late!
Corn- Didn't have quite enough corn for all shares this week, either, as we are getting into a new planting of a larger bicolor variety and they are just getting started. Hope to have a few ears for each of the large shares, though. This variety has nice long ears. I sprained my finger and it makes it difficult to pick corn, so I've been making Jack do it.
Summer squash- As mentioned above, the summer squash has really slowed down, but I'm hoping we will have enough...if not, we'll find something else to sub in its place!
Summer squash?-
In this week's share:
Heirloom tomatoes- Speaking of tomatoes, we should have some nice ones for this week's share. Being under the plastic helped keep the rain off the plants, but also I think stimulated them to ripen a bit, so it looks like there should be plenty of nice tomatoes this week.
Gypsy peppers- The gypsy peppers are so great...the plants are loaded with fruit, and the flavor is so good. Here is a webpage that doesn't have a ton of info, but has some links to some other good articles about how to use gypsy peppers....apparently they're especially popular in Northern California, which I didn't realize...http://www.thekitchn.com/what-can-i-do-with-gypsy-peppe-119538
Kale (Lacinato)- We are in the midst of clearing the fields and plowing in a lot of our Summer plantings to make room for Fall cover crop....that means we will be planting larger stands of grains and legumes to grow through the winter months and add fertility to the soil. But before we tilled in the Summer kale we thought we'd put it in the share one more time, so here you go!
Carrots- I'm very happy with the look of the Fall carrot beds...the roots seem to be densely planted, but not too dense to where they aren't able to size up. Looks like we will have lots of carrots over the next few months. http://www.marthastewart.com/274839/carrot-recipes
Ailsa Crag onions- These are the same yellow onions that have been in your share before, but now they have been brought in and dried down in the greenhouse for the last few weeks. They should store at room temperature for several weeks the way they are now. They are a sweet onion, though, so the flavor is nice and mild, but they won't keep for as long as storage varieties.
Radish- We have a new planting of radishes coming on. This time of year I love to have a cold dinner with some cheese and crackers and mixed vegetables like radish, carrot, cucumber, sliced peppers and tomatoes...in fact that's pretty much what Bobbie and I had for dinner tonight.
Lemon cucumber- I am hoping we will still be harvesting enough lemon cukes to give everyone at least one or two in their shares this week. The Summer squash and cucumbers are already beginning to slow down their fruiting quite a bit with the shorter days now.
Large Shares Only:
Melon- Large shares will get another of our Galia melons this week...while we are past the main burst of ripe melons, there are still some more coming ripe every day. We also planted a cantaloupe variety that hasn't even begun to ripen yet....I am hoping they do before it's too late!
Corn- Didn't have quite enough corn for all shares this week, either, as we are getting into a new planting of a larger bicolor variety and they are just getting started. Hope to have a few ears for each of the large shares, though. This variety has nice long ears. I sprained my finger and it makes it difficult to pick corn, so I've been making Jack do it.
Summer squash- As mentioned above, the summer squash has really slowed down, but I'm hoping we will have enough...if not, we'll find something else to sub in its place!
Summer squash?-
Week 14 Farm Share
Many people think of the end of August as getting towards the end of Summer, because it's almost time for kids to go back to School, and the weather does cool off a bit.....but really Summer goes until late September and the Fall equinox...and nowhere is that more true than in Northwest gardening. Many of our Summer crops are just hitting their stride, with melons in the share for the first time this week, and eggplant and peppers starting to really produce. Unfortunately our basil seems to have bit the dust for the second year in a row, but hopefully the tomatoes will make it through this cool spell and produce for many more weeks...they are loaded with green fruit right now. And there are many more beds of sweet corn we haven't even begun to pick yet.
In years past many Farm share members have told us they sometimes got overwhelmed with too much produce...one reason we decided to offer the smaller share size was to try to offer an amount that was more manageable for people who don't have as much time to cook this time of year. I've now heard from several people that they would be happy to have more produce in their shares, though....so I have made this week's share a bit bigger. I'm pretty sure there's no size (or maybe even two sizes) that works perfectly for everyone...that said, I'd also love to hear your feedback about share size. Email me! As mentioned in the email, with Labor Day next Monday, I am thinking we will switch the pickup days to TUESDAY and Thursday. Don't forget!
In this week's share:
Savoy Cabbage- We grew some really nice "savoy" (crinkly leaved) green cabbages for late Summer, and they will be making an appearance in your share this week. Depending on the weather and how you're feeling, you could serve it up cold in a coleslaw, or warm in soup, dumplings, or stir fry. Use a Gypsy pepper from last week's share in this recipe if you still have one:
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/38021/thornehedge-peach-slaw/?internalSource=hn_carousel%2001_Thornehedge%20Peach%20Slaw&referringId=16326&referringContentType=recipe%20hub&referringPosition=carousel%2001
Beets- Beets haven't been in the share for a while....try making some nice cold Borscht for lunch on a warm day: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/borscht-357129
Cherry Tomatoes- The cherry tomatoes are really going full steam now, and the plants are covered in ripe fruit. I am just crossing my fingers that the plants are not negatively affected by any wet weather.....tomatoes are susceptible to late blight when the weather turns cool and damp, especially when they are putting a ton of energy into fruiting. If we can avoid blight they should continue to produce into October, but last year it took them down hard!
Galia Melon- These delicious Israeli melons are similar to a honeydew, but way better than anything called honeydew in the grocery store! They are sweet and flavorful, with a nice juicy but firm green flesh. One of my favorite treats of late Summer! We also grew a cantaloupe variety which isn't ready yet, but hopefully will be in the coming weeks.
Eggplant- Our eggplants didn't get started quite as early as last year, but man they are productive right now. They are one of my favorite vegetables. I like to cut them into pieces, sprinkle on some salt and press out some of the water it draws out with a clean cloth, and fry them in some olive oil with garlic. Here are some other recipes to try out! http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/chickpea-and-eggplant-salad
http://www.marthastewart.com/274258/eggplant-recipes
Sweet Corn- The corn keeps on coming....we are picking out of new rows now, with maybe a new variety but I'm pretty sure it's still a bicolor. I also planted some white corn for later, and we planted some dry corn for Vincent that he brought back from a Slow Food conference in Italy....he's hoping to grind it into cornmeal for polenta if we can grow enough.
Lettuce- This is the toughest time of year to have a steady supply of lettuce, but I'm hoping we have enough to put a nice head in all of the shares this week! Make a salad or two...
In the Large Shares:
Lemon Cucumbers- We have some really nice lemon cukes on now. These round, yellow cucumbers are great for eating right out of your hand, like an apple....the thin skin doesn't need to be peeled. They can also be used in any recipe that you would use other cucumbers for.
Ailsa Crag onions- We have gotten almost all of our onions out of the field now, before this week's expected rain. The garlic has been out of the field for many weeks...so the leeks are the lone allium family plant still out in the ground now. Enjoy these sweet juicy yellow onions!
Red Potatoes- We are continuing to work on digging all of our potatoes, but only fingerlings are left to bring in. Our red potatoes turned out really nice, and we have many bins full of them to wash and clear out before winter!
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/76954/roasted-new-red-potatoes/
In years past many Farm share members have told us they sometimes got overwhelmed with too much produce...one reason we decided to offer the smaller share size was to try to offer an amount that was more manageable for people who don't have as much time to cook this time of year. I've now heard from several people that they would be happy to have more produce in their shares, though....so I have made this week's share a bit bigger. I'm pretty sure there's no size (or maybe even two sizes) that works perfectly for everyone...that said, I'd also love to hear your feedback about share size. Email me! As mentioned in the email, with Labor Day next Monday, I am thinking we will switch the pickup days to TUESDAY and Thursday. Don't forget!
In this week's share:
Savoy Cabbage- We grew some really nice "savoy" (crinkly leaved) green cabbages for late Summer, and they will be making an appearance in your share this week. Depending on the weather and how you're feeling, you could serve it up cold in a coleslaw, or warm in soup, dumplings, or stir fry. Use a Gypsy pepper from last week's share in this recipe if you still have one:
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/38021/thornehedge-peach-slaw/?internalSource=hn_carousel%2001_Thornehedge%20Peach%20Slaw&referringId=16326&referringContentType=recipe%20hub&referringPosition=carousel%2001
Beets- Beets haven't been in the share for a while....try making some nice cold Borscht for lunch on a warm day: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/borscht-357129
Cherry Tomatoes- The cherry tomatoes are really going full steam now, and the plants are covered in ripe fruit. I am just crossing my fingers that the plants are not negatively affected by any wet weather.....tomatoes are susceptible to late blight when the weather turns cool and damp, especially when they are putting a ton of energy into fruiting. If we can avoid blight they should continue to produce into October, but last year it took them down hard!
