Week 15
Last week someone called to see what we had available for wholesale. I mentioned rutabagas. He is very particular and he wanted to know how sweet they were. We try to eat everything before we sell it as a form of quality control but there was zero chance I was interested in eating a rutabaga last week. Despite the fact that we were hauling winter squash it felt a bit too much like summer. Well, after looking at the 10 day weather this morning I think I have some rutabagas and a fire in the wood stove in my near future.
The large metal building at our house is filled with winter squash on pallets and dry beans hanging from the rafters. It is so colorful that it makes me smile whenever I walk in. We are going to start winter squash a little earlier than usual this year because it is ready to eat and the weather seems to have turned. The variety of acorn we grow is honey bear and it is nice and sweet.
Lettuce
Acorn Squash
Broccoli
Colored Peppers
Cucumber
Sweet Onion
Dinosaur Kale aka Lacinato Kale - Small Only
Yokatta Na aka Vitamin Green - Large Only - similar to bok choy
Edemame - Large Only
Monday, September 16, 2013
Monday, September 9, 2013
Week 14
We often talk about the fields at Shincke Road where you pick up your box and our fields on South Bay Road but we do have one more spot in cultivation. It is two small fields off of 46th Avenue. One had our garlic in it and the other has a small amount of drought resisitant ornamental corn and some winter squash (which we some how managed to plant everywhere this year). After the stand closed on Saturday we went to take a look. I was not that hopeful because I hadn't been over since it was last weeded and at that time the plants looked so-so. We were greeted by some giant blue hubbards and pumpkins at the front of the field. Yippee. We walked around pointing out all the fabulous squash to each other. It was a fine time. I hope you all had some nice surprises this week as well.
Your box is typical of boxes this time of year. It has some summer stuff and some fall stuff.
Carrots
Cauliflower
Summer Turnips
Cherry Tomatoes
Poblano Peppers - I love fried chile rellenos but they are also great with out any breading. I stuff the roasted and cleaned chiles with a bit of filling, set them in a casserole dish, cover with sauce and bake them.
Parsley - Large Only
Salad Mix - Small Only
Head Lettuce - Large Only
Collards - Large Only
Eggplant - rotating item
Have a great week and enjoy the heat!
We often talk about the fields at Shincke Road where you pick up your box and our fields on South Bay Road but we do have one more spot in cultivation. It is two small fields off of 46th Avenue. One had our garlic in it and the other has a small amount of drought resisitant ornamental corn and some winter squash (which we some how managed to plant everywhere this year). After the stand closed on Saturday we went to take a look. I was not that hopeful because I hadn't been over since it was last weeded and at that time the plants looked so-so. We were greeted by some giant blue hubbards and pumpkins at the front of the field. Yippee. We walked around pointing out all the fabulous squash to each other. It was a fine time. I hope you all had some nice surprises this week as well.
Your box is typical of boxes this time of year. It has some summer stuff and some fall stuff.
Carrots
Cauliflower
Summer Turnips
Cherry Tomatoes
Poblano Peppers - I love fried chile rellenos but they are also great with out any breading. I stuff the roasted and cleaned chiles with a bit of filling, set them in a casserole dish, cover with sauce and bake them.
Parsley - Large Only
Salad Mix - Small Only
Head Lettuce - Large Only
Collards - Large Only
Eggplant - rotating item
Have a great week and enjoy the heat!
Monday, September 2, 2013
Week 13
Every year I make up a t-shirt for the farm in my head. I never get them made but I enjoy thinking about a good tag line while weeding. I haven't come up with a clever one yet this year. This year's theme seems to be disease and that doesn't seem like a fun t-shirt. It started with the garlic. The potatoes seemed to have a bit of everything this year. We had to bust out an organic approved fungicide for the onions and finally late blight has hit the tomatoes(probably via the potatoes). We still have some tomatoes in the hoop house that are doing okay and you have some of those in your boxes today.
