FREE BIRD FARM CSA

CSA Share Week 22

2011-11-01T09:33:00.000-07:00

Snow in October? Even here in Upstate New York, it’s just about unheard of.

In the last week, we had not one but two snow events here. Neither accumulated more than an inch or so. More significantly, with the snow came overnight temps dropping into the 20s. Not many plants will survive that kind of cold. Some do: hearty greens like collards, kale, escarole (in pic) and even some lettuce.

Fortunately, we harvested like mad before the first storm to get everything in that we knew wouldn’t tolerate the cold. Better said, Ken and our two remaining employees—Armando and Ariel Leal (cousins)—did the work, in the rain and in 30-degree temperatures, harvesting, washing and packing the produce. Talk about numb fingers.

It’s a relatively large share, but many of the items will hold. So there’s no need to feel like you have to eat it all in one week. Store the garlic on your countertop. It will hold there for weeks. The onions can do the same. Potatoes are best kept in a dark, cool but not cold location (don’t refrigerate). Many of the greens will hold up in your crisper. Just store in produce bags.

It was quite a growing season. We’ve never experienced anything quite like it. So you may be wondering if we’re glad it’s over. The truth is…nah. We love what we do and regret seeing another season come to an end. We are so very grateful for all of you who took a chance on us for yet another season or for the first time. We didn’t get all the crops we’d hoped or planted for, we were lucky that we never came up short overall.

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IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE:

1 bunch carrots

1 bunch kale

1 bunch cilantro

2 heads lettuce

1 bunch leeks

1 head escarole

1 bunch collards

5.6 ounces arugula (.35#)

Garlic *

3 pound bag potatoes

Onions (red and/or yellow)*

*Amounts vary at distribution sites based on onion and garlic size

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COOKING TIPS and RECIPES:

Potatoes, Leeks…. Need we say more. It’s time to make soup!

Similarly, escarole is a classic and tasty green in a chicken soup. For a quick fix, stir-fry it. It’s great with an orange-soy sauce (orange juice, soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, honey, Vietnamese hot sauce). Every year we recommend this Escarole and White Bean Stew with Rustic Croutons. A number of CSA member have tried it and loved it, so we keep recommending it. (It’s perfectly delicious without the pancetta).

This side dish of Sauteed Escarole with Raisins, Pine Nuts and Capers developed by Maryellen’s friend Jennifer Armentrout of Fine Cooking is equally delicious and quick too.

Collards also make a nutritious and simple weeknight side dish, such as in this recipe by Susie Middleton for Quick Sauteed Collard Ribbons.

We also stumbled over this recipe—Mama Nava’s Ye’abesha Gomen (Collard Greens). The ingredients are a bit unexpected, but it sounds as if it's a hit.

Lastly, if you still have butternut squash left over from last week and are not saving it for Thanksgiving, it can be used with this week's cilantro in a quick side dish for Butternut Squash with Ginger and Cilantro.

The CSA structure truly helps to buttress our farm so we can better focus on what we are passionate about—growing great organic food. Thank you for your support.

CSA Share Week 21

2011-10-25T06:46:00.000-07:00

Letter from the farm:
We finally were able to dig up our potato crop. Until last week the ground just had not dried out enough for us to be able to run our potato digger through the many, many rows of potatoes we planted this year. At one point we tried digging them up by hand, but the yield on the crop was so poor from the wet spring that the few crates we got out of a row would have to be valued at $16 a pound to justify the time it was taking to dig them up by hand. That’s a slight exaggeration. But, essentially, digging dozens of acre-long rows by hand wasn’t going to work.

While our digger got the job done, the ground was still a bit heavy for harvesting mechanically and a part on the digger did irreparably break in the process. It was an old digger, but as a farmer friend with a much bigger potato digger told us this weekend, his digger snapped from the weight of the wet soil too. We’ll need to look at replacing ours. A new one could cost anywhere from $5,500 to $16,000—and all that piece of machinery does is get pulled behind a tractor to dig up rows of potatoes towards the end of the season. There is no motor or anything electronic or computerized—just gears, belts and a lot of metal. Farm machinery can be costly that way, but without a potato digger, there’s just no sense in growing potatoes on a production scale. The time it takes to dig them up by hand with a potato fork and the percentage of potatoes that inevitably get speared and ruined by the fork make it worth investing in a replacement. There’s always the chance we might find a decent used one too.

IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE:

6.4 ounces baby winter mesclun mix

1 bunch carrots

½ pound shallots

2 1/2 pounds red potatoes

1 head red curly leaf lettuce

1 butternut squash

¾ pounds green beans

2 kohlrabi

Winter Greens and Green Beans: One of our CSA members said she had delicious success cooking her green beans with the winter mix that’s in this week’s share. She said to start cooking the beans in butter in a 12-inch skillet and, once they’re crisp-tender, stir in the greens and some minced garlic. As soon as the greens have begun to wilt, remove the pan from the heat. It should be just enough time to wilt the greens. The winter mix does contain a number of baby-sized cooking greens, including kale. It is equally good enjoyed as a salad—cold or lightly wilted. This is a cool-weather loving crop of greens, which is why you are just seeing it this time of year and not through the summer months.

Tip from the farm on Kohlrabi: Not sure what to do with kohlrabi? Trim off the leaves and slice the bulb into matchsticks. Our kids think they’re as tasty as eating apples. Kohlrabi is a cabbage but a surprisingly sweet one. You can always dip the sticks into a dressing. Or add to a stir fry or make a cole slaw…

CSA Share Week 20

2011-10-18T09:54:00.000-07:00

This is the 3rd to last CSA share (that is, 2 more weeks to go).

It’s definitely feeling like we’re well into fall here. It’s so much harder to harvest, wash and pack produce when it’s chilly out, like it was here on Monday.

Almost everyone in our family has caught a cold in the last couple of weeks. This shouldn’t be a big deal—everyone gets colds—but for someone like Ken who is working outdoors 7 days a week and getting up at 3 or 4 in the morning a few times a week only to work until dark, a little cold can easily turn into pneumonia. So we’re making lots of soups, drinking cold-friendly teas, and eating raw garlic to stay strong (okay, maybe the kids aren’t eating the garlic).

One of our interns years ago taught us the trick of eating raw garlic when feeling run down, and our local natural food store owners swear by it too. Sliced and sandwiched between a couple pieces of cheese, it’s quite tasty. Sure, it’s strong. It takes some getting used to. And if you have a special someone in your life, it’s good to consult with them first or have them ingest along with you. And it’s definitely not a friendly thing to eat before attending an event. But once you’ve gotten a taste for sliced raw garlic (eat at least a clove), it can be habit forming.

While there isn’t any garlic in this week’s share for members to snack on if they’re feeling run down, there are purple carrots. Yes, the purple carrots are back!!! Carrots were originally purple, and, from what we understand, any vegetable with purple pigmentation contains more nutrients.

So, if you don’t have any garlic hanging around from last week’s share and you too have or are coming down with a cold, eat your carrots!

In this week’s share:

1 bunch purple carrots

1 bunch beets

1 head curly leaf red lettuce

1 head frisée

5.6 ounces arugula
1 bunch scallions
Parsley
Winter squash
Red onions

Frisée or curly endive is a chicory. It’s classically known for being served with a warm bacon dressing, but there are a lot of other delicious ways to enjoy it. Wash it, spin it dry, and tear the leaves into pieces to prepare. It would be delicious as a salad with roasted beets (in this week’s share; diced or in wedges), toasted walnuts and an orange vinaigrette. Or try one of the following recipes:
Wilted Frisée Salad with Hot and Smoky Tomato Dressing--http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/wilted-frisee-salad-with-hot-smoky-tomato-dressing

Frisée Salad with Blue Cheese, Dried Cherries and Walnut Vinaigrette http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/frisee-salad-blue-cheese-dried-cherries-walnut-vinaigrette.aspx

Upside-down-apple-cheddar tarts with Frisée and Walnuts-- http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/upside-down-apple-cheddar-tarts.aspx

CSA Share Week 19

2011-10-11T07:49:00.000-07:00

On a day when we’re typically straight out harvesting and packing up the share, we somehow squeezed in a fun birthday party Monday for our oldest child, who is turning seven.
Every age seems to be magical, and seven is no exception. As we set up for our CSA distribution at the farm, our daughter now makes the signs that we attach to the bins, labeling the item and letting members know how much to take (as in pic). And this week both she and her brother, almost 4, helped pack all of the eggs. That was a lot of eggs.

It’s not easy involving our children in the work we do. The fact is, the pace is fast, there is a certain skill set often required (plus strength and endurance), and many aspects of farming are not safe for children to be around. But we try to include our kids when we can, whether it’s offering a learning experience—such as figuring out how to spell the name of a vegetable—or, most importantly, a chance to spend time together. After all, those birthdays seem to come all too quickly.

Field notes: This last week we had two nights with freeze warnings, so to prepare we picked out our entire eggplant and pepper crop (these plants don’t tolerate those kinds of temps). It got cold. We’ve seen “burn” marks on some of our beans from frost . But new and delicious crops are here this week too: bok choy, acorn squash, mesclun mix... And we’re not giving up. We put new plants in the ground just last week with hopes we might have an extended fall. Sometimes that can happen. Wouldn’t it be nice!

IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE

½ pound mesclun mix
1 acorn squash
1 bunch leeks
1 bok choy
1 bunch cilantro
¾ pound green beans
2 habañero chiles
2 jalapeños
1 head of garlic
4 bell peppers

CSA Share Week 18

2011-10-03T18:27:00.000-07:00

This week we feel fortunate to be able to offer a decent variety of vegetables—some new, some familiar, all ones that have been able to stand up to the ridicule of persistent rain we continue to experience.

It’s like déjà vu here. The season is ending just like it started. Rain, rain, rain, rain, rain. We might get one bright afternoon or even a full day of glorious sunshine only to be followed by more rain. If our fields can’t dry out, we can’t can work them. Things are just too saturated.

We don’t mean to harp on this topic of bad weather. But we are frequently reminded that most people don’t connect how all this rain affects a farmer. At a farmers’ market this weekend we had customers tell us they were unable to find spinach. This is a market with 36 vendors, granted, the vendors are not all farms and where at least 3 farms have had to drop out because of the weather this fall. Even though this market is located where federal disaster funds are being allocated due to flooding, we find we still need to do a lot of educating as to how so much rain is putting all farms under great stress—whether or not they’re in a flood plain or are a vegetable farm, orchard or dairy farm.

As we plan our meals here at the farm, however, we don’t find ourselves thinking about what’s not at hand because of the rain. What we have we’re thankful to work with. It is good food, delicious food, mindfully grown and true to what nature is able to offer during this sodden season.

So, maybe we’ll make a pasta dish tonight with golden cubes of sautéed eggplant, wilted arugula, garlic, and some goat cheese feta we purchased from a local farm. And maybe tomorrow we’ll make a lentil dish studded with butternut squash and Indian spices scooped up with some homemade flatbread or a fall stew with the turnips, squash and onions in this week’s share. And the braising greens (seen in pic)—we’ve been waiting for this mix of spicy, cool-weather greens to come into season. They’re just so good and nutritious.

At this stage in fall, we are lucky there are some vegetables still hanging on from summer. They haven’t been knocked off by a frost—yet. And there are some heartier vegetables new to the scene (despite the odds) that satisfy cravings for comfort foods as cooler temperatures arrive this week.

THIS WEEK’S SHARE:

arugula

eggplant

4 onions

1 bunch mixed braising greens (see note below)

1 head Freckles Romaine lettuce

1 butternut squash

1 bunch turnips*

¾ pound green beans

We’re not totally sure why the spicy greens in this week’s share are called a “braising mix” (the seed catalog has tokened the it this and at the farm it has just stuck). This bunched mix includes green mustard, red mustard, kale, tatsoi and hon tsai tsai—a Chinese specialty green also known as Kailaan (purple stems, some with edible flowers). You can chop and use in salads. At the farm, we like to lightly cook or stir-fry in olive oil, stirring in some minced garlic as soon as they’re wilted.

*If you have a bunch of turnips with healthy green tops and don’t plan to use them, pass them on. They’re delicious and super nutritious. There’s apt to be another CSA member glad to use them. Cook them like you would the “braising mix” mentioned above.

REMINDER: This is the 18th of 22 share weeks. The last distribution is Tues., Nov 1.

CSA Share Week #17

2011-09-26T18:09:00.000-07:00

Fall has arrived. We can see it in the lengthening of the trees’ shadows. We can hear it in the quietness of the air and the occasional call of a single Blue Jay swooping between the trees. We can smell as the colorful decaying leaves begin to accumulate on the ground. And our CSA members can taste it in this week’s share—with the arrival of winter squash and sweet potatoes.

We continue to hear of more and more farmers that have been completely washed out for the season. Many fellow growers and CSAs are done prematurely for the season. On our farm, many of our fall crops were damaged or lost to the extreme rains. The fields look so barren. But we are fortunate to still be standing and still able to offer a variety of vegetables in this week’s share.

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Note on last week’s corn: A few members reported they found a worm in their fresh corn last week. We are sorry to hear that, but it’s actually not such a bad thing. It’s an indication that your corn has been organically grown and with certified organic seed. Corn is a tricky crop to grow pest free. Conventional corn can be grown with pesticides spliced into the seed, so that it’s in the plant tissue. So corn can be sold as “spray free” but contain a pesticide component in the plant itself.

For the future, if you see a bug or worm in your corn, simply cut off that portion of the corn cob. We know, it’s not a comfortable sight to discover. Usually pests invade at the tip. Cut it off and you’re set to enjoy the rest of the ear of corn.

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IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE:

1 head escarole

6 1/3 ounces salad mix

1 bunch swiss chard

2 delicata squash

2 heads of garlic

1 bunch leeks

3 bell peppers

1 bunch radish

sweet potatoes

DELICATA SQUASH

Delicata is a favorite winter squash here at the farm. It’s a great weeknight squash. Creamy in texture and nutty in flavor like a butternut squash, but not a big project to cut up and cook. In fact, don’t even bother to peel them.

Perhaps the simplest way to cook it: slice it in half down its length, scoop out the seeds, brush cut sides with oil, sprinkle with coarse salt, and roast on a heavy duty sheet pan with raised edges in a 375 degree oven. At Free Bird, we like to start the roasting process cut-side down until it’s nicely caramelized underneath where the flesh touches the pan. Flip once it’s richly golden brown to finish cooking through (if the squash flesh is not already fully tender when pierced with a fork). Sorry—we’re guessing on the time: about 30 minutes? Check after 20 minutes, just to be on the safe side. To serve, rub the flesh with butter and, if you like, lightly drizzle with maple syrup. Or melt a few tablespoons of butter with chopped rosemary in a small saucepan. Add ½ cup of cider and bring to a gentle boil. Cook until the cider mixture is reduced by about half. Drizzle over the roasted squash halves (cut side up) and serve.

Alternatively, slice the squash in half down its length. Then slice each half into thin slices to make half-moon slivers. Toss with olive oil, salt and pepper and spread in a single on a heavy duty rimmed baking pan (like a jelly roll pan). Once golden brown on the underside, flip and continue to cook until golden brown and tender. The skin will shrivel and tenderize so it can be eaten (no need to slice off). In the last few minutes of roasting toss with minced garlic and some minced rosemary, if you like. Or serve with the cider glaze in recipe above.

CSA Share Week #16

2011-09-20T07:29:00.000-07:00

We have the best CSA members. We really do. And this weekend’s Open House at the farm was a strong reminder as to just how lucky we are. It was a gorgeous fall-like day—the sun warm and relaxing. We took a tour of the farm’s main growing field, where Ken was able to talk about our farming philosophy, answer members’ questions, and show members how and where things grow. Then members shucked corn and helped set up a large table of food for a pot luck lunch, which was chock full of delicious, healthy food. (see recipe below for Neil's dish we all really loved)

We enjoyed hearing from members as to how the CSA has enriched their lives—whether it has meant eating more healthfully, trying vegetables they would never have tried, enjoying how fresh everything tastes or insuring one’s family is eating sustainably-raised food. And we were inspired by just how much of a commitment members expressed for the farm. (We can always use that kind of morale boost.)

Thanks to all those who took a day off to come here to the farm (we know, we’re far). We wish the day could have stretched on longer.

This week’s share is showing just a glimpse of how the farm has been hurt by the drastic weather events of late August and early September. Call them Irene and Lee. The result: slim pickings. And, yet, we’re among the lucky ones! We have something to offer—just not many things we had planted for. At one of our farmer’s markets in the Hudson Valley we heard from many, many people that their CSAs were simply done for the season. Wiped out. Kaput. We appreciated hearing their tone of compassion for those farms. As it’s not an “us” vs. “them” kind of thing. We’re all in it together. We’ve all been hurt. Some just more seriously than others.

-Ken & Maryellen

P.S.- for those who were fans of the gingerbread made at the Open House, here is a recipe that’s similar to what she followed in the King Arthur cookbook: http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/gingerbread-recipe.

IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE
3 pounds Tongue-of-Fire heirloom shell beans (info. follows)
6.4 ounces salad mix
¾ pound fresh edamame
6 ears sweet corn*
1 bunch carrots or other item
Sweet bell peppers
1 melon

*Natural sugars in sweet corn turn to starch rapidly. If you can’t cook the corn immediately (Tues. night), wrap in a damp towel and then tuck in a plastic bag and store in your refrigerator’s produce drawer to help preserve it best.

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TONGUE OF FIRE SHELL BEANS. At Free Bird, shelling these Italian heirloom fresh shell beans is a family affair. If there’s extra after a market, we all sit on the back of the truck and start shelling away—prying open the colorful mottled shells and flicking the beans into a communal pot. If we aren’t finding something to laugh over while sharing in the task, we simply enjoy the time together just being quiet. And then we cook up a big pot. Whatever beans you cook up and don’t eat, drain and freeze in zipper-locked bags and enjoy later on in a stew or pasta or with sautéed greens and lots of garlic. These beans are creamy in texture and mildly nutty in flavor, similar to a cannellini bean. A lot of our market customers buy them to make pasta e fagiole (pasta and beans).
TO COOK THE FRESH SHELL BEANS: place the shelled beans (pods discarded) in a pot of water. Add a bay leaf and any aromatics you have on hand, such as a chopped carrot, parsley stems, or an onion, and bring to a boil. Reduce to a gentle simmer, stirring occasionally, until the beans are creamy in texture all the way through, about 30 minutes. (Taste to test for doneness.)

HOW TO FREEZE PEPPERS. As you may be noticing, the farm had one heck of a pepper crop this year. If you’re not sure what more to do with your peppers, stash them in the freezer. They hold up beautifully. First, remove the stem and core and then slice the pepper into strips or chop up. Place in a freezer-grade ziplock plastic bag removing as much air out the bag as possible. Then freeze. Pull the peppers out any time this winter when you want to make a stir fry, a pasta dish, chili, soup,… They hardly even need to be thawed before throwing in a hot pan.

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Neil Doshi's Fabulous Stew:

Hello everyone,

I went to the open house at the farm the past weekend and brought this dish for our potluck lunch. A few people asked me to share the recipe for the newsletter so here it is. It is a slightly modified version of a dish my girlfriend and I had in Turkey. All the ingredients are easy to obtain except for the last two, but both of them are optional. The resulting stew is great hot, cold, or at room temperature. It only gets better the next day and is great with some some pita. The prep and cooking time is under an hour.

Ingredients:
1 medium-sized italian eggplant (1/2" cubes) or a few skinnier eggplants cut into rings (about 1/4" thick) with the skin on
1 red pepper cut into strips
1 onion (cut along the grain, julienne)
2-3 cloves of garlic, chopped
2-4 Tomatoes chopped (see notes)
2 tbsp of tomato paste
1-2 tsp of turkish pepper paste (optional - see notes)
a few pinches of turkish pepper flakes (optional - see notes)

Directions:
Add olive oil to a stewing pot of some sort (I used an enameled dutch oven)
I turned the stove to medium heat (I wasn't going for any caramelization or browning)
Fry the peppers in the oil for about 5 minutes
Add the onions and fry for another 5 minutes
Add the garlic and fry for about a minute or so
Add the tomato paste and the option pepper paste and powder and fry for a few minutes
Add the tomatoes and cook on low for 10-20 minutes until a sauce forms

While this is going on, pan fry the eggplant on high in a different pan until browned and thoroughly cooked with a high heat vegetable oil to prevent smoking.
You can press out some of the oil from the eggplant after it is cooked with some paper towels because it will have absorbed quite a bit.
Stir the eggplant pieces into the vegetable stew and turn off the heat after a minute or two.

Notes:
1) You can use whole fresh tomatoes (I like roma tomates) with the skin & seeds or tomatoes from a can of whole peeled tomatoes without the liquid (its too salty). You could even add some whole cherry tomatoes in addition to the cut up tomatoes that form the sauce.
2) Turkish pepper paste is basically the red pepper equivalent version of tomato paste. I used something I picked up in Turkey, but you can buy something similar at Kalustyan's called "Biber Salcasi".
3) Turkish pepper powder is a dried pepper powder that is made from a mild to medium red pepper. Once again, I used something that I bought abroad, but they have two versions at Kalustyan's that you could try called "Kirmizi Biber" and "Biber Tursu". Alternatively, you can use a little bit of the usual red pepper flakes (cayenne) or some hot paprika.

--neil

CSA Share Week #15

2011-09-13T09:00:00.000-07:00

“Twelve days, sixteen inches of rain.” That’s how a fellow farmer in the region grimly summed up the last week and a half here—post Hurricane Irene. Excessive rain here in our county. Flooding. Landslides. Damns breaking. Roads closed. Schools closed. Residents and businesses evacuated.
At the farm, even our best-drained, high ground soils were so saturated that there was nowhere for the water to drain off. Many of our fall crops appear to have been ruined or substantially damaged.
We do our best to keep the focus on silver linings here. The loss we’re experiencing on the farm is short term (specific to this season). We haven’t had entire fields permanently washed away, and we’re not located in flood plains where river waters contaminated with chemicals and human pathogens have leached into our soil. And, looking beyond our region, there are much more serious natural disasters occurring in parts of the world where the consequences are life-threatening shortages of food.
But we’d be lying if we said we weren’t disappointed. We had done everything right to prepare for a strong end for our CSA members. Plants nurtured in the greenhouse since mid-July for the fall harvest were transplanted into the ground on time. Direct seedings were done right. Everything planted in abundance. Much work, time and money invested so that the next 7 weeks would be a banner finish.
This is truly a test for all of us—the farmers and the CSA members. We’ve had a number of market customers asking where’s the broccoli, when will we have spinach, are there any more tomatoes … ? When we explain the situation, they not only have been quick to understand but also have been more than willing to adapt and make do with whatever our fields are yielding. We hope our CSA members are able to share in that spirit of understanding.

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE
1 bunch turnips with edible greens or radish
5 ½ ounces arugula
7 ¼ ounces salad mix
3 sweet peppers
2 cucumbers
1 eggplant
¾ pound green beans
1 head garlic
2 to 3 red onions

*Amounts or type of vegetable with asterisk varying depending on your distribution location and what you received last week; we always strive for balance.
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Winging It: quick menu ideas from the farm that combine items from this week’s share
• sautéed eggplant with garlic, wilted arugula, and kalamata olives served over polenta
• Panini with caramelized red onions, arugula, roasted peppers and goat cheese
• Wilted turnip greens with garlic and chopped walnuts

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RECIPE: ROASTED EGGPLANT SOUP
The following is a recipe a couple of our Cooperstown CSA members recommended to us, adapted from: http://smittenkitchen.com/2010/10/roasted-eggplant-soup/
1 mid-small eggplant
3 mid sized tomatoes
1/4 a jalapeno pepper, seeds removed
1 large onion
8 cloves of garlic
Parsley
4 cups veggie broth (2 cans)
1/4 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup whole milk
Olive oil
Salt & pepper
Parmesan cheese to top
1. Lightly oil a baking pan and preheat the oven to 425
2. Cut the eggplant, tomato, and onion into 1/2 inch thick slices and spread out on the baking pan. Peel the garlic and lay the cloves, uncut on the pan. Also add your slice of jalapeno pepper – but make sure you keep track of where you put it.
3. Roast for 20 minutes, then remove the garlic. Put the rest back in the oven, turn the heat down to 400 and roast another 15-20 minutes.
4. Remove the pan and put the onion, garlic, eggplant, and tomatoes in a soup pot. Remove the jalapeno completely – just the oil from baking it will be plenty hot.
5. Add the veggie stock to the pot and bring to a boil. Once it’s boiling, turn down the heat a little and cook until the veggies are all tender. About 10-15 minutes.
6. Blend the whole soup in a food processor until completely smooth, then return to a low heat. Add the cream, milk, and a little less then 1/4 cup grated parmesan. Cook, stirring often, for 5-10 minutes. Turn off the heat, sprinkle with fresh parsley, and eat with bread.

CSA Share Week 14

2011-09-06T18:45:00.000-07:00

Happiness is…fresh melon.
For us here, it’s “back-to-school” week, but technically it is still summer! And melons are an icon of summer we can’t get enough of here. We’ll be transporting more than 1000 pounds of melon from the farm to the city this week. So bring an extra bag so you can lug your cantaloupe or watermelon home.
Watermelons do not further ripen off the vine. Canteloupe do. The best way to tell if a cantaloupe is ready to eat is if the nub end gives when you press into it with your thumb and the “button end” has a sweet, aromatic melon scent to it (versus a “green” smell). If it isn’t quite ripe, just leave it on your countertop until it does yield when you press it with your thumb. It should only take a day or two. It’s worth the wait.
It’s really hard not to talk about the weather. After all, we are farmers. We live according to it, and, boy has the weather been weird. This past week our region was declared a federal disaster area, and many here are coming to difficult terms with the significant damage caused by Hurricane Irene. We lost about 15 percent of our fall crops to flooding, but that’s nothing to complain about. We were lucky. We personally know 2 farms devastated from flooding. One farmer friend lost 5 feet of topsoil from 15 acres of cropland. Now it’s just bed rock. Many people lost their homes. Meanwhile, the state is investigating “compelling video evidence” of a tornado touching down not far from here during one of Sunday’s thunderstorms. Good grief.

IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE:
1 head green curly leaf lettuce
6 1/3 ounces salad mix
1 red cabbage
4 sweet bell peppers (red, yellow or orange)
2 jalapenos
2 serrano peppers (spicy)
4 tomatoes
1 bunch cilantro
1 large mild onion
1 bunch turnips (great for salad; cook the greens!) or 1 bunch radish
1 melon

CSA Share Week 13

2011-08-30T04:55:00.000-07:00

How did we fare from Hurricane Irene? After a precursory look at the fields, it looks like we’ve dodged a bullet. The storm dropped about 5 inches of rain here. So maybe 10 to 20 percent of our fall crops—those planted in low-lying fields—might not make it.
The high winds we experienced didn’t cause any structural damages. We were worried about our greenhouses and our 200-plus-year-old barn. Ken and two others spent half of Saturday repairing and reinforcing the barn roof as it likely would have lifted if we experienced any stronger winds.
Sadly, many farms in our region were not so lucky and presently still sit under a lot of water due to rivers flooding more extensively than they have in 500 years.
A substantial section of the NYS Thruway here is closed due to flooding. So deliveries to the city could be delayed due to detours and traffic.
We’ve mentioned this before...it has been a hard growing season . There seems to be a running joke among NY farmers that they’re just waiting for this season to end. But, knowing some of those farms that have been hard hit, Irene was the last thing they truly wanted or needed.

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
1 lb. string beans (green, purple or yellow wax)*
¾ pound edamame
2 large white onions
1 bunch leeks
6 ½ ounces salad mix or 4.8 ounces arugula*
2 cucumbers
1 red or yellow bell pepper or eggplant*
1 ½ pounds beets without greens
1 tomato
*items may vary according to distribution sites due to limited quantities of each crop.

RECIPES:
The farm’s crop of LEEKS have come in. And while they’re great as a base for soup or in a stir fry and a pleasant partner to salmon, they can also stand on their own, such as in this recipe for Creamy Baked Leeks with Garlic, Thyme, and Parmigiano.

Brown them with garlic and butter then simmer in white wine and a little chicken broth for an elegant but easy-enough-for-a-weeknight dinner of Spaghetti with Creamy Braised Garlic and Leeks.

BEETS: “People who swear they hate beets love this salad.” That was a compelling enough opener by Martha Rose Shulman in the New York Times to offer up this recipe for Grated Raw Beet Salad. If you’ve never eaten a beet raw, you’re in for a surprise. They’re incredibly sweet and healthy for you too.

CSA Share Week 12

2011-08-23T08:29:00.000-07:00

Mark your calendar: Free Bird Farm is hosting an Open House for CSA members on Sunday, Sept. 18 from 10 to 3 p.m. Tour the farm, see where your produce is being grown, meet your farmers and get a chance to hang out with some engaging people (other CSA members, that is!). Everyone is invited to bring a dish to share for lunch. Last year's potluck was a real hit. Be sure to bring a water bottle and sun protection too.

As for this week: we're happy to report our hens are back into the swing of things and laying enough eggs for all of our CSA members. We are still short on eggs as a whole—not having enough to bring to the farmers’ markets we attend. But there are now enough eggs that we don’t need to supplement with free-range eggs from a neighboring Amish farm.

Otherwise, we’re just plugging along here—grateful when there’s a break in the humidity and when a new crop pops up.

This week’s arugula is beautiful and tasty—bright and peppery and not riddled with holes. We managed not to put any tears in it as the hundred or so yards of cover was laid down and anchored with shoveled soil along the edges. If there is a miniscule tear in the cloth, the beetles will find their way under and start their gluttonous munching. The itsy insects merely create cosmetic damage—and you’ll never see a flea beetle on a washed leaf, but it is still much more rewarding to bring in a crop that isn’t riddled with bitty holes .

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
5 ½ ounces arugula
¾ pound French string beans
4 tomatoes
3 cucumbers
1 bunch parsley
1 bunch carrots
2 red bell peppers
2 heads garlic
2 zucchini
________________________________________________________
For those who are receiving the green French string beans this week, these beans requires removing the strings that run on each side of these flat, long beans. Snap off the stem end and the string on at least one side will readily pull off. If you miss a string, you’ll know it when you bite into it, and can easily just pull it off then. These are a dense-skinned bean—best eaten cooked to tenderize the bean.
This recipe from Ina Garten for String Beans with Garlic is simple and tasty.

