CSA Newsletter for Week 4 of the 2023 Season

  Farm Update

This Lacinato kale will be in the shares this week!
It's also called dinosaur kale or Toscano kale, and it has a
nice hearty texture that is great for cooking.

Hi everyone!  It's amazing how different things are at the farm now than they were a month ago!  Everything is growing quickly, everything is abundant, and we have a ton of variety.  And now we are definitely on the edge of too much rain.  We've gotten quite a lot of rain lately, and all of the plants have gotten a good soaking.  This time of year, when our potato plants are really large and require a lot of water, we still have to irrigate them even when the rainfall has been sufficient for most other crops. But even they have all the water they need right now.  Now the trick will be getting enough dry days in a row so Fred can plant the next round of crops.  We have a lot of seeds and transplants that need to go into the ground, but the soil needs to dry enough for Fred to prep the ground, and then we have to actually do the planting.  How many dry days we would need varies a lot based on a number of factors (temperature and wind being the main ones), so we could actually use a little less rain at the moment.

The slicing tomatoes get closer to being ripe every day! 

As has been the case for the last several weeks, the main thing we've been spending a bunch of time on each week at the farm is harvesting, and also the washing and bagging of the veggies.  There is also weeding and seeding and deliveries and working on constructing the greenhouse, but the main thing is harvesting all the veggies that end up on your table each week!  And we've got a few new things this week, including potatoes, fennel, parsley, and cabbage, along with some of the old favorites!  The thing to know about the potatoes this week is that new potatoes are amazing, and they are a totally different food than the storage potatoes that you can get at the store.  So if you've only had those big bags of potatoes from the store, these will be pretty different.  Since they've just been harvested, they are a lot less starchy, and they have a wonderful creamy texture that you just can't get with potatoes that have been out of the field for several months.  I hope you enjoy them, and all the other goodies this week! 

So that's it for this week!  Thank you so much, and we'll see you at the drop-offs! :-)

What to Expect in the Shares this Week

 

If you pick up at our Alma, Mt. Pleasant, or Midland drop-off, here are the options for your shares!  If you have a half share, you’ll choose one item from each choice category, and if you have a full share, you’ll choose two.  And if there is something you don’t like or can’t eat, you can bring it to the trading station at the end and trade it for something you like better. 
 

• Potatoes
• Carrots or spring mix
• Cherry tomatoes or fennel
• Zucchini or Swiss chard
• Parsley, basil, or microgreens
• Cucumbers, frisée, or green onions
• Cabbage, kale, or collards

If you pick up at our Lansing, Okemos, St. Johns, Midland hospital, or Alma hospital drop-off, or if you have home or workplace delivery, here are your options!  We have three different prepacked shares, and you can let me know which one you want by filling out this quick form by lunchtime the day before your drop-off.  If you have a half share, you can choose one of these options, and if you have a full share, you’ll choose two.

Share A:

I am super excited about parsley in 
the shares this week!  I think tabbouleh
or fried potatoes with parsley
will definitely be on the menu this week!

• Potatoes
• Carrots
• Cherry tomatoes
• Chard
• Cabbage
• Frisée
• Parsley

Share B:

• Potatoes
• Carrots
• Cherry tomatoes
• Zucchini
• Cabbage
• Cucumbers
• Basil

Share C:

• Potatoes
• Carrots
• Fennel
• Zucchini
• Kale
• Green onions
• Basil

Recipes

Cabbage is one of those things that people either love or hate.  I don't think I've ever heard from someone that they were kind of so-so about cabbage.  I love cabbage, but that wasn't always the case.  What changed my mind, back when I was a young little 20-year-old and had first started dating Fred, was a cabbage dish very similar to this one that he cooked for me.  So if you love cabbage, you will love this recipe.  And if you're not a a cabbage fan, give this Easy Fried Cabbage a try.  It might change your mind! :-)

CSA Newsletter for Week 3 of the 2023 Season

 Farm Update

It is so great to see all the plants looking
so healthy and verdant again after such a
long drought!  The crops are definitely
glad about all the rain we've been getting!

Hi everyone!  I hope you're all enjoying your veggies so far and making some awesome meals! We've definitely been enjoying having the bounty of summer veggies in our kitchen, and it is wonderful to have such a wide variety of great produce to work with!  During the winter and early spring, what we can make is very limited by the lack of good veggies, so we really relish this time of year when almost any food we want to make is possible!  We've had the first few cherry tomatoes in our kitchen for the last few weeks, and this week we finally have enough ripe cherry tomatoes to bring to you!  The yellow cherry tomato variety that will be in the shares this week is Golden Nugget, which an open pollenated variety with great heirloom tomato flavor.  They'll have a slightly shorter shelf life than some of the cherry tomato varieties that appear later in the season, but my guess is that won't be a problem, because they're so delicious you'll probably want to eat them all right away!  We've also got some really nice slicing tomatoes that are coming along nicely in the hoophouses, and they should be ready to harvest in a few weeks.  They're still green right now, but I'm already getting excited for the first BLT of the season.  It feels like real summer now that we're into tomato and basil season!

These golden cherry tomatoes are 
coming in the shares this week!  

