Monday, June 27, 2011

Week 4 Vegetable CSA 2011

Egg and Vegetable Shares Still Available!
Our laying hens are doing their job too well and we have plenty of eggs to sell.  But at some point in the near future, some of the laying hens will become stewing hens .  If you still want an egg share, please let us know so we don’t part with too many hens.   We can also sell eggs at the drop off.  Vegetable shares are also available.  Please spread the word as we have lots of good organic food to share. 

Farm News

Cooler than normal temperatures, misting rains, downpours, and thunderstorms can describe our week.  “At least it’s not a dry year,” was Brian’s comment as I anxiously watched the downpour spoil yet another chance to plant or weed.  But he’s right.  The tomatoes aren’t staked and the weeds are growing but so are the vegetables.  We are usually though not always better off in a wet period than a dry one.  The tomatoes may need staking but they are growing.  The carrots need weeding but they are growing.  Hot dry days are not as forgiving.  So we press on and do what we can to move forward.

We had workers finishing up the pepper planting in the east hoophouse.  We have weeders trying to make progress despite muddy hands.  I have a crew this afternoon while Brian heads to Naperville and another crew early tomorrow morning before predicted rain comes again.   This is the time of year when I feel I could work around the clock and wonder why doesn’t everyone else feel that way???

On the livestock end of things, I just received the call that our next batch of baby meat chicks are at the post office.  The four new calves that came to the farm last week have settled in nicely and are greedily grazing the lush grasses.  And the pigs are as happy as pigs can be in their mud baths left from the rain.  And I do mean happy.  Tremendous box this week.  Loving the cabbage and the bok choy and also the fresh basil.  We’re looking at carrots and beets next week as well as more sugar snaps

In The Box This Week

Red Leaf Lettuce  – Big pretty leaves from our east hoophouse.  The lettuce grows mostly undisturbed from the protection of the plastic covering the hoophouse so the leaves get nice and big.  Leaves like these do not last outside in the weather we’ve been having.  Driving hard rains shred the leaves and we find the ground littered with damaged leaves after the harvest.  

Red Russian Kale – Another contribution from the east hoophouse.  We have a bed of kale and swiss chard planted earlier this spring. These plants will thrive all season and will not die until the hardest of freezes this fall.  The leaves are so tender and tasty perfect for salads and stir fries.   I am a stem person – I love the crunch and flavor. And these stems are of top quality – tender, juicy and mild.   Don’t toss them – use them !   Last night’s supper was sautéed sugar snap peas, onions, and kale (stems and leaves).  We added our favorite Seeds of Change curry sauce and poached chicken and served over basmati rice.  The kale leaves blend so well in a dish like this and the chopped stems are like a celery or onion in texture.  Our little Laura proclaimed, “So yummie!”
Sugar Snap Peas – The pea harvest is peaking right now.   These are one of our favorite vegetables from the garden. Whether they are eaten raw or lightly sautéed, they are so delicious.  If you do decide to sauté, it is better to remove stem and pull off the attached string before cooking.  But we find ourselves unable to stop crunching on the raw pods. 

Garlic  Scapes – We planted 5,000 cloves of garlic last fall and that gives us close to 5,000 scapes.  Plenty of scapes!  The hummus recipe below is awesome.  Remember, garlic scapes keep forever so store them away in your refrigerator and take them out whenever you are looking for fresh garlic.
Fresh Basil    As I entered the barn this morning where we wash and bag all this good food, the basil was being bagged up and the aroma was such a welcome.  There is nothing like fresh basil and we’re pleased to have the first cutting in the box today. 
Bok Choy  - The first harvest of bok choy today.  Bok choy is an excellent stir fry vegetable and you will use both the stems and leaves.  Simply chop leaves and stems, add to a hot skillet with fat of choice and sauté until just wilted.
Cabbage – And the first harvest of cabbage this week.  How beautiful!  We love cabbage and you will find either green, red or a combination of the two.  Last night we did a very simple side of sautéed cabbage.  Using chicken fat we save from our pastured organic chickens, we stir fried an entire head of cabbage until just wilted.  There was none left.  The cabbage is so fresh and sweet that we didn’t need to add any other ingredients to have a more satisfying dish.  But this cabbage would also be excellent raw and we love to slice and add as a topping to our green salads.

Recipe

Garlic Scape Hummus
1 16 oz can of chickpeas or garbanzo beans
1/4 cup liquid from can of chickpeas
3-5 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (depending on taste)
1 1/2 tablespoons tahini
2 garlic scapes, bulb removed and set aside, stems chopped
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons olive oil

Drain chickpeas and set aside liquid from can. Combine remaining ingredients in blender or food processor. Add 1/4 cup of liquid from chickpeas. Blend for 3-5 minutes on low until thoroughly mixed and smooth.