We have several crops in the garden that are doing fantastic. We have done a good job of staying on schedule for seeding and planting salad and lettuce and we haven't seen any of the mildew issues that plagued us last year. Our peppers are healthy, abundant and turning red, orange and yellow earlier than normal. We don't grow a lot of corn but our corn patch is also more productive than it ever has been. And so farming goes - a moment of glory, a moment of defeat and for Kelly and I a lot of humor to off set the distress. We have been a bit more sarcastically gloomy this year but are still cracking jokes and while the amount of disease has been unusual winter will renew our optimism.
In fact, despite everything we had our best day ever at the stand on Saturday and have so much good food that we had a hard time narrowing it down for your boxes. One thing that didn't make the cut for today is cauliflower but you should have the first of our fall cauliflower in your boxes next week as well as poblano peppers.
Lettuce
Carrots - Back! I know they were only gone for a week but I couldn't resist the exclamation point.
Cherry Tomatoes
Red Slicing Tomato
Basil
Beans
Eggplant - Everyone will have some eggplant over the next few weeks but not everyone will get one this week.
Corn - Small For Sure - Large Maybe This is our last succession of corn. It is a white variety called Augusta that we have never grown before.
Green and Yellow Zucchini
Onions - Large Only
Corn and tomatoes go great together in salsa or in a salad. Below are a couple ideas of how we like to mix them.
Salsa
Corn, cooked and cooled and sliced off the cob
Tomato, diced
Hot Pepper
Garlic, minced
Onion, chopped
Cilantro
Salt
Squeeze of Lime
Salad
Skip the hot pepper and cilantro and add some basil. Replace the acid of the lime with a little vinegar and add a little olive oil and black pepper.
Baba Ganoush - Eggplant Spread
eggplant (about a pound/all the eggplant in your box)
1/4 cup tahini
2 cloves garlic, minced if making spread by hand
juice from half a lemon
2-3 tablespoons water
salt
Preheat your grill. Rub the eggplants with oil and place on grill. When the skin starts to blacken turn the eggplant. Continue to turn until the skin is mostly charred on all sides. You want the skin to be black and the eggplant to be soft and collapsed. If your eggplant is still a bit firm you can pop it in the oven until it is soft. You can also do this whole process in the oven by using the broiler if you prefer. Set aside to cool.
Put the tahini, garlic and lemon in a food processor. I use a mini-chop with good success. Blend. Mixture will be thick. Add water and process again. You want the mixture to be light and creamy. I add water one tablespoon at a time until I achieve the desired consistency. This step will assure a nice light and creamy baba ganoush.
Cut eggplant open and gently spoon out the flesh leaving the charred skin behind. Put in the food processor and mix. Add salt and more lemon juice if you think it needs it.
You can do this without a food processor. I like the texture I get when I use the Cuisinart but it can be made by hand with good results.
Serve with pita bread or veggies
Every year I make up a t-shirt for the farm in my head. I never get them made but I enjoy thinking about a good tag line while weeding. I haven't come up with a clever one yet this year. This year's theme seems to be disease and that doesn't seem like a fun t-shirt. It started with the garlic. The potatoes seemed to have a bit of everything this year. We had to bust out an organic approved fungicide for the onions and finally late blight has hit the tomatoes(probably via the potatoes). We still have some tomatoes in the hoop house that are doing okay and you have some of those in your boxes today.
We have several crops in the garden that are doing fantastic. We have done a good job of staying on schedule for seeding and planting salad and lettuce and we haven't seen any of the mildew issues that plagued us last year. Our peppers are healthy, abundant and turning red, orange and yellow earlier than normal. We don't grow a lot of corn but our corn patch is also more productive than it ever has been. And so farming goes - a moment of glory, a moment of defeat and for Kelly and I a lot of humor to off set the distress. We have been a bit more sarcastically gloomy this year but are still cracking jokes and while the amount of disease has been unusual winter will renew our optimism.
In fact, despite everything we had our best day ever at the stand on Saturday and have so much good food that we had a hard time narrowing it down for your boxes. One thing that didn't make the cut for today is cauliflower but you should have the first of our fall cauliflower in your boxes next week as well as poblano peppers.
Lettuce
Carrots - Back! I know they were only gone for a week but I couldn't resist the exclamation point.