With all this heat and rain, things are really taking off!  The crops are growing really quickly, and so are the weeds.  In any given week, we spend most of our time harvesting, and we felt like the weeds were getting away from us earlier in the week.  Fortunately, the farm crew was able to get a lot of weeding done later in the week, and things are back under some semblance of control for now.  The insect pressure we were experiencing a few weeks ago has also gone down now that it's not so dry out.  When we hadn't had rain in weeks, all the plants in the ecosystem surrounding the farm were really struggling, and naturally, the bugs wanted to eat the healthiest plants they could find.  Unfortunately, those were all the plants that we were irrigating like crazy, so it was definitely a battle to keep them all from getting eaten by desperate insects.  But now that we have gotten plenty of rain, the bugs have dispersed to other areas to avail themselves of all the lush green foliage that is around in the environment now. 

We are also excited to be making progress on getting the new hoophouse built!  If you've been reading the newsletter for a while, you may remember that we bought an old hoophouse at an auction in November.  We were just waiting for the weather to turn around enough to start reconstructing it at the farm, but we ran into a labor snafu back in March, and Fred wasn't able to get it put up before the planting season was in full swing.  We've been working on it little by little in the time margins that have presented themselves, but it was definitely slow going.  Yesterday our friend Danny came up to help at the farm, and he and Fred got some major work done on it!  There are still a few structural things we need to do with it, and then we have to put the plastic on, but it really feels like we are making real progress on the project, which is a relief.

The new hoophouse is coming along well!
We've got tomatoes planted in it already, and 
when we get the plastic on, that will help protect
the plants from the temperature fluctuations and 
cold rain we inevitably get in the fall.

Last week of the CSA, we had a whole bunch of people postpone their shares because of the 4th of July holiday.  If that's you, you can either get a double share this week, or some week in the future if that works better for you.  I have put all of the folks who postponed last week down for a double share this week by default unless you told me otherwise, but if you have an extra share coming to you and you don't want it this week, just send me an email or text and we can defer it to some future week.  If you have a prepacked share, when you fill out the form to let me know what share you prefer, you'll just select the full share option if you're making up for missing last week.  And if you postponed your share last week, but you just fill out the form and select a half share this week, I'll just assume that you are planning to take your makeup share sometime in the future.  This can get a little confusing, so if you have any questions, just let me know!  

So that's it for this week!  Thank you so much, and we'll see you at the drop-offs! :-)

What to Expect in the Shares this Week

 

If you pick up at our Alma, Mt. Pleasant, or Midland drop-off, here are the options for your shares!  If you have a half share, you’ll choose one item from each choice category, and if you have a full share, you’ll choose two.  And if there is something you don’t like or can’t eat, you can bring it to the trading station at the end and trade it for something you like better. 
 

• Cherry tomatoes or beets
• Carrots
• Spring mix or cucumbers
• Zucchini or pearl onions
• Green onions or basil
• Kale, bok choy, collards, or Swiss chard
• Microgreens mix, micro cilantro, kohlrabi, or dill

If you pick up at our Lansing, Okemos, St. Johns, Midland hospital, or Alma hospital drop-off, or if you have home or workplace delivery, here are your options!  We have three different prepacked shares, and you can let me know which one you want by filling out this quick form by lunchtime the day before your drop-off.  If you have a half share, you can choose one of these options, and if you have a full share, you’ll choose two.

Share A:

• Cherry tomatoes
• Carrots
• Spring mix
• Pearl onions
• Basil
• Collards
• Micro cilantro

Share B:

• Cherry tomatoes
• Carrots
• Cucumbers
• Zucchini
• Basil
• Swiss chard
• Kohlrabi

Share C:

• Beets
• Carrots
• Cucumbers
• Zucchini
• Green onions
• Kale
• Microgreens mix

Recipes

Once we start having cherry tomatoes, basil, and zucchini, it feels like real summer!  And just in case you don't already have plans for those beloved summer veggies, Fred has been making this really delicious salad lately that uses all three of them!  This is a true summer salad, and it only takes a few minutes to make!

Fred's Summer Zucchini Salad

Ingredients:  Zucchini, cherry tomatoes, basil, shaved parmesan cheese, olive oil, salt.  Use whatever amounts make sense to you. :-)

Chop zucchini into bite size pieces.  Put olive oil into a medium size pan over medium heat.  Sautee zucchini in olive oil until it is cooked through but not mushy.  Pour zucchini and remaining oil from pan into a large bowl and let it cool for a few minutes.  While you're waiting, cut your cherry tomatoes in half, and chop up your basil.  Once the zucchini is cooled down a little bit, add the basil and cherry tomatoes to the bowl.  Add salt and shaved parmesan cheese to taste, and stir it all up.  If you feel like you need to add a little more oil to get a nice salad dressing-y texture, go ahead and do so.  Serve as a side dish and enjoy! You could also switch it up a little bit by stirring in some goat cheese, or adding grilled chicken to make it more of a main dish.  This is a salad you can enjoy all summer long in different variations! 

CSA Newsletter for Week 2 of the 2023 Season

Farm Update

Fred and the crew harvested a whole bunch of carrots for Monday's CSA drop-off!
 All of these carrots are headed back to the barn to get washed and 
bagged for the CSA!