Place in serving bowl.  Garnish with garlic scape bulbs.

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Week 3 Vegetable Share 2011

 
Our laying hens are doing their job too well and we have plenty of eggs to sell.  But at some point in the near future, some of the laying hens will become stewing hens .
If you still want an egg share, please let us know so we don’t part with too many hens.   Delivery is available every week  (full share) or every other week (half share).  You can also purchase eggs at your drop location – St. Paul’s and Options only.   Email if you are interested. 


Farm News
So it has cooled off and stayed cool.  Our night time temperatures have been in the 50’s and with a steady wind blowing it is downright chilly.   Heavy rains came through last night and I was very happy to see the lettuce and swiss chard in the field were not completely shredded with the driving rain.  Finishing the harvest of peas, onions and radishes this morning, we ducked in and out of brief rain showers and I see now we’re in a perpetual mist.  Good ole Illinois weather – from one extreme to the next.  

Field work this week was planting cucumbers, summer squash, lettuce, arugula, bush beans, celery, and the second planting of beets.   The first planting of beets is so close to harvest we may be able to take baby beets next week.   Brian hilled the potatoes for the first time and it’s apparent now that approximately 20% of the seed potatoes rotted in the ground due to excess moisture this spring.  Our homeschool family who comes once per week weeded and mulched our tomato hoophouse and the plants look fantastic.  Now that our harvesting is done for the day, the kids are in our east hoophouse planting a bed of peppers – orange, yellow, chocolate, and red peppers will get the protection of our hoophouse to thrive and produce fruit well into the fall.  We have not grown hoophouse peppers until now and look forward to seeing them thrive. 

With the ground quite wet from last night’s rain, we’ll be anxious to weed as much as possible.  The weeds are growing fast and it takes all our efforts to keep them under control.   The box is beautiful this week and we hope you appreciate the freshness and flavors of the food.   Try a chicken salad wrap using lettuce or swiss chard leaves – yum!

In Your Box This Week

Leaf Lettuce  – Beautiful red and green leaf lettuce today.  The red lettuce is our favorite variety called ‘New Red Fire’ – a variety that does well in cold or heat.  The light green lettuce is and old variety my mother grew when I was a kid – ‘Black Seeded Simpson’.

Spinach – This is the last harvest of the hoophouse spinach.  It took Hannah and I a little bit of time to pick all these little leaves trying to strip all the plants of every good leaf.  Now, a crew of helpers are reworking the bed and planting 4 varieties of peppers today.  Out with the old and in with the new!

Green Onions – This will be the last of the larger green onions for awhile.  These green onions were overwintered from last fall so they have good size.  But the supply is near depleted and the spring onions are not quite ready.  For those of you who have had onions since the shares began and feel overwhelmed, you could slice them and freeze for later use.  Include both the white and green and use later on in stir fries, stews, etc.  They will also store quite well for the next few weeks wrapped in a cotton towel or paper towel and placed in a storage bag or container.

Garlic  Scapes – Many of you will recognize the garlic scapes from previous years.  This unique looking vegetable is the seed head of our garlic planting.  They emerge this time of year and we remove them so the plant will put its energy into the bulb.  They have an intense fresh garlic flavor.  The entire scape is edible although the very tip where it looks like a blade of grass can be a little tough.  Use the scapes anywhere you might want garlic flavor.  We have grilled them and put them in stir fries.  And they keep for weeks in a container or bag in the refrigerator.
French Tarragon   A class herb with a distinctive anise flavor.  Goes very well with the chicken salad recipe below.   This herb is best used fresh.  If you can’t use all of it, place in freezer bag or container, label and freeze for later use.
Radishes – We are just harvesting our first radish bed.  Never have we waited so long for radishes mature.  The planting suffered from too much moisture early on and never really recovered.  We have scratched a few more seeds in for another planting but these will not be ready for a few weeks.  Just to show how one year is different from another – last year we had so many radishes we couldn’t pick them all in time before they went pithy.  Every growing season is new adventure.
Swiss Chard/Red Russian Kale – Pretty bouquets of ‘Bright Lights’ swiss chard and Red Russian kale.  Both are quite nice in a salad but also stand up well in dishes such as sautéed chard and kale. The stems on the chard are beautiful and have a crunch and texture like celery but in more vibrant colors.
Sugar Snap Peas – The first harvest of sugar snap peas this week.  We can’t get enough of these sweet crunchy pods.  And they are loving this cool wet weather.  Peas can be a challenge.  You can’t get them going until early April but then it might turn hot in May shutting them down.  Let’s cross our fingers and hope we get a good harvest of these gems.
Chicken Salad with French Tarragon
2 cups chopped, cooked chicken meat*
1/4 cup dried cranberries, finely chopped
1 stalk celery, finely chopped
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1/4 cup mayonnaise
 1-2 Tbsp fresh chopped french tarragon
Salt and pepper to taste

Poach about 1 1/2 lbs of skinless chicken breasts and thighs, preferably bone-in (for flavor), in a quart of salted (1 teaspoon) water, for about 20 minutes, or until the chicken is cooked through. Remove from water, let cool, remove bones, chop the meat into 1/2-inch to 3/4-inch cubes.
Mix all of the ingredients together. Adjust seasoning. Serve with lettuce for a simple salad, in a tomato that has been cut open for a stuffed tomato, or with slices of bread for a chicken salad sandwich.