Cherry Tomatoes
Red Slicing Tomato
Basil
Beans
Eggplant - Everyone will have some eggplant over the next few weeks but not everyone will get one this week.
Corn - Small For Sure - Large Maybe This is our last succession of corn. It is a white variety called Augusta that we have never grown before.
Green and Yellow Zucchini
Onions - Large Only
Corn and tomatoes go great together in salsa or in a salad. Below are a couple ideas of how we like to mix them.
Salsa
Corn, cooked and cooled and sliced off the cob
Tomato, diced
Hot Pepper
Garlic, minced
Onion, chopped
Cilantro
Salt
Squeeze of Lime
Salad
Skip the hot pepper and cilantro and add some basil. Replace the acid of the lime with a little vinegar and add a little olive oil and black pepper.
Baba Ganoush - Eggplant Spread
eggplant (about a pound/all the eggplant in your box)
1/4 cup tahini
2 cloves garlic, minced if making spread by hand
juice from half a lemon
2-3 tablespoons water
salt
Preheat your grill. Rub the eggplants with oil and place on grill. When the skin starts to blacken turn the eggplant. Continue to turn until the skin is mostly charred on all sides. You want the skin to be black and the eggplant to be soft and collapsed. If your eggplant is still a bit firm you can pop it in the oven until it is soft. You can also do this whole process in the oven by using the broiler if you prefer. Set aside to cool.
Put the tahini, garlic and lemon in a food processor. I use a mini-chop with good success. Blend. Mixture will be thick. Add water and process again. You want the mixture to be light and creamy. I add water one tablespoon at a time until I achieve the desired consistency. This step will assure a nice light and creamy baba ganoush.
Cut eggplant open and gently spoon out the flesh leaving the charred skin behind. Put in the food processor and mix. Add salt and more lemon juice if you think it needs it.
You can do this without a food processor. I like the texture I get when I use the Cuisinart but it can be made by hand with good results.
Serve with pita bread or veggies
Monday, August 26, 2013
Week 12
The butternut squash has died back enough that we can see some beautiful tan butternuts under all the foliage. They look awesome. All our onions are out of the field and curing and it feels great to have that done.
No carrots this week to give you all a chance to use up what is in your veggie drawer and for a change of pace but we have some left from Saturdays stand if you need to buy some. We will have lots of stuff on the trade table for those of you who hate beets!
Hope you all have a fantastic week.
Salad Mix
Cherry Tomatoes
Tomatillos
Cilantro
Onion
Jalopeno Pepper - Perhaps it is the extra heat we have had this year but so far the chiles I have eaten have been spicy compared to other seasons.
Beets - Red
Kale - White Russian
Sun Jewel Melon- Large Only
Corn - Large Only
There are some directions for tomatillo salsa if you click on the tomatillo recipe on the right hand side. It is great with chips, as a sauce for enchiladas or a good base for braising chicken.
The butternut squash has died back enough that we can see some beautiful tan butternuts under all the foliage. They look awesome. All our onions are out of the field and curing and it feels great to have that done.
No carrots this week to give you all a chance to use up what is in your veggie drawer and for a change of pace but we have some left from Saturdays stand if you need to buy some. We will have lots of stuff on the trade table for those of you who hate beets!
Hope you all have a fantastic week.
Salad Mix
Cherry Tomatoes
Tomatillos
Cilantro
Onion
Jalopeno Pepper - Perhaps it is the extra heat we have had this year but so far the chiles I have eaten have been spicy compared to other seasons.
Beets - Red
Kale - White Russian
Sun Jewel Melon- Large Only
Corn - Large Only
There are some directions for tomatillo salsa if you click on the tomatillo recipe on the right hand side. It is great with chips, as a sauce for enchiladas or a good base for braising chicken.