__________________________________________________________
RECIPE
No matter which style or color bean is in your share, both are great in Maryellen's recipe for Green Bean Salad with Tomatoes, Arugula & Basil Dressing.

1 cup loosely packed basil leaves
2 strips lemon zest about 3 inches long and 1/2 inch wide, white pith removed
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt
¾ lb. French string beans, strings along edges removed
¾ pound cups arugula, rinsed and spun dry
1 ½ cups chopped tomatoes
1-1/2 cups (10 oz.) 1-inch-diameter fresh mozzarella balls (ciliegine), halved
1 Tbs. fresh lemon juice; more to taste
Freshly ground black pepper

Fill an 8-quart stockpot three-quarters full of water and bring to a boil over high heat. Put the basil and lemon zest in a metal sieve, immerse it in the boiling water, and blanch for 5 seconds. Remove, tapping the sieve over the sink to shake off excess water. Turn off the burner but leave the water in the pot with the cover on.

Roughly chop the lemon zest. Put the basil and lemon zest in a blender and pulse a few times. With the blender running, pour the olive oil through the lid’s fill hole and purée until smooth, stopping to scrape down the sides of the blender as needed. Transfer to a small bowl or liquid measuring cup and cover. Refrigerate until ready to assemble the salad.

Return the water to a boil over high heat. Add 2 Tbs. salt and the beans. Cook until the beans are crisp-tender or fully tender, depending on your preference, 4 to 6 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water. Spread the beans on a large rimmed baking sheet and refrigerate to cool completely. If making more than an hour ahead, cover and refrigerate.

In a large bowl, combine the cooled beans with the arugula, tomatoes, and mozzarella. Toss with the basil oil and lemon juice. Season to taste with salt and pepper and more lemon juice.

Make Ahead TipsYou can cook the beans up to a day ahead, just spread them out on a rimmed baking sheet, cover, and refrigerate. The basil dressing can also be made a day ahead. Wait to combine the beans and dressing until just before serving.

CSA Share Week 11

2011-08-16T06:03:00.000-07:00

The little pods of fresh soybean (edamame) dangle from a jungle of foliage. They're time consuming to pick but most worth it.

Usually in the weekly farm letter we focus on what’s been going on at the farm for the week. But since some members have been inquiring about how the farm is doing (and how our son is faring), we thought we’d talk about the big picture this week.

To be honest, it has been a frustrating growing season. Granted, we’re lucky we aren’t in Texas, where they’re experiencing record drought, or in the Midwest, where there was so much rain this spring that CSA farms were unable to offer members shares until mid-July. But here in Upstate New York the growing conditions this year have been challenging.

We are still seeing long-term negative effects of the sopping wet spring. Many of our crops that should be flourishing right now, like melons, aren’t producing what they should. We were forced to plant them in unrelenting wet conditions, and, consequently, many transplants drowned or their root systems rotted underground. Seed washed away. We probably got at best 1/3 of the sweet corn crop we had planted, and our first melon planting failed from root rot. We were stuck—we couldn’t hold plants in the greenhouse any longer than we did, or they’d become what is called “root bound,” so we were forced to plant into subpar conditions.

Hudson Valley orchard farmer and friend Tom Maynard suffered an 85 percent loss on his cherry crop early this summer because of this spring’s wet weather. That is, with the lack of sun, the trees didn’t photosynthesize at an adequate rate, which affected the blossoms ability to produce fruit. For Tom, his cherry crop is what typically covers his labor costs. No small loss.

Shawn Cleland, owner of nearby Timberlane Blueberry Farm, said the wet spring significantly compromised her crop too. When the bees arrived in mid-May there were no blossoms on the blueberry bushes for them to pollinate (the blossoms arrived about a month late). “We had no humming this year,” she said in reference to the usual bee activity. This week is probably the last of the blueberries that we’ll see. In a good year, she’d normally have another 3 weeks to harvest.

The one crop that liked all that ridiculous spring rain was our garlic crop. It did well. Phew.

Then came July. As the NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center summed up: “Persistent, scorching heat in the central and eastern regions of the United States shattered long-standing daily and monthly temperature records… making it the fourth warmest July on record nationally.” The NOAA noted, too, that the heat wave was marked by higher than normal overnight and early morning temperatures. That is, to the detriment of our hen flock, temperatures at night stayed high through the heat wave.

In the fields, we are still seeing some of the effects of the extreme heat we had in July. For instance, our peppers and eggplant experienced something called “blossom drop.” That is, the flowers on the plants fell off during the heat wave. It is from these flowers that the vegetables are produced on the plants. We are just now seeing new blossoms, but by the time they generate more “fruit,” the plants will probably be killed off by frost.

We planted a tremendous tomato crop, and it was looking beautiful up until blight and fungal disease arrived. We did everything right—we planted the tomatoes in a field where we’d never planted tomatoes before (thus reducing chance of picking up soil-born disease), they were pruned right and planted right. But air-borne disease blew in aggressively killing the tomato plants’ foliage and leaving spots on the tomatoes. So our crop has been compromised.

Even though we planted significantly more than was necessary for the CSA this year as a safeguard, overall yields have been disappointing on a wide variety of crops and some crops we completely lost. The quality of many items hasn’t been as top notch as we expect because of this year’s weather conditions. We hate to say it but…it has not been a banner year.

The weather this year has underscored some concerns we have about what kind of a long-term future is in store for farmers if the weather extremes we’ve experienced in the last few years truly are due to climate change and are to become the “new normal.” NPR’s Terry Gross/Fresh Air ran a compelling interview of climatologist Heidi Cullen on this subject a couple of weeks ago. When things slow down here (come winter) we plan to get a copy of Cullen’s book The Weather of the Future: Heat Waves, Extreme Storms, and other Scenes from a Climate Changed Planet. Maybe some of you, too, heard the interview. What she said really spoke to us in terms of what we have been observing.

Despite the setbacks, each week we have been able to drum up a sizable share and new crops keep arriving. This week’s purple beans, for instance, look gorgeous. And we are pleased to offer fresh edamame this week—something our staff had to spend hours picking (a very tedious crop to pick) and that you normally only see frozen (see tips, in newsletter, on how to cook fresh). This crop is a treat.

Update on Xavier: Our 3 ½-year-old son seems to be doing fine. Unfortunately, we don’t know what was wrong with him back in late June when we ended up 3 times in the emergency room and overnight in the hospital for a couple of days. The doctors were stumped and released him with a diagnosis of most likely having neurological complications, possibly from a concussion. Fortunately, Xavier’s symptoms have not recurred for more than a month. Needless to say, it was impossible to neatly compartmentalize that ordeal while trying to keep up with the demands of the farm. We greatly appreciate the e-mails, cards and well wishes we received. They really helped to carry us through a stressful couple of weeks.

IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE
2 white, large mild onions (great for kebabs and on the grill)
¾ pound velour stringless beans (see below)
1 pound edamame (fresh soy bean)
1 bunch basil
1 bunch amaranth greens (see below)
Eggplant
Tomatoes
1 additional item to be determined (broccoli, Romanesco cauliflower or gold beets)

Amaranth Greens:That curious bouquet of purpley-red and green leaves is back this week. Known as amaranth greens or Asian spinach, we have had a lot of farmers' market customers try it on a whim and come back the next week anxious for more. We hope you're just as glad to try it again. At the farm on Sunday, we cooked it as follows and served over a bed of quinoa and alongside some grilled zucchini and grilled sliced onions (also in this week's share). So healthy. We had some balsamic vinegar on hand to drizzle over it, but it was so tasty, we never opened the bottle.

To cook the amaranth greens: Pluck the leaves from the stem, rinse and pat dry with a towel or spin dry in a salad spinner. (Discard the stems.) Mince 1 to 2 cloves of garlic.

In a heavy-bottomed saute pan or a cast iron fry pan, heat a few tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil over medium heat. Add the garlic, stirring, until fragrant. Increase the heat to medium-high, add the greens, and toss with tongues to coat the greens with the oil and mix them with the garlic. Continue to cook until the greens have lightly wilted, about 3 minutes.

Season with Kosher salt to taste. If you wish, add a splash of balsamic vinegar or squeeze of lemon juice.

Edamame: Pronounced like eh-dah-mah-may. That would be the name for the fuzzy little pods containing nutty little fresh soybeans in this week's share. Kids and adults alike love this finger food. Very simple, very, very tasty.

To cook: Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.
Carefully add the edamame in their pods (no shelling necessary) so as not to splash yourself.
Cook for 5 to 6 minutes. To test for doneness run a cooked pod under cold water to cool slightly and then slip a bean out of the pod. The bean should be firm, yet give to the teeth. Mushy beans means that they are over cooked.
Drain in a colander and let cool to room temperature, or refrigerate for a couple of hours to serve cold. Before serving, toss the pods with a generous pinch of Kosher salt.
To eat, slip the beans out and into your mouth by pulling the pods between your teeth. Discard the pods.

A Note from the farm about the purple beans:This week’s purple velour filet beans are a “haricot vert”—a very slender, stringless bean that’s a favorite of chefs. We sautéed some as they came in from the field, and they are deliciously tender and flavorful when cooked for just a few minutes in a skillet over medium-high heat in some extra-virgin olive oil with a sprinkling of coarse or Kosher salt to finish. Sadly, as with so many purple varieties of produce, they will not hold their deep burgundy color once cooked. So if you want to showcase their color, serve raw in a salad or with a dip.

Share Week 10

2011-08-09T10:00:00.001-07:00

Our Big, Fat Coyote Spotting
Late the other night, as we were returning home from dinner with friends (a much-needed evening off the farm), we bypassed our driveway and pulled into one of our fields instead to check up on the hens. We wanted to make sure everyone was snug in their hen houses, doors shut tight—something one of our employees said he’d do (but always good for us to double check). Just as we pulled in a fat coyote was prowling through the grass heading towards the hens’ houses. He quickly high-tailed it back into a small wooded area.

While our flock took a beating from the heat a few weeks back, over the course of the season we’ve probably lost just as many hens to predators this year—mostly coyotes and foxes. Occasionally, there is something attacking them even in the middle of the day. We aren’t sure what it is, but we can tell by the pile of feathers that are left in the field that something was in their fenced-in area. While we’ve had troubles in the past 12 years with the occasional fox—or, worse, neighborhood dog, usually it is with the even more vulnerable meat birds we raise that get hit. This year has been a new and difficult experience, and we’re thinking hard about what we need to do differently to ward off the problems we’ve had without compromising the way we raise our birds.

Ken spent Saturday putting in a good amount of seed for fall crops—in anticipation of some forecasted rain this weekend. We ended up getting more rain than we’d expected and hope the heavy downpours weren’t so strong that they washed seed away. We also put in a few thousand transplants for fall, including the lettuce seen in the picture provided. Indeed, it’s time here to start preparing for the final act—autumn. There’s still a ton of work ahead (we’re only about halfway through the season), but it is that time when many of our end-of-season plants get started in the greenhouse or directly in the field.

IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE*
Tomatoes
1 bunch basil
1 bunch cilantro
2 large onions
1 Jalapeno
6 ¼ ounces salad mix
1 head of garlic
1 bunch leeks
Cabbage
Zucchini

*This is an approximate list. We were short on a number of items this week, so there was variation among groups as to the items they receive. For instance, the types of tomatoes and cabbage varied this week among sites; we simply did not have enough of one type to go around for all but do keep track of who gets what so that, for instance, this week you might receive a variety of tomato that last week you did not.

RECIPES AND COOKING IDEAS
This is a great week to make some fresh salsa. But there are plenty of other things to do with the produce from this week's share. Here are a few that grabbed us.

Using this week's red cabbage and cilantro--
Chinese chicken salad:
http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/chinese_chicken_salad.aspx

Mexican-style Slaw with Jicama, Cilantro and Lime:http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/mexican-style-slaw-jicama-cilantro-lime.aspx
(I wouldn't hesitate to leave out the jicama if you don't want to make a trip to the store. Substitute the leek greens--very thinly sliced--for the scallions.

This week's leeks...
Creamy Baked Leeks with Garlic, Thyme and Parmigiano
http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/creamy-baked-leeks-garlic-thyme-parmigiano.aspx)

This is one way to use up your onions (last week's or this week's--doesn't matter that they're not red) and wow people you might be entertaining (or treat yourself). You can also follow the recipe's method for caramelizing the onions, and make a simpler bruschetta with sliced tomatoes, fresh mozarella and a basil leaf:
Fig and Onion Bruschetta
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Fig-and-Onion-Bruschetta-351069

CSA Share Week 9

2011-08-02T06:07:00.000-07:00

Former farm intern Anna Lehr Mueser pitched in with packing this week's share at the farm. (Thanks Anna!) She holds a few bouquets of this week's ultra healthy (and beautiful) amaranth greens.

This week we have our first harvest of tomatoes and eggplant coming in. New also are amaranth greens, which come with a little story:

A few miles down the road from the farm is a roadside peddler named Cookie. He has a lot of junk, often some treasure, and always a friendly smile that readily stretches across his deeply tan face. A long-time resident, he knows our farm, and he knows we’ve got plenty of pigweed. Also called amaranth, to us it’s a rampant but relatively benign weed that grows all over the farm and is edible. In the past we’ve pulled some from the ground and brought it to Cookie to cook up. This year, we actually planted a variety of amaranth greens for our CSA members (leftovers for Cookie).

The cultivated version of amaranth is a lot more cooking friendly than the “weed”, with broad, deeply colored green and purple leaves that pluck easily from the stem. It’s mild like spinach and extremely good for you. Here’s an excerpt about it from Wikipedia.com:

“Amaranth greens, also called Chinese spinach, …are a common leaf vegetable throughout the tropics and in many warm temperate regions. It is very popular in India. They are a very good source of vitamins including vitamin A, vitamin K, vitamin B6, vitamin C, riboflavin, and folate, and dietary minerals including calcium, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, zinc, copper, and manganese. Because of its valuable nutrition, some farmers grow amaranth today.” That includes us.

Approach it like you would spinach—in soups, in a stir-fry, wilted in olive oil with a little garlic (served with some grilled meat) on the side or in a sandwich with sautéed onions and cheese. We used the amaranth recently in a black bean burrito with brown rice, diced tomato, and some of the sweet onions in this week’s share sautéed until soft and lightly golden.

In this week’s SHARE:
Tomatoes
1 bunch amaranth greens
1 bunch basil
6 1/3 ounces arugula
2 jalapenos
1 bunch beets
1 bunch Swiss chard
2 sweet bulb onions (1 red, 1 white)
1 large Italian eggplant or 2 Japanese eggplant*

*varies with distribution location

CSA Share Week #8

2011-07-26T16:45:00.000-07:00

Laying hens recover from the heat. Half the farm's flock was lost to last week's extreme heat.

A bit of a disaster struck the farm this past week. We were braced for the heat—making sure our generator was set up in case of a black or brown out. Without electricity we’d lose produce in our walk-in cooler and fall plantings that we’ve started in our greenhouse, because they need frequent watering (and thus a functioning water pump). Fortunately, we never lost our power. Unfortunately, instead, we lost half our flock of laying hens. With the first hot night, we lost 15. The next hot night, another 11, and so the week continued. Sunday night, when the heat finally broke, we finally didn’t experience any losses. This is a first for the farm. We’ve lost hens to predators and had mature meat birds die from overheating (their breed is prone to heart failure under extreme heat), but we’ve never lost our laying hens in the heat. They’re usually a hearty lot.
Typically, it has helped that at night our hens roost in mobile hen houses—houses built on wheels. The floors are constructed of sturdy wire mesh so that the houses normally get a good bit of air flow, even when the doors shut at night from underneath. We construct them this way so that their manure doesn’t accumulate on the floor but falls onto the ground a few feet below them. This means their houses stay cleaner, the soil below gets some terrific, natural fertility, and they get good air. But this week’s heat was so relentless that we ended up putting baby gates in the hen house doors at night (to let more air in but keep predators out), and we ran extension cords from the barn into the field to run fans in each house through the night. We provided added shade in the field during the day, and hosed down their houses to cool things down too. But it wasn’t until we simply got a normal, reasonably cool night with a breeze (Sunday) that we stopped losing the birds.
So what does this mean for your egg share? At this moment, we’re trying to gauge how this is going to affect members’ egg shares in the long term. We have enough eggs for everyone this week. And it may be we’ll have enough for the coming weeks—and just none for our farmers’ market customers. It’s hard to tell right now, because the hens that held up through the heat aren’t laying at their normal rate. When chickens are stressed, they’ll stop laying eggs. We should have a better sense for how this affects our egg production by next week’s distribution and will keep everyone posted.
Meantime, while hens were dropping in the heat, our field crew was putting in 11-hour days in order to get their usual work done as well as bring in our largest garlic harvest ever. Our crew is a determined-to-work bunch. They don’t like to take days off, and they passed on the option of taking extra long lunch breaks so they aren’t working in the height of the heat. Thanks to their determination, the garlic came in on time (too long in the soil and it starts to break), and the hot, dry breezes we’ve had helps to cure or dry the crop as it hangs in the barn.

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
1 cabbage
1 head of garlic
Fennel (1 large or 2 small that have been bunched)
6 1/3 ounces salad mix
3/4 pound (12 ounces) green beans
1 bunch carrots
2 fresh red onions (mild and wonderfully sweet when cooked or grilled)

On Fennel- You can do just about anything with fennel—grill it, roast it, sauté it, or, one of the farm’s favorites, eat it raw in a salad. For the latter, you’ll want to very thinly slice it or the texture can be a bit too coarse. You don’t have to have a super-sharp knife and knife skills to achieve this. A vegetable peeler lets you shave it. Trim the base, quarter lengthwise, cut out the core, and run the peeler lengthwise along each quarter to shave. You can also use a mandoline or hand slicer, if you have one. We stumbled upon this recipe for Quinoa, Nectarine and Fennel Salad on Sproutedkitchen.com. We especially liked that it used nectarines, which are in this week’s fruit share.

Cabbage: Don’t feel like you have to use your large head of cabbage overnight. This vegetable will hold in your crisper for at least a couple of weeks. While coleslaw is a refreshing way to eat cabbage raw, there are other ways to use raw cabbage, such as in a fish taco or, one of our favorite sandwiches, a reuben. Here’s an update on the reuben by a good friend, Tony Rosenfeld. He uses smoked turkey and a sun-dried tomato mayo instead of Thousand Island dressing: http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/smoked-turkey-reubens.aspx

CSA Share Week 7

2011-07-19T08:39:00.000-07:00

The farm's big garlic harvest has kicked in. Ariel washes recently harvested garlic before it gets hung in the barn to cure.

About 12 years ago Ken’s sister joined a CSA when she was living in Hoboken, NJ and working in the city. The CSA concept back then was new to us (and unknown to many). So when we asked her how she liked it she said it was a good experience but with one caveat: she didn’t see any tomatoes in her share until late July. Little did she know, that’s about when tomatoes appear in the Northeast (unless grown in a greenhouse).

We try to remember this anecdote every year, as tomatoes seem to be a gold standard for many CSA members, and one that’s easily misunderstood—even by the sibling of a vegetable grower . Tomatoes are a crop that require a lot of sun and heat and time to come to fruition (along with peppers, melons and eggplant). Most varieties require about 60 to 70 days of growth after transplants are planted into the ground. And since you don’t want to plant a tomato transplant in the ground before the risk of a frost is over (late May, to be safe), tomatoes grown outdoors don’t usually prosper until mid- to late-July.

These dog days of summer we’re finally experiencing are good for ushering the tomatoes, peppers and eggplant along, but we’re not there yet. Hang tight!

Meanwhile, it’s a good time to enjoy some other crops that have finally come in, like fresh green beans. Beans are labor-intensive to pick. You’re not only picking one bean at a time but also having to search through a jungle of a knee-high plant to pick only the ones that are to size (leaving the smaller ones on the plant so they can fill out). Some CSAs actually don’t offer green beans because they require too much labor to pick. Some have their members do their own picking. Since most of our members can’t do that (we're a bit too far), we take the time to make sure you can enjoy these fresh.

On the weather front (what’s a farm letter without talking about the weather…) we finally got a bit of rain Monday. Hopefully it’s enough to give the soil a good soaking. After the dry stretch we’ve had in July, the plants could really benefit from some rain. Hard to imagine being for want of rain after this spring, but here we are, needing it now.

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE
¾ pound green beans or yellow wax beans
1 bunch beets
1 bunch basil
6 1/3 ounces salad mix
1 bunch large, mild fresh onions with green tops
1 bunch swiss chard
¾ pound sugar snap peas (pods are edible, no need to shell) or 2 cucumbers (whichever one your distribution site didn’t get last week)
1 large or 2 small to medium zucchini

QUICK, FLAVORFUL SWISS CHARD:
This recipe comes from the Fast, Fresh & Green cookbook by our friend and former Fine Cooking executive editor Susie Middleton (Chronicle Books, 2010). This is a terrific book to own—“more than 90 delicious recipes for veggie lovers.” And it comes in a soft cover ($16.41 on amazon.com). Susie has a great approach to food—she offers a lot of fresh ideas, most of which are doable on a weeknight but remarkable enough to serve to guests.

Stir-Fried Swiss Chard with Pine Nuts and Balsamic Butter (from the Fast, Fresh & Green cookbook by Susie Middleton)
Serves 2 to 3.

1 TSP BALSAMIC VINEGAR
1 TSP SOY SAUCE
½ TSP DARK BROWN SUGAR
12 OZ SWISS CHARD
1 TBSP PEANUT OIL
3 TBSP PINE NUTS
KOSHER SALT
2 TSP FINELY CHOPPED FRESH GARLIC
1 TBSP UNSALTED BUTTER

1.In a small bowl, combine the balsamic vinegar, soy sauce, and brown sugar.
2.Pull or cut the stems away from the chard leaves. Cut or rip the leaves into 2- to 3-inch peces and wash and dry them well. Rinse the stems and slice them crosswise into ¼-in. pieces
3.Heat the peanut oil in a large nonstick stir-fry pan over medium heat. When the oil is hot (it will loosen and spread out), add the pine nuts and cook, stirring almost constantly, until they’re all lightly browned, 1 to 2 minutes. Watch carefully, because they brown quickly. Remove the pan from the heat and use a slotted spoon or spatula to transfer the pine nuts to a heat-proof plate or pan, leaving behind as much fat as possible.
4.Return the pan to the heat, add the chard stems and a pinch of salt, and cook, stirring occasionally, until they’re shrunken and beginning to brown lightly, about 5 minutes. (They will begin to crackle in the pan as moisture evaporates.) Add the garlic and stir-fry just until fragrant, a few seconds. Add the chard leaves and ½ tsp. salt and, using tongs, toss the chard leaves in the pan just until wilted (30 to 45 seconds). Scrape the balsamic mixture into the pan, stir, and remove the pan from the heat. Add the butter and toss and stir until it’s melted. Fold in half of the pine nuts. Transfer the chard (including all of the stems and liquid) to a small serving bowl and garnish with the remaining pine nuts.

The Farm's Basic Recipe for Roasted Beets
If you’ve never roasted beets, you’ve got to try it out. The dry heat of the oven tenderizes the beets and concentrates their sugar, so they’re both succulent and caramelized sweet.

1 bunch Free Bird Farm’s beets, scrubbed but not peeled
1 ½ tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt

Preheat the oven to 450° F. Cut off the tops and trim the bottoms of the beets. If medium in size, slice into wedges, from top to bottom, so that the wedges about 1 ½ inch thick at their widest point. Small beets can be sliced from top to bottom in half. Line a heavy-duty rimmed baking sheet or jelly roll pan with parchment paper. Pile the beet wedges or halves on the baking pan and drizzle with the oil. Sprinkle with a large pinch of salt, and toss to evenly coat. Spread the wedges out evenly on the baking sheet, cut side down, and roast until the undersides of the beets have begun to brown and become crispy, about 20 minutes. Using a spatula, turn the beets and continue to roast until they feel tender when pierced with the tip of a knife or the tines of a fork, about 10 to 15 more minutes.
Remove from the oven and allow to cool slightly. Serve with the skins on or slip off by rubbing the skin portion of the wedges with a sheet of paper towel.

Roasted beets are wonderful on their own with a little butter and salt or a squirt of lemon, pesto, or serve with a balsamic vinaigrette. Crumbled fresh goat cheese also goes well with the beets and the vinaigrette or pesto. The roasted beets will keep for five days in a covered bowl in the refrigerator. Make a salad with chilled roasted beets, mixed baby greens (from this week’s share), almonds, blue cheese and a vinaigrette.
© Maryellen Driscoll

A note on zucchini. This is the 3rd week in a row we have zucchini to offer. With zucchini, we have to constantly harvest the “fruit” off the plants, or the plants will stop producing new zucchini. So, since we have it, we decided to include it for another week. If you have a grill, that’s a favorite way to prepare it here on the farm. You can use the technique from the following recipe Maryellen wrote for Fine Cooking last summer. If you don’t feel like buying chives, you can make a similar oil using basil from this week’s share.

Grilled Zucchini with Chive Oil
http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/grilled-zucchini-chive-oil.aspx

Or if you don’t feel like cooking, you can riff off of her recipe for

Two-Color Zucchini Ribbons with Mint and Olive Vinaigrette
http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/two-color-zucchini-ribbons-salad.aspx
Don’t worry about using 2 colors of zucchini. One will do. And feel free to substitute the frisée with some of this week’s baby salad greens. (No sense in going out and buying produce if you don’t have to.)

And then there’s always zucchini bread…!

CSA Week #6

2011-07-12T09:46:00.000-07:00

Continued thanks to all those who have reached out to the farm with well wishes and prayers for our 3-year-old son, Xavier, photographed in today’s packed truck. He has been suffering from sporadic spasms shortly after a head trauma (horsing around after dinner). In two weeks we’ve seen 7 doctors, and no one is quite sure what he “has.” We are fortunate that in the last 4 days he has shown no symptoms. Of course, we are constantly on watch. We truly appreciate people’s concern.

LETTER FROM THE FARM
At one of the farmer’s markets we attend, there is a young couple just getting started on their own farm. They’ve worked on a successful, high-profile farm, but, as we learned when we bought our farm, there’s a big difference between working on someone else’s farm and starting out on one’s own. Sometimes, as we’re all setting up at the market, I think I see sheer panic in their eyes. And I can only project that they’re thinking: “How is this ever going to work?”
At the same market, there’s a middle-aged fellow, a 2nd generation farmer. He milked cows most of his life. When we met him 10 years ago the stress of farming had become so great for him that he was throwing up on his way to the barn every morning (and his 2nd hand man was showing up to work daily with a 12-pack of beer). Last we’d heard, he’d sold off his cows and was selling insurance. But now he’s giving the farming thing a whirl again, trying to make it selling tomatoes locally. I’m not sure what they’re thinking, but when I last spoke to them about their venture, I couldn’t help but think, “How are they ever going to make it work?”
On the phone yesterday, another long-time, highly diversified farmer (veggies, berries, syrup, livestock…) we know said the growing season is going so horribly that he’s rethinking his career choice. (He already holds a part-time job off the farm.) Even on a decent year, he says, it’s such a marginal enterprise. He is thinking, “I’m not sure this is really working enough.”
Meanwhile, in the last week it seems everyone around us—other than our farming friends—seem to be going on vacation, going away camping on the weekends, calling us to say hello while they’re sitting on the beach.
No matter how you slice it, farming is tough. There are a number of ways to manage risk, and, for us, the support our CSA members is a significant part of that. But, even then, we can’t predict when Mother Nature is going to slap us with one horrific season. We’ve managed to make it work—some years tougher than others, early on with both of us holding off-farm jobs, a couple of years going without health insurance,… And we’ve learned to be happy for our friends who are at the beach or on vacation while we’re working 7 days a week for a 9-month stretch. But those nagging questions: i.e. “is this really going to work?” or “is this really sustainable?” Well, they’ll persist. We’ve learned to tolerate the uncertainty of farming. It’s not a comfortable feeling, but sometimes it’s in pondering such questions that we come up with some of our best ideas.

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE
1 large, fresh mild Alyssa Craig onion
1 bunch collards
1 head escarole
1 bulb fennel
1 bunch carrots
2 to 4 zucchini*
broccoli, cucumber or sugar snap peas
Napa cabbage
1 bulb fresh garlic

*zucchini amount varied among different distribution sites depending on size. Amount to take home will be specified at your distribution.

COLE SLAW: Feeling daunted by your overstuffed produce bins? Here at the farm, we were feeling the same way too. We cleaned out a good chunk of space Monday evening making a festive cole slaw with finely sliced cabbage--in this week’s share--and carrots and zucchini--in last week’s share and in this week’s. The carrots and zucchini were sliced into long shreds using a zesting peeler (a very handy utensil-drawer gadget to have). You could always just grate them. The dressing was made with grapeseed oil mayonnaise, rice wine vinegar, honey, and a mild vegetable oil (we used grapeseed oil). (Sorry, no recipe; just kind of winged it—about 3 tablespoons mayo, 2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar, 1 teaspoon honey, and 2 to 3 tablespoons oil). Salt and pepper were added to taste.

IF YOU'RE UNFAMILIAR WITH COLLARDS OR LOOKING FOR A QUICK, TASTY SIDE DISH TO MAKE OUT OF YOUR GIANT HEAD OF ESCAROLE... here are two recipes we can vouch for as delicious:

Sauteed collard ribbons: http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/quick-sauteed-collard-ribbons.aspx

and Sauteed Escarole with Raisins, Pine Nuts and Capers: http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/sauteed-escarole-raisins-pine-nuts-capers.aspx

CSA week #5

2011-07-04T19:39:00.000-07:00

It’s now July, but it seems like the summer groove has yet to kick in for us here at the farm. Apparently, a lot of people are feeling the same way. As we overheard one woman say this week, “I haven’t even ordered myself a Coolatta this summer. It just hasn’t felt hot enough.”