Galia Melon- These delicious Israeli melons are similar to a honeydew, but way better than anything called honeydew in the grocery store! They are sweet and flavorful, with a nice juicy but firm green flesh. One of my favorite treats of late Summer! We also grew a cantaloupe variety which isn't ready yet, but hopefully will be in the coming weeks.
Eggplant- Our eggplants didn't get started quite as early as last year, but man they are productive right now. They are one of my favorite vegetables. I like to cut them into pieces, sprinkle on some salt and press out some of the water it draws out with a clean cloth, and fry them in some olive oil with garlic. Here are some other recipes to try out! http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/chickpea-and-eggplant-salad
http://www.marthastewart.com/274258/eggplant-recipes
Sweet Corn- The corn keeps on coming....we are picking out of new rows now, with maybe a new variety but I'm pretty sure it's still a bicolor. I also planted some white corn for later, and we planted some dry corn for Vincent that he brought back from a Slow Food conference in Italy....he's hoping to grind it into cornmeal for polenta if we can grow enough.
Lettuce- This is the toughest time of year to have a steady supply of lettuce, but I'm hoping we have enough to put a nice head in all of the shares this week! Make a salad or two...
In the Large Shares:
Lemon Cucumbers- We have some really nice lemon cukes on now. These round, yellow cucumbers are great for eating right out of your hand, like an apple....the thin skin doesn't need to be peeled. They can also be used in any recipe that you would use other cucumbers for.
Ailsa Crag onions- We have gotten almost all of our onions out of the field now, before this week's expected rain. The garlic has been out of the field for many weeks...so the leeks are the lone allium family plant still out in the ground now. Enjoy these sweet juicy yellow onions!
Red Potatoes- We are continuing to work on digging all of our potatoes, but only fingerlings are left to bring in. Our red potatoes turned out really nice, and we have many bins full of them to wash and clear out before winter!
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/76954/roasted-new-red-potatoes/
Lucky number 13
Late Summer Shares are in full swing! Last week's share seemed extra big, so I am trying to dial back the size a bit this week....
Cauliflower- Oh boy, we are harvesting so much cauliflower right now. It is rewarding, because the heads are beautiful and satisfying to grow, but tiring to pick as they are heavy, delicate, and hiding in an ocean of green leaves.
Lettuce- Our late Summer lettuce is doing much better than in years past. With each year I am getting better at timing our lettuce plantings, and this year has been great. It also helps that they're not getting eaten by deer this summer.
Carrot- A smaller bunch of carrots, which have been missing from the share for several weeks, so I hope you're happy to see them back!
Parsley- We haven't had any parsley in the share for a very long time,
Tomato- More of our heirloom tomatoes this week...get em while you can! The rain this time last year really knocked our tomatoes out early, so I am grateful for the dry forecast...
Corn- Hope you liked the Vitality corn last week, because we have more of the same. These have been the most productive corn beds we've ever had on the farm! We gave them some extra fertility and water and it's paying off....
Onion- Our torpedo red bottle onions are beginning to dry down, so they will have a bit more kick but still pretty sweet and mild.
LARGE SHARES:
Gypsy Pepper- More of our sweet Gypsy peppers. They are starting to ripen and redden up now, actually turning a deeper red than I've usually seen them in the past. Leave them out on the counter to let them sweeten up if you like. Great raw!
Summer squash- Just one or two medium sized zucchini for grilling up or whatever you like.
Green pole beans- These beans are growing along the patio at the Orchard Kitchen, and they're really beautiful. They're about 7' tall, and it's nice not having to bend down to pick them! Plus they have more bean-y flavor and crunch than a bush green bean. Really good!
Enjoy!
Cauliflower- Oh boy, we are harvesting so much cauliflower right now. It is rewarding, because the heads are beautiful and satisfying to grow, but tiring to pick as they are heavy, delicate, and hiding in an ocean of green leaves.
Lettuce- Our late Summer lettuce is doing much better than in years past. With each year I am getting better at timing our lettuce plantings, and this year has been great. It also helps that they're not getting eaten by deer this summer.
Carrot- A smaller bunch of carrots, which have been missing from the share for several weeks, so I hope you're happy to see them back!
Parsley- We haven't had any parsley in the share for a very long time,
Tomato- More of our heirloom tomatoes this week...get em while you can! The rain this time last year really knocked our tomatoes out early, so I am grateful for the dry forecast...
Corn- Hope you liked the Vitality corn last week, because we have more of the same. These have been the most productive corn beds we've ever had on the farm! We gave them some extra fertility and water and it's paying off....
Onion- Our torpedo red bottle onions are beginning to dry down, so they will have a bit more kick but still pretty sweet and mild.
LARGE SHARES:
Gypsy Pepper- More of our sweet Gypsy peppers. They are starting to ripen and redden up now, actually turning a deeper red than I've usually seen them in the past. Leave them out on the counter to let them sweeten up if you like. Great raw!
Summer squash- Just one or two medium sized zucchini for grilling up or whatever you like.
Green pole beans- These beans are growing along the patio at the Orchard Kitchen, and they're really beautiful. They're about 7' tall, and it's nice not having to bend down to pick them! Plus they have more bean-y flavor and crunch than a bush green bean. Really good!
Enjoy!
Farm Share Number 12
This week marks the twelfth farm share, which means we are about halfway through the season! Still a lot of produce to come, with new crops just coming on, and others we haven't even begun picking yet. This warm weather should really help to get our late Summer crops like tomatoes and corn into full production. We will plant the last few trays of lettuce for Fall harvest this coming week, and seed the last round of our fast greens. After that we will be done with all our plantings and until we begin planting our garlic for 2017 in the Fall!
In this week's share:
Sweet Corn! As promised, we are now picking our first planting of sweet corn and will have at least two ears for each share! This is a bicolor variety named Vitality that I always plant for our first succession...it grows well even in cooler Northwest weather and always produces nice early ears. They are a bit smaller than the ears from our midseason varieties, but very tasty! Throw some on the grill and serve with butter and salt, or with chili and lime.
Eggplant- Oh boy, am I excited for eggplant season. Eggplant is one of my favorite vegetables to eat, and it is fun to grow and harvest too. Eggplant is in the same Solanaceae family as tomatoes and peppers but loves the heat even more. This variety is new to me, we got the seeds from our friends at Deep Harvest Farm in Freeland who produce their own seeds to sell at local nurseries like Bayview Farm and Garden. Look for them next Spring if you're a home gardener! Bobbi may be making us some Ratatouille later tonight, with corn, tomatoes, pepper, squash, eggplant, and basil... http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/ratatouille-12164
Cherry Tomatoes- Our multi colored cherry tomatoes are back in the share...they started ripening early, but were really slowed down by the cool week we had at the beginning of the month. The farm share, the Orchard Kitchen, and the farm stand customers are all calling for more tomatoes.... I am hoping this warm sunny weather means we will have loads of tomatoes very soon.
Arugula- It has been a while since arugula appeared in the shares, I thought some nice peppery arugula sounded like a good compliment with cucumbers and tomatoes and corn. Some great recipes to check out in this blog post! http://www.thekitchn.com/crazy-for-arugula-9-recipes-to-118826
Cucumbers- I am very glad to be putting cucumbers in the share this week, because we are still picking so many of them we can't get rid of them fast enough! They are coming on strong. Hope you're enjoying our mix of varieties, the small blond Boothby's, the smooth green thin skinned Adam, and the more familiar Marketmore. In a few weeks we have a later planting of Lemon cukes that should get going for late August and early September cukes.
Fingerling Potatoes- We have begun doing our big potato dig, bringing in the storage tubers to hold and use through the Fall and Winter. On Thursday we picked a 100' row of our yellow potatoes and brought in well over 500 lbs of spuds! These fingerlings should still be pretty thin skinned like new potatoes, as we just mowed the greens and we will be digging the potatoes fresh for your bags....but in the coming months the potatoes will cure, becoming a bit drier and starchier with thicker skins as they do so. Fingerling potatoes are great for roasting, boiling, frying, or sautéing!