Week 2 Vegetable Share 2011


Farm News

Well, the good news is it probably won’t get much hotter than the last few days.  Whether it is 95 or 98, we won’t be able to tell and we usually don’t hit 100.   All we know is that it is quite warm and windy.  Some of the large leafed plants such as bok choy and cabbage can look very tired during the heat of the day. But there is moisture in the ground from recent rains and the plants rebound in the early evening.  Relief is coming, I hear, but let’s hope it’s not a round of dangerous storms and torrential rains.Today is delivery day but we are also working furiously to prepare beds and get more food planted.  Our greenhouse is still bursting with plants – celery (new this year), eggplant, cukes, zucchini, more basil, the second round of beets, and tomatillos.  That’s just a few items on the agenda.   Our planting has been interrupted by frequent rains.  With rain predicted this evening, we’re giving it our best shot at planting everything we can.

Happy Pigs On Pasture
On the livestock end of things, Brian went to Arthur, Illinois yesterday with the first batch of chickens – 200 meat birds for the meat shares.  The first beef of the season will go to the locker tomorrow morning with the remaining 4 later this month.  And the 13 little pigs are grazing their pasture and enjoying any vegetable trimmings, eggs from nests we find in the grass, and even a gallon of organic raw milk that went sour.  I was told they drank that gallon in about 2 minutes flat!   Laying hens are doing their job nicely and we have egg shares and extra eggs to sell to anyone interested.
It feels like we are at a full sprint right now trying to stay ahead of things. It’s always this way but we are getting good help right now and everyone is working so hard to produce really good organic food for you folks. 

In Your Box Today
 
Salad Mix  – A wonderful blend of baby green this week: red and green leaf lettuce, rainbow swiss chard, and pungent, flavorful arugula.

Spinach – This is young tender spinach from our hoophouse.  It has been growing with the protection of shade cloth for a few weeks now since the weather became warm.   But the plants have had enough of the heat and are beginning to send up flower stalks and leaf production will halt.  We’ll be pulling this planting and putting another in its place.

Green Onions – Pretty bunches of green onions this week.

Garlic  Scapes – Many of you will recognize the garlic scapes from previous years.  This unique looking vegetable is the seed head of our garlic planting.  They emerge this time of year and we remove them so the plant will put its energy into the bulb.  They have an intense fresh garlic flavor.  The entire scape is edible although the very tip where it looks like a blade of grass can be a little tough.  Use the scapes anywhere you might want garlic flavor.  We have grilled them and put them in stir fries.  And they keep for weeks in a container or bag in the refrigerator.
Fresh Parsley – The parsley is just getting started but the crop looks good so far.  Parsley can be used anywhere and a little goes a long way – this is intense parsley!  Try sprinkling a few leaves right into your salad. 
Broccoli – Our broccoli planting is struggling through the crazy spring weather and the dramatic temperature fluctuations.   Less than ideal weather conditions can bring on early heads but they are smaller than usual.  Fortunately, we have 4 varieties planted and they aren’t all sending up premature small heads.  We’ll have to wait and see which variety performs the best in adverse weather conditions.  Despite the difficulties, what is in your box today is tender and delicious.  Our girls are eating this broccoli raw and enjoying it very much. 

Garlic Scape Pesto
¾  cup garlic scapes, top bulbed part removed, cut into ¼-inch slices
1/4 cup walnuts
¾ cup olive oil
¼-1/2 cup grated parmigiano
½ teaspoon salt
black pepper to taste

Place scapes and walnuts in the bowl of a food processor and process until well combined and somewhat smooth. Slowly drizzle in oil and process until integrated. With a rubber spatula, scoop pesto out of bowl and into a mixing bowl. Add parmigiano to taste; add salt and pepper. Makes about 6 ounces of pesto. Keeps for up to one week.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Week 1 Vegetable CSA Newsletter - Local

Today’s box reflects the early spring garden – lots of greens and leaves.  We like to use everything from the garden – like the young tender beet leaves thinned from the beet planting.  Their vibrant color and mild flavor are a real treat in a salad.  The farm and garden are a place of potential right now – young seedlings and transplants, maturing fruit,  13 young pigs, growing chickens and a new puppy called Bella. 