Along with a shortage of beating-hot summer rays, we’re still getting quite a bit of rain. So the ground is often wet. This makes it hard to get some critical tractor work done—to keep weeds at bay, hill potatoes, prep new beds for new plants, and plant seed and transplants from the greenhouse. Most plants don’t care for quite so much rain either. We’ve seen certain crops simply rot in the field recently.
That said, as you can see with this week’s share, it’s not all awash (pun intended).

The garlic has liked all this wet, relatively cool weather. If you’ve never had fresh garlic before, you’re in for a treat. Peel away the outer, fibrous layer, like you would cured garlic, and inside you’ll find the cluster of cloves—snappy crisp and moist.

And new crops are popping up—like this week’s kohlrabi. Last week’s CSA volunteers were so excited to see this, they literally noshed on some like apples, right in the field.

On Friday, the ground was dry enough—or the situation urgent enough--that Ken was able to get some beds prepped and plastic and irrigation tape laid down for a 2nd planting of melons and cucumbers. Our 6-year-old daughter was working with him all day and took a snapshot of this from the tractor’s closed cab (see pic). We thought it was a pretty good shot. She spent a lot of time working with her dad this last week, as some of you know, because our 3-year-old son was in and out of the hospital. Let’s just say it was a tricky, tiring week—worrying about and caring for him while trying to keep each day’s pressing farm work under wrap. We appreciate the well wishes we’ve received from members and the support we got from core group members in pulling together last week’s newsletter without any photos or letters or tips from the farm.

Share List for Week #5
2 purple kohlrabi
1 head fresh garlic
1 bunch young leeks
1 bunch parsley
6 1/3 ounces salad mix
1 bunch swiss chard
1 bok choy
Zucchini
1 bunch kale
1 bunch basil

LAST WEEK’S BROCCOLI- The farm apologizes to those who received broccoli with florets that began to turn brown last week. It was green when it was harvested, washed and stored in refrigeration on the truck. So we aren’t quite sure why it turned so quickly, but we were disappointed to see this change when it came time to distribute.

KOHLRABI
Kohlrabi is a type of cabbage that looks like a root vegetable but actually grows above ground. The variety in this week’s share is purple on the outside, white on the inside. If you’re used to green kohlrabi, purple tastes essentially the same.
Kohlrabi has a crisp, juicy texture and the earthy sweetness of a combination of broccoli and cabbage. Kohlrabi is delicious paired with fresh herbs like chives, cilantro or parsley, radishes, carrots and apples, as well as with seasonings like horseradish, sesame, ginger, and mustard. Slice it into batons and snack on it with a creamy dip or dressing in the afternoon or before serving dinner. Thinly sliced, it can also be added to a salad. A popular way to prepare kohlrabi is as a slaw.
Kohlrabi is also tasty sautéed or roasted (cut them into thin slices or bite-size wedges first) or added to a braise or stew. You can also boil the bulbs until tender and mash them.
Kohlrabi will hold in the refrigerator for at least a couple of weeks. So, don’t feel pressed to use it up this week. Save some for a summer picnic.

Recipe from the farm: Kohlrabi Slaw with Confetti Chard
Making “matchsticks” and “confetti” might sound tedious, but a chef’s knife makes easy work of this. To make the matchsticks, thinly slice the kohlrabi. Stack a few of the slices on top of one another and then slice into the sticks. For the chard, roll the leaves into cigar shapes and then very thinly slice across to make the confetti.

2 Tbs. apple cider vinegar
1 tsp. honey
1/2 tsp. mustard seeds
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
3 1/2 Tbs. walnut or other mild-tasting oil
2 medium carrots, sliced into 1/8-inch thick matchsticks
1 purple kohlrabi bulb, trimmed and cut into 1/8-inch-thick matchsticks (2 cups)
1 cup of very thinly sliced chard leaves (see tip, above)
3 tablespoons chopped parsley

________________________________________
In a small bowl whisk the vinegar, honey, mustard seeds, 1/4 tsp. Kosher salt, and a pinch of pepper. Gradually whisk in the walnut oil until combined.
Put the kohlrabi, carrots, kale, and parsley in a medium bowl. Pour in the dressing and gently toss to combine. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

What do you do with your cooking greens?
Swiss chard and kale and similar cooking greens have this way of stumping people in terms of what to do with them. As the season progresses, we’ll try to offer new ideas. But if you have a surefire something you’d like to share with us—it doesn’t even have to be a recipe, maybe just an idea—please pass it on. The following recipe for crispy kale is a favorite with at Free Bird Farm (the only way their kids will go near this earthy-tasting green).

Crispy Kale
Serves four.
Roasting kale until it’s hatter crisp is one way to coax finicky eaters into enjoying this highly nutritious green. Children and adults alike eat them as if they’re chips. Serve as an appetizer, snack or with a meal.
Tip: To quickly remove the stem from a kale leaf, wrap your hand around the stem at the base of the leaf. Firmly hold the stem with your other hand as you run your wrapped hand up towards the leaf tip, quickly stripping the leafy portion from the stem. Discard or compost the stems.

1 bunch of kale from this week’s share, washed
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons cider vinegar
Kosher salt

Heat the oven to 350° F. Meanwhile, strip the kale leaves from the stems (see tip, above). Tear the leaves into large, bite-size pieces. Thoroughly dry in a salad spinner. Transfer onto a clean kitchen towel and blot just to make sure the kale is dry.
Mound the kale on a heavy-duty, rimmed baking sheet. Drizzle with the olive oil and cider vinegar and toss with your hands to evenly coat the leaves. Bake in the oven, turning the leaves once they’ve begun to crisp, after about 10 minutes. Rotate the baking sheet and continue to cook until crackly crisp but not browned, 8 to 12 more minutes. Do not let the leaves turn brown; they’ll taste burnt and bitter. Remove from oven, sprinkle with salt and serve.

Member Question: ARE RADISH GREENS OKAY TO EAT?
Here’s what we gleaned from e-how.com:
“Don't throw those radish greens away. They are perfectly good food. Radish health benefits are many; they are a good source of vitamin C, folate and vitamin K (people with high blood pressure shouldn't overdo on the greens). They may also aid in digestion and help flush toxins from the body.

Whether you are growing cherry belle radishes in your garden, buying a bunch to make radish rose garnishes, or just enjoy the flavor in a salad, save those radish greens and cook up some of these easy, tasty recipes.”

Read more: How to Use Radish Greens | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/how_5620696_use-radish-greens.html#ixzz1RAJFF4X1

CSA Week #4

2011-06-28T11:11:00.000-07:00

CSA members Scott Norton and Andrea Lacey harvest garlic scapes.

Thanks to all those CSA members who came Sunday to help out and harvest the last of the garlic scapes for this week's share! We enjoyed having visitors. For those of you who couldn't make it but would like to visit the farm, our Open House for CSA members is scheduled for Sunday, September 18.

IN THIS WEEK's SHARE:
1 bunch carrots
1 bunch basil
3/4 pound sugar snap peas
1 unit of broccoli (1 large head or 2 small bunched together)
3/4 pound garlic scapes
1 head of lettuce
1 bunch cilantro
1 bunch radish
1 bunch green onions

2011 CSA Season- Week 3

2011-06-21T07:42:00.000-07:00

Letter from the Farm. Finally, we had a week of normal growing weather. We welcome hot, sunny days balanced out by occasional rain showers. When we recently had an overnight rain that was followed by a bright, warm day, Ken aptly commented, “You can practically hear the plants growing today.”
We are still trying to catch up from four weeks lost to bad weather in April and May. We continue to plant seeds and transplant from the greenhouse in between harvesting for the CSA and a couple of farmers markets.
Our plants are popping up and looking very healthy in most cases, yet so are the weeds. So now we begin the summer long project of weed pulling and tractor cultivation to eliminate as many weeds as possible. Part of being organic is that we never kill weeds with petrochemical “herbicides.” We remove them by hand or with mechanically.
On that note, we can ALWAYS use help with weed control. So for all those coming to volunteer on Sunday, we surely have work for you that can help the farm immensely! If you have not RSVP’d and would like to come, please do so asap. If you’ve never pulled weeds before, it requires no special skills and can be pleasantly meditative and extremely rewarding. Sometimes, at the end of the day, we’ll go out and pull weeds just because it can feel therapeutic.
We know it’s a hike for many to get here, but we really look forward to seeing those of you who can make it on Sunday.

-Ken & Maryellen

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
¾ pound garlic scapes
1 bunch red Russian or Toscano kale
.35 pounds (6 1/3 ounces) Salad Mix
1 bunch baby turnips with (edible) greens
1 bunch beets (with edible greens)
Escarole or bok choy (whichever you did not get last week)
1 bunch Swiss Chard

GARLIC SCAPES. Those curly-cue shoots in this week’s share are garlic scapes (see pic above). They’re a flowering shoot that gets snapped off the garlic plant shortly after they appear so that the plant’s energy stays focused on developing a large, healthy bulb underground. Snap a scape in half, and you’ll recognize the bright aroma of early-season garlic. Scapes store really well (refrigerate in a sealed bag, and they’ll hold for at least a couple of weeks). Use them chopped or minced in whatever you’d normally use garlic. You can sauté or stir fry. Grill whole. Chop and add to pasta, salad, eggs… It’s incredibly versatile. Have fun experimenting with it on your own or in this pesto recipe—which would be great with pasta, especially a filled pasta, or as a spread on a sandwich.

RECIPE: Garlic Scape PestoAdapted from A Mighty Appetite blog by Kim O’Donnell, published online by The Washington Post

For ½ pound short pasta such as penne, add about 2 tablespoons of pesto to cooked pasta and stir until pasta is well coated.

1 cup garlic scapes (about 8 or 9 scapes), top flowery part removed, cut into ¼-inch slices
1/3 cup walnuts
¾ cup extra-virgin olive oil
¼-1/2 cup freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Optional: To bring out the flavor of the walnuts, gently toast them over medium-low heat in a skillet until fragrant. Remove from the skillet immediately. Let cool before processing.

Place scapes and walnuts in the bowl of a food processor and pulse until well combined and somewhat smooth. Slowly drizzle in oil and process until blended. With a rubber spatula, scoop pesto out of bowl and into a mixing bowl. Add parmigiano to taste; add salt and pepper to taste.

Store in an air-tight container in the refrigerator for one week. Or freeze in a thin layer in a sealed freezer bag. Break off a portion of the frozen pesto to use as needed—to flavor pastas or soups or spread on a sandwich.

2011-06-14T19:01:00.000-07:00

Week 2
Remember all those weeks of rain this spring? Many of us remember it because after a long, robust winter, we were starved for sunlight and weren’t getting our spring fix. For the farm, it meant three consecutive weeks in which the ground was wet, too wet to prep seed beds and put seed and plants started in the greenhouse in the ground. That’s a lot of time. Ken is still playing catch up on that front. So many of the crops we planned for the first few weeks of the CSA season are behind schedule. As the beginning of a CSA season goes, greens abound.
This week’s farm picture features a new radish variety for us called French Breakfast. We sliced it up last night and tossed in a salad with arugula and some slivered green onion tops. The consensus was this elongated hot pink radish with a splash of white at its root end is terrific. If you’re not keen on radish, try it. It’s nothing like the heavy, hot radish you might find in your supermarket. That said, we can’t agree on how it tastes. French Breakfast is known to be a more mild variety of radish, and Ken said that’s how it tasted to him. I was surprised by how much zing it packed in a bite. Maybe the peppery taste of the arugula was bringing it out. You’ll have to let us know what you think: mild or spicy?

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
1 bunch green onions
1 bunch French breakfast radish
½ pound spinach
6 ¼ ounces Salad Mix
5 1/2 ounces Arugula
Pac Choi or Escarole or Swiss Chard
1 head red leaf lettuce

IMPROVISING IN THE KITCHEN
It’s hard for the farm to plan how a CSA season will play out. We can plan, but Mother Nature is truly the one in charge. That’s not always easy for CSA members since there’s no guessing what’s going to come in a share from week to week. Heck, as this is being written Monday morning with the share halfway harvested, we still don’t know for sure quite yet what the final share is going to be. Sometimes it’s not until we start harvesting a specific crop that we know how much it will yield.

BUT if you’re a stickler for planning, especially when it comes to meals, here is an oxymoron to cook by:
Be prepared to wing it.
Stocking your kitchen with a handful of staples means you can spontaneously pull together dinner for at least a couple of nights after picking up your CSA share while you shop or look for recipes that help make use of some of the items you’re not so sure what to do with or want to save for a recipe you can follow over the weekend or for company.
At the farm, we don’t have a lot of food shopping options close by. (Come to the farm’s CSA Member Volunteer Day on June 26, and you’ll see what we mean.) So as the season nears and it gets too busy to travel to find certain groceries , we stock up too. Here’s a list of non-perishable items we keep in stock so we can mostly wing it from night to night using whatever veggies are coming in from the fields:
grains: rice (brown and white), whole wheat couscous, quinoa, barley, Israeli couscous, cornmeal for polenta...
noodles: a variety of pastas and two Asian noodles we particularly like.
Salad dressing basics: an assortment of vinegars, good quality extra-virgin olive oil and a more neutral oil like grapeseed or walnut oil
Salad extras: dried fruits and a variety of nuts and seeds
Beans: canned and dried
Canned and jarred goods, like capers, olives, artichoke hearts and even a jar or two of store-bought marinara sauce for those nights we are simply too exhausted to think up anything clever. We toss the cooked sauce with some pasta and then top with some sautéed greens from a week’s share with garlic or onions, pine nuts and parmigiano.
AND basic ingredients for making a stir fry sauce (a favorite way many members use up remaining CSA vegetables in on meal).

Understandably, not all CSA members have a lot of kitchen space to store this much stuff. Consider it food for thought. We still need to buy milk, and we are at weekend farmer’s markets, where we usually can get our good bread and cheese fix. But the above really carries us through the season.

2011-06-06T19:49:00.000-07:00

Ken & the kids pull weeds from a young beet crop
WEEK 1
Distribution date: Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Letter from the Farm:
It’s hard to believe we’ve finally made it to the CSA’s 1st distribution date. Spring has felt so LOOONG. So cold. So wet. So, ugh, dramatic. We’ve had tornado warnings, severe thunderstorms, and even a little hail—thankfully nothing like the damaging golf-ball sized hail some of our farming friends in the region have experienced. We’ve heard of a few farms down state having to delay their CSA distributions by a couple of weeks. Thankfully, we were able to get enough planted before the perpetual rain that plagued us in May to offer a modest first share.

As a general rule of thumb, the CSA season almost always starts out a little slow since there are only so many things that fully mature in the short amount of time we’ve so far had to grow this season. And, frustratingly, the conditions for getting things planted have been extremely difficult this spring because it has been so wet.

The season will start heavy on the greens—with things like lettuces, spinach, swiss chard… These are the plants that grow in a relatively short amount of time and without requiring a tremendous amount of heat (unlike summer-time favorites like tomatoes, cucumbers, melon…). Here at the farm, we’re just so glad to finally have truly fresh salad greens after suffering through a winter of store-bought packets of baby lettuces that turned slimy all too quickly.

This week that nagging question--what’s for dinner?—has an easy answer. Whatever goes with great salad.

SHARE LIST:
Spinach
1 bunch green garlic (see note below)
1 bunch scallions
1 bunch radish
1 head Romaine lettuce
Salad mix (a mix of baby red and green lettuces; nothing spicy)
1 bunch cilantro

Making the Most of Your Greens For some of us, getting through a head of lettuce in one meal is a breeze. For others, it takes more work and planning. If you fall into the latter category, consider your greens the foundation for a supper salads—main-course salads reinforced with proteins like beans, fish, chicken or other meats (grilled, sautéed, poached or roasted). Let the greens drive the main dish, and, if you don’t already, try making your own basic vinaigrette. It’s really, really simple to make, and outshines the gloppy stuff you find in the superstore any day.

Asian Vinaigrette with Cilantro This vinaigrette makes use of your cilantro and is great with a main-course salad of lettuce greens, thinly sliced scallions from this week’s share and steak or grilled or broiled shrimp or, if you’re a vegan, tempeh.

1 Tbs. minced fresh ginger
1 tsp. minced green garlic
2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
1 Tbs. dry sherry
1 ½ tablespoons rice vinegar
1 tablespoon fish sauce (also called nuoc mam)
2 teaspoons fresh lime juice
1 teaspoon honey
A dash of hot sauce or chile sauce (optional)
Kosher salt to taste
1 tsp. toasted sesame oil
2 Tbs. peanut oil

Combine all the ingredients, except for the sesame and peanut oils. Slowly whisk in sesame and peanut oils to blend.

Greens Storage Tip: If you have a salad spinner, that’s an ideal place to store your mixed baby greens in the refrigerator. The basket to the spinner allows air to flow around the greens so they can “breathe”; the top holds in moisture, so they don’t dry out. If you don’t own a salad spinner, consider buying one. It’ll serve you well through the CSA season. All of the farm’s greens are washed after harvest, but, as with any produce you get from the farm or purchase elsewhere, it is wise to wash again before use.

Cilantro Storage Tip: To keep your cilantro from perishing too fast, store it stem side down in a jar or glass of water (like you would a bouquet of flowers), “tent” the leafy tops with a plastic bag and refrigerate.

GREEN GARLIC
In this week’s share you’ll be receiving a slender, small bunch of scallions and then something that looks like bunched green onions but larger and with green tops that look more like leeks. This is green garlic. It’s the garlic plant in its early stage of growth—before the white bulb end has developed cloves. Green garlic is hard to find any time after spring. It has a fresh and delicate garlic flavor without the pungency of mature, cured garlic. It’s terrific with eggs, potatoes, in any kind of salad, and lightly sautéed in anything you’d normally use garlic. It’s also good as a garnish for a dip. Like a scallion, use the entire plant—from the white base to the green tops. The tops are somewhat fibrous, so, depending on how you use them, you may wish to slice thinly or chop well.

The Eggs Get Bigger
All of the farm’s eggs are being laid by spring chickens. That is, the hens are young and only begun to lay eggs in the last few weeks. Lucky for the hens, as nature has it, they start by laying small eggs. Right now the eggs are medium in size. As the season progresses, so will the size of the eggs, until they reach something between a large and extra-large size.

Recycling egg cartons. For all those with egg shares, the farm is more than glad to reuse any clean egg cartons—from the eggs we’ve provided or eggs members have purchased elsewhere. Bring them to the CSA distribution site.

Recycling rubber bands. Through the course of the season you’ll accumulate quite a few food-safe red rubber bands the farm uses to bunch a number of different herbs and veggies. The farm can reuse them. So feel free to bring your eventual stockpile to the CSA distribution, and they will get returned to the farm.

CSA Week 22, Final Share for 2010

2010-10-26T07:23:00.000-07:00

Photo caption:
Digging up our final crop of potatoes this past week, Ken had to stop numerous times to wrangle weeds out of the potato harvester’s rungs. A conventional (non-organic) farm would have “burned” the weeds and any other living plant in the bed with an herbicide shortly before harvesting to avoid this added work. Chemical herbicides are never used at Free Bird Farm.

Three years ago a good friend asked us to start a CSA. She’d belonged to one when living in the Hudson Valley and sorely missed the fresh, abundant produce. So we started out. We started small. And we noticed it was working pretty well. So, the 2nd year we grew some more. And this year we finally got gutsy and expanded membership 5-fold.

It was a leap of faith and created significant change here seemingly overnight. It turned our schedule—the rhythm of when we plant, weed, take care of our fields, harvest—a bit upside down. Soon enough, however, we adjusted to such changes. But even when everything was running beautifully, we’d still worry about each week’s share—was it balanced enough, was it new enough, are people going to get totally sick of all these greens (in June) or how can we not have broccoli and Brussels sprout crops (now)? After all, our goal is to do our best to provide a great variety of organically raised food for everyone week after week after week. We want our members to be well fed and happy.

In all, the change was a great move for our farm. Perhaps most significantly, it provided us stability. Having a fixed community to grow for—a group of supporters willing to invest at the start of the season in what we aspired to accomplish in a season—meant a number of things. It meant we could better plan our plantings, using seed, space and time more efficiently. We could more efficiently harvest—knowing just what was needed for the distribution versus a farmers’ market that is based on guessing how much we think will sell and whether the weather will be nice enough for people to come out and shop. It also meant that we didn’t have to carry the same level of debt we usually take on at the start the season and then fret over repaying through the majority of the season.

We never thought we’d see as many people as we now do rolling into our distribution shed on Tuesday afternoons. It’s an inspiring sign of change. Our members want something better than what they can get at the local supermarket. They care about how their food is grown. And they care about supporting their local farmers.

We hope being part of the CSA was rewarding to you too.

Thanks to everyone who helped to support us this growing season.

Ken & Maryellen and family

______________________________
IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE:

1 winter squash
1 large head of head bok choy
1 bunch leeks
6 ounces mesclun mix
1 bunch carrots
1 head frissee
cabbage
large bag of potatoes
1# bag of beets
________________________________

Many of the items in this week’s share will hold. The potatoes and squash can be stored for many weeks in a dark, dry, cool location (in a cabinet, for instance). Avoid storing in plastic bags and don’t refrigerate potatoes (it turns the starches into an off-tasting sugar). The leeks, cabbage, and even the beets should easily hold for a few weeks in a refrigerator’s crisper (their outer layers might wilt, but that’s okay).

________________________________

Recipe recommendations using items from this week's share:

Mushroom and Leek Soup with Thyme Cream
From Epicurious.com, Nov. 2007

Roasted Carrots
Gourmet, December 2008

CSA Share Week 21

2010-10-19T05:23:00.000-07:00

Caption: Weather extremes have stunted the farm’s broccoli crop, placing thousands of plants a few weeks behind schedule. Beautiful plants stand vibrant but with no edible buds in sight.

This week you’re seeing some fall favorites: parsnips and spinach. And we’ve tried to include as much that’s fresh from the field (versus storage crops) while we still have it. A sharp freeze any day now could kill off most of what still stands in our fields.

There are a few classic fall crops that we regret we just aren’t getting right now. Namely, broccoli. And cauliflower. And Brussels sprouts.

Their absence pains us as these are vegetables that we’ve been craving along with many CSA members and that we’ve put a lot of work into having this fall. All of these crops were planted in abundance and right on time late in the summer. Theoretically, they should be at their prime right now. But as soon as they were planted we hit the last of this summer’s extreme hot and dry spells. Two weeks’ worth. None of these crops thrive under such conditions. So they sat there dormant in the fields. The stretches of rain we’ve had haven’t helped either. Ten days without sun isn’t exactly an ideal growing scenario. So we’ve thousands of lusciously green leafy broccoli plants, cauliflower plants and Brussels sprouts without any “buds” to speak of. If we got some nice, consistent weather, maybe they’d bud up in a few weeks. But, basically, they’re well behind schedule, and there’s a good chance they’ll freeze before they come to fruition.

So, we work with what we have. Much to enjoy, just not everything we’d hoped, planned and planted for.

IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE:
1 bunch parsnips
½ pound spinach
14 ounces yellow wax beans
1 bunch fresh, baby onions (green tops edible)
6 ounces mesclun mix (for salad or for quickly wilting in olive oil)
1 bunch parsley
1 bunch Easter egg radish
1 head “freckles” Romaine lettuce (see note)
1 bunch dinosaur or Tuscan kale (or 3/4# sugar snap peas if not in your share 2 weeks ago)

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Freckles Romaine:
The reddish-brown “freckles” on this week’s head lettuce aren’t a sign of disease or frost damage. The speckles are intended with this variety of Romaine lettuce. In a salad, we think they look festive. And for a Romaine, we love how tender this variety of lettuce can be.

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Tip: If you have dill left over from last week, chop and blend with some sour cream, lemon zest and lemon juice and extra-virgin olive oil for a zesty dressing for the spinach (if eaten raw). Or drizzle over a salad of sliced radish and parsley leaves.

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PARSNIPS are a classic in stews, but they are also terrific roasted on their own. We often make this recipe developed by a friend, Amy Albert, for Fine Cooking magazine.
RECIPE: Crisp Roasted Parsnip Sticks We eat them like fries, sprinkled with a little malt vinegar.

or, add a little local maple sweetness with the following roasted parsnip recipe:

MAPLE-GLAZED ROASTED PARSNIPS
From Free Bird Farm
1 bunch parsnips, cut on a diagonal into 1/2-inch-thick slices
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt
2 teaspoons finely chopped fresh Italian parsley
1 ½ tablespoons pure maple syrup
1 tablespoon unsalted butter

Heat oven to 400°F. Toss the parsnips with the olive oil and a large pinch of Kosher salt in a bowl. Sprinkle with a large pinch of Kosher salt. Spread parsnips in single layer on rimmed baking sheet.

Roast parsnips 20 minutes. Turn and roast until browned and soft, 15 to 25 minutes longer. Remove the baking sheet from the oven and push the parsnips together into a loose pile with a metal spatula. Drizzle the parsnips with the maple syrup and dot with the butter. Toss to evenly coat with the syrup and butter. Transfer to a plate, sprinkle with the parsley and serve.

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At the farm, we had this for dinner last night, along with some gently crisped shallot slices and narrow strips of bell pepper (from last week's share) sauteed in olive oil. Great with some short-grain brown rice.

Quick Sautéed Spinach with Garlic Chips
From Free Bird Farm

4 peeled cloves garlic, very thinly sliced
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
½ pound spinach, washed and spun dry in a salad spinner
Kosher salt and freshly squeezed lemon juice to taste

Heat half of the olive oil a heavy, large skillet (we recommend cast iron) over medium heat. Add the garlic slices in a single layer and cook, stirring occasionally, until golden brown. Transfer to a small bowl and set aside.

Add the remaining oil and increase the heat to medium high. Add the spinach and cook, tossing frequently with a pair of tongs, until just wilted, about 3 minutes. Remove from the heat and sprinkle with lemon juice and Kosher salt to taste. Serve immediately with the crisp garlic “chips” sprinkled on top.

Share Week #20

2010-10-13T11:08:00.001-07:00

We’ve reached that time in the season when the weather really has the final word. We could have a good variety of crops thriving until almost Thanksgiving or it could be pretty much a wrap within the next couple of weeks.

This past weekend we got our first frost, and it was a good zap.

We spent Saturday harvesting like mad—bringing in whatever we knew wouldn’t stand up to Sunday’s early morning frost. Some of this week’s share consists of that final picking.

Saturday was also spent covering those crops most vulnerable to frost, such as green beans and baby lettuce, with a soft, protective agricultural fabric (seen in pic).

The farm is still waterlogged from that unrelenting rain we had up until Thursday. Even in sloped spots, the fields are still wet and muddy. We simply got more rain than the ground could absorb. This makes the harvest extra challenging—because there’s often 2 pounds of thick, heavy mud clinging to the soles of one’s boots. (Those CSA members who made it to this year’s rainy day Open House know a little bit about what we’re talking about.)

We could now use some consistent sun and relative warmth so that the fall plantings that survived all that rain can grow. Nothing has been able to progress or grow in the last couple of weeks, which could short us of harvestable crops in these last couple weeks of the CSA season.

IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE
2 lbs. red potatoes
3 red onions
6 ounces mesclun mix
1 bunch carrots
1 bok choy
6 ounces arugula
1 red leaf lettuce
1 bunch dill
3 yellow onions
last-of-the-season bell peppers or green beans

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RECIPES:

Dill goes with a lot more than just pickles. Looking for an idea? Here are a couple that go with some of the veggies in this week's share too:

Carrot Soup with Dill PestoFrom Epicurious.com

AND

Creamy Potato Salad with Lemon & DillServes six.

This was adapted from a recipe by Molly Stevens in Fine Cooking magazine. The salad would be niced served over a bed of this week’s red leaf lettuce.

2 pounds unpeeled red potatoes, scrubbed (small potatoes left whole, medium to large ones cut into large chunks)
Kosher salt
¼ cup minced red onion
2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill
1/4 cup heavy cream, well chilled
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1-1/2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
1-1/2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 teaspoons grated lemon zest
Freshly ground pepper

Put the potatoes in a medium saucepan, cover with water by an inch or two, add a large pinch of salt, and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium, partially cover, and cook until the potatoes are tender, about 20 minutes. Test for doneness by spearing a potato with a thin metal skewer. It should penetrate easily into the center of the potato and then slide right out. If the skewer lifts the potato out of the pot when you withdraw it, continue cooking a little longer. Drain the potatoes and let them cool. You can drain them on a cooling rack set over or in your sink, which will avoid squashing the tender potatoes (as often happens with a colander) and also lets the potatoes cool quickly.

When the potatoes are at room temperature, cut them into 3/4-inch chunks and put them in a mixing bowl. Add the onion and fold gently to distribute; set aside.

In a small bowl, whisk the cream until frothy but not at all stiffened. Whisk in the mayonnaise and mustard. Add the lemon juice, zest, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and pepper to taste. Pour the dressing over the salad and fold it in with a rubber spatula. Taste for seasoning. Serve, or cover and chill for up to a day.

A great fall recipe for lunch or a light dinner (maybe with the carrot soup?) that makes use of this week's arugula: Open-Face Brie, Apple, and Arugula Sandwiches

OR

Pasta Salad with Arugula, Feta & Sun-Dried Tomatoes, by Tony Rosenfeld, Finecooking.com

And here's something to try with this week's bok choy...

Salmon "Bulgogi" with Bok Choy and Mushrooms
Bon Appétit | June 2008

CSA Share Week 19

2010-10-05T06:43:00.000-07:00

After harvesting the CSA share and emptying out some sand bags (used to hold down row covers) on Monday, one of Free Bird Farm’s staff is ready to shower and put his feet up (boots off, of course). It sure is wet.

There’s a lot of mud on our boots. Here at the farm, we don’t have sidewalks, paved roads around the fields or even a paved driveway. There’s some gravel and a whole lot of exposed dirt. And after the 6+ inches of rain we got late last week, it seems like it’s all just mud.

As it rained and rained and rained Wed., Thurs. and Fri., there was still a large harvest to tend to. So everyone worked, moving inside to clean onions or to handle other tasks when the rain fell just too hard. And now everyone is working through the storm’s aftermath, trudging through the fields with heavy hunks of mud clinging to boots and mud stained through the knees of one’s pants, smeared on sweatshirts, splattered on hats. It’s a mess.

