Week 13
We got a lot more of you eggplant than I expected last week. Mainly, because as it turns out many of you didn't want it. Which is fine, I know many people find it bland and/or dislike the texture. I really like it, but only eat it once or maybe twice a season because I have a small allergic reaction to it. I did cook some up last week though and it was fantastic. I sliced it long ways and grilled it with some zucchinis and orange peppers. I then roughly chopped everything and tossed it together. We had it with roasted potatoes, grilled chicken and this amazing herby sauce called zhug I just discovered. A friend had encouraged me to make it earlier this summer and I just got around to it last week. It is so delicious. I looked at a bunch of recipes and then just winged it. I used less cardamon than the link above and added some lemon juice. I also used jalapenos which for me had just the right amount of spice. It is so delicious, I can't wait to eat some more. I also wasn't bothered by the eggplant which means I will go for twice this summer and eat it again since there is another recipe on my summer bucket list with eggplant. We are growing a beautiful red pepper from Uprising Seeds that they say is used to make a roasted pepper and eggplant spread in the Balkans called ajvar. In addition to all the veggies we have been eating I have been loving the arroz con leche palletas from the corner store. It tastes like an horchata popsicle with raisins in it! Probably a lot like eggplant, not for everyone, but loved by a few.
We will be continuing the onion haul and trudging through the fall carrots this week, hopefully with some cleaner air. I am happy to have the doors and windows open again. It is also fun to be back to wearing a winter hat all day, but that might just be me!
Carrots
Lettuce - We have a nice variety at the moment but not a lot of one in particular and the weather looks mild for Monday so you will choose your own from the selection on the stand.
Broccoli
Cabbage
Potatoes
Tomato - Cherry toms for everyone and a slicer for the large shares.
Garlic - Large Only
Eggplant - Hope to get it to all of you who didn't have it last week.
Sunday, August 26, 2018
Sunday, August 19, 2018
Week 12
Despite the sunny days, I am starting to feel a shift in seasons. For me the first sign is when it is no longer light out when I get up. Another sign is that zucchini sales are starting to pick up. Our zucchini sales dip when zucchinis are abundant in people's gardens, but as summer starts to fade as does the productivity of a zucchini planted in May. Regardless of how I might be feeling, the forecast has some very nice weather in it this week. We will try to make a dent in weeding and thinning the fall carrots and hopefully get most of our onions out of the field and drying down this week.
Lil Gem Lettuce - I know I have said it before but I love this stuff!
Eggplant - Because we don't grow a lot of eggplant this is always a multi-week process to get them for everyone.
Cherry Tomatoes
Some sort of Melon - not sure if it will be dealer's choice or if we will have a display out for you to choose from but melon season is going fast this year.
Sweet Bell Peppers
Red Onion
Collards - Large Only - If you have never had the collards and black eyed peas from Our Table you are missing out. There isn't anything fancy about it. Sauteed onions, garlic, collards black eyed peas and some seasoning. It is delicious.
A CSA member told me of Mennonite tradition in her house. Watermelon is eaten with small pieces of fried dough called roll kuchen. She gave me a photo copy out of her cookbook with the recipe her mother always made. I read a bit about it because I love food traditions and there are lots of similar but different recipes out there. Hers uses sour cream, some call for oil, some margarine, some have cream. Some people like them crispy and others soft. I didn't get a chance to try it last week, but hopefully this week. Since I have yet to make it, I won't include a recipe but I googled roll kuchen and tons of recipes came up. Let me know if you try one.
Despite the sunny days, I am starting to feel a shift in seasons. For me the first sign is when it is no longer light out when I get up. Another sign is that zucchini sales are starting to pick up. Our zucchini sales dip when zucchinis are abundant in people's gardens, but as summer starts to fade as does the productivity of a zucchini planted in May. Regardless of how I might be feeling, the forecast has some very nice weather in it this week. We will try to make a dent in weeding and thinning the fall carrots and hopefully get most of our onions out of the field and drying down this week.
Lil Gem Lettuce - I know I have said it before but I love this stuff!
Eggplant - Because we don't grow a lot of eggplant this is always a multi-week process to get them for everyone.
Cherry Tomatoes
Some sort of Melon - not sure if it will be dealer's choice or if we will have a display out for you to choose from but melon season is going fast this year.