Hi everyone!  The first week of the CSA was a success!  It's always a big production to get the CSA up and running each season, and there are always a few bugs to work out, but this year was the smoothest start yet.  It was so awesome to see everyone again at the drop-offs too!  And speaking of the drop-offs, this Tuesday is 4th of July!  All of the drop-offs are going to be occurring as usual, but I know a lot of people have vacation plans, parties, and other things that will prevent them from making it to the drop-off.  If that's you, you have a few options.  The first one is to simply have a friend pick up your share for you.  They can just come to the drop-off, initial next to your name, and pick out your veggies.  Or if you usually go through the line but you'd like to have your share prepacked this week to make it easier for someone to pick up, just fill out the quick form below in the "What to Expect in the Shares this Week" section, and we'll prepack your share this week.  The second option is to plan to pick up your share at one of the other drop-offs this week.  For example, if you can't make it to the Mt. Pleasant drop-off this week because you're going to be at a party, you can pick up your share on Monday in Alma instead.  I just need to know a day ahead of time so I can make sure to put the right number of shares on the harvest list, so if you want to do that, just be sure to let me know by Sunday afternoon. You could also pick up in Midland on Thursday, and then I'd just need to know by Monday afternoon so I can adjust the harvest list for Tuesday.  Or, the third option is that you could just plan on postponing your share this week entirely, and picking up an extra share next week.  If you want to do that, I just need to know by the day before your missed drop-off.  And any of these options are available anytime you have plans during the CSA drop-off, not just holiday weeks!

On the farm front, things are growing really fast now that we've gotten some rain!  We could even actually use some more rain, so I'm glad that we're supposed to get some more tomorrow.  We've been continuing to irrigate some plants (such as our potatoes, which are so big that they just need tons of water).  But everything is looking a lot healthier and less desperate out there, and that is definitely a relief!  The weeds are also growing fast now, so we are doing a lot of weeding lately.  I actually really like weeding, because I like restoring order from chaos.  Sometimes the weeds just get crazy all of a sudden, and it's nice to be out there in the sun, getting plant beds under control while I listen to music or audiobooks or podcasts on my phone.  And then when I get done, my back usually hurts, but it's so nice to stand up, stretch out, and admire how nice those previously weedy beds look.

A whole coldframe full of zucchini plants.
These are the same zucchinis that you got at the drop-off last week, 
and we'll have them again this week!

Another big thing we've been spending a bunch of time on lately is harvesting!  It probably comes as no surprise that harvesting veggies for 320 CSA members, as well as our stores, restaurants, and food hub partners, takes a lot of hours every week!  When many people think of harvesting, they think of large tractors driving around in huge fields of corn, soybeans, and wheat.  That is definitely not what harvesting looks like at our farm, simply because we're on a much smaller scale, and we grow so many different types of vegetables that mechanical harvesting just doesn't apply.  We harvest everything by hand, so what that actually looks like is Fred and the crew walking out the field with knives and crates and sometimes rubber bands, and cutting/pulling/plucking whatever we need for that day's shares.  It is pretty labor intensive, and since Fred is by far the fastest harvester at the farm, most of that work falls to him.  So he gets an incredible amount of exercise bringing in all of the food that goes out on our truck every day.  While he is doing that, the rest of the crew is in the barn, washing and bagging all the veggies that Fred brings in, and putting them in our walk-in cooler until we're ready to load up the truck and hit the road.  Then once the veggies are washed and packed up, we go out to do whatever weeding, planting, seeding, or field work needs to happen to keep all of the plants growing and healthy.  The work is pretty fast and intense, sometimes really hot (or cold, if it's spring or fall), and always very immediate.  But it keeps us outside in the sun and physically active all summer, and it also allows us to have some spectacular food on our table when we do come in.  For me in particular, it gives me the ability to get to know some awesome people and talk with you all at the drop-offs every week, which I love.  So while there are definitely times when I can barely stay awake by the time I get home from the drop-off, or when I'm grumbling about some Sisyphean task like cleaning ramps, I can't actually imagine not doing this.  And we've got 18 more weeks of the CSA, so there will be a lot more work, joy, exhaustion, good food, exercise, community, and all the rest of it coming down the pike!

So here we go into week 2!  See you at the drop-offs! :-)

It's basil season!  I am so excited to be bringing
this lovely basil to you all this week!

What to Expect in the Shares this Week

 

If you pick up at our Alma, Mt. Pleasant, or Midland drop-off, here are the options for your shares!  If you have a half share, you’ll choose one item from each choice category, and if you have a full share, you’ll choose two.  And if there is something you don’t like or can’t eat, you can bring it to the trading station at the end and trade it for something you like better. 
 

• Spring mix or Swiss chard
• Carrots for everyone!
• Snap peas or beets
• Zucchini or frisée
• Basil, microgreens, or kohlrabi
• Green onions, pearl onions, or radishes
• Cucumbers, bok choy, or kale

If you pick up at our Lansing, Okemos, St. Johns, Midland hospital, or Alma hospital drop-off, or if you have home or workplace delivery, here are your options!  We have three different prepacked shares, and you can let me know which one you want by filling out this quick form by lunchtime the day before your drop-off.  If you have a half share, you can choose one of these options, and if you have a full share, you’ll choose two.