It’s still a little early to assess the damage of the excessive rain that dumped on the fields last week. It seems to have ruined some heads of lettuce that were due in a couple of weeks. And there’s even more rain in store this week. Time will reveal what crops were able to hold up and which are going to perish from the excessive water.

(P.S. There are quite a few new or less familiar items in this week’s share, so we included many “primers” and recipes this week to hopefully inspire you.)

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In this week’s share:
2 delicata squash
1 pound Tongue of Fire fresh shell beans
¾ pound green beans
1 head of escarole
6 ounces of arugula
1 bunch Tuscan or “dinosaur” kale
1 head of Romaine lettuce
2 kohlrabi or ¾ pound peas*

*We had limited availability of both these crops this week. Our hope is there will be enough next week so that whoever received one gets the other.
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“Rusty” green beans
You might notice reddish-brown markings on some of this week’s green beans. This “rust” basically shows up on the beans in wet and cool temperatures (like we’re having). They are still good to eat, but… they are not going to hold as long as usual in your refrigerator. So eat sooner than later.

ROASTING DELICATA SQUASH
This is a great weeknight squash. Perhaps the simplest way to cook it: slice it in half lengthwise, scoop out the seeds, brush cut sides with oil, sprinkle with coarse salt, and roast on a heavy duty sheet pan with raised edges in a 375 degree oven. At Free Bird, we like to start the roasting process cut-side down until it’s nicely caramelized underneath where the flesh touches the pan. Flip once it’s richly golden brown to finish cooking through (if the squash flesh is not already fully tender when pierced with a fork). Sorry—we’re guessing on the time: about 30 minutes? Check after 20 minutes, just to be on the safe side. To serve, rub the flesh with butter and, if you like, lightly drizzle with maple syrup.

REVISITING SHELL BEANS We’re always glad to see an extra basket of these beans in the farm’s walk-in cooler. As a family we’ll sit together for a good long while (you’d never believe a 2-year-old could sit at such a task for so long) and gently pry open the shells, popping the colorfully mottled beans into a bowl or large cook pot. Sometimes we have a contest—which team can shell the most beans at once. Most of the time we sit quietly, focused on the group task. Whatever we don’t eat, we freeze in zipper-locked bags and enjoy through the winter in stews, pastas or with sautéed greens. These beans are creamy in texture and mildly nutty in flavor, similar to a cannellini bean.

TO COOK THE FRESH SHELL BEANS: place the shelled beans (pods discarded) in a pot of water. Add a bay leaf and any aromatics you have on hand, such as a chopped carrot, parsley stems, or an onion, and bring to a boil. Reduce to a gentle simmer, stirring occasionally, until the beans are creamy in texture all the way through, about 30 minutes.

These beans would go great with this week’s kale. Strip the stems from the kale and sauté it briefly in extra-virgin olive oil in a 12-inch skillet over medium-high heat. Add a clove of minced garlic at the end of cooking, turn off the heat and toss in the (cooked beans). Season with Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste. Serve with freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano.

OR try the beans with this recipe for White Bean and Escarole Soup with Garlic (perfect for this cool, rainy week we’re having).

OR make your own vegetable soup, like a minestrone, with the shell beans, green beans, kale and, if you have left over from last week, butternut squash and carrots. Include a can of tomatoes if you have that in your pantry.

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Primer on Kohlrabi
If you’re wondering what the ogre-like turnip-looking vegetables are in this week’s share (white or purple), they’re kohlrabi. Actually a cabbage, kohlrabi has a bulbous stem that grows just above ground. Its leafy stalks shoot upward from the bulb. Both parts can be eaten but are best cooked separately. (*Kohlrabi can be prone to splitting during growth. This happened to some of our white ones in this week’s distribution. We found they are still just as tasty—just a little unusual in appearance.)

Kohlrabi has a crisp, juicy texture, like an apple or water chestnut. Peel the thick, outer skin off, and inside you’ll taste an earthy sweetness reminiscent of cabbage with a hint of bite like a radish.

Kohrabi is often used shredded or thinly sliced in a slaw or salad, such as in this recipe for Kohlrabi-Radish Slaw with Cumin and Cilantro. (If you don't have radish on hand, thinly slice the kale or escarole to substitute. Or use cabbage.) If cooked – sautéed, roasted or added to a braise or stew—kohlrabi retains some of its crunchy texture, but the flavor mellows quite a bit.

To store, cut the leafy stalks off the bulbs and refrigerate the bulbs separately in a sealed bag or container. If stored properly, the bulbs can last a few weeks.

CSA Share Week #18

2010-09-27T19:06:00.000-07:00

A CSA member recently asked us how we determine what’s in a share from week to week. We thought this was a good question and worth sharing our answer with everyone.
There are a lot of factors we weigh when we determine a share each week:
• Firstly, we try to distribute to members what is most fresh in our fields;
• We also try to distribute what we have enough of each week for all members so that most weeks everyone gets the exact same share. If we're short something, we make sure those who get something else get something similar and of comparable value. For example, recently we didn't have enough escarole for all members, so one group got kale instead (which we had some of but not enough for everyone). Similarly, we recently didn't have large red and yellow bell peppers for everyone, so one distribution group got smaller peppers but more of them (3 versus 2).
• We try to make sure that the value of a share is more than $20 (Upstate NY prices)—knowing that depending on the stage of the season some weeks might not be quite that and most weeks it’s comfortably more than that. This season we have been fortunate to consistently meet this standard each week starting at the very beginning of the season. For example, this week’s share we calculate to be worth slightly more than $23 if purchased at one of our Upstate farmer’s markets.
We should also note that being in a CSA means you may not always get that value--depending on how the season turns out; if a farm loses 70% of their crop to hail (and I've heard of this happening), the members also suffer a loss in their shares. That's the "shared risk" part of being in a CSA; you’re willing to hang in there with the farm through thick and thin.
• On the flip side, we also try to make sure each week’s share isn’t too large. Distributing more produce than members can use in the course of a week is an all too common way a CSA can drive off members the following year. So we try not to overwhelm members while at the same time making sure they feel like they are getting an ample share each week.
• Lastly, we try to minimize too much repetition with certain vegetables--so if you've had eggplant 2 weeks in a row, we try to avoid including that crop for at least the following week. Granted, with vegetables like salad greens or onions, which people regularly eat or use to cook, we aren’t so hesitant to offer repetitively. We also try to make sure each week’s share is well balanced in terms of the makeup and diversity of the vegetables in the share. For example, if we include something out of the ordinary (like the Asian greens in this week) we try to make sure it’s balanced by plenty of more commonplace vegetables.
It's tricky business—determining what's in a share each week. We put a lot of thought into it. Often we stress about it—wanting to make sure members get the best of what we have, a nice variation of items, and at a value better than if they were to buy from an organic grower at a farmer's market or at a natural foods grocery store like Whole Foods. Fortunately, this has been a pretty good season so far. But, ultimately, we can only think out, debate and assess a share list each week according to what nature permits. We’d love to be including collards, broccoli, head lettuce and kale this week as we’d planned, but these were crops affected by this season’s weather extremes. But there’s still a good chance you’ll see these items before the season is over. And on the flip side, you’re seeing potatoes—a crop we had very little of in 2009 because of last year’s infamous late blight.

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:

1 butternut squash
1 bunch Swiss chard
1 ½ pounds beets
1 bunch cilantro
1 red onion
red bell peppers
1 bunch leeks
1 bunch mixed Asian greens (mizuna, tatsoi, Japanese red mustard greens)
1 ½ pounds all-purpose white potatoes

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RECIPES
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BUTTERNUT SQUASH with GINGER and CILANTRO
Adapted from a recipe by Lori Longbotham in Everday with Rachel Ray, Nov. 2009

2 pounds butternut squash, peeled and cut into 3/4-inch cubes
2 tablespoons vegetable oil, such as safflower or canola
3/4 teaspoon ground coriander
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
¼ finely chopped crystallized ginger
¼ cup cilantro leaves

Directions: Preheat the oven to 450°. In a large bowl, toss the squash with the oil, coriander, 1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. On a large baking sheet, arrange the squash in a single layer and bake, turning occasionally, until tender and golden-brown, about 30 minutes.

Transfer the squash to a serving bowl and toss with the crystallized ginger and cilantro.

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CREAM OF RED PEPPER AND POTATO SOUP
This is a recipe from another one of the farm’s favorite cookbooks—“One Potato, Two Potato” by Roy Finamore with Molly Stevens. There’s hardly a recipe in this book that doesn’t make you want to cook. This recipe conveniently makes use of a few items in this week’s share.

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 pound red bell peppers (2 to 3 peppers), cored, seeded and chopped into 1-inch pieces
1 cup chopped leeks (white and pale green parts)
2 garlic cloves, minced
½ teaspoon sweet paprika
Pinch of cayenne pepper
Coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 pound waxy potatoes, peeled and cut into ½-inch chunks
1 cup light cream

Heat the olive oil in a wide soup pot over medium heat until it slides across the pan. Add the bell peppers, leeks, garlic, paprika, cayenne, and salt and pepper. Reduce the heat to medium-low and cook gently, stirring from time to time, until the vegetables begin to give up some of their liquid but are not at all brown, about 5 minutes. Add the potatoes and continue to cook for another 5 minutes.
Add 4 cups water, cover partway, and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to a simmer and cook until the vegetables are very tender, 20 to 30 minutes.
Let the soup cool for 5 minutes, then work it through a food mill to eliminate all pepper skins (farm’s note: if you don’t have a food mill, press through a colander with a large rubber spatula). Stir in the cream and then strain the soup through a fine mesh sieve. (Skipping this last step will give you a soup of equally fine flavor but with a much less luxurious texture.) Rinse out the pot and pour the soup into it. Return the soup to the heat and bring it to a simmer. Taste for seasoning and serve warm.

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SIDEBAR: EGG FRESHNESS
Ever wonder how fresh our eggs are? Well, we can’t tell you exactly which day the particular eggs in your carton were laid, but we can say that all of the eggs that go to our Tuesday CSA members were laid some time between Friday and Monday. (Saturday distribution members' eggs were laid any time between Tuesday and Friday.) So that makes the eggs anywhere from 1 to 4 days old when they arrive at distribution (they're kept refrigerated during that duration). A study from the University of Illinois that found supermarket eggs ranged from being 7 to 45 days old, with the average age being 16 days.
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CSA Share Week 17

2010-09-21T03:38:00.000-07:00

This Thursday is the first day of fall, and we've enjoyed spotting the signs
of its arrival as we walk around the farm with our kids. Acorns are dropping
to the ground. Goldenrod is in flourish. Milkweed pods are beginning to
unfurl, their fairy-like seeds loft into the air. Pheasant are popping in
and out of hedgerows. Monarch butterflies seem to be taking their last sip
of nectar from clover buds before migrating south. The green of the pasture
is losing its vibrancy and, oh yes, some leaves have just begun to turn
color.

The region received its frost warning for tomorrow morning (Tues.) north,
south, east and west of us. We're holding our breath that we truly are
spared. In the same week we're expecting 80-degree weather. These are the
kinds of days when everyone starts work in sweatshirts and knit caps and
ends the day in short sleeves.

This week at the farm another sure sign of autumn's approach can be
witnessed inside our barn. We're cutting down, trimming, cleaning and
packing up the garlic crop-much of which will go with us to the Hudson
Valley Garlic Festival this weekend in Saugerties, NY.

If you are looking for something to do and either love garlic or love
festival-style amusement, this is quite an event to attend. There are dozens
of garlic growers like us, peddling garlic, braids and other
garlic-related products. There are braid-making workshops. There's music.
There are craft booths. And, for those who dare, there's garlic ice cream.
It's a big event (thousands attend), and, if you go, we don't recommend
making plans that evening with anyone who hasn't attended the festival as
well. Because if you succumb to the standard conduct of those attending the
festival, you'll be grazing on raw garlic samples all day as if it's candy.
You'll learn to tell the difference between one variety's level of pungency,
another's heat, another's sweetness...—until all that garlic ultimately
burns out your taste buds for the day.

In this week's share:
1 ½ pounds red potatoes
8 ounces (1/2 pound) spinach
6 ounces salad mix
1 bok choy
1 bunch carrots
1 bunch green onions
1 bunch mixed radish (pink, purple, red, white)
1 bulb garlic

*******Special Request from the Farm:*******
Maybe some of you have heard of Cookies for Kids ' Cancer, a 501 (c) nonprofit some special friends of the farm started after their son was diagnosed with cancer at the age of 3. The organization raises funds to support research
for new and improved therapies for pediatric cancer. Cookies for Kids'
Cancer was recently selected by the Jimmie Johnson Foundation (Nascar
Driver- Lowe's Team) as a winner in its Samsung Helmet of Hope Program. The
13 chosen charities are now in a popularity contest to win an additional
$20,000 grant. Plus, the winning charity will receive a great deal of
publicity and awareness courtesy of the most successful driver in Nascar. If
you can, please take a moment to vote for Cookies for Kids' Cancer at this
link. You can vote from every computer you can find and depending on your internet connection, from different browsers on the same computer.
Our friends' son, Liam, age 6 now, is still battling neuroblastoma.

Thank you for considering this.
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RECIPES

Stir-Fried Bok Choy with Garlic, Ginger, and Scallions
by Susie Middleton, from Fine Cooking magazine

A simple, four-ingredient sauce makes a perfect finish for the intriguingly sweet and bitter flavor of this stir-fried Asian green. You can use mature or baby bok choy for this recipe.

Serves three to four.

1-1/4 lb. bok choy (about 1 large, 2 medium, or 5 to 6 baby)
2 Tbs. oyster sauce (preferably Lee Kum Kee brand)
2 Tbs. lower-salt chicken broth
1 tsp. cornstarch
1/4 tsp. Asian sesame oil
2 Tbs. peanut oil
Kosher salt
4 oz. scallions (8 to 10 medium), white and light-green parts only, cut into 3-inch lengths and halved lengthwise if thick
2 large cloves garlic, peeled and thinly sliced
One 1/2-inch square of ginger, peeled and cut into thin matchsticks

To prep mature bok choy, separate the leaves from the stems by slicing the bok choy head crosswise at about the point where the leaves begin to spread out. Cut the leaves into lengthwise strips 1 to 1-1/2 inches wide. Quarter the stem end lengthwise and remove any inner leaves, putting them with the leafy tops. Slice the stem quarters crosswise into pieces about 3/4 inch thick. Rinse and dry the stems and leaves separately. (If using baby bok choy, simply cut the heads lengthwise into 3/4-inch-wide pieces or wedges.)

In a small bowl, combine the oyster sauce, chicken broth, cornstarch, and sesame oil. Whisk well to dissolve the cornstarch.

In a 12-inch nonstick stir-fry pan, heat the peanut oil over medium-high heat. When the oil is hot, add the bok choy stems and season with 1/8 tsp. kosher salt. (If using baby bok choy, add all the pieces now and skip the step of adding the leaves later.) Cook, tossing frequently with tongs, until the stems are pliable and lightly browned, 5 to 6 minutes. Add the scallions, garlic, and ginger and cook, stirring constantly, until the aromatics are tender, fragrant, and starting to brown, about 2 minutes. Add the bok choy leaves and 1/8 tsp. salt. Using tongs, toss until the leaves are completely wilted and integrated with the stems, 1 to 2 more minutes.
Remove the pan from the heat, and using a heatproof spatula, stir the sauce and quickly mix it with the vegetables in the pan. As soon as the sauce thickens and has coated most of the vegetables (a few seconds), transfer to a platter and serve immediately.

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Traditional Creamed Spinach
From Wholefoodsmarket.com
Serves 6

Ingredients
About 3 pounds fresh spinach
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 tablespoon chopped garlic
3/4 cup small (1/4-inch) diced yellow onions (about 1 small onion)
3/4 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup grated parmigiano-reggiano cheese
Pinch ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

To prepare spinach, first remove any unwanted stems or brown parts. Rinse leaves several times in cold water until all the dirt has been rinsed off. Drain spinach but leave some water clinging to spinach leaves.

Heat a large pan over medium-high heat and add wet spinach. (This step may need to be done in batches.) Turn spinach frequently with a pair of tongs as it cooks. Once it is wilted, remove from the pan and place in a strainer and squeeze out as much liquid as possible. (This step is very important.) Transfer drained spinach to a cutting board and chop coarsely. Set aside.

Meanwhile, melt butter in a saucepan over medium heat and add garlic and onions. Cook until onions are translucent and soft (about 10 to 15 minutes).
Add cream, parmigiano-reggiano, nutmeg, salt and black pepper and continue cooking until it is reduced a bit (about 5 minutes).

Add spinach to cream and mix well. Continue to cook until cream has almost completely been absorbed and dish is thick and creamy. Remove from heat and serve.

CSA Share Week 16

2010-09-14T06:50:00.000-07:00

This Sunday the farm held its open house for CSA members. The forecast was for showers after 2 p.m. “Good enough,” we thought. It wasn’t going to be a lovely, sunny day, but at least it would stay dry for the bulk of everyone’s visit. Or so we thought.
Cars began rolling in at 10 a.m., just as it curiously began to start drizzling. “Maybe this will pass by. A quick shower,” we said to ourselves, holding fast to positive thinking. By the time the first tour was scheduled and about 30 people had arrived, the rain was pouring down. We sought shelter in the barn. Not such a bad place to start. The 200-year-old barn is a point of conversation in itself. So were the thousands of garlic bulbs hanging in the barn basement. And, seeking more cover, we moved to our largest greenhouse, were there was plenty to discuss and show there. After all, how many people have seen lettuce when its leaves are the size of one’s fingernail?
Eventually, we could stall no longer. The rain was pouring down, and no one seemed anxious to venture out to see our veggie fields. Hanging out under the 20 x 30 foot tent we’d rented wasn’t even desirable. It was a raw, wet day. So, thank goodness for our big, old farmhouse. Everyone packed into our 30-foot-long kitchen. We spread out a wonderful variety of food brought by members and provided by the farm, brewed some coffee, and simply got to know one another. It was great.
By the time lunch was over, the rain had subsided and we trekked out to see the main working part of the farm including the brooder, which presently houses about 300 two-week-old chicks, our primary vegetable fields, the new irrigation pond, and the hens out on pasture looking more than a little soggy.
It wasn’t quite the day we’d planned. We had activities planned that never happened—corn stalks in a back field ready to be cut down and bunched for members who might want to make door (or apt.) decorations, and a winter squash crop ready for harvest. But after accumulating a few pounds of thick mud on the bottoms of one’s shoes touring the farm, no one was itching to hike to the back of the farm where those crops lay wet and waiting.
We are so grateful to all those who came. It was a wonderful mix of members—coming from as close as across the street to as far as New York City and even Connecticut. We even had one member catch a red-eye flight back from L.A. to make it to the farm (thanks Ariel!). It was a treat for us to take a day off from our usual work and meet or better get to know some of the CSA members. (The bonfire the night before with campers was a highlight as well.) Again, to all, thanks!

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IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE:

1 bunch leeks
Mixed bell peppers
1 bunch cilantro
7 ounces spicy lettuce mix
¾ pound (12 ounces) edemame
6 ounces baby salad mix
1 watermelon
1 red onion

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TIPS & RECIPES

This week’s spicy mixed greens are a combination of Mizuna, Red Russian kale, Komatsuna, Red Giant mustard, and Tatsoi. It’s suitable for a cold green salad with sliced red bell peppers or fall pears or for briefly wilting or stir-frying in hot oil with the week’s leeks. The spicy profile makes it well-suited to the following salad dressing adapted from one of the farm’s favorite cookbook sources for inspiring salads: Lettuce in Your Kitchen by Chris Schlesinger and John Willoughby(© 1996, William Morrow and Company).

Dressing #1:
1 1/2 stalk lemongrass, roughly chopped
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
1/3 cup white vinegar
1/3 cup water
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon neutral-tasting vegetable oil, such as peanut, sunflower or safflower oil
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon fish sauce (optional)

In a small saucepan, combine the lemongrass, ginger, vinegar, water, and sugar and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat to low and simmer until you have about 1/3 cup liquid, after about 35 minutes. Remove from the heat and strain, discarding solids. Add the sesame oil, vegetable oil, soy sauce and fish sauce (if you want) and mix well.

OR… if you cannot easily find lemongrass, this sesame dressing, also from Lettuce in Your Kitchen, is quick and uses more readily available ingredients.

DRESSING #2
Combine:
¼ cup olive oil
1 tablespoon sesame oil
¼ cup rice wine vinegar
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 teaspoon minced fresh ginger
Pinch of dried red pepper flakes
Salt and freshly cracked black pepper to taste

A nice addition to the greens would be grilled or sautéed chicken. Or, if wilting the greens, drizzle with the soy sauce and sesame oil dressing (above) and serve over sticky white rice or brown rice with thinly sliced red pepper and strips of cooked egg (beaten and left to set in the pan, like an omelet.)

What’s edemame? It’s a fresh soy bean. And don’t let its fuzzy exterior fool you. Inside the pods are nutty little beans that make a great snack, appetizer or side dish. They’re easy to cook and fun to eat. Not sure how to cook edemame? It’s as simple as cooking pasta. We recommend going to wikipedia.com and searching “how to cook edemame.” There are both instructions and a video.

CSA Share Week 15

2010-09-06T19:37:00.000-07:00

This time of year most home gardeners put away their shovels and hoes. They enjoy what their gardens might happen to yield. Otherwise, what’s done is done. But after the last couple weeks of yo-yo weather we’ve had here, even those stick-it-out-‘til-the-bitter-end gardeners are feeling left with little choice but to call it quits.
While we’ve had a summer full of weather extremes, the latest two episodes were rough. It started two weekends ago when we had 6 inches of rain in about 24 hours. A state of emergency was declared in our valley because creeks and rivers were overflowing, making some roads impassable. The end result of that here on the farm wasn’t so great either. Certain low-lying fall plants simply drowned.
Next came the heat. Seven days of 90-plus degree hot, humid weather. No matter the crop, plants struggle in that kind of intense, sustained heat. Some just don’t make it. A lettuce crop we’d hoped to be harvesting right now (as we’re surely hankering for a head of lettuce) bolted. This happens when it’s too hot. The lettuce shoots up seemingly overnight to take on a cone-like shape and a bitter taste. There’s nothing to do but till it under.
By late Friday the cool air most elegantly arrived, and we’ve found ourselves thankful to be starting the day in long sleeve shirts.
Despite that fall feeling in the air, we’re still looking forward. It’s evident in our greenhouse, well-stocked with young, growing plants. We’ve newly prepared seed beds in the fields where we’re planting more arugula, salad greens, radish, etc. And in our basement a few “speed trays” of seedlings (pac choi and radicchio) are coming to life under grow lamps. So even though it might feel like we’ve plummeted into autumn, we’re banking on there still being time to keep growing some quick-to-grow, cool tolerant crops. It’s always worth a shot. How much time will we have? Well, we’re afraid that’s up to our friend Jack Frost.

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In this week’s share:
1 watermelon
1 1/2 lbs Yukon Gold potatoes
6 ounces arugula
8 ounces (1/2 lb.) shallots
1 pound beets (no greens)
1 head escarole
2 bell peppers
1 eggplant
1 garlic

A note on this week’s eggplant:
Like fair-skinned people, light-colored vegetables can suffer from intense sun, of which we’ve recently had plenty. You may notice it in this week’s share with one of the two varieties of eggplant. With the round-ish Rosa Bianca eggplant, which has violet and white streaks, some of the skin has begun to take on a yellow hue. Don’t be turned off by this. It’s simply a “sunburn” and doesn’t affect the quality or taste of this Italian heirloom variety known for its creamy, mild flavor.
Similarly, we’ve heard a number of people at our farmers’ markets recently ask how to tell if an eggplant is ripe. If it’s firm and the skin smooth and glossy, it’s good. It doesn’t matter what size the eggplant is. And if your eggplant sits in your refrigerator and begins to take on that puckered look, don’t feel like you have to throw it out. It’s simply losing moisture. In our experience, it has to look rather withered before it’s unusable.

An advisory on last week’s “sweet” hot peppers.
Some CSA members received classic bell peppers in their share. Others received fire engine red, long, tapered peppers. We’d bit into the tips of a few before packing this variety up to make sure it was sweet. Yes, they tasted sweet and refreshing. Then, this weekend, when Maryellen was working at a farmer’s market, a customer asked if the tapered red peppers were sweet. Indeed, she thought, and she bit valiantly into a tip of one to prove it to the customer. Yes, it was sweet. Then one of our wise-beyond-years staffers suggested she bite into the pepper at the top. Holy hot pepper. The burn was intense. The staffer, who happens to eat 2 or 3 jalapeños a meal, got a good chuckle out of it. But we’re left a bit stumped, as we don’t recall ordering any hot red pepper seed (will need to dig into our records to be sure). And we’re remiss, as we hate to think how many CSA members used their “sweet” pepper only to find it was anything but. We ran another little taste test today, and were amazed to find that if you never come into contact with the seeds, there is no heat in the flesh of this pepper. But take the top of the pepper and roll it back and forth between your palms to press the seeds into the pepper and you’ve got yourself one heck of a hot pepper.

***Our apologies to anyone who was taken by surprise like we were.***
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RECIPES

Grated Beet and Carrot Salad
Instead of giving CSA members a recipe for roasted beets back in July when no one could even think of turning on their oven this summer, we should have shared this “recipe” for grated beet and carrot salad from Chocolateandzucchini.com. It’s more of a roadmap than a recipe. The author includes a long list of options, so that you can easily create your own version based on what you have on hand in your kitchen (maybe some parsley left over from last week’s share?)

What’s for dinner at the farm? At Free Bird Farm, we always try to make 1 dinner a week that primarily uses ingredients going to CSA members. Sometimes you read about them in recipe form (i.e. last week's turnip and parsley salad). Sometimes we share the idea because it's simple enough that we believe you can take the concept and run with it to your liking.
Last night (Mon.) we built a sandwich off the grill with roasted bell peppers, a fistful of arugula, grilled lamb sausage, goat cheese, balsamic vinegar and some fresh garlic minced to a paste (the garlic probably would have been a little less assertive if it had been roasted and, surely, this would have been just as satisfying with grilled eggplant slices instead of the sausage). Everything was pressed between a couple slices of rustic bread brushed with olive oil and toasted on the grill. We admit that we sliced a tomato and added that in too (not in this week’s share, we regret; the crop is losing steam). We also had some raw carrots on the side.

Mustard & Rosemary Roasted Potatoes
Adapted from a recipe by Molly Stevens for Fine Cooking magazine

These potatoes start out looking very wet, but the mixture cooks down to leave the potatoes crisp, crusty, and tangy.
Serves four.

¼ cup Dijon mustard
3 tablespoons cup olive oil
2 teaspoons dry vermouth or other dry white wine
1 large clove garlic, minced
2 teaspoons chopped fresh rosemary
¾ tsp. coarse salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1 ½ pounds Yukon Gold potatoes, cut into 3/4- to 1-inch dice

Heat the oven to 400°F. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the mustard, olive oil, vermouth, garlic, rosemary, salt, and pepper. Add the potatoes and toss to coat. Dump the potatoes onto a large rimmed baking sheet and spread them in a single layer. Roast, tossing with a spatula a few times, until the potatoes are crusty on the outside and tender throughout, 50 to 55 min. Serve hot.

CSA Share Week 14

2010-08-31T07:09:00.000-07:00

(caption: a canteloupe crop damaged by a fast-progressing powdery mildew lies lifeless next to a healthy watermelon crop (front right) resistant to the air-borne fungus)

On hot pink paper we received this notice in the mail a couple weeks ago: DISEASE ALERT! DOWNY MILDEW FOUND IN FULTON, MONTGOMERY AND SCHOHARIE COUNTIES! No sooner had we read the notice from Cornell University Cooperative Extension when, sure enough, we were seeing evidence that an air-borne fungus had landed in our fields.
Our spirits especially sank when we saw it on our winter squash crop—a white to grayish powdery growth on the upper surfaces of the leaves that would quickly penetrate the plant cells and kill the plant. We’d planted our winter squash seeds back in early May and nurtured them in the greenhouse for four to five weeks. Once in the field, we kept them well weeded as the vines stretched and the broad, deep green leaves unfurled forming a dense carpet over the plant beds and spreading across the paths on each side as well. The bees did their work too, pollinating flower after flower so that the plants would successfully produce fruit. All this time, resources and work, and only to have a common fungus show up aggressively shortly before the squash was to be ready for harvest.
It looks like our farm has not been hit with downy mildew but, instead, powdery mildew, a more widespread air-borne fungus. Nonetheless, we heeded Cooperative Extension’s warnings and read their 2-page informational sheet carefully. What we found striking was that the first 1 ½ pages of information were dedicated to a long list of synthetic fungicides that can be applied to control downy mildew (if you’re a conventional farm). Names like Ranman, Revus, and phosphorus acid fungicides. There are detailed instructions as to the amounts and frequency with which these products can or should be used (it’s not as if farmers apply the fungicide once and it’s a fix). It also explains which crops certain chemicals can and cannot be used on or which combination of products can or cannot be used.
And then there’s the organic section to the mailed notice. It’s one paragraph. It starts out, “Downy mildew is challenging to manage in an organically-produced crops due to current lack of adequately effective resistant varieties, cultural practices and approved products.” The organically approved products they did mention were recommended as preventative controls only. None would eradicate the fungus.
Whichever mildew hit our winter squash crop, our cucumbers and our cantaloupe crop, it hit fast. We didn’t even have time to contemplate applying an organically approved spray. For the squash and melons, we’d have needed a boom sprayer—a sprayer that would project over a field. That’s just something we’re not about. And because both of these crops sprawl beyond their beds, we cannot straddle the crops with a tractor and a spray applicator attachment nor reach with a small backpack sprayer.
For us, part of being organic is picking our battles—especially when it comes to applying sprays to crops—even ones that are organic. We’re glad to get what melons we’ve been able to harvest—enough watermelon for everyone this week(!). We’ll take a hit on the cucumbers—but everyone received a good stretch of cucumbers earlier this season, right? And we’ll hope for the best on the winter squash. As it goes, this is farming.