'
In the LARGE shares:
Lettuce- Not sure which variety we'll be cutting this week, but this will add a bit more greenstuff to your large shares for salad making!
Hakurei Turnip- The Japanese turnips continue to be great throughout the Summer, and we should have some nice ones this week. The tops are still tender and nice for stir frying or braising too!
Ailsa Crag Onions- We are also beginning to work on preparing our onions for storage, too.... Last week we crimped the necks so that they begin to dry down....this week I am hoping we have time to pull them out of the ground and "windrow" them in the field; putting them into an organized strip to dry out on the surface of the soil. After that we will clean them, cutting off the tops and roots and taking off any dirt, and bring them in to finish drying. These Ailsas should be able to cure well enough to hold until at least mid October or so, while true storage onion ("Copra") should hopefully store much longer than that, until January or beyond.
next- kale lettuce
In this week's share:
Sweet Corn! As promised, we are now picking our first planting of sweet corn and will have at least two ears for each share! This is a bicolor variety named Vitality that I always plant for our first succession...it grows well even in cooler Northwest weather and always produces nice early ears. They are a bit smaller than the ears from our midseason varieties, but very tasty! Throw some on the grill and serve with butter and salt, or with chili and lime.
Eggplant- Oh boy, am I excited for eggplant season. Eggplant is one of my favorite vegetables to eat, and it is fun to grow and harvest too. Eggplant is in the same Solanaceae family as tomatoes and peppers but loves the heat even more. This variety is new to me, we got the seeds from our friends at Deep Harvest Farm in Freeland who produce their own seeds to sell at local nurseries like Bayview Farm and Garden. Look for them next Spring if you're a home gardener! Bobbi may be making us some Ratatouille later tonight, with corn, tomatoes, pepper, squash, eggplant, and basil... http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/ratatouille-12164
Cherry Tomatoes- Our multi colored cherry tomatoes are back in the share...they started ripening early, but were really slowed down by the cool week we had at the beginning of the month. The farm share, the Orchard Kitchen, and the farm stand customers are all calling for more tomatoes.... I am hoping this warm sunny weather means we will have loads of tomatoes very soon.
Arugula- It has been a while since arugula appeared in the shares, I thought some nice peppery arugula sounded like a good compliment with cucumbers and tomatoes and corn. Some great recipes to check out in this blog post! http://www.thekitchn.com/crazy-for-arugula-9-recipes-to-118826
Cucumbers- I am very glad to be putting cucumbers in the share this week, because we are still picking so many of them we can't get rid of them fast enough! They are coming on strong. Hope you're enjoying our mix of varieties, the small blond Boothby's, the smooth green thin skinned Adam, and the more familiar Marketmore. In a few weeks we have a later planting of Lemon cukes that should get going for late August and early September cukes.
Fingerling Potatoes- We have begun doing our big potato dig, bringing in the storage tubers to hold and use through the Fall and Winter. On Thursday we picked a 100' row of our yellow potatoes and brought in well over 500 lbs of spuds! These fingerlings should still be pretty thin skinned like new potatoes, as we just mowed the greens and we will be digging the potatoes fresh for your bags....but in the coming months the potatoes will cure, becoming a bit drier and starchier with thicker skins as they do so. Fingerling potatoes are great for roasting, boiling, frying, or sautéing!
'
In the LARGE shares:
Lettuce- Not sure which variety we'll be cutting this week, but this will add a bit more greenstuff to your large shares for salad making!
Hakurei Turnip- The Japanese turnips continue to be great throughout the Summer, and we should have some nice ones this week. The tops are still tender and nice for stir frying or braising too!
Ailsa Crag Onions- We are also beginning to work on preparing our onions for storage, too.... Last week we crimped the necks so that they begin to dry down....this week I am hoping we have time to pull them out of the ground and "windrow" them in the field; putting them into an organized strip to dry out on the surface of the soil. After that we will clean them, cutting off the tops and roots and taking off any dirt, and bring them in to finish drying. These Ailsas should be able to cure well enough to hold until at least mid October or so, while true storage onion ("Copra") should hopefully store much longer than that, until January or beyond.
next- kale lettuce
Week Eleven...
We are starting to clear up some space on the farm- we've mowed or tilled in our older strawberry beds, most of the Spring peas and brassicas, and a lot of the beds of greens we were harvesting from earlier in the year. We are also now beginning the big late Summer project of clearing and bringing in storage crops like potatoes and onions. It makes our lives easier! Fewer beds to water and weed! More open space, where I hope to soon be planting cover crop which will grow through the Fall and Winter and add nutrients and organic matter to the soil for next year.
I was really hoping we would have corn for the farm shares this week! I ate my first ear of corn just a few days ago, and it is ripening quickly....but isn't quite there yet. Hopefully by this weekend we will have some in the farm stand, and then it should definitely be in the farm share next week.
Tomatoes- Some of our larger heirloom tomatoes will be in the share this week...great for putting in a salad or a sandwich, or just eating by themselves with a little salt and pepper. These tomato varieties are sometimes a little funny looking with odd shapes and colors, but their flavor is way better than the tomatoes in the grocery store! Don't put them in the fridge, just leave them out at room temperature until you're ready to use them as you would other fruit.
Gypsy peppers- Eventually, our gypsy peppers turn a beautiful coral orange color and are very sweet, but these ones were picked a bit early to thin the fruit set and let the plants ripen other fruits...while they aren't as sweet, they're great to use like you would a green pepper and have a nice bit of tartness.
Basil- We are overwhelmed with so much basil this year! I planted extra because last year most of our basil died mysteriously and suddenly, and I wanted to make sure we had plenty this year. Boy, do we ever. I like this article on how to make a small batch of pesto:
http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2014/08/06/bite-of-minnesota-small-batch-basil-pesto/
Torpedo Red Bottle Onion- More of our torpedo onions....they are beginning to dry down now for harvest and storage, so the tops are no longer as nice as they were a month ago. We will probably chop the tops off for you and give them out as loose onions.
Summer squash- I hope you're not tired of zucchini yet! Remember, we only have it for two or three months of the year, so enjoy it while you can...our squash harvest has actually gone really well this year, and we have so far not been overwhelmed with buckets of extra squash. I am trying to get a little better every year to plant the perfect amount of things, so that we have enough but are not buried in extra or fretting about waste. Every year there is a week or two of Summer where we just have so much food....right now! But generally, we're dialing it in over time.
http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/recipe-collections-favorites/popular-ingredients/zucchini-recipes/orzo-salad-zucchini-feta-0
Yellow wax beans- Fresh bean season is even shorter than zucchini season, but great while it's here. Martha Stewart has been noticeably absent from the blog, but she's back with some bean recipes:
http://www.marthastewart.com/275532/green-bean-recipes
...
Cauliflower- We have some beautiful cauliflower coming out of the field right now, plenty to go in the large shares. In the past I haven't grown much broccoli and cauliflower in August because we have so many other crops to pick, but it's doing great and it's nice to have it.
Strawberries- So many strawberries to pick, so little time. With our new beds on, we have been very busy trying to stay on top of it.
Spinach- After several beds of spinach that weren't very productive (I think the spot was a little less fertile, plus the long days of June tend to make spinach flower early) we have a beautiful new bed on, perfect for bunching! Here's a funny recipe that will use up your basil, too....and some tomatoes if you use them instead or in addition to the sundried tomatoes it calls for:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/feta-spinach-and-basil-omelette-muffins
I was really hoping we would have corn for the farm shares this week! I ate my first ear of corn just a few days ago, and it is ripening quickly....but isn't quite there yet. Hopefully by this weekend we will have some in the farm stand, and then it should definitely be in the farm share next week.
Tomatoes- Some of our larger heirloom tomatoes will be in the share this week...great for putting in a salad or a sandwich, or just eating by themselves with a little salt and pepper. These tomato varieties are sometimes a little funny looking with odd shapes and colors, but their flavor is way better than the tomatoes in the grocery store! Don't put them in the fridge, just leave them out at room temperature until you're ready to use them as you would other fruit.
Gypsy peppers- Eventually, our gypsy peppers turn a beautiful coral orange color and are very sweet, but these ones were picked a bit early to thin the fruit set and let the plants ripen other fruits...while they aren't as sweet, they're great to use like you would a green pepper and have a nice bit of tartness.
