Week 9

This past week a dear friend and her family came to stay with us for a few days.  Maryanne and I spent our junior year of college living and studying in Rouen, France.  The study abroad program connected her family and mine so that I could catch a ride with them to airport to meet up with the rest of the study abroad group.  We were friends instantly, talking nonstop the entire two hours to JFK airport.  France was incredible and without that year in France, I don't know that I ever would have found my way to a life in agriculture.  I was fascinated by their food systems.  I loved the regional pride they took in certain foods that could only be found in one region of the country and was struck by the joy people took in eating.  It was the nightly cheese plate that stuck with me the most and I knew I wanted to learn more about making cheese.  It took me ten years to follow up on that dream. When I left Colorado for Maine to learn cheese making, I had no idea that it would be the the other most transformative year of my life.  I learned a lot about making cheese that year, but more importantly I discovered farming and I met Kelly.  Maryanne was living in Maine and I spent a lot of time at her house, sharing food, doing laundry and hanging out on my day off.  She has been a part of two of the most important years of my life, not just in terms of my interest in agriculture, but really just in general.  We hadn't seen each other in about six years, but it didn't feel that way.  It was so wonderful to spend time with her and her family and also to be reminded of why I fell in love with farming and how I got to this spot.  I also slacked a bit on doing farm work which was an incredible luxury for July and I feel ready for August!  A special shout out to Kelly who was so supportive and who along with our crew picked up my slack so that I could enjoy having my friend in town.

The heat has given us a boost and the first good harvest of slicing tomatoes happened on Friday.  I was also surprised to see how much the melons have grown in the past week.  Stuff happens so fast this time of year, it can be hard to keep up, but so far so good.  I was particularly pleased we got the parsnips and leeks weeded.  I don't know how many of you missed getting them in your boxes last year but I really missed having them to both sell and eat.

Carrots - We have a crew member out this week and we are going to save a bit of time by giving you carrots without the tops.  The only purpose the tops serve is that they look nice, which admittedly  I put a lot of value in, but these will taste just as good.
Beets 
Lettuce
Potatoes - We have moved our next planting of potatoes and these will be true new potatoes with very thin skins.  If you pick up at our house you can see the potatoes flowering in the back field behind our house.
Japanese Cucumber - Our favorite cucumber - has a thin skin and is more perishable than the type you had in your boxes a couple weeks ago.
Slicing Tomato
Kohlrabi
Cherry Tomato - Large Only

Week 7

Many of the crops that like heat get covered with floating row cover when we transplant them.  Floating row cover is a very light weight spun poly that adds a little warmth and protection but still allows light and water to pass through it.  For things in the cucurbit family like zucchinis, cucumbers, melons and winter squash it also protects them from the cucumber beetle.  We like to leave the cover on as long as possible, not taking it off until we see the plant starting to flower.  This past week we uncovered the melons and this coming week we will remove it from the winter squash.   Typically the winter squash are attempting to spring loose by the time they flower.  Yesterday Kelly took the tractor over and rototilled the paths while the squash is still contained.  Hopefully we will get a chance to uncover it tomorrow.  Before we had cucumber beetles, we still used row cover for heat, but we would be little more casual about it.  If we were reusing row cover and it was just a little short we would leave a dozen or so plants uncovered with the idea that we would cover them later (ya, right).  One thing that proved to us was that it really makes a difference.  Plants that get covered get off to a much quicker start and seem more productive.  Looking out at a field of white is less pastoral but the advantages of using it more than make up for the looks and cost of it.

I thought last week's box was lovely as I was packing it.  This weeks box isn't as bountiful ,but it will contain some of our first cherry tomatoes.  Ahh, summer.  We gorged ourselves on apricots, blueberries and peaches this week.  Tomatoes and stone fruit are a couple of the things I look forward to most this time of year.  I bought some delicious peaches at market the same day I was given a small depression glass mixing bowl by someone who knows I love old dishes of all sorts.  The peaches and blueberries looked so beautiful in the blue glass and it gave me a reason to use some adorable pink depression glass custard cups I picked up at a yard sale last winter.  I will admit that most of the time I enjoy choosing what plate I want to use for a particular dish as much as I do making and eating the food.  As tiring as July can be, it is also a wonderful time of year- good food, nice weather.  We ate outside most nights last week.  One night as dusk set in we were treated to watching three barred owls fly around.  They were making short trips from tree to tree in our orchard sometimes landing on the ground and calling to each other the whole time.   They were so close, it was an amazing thing to see.

Hope you all have some nice meals this week!  So far the only thing in my meal plan is to make some peach ice cream.