A note from the farm on the national egg recall
You don’t have to pay close attention to the news to know that about a half billion eggs were recalled from two Iowa egg farms in the last month. As we were pulling our farm letter together, the New York Times posted an update reporting that federal inspectors found widespread safety problems, including barns infested with flies, maggot and rodents. “Additional problems included overflowing manure pits, improper worker sanitation and wild birds roosting around feed bins.”
When the outbreak was first reported, we saw a tv news clip that showed images of a bunch of meat birds roaming “freely”—if somewhat packed together—indoors. We figured the news channel probably didn’t want to include images of industry-raised laying hens locked up in skyscraper-like stacks of cages because it’s simply not a camera-friendly image.
For those of you who aren’t familiar with how we raise our hens, it’s a lot different from the factory-like egg farms you’re hearing about in the news. We have about 200 hens and 2 portable homes for them. Other than to lay their eggs in their houses and roost at night, they spend almost all of their day outside on pasture pecking at bugs, eating grass, running towards anything and anyone that provide them some added entertainment. Their laying nests and houses are cleaned daily, although there is not much to clean since they spend little time indoors and because one house has a mesh floor, so manure actually drops right onto the floor ground. We move the birds’ homes through the field regularly so that they’re always on fresh grass. The only time they are confined is at night. This is to protect them from night-prowling predators like fox and coyote.

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
1 watermelon
1 ½ pounds Tongue of Fire fresh shell beans or 3/4 lbs. edemame*
1 bulb of fennel
1 bunch carrots
2 sweet Italian bell peppers
1 bunch parsley
1 bunch leeks
1 bunch small turnips
1 small white onion and 1 small red onion or 1 large white onion

*If your distribution site received edamame last week, you will receive shell beans this week instead.

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Fresh soy beans are hard to find, super easy to prepare, and fun to eat. A real treat. Eat as a snack or serve as an appetizer before dinner (or with dinner). For good instructions on how to cook, go to wikipedia.com and search "how to cook edamame." Really, it's easier than cooking pasta.

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TIP:
Turnip greens are exceptionally high in calcium, and many of the turnips in this week’s share have greens good enough to still eat. To cook, very briefly wilt in a medium-hot pan with olive oil and, if you like, thinly sliced leeks. Stir in some minced garlic (optional) and remove from the heat. Serve with a drizzling of apple cider vinegar cut with a little honey and some cooked Tongue of Fire beans from this week’s share.

*If you don’t think you’ll ever cook your turnip greens, pick a bunch with greens that aren’t in as good of shape so that members who are inclined to try them can enjoy them.

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RECIPE
Turnip Parsley Salad with Walnuts and Capers
While a new crop of salad greens at Free Bird has yet to come in, the small, mild-flavored turnips in this week’s share make a nice salad ingredient along with the parsley.

Ingredients:
1 bunch turnips
½ cup parsley leaves, packed
2 teaspoons small capers, rinsed and coarsely chopped
¼ cup walnuts, toasted and coarsely chopped
2 teaspoons cider vinegar
1 1/2 tablespoons walnut oil
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Trim the greens and root ends from the turnips. (Reserve any good-quality greens for wilting separately; see tip). Slice the turnips in half lengthwise, and then very thinly slice into half moons. You should have about a heaping cup of very thinly sliced turnips. Place the turnips in a medium serving bowl.
Loosely tear the parsley leaves and add to the bowl. Add the capers and walnuts. Toss to combine.
Drizzle with the cider vinegar and oil. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Toss. Add more vinegar, oil, salt or pepper to taste. The salad should taste lightly dressed.

Recipe by Maryellen Driscoll, Free Bird Farm

CSA Share Week 13

2010-08-24T09:02:00.001-07:00

It’s been a pretty dry summer, but this weekend we got rain. Lots of it. It started Saturday night, continued through the day Sunday, and by Monday (as our local members know) a State of Emergency was declared in our county because of flooding. Most of our fields gently slope, so nothing is sitting in puddles. This is good for the new fall plantings we’ve been putting out (see pic). But all of our field staff is off today because it’s just too wet and muddy to get anything done in the fields.

This week you are still able to enjoy summer’s peak vegetables. As the days shorten and the intensity of the sun subsides, we’ll soon be moving away from the ingredients that make for some of summer’s favorites, like fresh tomato sauce, salsa, pesto, and grilled vegetables. Enjoy as much of it as you can. Freeze the rest!

(Our phone and internet service has been out too. It’s sporadically working now. So, the content for this blog is late and sparse. Sorry.)

In this week’s local share:
4 tomatoes
1 bunch basil
Bell peppers: 2 small red, 1 yellow
1 jalapeño
1 Italian eggplant
1 bunch cilantro
1 bunch swiss chard
1 red onion
1 yellow onion

CSA Share Week 12

2010-08-17T13:40:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note this week as we’re temporarily short handed. Sorry for the late posting.

The Italian fresh shell beans in this week’s share are an heirloom variety we grow every year. Crack open the shell and, depending on the stage at which the beans were picked, they can range from a pale green to a richly mottled white and rose. (Either way, sadly, they turn a drab beige when cooked.) We love their creamy texture and nutty flavor.

These beans are delicious, whether they are used to make succotash, added to a minestrone soup (using fresh tomatoes and green beans from this week’s share perhaps) or tossed into a pasta. We use the beans as many ways as we can think of—in pasta, on grilled pizza, tossed with caramelized onions and fresh thyme or slathered in pan drippings from a roast chicken. Store in your refrigerator. Any unused, cooked beans freeze well for winter soups or stews (see instructions for how to cook).

IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE:
Tomatoes—1 large red plus 1 quart medium-small salad tomatoes
1 lb. 8 ounces Yukon gold potatoes
1 lb. 8 ounces Fresh Italian shell beans
1 bunch parsley
5 ½ ounces arugula
1 bunch basil
¾ lb (12 ounces) green or yellow wax beans
1 bunch beets

How to Cook Fresh Shell Beans
Shell the beans, discarding the pods. (This can be really relaxing.) Cover the colorfully mottled beans in chicken broth or water with a handful of added aromatics—such as leeks or onion, carrot, parsley stems, and a bay leaf. Either keep the aromatics in large enough pieces that you can easily fish out or bundle in cheesecloth. Bring the water or broth to a boil, and then reduce to a gentle simmer, stirring occasionally, until tender (30 to 50 minutes; taste to check for doneness). Sadly, the beans will lose their color and mottling as they cook. Drain in a colander.

Quick-Roasted Beet Slices
We like this recipe because it requires a short amount of time in the oven and concentrates the inherently sweet flavor that beets have to offer.

1 bunch beets
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
½ teaspoon kosher salt

After about 15 minutes, swap the pans to opposite racks and rotate halfway through.
Heat the oven to 425° F. Cover two large rimmed baking sheets with parchment. Slice off the tops and bottoms of the beets, reserving the beet greens for sautéing or another use if in good condition. Slice the beets into rounds as thin as possible (ideally 1/8 inch). If your beets are large, cut them in half first, lay them on their flat sides, and cut half moons instead of rounds for safer cutting. Toss the slices well with the olive oil and salt and spread them in one layer, with a little space between each, on the two baking sheets. After about 15 minutes, swap the pans to opposite racks and rotate so that they cook evenly. Continue to roast until the beets are soft and shrunken and crisp around the edges, about 25 minutes.
Serve immediately as is, drizzled with honey and melted butter, or with minced fresh basil and a drizzle of good-quality balsamic vinegar.

Or make the following salad with arugula and goat cheese salad.

Arugula with roasted beets and goat cheese saladServes 4 as a starter salad

5 ounces arugula
1 recipe quick-roasted beets (in this week’s newsletter)
Homemade balsamic or lemon vinaigrettte
1 ½ ounces fresh goat cheese, crumbled
¼ cup toasted walnuts, coarsely chopped
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

In a serving bowl combine the arugula and beets. Lightly drizzle with a few tablespoons of vinaigrette and toss to combine. Season to taste with kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper. Sprinkle with the goat cheese and walnuts and add more dressing to taste.

Green Bean Salad with Tomatoes, Arugula & Basil Dressing
by Maryellen Driscoll
Serves eight.

This recipe was originally developed for Fine Cooking magazine when I was 8 months pregnant with our son. That feels like ancient history (okay, 3 years), but a CSA member and close friend who tried this at the farm reminds me every year how much this dish inspired her to branch out. So I share it another year.

1/2 cup loosely packed basil leaves
1 strip lemon zest about 3 inches long and 1/2 inch wide, white pith removed
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt
1 lb. fresh slender green beans, trimmed (long ones snapped in half)
1 cup arugula, rinsed and spun dry
1 cup large diced tomato (or cherry tomatoes)
¾ (5 oz.) 1-inch-diameter fresh mozzarella balls (ciliegine), halved
1 ½ teaspoons fresh lemon juice; more to taste
Freshly ground black pepper

Fill an stockpot three-quarters full of water and bring to a boil over high heat. Put the basil and lemon zest in a metal sieve, immerse it in the boiling water, and blanch for 5 seconds. Remove, tapping the sieve over the sink to shake off excess water. Turn off the burner but leave the water in the pot with the cover on.

Roughly chop the lemon zest. Put the basil and lemon zest in a blender and pulse a few times. With the blender running, pour the olive oil through the lid’s fill hole and purée until smooth, stopping to scrape down the sides of the blender as needed. Transfer to a small bowl or liquid measuring cup and cover. Refrigerate until ready to assemble the salad.

Return the water to a boil over high heat. Add 1 Tbs. salt and the beans. Cook until the beans are crisp-tender or fully tender, depending on your preference, 4 to 6 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water. Spread the beans on a large rimmed baking sheet and refrigerate to cool completely. If making more than an hour ahead, cover and refrigerate.

In a large bowl, combine the cooled beans with the arugula, tomatoes, and mozzarella. Toss with the basil oil and lemon juice. Season to taste with salt and pepper and more lemon juice.

Make Ahead Tips
You can cook the beans up to a day ahead, just spread them out on a rimmed baking sheet, cover, and refrigerate. The basil dressing can also be made a day ahead. Wait to combine the beans and dressing until just before serving.

CSA Share Week 11

2010-08-10T07:57:00.000-07:00

Tonight: eat your corn.
Don't wait till tomorrow. And please don’t tell us if you wait until even the next day. The sooner you eat this corn, the better. We grow varieties meant for fresh
eating, not for holding their sweetness as they're shipped from the South or
California to the Northeast. The corn we grow is meant to go from field to
table. The longer the corn is stored, the more the sugar in the corn turns to
starch. Tender to the tooth and with true corn flavor, this week’s variety is just enough but not too too sweet.

If you can't prepare it tonight, wrap it in damp dishtowels (clean) or
even newspaper, tuck in a plastic bag, wrap tight or seal, and stash in your
fridge's produce bin. That's the best way to store it.

Another corn-related suggestion: when picking up your corn at today’s distribution, please don't rip the ears open. This is a CSA, not a farmers' market. We pick enough for everyone but not a whole lot more than that. (In fact, at some distribution sites, where membership is small, we send exact amounts on most things.) So any corn you tear open and toss aside is corn that some other member ultimately has to take home. THIS IS ORGANIC CORN. NOTHING HAS BEEN SPRAYED ON IT. Absolutely nothing. So there is a chance you'll get an ear with a corn earworm—usually found towards the tip of the ear. In the course of this weekend, when we cooked a lot of corn for friends and family who were visiting, we probably found 1 worm in about every dozen ears cooked. They’re not a big deal. If you come across one, take a large, strong knife, like a chef's knife, and simply cut the tip off the corn (or the section where the worm has dined). Discard what you've cut away and enjoy the rest.

Similarly, this week you're going to see some less than picture-perfect
tomatoes. As a general rule of thumb, these are the tastiest of the batch,
as these are heirloom varieties. Heirlooms are not meant to look like the
perfectly uniform, candy-red tomatoes you see in the supermarket. They're
old-fashioned tomatoes regarded for their supreme flavor. They don't tend to ripen to a uniform red. Some aren't even supposed to be red, like the Pink
Beauties you see in this photo. Heirlooms can appear misshapen, they often
have cracks by the stem, but boy do they taste good.

As with the corn, we kindly ask that you don't overly handle the
tomatoes at distribution—squeezing one after the other to find the ripest of the lot. If you pick one up that's still on the firm side, consider this a long-term
asset. Left out on your countertop, it will be at its peak ripeness in a few
days when the riper others in your share have passed their time.

Tomatoes should be stored on the countertop. Refrigeration makes them mushy. If you've only used half of a tomato, store slice-side down on a plate and, if you like, cover with a bowl.

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IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
6 ears of sweet corn
4 tomatoes
1 jalapeño
5 ½ ounces salad mix
1 Japanese eggplant
1 red onion
1 bunch swiss chard
1 bunch carrots
2 sweet Italian frying pepper
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If you haven’t been eating a carrot (or two) a day, take the challenge. Even as a late-morning snack. It’ll make you feel good. If you’re still behind on using your carrots and are loathe to turn on the oven and roast some with supper or bake some carrot cake for dessert, why not pickles? We liked this recipe for its simplicity. There are others, including one we plan to try this week from Thomas Keller’s book Ad Hoc at Home, that makes use of the jalapeño in this week’s share—in case you don’t use it to make in the salsa recipe below.

Pickled Carrot Sticks
from Gourmet | November 2003; originally published November 1985

Zanne Stewart, Gourmet's executive food editor, originally developed these carrot sticks to take on a picnic, but they were such a hit they've become a staple in her refrigerator. Best of all, they don't need to be sealed in sterilized jars, so they're a snap to make.

Yield: Makes 10 to 12 servings

1 pound carrots, cut into 3 1/2- by 1/3-inch sticks
1 1/4 cups water
1 cup cider vinegar
1/4 cup sugar
2 garlic cloves, lightly crushed
1 1/2 tablespoons dill seeds
1 1/2 tablespoons salt

Blanch carrots in a 4-quart nonreactive saucepan of boiling salted water 1 minute, then drain in a colander and rinse under cold water to stop cooking. Transfer carrots to a heatproof bowl.

Bring remaining ingredients to a boil in saucepan, then reduce heat and simmer 2 minutes. Pour pickling liquid over carrots and cool, uncovered. Chill carrots, covered, at least 1 day for flavors to develop.

Cooks' note:
Carrots keep, chilled in an airtight container, 1 month.

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If you’re a vegetarian, skip the grilled chicken part of this recipe and serve over beans and rice or with quesadillas.

Grilled Chicken with Tomato, Lime & Cilantro Salsa
Adapted from a recipe by Jessica Bard in Fine Cooking magazine

This dish is also delicious served cold or at room temperature over salad greens. Serves four as a main course, six to eight as a “small plate.”

2 cups seeded, diced ripe tomatoes (2 to 3 medium tomatoes)
1/2 cup finely chopped fresh cilantro
3 to 4 tablespoons finely diced red onion
2 Tbs. fresh lime juice
3 Tbs. extra-virgin olive oil
Finely grated zest of 1 lime (about 1 tsp.)
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 tsp. minced chipotle (from a can of chipotles in adobo sauce)
4 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves (1-1/2 to 2 lb.)

Prepare a medium-hot grill fire.

In a medium bowl, combine the tomatoes, cilantro, scallions, lime juice, 1 Tbs. of the oil, and the lime zest. If your tomatoes aren’t perfectly ripe and sweet, add 1/2 tsp. sugar. Season with 1/2 tsp. kosher salt and 1/4 tsp. pepper.

In another medium bowl, mix the chipotle, the remaining 2 Tbs. oil, 1/2 tsp. kosher salt, and 1/4 tsp. pepper.

Trim the chicken. If the tenderloins are still attached, remove them and save for another use. Use the flat side of a meat mallet to pound each chicken breast to an even 1/2-inch thickness. Add the chicken to the chipotle mixture and toss well to coat.

When the grill is ready, lay the chicken on the hot grill grates and cook, covered, until the chicken has grill marks and the edges turn opaque, 2 to 3 minutes. Flip the breasts and continue to cook until the chicken is cooked through, 2 to 3 minutes more.

Transfer the chicken to a clean cutting board and let rest for 5 minutes. Slice each breast crosswise on the diagonal into 1/2-inch-thick slices. Arrange the chicken on a platter and top with the salsa.

Make Ahead Tips
If you're serving at room temperature, the chicken can be grilled ahead. After grilling, let it cool for 20 minutes, refrigerate (for up to 8 hours), and slice just before serving with the salsa. The salsa ingredients may be prepared up to 2 hours ahead, but mix them together just before serving.

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Yes, another week of eggplant. Some may be cheering. Others may be in need of something that takes this nutty, creamy vegetable a step further than just grilling or roasting (although that would be just great with a quick- sauce from this week’s tomatoes). Caponata--a sweet-and-sour Sicilian version of ratatouille--is the ticket. We like this recipe because it doesn’t involve the tedious step of salting your eggplant in advance, which we’ve never found all that necessary. Maybe that’s the difference between really fresh eggplant and not. It wouldn’t ruin the dish if you want to skip going out and buying celery. Try chopping up some of this week’s pepper instead.

Sicilian-Style Eggplant Caponata
Adapted from Wholefoods.com

Serves 4
Make sure to bring the caponata to room temperature before serving. It's delicious spooned onto bruschetta or pita chips.

Ingredients
3 cups chopped eggplant
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 small yellow onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup celery, diced
2 tomatoes, chopped
1 tablespoon capers, drained
3 tablespoons lightly toasted pine nuts
1 1/2 teaspoons to 1 tablespoon natural cane sugar
2 1/2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
¼ teaspoon dried chile flakes, optional
Sea salt, to taste
1/4 cup green Sicilian olives, minced for garnish

Method
Preheat oven to 400°F. Toss chopped eggplant with 2 tablespoons of olive oil and sprinkle with sea salt to taste. Place a piece of unbleached parchment paper on a cookie sheet. Spread eggplant in one layer over the parchment paper. Bake eggplant for 25 minutes or until tender.

Meanwhile, sauté onion, garlic and celery over medium heat in the remaining 2 tablespoons of olive oil until onions are translucent, about 4 to 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add tomatoes and eggplant. Continue to cook for 3 minutes. Add capers, pine nuts, sugar, vinegar and chili flakes, if desired. Cook for 8 to 10 minutes, stirring often, until tomatoes are tender and vegetables are melding together.

Season to taste with sea salt. Garnish with minced olives. Refrigerate for at least four hours or, even better, overnight.

CSA Share week 10

2010-08-03T06:40:00.000-07:00

Good bye July. And good riddance. It was one of the hottest and driest of summer months on record. We have been noticing some low yields and heat stress on certain crops because of the weather but are surprised and relieved that overall the vegetables are hanging on. In late July and early August we begin to prep beds and plant cool-loving fall crops, such as peas, spinach, broccoli, and Brussels sprouts. For us, this means a significant change in weather is just around the corner. Hard to believe. We’re already starting to get some cool nights, which pleasantly makes for better sleeping.
So as we enjoy August’s heat-loving crops, which have been months in the making—tomatoes, peppers, eggplants and melons (ETA closer to Sept.)—we hope for rain to get the fall crops off to a good start.

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IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
1 large Italian eggplant
1 bunch carrots
1 bunch parsley
1 head of garlic
2 bell peppers
1 bunch kale
2 cucumbers
3/4 lb. (12 ounces) green beans

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RECIPES

Kale with Panfried Walnuts
From Gourmet | November 2009
Recipe by Ian Knauer

When earthy greens are tossed with a walnut- and garlic-scented oil and lots of crunchy nuts, they taste delightfully new.

Yield: Makes 8 servings
Active Time: 20 min
Total Time: 30 min

3 pounds kale, stems and center ribs discarded
1 cup chopped walnuts (3 1/2 ounces)
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

Tear kale into large pieces, then cook in a large pot of well-salted boiling water, uncovered, until tender, about 6 minutes. Drain kale, and, when cool enough to handle, press out excess liquid.

Cook walnuts in oil in a 12-inch heavy skillet over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, until pale golden, about 5 minutes. Stir in garlic and cook, stirring, until very fragrant, about 1 minute. Add kale and salt and pepper to taste and cook, tossing, until heated through.

Serve kale warm or at room temperature.

Spicy Parmesan Green Beans and Kale
From foodnetwork.com
Recipe by Giada De Laurentiis

3 tablespoons olive oil
1 onion, sliced
1/4 pound cremini mushrooms, trimmed and quartered (about 14 mushrooms)
1 1/2 pounds green beans, trimmed and slice into 1-inch pieces
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup white wine
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 bunch kale (1/2 pound), rinsed, stemmed, and roughly chopped
2 tablespoons lemon juice (about 1/2 a lemon)
3 tablespoons finely grated Parmesan

Warm the olive oil in a large, heavy saute pan over medium-high heat. Add the onions and cook until translucent, about 4 minutes. Add the mushrooms, green beans, salt, and pepper and cook for 2 minutes. Add the wine and continue cooking until the green beans are almost tender, about 5 minutes. Add the red pepper flakes and the kale and continue cooking until the kale has wilted, about 4 to 5 minutes. Add the lemon juice and the Parmesan cheese. Toss to coat and serve immediately.

CSA Share Week 9

2010-07-26T18:36:00.000-07:00

There’s something triumphant about seeing the season’s first mature eggplant-- glossy, rich, vibrant—dangling purple under a canopy of large felt-like, green leaves. We’re glad to see this crop looking healthy and abundant. A nod must go to Ken and our 5-year-daughter Alis who spent many an evening hand picking Colorado potato beetles and their larvae from the plants’ leaves, so that these predatory insects didn’t decimate the crop. (As mentioned in a previous note: having planted our potato crop about ¼ mile away from our main veggie field, the beetles chose to hammer in on the eggplant this year instead.) Sometimes Ken & Alis would squish the yellow and black striped beetles between their fingers or pinch the red-orange grubs until they popped like berries. Other times they’d collect the beetles in a coffee cup, so Alis could proudly bring her found treasure back to the house to show everyone before incinerating in our wood-burning furnace.
It’s the end of July, and we’re moving plants, such as Brussels sprouts and collards, out of the greenhouse and into the fields. In the past week we also planted a 2nd crop of tomato plants, hoping to stretch the tomato season, which we’re now just beginning. These late plants will hopefully yield through September, and, if we're lucky, into October.

We'd like to encourage everyone to use their veggies for snacks in addition to using for dinner. We were chomping on the purple carrots this morning while packing up members’ shares. The yellow wax beans, too, make a great snack. Last night we wanted to test the cooking time on the “lower-fat” roasting method for eggplant (recipe in this week’s newsletter) and couldn’t help but graze off the cooled roasting pan every time we passed by. One of our beloved farmers’ market supporters swears by a steady diet of swiss chard smoothies, which we’re tempted to try. In case anyone is choking at the thought, he says adding banana and avocado are key. (Owning a deluxe blender, like a VitaMix, is essential for "juicing" greens too. We're not purists. We like sweets. But we never regret when we grab something like a carrot for a snack instead.

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IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
1 large eggplant
1 bunch purple carrots
1 bunch beets
1 head of Romaine lettuce
6 ounces spicy baby greens (see note)
1 large, sweet onion
12 ounces yellow wax beans
1 bunch Swiss chard

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RECIPES:

Grilled Eggplant
Grilling eggplant is simple and delicious. Serve it as a side as is or topped with any of the following individually or in combination: crumbled feta or goat cheese, chopped olives, toasted pine nuts, minced garlic and/or a fresh herb, such as parsley, basil, mint or oregano. Or add it to a pasta dish or layered in lasagna.

1 large eggplant
3 Tbs. extra-virgin olive oil; more as needed
Kosher salt

Prepare a medium-high charcoal or gas grill fire. Trim the ends off the eggplant and cut into 1/2-inch-thick rounds. Just before grilling, brush both sides of the eggplant slices with olive oil and season with salt. Grill (covered on a gas grill; uncovered on a charcoal grill) until golden-brown grill marks form, 3 to 4 minutes. Turn the eggplant and grill until tender and well marked on the second sides, 3 to 4 minutes more. The interior should be soft and grayish in color.

Spaghetti with (Lower-Fat) Eggplant and Basil
Adapted from How to Cook Everything, by Mark Bittman (Macmillan, 1998)

Eggplant soaks up a startling amount of olive oil, especially if you sauté it in a skillet. Roasting does turn the flesh a tasty golden brown without requiring quite so much oil.

1 Italian globe eggplant, stem end trimmed
4 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon minced garlic
¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
2 cups canned (drained) plum tomatoes, roughly chopped
Kosher salt
¼ cup shredded fresh basil leaves
1 pound spaghetti, linguine, or other long pasta

Preheat the oven to 450° F. Cut the eggplant into ½-inch cubes/chunks. Once the oven is heated, pile the eggplant in a roasting pan or heavy-duty baking sheet, drizzle with 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil and toss. Cook on the middle or lower-middle rack, until the eggplant cubes have turned golden brown, after about 10 minutes. Flip a metal spatula over so its underside faces up, and push the spatula’s edge through the eggplant to turn it over. Continue to roast until golden brown on 2 sides and tender, about 5 to 7 minutes more.

Meanwhile, bring a large pot of water to a boil.

As the pot of water is heating, add the remaining tablespoon of olive oil to a 12-inch skillet and heat over medium-high heat. Once the oil is shimmering, add the garlic and red pepper flakes and cook until just fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add the tomatoes and cook, stirring occasionally, until they break up and the mixture becomes saucy, 10 to 15 minutes. Season with salt. Add the roasted eggplant and ¼ cup shredded basil leaves (or a tablespoon of pesto—especially if you’d made some from this season’s past shares and stored in the freezer). Taste and add more salt, if needed.

Cook the spaghetti in the boiling water until al dente—tender but firm, not mushy. Drain.

Add the spaghetti to the pan of sauce. Using tongs, toss to gently coat the noodles with the sauce. Serve.

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Tips:

This week’s baby greens are spicy a mix of arugula, baby mustard and baby Asian greens. Use them to make a salad, wilt with a warm dressing or briefly in a pan of hot oil with minced garlic, or stuff in a crusty sandwich with grilled eggplant and a soft, melty cheese, like Taleggio, with a slice from this week’s mild onion and a drizzling of balsamic vinegar.

Store this week’s large, white onion in the refrigerator. It’s mild in flavor. Slice and eat raw in salads or sandwiches or cook gently in a fry pan with butter and/or oil as it caramelizes nicely.

CSA Share Week 8

2010-07-20T07:10:00.001-07:00

We wouldn’t be surprised if members have seen an occasional ladybug, cabbage looper (light green “caterpillars” that cling to the undersides of broccoli), or other insect amidst the produce at distribution. But frogs ?! Gulp.
Somehow a frog snuck into one of the farm’s produce totes and made it on the truck to New York City. (Sounds like the beginning of a classic children’s adventure story.) Fortunately, a CSA member was kind enough to set it free in a nearby park. One of our CSA organizers in the city wrote, “I love it! Does it get any more “farm fresh” than that.” We should hope not. A wild rabbit would have a harder time snuggling into a bin of lettuce without notice (though we wouldn’t mind one less rabbit around here). Our neighbor once had a chicken ride on the axle of his truck into town…
We wish the frog well!

Other farm happenings:
We just wrapped up our garlic harvest. This is usually a big feat to squeeze in with everything else we never have enough time to do. But this year’s field crew works like World Cup champions in the (veggie) field--incredibly team spirited. One day they got an early start at 6 a.m.—without our even asking. The harvest was wrapped in less than a week (versus the usual 10 to 14 days). Hooray.

We’re anxiously waiting to see our tomato crop ripen. A grower friend who is all about his tomatoes assures us that his crop seems to be taking its time too. So it could be a few more weeks before we’re really picking tomatoes. Other classic summer crops, like eggplant and peppers, should be arriving within the next few weeks too.

Feedback. One of our original CSA members from up in the Adirondacks recently wrote: “I just made a big pot of veggie and split pea soup with our leftover CSA veggies. The kids even asked for seconds! I froze some onion greens and for dinner I am making roasted beets with candied ginger and brook trout that my husband and kids caught yesterday. I needed a day like today! It feels so good to cook with fresh veggies and ingredients on hand.”

We love this kind of correspondence. It’s great to hear how members are using their produce.
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We’d like to hear from you too: Use the farm's e-mail address to share with us what you’ve been doing with the items in your share. It doesn’t need to be in recipe form, and it doesn’t have to be anything fancy. A simple idea is great; the simpler the better. Something we can then share with everyone else. We can all benefit from others’ inspirations/creations.
Or send us a question! We’d love to include a Q&A section to the weekly blog (or, if your CSA group has its own newsletter, to that too).
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IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
1 bunch carrots
1 Napa cabbage
¾ lb. (12 oz.) green beans
2 jalapeño peppers
1 bunch curly-leaf kale
1 head cauliflower
2 cucumbers
2 lbs. summer squash (mix of green zucchini, golden zucchini and/or crookneck summer squash)
1 bunch fresh red onions
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RECIPES

QUINOA WITH LEMON AND ZUCCHINI

Serves 6
Toss with peeled, cooked shrimp to make a complete meal.

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 medium zucchini, sliced into ¼-inch thick half moons
3 tablespoons finely diced red onion
Kosher salt
1 1/4 cups quinoa, rinsed for 1 minute under running water
2 1/2 cups water
Zest of 1 lemon
2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
¼ cup thinly sliced red onion or green onion tops
Finely chopped parsley (optional)
Crumbled feta (optional)

Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the zucchini in a single layer. Season with salt and cook, flipping once the zucchini is golden brown, 2 to 3 minutes. Sprinkle in the onion, stir with a spatula to blend, and remove from the heat. In a large saucepan, add the quinoa, water and a large pinch of Kosher salt. Bring to a boil, lower heat and simmer, covered, until quinoa is tender but still chewy and a white spiral-like germ appears around each grain, about 15 minutes.

Add the quinoa to the zucchini, zest, lemon juice, onion tops and parsley (if using) and toss. Serve warm or room temperature, topped with feta cheese and a wedge of lemon if you like.

