CSA Newsletter for Week 10

 

Farm Update

Hi everyone!  This week, we are officially halfway through the CSA season, and we're starting to feel a change in the air.  You know how around mid-August, there's something about the air that feels just a little bit like fall, even though it's still really hot out?  We've noticed that change recently.  I think of it as back-to-school weather, and it always makes me want to buy school supplies and walk around MSU campus drinking orange spice tea.  But maybe that's just me. 😂

We are officially done with our massive potato harvest!  That was a huge job, but it is done for the season!  The humongous amount of weeding has also finally subsided, and now we're basically just doing maintenance weeding.  We'll be starting our large onion harvest this week, which should also be a big job.  Remember those 60,000 onion plants we put in the ground in March?  Now they all have to come out of the ground, so I expect that will take up a major portion of the next few weeks.  After the onions are harvested, we'll lay them out to cure in one of our coldframes that isn't currently planted.  Onions that are intended to be stored for long periods of time at room temperature need to be cured first so they don't rot after a few weeks, and the empty coldframe is just the right place to do it!  

New this week, we're finally into our green peppers!  I'm especially excited about our green Carmen peppers, which are an elongated sweet pepper variety with a fantastic flavor.  They kind of resemble hot peppers because they're longer than your traditional green bell peppers, but they're actually sweet instead of spicy.  So if you've never tried them before, you're in for a treat!  We're also on the verge of having a ton of slicing tomatoes! Right now we're getting the first trickle of red, ripe slicers, and we've got plenty of tangy green tomatoes on the vine (which will be making an appearance in the share this week!  Yum!) But as the week wears on, a lot more of them will be ripening, and we'll probably be fully into tomatoes next week.  Then we'll start drowning in them and eating them for every meal, and by October I'll be pretty content to never see another tomato again until next summer.  And then next July, I'll be counting down the days until the tomatoes are ready again.  I know this, because that is what has happened pretty much every year since we started the farm 10 years ago.  There is a very cyclical nature to farming, and while each growing season is unique, there are some things that don't change, like weeds in June, rain in October, and feeling like you can take on the world in February.  And lots of tomatoes in September.

So welcome to week 10 of the CSA!  See you guys at the drop-off!

What to Expect in Your Share

If you are going through the line at one of our traditional style drop-offs (Alma, Mt. Pleasant, and Midland), here’s what the options will be at the different stations.  If you have a half share, you’ll choose one item at each station, and if you have a full share, you choose two items at each station! 

• Potatoes
• Cherry tomatoes
• Beets, kale, or a bag of small onions
• Leeks, okra, or 2 green peppers
• Romaine lettuce
• Microgreens, basil, or green tomatoes
• Garlic, onions, or slicing tomatoes

If you have a prepacked share, here are your options.  If you have a half share, you’ll choose either share A, B, or C, and if you have a full share, you can choose two of them.  So just fill out this Google form by lunchtime the day before your drop-off to let me know which share you want for this week!  If I don't hear from you, I'll just choose for you. :-)

Share A:  Romaine, cherry tomatoes, potatoes, beets, 2 green peppers, onions, and microgreens.

Share B:  Romaine, cherry tomatoes, potatoes, kale, leeks, garlic, and microgreens.

Share C:  Romaine, cherry tomatoes, potatoes, bag of small onions, okra, slicing tomato, and basil.

 

Recipes

About 15 years ago, microgreens were the fancy thing that all the cool restaurants were using to convey how hip they were.  Now they're a little more mainstream, and even regular home cooks have access to these flavorful tiny versions of the vegetables we know and love!  And now that we're all eating at home more, what a perfect time to fancy up our everyday meals and make every dinner a celebration!  If you've never really worked with micros, here are 8 Ways to Kick up Your Meals with Microgreens from Urban Cultivator.  Fred and I regularly use micros in some variation of all of these ways (except the pesto, because we have tons of basil), and it definitely makes a regular dish feel special.  So check it out and give some of these a try!