Sweet Bell Peppers
Red Onion
Collards - Large Only - If you have never had the collards and black eyed peas from Our Table you are missing out. There isn't anything fancy about it. Sauteed onions, garlic, collards black eyed peas and some seasoning. It is delicious.
A CSA member told me of Mennonite tradition in her house. Watermelon is eaten with small pieces of fried dough called roll kuchen. She gave me a photo copy out of her cookbook with the recipe her mother always made. I read a bit about it because I love food traditions and there are lots of similar but different recipes out there. Hers uses sour cream, some call for oil, some margarine, some have cream. Some people like them crispy and others soft. I didn't get a chance to try it last week, but hopefully this week. Since I have yet to make it, I won't include a recipe but I googled roll kuchen and tons of recipes came up. Let me know if you try one.
Sunday, August 12, 2018
Week 11
When tomatoes first started to appear in abundance I spent an entire week eating tomatoes and mozzarella daily. Sometimes on their own, sometimes in pasta, on bread or on pizza. I won't even admit how much olive oil I went through that week! I have slowed down a bit although I really never tire of tomatoes. We had shakshuka for dinner last night which is an easy meal and a great way to use up the tomatoes that were almost too ripe for anything other than pig treats on my counter. So while tomatoes are still finding their way into many of our meals we have a bit more variety going on now that I am done binging. I have been looking over my summer bucket list of recipes and I realize I am getting a little behind. The mild panic began when I found a picture on my phone for a recipe for squash blossom soup from a cookbook I saw in Mexico and realized I didn't even have it on my list. Tonight we are having an old favorite that is on the list, a Rick Bayless recipe for zucchini tacos and if I am feeling ambitious a peach cobbler. Hopefully I will find some time this week to explore new recipes as well.
Things feel refreshed on the farm after the expected, but also unexpected (it down poured here) rain over the weekend. The rain waters things in a way our limited irrigation just can't do. Although rain was predicted all week and we only accepted the forecast around 5pm on Friday when we decided that we should probably get the onions that had fallen down, a sign of maturity, out of the field. It was only small portion of them but I imagine many more will fall this week.
Those of you who didn't get Sun Jewel melons will get them this week.
Carrots
Potatoes
Green Beans
Herb Choice - Lots of basil, dill, parsley and a little cilantro to choose from.
Zucchini
Cucumbers
Slicing Tomato
Tomatillos - Small Only
Watermelon - Large Only
When tomatoes first started to appear in abundance I spent an entire week eating tomatoes and mozzarella daily. Sometimes on their own, sometimes in pasta, on bread or on pizza. I won't even admit how much olive oil I went through that week! I have slowed down a bit although I really never tire of tomatoes. We had shakshuka for dinner last night which is an easy meal and a great way to use up the tomatoes that were almost too ripe for anything other than pig treats on my counter. So while tomatoes are still finding their way into many of our meals we have a bit more variety going on now that I am done binging. I have been looking over my summer bucket list of recipes and I realize I am getting a little behind. The mild panic began when I found a picture on my phone for a recipe for squash blossom soup from a cookbook I saw in Mexico and realized I didn't even have it on my list. Tonight we are having an old favorite that is on the list, a Rick Bayless recipe for zucchini tacos and if I am feeling ambitious a peach cobbler. Hopefully I will find some time this week to explore new recipes as well.
Things feel refreshed on the farm after the expected, but also unexpected (it down poured here) rain over the weekend. The rain waters things in a way our limited irrigation just can't do. Although rain was predicted all week and we only accepted the forecast around 5pm on Friday when we decided that we should probably get the onions that had fallen down, a sign of maturity, out of the field. It was only small portion of them but I imagine many more will fall this week.
Those of you who didn't get Sun Jewel melons will get them this week.
Carrots
Potatoes
Green Beans
Herb Choice - Lots of basil, dill, parsley and a little cilantro to choose from.