Carrots - I know some of you are keeping up with the carrots because you are buying extra at market.  For those of you who need some inspiration we love the carrot salad from the Portland restaurant Kachka.  Admittedly, I have never eaten there, but a customer turned me on to the cookbook of the same name.  We served it this winter along with a few other root vegetable salads and some pierogis at a dinner party and everyone loved it.  The link is a little strange, but it was the only place I could find it.  If you look towards the top of the page when you open the link you will see that it is showing on 1 of 5 pages in the cookbook where the salad is mentioned. You will have to click next to see the actual recipe.   Russian Korean Carrot Salad 
Cucumbers
Cherry Tomatoes
Herb Choice - Mostly basil or parsley.
Green or Purple Bell Pepper
Scallions - I think in most years we are giving you bunched onions at this point in the season.  They are a bit behind this year.  I am still confident they will size up, but for now we are sticking with scallions
Green Beans - Large Only
Collard Greens - Large Only

Week 6

All but a very small section of garlic, Spanish Roja, is pulled and drying in the barn.  The garlic field is being flipped for fall carrots that are due to be seeded in one week.  The quick flip of fields and getting two crops out of the same space has been a regular strategy this summer.  We really haven't downsized plantings much, but our space has been downsized by a little over 20 percent.  In my mind it didn't seem like that would be as difficult as it has been.   Our labor is considerably higher than last year and I am not exactly sure why, but I suspect loosing Shincke is contributing to it.  Every year is different.  Every year we hope to be better farmers and better managers.  I think both Kelly and I are really struggling with that this year.  It is much easier to become better at something when you first start doing it.  We are in our 12th season of farming and our drive to always be better is still there, but it seems harder to make large improvements.  The transition to South Bay has gone okay, but it hasn't simplified things as much as we had hoped.  I still am not happy with the flow of our new washroom and walk-in or the organization of all our stuff.  I don't think I realized how many systems we had in place.  Those systems just kind of formed naturally and got tweaked a little each year.  I thought we would take all that knowledge, bring it to South Bay and set up a perfect system, but it is just going to take a bit more time than either of us expected...story of lives :)

We started going the Oly market all four days last week and we applied for a double stall/permanent stall assignment.  Up until this week we showed up at 8:55 and waited for our name to be called based on a seniority system.  We then unloaded the van, parked it a couple blocks away and then set up, all in under an hour.  We never knew if we would get to spread out into an extra space or not.  Now we can show up earlier and just head to our stall!  It feels so much better.  We also hired another person.  She will cover crew taking summer vacations and work on Fridays since we will be loosing a harvest position to work the market on Friday.  July is always a hectic month.  While you all are still in the first half of your CSA season, July is the month that really sets us up to sell through November.  Today I am seeding the last round of cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower, all of which should be planted in the field by August 1st.  Seed, weed, harvest, repeat!  The motto for July is now or never. Well, there is always next year, but I promise I am still trying to make this year the best yet.

On that note, I am off to seed.

Enjoy your week.  Hope you all had a nice holiday.

Lettuce
Carrots
Potatoes
Swiss Chard
Zucchini
Garlic
Cauliflower - If you don't have cauliflower this week you will next week.  I am hoping we can harvest enough for everybody but we might have to do one size share this week and the other size next week.
Bok Choy - Large Only

Week 5

This morning we walked around and checked in on some things that we suspected should be close to harvest.  We uncovered the cauliflower this morning in hopes that it might be ready for this week's CSA, but it is still a week or two out.  Field cucumbers should start picking tomorrow and the zucchini is finally taking off and looking nice.  We also have a new variety of chard that we hope to put in your boxes next week.  The rainbow chard is pretty, but I am on the lookout for one whose flavor leans a bit more towards spinach. 

This morning when we went to load cabbage out of the walk-in at the house the temperature was reading 26 degrees.  It doesn't look like we lost any cabbage, but I am not sure what the situation will be tomorrow.  If it is freezing we will turn it off before we load it, which will keep everything cool enough.  Fortunately we just got a larger walk-in at the farm up and running this week and the older small walk-in is also still running so the cabbage has a place to go while we sort the situation out.  Don't be concerned if the walk-in is turned off. 

 Happy Eating!

Carrots
Lettuce - Hopefully little gems for everyone
Snow Peas
Cabbage
Scallion
Cucumber
Basil - Large Only
Broccoli - Large Only

Week 4

We started pulling garlic this week.  Those of you who pick up on Monday will see the start of it hanging in the metal building.  This starts the transition of that building from soil and fertilizer storage to curing and storage spot for garlic, then onions, then squash.