Share A:

• Spring mix
• Carrots
• Beets
• Frisée
• Microgreens
• Green onions
• Cucumbers

Share B:

• Spring mix
• Carrots
• Snap peas
• Zucchini
• Basil
• Pearl onions
• Kale

Share C:

• Chard
• Carrots
• Snap peas
• Zucchini
• Kohlrabi
• Radishes
• Cucumbers

Recipes

One of the biggest questions I got last week was "What do I do with frisée?"  And for every person who asked me, I bet there are another two who are also wondering about it.  So here is a quick rundown on frisée!  Frisée is an endive, so it is pretty similar to lettuce, but with a slightly more bitter flavor.  It's used a lot in French cooking, and adds depth and sophistication to basic salads.  We like to tear some up and mix it with spring mix for a salad, or you can make a traditional Salade Lyonnaise.  Here is a great recipe for Lyonnaise Salad from The Kitchn!  And if you don't want to do the whole poached egg thing, you can make the recipe super easy by topping it with any fried egg that is still runny in the middle.  Yum! 

CSA Newsletter for Week 1 of the 2023 Season

Farm Update

The potato plants are looking strong
and healthy! It is nice to see them looking
so good after their recent battles with frost
and insect pests!

Hi everyone!  The CSA starts next week, and we are excited to see everyone again!  If you are new to the CSA, and you missed my post a few weeks ago about what to expect at your first drop-off, you can check that out here learn everything you need to know about the first drop-off! This season has been up and down so far, between the late frosts and the drought we've been experiencing for about the last two months, but we finally have enough abundance and variety of vegetables to start the CSA.  We're also supposed to get a good rain in the next few days, which we could really use!  It's looking like we're going to get rained on for most of Sunday and Monday, and while I don't love the idea of getting rained on at the first CSA drop-off of the year, I'll take it.  Once we get a good rain, so many crops that have been held back from growing will take off, and we'll have even more variety for the next few weeks.  Also, we've been experiencing a lot of pressure from insects, which attack our plants even more ferociously in really dry periods.  Because we've been irrigating our plants like crazy with our drip irrigation system, they look a lot better and greener than any other plants that are around in the wild, and naturally, the bugs want to eat the healthiest plants.  So once all the other plants in the ecosystem get the water they need, our plants will be proportionately less attractive to the bugs, and we won't have to fight them as hard.  

The upside to the drier weather is that the weeds really haven't gotten as out of control as they usually do this time of year, because their growth has also been stunted by the drought.  When we irrigate our crops, we use a drip irrigation system, which is basically a series of little flat perforated hoses that run right along the rows of crops and drip water only where it is needed.  This uses a lot less water than overhead irrigation systems, and it also keeps the weeds at bay by watering (mostly) only the plants we want.  Now that we're past those late frosts that damaged so many of our plants in May, and since we've been irrigating so much, there are a lot of things that are looking really good around the farm.  It was pretty discouraging for a while to see everything looking so beaten down after we worked so hard to take care of it, but now things are starting to look really healthy.  The hoophouses are verdant with zucchini and cucumber plants and tomato vines, and our plantings of carrots look really strong and beautiful.  The potato plants are growing large and nice, and we pulled up a potato plant yesterday to see how the potatoes themselves are developing.  They're looking good so far, and Fred and I ate those first delicious little potatoes with our lunch yesterday.  We are so excited that we finally have so much variety coming out of the fields and hoophouses, and we've definitely been enjoying all the abundance in our own kitchen!

Our drip line irrigation on a new planting
of onions, carrots, and spring mix.

We have made it through the first big planting push of the spring, and now there are just a few beds that have yet to be planted.  Since we didn't get any rain over the last few months, there is still so much cover crop in those beds that we can't plant until we get some rain and the winter cover crop starts its normal process of composting.  Once that happens, we're going to plant those beds pretty aggressively with some of the veggies that will be in the shares in late summer.  We always need to have plants that are at the right stage to harvest, so we plant new crops every few weeks.  It's definitely an art and a science, because you need to have open beds to plant, you have to have the right weather conditions for planting, and you have to have the right amount of time before you intend to harvest those plants so that you don't ever have a week where there is too much or too little coming out of the fields.  Too much, and we risk not being able to harvest everything (which is hugely wasteful), and too little, and we feel bad that we don't have as much variety as we'd like for the CSA.  There is a lot to manage, including a lot of factors that are out of our control.  But the best we can do is make an educated guess, control the factors we can can, and be ready to pivot around the ones we can't.  

Fortunately, we have a really great crew this summer, and unreliable labor is not an issue this year as it has sometimes been in the past.  With farming, the work needs to be done when it needs to be done.  There is no such thing as getting to it later, so there were a lot of years where Fred just had to work nonstop in order to keep everything from falling apart.  Having reliable, enthusiastic, capable workers this year has been such a joy and a relief!  A huge shout out to Abby, Ander, and Amy, who have been wonderful to work with!  I am so looking forward to doing this whole season with them!  

And with that said, here we go into the first week of the 2023 CSA season! 

What to Expect in the Shares this Week

 

If you pick up at our Alma, Mt. Pleasant, or Midland drop-off, here are the options for your shares!  If you have a half share, you’ll choose one item from each choice category, and if you have a full share, you’ll choose two.  And if there is something you don’t like or can’t eat, you can bring it to the trading station at the end and trade it for something you like better. 
 

• Spring mix for everyone!
• Carrots for everyone!
• Cucumbers or radishes
• Oyster mushrooms, snap peas, or zucchini
• Kale, Swiss chard, or bok choy
• Kohlrabi, microgreens, or frisee
• Green onions or garlic scapes

There might be some stuff on this list that you're unfamiliar with, so if you want to learn more about what any of these are, just click the link to read more!