Basil- We are overwhelmed with so much basil this year! I planted extra because last year most of our basil died mysteriously and suddenly, and I wanted to make sure we had plenty this year. Boy, do we ever. I like this article on how to make a small batch of pesto:
http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2014/08/06/bite-of-minnesota-small-batch-basil-pesto/
Torpedo Red Bottle Onion- More of our torpedo onions....they are beginning to dry down now for harvest and storage, so the tops are no longer as nice as they were a month ago. We will probably chop the tops off for you and give them out as loose onions.
Summer squash- I hope you're not tired of zucchini yet! Remember, we only have it for two or three months of the year, so enjoy it while you can...our squash harvest has actually gone really well this year, and we have so far not been overwhelmed with buckets of extra squash. I am trying to get a little better every year to plant the perfect amount of things, so that we have enough but are not buried in extra or fretting about waste. Every year there is a week or two of Summer where we just have so much food....right now! But generally, we're dialing it in over time.
http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/recipe-collections-favorites/popular-ingredients/zucchini-recipes/orzo-salad-zucchini-feta-0
Yellow wax beans- Fresh bean season is even shorter than zucchini season, but great while it's here. Martha Stewart has been noticeably absent from the blog, but she's back with some bean recipes:
http://www.marthastewart.com/275532/green-bean-recipes
...
Cauliflower- We have some beautiful cauliflower coming out of the field right now, plenty to go in the large shares. In the past I haven't grown much broccoli and cauliflower in August because we have so many other crops to pick, but it's doing great and it's nice to have it.
Strawberries- So many strawberries to pick, so little time. With our new beds on, we have been very busy trying to stay on top of it.
Spinach- After several beds of spinach that weren't very productive (I think the spot was a little less fertile, plus the long days of June tend to make spinach flower early) we have a beautiful new bed on, perfect for bunching! Here's a funny recipe that will use up your basil, too....and some tomatoes if you use them instead or in addition to the sundried tomatoes it calls for:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/feta-spinach-and-basil-omelette-muffins
Blog for Week 10
I am trying to get this published before going in to harvest at the farm this morning, so I haven't had time to put in recipes! Fortunately, this week's share is mostly easy and straight forward stuff that shouldn't be hard to use up....
IN ALL SHARES-
Cherry tomatoes- Our early cherry tomatoes are finally producing enough that I hope to have enough for all shares. We grow mostly Sungold cherry tomatoes (the round orange ones) but this year we've added a mix of some other colors, mostly at the request of Vincent, chef of the Orchard Kitchen and a big fan of our tomatoes. Don't store tomatoes in the fridge! They're best left out at room temperature.
Lettuce- We are into a nice new bed of head lettuce with lots of Bergam's green, our big dense Greenleaf lettuce.
Snap peas- I think this marks the end of the Super Sugar snap peas in the farm share for this year...we are into our final planting, and they are already beginning to slow down with the hot dry weather. We've had a good run this year, and we have more rotations of beans for late Summer!
Carrots- The beds of carrots we're picking out of now got a bit weedier than we were expecting....beginning last year we started having problems with a terrible weedy bunch grass, especially in the carrot beds. It is a real pain in the neck. This grass goes from tiny to huge in no time, and has a big root system that makes it really hard to pull out without disturbing the crops. So the carrot size is not quite as consistent as usual, because some of the weedier sections sized up a bit slower than others....that said, they are very nice carrots that are otherwise tasty and pretty.
Garlic- More of our Softneck garlic....our garlic has all been harvested from the field now, but we've gotten so busy in the last few weeks we still haven't had time to clean our last variety....it's just sitting in a cart waiting to be cleaned and hung up in the barn and has been for weeks. Oh well, we'll get to it sooner or later.....this is one of our earlier varieties that has been hanging for over a month, and should be almost fully cured.
Broccoli- Not having been on the farm since Friday morning, I'm not really sure how much broccoli to expect this week, but I think we'll have enough to get at least a small head in all shares...
Cucumbers- Cucumbers are back in the share....they are quickly racing towards peak production, so we may be picking a whole lot of cukes very soon. Right next door, our melon plants are looking great and will hopefully be ripening fruit soon...we are also experimenting with growing some pickling cukes for Britt's pickles right now! Let me know if you are a big pickling fan if you'd be interested in buying a case of pickling cukes sometime in the next few weeks.
IN THE LARGE SHARES-
Celery- I am always very excited for the first celery in the Summer. Celery is a trickier crop that takes quite a while to reach harvestable size (we seeded the tiny celery seeds way back in early March), but there is such a difference in quality from the grocery store celery. Right now the stems are flavorful and crunchy, but not quite as big and juicy as they will be later on. Great for eating raw or cooking...
Radish- With so many veggies in season now, it's been a little while since radishes have appeared in the share.
Green onion- These are from our second planting of scallions....I don't think we'd ever done a later planting of them before, but we decided to this year, on a whim. I'm glad we did...it's nice to have more scallions now for mid Summer, since our first bed has been done for a few weeks now.
Enjoy!
IN ALL SHARES-
Cherry tomatoes- Our early cherry tomatoes are finally producing enough that I hope to have enough for all shares. We grow mostly Sungold cherry tomatoes (the round orange ones) but this year we've added a mix of some other colors, mostly at the request of Vincent, chef of the Orchard Kitchen and a big fan of our tomatoes. Don't store tomatoes in the fridge! They're best left out at room temperature.
Lettuce- We are into a nice new bed of head lettuce with lots of Bergam's green, our big dense Greenleaf lettuce.
Snap peas- I think this marks the end of the Super Sugar snap peas in the farm share for this year...we are into our final planting, and they are already beginning to slow down with the hot dry weather. We've had a good run this year, and we have more rotations of beans for late Summer!
Carrots- The beds of carrots we're picking out of now got a bit weedier than we were expecting....beginning last year we started having problems with a terrible weedy bunch grass, especially in the carrot beds. It is a real pain in the neck. This grass goes from tiny to huge in no time, and has a big root system that makes it really hard to pull out without disturbing the crops. So the carrot size is not quite as consistent as usual, because some of the weedier sections sized up a bit slower than others....that said, they are very nice carrots that are otherwise tasty and pretty.
Garlic- More of our Softneck garlic....our garlic has all been harvested from the field now, but we've gotten so busy in the last few weeks we still haven't had time to clean our last variety....it's just sitting in a cart waiting to be cleaned and hung up in the barn and has been for weeks. Oh well, we'll get to it sooner or later.....this is one of our earlier varieties that has been hanging for over a month, and should be almost fully cured.
Broccoli- Not having been on the farm since Friday morning, I'm not really sure how much broccoli to expect this week, but I think we'll have enough to get at least a small head in all shares...
Cucumbers- Cucumbers are back in the share....they are quickly racing towards peak production, so we may be picking a whole lot of cukes very soon. Right next door, our melon plants are looking great and will hopefully be ripening fruit soon...we are also experimenting with growing some pickling cukes for Britt's pickles right now! Let me know if you are a big pickling fan if you'd be interested in buying a case of pickling cukes sometime in the next few weeks.
IN THE LARGE SHARES-
Celery- I am always very excited for the first celery in the Summer. Celery is a trickier crop that takes quite a while to reach harvestable size (we seeded the tiny celery seeds way back in early March), but there is such a difference in quality from the grocery store celery. Right now the stems are flavorful and crunchy, but not quite as big and juicy as they will be later on. Great for eating raw or cooking...
Radish- With so many veggies in season now, it's been a little while since radishes have appeared in the share.
Green onion- These are from our second planting of scallions....I don't think we'd ever done a later planting of them before, but we decided to this year, on a whim. I'm glad we did...it's nice to have more scallions now for mid Summer, since our first bed has been done for a few weeks now.
Enjoy!
WEEK NINE
The growing season continues to chug along, and I am very happy with how everything is growing these days. The crops are looking happy and growing fast, and it looks like there is a lot of food in our future. The tomatoes are getting going and will make their first appearance in the large shares this week, but with lots more to come. Strawberries are super abundant right now, with the new beds that we planted this Spring beginning to yield heavily, and the older beds from last year still going strong. The late Summer crops, like melons, peppers, and eggplants, all of which had a few struggles early on in times of cool wet weather, are now looking great and should be yielding before too long. And the potato and winter squash field, in our new acreage at the bottom of the property, is just unbelievable.