Nutrition
Per serving (about 6oz/184g-wt.): 170 calories (45 from fat), 5g total fat, 1.5g saturated fat, 5mg cholesterol, 570mg sodium, 25g total carbohydrate (3g dietary fiber, 1g sugar), 6g protein
Adapted from the Whole Foods’ web site

WILTED NAPA CABBAGE WITH PEANUTS AND STICKY RICE

This is a riff off of a recipe for sticky rice pancakes published in “Simple to Spectacular” by Jean-Gorges Vongerichten and Mark Bittman (Broadway Books, 2000). The salty-tart sauce might be a little unexpected but works particularly nicely with the cabbage.

1 ½ cups sticky or sweet rice
4 cups thinly sliced Napa cabbage
¼ cup thinly sliced red onion or fresh green onion tops
Minced jalapeño (to your liking)
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
2 tablespoons peanut or other neutral oil
1 tablespoon soy sauce
Juice of 1 lime
¼ cup chopped peanuts

Soak the rice in water to cover for at least 1 hour or, preferably, overnight. Bring a pot of water to boil (use a wok or pasta pot). Drain the soaked rice in a mesh colander and set the colander over the pot of boiling water (the rice should not be immersed in the water). Cover and steam for about 8 minutes, until all traces of chalkiness are gone and the rice is fully tender.

In a small saucepan, combine the butter, soy sauce, and lime juice. Turn the heat to low to melt the butter. Season with pepper. Set aside.

In a wok or large fry pan, heat the oil over medium-high heat. Add the cabbage and onion and cook, tossing frequently with tongs, until just wilted. Serve the cabbage mixture draped over the rice. Spoon some of sauce over the cabbage, sprinkle with the peanuts and serve.

If you wish to make the rice into crunchy pancakes: toss it while still hot with 1 tablespoon butter, some salt and freshly ground black pepper. Stir in 1 lightly beaten egg, 2 minced scallions, and 2 tablespoons minced cilantro. Gently shape into 4 large or 8 small cakes. In a large fry pan heat 2 tablespoons of peanut or other mild oil over medium-high heat. Cook the cakes in the hot oil until lightly browned on both sides, a total of 4 to 6 minutes.

CHOCOLATE-NUT ZUCCHINI BREAD

Macerating the grated zucchini—tossing it with sugar and
leaving it to sit—helps draw out excess moisture to avoid
the soggy, dense texture that typically plagues zucchini
bread.

Serves 8

4 oz. (8 Tbs.) unsalted butter; more for the pan
9 ½ oz. (2 cups plus 2 Tbs.) all-purpose flour; more for the
pan
¾ lb. zucchini (about 3 small), stem ends trimmed
¾ cup plus 2 Tbs. granulated sugar
1/3 cup strongly brewed coffee, cold or at room temperature
1/3 cup low-fat plain yogurt or buttermilk
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
2 oz. finely chopped bittersweet chocolate (1/3 cup)
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (1 oz.)
1 tsp. baking powder
½ tsp. baking soda
½ tsp. table salt
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

Position a rack in the center of the oven and heat the
oven to 375°F. Butter a 8 ½ x 4 1/2-inch metal loaf pan and
dust with flour; tapping out any excess.
Using the large grating disk on a food processor, pass
the zucchini vertically through the feed tube to grate. (If
the zucchini is too wide to fit, slice in half lengthwise.)
Discard any remaining ungrated portions wedged on top
of the disc. Transfer the grated zucchini to a colander or
sieve set over a bowl. Sprinkle 1 Tbs. of the sugar over the
grated zucchini and toss to distribute. Sprinkle another
1 Tbs. sugar over the zucchini and toss again. Set aside
for 20 minutes.
In a small saucepan, melt the butter over medium-low
heat. Pour the butter into a medium bowl and let cool
slightly, 5 to 10 minutes. Whisk the remaining 3/4 cup
sugar, coffee, yogurt or buttermilk, and eggs into the
butter.
In a large bowl, combine the flour, chocolate, walnuts,
baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon.
Squeeze the zucchini by the fistful to thoroughly wring
out excess liquid. Add the zucchini to the wet ingredients
and stir to combine. Pour over the flour mixture, and using
a large wooden spoon, stir until just blended.
Spoon the batter into the prepared pan, spreading
it evenly with a rubber spatula. Bake until a toothpick
inserted in the center comes out clean, about 1 hour. Let
cool on a wire rack for 10 minutes. Loosen the edges with
a knife and release the bread, turning upright onto the
rack until completely cooled.

Recipe by Maryellen Driscoll, Free Bird Farm
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TIPS:

Napa cabbage has a more delicate flavor and tender texture than green or red cabbage, which makes it popular for use in cole slaw. We like it, too, in stir fries.

Purple carrots. If you can believe it, carrots were originally purple. We’ve been growing a particular purple variety of carrot, called Purple Haze, for a number of years now. It actually outsells orange carrots at one farmers’ market we attend, because our customers have come to know and love this variety well.
The carrots—purple or orange—are terrific as a fresh snack, but we also love to roast them as it concentrates their sweet flavor. Before roasting, wash the carrots but don’t bother peeling. Toss with extra-virgin olive oil and sprinkle with salt. Roast in a 425° F oven on a baking sheet with raised edges until they feel tender when skewered with a fork, 25 to 30 minutes. About halfway through cooking, do shake the baking pan back and forth so that the golden undersides of the carrots roll to face upwards.

Quick weeknight pasta with cauliflower … Cauliflower is an easy veggie to add to a quick weeknight pasta. Cut into small florets and sauté or roast until golden brown and tender. Stir in some minced garlic at the end of cooking, and then toss with white, kidney or aduki beans, chopped capers, a pinch of red pepper flakes and a pasta of choice (set aside a little pasta cooking water to add as needed; it helps moisten and bring everything together). If you eat meat, sausage or crisped prosciutto is a nice addition. Serve with grated parmigiano.

CSA Share Week 7

2010-07-13T04:38:00.000-07:00

Soon after the terrific downpour we finally got on Sunday afternoon, this rainbow (in pic) appeared over the farmstead that sits across the street from us. It was the perfect conclusion to how we were all feeling—people and plants, alike. What a relief to get some drenching rain and a break from last week’s torrid heat. During the heat spell, we put as much irrigation (water) on things as we could. For the most part, everything in our fields held in there and has since rebounded. (And our hard-working staff is still standing too; we arranged days and afternoons off during the worst of it so no one overdid it or risked getting sick.) It was pretty critical that it rained when it did, as the plants were stressed. And hopefully we’ll continue to get some rain. (The rainbow was actually more spectacular than in the photo—a double rainbow no less. But by the time the camera and kids were feteched, it had begun to fade.)

We just got our issue of Fine Cooking magazine in the mail today, and, lo and behold, there’s a feature on zucchini written by Maryellen. Perfect timing. Kind of lost track of that article’s publication since most of the recipes were developed last summer, when the ingredients were in season and the weather right for the magazine to take outdoor photos. We’re not allowed to reprint the recipes in this newsletter this year (copyright agreement stuff), but do look for this issue at your local grocer’s or bookstore. A flip through it might tempt you enough to grab it off the shelf. There’s a recipe for tri-color zucchini ribbon salad with mint and olive vinaigrette, grilled zucchini with chive oil, and sautéed zucchini with za’atar and crispy chickpeas. There’s also a “hand pie” feature (not by Maryellen) we’re drooling over. Sweet and spicy fried peach pies(?!) and blackberry-apple turnovers we’ll surely try when blackberries come into season in late August at the berry farm in our neighborhood.

We’re starting to make plans for our Open House on Sunday, Sept. 12. We chose September for our Open House because there’s still plenty of your produce to see growing in the fields but the heat has mellowed and there’s something beautifully still about the air. Apples are coming into season, our barn is wafting with the smell of thousands of bulbs of cured garlic, … and besides, July is pure craziness here (we’re in overdrive) and August is when the fly population peaks, and we can’t begin to tell you how annoying they can be—especially if there’s a big picnic taking place. We’d love to have you come spend the day to relax and explore at the farm. We’d love to meet or re-meet you too!
In addition to visiting the farm for the day, here are a number of other places you can go while over this way:
Arkell Art Museum- Late 19th and early 20th century American paintings, public library, art gallery; www.arkellmuseum.org
Bellingers Orchard- U-Pick apple orchard with beautiful vista of the Mohawk Valley, addictive cider donuts made on the premises, www.bellingersorchard.com
Conbeers- small family farm with agri-tourism events in fall (no web site; we’ll provide more before the Open House weekend)

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IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE:
1 bunch small turnips (see recipe and tip)
1 bunch carrots (see tip)
12 to 13 ounces green beans
2 cucumbers
2 pounds zucchini (green or gold) or summer squash
1 cabbage
1 bulb of fresh garlic
1 bunch fresh onions or 1 cauliflower

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COOKING TIPS:
We grow two kinds of zucchini—one is a deep, glossy green and the other a vivid gold color. Both can be used interchangeably in a recipe along with yellow crookneck summer squash and even the patty pans (the squat, dumpling-like yellow summer squash that are in limited supply this week). The crookneck squash tends to have more seeds inside, so you’ll want to slice it in half lengthwise and scrape out the seeds before slicing or dicing.

Withering onion tops. You’ll probably notice that the fresh onions you’ve been getting are graduating into a new stage in which the green tops are starting to die back. Some of the green tops are still good; some are wilted or even a bit slimy. If wet or turning slimy, cut any of the latter off before storing the onions in your refrigerator. There’s nothing wrong with the onions; they were just harvested for this week’s share. They are simply preparing to become the topless kind with the papery outer layer that we all know best. We start leaving these onions in the field now until the tops are fully wilted and the onions have developed a dry outer skin. We then pull the onions out of the ground, let them cure briefly in the field, and then spread them inside our barn so that the outer skin layer further dries making the onion suited to storage.

Turnips While the turnips in this week’s share could be roasted or used in a stew, you’ll be pleasantly surprised how delicious these small turnips are in a salad. Trim off the ends and thinly slice into coins, like a radish. They’re well suited to Mediterranean flavors like in this week’s green bean and turnip salad recipe.

Carrots. The carrots in this week’s share are wonderfully aromatic; nothing like the cardboard-flavored carrots you get in your average supermarket. They’re fairly thin and their skin is thin too, so don’t bother peeling and wasting away any of the carrot (or the skin’s excellent nutrients). Just scrub lightly with a clean cloth or your hand under water before use.

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RECIPES

Green Bean and Turnip Salad with Cumin Vinaigrette

The following is how we prepared the turnips for their dinner last night—using green beans, turnips and zucchini from this week’s share. One of our farmers' market customers inspired us to try the turnips in a salad; we were lapping our plates by the meal's end. The quantities for the main salad ingredients are approximate (kind of pulled together on the fly), so use your best judgment as to how much you’d like to make. The vinaigrette measurements are specific. If you add too much vinaigrette, no worries. It’ll pool to the bottom of the bowl.

For the vinaigrette:
3 Tbs. white wine vinegar
1 tsp. Dijon mustard
1 tsp. clover honey
1/4 tsp. cumin seeds, toasted, coarsely ground in a mortar and pestle
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
5 Tbs. canola oil

For the salad:
5 Tbs. extra-virgin olive oil (plus more for pita strips)
¾ pound green beans
1 bunch turnips
½ of a zucchini, gold or green, sliced into thin half moons
about 3 tablespoons thinly sliced green onion tops
about 4 tablespoons chopped parsley
¼ cup diced tomato (optional)
1 small whole wheat pita

Fill a stockpot with enough water to comfortably cover the beans. Bring the water to a boil. Add the green beans and a large pinch of Kosher salt and let cook until the beans are bright green and slightly tender, about 3 minutes. Strain the beans in a colander. Transfer to a medium-sized bowl and cover with cold water until the beans are no longer warm. The beans can be made many hours ahead and kept in a sealed container in the refrigerator.

In a small mixing bowl or 2-cup Pyrex measuring cup, combine the vinegar, mustard, honey, and cumin seeds. Slowly whisk in the olive oil to evenly blend. Season with Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste. Set aside.

Slice the pita into strips, about ½-inch wide. On a baking sheet, mound the strips, drizzle with a couple tablespoons of the olive oil and toss to coat. Spread evenly on the baking sheet and then toast under the broiler until golden brown and crispy (most likely just a few minutes, depending on your broiler).

Strain the beans from the cold water and dry out the bowl. Add the beans, turnips, zucchini, onions, parsley and tomato, if using, to the bowl. Add half the vinaigrette. Using tongs, toss and season with Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper to taste. Add more vinaigrette, as needed, and the pita strips. Toss and serve.

Recipe by Maryellen Driscoll, Free Bird Farm

Zucchini Oven Fries with Blue Cheese Dipping Sauce
Serves 4.

For the fries:
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 pound medium zucchini, stem ends trimmed
¼ cup buttermilk
2 large eggs
¼ teaspoon table salt
¼ tsp. hot sauce, such as Tabasco
1 ½ cup plain dry bread crumbs
2 tablespoons sesame seeds
Kosher salt

For the sauce:
2 ounces blue cheese, crumbled
2 Tbs. sour cream
1 Tbs. milk
1 Tbs. freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 Tbs. minced flat-leaf parsley
Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Position a rack in the center of the oven and heat the oven to 400° F. Pour the olive oil onto a rimmed baking sheet or jelly roll pan, spreading evenly with a pastry brush.
Slice the zucchini into 3” long by 1/3” thick sticks.
In a medium bowl, whisk the milk or buttermilk, eggs, hot sauce and table salt to blend. Set aside.
In an 8”x8” baking pan, combine the bread crumbs and sesame seeds.
Set a cooling rack over a rimmed baking sheet. Dip and coat the zucchini batons in the egg mixture and transfer onto the wire rack. Working in batches, place a handful of the batons in the pan of bread crumbs. Shimmy the pan back and forth to evenly coat.
Transfer the breaded sticks to the baking sheet and continue the breading process until all of the sticks are arranged on the baking sheet. [it might seem crowded, but the sticks will shrink as they cook]
Bake until the breaded zucchini sticks are golden brown on their undersides, about 12 minutes. Using a large metal spatula, turn the sticks and continue to bake until crispy and golden brown all over, about 12 minutes more.
Transfer to a paper-towel lined plate and serve immediately.

To make the sauce:
In a small mixing bowl, whisk the cheese, sour cream, milk and lemon juice until well combined. Depending on the consistency of the cheese you may need to mash some of the cheese with the back of a soup spoon to blend. Stir in the parsley and season with salt and pepper to taste.

Recipe by Maryellen Driscoll, Free Bird Farm

CSA Share Week 6

2010-07-06T07:10:00.000-07:00

Do we need to even say it? It’s really, really, really hot. We’re not sure we’ve seen a heat wave quite like this in the 11 years we’ve owned our farm. We’re irrigating as best we can, but the pond project isn’t complete, and our present system cannot distribute water in large sections of field. So we’ll keep disconnecting and reconnecting irrigation lines to keep as much watered as we can until this heat breaks.
Certain crops simply don’t like heat. Lettuce and broccoli are sure casualties. We’re harvesting all of our fennel crop now too; that will otherwise bolt. And we’ve severely trimmed down the basil (thus, this week’s big bunches) so that it won’t go to seed either. In sum, many of the items in this week’s share you aren’t apt to see again soon. Other heat-loving crops we see further into summer, like tomatoes and peppers, melons and cucumbers, aren’t necessarily going to thrive under these conditions either. When it’s this hot, plants become stressed.
Like we said, we’ll do our best with irrigation and hope the intense heat breaks sooner than later.
Meantime, this week’s share has a lot of new items we’re excited about. The anise flavor of the variety of fennel we grow, called Orion, makes the flavor of store-bought fennel seem feeble. See this week’s tips on how to thinly slice fennel (great mixed in with your baby salad greens). There are also ideas on hot-weather options for cauliflower—something we normally love to roast but wouldn’t consider turning on the oven for right now. And while this week’s herbs—basil and parsley—go beautifully with just about every vegetable in this week’s share, they can also be their own stars. It just might be a good week to make pesto and tabbouleh.

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IN THIS WEEK’S SHARE*:
1 bulb fennel
1 bunch parsley
1 head cauliflower
6 ½ ounces salad mix
1 large bunch basil
1 bunch radish
1 bag spinach
1 lb. bag of sugar snap peas

*The above list is what local members can expect to receive. Due to a short supply of certain crops, members in the city are receiving a slightly different share than local members. Our summer squash crop is just kicking in and was compromised by mice in the early greenhouse stages; so we didn't have enough for everyone this week. Similarly, our spring pea crop didn't germinate well. So this crop is limited and short-lived. We will have more squash and peas for all as the season progresses. We do our best to make sure what when there are variations that the different items are of comparable worth and overall desirability.
For our CSA members in the city, please refer to the newsletters your CSA group compiles weekly for specifics on your shares and other CSA news specific to your community group.

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RECIPES:

Sautéed Cauliflower: Cauliflower has an inherently nutty flavor that especially comes through when sautéed (or roasted). To sauté, heat a heavy-bottomed or cast iron skillet over medium-high heat. Add two tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil or a heat-friendly oil like canola or safflower oil. Once the oil is shimmering, add the cauliflower (cut into 1-inch florets) so that it fits in the pan in a single layer. If necessary, cook in batches. Lower the heat to medium and let cook until golden brown, 2 to 3 minutes. Flip the cauliflower and loosely cover with a lid so that the cauliflower browns and steam cooks. Continue to cook until golden brown and tender, about 5 more minutes. Suggestions: serve in a pasta dish with beans (kidney, white or garbanzos), roasted red pepper or sun-dried tomatoes, sautéed onion, garlic, and basil or as a side dish with melted butter, chopped parsley and minced capers.

Cauliflower pickles. We're really liking the sound of this cool, crunchy pickled cauliflower recipe (click on "pickled cauliflower" to connect to link). Since carrots and red bell peppers aren’t quite ready at our farm, you can always omit and add a few more cups of cauliflower. If this seems like way more pickles than you’d ever eat, you can halve this recipe.

Quick fix: Radish and parsley salad
Make a simple salad of thinly sliced radish and parsley leaves. Serve with freshly squeezed lemon juice, extra-virgin olive oil, and a pinch of Kosher or sea salt. If you have any green onion tops left over from last week’s share, thinly slice and add some of those too. Or shave some of this week’s fennel and toss in too.

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Tips:
Fennel- very thinly slicing fennel is the best way to prepare it, especially if serving in a salad. You don’t have to have a super-sharp knife and knife skills to achieve this. A vegetable peeler lets you shave it. Trim the base, quarter lengthwise, cut out the core, and run the peeler lengthwise along each quarter to shave. You can also use a mandoline or hand slicer, if you have one. For a more detailed lesson on how to use any of these tools to thinly slice or shave fennel, go to the Fine Cooking test kitchen’s web site.

Storing herbs- like basil (last week’s tip), store parsley in a cup or jar of water tented with a plastic bag and refrigerated. Parsley will hold up for a number of days; basil usually only lasts 3 to 4 days.

CSA Week 5

2010-06-29T06:57:00.000-07:00

If you aren’t clued into all the hustling that is going on in the fields and behind the scenes here, it’d be easy to think this thing called farm life is relatively tranquil--unless you’ve been monitoring the traffic in our driveway for the last month. The activity starts around 6:30 a.m. when a large, diesel truck rumbles up our driveway. That belongs to a local excavator, who has been digging a 1-million gallon, 3/4-acre pond on our farm. This pond is a big deal for us. We received a grant through the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service to build the pond as the primary source of water for irrigating our fields. It was the first grant we’ve applied for, and it was a boon to be selected as a recipient.
Up to this point, we’ve naturally relied on rain to keep our plants adequately hydrated. And when that’s not enough, we’ve irrigated using water pumped from a well. The well has miraculously never run out, no matter how dry the summer, but it can only pump water to the fields in small segments (we’ll not bore you with the technical details as to why), and the amount of acreage upon which we grow keeps expanding. So, to have a pond like this is a significant form of insurance for when we face drought conditions. It also simply allows us to have more control over our environment, so we can grow better crops. The grant includes the cost of irrigation line, a pump, filters, etc. So, really, we couldn’t feel more fortunate.
The pond project has meant daily visits from USDA field agents, an occasional fuel-truck delivery, a periodic visit from a large-equipment repair trucks (there seem to have been a few breakdowns), and an entourage of pickup trucks somehow affiliated with the contractor. Between that, the day-long hum of excavating machinery at work behind our fields, and the usual traffic in our driveway—harvest vehicles, staff comings and goings, supply deliveries, random (sometimes very random) visitors—the farm has been buzzing.
Right now the project is in its final stages, and, fortunately, we’ve been getting ample rain. The pond is dug but the “spoils”— the equivalent of 1 million gallons of displaced dirt, now need some re-arranging. So this past week we’re seeding, planting, harvesting and weeding to the background hum of a bulldozer at work.
It has been exciting to watch it all develop, and the excavation site makes a great post-dinner destination for the kids when Ken has to work until dark. By then the day’s traffic has quieted, and all seems at peace as we walk over the mounds of spoils and gape at the giant hole, trying to imagine what it will be like when it’s full of water, surrounded by a grassy border, and no longer quite the mud pit our children in the meantime are quite enjoying.

IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
1 head frisée
1 bunch basil
1 head red leaf lettuce or bag of salad mix
1 head green cabbage
1 bunch broccoli
1 bunch spring onions
1 head curly leaf kale
1 bunch rainbow swiss chard

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RECIPES:
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Frisée salad with peaches, avocado & pistachios
Serves four.

1 head frisée, rinsed, dried, and torn into bite-size pieces
2 tablespoons raspberry or red-wine vinegar
1 teaspoon honey
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
¼ cup thinly sliced green onion tops (from the fresh onions in this week’s share)
½ cup pistachios, toasted
2 peaches, pitted and sliced into thin wedges
1 ripe avocado, thinly sliced
1 tablespoon minced garlic scapes (hopefully you have some left over from last week’s share)

Add the frisée to a large bowl. In a small bowl, whisk the vinegar and honey to blend. Whisk in the olive oil. Whisk in a large pinch of Kosher salt and a few grinds of pepper. Drizzle all but a couple tablespoons of the dressing over the frisée, sprinkle with the sliced onions, and, using tongs, toss to evenly distribute. Add the peach slices and garlic to the remaining dressing and gently toss to coat.

Mound the frisée on four salad plates. Arrange the avocado slice and then the peaches on top. Sprinkle the pistachios on top and serve.

© Maryellen Driscoll, 2010

Crispy Kale
Serves four.
Roasting kale until it’s shattery crisp is one way to coax finicky eaters into enjoying this highly nutritious green. Children and adults alike eat them as if they’re chips. Serve as an appetizer, snack or with a meal.
Tip: To quickly remove the stem from a kale leaf, wrap your hand around the stem at the base of the leaf. Firmly hold the stem with your other hand as you run your wrapped hand up towards the leaf tip, quickly stripping the leafy portion from the stem. Discard or compost the stems.

1 bunch of kale from this week’s share, washed
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons cider vinegar
Kosher salt

Heat the oven to 350° F. Meanwhile, strip the kale leaves from the stems (see tip, above). Tear the leaves into large, bite-size pieces. Thoroughly dry in a salad spinner. Transfer onto a clean kitchen towel and blot just to make sure the kale is dry.
Mound the kale on a heavy-duty, rimmed baking sheet. Drizzle with the olive oil and cider vinegar and toss with your hands to evenly coat the leaves. Bake in the oven, turning the leaves once they’ve begun to crisp, after about 10 minutes. Rotate the baking sheet and continue to cook until crackly crisp but not browned, 8 to 12 more minutes. Do not let the leaves turn brown; they’ll taste burnt and bitter. Remove from oven, sprinkle with salt and serve.

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KITCHEN TIPS

Kitchen Tool of the Week. A salad spinner is one of the more worthwhile kitchen gadgets to own, and it’s not just great for drying salad greens. Use it to store the delicate salad mix (mixed baby lettuce leaves) you’ve been seeing weekly in your share. The basket lets air circulate around the greens to prevent damage from too much moisture, while the lid on the salad spinner helps keep just the right amount of moisture in. The greens tend to hold well this way through the entire week.
You can also use the salad spinner to spin out any excess moisture from your kale before trying this week’s addictive crispy kale recipe. It’s also handy for spinning excess moisture from greens, such as this week’s swiss chard, before adding to hot oil for a sauté or stir fry.

Storing basil. Fresh basil doesn’t hold well in the refrigerator. So use as soon as you can. If you can’t use immediately, store stem end down in a cup of water and loosely cover the leafy top with a plastic bag. If you don’t have the ingredients for pesto and want to find a way to store it long term, finely chop with olive oil in a blender or food processor. You can then add to tomato sauces, pasta dishes, winter soups or risotto in the winter.

Ideas for using your share contents this 4th of July weekend:
Spring onions: caramelize the white portion of the onions (bulb end) and use as a bruschetta topping with thin slivers of basil and goat cheese; if you’ve a stockpile, make into an onion tart; thinly slice the green tops and use in anything from scrambled eggs or egg salad to tuna salad a garnish for hummus or tossed in a pasta dish

Garlic scapes: make pesto (see last week’s recipe) and top on grilled,
homemade pizza along with fresh mozzarella or toss with pasta, fresh mozzarella, feta or goat cheese and basil for a simple pasta salad

Cabbage: make cole slaw with a light dressing using rice vinegar or lemon juice, sour cream and walnut oil

More on salad dressings. A couple weeks ago we talked homemade salad dressings--how much better they taste, how simple they are to make. Jamie Oliver's weekly Food Revolution newsletter includes a link to what he calls Jam Jar Dressings. He sums up the subject really well, in his quintessential Jamie way, and offers a handful of great salad dressing recipes too.

CSA Week 4

2010-06-22T07:02:00.001-07:00

A ladybug, a natural predator of pests, nestles in the fronds of some upcoming fennel

Letter from the Farm At last we’ve had some nice weather—warm temperatures with enough moisture so that the plants are showing some vigor. Up until now, cold nights, dry stretches, and general inconsistencies in growing conditions have been hard on many of the plants in our fields. In sum, we’re finally seeing crops growing.
Now is a critical time for pest control, as this is the time pests really take off. Our main insect problems are potato beetles, cucumber beetles and flea beetles. On occasion, we battle cutworms.
Just like weed control, successful pest control is all about timing and getting on top of the issue when it’s new. We make every effort to cultivate when the weeds are hair-like (and easy to remove); we try as best we can to control pests now before they have a chance to lay their eggs and multiply exponentially.
This year we’re lucky enough to have planted our potatoes ¼ mile away from where we planted last year. We’ve seen not one potato beetle on the plants thus far. Last year the beetles hammered on the plants with an intensity we’d never seen before, and then came blight. It was a weak year for potatoes.
The potato beetles are here but have tried to prey upon our eggplant crop instead. So we have been going over the rows of eggplant twice daily squishing with our hands the adult potato beetles off the top of the plants’ leaves and, just as importantly, smashing any eggs laid on the underside of the leaves that we find.
The kicker is, often times, the farm’s weekly schedule and the weather don’t allow us to do such things in a timely manner. So bugs and especially weeds take off—all too often. This results in much more labor-intensive pest and weed control and, at worst, the loss of a crop.
Like most years, we’ve had our share of successes and failures. Right now we’re seeing a lot of crops looking strong. That feels good.

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IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:

1 pound garlic scapes (see recipes)
1 bunch basil
5 ounces mesclun mix
1 bunch spring onions
1 green cabbage (local CSA members); 1 bunch broccoli (NYC members)
1 head freckles romaine lettuce (see note)
1 bunch Tuscan kale
½ pound salad mix
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notes on this week’s share:
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Freckles! Don’t be fooled by the brown mottling on this week’s lettuce. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with it. This is an heirloom romaine lettuce—meant to have light-brown freckling—that we just love. It’s buttery-tender yet toothsome, and delicious.

Garlic scapes. Those curly-cue shoots in this week’s share are garlic scapes. They’re a flowering shoot that gets snapped off the garlic plant shortly after they appear so that the plant’s energy stays focused on developing a large, healthy bulb underground. Snap a scape in half, and you’ll recognize the bright aroma of early-season garlic. Scapes store really well (refrigerate in a sealed bag, and they’ll hold for at least a couple of weeks). But, if you use them like you would garlic or a scallion, they probably won’t last that long in your fridge. You can sauté or stir fry. Grill whole. Chop and add to pasta, salad, eggs… It’s incredibly versatile. Have fun experimenting with it on your own or with these two recipes.

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RECIPES

WHITE BEAN AND GARLIC SCAPES DIP
by Melissa Clark, published in the New York Times.
Yield: 1 1/2 cups.
Time: 15 minutes

Melissa is an inspiring food writer, who wrote a great companion piece to this recipe about green garlic (in case you still have some of yours kicking around in your fridge).

GARLIC SCAPES PESTO
For ½ pound short pasta such as penne, add about 2 tablespoons of pesto to cooked pasta and stir until pasta is well coated.

1 cup garlic scapes (about 8 or 9 scapes), top flowery part removed, cut into ¼-inch slices
1/3 cup walnuts
¾ cup extra-virgin olive oil
¼-1/2 cup freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Optional: To bring out the flavor of the walnuts, gently toast them over medium-low heat in a skillet until fragrant. Remove from the skillet immediately. Let cool before processing.

Place scapes and walnuts in the bowl of a food processor and pulse until well combined and somewhat smooth. Slowly drizzle in oil and process until blended. With a rubber spatula, scoop pesto out of bowl and into a mixing bowl. Add parmigiano to taste; add salt and pepper to taste.

Store in an air-tight container in the refrigerator for one week. Or freeze in a thin layer in a sealed freezer bag. Break off a portion of the frozen pesto to use as needed—to flavor pastas or soups or spread on a sandwich.