If you pick up at our Lansing, Okemos, St. Johns, Midland hospital, or Alma hospital drop-off, or if you have home or workplace delivery, here are your options!  We have three different prepacked shares, and you can let me know which one you want by filling out this quick form by lunchtime the day before your drop-off.  If you have a half share, you can choose one of these options, and if you have a full share, you’ll choose two.

Share A:

• Spring mix
• Carrots
• Oyster mushrooms
• Kale
• Frisee
• Radishes
• Green onions

Share B:

• Spring mix
• Carrots
• Oyster mushrooms
• Swiss chard
• Kohlrabi
• Cucumbers
• Green onions

Share C:

• Spring mix
• Carrots
• Zucchini
• Bok choy
• Microgreens
• Cucumbers
• Garlic scapes

Look at these lovely tomato vines in flower!
They have a bunch of green cherry tomatoes
on them, which will make their way into 
the shares when they ripen in a month
or so.

Recipes

The start of the CSA season is always exciting, and especially if you're new, you may encounter some veggies you've never cooked with before!  Kohlrabi is one I always get questions about, so if you've never tried kohlrabi, you are in for a treat! It's very fresh tasting, and while you can find many kohlrabi recipes on the internet (I'll link to some below), we've been making a really simple and delicious salad with it lately in our kitchen!

Fred's Asian Kohlrabi and Carrot Salad

This salad is really simple, and you can play around with amounts and ingredients as you see fit.  To start, grab a handful of spring mix and put it on a plate.  Then grab a cheese grater, and use the large grating holes to grate some carrots over the spring mix (however much you want!  We generally use a lot!).  Peel the outer skin off the kohlrabi and discard.  Take the peeled kohlrabi and use the large grating holes of your grater to sprinkle some shaved kohlrabi over the salad (again, however much you want!).  Then, grab any Asian inspired sauce, vinaigrette, or dressing you have on hand, and sprinkle liberally over your salad.  We use a mix of sesame vinaigrette, soy sauce, and teriyaki sauce, but you could also use Thai peanut sauce, a soy/hoisin sauce mix, or any other dressing you like.  Enjoy as a small side dish, or you could also add little bits of grilled chicken, venison, or other meat to make it a main dish!

If you just want to check out a whole bunch of kohlrabi recipes to get your creative juices going, here are 10 Fun Kohlrabi Recipes from A Couple Cooks!  And honestly, I also like just cutting them into sticks and munching on them raw with ranch dressing. :-)

Here is the Swiss chard that will
be in the shares this week!

Swiss chard is more mainstream now than it was when we first started the CSA in 2011, but it is another thing that you may never have cooked with before, especially if you haven't ventured much into leafy greens.  (Do it!  Leafy greens are so good for you, and they are also delicious!) Chard is fantastic in omelets!  Here is a great base recipe for a Chard and Onion Omelet from the Food Network, but you could also play around with different cheeses, herbs, and veggies.  The thing I love about omelets is that you can put pretty much whatever you want in them, so have fun with it! 

What to Expect at Your First CSA Drop-Off!

Our little cucumbers are coming along, and there
should be a lot of them ready to harvest in a few weeks!

Hi everyone!  The start of the CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) is getting closer, and if you haven't been part of the CSA before, you probably have questions about how it works!  So here is a rundown of what you need to know in order to feel prepared for your first CSA drop-off!

The first thing is that we have two pretty different types of drop-offs.  If you are picking up at our Alma, Mt. Pleasant, or Midland drop-offs, those are what we call "market style" drop-offs.  Here's how those ones work:

You'll pull up to the drop-off location between 5 and 6 PM on your drop-off day, and we'll have some long tables set up with all of the produce options for that week!  At the beginning, we'll have a sign-in sheet where you'll initial next to your name, and if you have anything you want me to know about (like that you'll be out of town the following week), you can also write me a note on the sign-in sheet.  Then there will be seven different "stations" at the table, and each one will have a choice and a sign telling you what to do.  The signs will say something like, "Spinach or Spring Mix:  Half Share, Choose 1.  Full Share, Choose 2".  Each sign will tell you what the options are for that station and how many items to choose.  And at the very end, we have our Trading Station.  Before each drop-off, we put a variety of items at the Trading Station so that if there are any stations where you don't want or can't eat those items, you can trade for something you like better.  So if you don't like onions, for example, you can trade your onions for something else at the Trading Station.  

Here are some pro tips for the market style drop-offs:

-The drop-off starts at 5 PM, but people often start lining up before that.  There is usually a pretty long line at the beginning of the drop-off until about 5:15, but after that, you don't generally have to wait in line.  The upside to getting there early is that all of the varieties of veggies are still there.  Because we harvest the right amount of produce for the people we know are coming, sometimes if everyone wants a particular item, that item can be snapped up before the end of the drop-off. If you don't mind standing in line, we always have the maximum variety at the beginning of the drop-off. But if you don't like standing in line and you don't have your heart set on a particular item, getting there after 5:15 is the way to go!