Zucchini
Cucumbers
Slicing Tomato
Tomatillos - Small Only
Watermelon - Large Only
Sunday, August 5, 2018
Week 10
When something is important to you it is often tied up in a lot of emotion: joy, frustration, worry, etc. Since the farm is so important to me, I ride a roller coaster of emotion through the season. The highs are fantastic, the lows equally extreme in the other direction. Over time I have gotten better at not getting too caught up in the lows. It is rare that there is a complete loss of a crop. Today I was reminded twice that often things can turn around and end up not being that bad. Kelly and I walked through the onions when we were making your box list this morning. In late May the onions were a disaster. We grew beautiful starts, but after transplant they started dying. Onions always suffer from transplant shock, but usually after looking like they aren't growing or even looking like they are shrinking for a few weeks they start to take off. They don't usually die. After a lot of freaking out and a bit of investigation we discovered we had onion maggots. Unattractive as they are destructive, they eat the inside of the onion plant until it dies and then move on to the next one in the line. I read that there can be three generations in a season, but it appears that so far we have only been effected by the first one. Although it felt like we were loosing onion after onion, in the end it was probably about 15 percent. The onions that are left look great. Perhaps the little extra space helped. Perhaps all the water we pounded them with because we didn't know what else to do and needed to feel like we were doing something helped. I don't know. Anyway, you will be getting one of those nice onions in your box this week. More recently the deer got into our cucumber house and ate the tops off the plants. These are the Japanese cukes and Persian cukes that we trellis. In other words there was already a lot of labor and time invested in these plants. It was probably the low point of my summer. Most of the cucumbers had another growth point that was just starting (we prune larger growth points to keep the plants to one leader) and while it set us back a couple weeks almost all of them have made a comeback and are starting to produce cucumbers. You have cucumbers out of this house in your box today. When it comes to joy it is great to savor the moment, but when things aren't going well it is much better to look towards the future and keep the big picture in mind.
Cheers to a great week and good food.
Lettuce
Corn
Japanese Cucumber
Sun Jewel Korean Melon - The melon I mentioned last week that always kicks off our season. It is mild, sweet and refreshing. There is a chance that we won't have enough for everyone, in which case you will get one next week.
Cherry Tomatoes
Walla Walla Onion
Garlic
Tomatillos - Large Only - Small shares will get them next week.
Slicing Tomato - Large Only
When something is important to you it is often tied up in a lot of emotion: joy, frustration, worry, etc. Since the farm is so important to me, I ride a roller coaster of emotion through the season. The highs are fantastic, the lows equally extreme in the other direction. Over time I have gotten better at not getting too caught up in the lows. It is rare that there is a complete loss of a crop. Today I was reminded twice that often things can turn around and end up not being that bad. Kelly and I walked through the onions when we were making your box list this morning. In late May the onions were a disaster. We grew beautiful starts, but after transplant they started dying. Onions always suffer from transplant shock, but usually after looking like they aren't growing or even looking like they are shrinking for a few weeks they start to take off. They don't usually die. After a lot of freaking out and a bit of investigation we discovered we had onion maggots. Unattractive as they are destructive, they eat the inside of the onion plant until it dies and then move on to the next one in the line. I read that there can be three generations in a season, but it appears that so far we have only been effected by the first one. Although it felt like we were loosing onion after onion, in the end it was probably about 15 percent. The onions that are left look great. Perhaps the little extra space helped. Perhaps all the water we pounded them with because we didn't know what else to do and needed to feel like we were doing something helped. I don't know. Anyway, you will be getting one of those nice onions in your box this week. More recently the deer got into our cucumber house and ate the tops off the plants. These are the Japanese cukes and Persian cukes that we trellis. In other words there was already a lot of labor and time invested in these plants. It was probably the low point of my summer. Most of the cucumbers had another growth point that was just starting (we prune larger growth points to keep the plants to one leader) and while it set us back a couple weeks almost all of them have made a comeback and are starting to produce cucumbers. You have cucumbers out of this house in your box today. When it comes to joy it is great to savor the moment, but when things aren't going well it is much better to look towards the future and keep the big picture in mind.
Cheers to a great week and good food.
Lettuce
Corn
Japanese Cucumber
Sun Jewel Korean Melon - The melon I mentioned last week that always kicks off our season. It is mild, sweet and refreshing. There is a chance that we won't have enough for everyone, in which case you will get one next week.
Cherry Tomatoes
Walla Walla Onion
Garlic
Tomatillos - Large Only - Small shares will get them next week.
Slicing Tomato - Large Only
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