Adapted from "A Mighty Appetite with Kim O’Donnell" blog, The Washington Post website

CSA Week 3

2010-06-15T06:17:00.000-07:00

The harvest for this week’s CSA share finished early enough that there was a little time to catch up on a few things in the fields. The last tomato stakes were pounded into the ground. Young, delicate tomato plants were carefully tied to the stakes or to overhanging wire trellises (seen here in farm pic). Row covers used to protect spring plantings from cold and wind were pulled off and rolled up. And a cool breeze helped dry things off some after a weekend of rain, so at least no one was working with five pounds of mud clinging to their work boots.
The deficit of rain we experienced in May has been plenty compensated for this first half of June. The long-term forecast this week calls for more rain and cool temperatures-- no higher than in the 70s. This is concerning, as such cool, wet conditions are a welcome mat for mildew and disease, such as dreaded blight, to plants. We’re looking anxiously for some strong sun.
CSA members are on the cusp of seeing a little more variety (that is, less lettuce) in their shares. If you eat a lot of salad, like we do, you can be assured that we do try to offer some kind of salad green just about every week of the CSA season. So, if you haven’t been making your own salad dressings, now might be a good time to start (see the basic vinaigrette recipe below). While we’re sure there are a few decent bottled dressings out there, the majority of commercial dressings are harshly flavored, greasy, and heavy. You can’t toss and gently coat the mix of delicate baby greens you’ve been getting in the last 3 week’s shares with glop. So we strongly encourage you to try making your own. It’s really a cinch.

In this week’s share:
1 bunch beets
1 bunch green garlic
½ pound salad mix
1 head red leaf lettuce
1 bunch spring onions
1 head bok choy
1 bunch cilantro

Early Bird special: We have some extra radish and escarole this week. It’s not enough for everyone, so it’s first come, first serve (we’re going on the hunch that not everyone is going to be lunging for more of either). We’d rather share it with CSA members than see it go to waste.

RECIPES:
If you’re not familiar with cooking beets or are looking for some fresh ideas, The New York Times published a nice article on what makes beets so great and healthy a couple of years ago. It includes a handful of tempting recipes for both the beets and their greens. Beet greens are delicious and nutritious, a good source for beta-carotene, vitamin C, iron and calcium.

How to sauté beet greens:
For an easy weeknight preparation, slice the greens from the beets, rinse and pat or spin dry. Heat 2 tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat until the oil is shimmering. Add the greens and a tablespoon of thinly sliced green garlic. Using tongs, stir and toss the greens until wilted. It should take just a few minutes. Season with Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste. Serve with a squirt of lemon juice and some freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano. Or drizzle with a little balsamic vinegar, and sprinkle with some crumbled blue or goat cheese.

Basic Recipe for Roasted Beets
If you’ve never roasted beets, you’ve got to try it out. The dry heat of the oven tenderizes the beet and concentrates its sugars.

1 bunch Free Bird Farm’s beets, scrubbed but not peeled
1 ½ tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt

Preheat the oven to 450° F. Cut off the tops and trim the bottoms of the beets. If medium in size, slice into wedges, from top to bottom, so that the wedges about 1 ½ inch thick at their widest point. Small beets can be sliced from top to bottom in half. Line a heavy-duty rimmed baking sheet or jelly roll pan with parchment paper. Pile the beet wedges or halves on the baking pan and drizzle with the oil. Sprinkle with a large pinch of salt, and toss to evenly coat. Spread the wedges out evenly on the baking sheet, cut side down, and roast until the undersides of the beets have begun to brown and become crispy, about 20 minutes. Using a spatula, turn the beets and continue to roast until they feel tender when pierced with the tip of a knife or the tines of a fork, about 10 to 15 more minutes.
Remove from the oven and allow to cool slightly. Serve with the skins on or slip off by rubbing the skin portion of the wedges with a sheet of paper towel.

Roasted beets are wonderful on their own with a little butter and salt or a squirt of lemon, or serve with a vinaigrette. They will keep for five days in a covered bowl in the refrigerator. Make a salad with chilled roasted beets, mixed baby greens (from this week’s share), almonds, blue cheese and a vinaigrette.

© Maryellen Driscoll, 2010

Basic Vinaigrette
Yields 5 to 6 Tbs.

At its very simplest, a vinaigrette is a blending of vinegar and oil. Neither two ingredients like to naturally mix, so you often will see recipes that call for a little Dijon mustard used to help emulsify or bind the two main ingredients (as well as add a flavor boost to the vinaigrette). Once you get comfortable with this basic recipe, you can start branching out—trying different vinegars, combinations of vinegars or lemon, orange, or lime juice, adding thickeners like sour cream, yogurt, or even just a little mayonnaise for creaminess, blending in different fresh minced herbs or chopped capers or olives.

¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 small clove garlic, minced or mashed to a paste (or 1 tablespoon minced green garlic from this week’s share)
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar, freshly squeezed lemon juice or other vinegar; more to taste
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
Honey to taste

Add the vinegar to a small bowl or a liquid measuring cup (I like to use my 1-cup Pyrex because it doesn’t tip and makes it easy to pour onto the greens). Add the oil slowly to the vinegar while constantly whisking with a small whisk. (If you don’t own a small whisk, I highly recommend one for this; an inexpensive one is just.) Add the garlic, a pinch of Kosher salt, a few grinds of freshly ground black pepper and a generous drizzle of honey. Whisk to blend. Taste, adjusting the amount of vinegar, oil or other ingredients to your liking.

Tips: It’s helpful if you make the vinaigrette just before serving the salad, since it will separate if it sits. If it separates, whisk until once again evenly blended.

To serve, pour the vinaigrette sparingly over a bowl of greens and toss with a pair of tongs (another favorite kitchen tool). The greens should be pleasantly coated. Taste and add more vinaigrette if needed.

Once dressed with a vinaigrette, greens won’t hold overnight; so dress only as much as you plan to eat.

Double your recipe, use only as much as needed, and store the rest in an airtight container or clean jar with lid in the refrigerator. Before using again, pull the vinaigrette out of the refrigerator so that it can come to room temperature (olive oil will solidify in the refrigerator but return back to a liquid at room temp.). Shake with the container or jar lid on to evenly re-blend the vinegar and oil before serving.

If you have kids, involve them. Let them add everything but the olive oil, which they can whisk in while you slowly pour the oil in or vice versa. If the oil gets dumped in too quickly and doesn't blend, actively whisk it until it's blended (maybe when they're not looking).

CSA Share Week #2

2010-06-08T08:51:00.000-07:00

CSA SHARE WEEK #2

How does your garden grow…?

At our first farmers’ market in late May, an older gentleman politely approached our stand to ask: “Do you have any tomatoes?” We gave the spiel about how locally grown tomatoes don’t normally appear until some time in July. “Well,” he countered, “I thought you might have some left over from last season.”

Though this man’s rebuttal was surely unique, all too often we field questions about when tomatoes and many other vegetables will be available. Our neighbor once asked us if we’d have Brussels sprouts for a Father’s Day dinner. Really, when everything from tomatoes to winter squash and apples and berries can be found year round in supermarkets, why should the average person be familiar with the cycle of a Northeast growing season?

As a CSA member you will get to experience this cycle first hand with your week-to-week shares. Early in the season you’re typically eating lots of salad and greens, as these light, leafy, highly nutritious vegetables are something that will grow relatively early in the growing season.

Many of the crops that you’ll be receiving further into the summer, such as peppers, tomatoes, and eggplant, need a lot of heat to grow, flower, and produce fruit. These plants not only take time but simply can’t be planted until the threat of frost is past in late May.

As growers, we do have some tricks up our sleeves to help some of these slow-to-grow, heat-hungry crops along. For instance, we start these high summer crops on heated grow mats so that the seeds will germinate well before the ground outside is warm enough. And the young plants then get a head start in our greenhouses, which warm up beautifully inside even when it’s 50 degrees outside—so long as it’s sunny. Once it’s warm enough we then transplant them into the fields.

We could have tomatoes in June. A close grower friend does just that. But then he has to charge $3 to $5 per tomato just to cover all his costs—from purchasing nursery-raised plants in winter to burning fossil fuels to keep his greenhouses heated early in the season. We enjoy a fresh tomato, but not that much.

If you’re new to the idea of truly eating in accordance with the growing season, there is this online chart that maps things out fairly well (except somehow it’s got peppers appearing in June; that can’t be). This is just a guide and not specific to what we grow or when we’ll definitely have a crop. But when you start feeling antsy, wondering when you might see a fresh cucumber, this trusty chart might prove useful.

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IN THIS WEEK'S SHARE:
½ pound salad mix (baby lettuce greens, nothing spicy)
1 bunch green garlic
1 head escarole
1 bunch spring onions
1 bunch swiss chard
½ pound spinach
1 bunch Easter egg radish
1/3 pound (4.8 ounces) arugula
1 head red leaf lettuce
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Since this is the time of year you can expect a lot of greens (see letter, above), we thought we'd share with you a couple of our favorite main-course salads that use some of this week's share contents.

RECIPES
Pan-Seared Salmon with Baby Greens
Serves four.

For the dressing:
2-1/2 Tbs. Champagne or white wine vinegar
2 Tbs. fresh orange juice
1 tsp. finely grated orange zest
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup dried cherries
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

For the salmon:
4 6-oz. skinless salmon fillets, preferably center cut
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1-1/2 Tbs. extra-virgin olive oil

For the salad:
8 oz. mixed baby salad greens (about 8 lightly packed cups)
4 radish, very thinly sliced crosswise
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Start the dressing: In a small bowl, combine the vinegar with the orange juice and zest, 1/4 tsp. salt, and a few grinds of pepper. Stir in the dried cherries and set aside.

Cook the salmon: Season the salmon fillets on both sides with 1 tsp. salt and 1/4 tsp. pepper. Heat the oil in a 12-inch skillet over medium-high heat. Cook the salmon, flipping once, until barely cooked through and a rich golden brown crust develops on both sides, 4 to 5 minutes per side. Set aside on a plate.

Finish the dressing: Using a fork or slotted spoon, remove the cherries from the orange juice mixture and set aside. Slowly whisk the 1/2 cup olive oil into the orange juice mixture until blended. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Assemble the salad: Combine the greens and radish in a large bowl. Add about half of the vinaigrette to the salad, toss, and season to taste with salt and pepper. Divide the salad among 4 large plates or shallow bowls. Set a piece of salmon on each salad and sprinkle the cherries around the fish. Drizzle some of the remaining vinaigrette over each fillet and serve.

© Maryellen Driscoll, Free Bird Farm

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Spinach and Artichoke Salad with Couscous Cakes and Feta
Quick-to-cook couscous cakes make this meatless main-course salad satisfying.
Serves three.

For the dressing:
2 Tbs. fresh lemon juice
1 Tbs. sour cream
1 tsp. finely chopped fresh mint
5 Tbs. extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
Honey

For the couscous cakes:
3/4 cup couscous
Kosher salt
1 large clove garlic, peeled
1/4 cup packed fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves (optional)
1/2 cup canned chickpeas, rinsed and drained
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
Finely grated zest of 1 medium lemon (about 1-1/2 tsp.)
3 Tbs. vegetable or canola oil

For the salad:
8 oz. spinach, washed and dried (about 6 lightly packed cups)
1 14-oz. can artichoke bottoms, drained, rinsed, and sliced
4 to 5 radish, very thinly sliced
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 oz. crumbled feta (about 1/4 cup)

Make the dressing:
In a small bowl, combine the lemon juice, sour cream, and mint. Slowly whisk in the olive oil. Season to taste with salt and pepper and honey, if desired.

Make the couscous cakes:
Put the couscous and 1 tsp. salt in a medium bowl. Add 1 cup boiling water to the couscous, cover the bowl with a pan lid or plate, and let sit for 4 to 5 minutes.

Coarsely chop the garlic in a food processor. Add the parsley, if using, and pulse until finely chopped. Add the chickpeas and 1 tsp. salt and pulse until coarsely chopped.

Uncover the couscous and fluff with a fork. Stir in the chickpea mixture, eggs, and lemon zest until well combined. Press the couscous mixture into a 1/4-cup measure, smooth the top, and invert the measuring cup to release the cake onto a plate. Repeat with the remaining couscous mixture to make 9 cakes.

Heat 1-1/2 Tbs. of the vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium heat until shimmering hot. Add 5 of the couscous cakes to the skillet and use a spatula to lightly flatten the cakes so they’re about 3/4 inch thick. Cook, flipping once, until crisp and golden brown on both sides, 2 to 3 minutes per side. Transfer to a paper-towel-lined plate. Add the remaining 1-1/2 Tbs. vegetable oil to the skillet and cook the remaining cakes the same way.

Assemble the salad:
In a large bowl, toss the spinach, artichokes, and radish with about three-quarters of the dressing. Season to taste with salt and pepper and divide among 3 large plates. Top each salad with 3 couscous cakes, sprinkle each salad with feta, and drizzle with the remaining dressing.
© Maryellen Driscoll, Free Bird Farm

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KITCHEN TIPS:

Radish. Radish--whether you're using for salad or simply as a snack with a squirt of lemon juice and a sprinkling of Kosher or sea salt--seems all the more tasty when thinly sliced. If you don't have a mandoline or v-slicer, it can be tricky thinly slicing such a small, round object. The trick is to keep the radish from rolling: slice the stem and root end off first, then set on a cut end and proceed to thinly slice.

Green Garlic. One of our favorite hallmarks of spring is green garlic. Subtle in flavor, it’s an incredibly versatile ingredient. Like a green onion, you can use the white and green portions. It’s all edible. We often using the white portions for sautéing in anything we’d normally use traditional, cured garlic. The green portion is delicious thinly sliced or minced and used as a garnish on top of eggs, pasta or a salad. Or fold into tuna, pasta or a grain salad. Store in your refrigerator.

2010-05-31T20:30:00.000-07:00

Ken and kids lay irrigation line in a row of broccoli to help cool the crop from the recent high heat. We regret to say, that crop of broccoli didn’t hold up. No worries. There will be more.

Letter from the Farm
We love farming. But it’s not nearly as romantic a job as one would think.

Farming is all consuming. We don’t get weekends off, forget about a summer vacation, and even holidays like this week’s Memorial Day are just another work day for us.

Farming is expensive. According to the USDA, operating expense ratios for a “medium-sales small-scale” farm like Free Bird are about 75 percent. That means for every dollar we earn, 75 cents goes to costs. A good example of farming’s steep costs might be the $1400 we recently spent to replace two tractor tires. (At least the other 2 were salvageable.)

Farming is unpredictable. In May, we’ve had damaging frost and unseasonably hot, not-so-helpful 90-degree weather. Last week we had the worst hail we’ve seen on this farm. Amazingly, no damage. And there’s more than just weather to contend with. We have bunnies noshing on new plantings, and coyotes stealing chickens. Ironically, nature isn’t always so compatible with farm life.

So maybe it’s a precarious calling. But as much as we are constantly bracing ourselves for the unexpected, we are equally and steadfastly embracing the many, many positives of what we do. We love the work. We care deeply about what we do. It’s ever changing. Every year is an opportunity to do things better. And we come to know some of the coolest people—fellow farmers, market customers, and CSA members alike.

We’re excited about the upcoming season and getting to know new members as well as catching up with returning members from as near as our small, beautiful town of Palatine Bridge to the southern Adirondacks, Albany, Cooperstown, and two new and dynamic CSA communities in New York City. Our CSA has experienced quite a bit of growth this year; consequently our farm has undergone quite a bit of growth and change. Yet no matter how busy we get, moments like the one in this photo are what define us. We remain what we originally set our hopes and hearts on being, a family farm.

Thanks for growing with us.

Ken & Maryellen
Free Bird Farm

In this week’s share:

1/2 lb. spinach
1/2 lb. mixed baby salad greens
1 bunch green onions
1 head bok choy
5 ounces (1/3 lb.) arugula
1 head romaine lettuce
1 bunch radish
1 bunch cilantro

Farm Facts.
What are the holes in the arugula? That’s the work of itsy, bitsy, voracious-for-the-taste-of-arugula flea beetles. The beetles small size (1/16 inch) and ability to jump are what earns them their name.
To stave them off, we rotate where we plant our arugula each year, and we lay row covers over the crop as soon as the seed is sown. We do not apply pesticides. Despite our efforts, flea beetles find their way to the arugula—through the slightest tear in the cover or a gap in its sides when lifted by the wind. You’re not going to find these bugs in your greens. The holes are merely cosmetic.

Variations in egg size. Bear with us while some of your eggs might be on the small side. Our 5-month-old pullets have just begun to lay, and small eggs are what they first deliver. Fairly soon, our Rhode Island Red chickens will be laying their standard large to extra-large sized eggs for you.

Recycling egg cartons. For all those with egg shares, we’re more than glad to reuse any clean egg cartons—from the eggs we’ve provided or even eggs purchased elsewhere. Bring them to the CSA distribution site.

Recycling rubber bands. Through the course of the season you’ll accumulate quite a few rubber bands we use to bunch a number of our veggies. We can reuse them. So feel free to bring your eventual stockpile to the CSA distribution, and they will get returned to us.

Recipes:We'll do our best to provide recipes each week and ones that are relatively simple since most often cooking with a CSA share means cooking on the fly. We'll also do our best to include recipes that use more than one share ingredient and don't call for additional produce that's not in season. We'll also strive to offer recipes or include variations on recipes, so that they can be enjoyed by all, whether you are a vegetarian or vegan or eat meat.

Mango-cilantro salsa
Serves 3

This quick recipe uses both the cilantro and scallions in your share. It’s great with grilled shrimp, pan-seared salmon, or chicken. Or spoon it over one of the farm’s favorite in-a-pinch meals—black beans, rice and tortillas.

1 heaping cup chopped mango (thawed, frozen mango works fine)
2 tablespoons chopped green onions
2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
1 1/2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lime juice
2 tablespoons mild-flavored oil, such as peanut, walnut or grapeseed
Large pinch of red pepper flakes (or minced fresh jalapeño, amount to your liking)

Combine all of the above ingredients in a small bowl. Season with kosher salt & freshly ground black pepper to taste. Let sit, refrigerated, for up to 4 hours before serving.

Recipe by Maryellen Driscoll

Bok Choy
A relative of cabbage, bok choy is a common ingredient in Asian cuisine. It has a soft crunch and a gentle bitterness. It’s well suited to stir-frying, and we especially like this recipe for stir-fried bok choy with garlic, ginger, and scallions by friend Susie Middleton.

2009-10-30T13:00:00.000-07:00

Week 22

Indeed, this is the last week of our CSA season. We don't consider membership to a CSA suited for everyone, but we hope nonetheless that everyone took something positive away from the experience—whether it meant you found yourself eating healthier, were inspired to cook new things, or simply enjoyed having an abundance of produce picked-that-day fresh. We try hard to provide great shares week after week and hope that, in general, we succeeded. It was a hard growing season, as any of you who keep a garden would know.
Expect soon a year-in-review letter from the farm. We'd like to share with you thoughts on how we would have liked to do better (i.e. more winter squash), why we we may have been short on certain things (aka historically disastrous summer weather), as well how we hope to do some things differently next year. We'll also include a short survey so that we can find out from you what you really liked, what you could live without or would like to see us do differently. Your feedback really counts.

Meantime, this week’s share included:
½ pound spinach
2 pounds potatoes
1 quart Brussels sprouts
1 large yellow onion
1 bunch Toscano kale
1 head of read leaf lettuce
1 bunch leeks
1 bunch parsley
3 green bell peppers (see note below)
1 green cabbage (see storage note below)
1 pound garlic (see storage note below)

Bell peppers. Lately, for every pepper we slice or dice for dinner (or for a morning omelet), we chop one or two extra, slip it into a zipper-sealed bag and stash in the freezer. It’s a nice ingredient to have on hand through winter.

Cabbage. Don't feel like you have to use your cabbage this week. Or next week. Or the next. Cabbage has incredible staying power when stored in the fridge. At some point, however, you might want to use it to try Molly Stevens’ recipe for Braised Cabbage with Maple and Ginger (don’t worry that it calls for red cabbage; use your green one). After trying this recipe, you may feel compelled to seek out her book All About Braising: The Art of Uncomplicated Cooking, which includes this recipe. This cookbook was recently included in the Village Voice's list of “Our 10 Best: Cookbooks" and has won awards from the esteemed James Beard Foundation and the International Association of Culinary Professionals.

Garlic. Unlike the garlic you get at the supermarket (often grown in China), our garlic keeps. So tuck it somewhere dark, dry and cool (not in the refrigerator). If you don't use it all beforehand, it will last until next May or even June—around when fresh garlic starts to appear in the following year's shares.

2009-10-23T04:00:00.000-07:00

WEEK 21

Reminder: One more week left in the CSA season

In this week's share:
2 pounds potatoes
1 quart Brussels sprouts
2 bulbs garlic
1 head of red leaf lettuce
1 large head of bok choy
1 bunch kale
1 onion
1 bunch radish
1 bag mixed peppers
2 delicata or sweet dumpling squash

Re: peppers.
At a farmers' market last week a customer bought half a dozen peppers. Her friend looked stumped, then proceeded to ask what she planned to do with all those peppers. The reply: "I slice them up and eat them for lunch." The friend then grabbed 5 as well. It was a good reminder that these peppers are crispy and sweet enough to enjoy raw; nothing like the thick, leathery peppers with half the bright flavor we often find at the grocery store.
If you haven't been able to make your way through the last 2 weeks' worth of peppers quite so efficiently, chop and freeze them. There's no need to blanch or parcook. Just chop and seal in a freezer bag. Pull them out this winter when making a stir fry, pasta sauce, homemade pizza, among many other possibilities. Or if you've got the time and inclination, roast the peppers and then freeze them.

2009-10-23T03:56:00.000-07:00

Week 20

In this week's share:

1 bag of mixed peppers
1 head of lettuce
1 head of escarole (not to be confused with lettuce)
1 pound of green beans
1 bunch radish
1 onion
2 bulbs garlic
1/2 pound spinach
1 bunch collard greens
1 large or 2 small tomatoes (from a late crop planted in our greenhouse)

2009-10-09T12:04:00.000-07:00

Week 19

We’ve 3 more weeks to the season (22 in all). That means the last week in october is the final week of the CSA season. :(
We included a number of late-summer type crops with you this week that you are not apt to see again (i.e. eggplant, peppers)—especially if we end up with some snow in the next week. We’ve yet to have a frost on the farm, but last we checked there was snow in the forecast.

We’ve got covers over vulnerable greens hoping that they’ll stay protected. But a lot of our hearty end-of-the-season plantings, such as cauliflower and broccoli, which should hold up to a frost, still very much need some sun to grow. Yes, that ever-elusive thing we call sun…

In this week’s share:
1 head of Romaine lettuce
1 head of bok choy
1 bunch of Swiss chard
2 Beatrice Italian eggplants (see cooking tip below)
Bag of spinach
1 cabbage (don’t feel pressed to use this too soon; it will hold for a few weeks in your refrigerator)
1 bunch carrots
3 green peppers—easy to chop & freeze for the winter!
1 bulb of garlic
1 bag of arugula

Getting your vegetables through a CSA often requires you be able to cook on the fly with what you have been given. That's not always so easy. So we try to help you with that when we can. Take eggplant. That’s not exactly a vegetable most people grab for when they need a quick-fix vegetable side. That is, not unless you’ve roasted eggplant. It’s effortless and delicious. Try this recipe: http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/oven_roasted_eggplant.aspx

Something we often do with eggplant is grill it. To grill: slice the eggplant into ¼- to ½-inch thick discs, brush generously with olive oil, season with Kosher salt and grill over medium heat until golden brown on each side. For a simple dinner, we often then halve or quarter the grilled eggplant slices and toss with pasta, chopped sun-dried tomatoes, chopped olives or capers and a little reserved cooking water from the pasta and some extra-virgin olive oil so that the pasta isn’t too dry. For some protein we sometimes add white beans. A minced fresh herb, such as basil, rosemary, oregano or chives, is terrific but not necessary. Serve with grated parmigiano reggiano or crumbled goat cheese.

2009-10-01T13:08:00.000-07:00

Week 18

Let's hope this week's November-like stretch of cold is a precursor to one loooong Indian summer. We've so many beautiful fall crops, but they need sun to grow and come to fruition.

Here is what's in this week’s share:
1 butternut squash
1 bunch radish
1 pound Brussels sprouts
2 pounds potatoes
1 bunch parsley
2 heads lettuce
1 bunch curly-leaf kale
1 bulb garlic
1 pound green beans
1 red onion

2009-09-24T12:37:00.000-07:00

Week 17

In this week’s share:
Bunched fresh red onions
1 bunch kale
1 bunch leeks
7 ounces salad mix
7 ounces spicy greens mix (mesclun)
1 lb. green beans
3 green bell peppers
1 bunch beets

Beets. Don't like 'em? Then maybe you haven't tried them roasted:

1 bunch beets, trimmed, peeled*, and cut into 3/4- to 1-inch-thick wedges
3 Tbs. extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Lemon juice, optional

Heat the oven to 450° F. On a heavy-duty rimmed baking sheet, mound the sliced beets in the middle and drizzle with the olive oil. Toss to coat generously. Sprinkle with salt and a few grinds of pepper, and toss again. Evenly spread the beets cut side down in a single layer across the baking sheet.

Roast until they've begun to brown (or turn a darker red) on their undersides, 15 to 20 minutes. Flip and roast until tender, about 15 minutes more.

Transfer the beets to a serving bowl. Season to taste with Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper. You can also add a squirt of lemon juice or toss with a balsamic vinaigrette and top with crumbled goat cheese.

*If you're short on time or big on shortcuts, you can skip the step of peeling the beets. After roasting, the skins will have loosened and will slip right off on your plate with the help of a fork.

2009-09-17T10:43:00.000-07:00

Week 16

There was a point this season that we weren’t sure we’d get a corn crop. With all the rain and lack of sun the stalks just sat there through July and most of August, not growing. Then, suddenly, they shot off. Our 4-year-old daughter, seen here in perfect fairy form planting her giant pumpkin plants this spring, seems to have an eagle eye for such details and noticed this like a typical kid would notice a new display of balls at the local supermarket. “The corn has taken off!” she exclaimed. Indeed, it did. We planted 2 varieties with different growth cycles—one needing more time to grow than the other—so we’d have a few weeks worth of corn to harvest. Unfortunately, because the plants’ growth was so out of whack, they ripened simultaneously. This happened with a few crops we planted at different times; they matured at the same time because of this year’s poor growing weather. So this season's corn harvest will be a short-lived one. Here and, sadly, gone. Any leftover ears from dinner this week we’ve been slicing and freezing to make Ajiaco, a flavorful Colombian chicken soup we often crave (but just don’t have time to tackle this week!).

In this week’s share:
1 head of Pac Choi (also known as Bok Choy)
1 pound Brussels Sprouts
1 pound Yellow Wax Beans
2 lbs. Yukon gold potatoes
1 yellow onion
10-11 ears sweet corn
1 large Italian eggplant
1 head of Romaine lettuce
7 ounces salad mix

Pac Choi. Like the classic, white-stemmed pac choi (also known as bok choy or pak choi), the beautiful, green-stemmed version we grew this year, called Black Summer, is well suited to stir fries and Asian-flavored soups. If you’re stir frying, you’ll want to slice the thicker stem end of the leaves and cook separately from the leaves since they need more time to cook. Or, similarly, start stir-frying the stems and shortly before their being done, stir in the sliced or chopped leafy part, which should wilt pretty much immediately.

Brussels Sprouts. In our minds, brussels sprouts are a lot like beets. You need to know how to cook them to love them. Like beets, our favorite way to prepare them is to roast them. It brings out a nutty flavor that you may never have known Brussels sprouts to have if all you’ve done is steam them. You can simply toss in olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper and roast as is. Or you may like to branch out with this recipe for Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Dijon, Walnuts & Crisp Crumbs by our friend Martha Holmberg, who is the editor of the food section at the Portland Oregonian and former editor of Fine Cooking magazine. This recipe for Creamy Brussels Sprout Gratin is a little more decadent but surprisingly simple to make.

2009-09-10T10:48:00.000-07:00

Week 15

In this week’s share:
1 honeydew melon
1 bunch carrots
1 large green pepper
1 head of broccoli
1 pound green beans
1 bag of arugula
1 bunch of leeks
1 pound shallots
1 cooking onion (cured; will hold in pantry)
Garlic

One of our members splits her share with her adult daughter who lives and works about 50 minutes away. She recently told us how her daughter travels to her house every Wednesday night so that they can cook a meal together from their share. Then they have fun figuring out how to divvy the rest. We LOVE hearing these stories: how our food brings people together, challenges people to cook something new or with greater spontaneity, provides them fresh, organic ingredients they can't find in the stores, inspires their kids to eat more healthy... Thanks to everyone who shares these tidbits with us. They go a long way.

There are no great mysteries to the ingredients in your share this week. Lots of fresh, practical produce we hope you will enjoy. If you have potatoes left over from last week, it's feeling like just the right weather for some leek and potato soup.

Before slicing into your melon, make sure it is truly ripe. It should give a little when you press into the dimple end with your thumb. If it feels too firm, let it sit on your countertop for a few days until it reaches proper ripeness.

2009-09-04T06:34:00.000-07:00

Week 14

In this week’s share:
1 honeydew melon
1 pint sungold cherry tomatoes
2-3 sweet Italian red peppers
1 bunch carrots or beets
2 pounds red potatoes
1 pound edamame (see last week’s share info.)
2 or 3 bulbs of garlic
1-2 mild cured onions
Bag of mixed young salad greens
1 bunch radish
1 bunch swiss chard

2009-08-26T19:10:00.000-07:00

Week 13

In this week’s share:

watermelon

purple cauliflower (tastes great and holds its gorgeous color when cooked)

1 lb. fresh edamame (see cooking info. below)

2 to 3 tomatoes

8-ounce bag of spinach (not baby in size but tender enough for eating in salads)

1 lb. green beans

2 jalapenos

1 bunch carrots

2 red onions

It’s hard to believe this is our last August share. Where did the summer go? Oh right, we hardly had one(!). Here’s a photo (above) of Ken (right) and our go-to staffer Karl (left) setting up to plant some fall crops in the field. Karl came here from Asheville, NC, to work a season on the farm with us. Some of you have met him. He’s great. Hard working, personable, and lots of fun.

Edamame. Pronounced like eh-dah-mah-may. That would be the name for the small, fuzzy pods with flat, nutty-tasting beans you're seeing for the first time this season in your weekly share. This link: http://www.wikihow.com/Cook-Edamame sums up well how to cook and serve. Our kids chant this fresh soy bean's name when we serve it for dinner. Finger food. Very simple, very tasty.