-We can also prepack your share for you at the farm for no extra charge if you are on a tight schedule or if you won't be able to get to the drop-off by 6 PM.  We do prepacked shares for our Lansing, Okemos, St. Johns, and home/workplace delivery folks, and even if you pick up at one of our regular drop-offs, you can have us prepack your share.  In the CSA newsletter each weekend, I'll let you know what the options are for the prepacked shares (Share A, Share B, or Share C), and you can let me know which one you'd like us to pack for you.  Then you can just swing by the drop-off, grab the bag with your name on it, and be on your way without having to wait in line.  Just let me know by noon the day before your drop-off if you want to go with that option!

-We'll have plastic grocery bags available at the drop-off, but it's better if you bring a reusable bag.  It's more environmentally friendly and allows us to go through less plastic, but if you forget your bag, we'll have some there!

-If you're stuck in a meeting or your kid's sporting event, and you realize that there's no way you're going to make it to the drop-off in time, no worries!  Just call or text me at 517-896-6884 and let me know, and I can pack up a share for you and leave it at the drop-off.  Then you can just swing by and pick it up when you get done with what you're doing.  :-)

The cherry tomato vines are starting to get nice and
long, and there are plenty of unripe tomatoes on them!
Pretty soon, they will all ripen into a beautiful yellow color.

And if you're picking up at our Lansing, Okemos, St. Johns, or hospital drop-offs or you have home/workplace delivery, here's how it works for you:

Each weekend, I'll send out a CSA newsletter with farm news, recipes, and most importantly for you, what the veggie choices will be for the upcoming week! It will say something like, "Share A has these seven items, Share B has these seven items, and Share C has these seven items."  If you have a half share, you'll choose one of those options, and if you have a full share, you'll choose two of those options.  I'll have a link to a quick form for you to fill out and let me know which choice you prefer, and then we'll pack up your preferred share in a bag with your name on it and bring it to your drop-off location on your pickup day.  If you forget to fill out the form, no worries!  We'll still bring you a share, and we'll just put in whatever we think you'll like.  If you want to specify a preferred share, just make sure to get that form in to me by noon on the day before your drop-off.  I generally make the harvest list the afternoon/evening before your drop-off day, so I can't guarantee that I'll see any requests that come in after that.  If you do get your request in late, I might still be able to get that on the harvest list for you, but I can't promise it.  So it's best to send in your requests early!

And then, you just arrive at your drop-off location during the pickup time frame, tell the folks at your location your name, and they'll go get your bag for you!  For those of you picking up at Mert's Specialty Meats or the Soup Spoon Café, I always say that you can start picking up your share at 4:30, but I often drop-off the shares before that.  I'm going to set up at text to let you all know when your shares are ready for pickup, but if you'd like to opt out, just send me a quick email at michele@mforganics.com and let me know that you'd prefer not to get those texts.

And if you have home or workplace delivery, you just get to sit back and wait for me to drop-off your share on your doorstep!  You don't have to be there when I deliver the shares, but if it's especially hot or especially sunny, I'd recommend setting out a cooler by your front door for me to put your veggies in so they don't get all wilted in the heat.  

And here is some good information to know, whether you are picking up at one of our market style drop-offs or getting a prepacked share:

-If you know you won't be able to make it to a drop-off because you have an appointment, are out of town, etc, you have a few options.  You can either have a friend pick up your share, you can arrange to pick up your share at a different drop-off that week, or you can just postpone your share that week and get double when you get back.  For example, if you usually pick up in Mt. Pleasant on Tuesdays but you're out of town until Wednesday, you can just let me know by the previous day that you want to pick up in Midland on Thursday.  Then I'll just put you on the list for Thursday instead, and you can still get your veggies that week. Or you can postpone your share and make it up when you get back.  If you have a full share, it is totally fine to split up your makeup share so you don't get totally overrun with veggies!  And if you're having a friend pick up for you, you don't have to let me know ahead of time.  Your friend can just sign for you on the sign-in sheet.

-If your normal drop-off day falls on a bank holiday like Independence Day or Labor Day, the drop-off will still be occurring as usual!  However, if you have plans and can't make it, just let me know by the day before, and we can postpone your share or you can pick up at one of the other drop-offs that week.

-If you realize later in the evening sometime that you totally forgot to go pick up your veggies, never fear!  Just email or text me, and while I can't necessarily put you down for an extra share the following week, chances are good that I can still get you some extra veggies the next week to make up for what you missed.  We generally overharvest a bit, so once the main rush goes through (after about 5:15), I'll have a good idea of how much extra we'll have, and I can probably send you home with an extra share at that point.

-If you need to get in touch with me on the day of your drop-off, texting is the best way to do that! I don't check my email a ton during the day, and I am often packing veggies or doing something else that makes it hard to answer the phone.  But if you text me at 517-896-6884, I'll get back to you as soon as possible.  In fact, go ahead and put my number in your contacts right now!  I bet you'll need it at some point! :-)

So that's it!  Just let me know if you have any questions!  As of right now, we still haven't nailed down an official start date because it all really depends on what the weather does over the next few days, and alas, we can't control Mother Nature.  We're really hoping to start the week of June 19, but based on the drought we've had, we might have to get started the week of June 26. I'll let you know as soon as we know for sure!  Keep your fingers crossed!  

This drought we've been having has been pretty rough 
on our poor plants.  As you can see, some of them are
definitely looking the worse for wear. 

Projected CSA Start Dates for 2023!

Farm Update

The tomato plants are really taking off in the coldframes!