One Spinach Leaf At A Time
Farm News
We’re kicking off the season with a near perfect weather day.  We could all use a few more days like today – light winds, mild temps, low humidity.  The garden and livestock will be comfortable today.  It’s been another eventful spring with weather conditions all over the place.  We snuck in our first plantings April 1, then rain and cold.  Got a few turnips in a couple weeks later, more rain and cold.  The turnips sat under water and struggled and we eventually tilled them under.  Another 2 weeks gone and we got the broccoli and cabbage in the ground in early May.  More rain, cold and then hot.  Right now the garden is behind where we want to be but a day like today certainly helps things along. 

We are planting every chance we get once the ground dries out.  Our soil is quite heavy with a high clay content so we must be patient and let the soil dry.  If we work it too wet – (till or cultivate) we make ‘pottery’ once the soil dries - hard dry clods and a firm crust over the soil surface that can be impenetrable for little seedlings.   Every year our soil improves as we add more organic matter, proper soil nutrients, and livestock grazing.  The earthworm population is phenomenal and in a dry year, our soil holds more moisture than a sandy lighter soil.   But in a wet year it comes down to patience. 
We’ll be looking for sugar snap peas in the next couple weeks as well as garlic scapes – the dramatic seed stalk that emerges from a garlic plant in early June.   The lettuce is sizing up and the radishes, despite struggling through wet conditions, will hopefully be ready for next week.
We’ll keep you updated throughout the season with the newsletter, a weekly email and the blog.  We’re glad to have you along.

Greens Blend  – A lovely blend of baby beet greens (deep purple stems), baby swiss chard, and arugula.  All leaves and stems are quite tender and mild.  You may not have eaten something like beet greens before but think you will find them quite delicious.  We are going to make you stray from the usual lettuce salad this year and introduce you to leaves with different flavors and textures.

Spinach – Young tender spinach from our hoophouse.  These leaves are delicate and mild – excellent flavor.  The stems are long but tender and tasty – don’t toss them!  Use them for dipping – great for kids and easier to eat than celery.

Green Onions

Green Garlic  – These big stalks of garlic are actually immature plants from our November planting.  These plants should be treated more like a fresh onion or leek as they should be refrigerated (if the stalk is too big just cut in half.  The entire stalk is edible from white bulb to the green stalks.  You will even see the early sign of the garlic scape or seed stalk emerging from the center of some of the stalks.  Use any portion of the garlic plant wherever you want fresh garlic flavor.  The garlic planting does not fully mature until July when we pull the remaining plants, size, bunch them in 10, and hang them in the corn crib to cure.  The curing process assures the bulbs will store for months.
French Sorrel – One of the first greens to emerge in the spring, French Sorrel is a perennial in the garden.  The leaves have the most unique flavor of any green – sour citrus.  Add a bit to your salad or sandwich – the flavor will certainly awaken your taste buds. 
Fresh Oregano – Add chopped fresh oregano to a basic salad vinaigrette, pasta sauce, or dry for later use by removing from the bag, spreading out the pieces and place in warm dry area out of sun until leaves are completely dry and crumbly.
Organic Pastured Eggs – The garden is getting a slow start this year but our laying hens are giving us plenty of eggs.  So we’re sharing the harvest and giving out a dozen eggs with the vegetable box today.   These eggs come from our laying hens grazing on pasture that will be the garden next year.  They peck, scratch and graze from sun up until sun down.  And somewhere in between they lay one beautiful perfect pastured egg.  With the green pasture so lush right now, these are some of the best eggs of the season.  The hen’s diet is perfect – plenty of pasture to graze and a certified organic grain ration. If you have not tried our eggs before, you will be pleasantly surprised by the deep yellow yolk – a clear sign of a perfect egg. 
Homemade Salad Dressings
I’m a H.S.D.A - homemade salad dressing advocate.  They are easy and way better than store bought.  Here are a couple favorites.  For supper last night we had salad bar – we lined up the greens and fixings on the counter and each of us went through the salad bar and filled our plates. If you can chop a few veggies, wash greens and make a salad dressing – dinner is  ready.  And don’t forget the sunflower seeds and raisins – both are excellent on a salad.

Strawberry Balsamic Vinaigrette
1/3 c balsamic vinegar
½ tsp salt
Freshly ground pepper
2 T Strawberry Jam
1 cup olive oil

Combine all but the olive oil in a deep bowl (to prevent splashing).  While whisking constantly, drizzle in olive oil.  Adjust seasonings to taste.

Thousand Island Dressing
1 c plain organic yogurt
¼ c mayo
¼ c ketchup
1 T apple cider vinegar
2 T finely chopped sweet pickles such as bread and butter type or pickle relish
Freshly ground pepper and salt to taste        

Combine all ingredients.  Use as a salad dressing or dip for vegetables.