Monday, August 19, 2013
Week 11
When I was ordering seeds last winter I was thinking of you all. For the past few years we have given you the same varieties of winter squash each year. We grow a few other varieties but the farm share always gets our favorites and the ones that seem the most popular. In an effort to make things a bit more interesting for you and me I went looking for a new winter squash for this year. We planted two new varieties that are growing next to the sun jewel melons and the whole place is a mess of foliage that I have resisted looking in because I would have move some vines around to try to find a place to step. On Friday when we harvested some melons for the stand my curiosity got the best of me. The first one is called sweet fall and it is described as a 4 pound squash. Well, I can't seem to find one that looks smaller than 12 pounds! The other squash is suppose to do well in short season climates (we have a long growing period due to the temperate climate but the lack of heat still means all heat loving crops need to be short season varieties) but I could only find lots of really small immature squash. Darn it. Looks like we might be sticking with the old favorites again this year.
I know it probably seems a bit early to be talking of fall but as we pull the onions out to dry down and watch the squash leaves start to yellow a little bit it is hard not to think about it. Even your boxes have a touch of fall in them. Our first round of fall cabbages and broccoli are beginning to mature and they look great. Summer isn't usually a time of year people think of as good broccoli growing weather but we always get some of our nicest crops this time of year. There is plenty of summer in your boxes today as well and we have more of it to come next week.
Lettuce
Carrots
Cherry Tomatoes
Slicing Tomatoes
Cabbage
Broccoli
Yellow or Orange Bell Pepper - Large Only
Cilantro - Large Only
Swiss Chard - Large Only
When I was ordering seeds last winter I was thinking of you all. For the past few years we have given you the same varieties of winter squash each year. We grow a few other varieties but the farm share always gets our favorites and the ones that seem the most popular. In an effort to make things a bit more interesting for you and me I went looking for a new winter squash for this year. We planted two new varieties that are growing next to the sun jewel melons and the whole place is a mess of foliage that I have resisted looking in because I would have move some vines around to try to find a place to step. On Friday when we harvested some melons for the stand my curiosity got the best of me. The first one is called sweet fall and it is described as a 4 pound squash. Well, I can't seem to find one that looks smaller than 12 pounds! The other squash is suppose to do well in short season climates (we have a long growing period due to the temperate climate but the lack of heat still means all heat loving crops need to be short season varieties) but I could only find lots of really small immature squash. Darn it. Looks like we might be sticking with the old favorites again this year.
I know it probably seems a bit early to be talking of fall but as we pull the onions out to dry down and watch the squash leaves start to yellow a little bit it is hard not to think about it. Even your boxes have a touch of fall in them. Our first round of fall cabbages and broccoli are beginning to mature and they look great. Summer isn't usually a time of year people think of as good broccoli growing weather but we always get some of our nicest crops this time of year. There is plenty of summer in your boxes today as well and we have more of it to come next week.
Lettuce
Carrots
Cherry Tomatoes
Slicing Tomatoes
Cabbage
Broccoli
Yellow or Orange Bell Pepper - Large Only
Cilantro - Large Only
Swiss Chard - Large Only
Monday, August 12, 2013
Week 10
Looking around the garden I can see the decline beginning to happen. Each week there is a little less green as we till in crops that we have finished picking. I love watching the season unfold.
I ordered seed garlic last week and hopefully next year's garlic will be a success. I wasn't able to get our favorite variety but am looking forward to trying a couple new ones. At 20 bucks a pound it would have been cheaper to try to find some local seed from friends but everyone I talked to had some disease issues in their garlic this year and I wanted to take as few chances as possible even if it means it will take a few years of saving seed before we are up to the 300 pounds we planted last fall. We will be more careful about culling plants that don't look good and about what garlic we save for planting.
Last week some of you had a Sun Jewel Melon in your box and the remainder of you will receive one over the next couple weeks. It is a Korean melon with a crisp flesh. I just learned that some people eat the seeds. They are the sweetest part of the melon.
You received our first picking of corn last week and may receive the last picking off the planting today. It is tough to say just how much is out there and I am not sure if you will have it in your boxes today. We have two more plantings behind the current one so you will receive more corn at some point regardless of whether you have some in your box today.
Carrots
Cherry Tomatoes
Slicing Tomato
Summer Squash
Walla Walla Onions
Basil
Asian Cucumber - Large Only
Lemon Cucumber - Small Only
Wax Bean/Green Bean
Corn - Maybe
Sun Jewel Melon - Rotating Item
Lettuce - Large Only
Looking around the garden I can see the decline beginning to happen. Each week there is a little less green as we till in crops that we have finished picking. I love watching the season unfold.