Hi everyone!  Summer is finally here!  As is always the case in June, there is more to do than we can actually stay on top of comfortably, but it is better this year than most because we have a really great crew of one part-time and two full-time employees this year.  So we are keeping our heads above water better than most Junes, but there is still plenty of work to be done!  It has been so dry lately that we have been irrigating non-stop to keep all of our little plants doing well.  One good rain is worth about a month of irrigation though, so we could definitely use some rain!  The upside is that the weeds have not been getting the water they need either, so there are a lot fewer of them than usual.  That means that we are spending less time weeding and more time moving irrigation lines around, so we end up breaking even in the end.  We made our first major planting push over the last month, and while the planting has slowed down, there are still a few things we are getting in the ground.  Our shipment of sweet potato starts arrived the other day, so starting later this morning, we will be planting 3,000 sweet potato plants.  Last week, we got the rest of our seed potatoes into the ground, which, if all goes according to plan, should produce between 13,000 and 18,000 pounds of potatoes for us to give out throughout the season.  

It looks like we are finally past the frosts for the year, which is a relief, because that last frost we had earlier this week did some damage to a few of our crops.  Most of them will pull through, but they are definitely looking worse for wear.  Surprisingly, our kale was the crop that fared the worst.  Over the years, kale is the one crop we can generally count on to take a frost without so much as a shrug, but a frost this hard when the plants were so young seems to have been too much for about half of our kale plants.  Fortunately, we always plant way more than we'll need for the CSA, simply because we know that these things happen.  But we are going to need to form a plan to regroup in the kale department, and that plan will probably involve replanting about half of the plants.  Our broccoli and cabbage have really taken a hit as well.  After those several hard frosts weakened the plants, a bunch of opportunistic insects flocked to the vulnerable plants and did yet more damage.  And since it is so hot and dry (and since we've been irrigating so much), our plants look better to the bugs than anything else they can find around, so they've been really taking a toll on our cabbage-family plants in particular.  

While some of our plants are looking the worse for wear because of the extreme temperatures and lack of water they've experienced lately, many other crops are looking really fantastic!  Our spinach, lettuce, beets, snap peas, and carrots have been looking extra good, so we're really focusing on keeping those crops looking awesome and growing up strong!

The new greenhouse is under construction!  It's going up bit by bit as we can
fit it in around other tasks, but we're making real progress.

Aside from planting, irrigating, and moderate amounts of weeding, we're also constructing the new (old) greenhouse we bought at auction back in November.  We had hoped to get that put up much earlier in the spring, but we ran into a labor snafu in March, and were unable to make that happen.  But now we've got some great employees working for us, so we're getting the greenhouse put up a bit at a time in between the other farm tasks that keep everything running.  We've also been doing deliveries to some of our stores for a few months now.  While we don't have enough variety yet to start the CSA, we have been able to keep GreenTree in Mt. Pleasant, the Argus Farm Stop stores in Ann Arbor, and ELFCO in Lansing supplied with spinach, spring mix, green onions, baby leeks, green garlic, asparagus, and the like.  We also supply some larger multi-farm CSAs that are coordinated through the Allen Neighborhood Center in Lansing and St. Joe's hospital in Ypsilanti with a few items for their CSA boxes.  So we've definitely been keeping busy with the harvesting, washing, packing, and delivering the veggies, but it will get even busier when we start the CSA later in June!

Speaking of which, we don't have official CSA start dates yet, because so much depends on what the weather does between now and then, but our projected start dates are in the third week of June.  I'll let you all know for sure as soon as we know, but in the meantime, you can mark your calendars with the following dates:

Alma:  Monday, June 19th from 5-6 PM out in front of His Place, downtown on Superior St.

Mt. Pleasant:  Tuesday, June 20th from 5-6 PM behind Herbs Etc, downtown on Broadway.

Lansing:  Wednesday, June 21st anytime from 4:30-9 PM at the Soup Spoon Café on Michigan Ave.

Okemos:  Wednesday, June 21st anytime from 4:30- 6 PM at Mert's Specialty Meats on Grand River.

St. Johns:  Wednesday, June 21st anytime after 3:30 PM on the front porch of a CSA member who lives close to downtown.  I'll be sending you St. Johns folks an email separately with the details, so be on the lookout for that in the next week or so!

Midland:  Thursday, June 22nd 1from 5-6 PM in the back parking lot of the Eagle Ridge Church of God on Waldo Ave.

Midland hospital drop-off:  Thursday, June 22nd anytime after 4 PM at the delivery turnaround behind the Center for Women's Health.  This one is only for hospital employees due to hospital regulations.

So if you have any questions about that, just let me know!  Again, these dates are tentative, but I will let you know for sure as soon as we know!  And if you know anyone who is interested in the CSA, we do still have some spots available, so they can still sign up!  They can check out all the details about the CSA on our website, and just fill out this sign-up form to get on the CSA list for this year and start getting delicious organic veggies in just a few weeks! :-)

And stay tuned for next week's CSA newsletter, which will be all about what to expect at your first CSA drop-off! 

Fred has just finished loading up the delivery vehicle for our 
Ann Arbor delivery route last Monday.  The new (old) vehicle looks
pretty wacky, but it can haul a lot of vegetables!

CSA Newsletter for April 2023

 Farm Update

Our first direct planting of lettuce is up in the field!
It's still little, but it is looking strong!

