CSA Newsletter for October 17, 2015

Farm Update

Look at this lovely planting of lettuce, which will be in the
shares this week!

Hello everyone!  We hope everyone is staying warm during this chilly weekend!  Don’t be surprised if there are a few minor changes to the CSA options this week as we see the effects of the freezing temperatures over the weekend.  We are hopeful that most cold-hardy crops will do well through the freeze since things have had several weeks to acclimate, but nothing is for sure.   This last week has been mostly about harvesting and preparing for freezing weather.  Fred covered one of our main broccoli plantings that we hope to have for next week, and he also prepped the small greenhouse for being heated once again.  The workload has started slow down, but it has also been a little harder as the cold makes working outside less productive than in warmer weeks.  Looking out at the farm, it is easy to see that things are winding down as the main green areas are our cover crops and the few plantings that are still producing veggies for the next few weeks. The ever-present frogs and snakes have also started to leave us, and the grass and areas that surround the farm are turning browner.  We have a really nice planting of lettuce in the coldframes right now, which is where almost all of the lettuce is likely to come from this week. 

For those of you in the Lansing and Midland drop-offs and delivery routes, this will be your last week of veggies for the 2015 season.  For those of you in the Alma and Mt. Pleasant areas, you still have this upcoming week and the following week since you started a week later in June. We have really enjoyed working with all of you in the CSA this year, and if you have any feedback or suggestions that will help make your share or CSA experience better, we would love to hear from you as we will quickly enter the planning stage for 2016 soon.  Also, if you are interested in signing up for next year, just let us know and we’ll get you set up for the 2016 season!

What to Expect in Your Share This Week

At the regular drop-offs:

• Sweet potatoes or potatoes
• Spinach, winter squash, or Brussels sprouts
• Carrots
• Lettuce
• Broccoli or beets
• Kale or cabbage
• Onion or shallot

For home/workplace delivery:

A Share:                    B Share:
Sweet potatoes          Potatoes
Winter squash           Spinach
Carrots                      Carrots
Lettuce                      Lettuce
Beets                         Broccoli
Kale                          Cabbage
Shallot                      Onion

Veggie Spotlight:  Spinach

Back in the spring, we uncovered last fall's planting of
spinach to find it waiting for us, ready to eat!

Though referenced a bit earlier in Persian writings, one of the earliest recorded accounts of spinach being cultivated was in the 7th century, when the King of Nepal gave it to the Chinese as a gift. During the Moorish empire, spinach first entered Europe through Spain by Arab agronomists who developed the spinach we think of today. There it grew immensely in popularity and was famously loved by Catherine de Medici, who requested that she have it for every meal. Even though spinach is now popular here in the United States, by far most of the world’s spinach is still consumed in Asia. In fact, even though the US is the world’s second leading producer at 3%, China actually produces 85% of the world’s spinach (though this data is almost 10 years old). Spinach has been an outstanding crop for northern small farms like ours, because our cooler climate helps it to be darker, thicker, and more flavorful than California spinach. It has a unique ability to withstand extremely cold temperatures (well below 0 degrees Fahrenheit) as long as it does not get exposed to too much wind while frozen. This cold hardiness comes from its origins back in Persia where it would sprout in the fall, withstand the cold of winter, and flower in the spring.

We actually grow more spinach at the farm than many folks in the CSA realize, because it is most abundant at our farm earlier and later than the normal CSA season.  This spring especially, our overwintered spinach did extremely well for a good mid-to-late May crop.  It is always one of the last and first crops we seed every season.  Currently, spinach at the farm is seeded using our field seeder, which can be modified to seed our coldframes as well. Spinach is seeded in early to mid-March in the coldframes and is able to germinate at low temps. When it is up it is usually very frost hardy. The first field seeding of spinach was early this year (on March 30^th), and we immediately covered it with our clear perforated plastic tunnels, which act like mini-coldframes.  Spinach takes a lot of fertility, so we always put down extra manure pellets before planting.  This year we grew two varieties: the traditional Tyee and a new variety called Ashley.  The spinach you can get in your share this week is the Ashley type, and we have been impressed with the dark green leaves and nutrient-density of this new variety.  We have started talking to some seed companies to see what other new varieties might be coming out that have the nice dark leaves, but also display better heat tolerance than current varieties.  Better breeding work will be required to get more weeks of spinach into the shares as breeders adapt new varieties to deal with heat stress, which is the main limitation we face trying to grow spinach in the summer.  Growing the Ashley variety we were able to get two more week of spinach this season than we would have had with just the old Tyee variety.

Here is a planting of spinach under a covering of clear plastic.
The plastic will help insulate the spinach through the long
winter so we can eat it early in the spring.

One thing that makes spinach unique compared with other veggies we grow is that we seed it in the fall for a crop next spring. When Fred grew spinach in Ohio he could reliably count on the spinach planted in the fall to come back for a great early spring crop, but with harsher temps and longer winters here in central Michigan we have to cover it to get it to survive reliably. In winters with lots of snow cover, the spinach comes back very well regardless of low temperatures, because the snow actually has an insulating effect on the plants beneath it.

Spinach is considered a superfood because it is absolutely packed with vitamins and nutrients, ranking just behind things like kale for its nutrient content. We are glad to have it in the shares and our table again, and hope you enjoy this unique and tasty green this week as well!

Recipes

If you are like me, you are now totally excited to get some yummy spinach meals on the table!  Here is a recipe for Garlic Parmesan Chicken (with lots of sauteed spinach!) to get you started.  Totally delicious, fast, and so easy even I can do it! :-)