I am also very happy because we are soon reaching the end of the ultra busy season for us farmers....early Spring takes a lot of planning and thinking, but not too much work, with planting and seeding and weeding to do, but not much harvest....late Summer and early Fall are pretty busy, but we're mostly just harvesting all the time, so while it can be tiring, we're basically on auto pilot and just getting through the pick list every day. It is primarily June and July that can be pretty stressful and crazy, with so much to harvest that the work can never end, but still lots of planning and thinking to do for seeding schedules, weeding, planting, tractoring, watering, and everything else. August and September are a very happy time, when we have lots of food, a lot of work to do, but time to enjoy the Summer too before it's over.
This coming weekend marks Bobbi and my six month wedding anniversary, which we are going to celebrate by going on a float trip down the Nooksack river (in Whatcom county) with a bunch of friends, including Jack and Whitney.
Here is what's in your share for this week:Strawberries! As mentioned above, lots of strawberries right now. Keeps us busy, as they are pretty time consuming to pick, but delicious to eat!
New potatoes- Our potato field is really rockin' right now, and we are digging up some very pretty tubers. I was going to make steamed potatoes and pan fried fish for dinner tonight, but by the time I got home Bobbie and I were both too tired to cook or bother with dinner! I don't think I used this recipe before for oven roasted new potatoes, right?
http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/roasted_new_potatoes/
Beets- Beets are a tricky veggie to decide when to put in the share. Most people love beets, and I'd say they're one of the more popular things we grow...but there are those folks who are beet haters and would rather never have beets in their share. I try to find a balance and not put them in the share too often. If you are a beet hater, keep trying a new recipe every now and then! Maybe you'll find one you love...it happened that way with my mom. This week's bunch has red beets and Chioggia, the pink candy striped beet with a really sweet flavor.
Ailsa crag onions- These gigantic onions are really great...they aren't quite as sweet and juicy as the walla wallas, but they keep better, and have a bit more onion flavor so they are a great all purpose onion. And as you will see, they have grown to an amazing size this year!
Red Russian Kale- We have heaps of summer kale that we grew hoping to wholesale to Georgie Smith at Willowod Farm. Her kale always gets pretty cruddy in the summer time, between dry windy conditions on the prairie and pest issues. So we planted tons of kale for her, and lo and behold this year her kale is growing great through the Summer. You win some, you lose some...anyone want a 50 lb case of kale?
http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/recipe-collections-favorites/popular-ingredients/
Zucchini- The squash is really going full speed now, and we are struggling to keep up with harvest! That is just how it always goes with summer squash this time of year though....
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/photos/our-best-zucchini-recipes.page-5.html
And in the LARGE shares only-
Cauliflower- Some nice summer cauliflower to go in the large shares. http://allrecipes.com/recipe/54675/roasted-garlic-cauliflower/
Tomatoes!! Our very first heirloom tomatoes of the year...we just harvested today and they look beautiful. Like many of the crops, they start at a slow trickle and then quickly build steam....so hopefully we will have enough tomatoes to put in all the shares next week!
This week the large shares will get more potatoes, onions, and zucchini than the smaller shares!
Blog for Farm Share Week 8
I can tell we are getting into the high Summer season, because it is starting to get difficult to limit the number of items in the shares. It is great to be able to offer so much stuff in the share this week, and many Summery things (green beans, cucumbers, fresh red onions, basil).
Friday afternoons I walk around the farm and try to come up with an idea of what will be in the share the following week. For the Thursday shares though, this is trying to look 6 days into the future, which can sometimes be difficult, and sometimes I blow it. Case in point; the broccoli last week. I could see that we would have plenty of broccoli for Monday shares, but thought that by Thursday the next beds would be on and ready to harvest. I was wrong! We ended up having very little broccoli for Thursday, and I had overpromised it, so we had to make the last minute call to put purple cabbage in the shares instead....unfortunate, because Monday shares had already gotten broccoli....so this week we will try to right our wrongs by giving out more broccoli on Thursday.
Planning for the farm share, I've found the best approach is to just be a bit flexible and roll with the punches that the weather, the crops, the wholesale orders, and the pests might throw at us. Thanks for understanding if your bag differs slightly from this blog!
This week's share:
Green beans- Our first picking of fresh green beans! These beans are very fresh and tender with a great taste. Much better than the ones at the grocery store, we promise! Great just lightly steamed or raw, but here are some recipes just in case: http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/recipe-collections-favorites/popular-ingredients/green-bean-recipes
Cucumbers- Finally! After several weeks of waiting, I am hopeful that we'll be picking enough cucumbers to give everyone at least one. Cucumbers coming on feel like the true beginning of Summer to me. Easy to throw on a salad or sandwich. Like, an English tea cucumber sandwich... http://allrecipes.com/recipe/220775/english-tea-cucumber-sandwiches/
Broccoli/ purple cabbage- As mentioned above, I blew it last week on the broccoli. Trying to even it up this week, so it will be a bit complicated: Monday small shares will be getting purple cabbage, Thursday small shares and all large shares will be getting broccoli.
Lettuce- Head lettuce is back in the shares. Bobbi and I just had a lettuce salad for dinner with a nice dressing that Bobbi made. It had (approximately) a tablespoon of mayonnaise, 3 tablespoons of plain yogurt, 1 teaspoon olive oil, 1 teaspoon of rice vinegar, and some finely chopped fresh herbs; basil, parsley, sage, lovage, and tarragon. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Torpedo Red Bottle Onions- These are a really great Italian heirloom sweet onion. They have a very mild (not too onion-y) flavor that is great raw or lightly grilled. Named for their bottle like shape...these onions have very nice tops, too that are usable in place of green onions.
Basil- The basil is really popping off on the farm right now, so we will be giving small shares a generous bunch and large shares a big bag of basil, with enough to make a batch of pesto: http://damndelicious.net/2014/07/05/easy-homemade-pesto/
IN THE LARGE SHARES>>>!
Strawberries- Besides getting a big bag of basil for pesto, large shares will also include a pint of strawberries this week! I believe all shares will have strawberries in them next week...the strawberry plants seem to be heading quickly towards their peak season. They are really tasty right now...very shiny, red and beautiful.
Napa cabbage- Our first planting of Napa cabbage all bit the dust before we could even harvest any...it bolted (started flowering) early before heading up. Our newest planting looks good...the heads seem to be getting tight and should be ready for harvest this week.
Snap peas- A pint of snap peas in your share this week! The snap peas go through July, but seem to seldom last very long into August, when conditions just get too hot and dry for them to thrive. Enjoy them while you can!
Friday afternoons I walk around the farm and try to come up with an idea of what will be in the share the following week. For the Thursday shares though, this is trying to look 6 days into the future, which can sometimes be difficult, and sometimes I blow it. Case in point; the broccoli last week. I could see that we would have plenty of broccoli for Monday shares, but thought that by Thursday the next beds would be on and ready to harvest. I was wrong! We ended up having very little broccoli for Thursday, and I had overpromised it, so we had to make the last minute call to put purple cabbage in the shares instead....unfortunate, because Monday shares had already gotten broccoli....so this week we will try to right our wrongs by giving out more broccoli on Thursday.
Planning for the farm share, I've found the best approach is to just be a bit flexible and roll with the punches that the weather, the crops, the wholesale orders, and the pests might throw at us. Thanks for understanding if your bag differs slightly from this blog!
This week's share:
Green beans- Our first picking of fresh green beans! These beans are very fresh and tender with a great taste. Much better than the ones at the grocery store, we promise! Great just lightly steamed or raw, but here are some recipes just in case: http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/recipe-collections-favorites/popular-ingredients/green-bean-recipes
Cucumbers- Finally! After several weeks of waiting, I am hopeful that we'll be picking enough cucumbers to give everyone at least one. Cucumbers coming on feel like the true beginning of Summer to me. Easy to throw on a salad or sandwich. Like, an English tea cucumber sandwich... http://allrecipes.com/recipe/220775/english-tea-cucumber-sandwiches/
Broccoli/ purple cabbage- As mentioned above, I blew it last week on the broccoli. Trying to even it up this week, so it will be a bit complicated: Monday small shares will be getting purple cabbage, Thursday small shares and all large shares will be getting broccoli.