We had a lot of enjoyable meals this week.  It started out with a charred snap pea and burrata salad that reminded me how good snap peas can be when lightly cooked.  I seared them in a hot cast iron, but would like to grill them next time.  I was a little on the fence about whether I liked the mix of raw and cooked peas, but it does make for a more interesting texture.  The mint and lemon zest really iced the cake.  I also made a golden coconut broth with crispy tofu a great vegetarian food blog.  I increased the miso and tamari while decreasing the water a tad to make a richer, more savory broth.  The crispy tofu is easy and fantastic.  I used roasted zucchini and snow peas.  Typically when making that kind of dish I just add the veggies to the broth, but cooking them separate worked great.  One of the points of making that dish was to make extra rice for this crispy rice bowl with ginger scallion vinaigrette that we discovered over the winter and can't stop eating.  It is just so easy and really adaptable.  In the winter we used shredded daikon and carrot, but last week we used carrots, cukes and raw peas.  I love it the fried egg, but we have also topped it with salmon and grilled chicken.

Carrots
Beets
Potatoes - The plan was to give everyone the white and pink potato Warba last week and the red skinned potato Cheshire this week but we culled more Warba than expected and a few of you ended up with Cheshire.  Kelly and I both think it is the tastier of the two and you will all be getting it this week.  It has a deep yellow flesh, occasionally streaked with red and a waxier texture.  We sold out of them at market yesterday and so I dug a few this morning and snapped this pic.  I just love it when all the potatoes stay attached to the plant.  In general they aren't as big as the Warba but they are plentiful.
Zucchini
Snap Peas 
Garlic
Lettuce - Large Only

Week 3

Even during the busy season I find a bit of time to look at cookbooks and food blogs.  One blogger/cookbook writer who I like a lot is Andrea Nguyen.  She has written several Vietnamese cookbooks, but her blog is a bit more diverse in its recipes.  The other day I stumbled on an entry from 2017 that talked about Joyce Chen.  Chen, who was born in China, opened several restaurants in Boston in the 60's and 70's, had a cookbook, a cooking show briefly on PBS and a line of stir fry sauces.  Despite my New England upbringing and my childhood admiration for Julia Child, who filmed her cooking show on the same set as Chen, I had never heard of her.   Her story is interesting and I am excited to have a cookbook to keep my eye out for when I am in used bookstores.  My collection of cookbooks is bordering on absurd, but every time I pull one down thinking I should pass it on I change my mind.  I just love them and the history they contain.  I ended up making the recipe for Peking meat sauce noodles that Nguyen adapted from Chen's cookbook.  It was incredibly savory and great for this time of year.  I adapted it a bit myself and used frozen udon noodles mainly because I like any excuse to eat them.  I love how thick they are and I love the springy/chewy texture.  The recipe was great because it calls for both radishes and radish tops.

Lettuce
Carrots
Snap Peas
New Potatoes - These potatoes will not store for long.  They should be used soon.
Cucumber
Radishes - Radishes aren't just for salads.  They can be roasted or sauteed as well.
Strawberries - Large Only

Week 2

Last week was a hustle.  We had a bunch of flats that NEEDED to be transplanted and the first week of CSA and Chehalis always stresses me out a bit.  I was bummed snap peas weren't picking yet, but also a little relieved.  On Friday afternoon, about an hour after the crew should have gone home we threw the last shovels full of dirt on the row cover we use to get the winter squash off to a good start and called it  a week.  Everything that needed to get planted did and I went to bed Friday night incredibly relieved.  A former employee came in on Saturday and he and Kelly tied up some loose ends and got the drip irrigation set up for the squash while I went to market with another crew member.  This week we will plant out melons and our second succession of peppers.  It is unusual to have two successions of peppers in this part of the world because they are a heat loving crop.  We started doing it last year so we would have green bells for the co-op for a longer period of time.   We have a couple new melons in the mix that I am excited about.  However, melons can be risky so I seeded larger amounts of two of our reliable favorites for your farm shares.  Lettuce and salad get planted out every week and they are on the agenda as well.  Field zucchinis are pretty close and these next couple weeks will see more time spent harvesting and less time transplanting as all of our longer season warm weather crops will be out by the end of this week.

I hope you all made some good meals with your boxes last week.  This box will be pretty easy to eat without even turning on the stove if you are so inclined.

Carrots 
Cucumber - These are out of a hoop house. Field cukes are about a month out.
Broccoli
Peas - Snap or Snow - Hoping to get as many of you snow peas as possible but if there aren't enough there may be some snap peas as well (large share) or instead of (small share) snow peas.
Salad Turnips -  These are milder than radishes and are great raw or cooked.  For some people the greens are the best part so please give them a try.
Strawberries - I hope I don't regret putting them on the list.  They are a maybe and I might be being optimistic.
Salad Mix - Large Only