What’s in the Box:
Carrots, green top onions, summer squash, zucchini, red cabbage, green cabbage, english cucumber, tomato, pea shoots, sunflower shoots, and swiss chard.
What’s going on at the farm:
We have some pretty hot and humid days in the future for us here as we head deeper into the main summer portion of our CSA season. Exceptional amounts of rain have kept the fields muddy and the bugs hatching even better to keep us moving quickly in the fields. We have been keeping up on our regelular chores of harvesting, weeding and pruning and mowing but also removing beds and preparing for other crops to go out this week if it will just stay dry for a few days for us. I am actually proud to say we got all the peas torn down immediately after the last pick on them this last week and hauled in the cabbage and got the fields plowed today. The old strawberries were removed and some rock picking was done in that field too! We have some big events for us in the next month including garlic harvest, onion harvest, and hopefully also planting of many fall crops which will rely on our ability to keep up with all the other tasks of harvesting, cleaning, and delivering/marketing. The change in weather has some new crops ready to peak this week including some of our personal favorites, tomatoes and carrots!
Heirloom tomatoes: these babies are earlier than ever this year, beating our first good harvest last year by two weeks!!! We have many varieties to keep it interesting and flavorful. This week you will receive some pink Tomimuro Mucho’s which are a pink japanese tomato with wonderful, sweet, balanced flavor. There may be a few other varieties in your share this week including a small black slicer, and some other pink tomatoes including Pruden’s Purple, and Pink Beauty. Tomato sandwiches, BLT, or caprese are some suggestions, need I say more?
Swiss chard: For only the second time this season our bright lights swiss chard makes a stunning appearance with its multi colored stems and earthy beet like stems and rich spinach like greens. I enjoy my chard sautéed in butter for a frittata in the morning with a little cheddar cheese added at the end. Its great anywhere you would use spinach too and packed with vitamins!
Carrots: Crispy, sweet and crunchy these lovely roots were one of the first crops I planted this year and they are finally in after several months of attention weeding this sometimes challenging to grow crop. One of the reasons they are so challenging is because they take two weeks to sprout and cannot be transplanted so that gives weeds an unfair head start on the carrots. Yet, here they are… enjoy!
Cabbage is great for slaw, or in stir fry too! Try it with other grated roots like carrot or minced onions and herbs. I really like dressing it with a balsamic mayo I make with balsamic vinegar and mayonaiise. Two types of cabbage coming to you this week and its the 4th of July so do yourself a favor and try a multicolored coleslaw or grilled cabbage quarters! I like to quarter them bi slicing through the tap root into large quarters and then roast the flat side down and marinate the cabbage as it cooks with teriyaki or your other favorite dressing.
Onions are bulbing out quickly in the field with all the rain and irrigation. We will continue to thin our crop this week to provide you with a random selection of onion variety which could be red or yellow with tops on. Cooking with the tops works too, and thinning all of these should make for a good-sized dry onion crop later when we pull them at the end of July.
Pea and sunflower shoots: These are a great summer solution to salad greens and great as a topping on just about any dish you can imagine!
Zucchini and Summer Squash are very similar in texture, flavor, and cooking requirements. They really go well in everything and we are continuing to pick these guys daily in order to keep them from getting to big on us, at least that is our goal. I love these sautéed with butter and onions with eggs, on pizza, grilled and brushed with herbs and oil, and in pasta, stir fry, or even sliced thinly the long way for a mock lasagna using squash instead of noodles.
Cucumbers love all this humidity and water and our slicers have finally started coming in this week. The bigger slicers have a slightly thicker skin but are still the european type with small seed cavities and smooth skin with no spines. Our baby english cucumbers are still peaking too so we will have some of those sweeter, softer, and smaller ones that you were receiving in there too.
Some other crops to note that look good and will be coming the next couple weeks include eggplant, green peppers, leeks, hot peppers, cherry tomatoes, and cauliflower.
Have a great 4th of July holiday everyone and enjoy the veggies!