Lettuce- Head lettuce is back in the shares. Bobbi and I just had a lettuce salad for dinner with a nice dressing that Bobbi made. It had (approximately) a tablespoon of mayonnaise, 3 tablespoons of plain yogurt, 1 teaspoon olive oil, 1 teaspoon of rice vinegar, and some finely chopped fresh herbs; basil, parsley, sage, lovage, and tarragon. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Torpedo Red Bottle Onions- These are a really great Italian heirloom sweet onion. They have a very mild (not too onion-y) flavor that is great raw or lightly grilled. Named for their bottle like shape...these onions have very nice tops, too that are usable in place of green onions.
Basil- The basil is really popping off on the farm right now, so we will be giving small shares a generous bunch and large shares a big bag of basil, with enough to make a batch of pesto: http://damndelicious.net/2014/07/05/easy-homemade-pesto/
IN THE LARGE SHARES>>>!
Strawberries- Besides getting a big bag of basil for pesto, large shares will also include a pint of strawberries this week! I believe all shares will have strawberries in them next week...the strawberry plants seem to be heading quickly towards their peak season. They are really tasty right now...very shiny, red and beautiful.
Napa cabbage- Our first planting of Napa cabbage all bit the dust before we could even harvest any...it bolted (started flowering) early before heading up. Our newest planting looks good...the heads seem to be getting tight and should be ready for harvest this week.
Snap peas- A pint of snap peas in your share this week! The snap peas go through July, but seem to seldom last very long into August, when conditions just get too hot and dry for them to thrive. Enjoy them while you can!
WEEK 7!!
Hey all,
Last Thursday we got to enjoy an amazing dinner at the Orchard Kitchen. It was really, really cool to see all of the produce we've worked hard to grow highlighted so amazingly through Vincent's cooking. We had a risotto with peas and summer squash, a salad with beets, greens, and onions, and some delicious local pork with new potatoes. And then an almond cake for dessert with local berries, including our strawberries. It is really a memorable experience to have dinner there, and I definitely recommend it to anyone who hasn't checked it out yet!
This week marks the seventh week of the 2016 farm share. How time flies! I feel that this has (so far) been the most successful season we've had on the farm in terms of the amount and quality of the produce, and also with how manageable the work load has been. The rain has really helped to keep irrigation stress under control, while we've had a few pest issues, nothing heart breaking, we have been wasting less food than ever....the only down side has been a broken down tractor that we will hopefully have fixed in the next few days. Another huge improvement over years past has been not doing the farmer's market. While the market was always really great for us, it took a ton of time and effort to pick, store, pack up, sell, break down...every Saturday, which made for a six day work week no matter how I tried to plan it otherwise. It has definitely made life on the farm a lot easier, and given us a lot more time to do other stuff, by deciding to no longer do the market every weekend.
In this week's share:
After a few less-than-sunny weeks, the forecast, while not looking super hot, looks pretty warm and dry coming up. I am surprised how many of the heat loving crops haven't seemed to mind the sometimes gray and cool weather. The tomatoes, beans, corn, and peppers are all looking healthy and happy. The winter squash has really taken off and looks downright amazing! The only crop that seems to be a bit behind schedule are the cucumbers, which are growing and look fine, but surprisingly just haven't really started fruiting yet. I was hoping to have cucumbers in the share this week, but aside from a straggler here and there, we just haven't gotten many cukes yet. Hopefully this week's sunnier weather changes that, as I do love a good cucumber salad. In the meantime, we have lots of other nice veggies to fill the shares this week.
Shelling peas- These peas, unlike the snap peas, have tough outer pods that aren't very good to eat. If you peel open the shell, they are filled with tender sweet peas, like the green peas many of us remember from childhood. These are a real treat...in particular Northern European (from the UK and Scandinavia) people seem to always be super excited about fresh shelling peas whenever we have them.
The farm manager at Sauvie Island Organics, the first farm I worked at, made an amazing cold soup from fresh shelling peas that was one of the most memorable vegetable soups I've ever had. It was basically like this recipe: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/95110/fresh-pea-soup/ with one notable difference....after shelling the peas, she would reserve the pods and boil them in water to make a strongly pea flavored broth that she would use in place of the water in this recipe. It made for a very strong pea flavor that was delicious!
Carrots- We have had a great crop of carrots so far. Beautiful roots with strong green tops! A newer planting had to be recently rescued from the weeds...we have a terrible weedy bunch grass that has begun appearing on parts of the farm and it can completely take over beds! Fortunately, we caught it just in time to rescue the baby carrots from being overtaken by a grassy jungle.
Herb bunch- Our new cilantro bed is on, so it is time to right our previous wrongs! A few weeks ago, Monday pickup folks got cilantro, but we were all out before the Thursday harvest. This week, we will give parsley bunches out on Monday, and cilantro on Thursday.
Spinach- Very nice spinach this year, perfect for bunching. Here is a recipe for exactly the way I like to make fresh sautéed greens: http://www.marthastewart.com/1150315/sauteed-fresh-spinach
Broccoli- Broccoli is back in the share, with new broccoli beds starting to come into production.
http://www.epicurious.com/ingredients/how-to-buy-store-and-eat-your-broccoli-article
Zucchini/Summer Squash- We planted less summer squash this year than in years past, mostly because when it really gets going in late Summer we have to pick it regularly and end up with so much summer squash. But in the early Summer, when the plants are just getting going, it means not having quite as much as we could use. Oh well, it's a trade off. I'm hoping that this week, for the first time, we'll have enough to give ALL shares a few squash...maybe a bit more in the large shares.
Garlic- I'm not sure yet which garlic variety we will giving out this week, but probably one of our early softneck varieties that we had planned to use for food garlic (as opposed to saving for seed). We have so much more garlic this year than ever before, it is great being able to give it out more frequently!
In the LARGE SHARES-
Purple cabbage- Taco time! When I was growing up my Dad would make fish tacos with chopped purple cabbage and a creamy dressing. Sprinkle some cilantro and queso fresco on top....easy dinner.
Radish- At the Orchard Kitchen, Vincent served a really simple and delicious little hor d'oeuvre...one of our radishes, sliced longwise in half with the greens left on, and a mustardy dressing to dip it it. He told us to eat the greens, which even I as a vegetable farmer didn't think sounded appealing...but it was delicious! I wish I had a photo to show the beautiful presentation they used....
Walla walla onions- This will be the final appearance of our Walla walla onions after a very successful run. Hopefully by next week the rest of our onions will be sizing up and ready to go into the shares. No other onion is quite as delicious as onion rings, though....it's hard to make good onion rings at home, but worth a try! http://www.lifesambrosia.com/buttermilk-walla-walla-onion-rings-recipe/
Blog for Farm Share Week 6
It was great to see some of you at the party last week! We had nice weather and some good snacks. I think Jack and I both felt like it was really nice doing the party a month into the share, rather than in May....the fields look great and there are more crops to see, it seemed like more people were able to come, and we had more produce to serve as snacks. If we can, we'll try to host another get together before the end of the year.
Vincent and Tyla Nattress, who own the property we farm, are taking a well deserved weekend off from the Orchard Kitchen to get off island and celebrate the fourth with their daughters. They'll be back to serving dinners at the Orchard Kitchen this coming week though, and all of us from Ebb Tide have been invited to eat with them this coming Thursday! We are very excited. If you haven't had a chance to eat at the Orchard Kitchen, you should check it out. They'll be serving dinner Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights for the rest of the Summer. Here's a link: http://www.orchardkitchen.com/#foodweb
They are also still working to improve the property for their dinners; right now they're building a patio overlooking our crops, and fixing up the old hay barn to use for additional seating!
In all shares this week:
Strawberries- The berries are back in the share! It's always hard to anticipate, but it seems like the plants are primed for a big flush of ripe fruit, so I'm thinking we should have plenty of berries to give you all a pint this week.
Arugula- More lemony, peppery arugula in the shares this week. Great for a Summer salad. Bobbi and I just had arugula for dinner with some grilled zucchini and onion.
Sugar snap peas- The peas are so great raw and so easy to eat. If you can avoid snacking on them, though, you could make an easy pasta dish with lots of the stuff in your share: just sauté some cauliflower and kale in olive oil, add some chopped peas and zucchini, and finish with some basil and arugula, salt and balsamic vinegar.
Basil- After getting off to a slower start this Spring, all of a sudden the basil has really taken off! When the basil starts getting big, it needs to be picked hard to encourage it to keep growing, so you all will be the beneficiaries!