I ordered seed garlic last week and hopefully next year's garlic will be a success. I wasn't able to get our favorite variety but am looking forward to trying a couple new ones. At 20 bucks a pound it would have been cheaper to try to find some local seed from friends but everyone I talked to had some disease issues in their garlic this year and I wanted to take as few chances as possible even if it means it will take a few years of saving seed before we are up to the 300 pounds we planted last fall. We will be more careful about culling plants that don't look good and about what garlic we save for planting.
Last week some of you had a Sun Jewel Melon in your box and the remainder of you will receive one over the next couple weeks. It is a Korean melon with a crisp flesh. I just learned that some people eat the seeds. They are the sweetest part of the melon.
You received our first picking of corn last week and may receive the last picking off the planting today. It is tough to say just how much is out there and I am not sure if you will have it in your boxes today. We have two more plantings behind the current one so you will receive more corn at some point regardless of whether you have some in your box today.
Carrots
Cherry Tomatoes
Slicing Tomato
Summer Squash
Walla Walla Onions
Basil
Asian Cucumber - Large Only
Lemon Cucumber - Small Only
Wax Bean/Green Bean
Corn - Maybe
Sun Jewel Melon - Rotating Item
Lettuce - Large Only
Monday, August 5, 2013
Week 9
Most small farmers have mixed feelings about sweet corn. On the negative side is that it takes up a lot of space, loves nitrogen and water, is very hard to make any money on unless you are growing acres of it and it can be a little iffy to pull off a good crop in the Pacific Northwest. On the plus side is that nothing tastes as good as freshly picked sweet corn. That one plus keeps us growing it. There is one key to enjoying your sweet corn. You should eat it as soon as possible. Once corn is picked it immediately starts converting sugar to starch. Modern hybrids have been developed to slow this process but it still holds true with the variety we grow.
Last week a farm share member who is from the same town in Montana as Kelly was telling us about her and her husband's trip "home". Naturally most of the discussion focused on where they ate and where we eat when we go back to Helena. Nothing brings back memories like eating food you ate when you were younger. There is a sandwich place in Helena that is famous(I use that term loosely) for their ranch dressing. It sparked a conversation about ranch dressing and how none of us had made it but remember our mothers making it with the packet when we were kids. Well, forget the packet. I am including a link for a homemade ranch dressing that will make a happy home for your parsley.
Have a wonderful week and enjoy the summer sunshine.
Lettuce
Carrots
Green Beans
Bell Peppers
Cherry Tomatoes
Corn
Parsley
Kale - Small Only
Salad - Large Only
Cucumber
Ranch Dressing
Most small farmers have mixed feelings about sweet corn. On the negative side is that it takes up a lot of space, loves nitrogen and water, is very hard to make any money on unless you are growing acres of it and it can be a little iffy to pull off a good crop in the Pacific Northwest. On the plus side is that nothing tastes as good as freshly picked sweet corn. That one plus keeps us growing it. There is one key to enjoying your sweet corn. You should eat it as soon as possible. Once corn is picked it immediately starts converting sugar to starch. Modern hybrids have been developed to slow this process but it still holds true with the variety we grow.
Last week a farm share member who is from the same town in Montana as Kelly was telling us about her and her husband's trip "home". Naturally most of the discussion focused on where they ate and where we eat when we go back to Helena. Nothing brings back memories like eating food you ate when you were younger. There is a sandwich place in Helena that is famous(I use that term loosely) for their ranch dressing. It sparked a conversation about ranch dressing and how none of us had made it but remember our mothers making it with the packet when we were kids. Well, forget the packet. I am including a link for a homemade ranch dressing that will make a happy home for your parsley.
Have a wonderful week and enjoy the summer sunshine.
Lettuce
Carrots
Green Beans
Bell Peppers
Cherry Tomatoes
Corn
Parsley
Kale - Small Only
Salad - Large Only
Cucumber
Ranch Dressing
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