Hi everyone!  Hope you're all doing well and enjoying the rapidly improving weather! Things are definitely in full swing at the farm now, and the name of the game right now is planting, planting, and more planting! We do many different types of planting, from starting seeds in flats in the greenhouse that will eventually be transplanted into the fields, to seeding into the protected soil in the hoophouses, to actually seeding directly into the field. And we're doing all of those things right now! Our first plantings of direct-seeded carrots and lettuce are coming up in the fields, and it is always so exciting to see those first little baby plants of the year emerge from the ground! Last week Fred and our crew spent the day transplanting kohlrabi and green onions that we started as seeds in the greenhouse back at the beginning of March into the field, and they also planted about half of the potatoes this week that will be making it onto our plates in a few months.

Most of the field work we are doing right now is preparatory in nature (seeding, planting, tilling, and spreading compost). But we're actually always preparing for some crops (tilling and preparing beds), planting some other crops (seeding or transplanting), maintaining and monitoring some other crops (weeding, cultivating, and keeping an eye on pests and disease), and harvesting some crops (actually removing the edible part from the plant or the soil, cleaning it it up, and bringing it to the CSA or our local stores and restaurant partners. This part of the season leans heavily toward the preparation and planting, and later in the fall will lean more heavily toward harvest, but there are elements of all of those life stages happening from about the end of February to about the middle of December at the farm.

Right now we're not harvesting as much as we will be in a few months, but we are already harvesting spring mix, cilantro, spinach, green onions, green garlic, and microgreens in pretty significant quantities. We're also fully into the very abundant but very short ramp season, and Fred has been working with our friend Willy to harvest some of the wild ramps in Willy's woods. This time of year, Willy's woods have such an abundance of ramps that we can harvest as many as we can eat or sell, and not even make a dent in what is out there. It is truly incredible. At this point, the crops and ramps we're harvesting are going to a few stores, restaurants, and some multifarm CSAs to which we contribute. These include GreenTree Cooperative Grocery in Mt. Pleasant, the Argus Farm Stop stores in Ann Arbor, the CSA through the Allen Neighborhood Center in Lansing, the Farm at St. Joe's CSA in Ypsilanti, and Spencer restaurant in Ann Arbor. As it is still early in the spring, we don't have enough variety of items to start our own CSA yet, but we are glad to be able to get the first spring veggies onto people's tables in these other ways.

The first little baby carrots are poking out of the ground, and 
I can't wait to actually eat them in a few months!  

And in just a few months, we'll have such an abundance of wonderful veggies coming out of the fields, that it will be time to start the CSA! We don't have an official start date yet, because it depends a lot on what the weather does between now and the start of the CSA season, but we generally get started in mid-June, and this year will likely be the same. I'll let you all know when we have an official start date, but tentatively mark your calendars for the third week of June!

I've had a few people ask if we still have availability for this season, and we do! So if you've been wondering if you can still sign up, or you have a friend who is interested in joining, you still can! Our availability will likely fill up significantly over the next month, so if you know you want to sign up, better go ahead and do it soon, but we likely won't sell out before the end of May. And as always, tell your friends! If you love our fresh, delicious organic vegetables, spread the word! Word of mouth is the way most people find out about us, and we always appreciate it so much. It's $630 for a full share or $340 for a half share at all of our regular CSA drop-off locations, and we also offer home/workplace delivery for an additional $95 (that covers the whole season) if you live/work within a few miles of where we're already driving. Just let me know if you have any questions, and if you are interested in signing up for the 2023 season, you can just fill out this registration form!

As the weather gets nicer and we all start to emerge from hibernation, it's time to start planning for summer! For you all, that might mean planning a vacation, getting your outdoor spaces cleaned up, and locking in your supply of wonderful veggie goodness (hint, hint!). For me, that means figuring out how to manage all of the various responsibilities of a fast-paced, demanding farm where there is very little flexibility and timing is everything, a home that is fortunately pretty forgiving when I get too busy, three very active kids, and my other off-farm job (which is also fortunately pretty flexible when I need it to be). It's really a lot like an advanced game of Tetris, but it's real life, and the stakes are a lot higher. It gets crazy busy for the warm half of the year, but it also means that I get to spend almost all of my hours outside, and you really can't find better food anywhere, which is a very high priority for us. So ready or not, here we go into another farm season! It's always an adventure, and I'm definitely looking forward to finding out what this year will send us, and I'm so glad to have you all along for the journey! Thanks so much, and we'll see you in June!

Recipes

It's finally spinach season! When we first start harvesting the first spinach of the year, it's like the clouds open up and the sun shines upon our dinner table. (That feeling may have to do with the fact that we actually are getting more sunlight around the time we start harvesting spinach, but nonetheless, spinach season feels like a sign that winter is over.) So needless to say, we've been eating a lot of spinach in our house lately! I like to just put some in a tortilla with some salad dressing and just make a quick salad wrap as a snack, or incorporate it into the stir fries that are a staple around our house, and use it in delicious pasta dishes, like this Creamy Lemon Orzo from Rachel Cooks. Rachel was a friend of mine in college, and now she has a really great food blog with accessible, healthy, and totally yummy recipes, and every week when I get her emails, I get a little bit geeked out about them. So enjoy the recipe, and definitely check out some of her other recipes, because I guarantee you'll find a bunch you'll want to try!