Kale- We planted lots and lots of kale this Spring, hoping to wholesale it to Willowood Farm in Coupeville, as they always get aphid problems in the Summer months and can't meet the demand for kale from all the Seattle restaurants they sell to. Unfortunately for us, so far they have had no aphid issues and have tons of their own kale...so we are stuck with an enormous kale surplus. If anyone knows of someone who wants to buy 50 pounds of kale, let me know!
http://www.epicurious.com/tools/searchresults?search=kale
Cauliflower- Our first cauliflower planting is on, and it is truly beautiful! Cauliflower is one of my favorite crops to grow; it is usually pretty difficult, but it loves the soil at Ebb Tide and we usually have no problem producing some really nice cauliflower. Finding the snow white heads hiding inside the huge plants and cutting them out is kind of like a treasure hunt!
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/oven-roasted-cauliflower-with-garlic-olive-oil-and-lemon-juice-recipe.html
http://www.marthastewart.com/275272/cauliflower-recipes#233356
In large shares only:
Fennel- Fennel bulbs are a great vegetable that a lot of people are less familiar with. They have a pleasant crunch similar to celery, but with a sweet, anise like taste. If you love the flavor, it is strongest and crunchiest eaten raw, and is great in a salad, slaw, or sliced for an appetizer plate with a dip. If the flavor is too strong for you raw, try chopping it and sautéing or roasting it as you would an onion for a soup, pasta sauce, or casserole.
http://www.marthastewart.com/286398/fennel-recipes
Zucchini- More zucchini for the large shares this week. We have been using our barbeque a lot, so it is always great to have some zucchini around. It is so easy to slice up, brush with some olive oil and throw on the grill for a few minutes.
Lettuce- A nice head of (I hope green butter) lettuce to round out the large shares. Butter lettuce is a great summer treat with its mild, sweet leaves. It is easy to grow, but doesn't hold for very long, so we need to pick it as soon as it's ready.
Vincent and Tyla Nattress, who own the property we farm, are taking a well deserved weekend off from the Orchard Kitchen to get off island and celebrate the fourth with their daughters. They'll be back to serving dinners at the Orchard Kitchen this coming week though, and all of us from Ebb Tide have been invited to eat with them this coming Thursday! We are very excited. If you haven't had a chance to eat at the Orchard Kitchen, you should check it out. They'll be serving dinner Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights for the rest of the Summer. Here's a link: http://www.orchardkitchen.com/#foodweb
They are also still working to improve the property for their dinners; right now they're building a patio overlooking our crops, and fixing up the old hay barn to use for additional seating!
In all shares this week:
Strawberries- The berries are back in the share! It's always hard to anticipate, but it seems like the plants are primed for a big flush of ripe fruit, so I'm thinking we should have plenty of berries to give you all a pint this week.
Arugula- More lemony, peppery arugula in the shares this week. Great for a Summer salad. Bobbi and I just had arugula for dinner with some grilled zucchini and onion.
Sugar snap peas- The peas are so great raw and so easy to eat. If you can avoid snacking on them, though, you could make an easy pasta dish with lots of the stuff in your share: just sauté some cauliflower and kale in olive oil, add some chopped peas and zucchini, and finish with some basil and arugula, salt and balsamic vinegar.
Basil- After getting off to a slower start this Spring, all of a sudden the basil has really taken off! When the basil starts getting big, it needs to be picked hard to encourage it to keep growing, so you all will be the beneficiaries!
Kale- We planted lots and lots of kale this Spring, hoping to wholesale it to Willowood Farm in Coupeville, as they always get aphid problems in the Summer months and can't meet the demand for kale from all the Seattle restaurants they sell to. Unfortunately for us, so far they have had no aphid issues and have tons of their own kale...so we are stuck with an enormous kale surplus. If anyone knows of someone who wants to buy 50 pounds of kale, let me know!
http://www.epicurious.com/tools/searchresults?search=kale
Cauliflower- Our first cauliflower planting is on, and it is truly beautiful! Cauliflower is one of my favorite crops to grow; it is usually pretty difficult, but it loves the soil at Ebb Tide and we usually have no problem producing some really nice cauliflower. Finding the snow white heads hiding inside the huge plants and cutting them out is kind of like a treasure hunt!
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/oven-roasted-cauliflower-with-garlic-olive-oil-and-lemon-juice-recipe.html
http://www.marthastewart.com/275272/cauliflower-recipes#233356
In large shares only:
Fennel- Fennel bulbs are a great vegetable that a lot of people are less familiar with. They have a pleasant crunch similar to celery, but with a sweet, anise like taste. If you love the flavor, it is strongest and crunchiest eaten raw, and is great in a salad, slaw, or sliced for an appetizer plate with a dip. If the flavor is too strong for you raw, try chopping it and sautéing or roasting it as you would an onion for a soup, pasta sauce, or casserole.
http://www.marthastewart.com/286398/fennel-recipes
Zucchini- More zucchini for the large shares this week. We have been using our barbeque a lot, so it is always great to have some zucchini around. It is so easy to slice up, brush with some olive oil and throw on the grill for a few minutes.
Lettuce- A nice head of (I hope green butter) lettuce to round out the large shares. Butter lettuce is a great summer treat with its mild, sweet leaves. It is easy to grow, but doesn't hold for very long, so we need to pick it as soon as it's ready.
Week 5 blog
I caught the flu this weekend but I'm feeling better now. Not well enough yet for my normal routine of going out for a beer to write the blog (we don't have internet at home). So I am writing this from my phone and I'll keep it brief! Forgive typos please!
Strawberries will be back in the shares next week I hope.. They are just beginning their second flush and i want sure if we'd have enough for this week..
In both shares this week:
New potatoes! These red skinned beauties are dug from the still growing plants. The skin is thin and delicate and they won't keep as well as storage spuds, but they taste great and cook up a bit faster. More spuds in the larger shares.
Turnips - the delicious hakurei turnips will be making another appearance.
Carrots -. The carrots keep getting bigger each week!
Lettuce- what nice heads of lettuce this year! This time last year we had barely any lettuce thanks to some pesky deer getting in our field. We beefed up fencing and haven't had a problem since!
Walla wallas- more tasty sweet onions. The other onions are growing fast, so next time we'll have a different variety in the share for you.
Swiss chard- a nice colorful braising green bunch!
Garlic- we continue to work at bringing our garlic in to dry, one variety at a time. This is more of the Xi'an, our earliest variety with pretty purple stripes
And in the larger shares only:
Broccoli- broccoli is back in the large shares!
Basil- this will be our very first pick on the earliest basil plants. Pasta primavera!
Zucchini- as the summer squash plants ramp up its working out great to put them in only some of the shares each week. Should be up to our ears in it soon though, and hopefully cucumbers too, which have been a bit slower to get going this year.
Strawberries will be back in the shares next week I hope.. They are just beginning their second flush and i want sure if we'd have enough for this week..
In both shares this week:
New potatoes! These red skinned beauties are dug from the still growing plants. The skin is thin and delicate and they won't keep as well as storage spuds, but they taste great and cook up a bit faster. More spuds in the larger shares.
Turnips - the delicious hakurei turnips will be making another appearance.
Carrots -. The carrots keep getting bigger each week!
Lettuce- what nice heads of lettuce this year! This time last year we had barely any lettuce thanks to some pesky deer getting in our field. We beefed up fencing and haven't had a problem since!
Walla wallas- more tasty sweet onions. The other onions are growing fast, so next time we'll have a different variety in the share for you.
Swiss chard- a nice colorful braising green bunch!
Garlic- we continue to work at bringing our garlic in to dry, one variety at a time. This is more of the Xi'an, our earliest variety with pretty purple stripes
And in the larger shares only:
Broccoli- broccoli is back in the large shares!
Basil- this will be our very first pick on the earliest basil plants. Pasta primavera!
Zucchini- as the summer squash plants ramp up its working out great to put them in only some of the shares each week. Should be up to our ears in it soon though, and hopefully cucumbers too, which have been a bit slower to get going this year.
Farm Share #4
We will be officially getting into Summer for this week's farm share. Thanks to the cooler weather we've been having lately we are still mostly harvesting the Spring crops. I am not complaining! Although the tomatoes and corn and cukes have slowed down a bit, things are still growing great, and it is definitely easier than last year! This time last year it was so hot and dry, it was really a challenge to keep up with the irrigation. This cool wet week has really given us a chance to catch up, and a lot of the cool weather crops like the peas, broccoli, and greens are loving it. We have a lot of crops right around the corner; the potatoes, cauliflower, fava beans, fennel, and basil are all starting to come on, and the cucumbers and green beans are not far away either, especially with warmer weather forecasted ahead.
Here's what's in this week's share:
Beets- Beets will be in all shares this week, a nice mixed bunch of red, gold, and Chioggia beets. The Red and gold are pretty self explanatory; the gold are just like the red with a nice, sweet taste. The Chioggia are pink on the outside with a pink and white swirl in the middle that's very pretty. http://www.marthastewart.com/274226/beet-recipes
Lettuce- Head lettuce is back in the share this week; not everyone will get the same variety, so it will be either a green butter lettuce, a green oakleaf lettuce, or a redleaf lettuce. They are more modestly sized but very nice! Hope you're ready for em.
Peas- Sugar snap peas making their third appearance in a row. They are coming on strong and really delicious. As I mentioned above, peas are a crop that is happy to have the cooler wetter weather... our peas usually go through the month of July as long as it doesn't get too hot! We are also growing shelling (or English) peas this year, which should be ready in a few weeks.
Garlic Scapes- Garlic scapes appeared in the large shares a few weeks ago, so you may remember...they are the flowering stalk of the garlic plant, which the plant produces a few weeks before harvest. They are truly delicious and easy to use. Use them in almost anything that you would garlic...stir fry, casserole, salad or salad dressing, or raw. They are also my very favorite thing pickled! You can try quick pickling them if you're up for a bit more of a project!
http://www.foodiewithfamily.com/pickled-garlic-scapes-make-ahead-monday/
Radishes- For the first shares, I was worried we may not have enough radishes. I had made a real rookie mistake...using the wrong seed plate in our Earthway Seeder! For direct seeding (putting unsprouted seeds directly in the ground) we use and device built by Earthway, which requires swapping out different seed plates based on the size seed you are planting. Instead of using the Radish/Spinach plate, I unwittingly planted a bed of radishes using the Beet plate. Beet seeds are much larger than radish seeds, so the seed was put down waaay too heavily! We tried to thin the seedlings, but we weren't quite aggressive enough in our thinning, so the radishes were still a bit overcrowded. This time around is a different story. We have a lot of radishes, so I have no worries about not having enough!
Spinach- We were going to put arugula bunches in the share, but the spinach is so nice right now, and without any broccoli, kale or chard I thought spinach would be nicer because you can cook with it if the lettuce is enough salad for the week... seems like many people can't get enough spinach! We are having a very successful spinach growing season so far with several very nice plantings.
Herb bunches- Well, we had a case of what my friend and former boss Georgie Smith calls "remay blindness". The remay is the big white floating row cover that you may have seen in our fields that is great for keeping away pests and warming up the crops. But it prevents you from being able to see what's going on, and if you forget to pull up the corner of the remay to peek, you have no idea what's going on under there. In this case, the cilantro started to bolt (send up a flowering stalk) as it often does (although this was unusually early) and I missed spotting it. Because of this, we won't have cilantro left for the end of the week...so Thursday folks will be getting dill bunches instead. When we get into the next herb planting I'll remember to swap it around so everyone gets both!
IN THE SMALL SHARES:
Zucchini- The Summer squash plants are growing fast now but still just getting going with their fruiting. I'm hoping this week we'll have enough zucchini to go in all the small shares....with more on the way soon for everyone. You may have to halve this recipe, but this is a great way to use zukes-
http://www.justataste.com/5-ingredient-zucchini-fritters-recipe/
AND IN THE LARGE SHARES:
Carrots- More carrots out of our first Spring carrot beds. These should be a piece of cake to get rid of.
Scallion- The scallions have grown so nicely this year, I have found myself using them all the time in the kitchen in things I'd never thrown scallions into before...but the standby has been to throw some into a lettuce salad with carrots, radishes, and hakurei turnips.
http://www.saveur.com/gallery/Scallion-Recipes
Cabbage (or kohlrabi/broccoli)- We have some beautiful little heads of "Melissa" semi savoyed (slightly crinkly leaved) cabbage. It has a nice green and purple leaf and a delicious crunch. Unfortunately, the back part of the bed has been mysteriously slow to head up...a few folks may get mini cabbage heads, in which case we'll throw in a bit of broccoli or a kohlrabi bulb to make up for it!
Here's what's in this week's share:
Beets- Beets will be in all shares this week, a nice mixed bunch of red, gold, and Chioggia beets. The Red and gold are pretty self explanatory; the gold are just like the red with a nice, sweet taste. The Chioggia are pink on the outside with a pink and white swirl in the middle that's very pretty. http://www.marthastewart.com/274226/beet-recipes
Lettuce- Head lettuce is back in the share this week; not everyone will get the same variety, so it will be either a green butter lettuce, a green oakleaf lettuce, or a redleaf lettuce. They are more modestly sized but very nice! Hope you're ready for em.
Peas- Sugar snap peas making their third appearance in a row. They are coming on strong and really delicious. As I mentioned above, peas are a crop that is happy to have the cooler wetter weather... our peas usually go through the month of July as long as it doesn't get too hot! We are also growing shelling (or English) peas this year, which should be ready in a few weeks.
Garlic Scapes- Garlic scapes appeared in the large shares a few weeks ago, so you may remember...they are the flowering stalk of the garlic plant, which the plant produces a few weeks before harvest. They are truly delicious and easy to use. Use them in almost anything that you would garlic...stir fry, casserole, salad or salad dressing, or raw. They are also my very favorite thing pickled! You can try quick pickling them if you're up for a bit more of a project!
http://www.foodiewithfamily.com/pickled-garlic-scapes-make-ahead-monday/
Radishes- For the first shares, I was worried we may not have enough radishes. I had made a real rookie mistake...using the wrong seed plate in our Earthway Seeder! For direct seeding (putting unsprouted seeds directly in the ground) we use and device built by Earthway, which requires swapping out different seed plates based on the size seed you are planting. Instead of using the Radish/Spinach plate, I unwittingly planted a bed of radishes using the Beet plate. Beet seeds are much larger than radish seeds, so the seed was put down waaay too heavily! We tried to thin the seedlings, but we weren't quite aggressive enough in our thinning, so the radishes were still a bit overcrowded. This time around is a different story. We have a lot of radishes, so I have no worries about not having enough!
Spinach- We were going to put arugula bunches in the share, but the spinach is so nice right now, and without any broccoli, kale or chard I thought spinach would be nicer because you can cook with it if the lettuce is enough salad for the week... seems like many people can't get enough spinach! We are having a very successful spinach growing season so far with several very nice plantings.
Herb bunches- Well, we had a case of what my friend and former boss Georgie Smith calls "remay blindness". The remay is the big white floating row cover that you may have seen in our fields that is great for keeping away pests and warming up the crops. But it prevents you from being able to see what's going on, and if you forget to pull up the corner of the remay to peek, you have no idea what's going on under there. In this case, the cilantro started to bolt (send up a flowering stalk) as it often does (although this was unusually early) and I missed spotting it. Because of this, we won't have cilantro left for the end of the week...so Thursday folks will be getting dill bunches instead. When we get into the next herb planting I'll remember to swap it around so everyone gets both!
IN THE SMALL SHARES:
Zucchini- The Summer squash plants are growing fast now but still just getting going with their fruiting. I'm hoping this week we'll have enough zucchini to go in all the small shares....with more on the way soon for everyone. You may have to halve this recipe, but this is a great way to use zukes-
http://www.justataste.com/5-ingredient-zucchini-fritters-recipe/
AND IN THE LARGE SHARES:
Carrots- More carrots out of our first Spring carrot beds. These should be a piece of cake to get rid of.
Scallion- The scallions have grown so nicely this year, I have found myself using them all the time in the kitchen in things I'd never thrown scallions into before...but the standby has been to throw some into a lettuce salad with carrots, radishes, and hakurei turnips.
http://www.saveur.com/gallery/Scallion-Recipes
Cabbage (or kohlrabi/broccoli)- We have some beautiful little heads of "Melissa" semi savoyed (slightly crinkly leaved) cabbage. It has a nice green and purple leaf and a delicious crunch. Unfortunately, the back part of the bed has been mysteriously slow to head up...a few folks may get mini cabbage heads, in which case we'll throw in a bit of broccoli or a kohlrabi bulb to make up for it!
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