Tomatoes. Somehow our failing tomato plants are still producing some but an ever-dwindling crop of tomatoes. See last week’s blog for information on how we were affected by this year’s late blight.

Crop report. There’s a frost warning tonight in an area of the Adirondacks about an hour north of us. Any mumblings of this “f” word, let alone in August, make us shudder.

2009-08-20T07:44:00.000-07:00

Week 12

In this week’s share:
3 tomatoes

1 large, round Italian eggplant
1 cucumber
1 bag of salad mix
2 pounds Yukon gold potatoes
¼ pound arugula
1 walla walla sweet onion
1 bunch of parsley
1 bunch of carrots
1 ½ pounds Italian heirloom fresh shell beans (see tips below for cooking and storing)
1 head of broccoli
1 bunch of leeks

We have a CSA member who periodically e-mails us with descriptions of some of the dinners she puts together through the week using her share. It’s inspiring to read about the healthy dinners she is serving to her family of four. And it’s rewarding to see how her CSA share has inspired her to make the most of what comes from the farm. She tells us that this is something she especially enjoys about the CSA: it forces her out of cooking the same thing over and over again.

On the farm, we too can fall into the trap of cooking the same thing over and over again (especially when everyone is working such long hours this time of year). So we glean a lot from talking to (or e-mailing with) CSA members and farmers’ market customers, some of whom are truly accomplished cooks (domestic and professional). This can be especially useful with less obvious ingredients like the colorful Italian heirloom fresh shell beans in this week’s share, pictured above.

We’ve heard from a number of people that they use them for succotash. One farmers market customer planned to use them to make minestrone soup. One chef—confit. We use the beans as many ways as we can think of, as we love their creamy texture and nutty flavor. They’re great in a pasta dish.

Using ingredients from this week’s share, here is one suggestion for using the beans:

Penne with Caramelized Walla Walla Onions, Fresh Shell Beans and Tomato.
We’ll try to flesh out a specific recipe for the future, but, in short, caramelize sliced onion in extra-virgin olive oil over medium heat until deeply golden brown, 12 to 15 minutes. Set aside. Dice tomato and sauté briefly in a few tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil over medium-high heat adding minced garlic towards the end. Toss the penne with the tomatoes, onion, and beans—adding a little more olive oil if needed. Season to taste with Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, and serve with shaved parmigiano reggiano. Some capers would be nice too. Or, even better, stir in some pesto if you have any made from the basil you’ve been getting in the past weeks’ shares.

(For more detailed instructions on how to caramelize the onions, see this recipe for Caramelized Onion Cheeseburgers. You might be tempted to try this recipe too. It calls for both the Walla Wallas and arugula in this week's share.)

The beans would also be great on a grilled pizza with (from this week’s share): arugula, caramelized onion and goat cheese.

Or freeze them. Cook, following instructions below, and freeze in zipper-lock freezer-grade bags to use in soups or stews this winter.

How to Cook Fresh Shell Beans

Shell the beans, discarding the pods. (If you have kids, recruit their help with shelling.)
Cover the colorfully mottled beans in chicken broth or water with a handful of added aromatics—such as (from your share) some leeks, carrot, parsley stems (save the leaves and just add the flavorful stems), and a bay leaf. Either keep the aromatics in large enough pieces that you can easily fish out or bundle in cheesecloth. Bring the water or broth to a boil, and then reduce to a gentle simmer, stirring occasionally, until tender (30 to 45 minutes; taste to check for doneness). Sadly, the beans will lose their color and mottling as they cook. Drain in a colander.

2009-08-13T07:48:00.000-07:00

Week 11

In this week’s share:
3 tomatoes
2 pounds red potatoes
1 head of broccoli
1 bunch of swiss chard (see cooking tips below)
1 bunch of carrots
1 bag of salad mix
1 pound of green beans
2 large onions
1 bulb of garlic

(green bean harvest at right)

Crop Report: Late Blight
In the 10 years we’ve owned our farm, we’ve never experienced weather quite like we’ve had this summer. When July had passed, it was somehow consoling to hear the media report that there had not been a July this cool since some time in the early 1800s. We knew it was bad, but, in fact, it was historically so. With such cool, wet temperatures, we also knew it wasn’t going to be a great year for tomatoes. But, instead, it’s been a disastrous year. The cause: late blight introduced to the Northeast through starter tomato plants imported from the South and sold in stores like Home Depot and WalMart to aspiring home gardeners.
Sadly, our farm has not been immune to the effects of this airborne plant disease. This week we had an agent from Cornell Cooperative Extension come out to our farm to confirm that both our tomato crop and potato crop had been affected by last blight (note: it is not harmful to humans). What this means for CSA members, is that what tomatoes we’re able to share in this year’s CSA season is severely limited and will be short lived. This is pretty disappointing for us to report. We grow more than a dozen varieties of tomatoes (including heirlooms) and put a great deal of time into preparing for this crop—pounding thousands of stakes into the ground, pruning the plants, tying them to the stakes as they grow. Not to mention, since we also sell our produce at farmers’ markets, it’s a significant income loss for our family.
That said, we’re not ones to bellyache or give up. We took a chance weeks ago planting some broccoli plants on the late side, and, thanks to this summer’s lack of heat, we have a gorgeous broccoli crop in the middle of August. And weeks ago, when it started to look like we just weren’t going to get much heat this summer, we compensated by planting crops that do well in cooler times (radish, peas, greens). So, we can at least breathe a sigh of relief that each week’s share has still been abundant.

If you’re interested in learning more about late blight, there was a terrific op-ed this week in the New York Times: You Say Tomato, I Say Agricultural Disaster.

On a lighter note...Swiss Chard. For quick use of this leafy, nutrient-rich green, we like to sauté it. Here’s an excellent recipe for the basic technique of how to sauté swiss chard as well as a host of ideas on how to embellish. If you’re looking for a recipe suited to more of a special occasion, this Creamy Parmesan Swiss Chard Gratin is decadent.

2009-08-06T09:18:00.000-07:00

Week 10

In this week’s share:
1 lb. green beans
½ lb. mix baby lettuce greens
3 cucumbers
1 bunch of carrots (standard, purple or Parmex—a stubby, Parisian market variety suited to freezing.)
1 bulb of garlic
1 Walla Walla large, sweet onion
3 to 4 tomatoes
Patty pan squash
1 bunch beets
1 bunch cilantro
1 bunch basil

Green beans. These are so fresh, there’s little you have to do to make these taste great. We usually cook them in a large skillet with a few tablespoons of butter or extra-virgin olive oil and a small amount of water (about 3 tablespoons) over medium-high heat. When the water comes to a boil, cover the pan for just a couple of minutes to steam-cook the beans ever so slightly (they’ll turn bright green). Remove the lid, toss with tongs and let the remaining water cook off. Tossing periodically with tongs to cook the beans evenly and coat with the melted butter or oil. Remove from the heat once crisp tender. Season with a large pinch of Kosher salt and serve.

Cilantro. We liked this recipe for cilantro coconut rice that one of our members shared with us last year (feel free to share recipes in the comment section of this blog!).

Another member shared with us how she kids manages to get a lot of our vegetables into her kids and spouse by making spring rolls—grating or slicing into fine julienne carrots, yellow zucchini, cabbage, and/or cucumbers and wrapping in rice paper. You can add shrimp or tofu as well as your cilantro or basil. A sweet-and-sour-type dipping sauce sweetens the package deal. (Recipes anyone?)

What to do with all those cucumbers. Snack! Also, we just made this homemade falafel with tomato and cucumber salad. It was a hit with lunch guests and really simple. You can also make a Thai-style cucumber salad and served with grilled satay. Or if you like the idea of Thai food but can’t find all the ingredients for satay, this Grilled Thai Chicken is simple and so delicious. We try to cook this at least once every summer.

2009-07-30T09:16:00.000-07:00

Week 9

In this week’s share:

1 pound yellow wax beans

6-ounces arugula

1 Napa cabbage

1 head of red Romaine lettuce

Tomatoes (1 or 2 depending on size)

1 bunch of basil

1 12-ounce bag of snow peas

2 large red onions with green tops

Garlic (see storage tips below)

There are a number of items in this week’s share that can combine nicely. Below is an adaptation of a recipe for Green Bean Salad with Tomatoes, Arugula & Basil Dressing that Maryellen developed for a Fine Cooking magazine last summer. It makes use of the yellow beans, arugula, tomatoes, basil and onion tops in this week’s share.

This recipe for Hoisin Pork with Napa Cabbage (click on recipe name to connect to link) is a nice week-night stir fry. Kids are apt to like this one. Instead of using red bell pepper, as the recipe suggests, you can throw in some of your snow peas. And finely slice some of the green tops on your red onions in place of the chives. Or if you’d like to make use of your snow peas on their own, here’s another tempting stir-fry recipe: Sesame Chicken with Ginger and Snow Peas. To be truthful, we can’t say we’ve tried either of these recipes. But we’ve known author Tony Rosenfeld for many years. He’s a gifted cook, and writes recipes that work for real people living real (busy) lives. So we feel pretty comfortable recommending these two recipes.

We’re big on garlic. It finds its way into our dinners pretty much every night. So, to us, a bulb a week doesn’t seem over the top. If you’re not using up your garlic that fast, however, take heed. So long as you store it in a relatively cool (but not refrigerated), dry location and out of the sun, it will hold up for a good long while (unlike the garlic you’ll find in the supermarkets that typically comes from China). And if you feel like using up a bunch, here’s yet another Tony Rosenfeld recipe for slow-cooking garlic in extra virgin olive oil. It tempers and sweetens the garlic’s flavor and results in a creamy texture—much like roasted garlic. Only, you don’t have the sticky mess of squeezing cloves out of the skins, and you end up with a garlic-infused oil with which you can cook or use to make salad dressings. Spread the garlic and oil on a slice of a crusty bread and top with sliced tomato and basil (from your share), some goat cheese if you like too. It makes a simple appetizer or side to a salad. Slow-cooked garlic is a natural in pasta dishes. Use for a pizza topping. And if you still can’t use it up within a week’s time, put it in an airtight container and freeze for later use. We often make a double batch. It’s that good.

RECIPE:
Yellow Wax Bean Salad with Tomatoes, Arugula & Basil Dressing

Serves four.

1/2 cup loosely packed basil leaves

1 small strip lemon zest, about 3 inches long and 1/2-inch wide, white pith removed

3 tablespoons cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 Tbs. kosher salt; more to taste

1 lb. fresh yellow wax beans, trimmed (long ones snapped in half)

1 cup arugula, rinsed and spun dry

1 tomato chopped into ½-inch pieces

¾ cups (5 oz.)1-inch-wide fresh mozzarella balls (ciliegine), halved

2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice; more to taste

Fill a large (8 qt.) stockpot ½ full of water and bring to a boil over high heat. Put the basil and lemon zest in a medium-to-large sieve, immerse it in the boiling water and blanch for 5 seconds. Remove, tapping the sieve over the sink to shake off excess water. Turn off the burner but leave the water in the pot with the cover on. Roughly chop the lemon zest. Put the basil and lemon zest in a blender and pulse a few times to chop the leaves. With the blender running, pour the olive oil through the lid’s fill hole and process for 30 seconds. Scrape down the sides of the blender and continue to purée until smooth, 30 to 60 seconds more. Transfer to a small dish or liquid measuring cup, and cover. Refrigerate until ready to assemble the salad.

Return the water to a boil over high heat. Remove the cover and add the salt and then the beans. Cook until the beans are crisp-tender or fully tender, depending on your preference, 4 to 6 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water. Spread the beans on a large rimmed baking sheet and refrigerate to cool completely. If making more than an hour ahead, cover with plastic wrap.

In a large bowl, combine the cooled beans with the arugula, tomatoes, and mozzarella. Drizzle with the basil oil and the lemon juice. Toss with tongs. Season to taste with salt and pepper and more lemon juice.

2009-07-23T07:25:00.000-07:00

Week 8

This past week our green beans were prepared by American Hotel chef Lee Wolver for an upcoming Rachel Ray segment on the Food Network. Lee uses a lot of our produce as well as our chicken in his menu. If you haven't been to the American Hotel in Sharon Springs (or haven't been lately), now is a beautiful time of year to check it out. Well, any time of year it's a really pleasant place to dine.

Walla Walla Sweet onions have arrived. These big, bulbous onions make us smile. They have a nice balance of bright sweet flavor and zesty onion bite when served raw, be it in a green or pasta salad or a sandwich. Sliced thick, they brown beautifully on the grill. Sliced thin and slowly cooked over medium to medium-low heat in olive oil and/or butter (stir occasionally), they melt down into a perfect portion of caramelized onions. Ideal in a pasta dish or bruschetta. These are very juicy, fresh onions not meant for on-the-counter or cupboard storage. Keep in your fridge.

Farm report.
This is a busy week. We're in the throes of squeezing a pretty giant garlic harvest in along with everything else we're trying to normally do in a week. So everyone is working straight out. No days off. Dinners late. Everyone stinking of, aaaah, garlic. And the crop looks great.

In this week’s share:
1 pound of green beans
Cucumbers
1 big Walla Walla onion (refrigerate; for more info., see above)
1 bunch of parsley
1 bunch of Swiss chard
1 bulb of garlic
Green cabbage
½ pound of salad mix
Cauliflower—purple or white
1 head of escarole (not to be confused with lettuce)

2009-07-16T08:23:00.000-07:00

CSA Share Week 7

On Sugar Snap Peas

As you may have noticed, we care a lot about quality. At a farmers’ market last week, Maryellen just didn’t have the heart to sell the salad mix that was harvested for that day. It just wasn’t looking as good as it should. Now salad mix is a popular item at our markets, and farmers’ markets are an important means for supporting our farm, but, to us, that’s all the more reason not to sell something that doesn’t meet our standards.

So it felt a bit strange this week, packing up sugar snap peas for the CSA shares knowing that, because the pea plants were at the end of their life cycle, some of the peas were showing their age, with less-than-smooth shells and some with “rust”—little dark spots you’ll sometimes see on mature green beans too. In this situation, however, we urge you to look beyond any cosmetic imperfections and taste. These peas are delightfully sweet and snappy and meant to be enjoyed just as they are, fresh and whole. It would be a shame to let them go past in the field.

Of course, we gave you a heaping pile, so if you would rather, they can be shelled. Some children prefer to eat them this way, including our food-fussy toddler. It requires some effort, of course. We peel open the pod, “ooh” and “ahh” over what’s inside--how many peas there are, how big and plump they look, …. and he pops them into his mouth while we eat the sweet leftover pods. Our 4-year-old daughter, who likes to go out to the sugar snap pea crop after dinner for “dessert,” gets in on the game too and inevitably adds an element of sibling rivalry—who can find the most peas in a pod.

Crop Report

With all this remarkably cool, wet weather we’ve had this summer, many of our plants simply aren’t progressing as usual. Usually we’ve heaps of green beans and the beginning of our tomato crop coming in at this point in the season. The plants are standing, they’re just in need of some sun and heat to progress. Hopefully they’ll both be part of your share soon.

In this week’s share:

1 bunch of leeks

1 bunch of purple carrots

1 big head of broccoli

1 large bag of mesclun mix

1 head of garlic (okay to leave out and cure on countertop at this stage)

1 bunch of radish

Mixture of patty pan squash, zucchini, and yellow summer squash

Heaping quart of sugar snap peas

1 bunch of green onions (store in the refrigerator)

2009-07-09T08:46:00.000-07:00

CSA Share Week 6

We’re so glad to be seeing those purple carrots. We think they’re pretty amazing. If anything, we love that our 4-year-old daughter eats them like they’re candy. Now if only our toddler would take after her that way. This variety, called Purple Haze, has more carrot taste than just about any other carrot we’ve eaten. Certainly, it beats the woody, flavorless ones we too often encounter in stores. They’re terrific as a fresh snack, but we also love to roast them as it concentrates their sweet flavor. Before roasting, wash the carrots but don’t bother peeling. Toss with extra-virgin olive oil and sprinkle with salt. Roast in a 425° F oven on a baking sheet with raised edges until they feel tender when skewered with a fork, 25 to 30 minutes. About halfway through cooking, do shake the baking pan back and forth so that the golden undersides of the carrots roll to face upwards.

In this week’s share:
1 bunch purple basil (see storage tip below)
1 head of Romaine lettuce
1 red cabbage (see recipe ideas below)
Broccoli
1 bunch of green onions (make use of the fresh, green tops!)
5 zucchini
1 head of garlic (you can let “cure” on the countertop--out of direct sun—for longer storage)
1 bunch of beets
1 bunch of purple carrots

Basil is delicate and quick to go by. Store it in your fridge, stem side down in a cup with a little water. Tent the leafy tops with a plastic bag to protect from the refrigerator’s cold air.

Re: CABBAGE
We know cabbage is the kind of thing some people can’t get enough of and others don’t know what to do with (or just don’t like). Here are a couple of recipes that might convert the latter camp.

Red Leaf & Cabbage Salad with Grilled Tarragon Chicken
If you have red leaf lettuce left over from last week, that’s what this recipe calls for. Otherwise, substitute with this week’s Romaine. And don’t hesitate to substitute the fresh tarragon for this week’s basil or last week’s parsley, if you still have that on hand. Don’t bother buying a shallot. Use the white bulb part of one of your smaller green onions.

Grilled Red and Green Cabbage Slaw
Grilled cabbage? Why not! Doesn’t everything taste better on the grill? And you get to make use of your green onions too.
Here are some tips on how to get around buying ingredients you might not have for this recipe:
Substitute basil or parsley for the tarragon;
Use all red cabbage (no need to go buy yourself a green head);
Also, don’t feel like you need tarragon vinegar. A red or white vinegar, even balsamic, can make a fine substitute.

2009-07-02T13:26:00.000-07:00

At right: Colorado Potato Beetles Attack (read below how we fight back, one bug at a time)

CSA Share Week 5

NEWS: We’re Now Certified Organic!
Weeks after our farm inspection, we’ve finally received notice: we’re officially Certified Organic. We appreciate the number of people who encouraged us to do this because they believed in us, knew we were in this for the long haul, and believed the benefits of being certified would outweigh the work (and cost) involved in being certified. But what really inspired us to move forward on this was the ongoing frustration of knowing we followed all the rules but legally could not call ourselves “organic.” The certifying process was challenging, as expected. We started as early as January. Ken spent a day at a winter workshop going over all the ins and outs of the application and then spent hours filling out paperwork, which included a 15-page application addendum just to be able to package our salad mixes in labeled, sealed containers. But the paper work involved with being certified organic pales to the physical work that truly distinguishes us from conventional growers. Case in point: Colorado potato beetles (see pic above). They’re all over our potato crop. But instead of spraying them with a chemical pesticide, we hand pick them one by one. Or if there’s a good cluster of them, you can brush them off as a bunch into a container. Left to their devices, these bugs will at the very least affect a crop’s yield. At worse, they’ll kill the crop. This year they’re pretty bad. If not for the tireless efforts of a few people over the course of nearly two days this past week, our potato crop would likely have been ruined. Okay, the two days of work also involved hand weeding as they went along too—yet another difference between organic growing practices and conventional. We simply don’t use chemicals to kill weeds. The list of differentiations could go on, but it seemed fitting that we receive our approval the week we’re hand picking bugs from the field.

Rain, rain go away…
Many people are asking if all this rain is becoming a problem on our farm. Yes, it is. The ground is too wet to prepare seed beds. So we can’t directly seed into beds for new crops, and plants long ready to be moved out of the greenhouse and into the field are overdeveloping in their pots for lack of prepared beds to plant into. Of course, all this rain and lack of sun isn’t so great for what’s in the fields either. Certain crops become vulnerable to disease (last year this is what seriously compromised our tomato crop), and many simply don’t progress without much-needed sun. Bees don’t like all this rain either. So they’re not out helping to pollinate important crops like green beans, squash, cucumbers and melons.

Despite all this cool, wet weather, we did manage to pull together a nice, big share for the holiday weekend:
· 1 bunch of swiss chard
· 1 big head of red lettuce
· 1 bulb of fresh garlic
· Quart of snap peas
· A few zucchini
· A few yellow summer squash
· 1 head of broccoli
· 1 bunch of radish
· 1 bunch of spring onions
· 1 bunch of carrots—the first of the season
· 1 bunch parsley

As bountiful as this might seem, you can easily work through half your share in a meal. For example, this is what we had for dinner the other night: penne with grilled onions, zucchini (or summer squash), chard with olives and goat cheese (feta or shaved parmigiano reggiano would work well too). Then we had a big salad on the side.
This isn’t exactly a recipe, but here’s some general info. on how this was prepared: thinly slice ¼ head of garlic (see instrux below) and gently simmer in extra-virgin olive oil over medium-low heat until fragrant. Remove from the heat and grate zest from half a lemon into the oil. Cut off the onions green tops and slice the lower bulb part in half lengthwise. Cut the squash diagonally into ¼-inch thick ovals. Brush onions and squash with olive oil, season with salt and pepper, and grill over medium-high heat until golden brown—3 to 5 minutes per side. Rinse the chard and the lay the bunch on the grill spread out some so that it wilts and some lightly browns, flipping after a couple of minutes.
Chop the onion and chard (discarding the thick lower part of stems if desired) and toss with pasta, chopped olives, garlic oil, the grilled squash, and some reserved pasta cooking water (as needed). Add a generous squirt of lemon juice and season with salt and pepper to taste. Sprinkle with crumbled goat cheese and minced parsley.
About fresh garlic: at this stage in the season, the garlic can sit out on the counter. It won’t spoil. It will just lose moisture and “cure.” Refrigerating will help keep the outer papery layers stay supple so you can use all but the woody stem in the middle of the bulb. We’ve been halving the garlic (top to bottom), removing the woody stem, and slicing thinly across the half bulb. No need to extract individual cloves yet. It’s all edible. Store whatever is left in an airtight container in the refrigerator.

2009-06-26T04:02:00.001-07:00

Week 4
Yes, you’re seeing strawberries in your share for the 3rd week in a row. We’ve had a terrific crop and are really glad to be able to offer these this year. Sadly, this is likely the last week you’ll be seeing them for the season. It’s a short-lived crop, and our plants are at the tail end of production. Strawberries aren’t the easiest crop to grow or pick, so we’ve not been taking one berry for granted. We’ve been eating them with waffles, pancakes, on cereal, as a snack morning, noon, night…sometimes with homemade shortcakes and some whipped heavy cream we are able to buy from a farm right in our neighborhood. Next and most likely last…strawberry ice cream!

Strawberry storage tip: If you need to hold your strawberries, here's how we have the most luck. Rinse, spread on a cooling rack set over a baking sheet and set in a safe place in the refrigerator. If you're going to freeze, rinse, air dry and then spread in a single layer on a baking sheet to par-freeze in the freezer before freezing in a freezer-safe bag or container. The par-freezing step helps prevent the berries from sticking together.

In this week’s share:

1 quart of strawberries
½ pound bag of salad mix
1 large head of broccoli
1 bunch of red spring onions
1 humungous head of romaine lettuce
1 bunch of kale
1 bulb of garlic
3 zucchinis

2009-06-18T09:52:00.000-07:00

17-June-2009 share contents:

8 oz. mild mesclun mix
1 bunch cilantro
1 gigantic head of red leaf lettuce
1 bunch red spring onions
1 quart strawberries
1 head of escarole (see cooking ideas below)
garlic scapes

That thick-leaf, light-green head of lettuce—or what looks like lettuce—is actually escarole. You can eat this member of the chicory family raw, but its bitter flavor is nicely tempered when cooked. I recommended this Fine Cooking recipe for Sausage, Escarole and White Bean Stew last year, and I can’t help but do the same again—esp. while we’re having this cool, rainy weather. It’s great.

If you’re looking for a meat-free option, try this recipe for Sautéed Escarole with Raisins, Pine Nuts, and Capers.

To be honest, I usually don’t follow the initial step of blanching before sautéing as this recipe instructs, and I’m quite happy w/the results. But that might just be the difference between working with escarole that’s just been picked from the fields versus the tough stuff you find in the markets. See what you think.

As for garlic scapes, chop them up and add to eggs, salad, a sauté or a stir-fry. Chop by hand or mince them in a food processor and store in a sealed container to add to your dinners throughout the week. Stored in a plastic bag, garlic scapes hold up for a couple of weeks.

2009-06-10T20:06:00.000-07:00

June 10, 2009

Strawberries!!! We’re excited to be able to offer them this year and hope you really enjoy them. As you see, we have been.

Expect June to continue to consist of a lot of greens. That’s simply what thrives in what has remained relatively cool, dry weather. The great thing about greens is that you can build a meal around them. Maryellen just had 4 such recipes published in the recent issue of Fine Cooking. You can find the following recipes in the June/July issue as well as being rotated on the magazine’s web site http://www.finecooking.com/: Almond-Crusted Chicken and Nectarine Salad with Buttermilk-Chive Dressing, Pan-Seared Salmon with Baby Greens and Fennel, Grilled Steak with Pineapple-Ginger Dressing and Spinach and Artichoke Salad with Couscous Cakes and Feta. This really isn’t meant to be a shameless plug; they’re just in-season and relatively easy-to-make recipes that you can refer to and riff from. For instance, substitute the strawberries for the nectarines, since nectarines aren’t quite yet in season or substitute this week’s romaine for the spinach. We had the couscous cakes as a side dish this week but instead of using herbs we stirred in some of that spring garlic pesto mentioned in last week’s blog.

Storage tips:
To minimize our use of plastic bags, we aren’t packaging heads of lettuce. They come in your share as is. The lettuce really does need to be sealed somehow, however, so that it holds its moisture and, thus, structure. We’d recommend washing, spinning and storing in a salad spinner. Salad spinners do a great job of holding lettuces and other greens. We have one by Oxo that we like but also onced owned one by Zyliss that worked terrifically as well. If you don’t have a salad spinner, you can always clean and reuse the bags last week’s salad mix or arugula were packed in. You know, reduce, reuse…recycle.

What's in this week’s share:

1 quart strawberries

8 oz. mixed baby lettuce leaves aka “salad mix”
1 bunch Easter egg radish
1 large head of Romaine (perfect for Caesar Salad with or without grilled chicken)
2 bunches spring onions*
1 bunch spring garlic*

*The white portions of the onions and garlic are well suited when sliced to sautéing over medium heat until lightly golden. Or halve lengthwise and grill. We’ve been eating them with everything from eggs to last night’s dinner of gnocchi with wilted arugula (from last week’s share), Tongue of Fire shell beans (frozen from last year’s crop) and shaved parmigianno reggiano cheese.

2009-06-05T12:45:00.000-07:00

3-June-2009

This is it. The CSA season has begun and we’re up and, believe me, running. It’s a very busy time on the farm—planting, planting, planting. The weeds are starting to make their presence known, so we’re working hard to stay on top of them since they can easily out-compete certain plantings. A good friend came for a few days this week to visit and help however she could. She was put on a carrot-weeding assignment—one of the toughest young crops to weed. At this stage the carrot plants are itsy fern-like wisps barely rooted in the ground. The weeds were beginning to tower over and shoulder their way into them, so pulling the weeds without taking the carrot plant too, she learned, can be tricky. After two days at the task, mostly on hands and knees, the rows were spotless and we jumped at the chance to irrigate. (Maybe you notice the soil looking a little parched here.) So, when those first purple carrots show up in a share, we’ll all have to give thanks to our friend and resolute weeder Susie.

Here’s what is in this week’s share:

8 oz. mixed baby lettuce leaves aka “salad mix”
4 oz bag of arugula (narrow green loose leaves with addictive peppery punch)
1 bunch Easter egg radish
Lettuce (2 heads Romaine or 1 head Romaine and 2 to 3 heads mixed baby heads of lettuce)
1 bunch spring onions (use the green tops and white bottoms—just like a scallion)
1 bunch spring garlic (looks like onions but with bigger bulb bottoms and definite garlic smell)

Other notes:
May was a cool month. And we woke despairingly to a widespread frost the 1st of June. We’re still waiting to see if the frost killed our sweet potato crop. So while there’s LOTS planted in the fields and in the greenhouse (see pic above), nothing in our fields has really shot off. We need some heat, and rain would be good too. As late spring often goes, expect your share to be on the smaller side at the start of this season. And be prepared for it to be heavy on greens this time of year as well. Leafy greens are what thrive in cool-ish spring weather and take the least amount of time to grow. More on this subject later.

Re: garlic
This is spring garlic. All of it can and should be eaten--both the green tops and white bottoms. We’ve composted what remained of our cured bulb garlic from last year (it was getting pretty punky anyhow) and now cook with this instead. It's one of our favorite hallmarks of spring--up there with robins, lilacs and sore backs.

I tend to chop the white bulbs and use it just like I would regular garlic. Sometimes the outermost skin layer is tough and needs to be peeled off. While still tender, the green tops are great sliced or finely chopped and added to eggs or most any salad—potato, pasta, bean, rice or a leafy green salad. I haven't tried this, but I bet it would be nice pureed with some extra-virgin olive oil to make a green garlic pesto that you can drizzle over pasta or some grilled fish or meat.

Week 20; October 15, 2008

2008-10-16T10:45:00.000-07:00

It’s hard to believe this is the last share. We wish it could carry on for a few more months. Maybe soon enough we’ll be able to swing winter shares.
Meantime, thanks to all those people who signed up. Thanks too for all of the positive feedback. It really helps keep us going.

There’s a lot in this share that is either familiar to you or is becoming familiar to you—like edamame (see Aug. 20/week 12 blog entry for info. on how to cook).

Spaghetti squash might be one novelty. This is one squash you don’t often see featured in cookbooks or recipes. Maybe it’s because it’s really easy to cook:

Preheat oven to 350°F. Cut the squash in half lengthwise and scoop out the seeds. Brush both halves with the butter and sprinkle with the brown sugar. Place them, cut sides down, on a baking sheet and roast until fork-tender, about 1 hour.

Apparently, you can also easily cook it in a microwave in less than 20 minutes. See recipe link below for information on how to do this as well as how to spice up this relatively neutral-flavored squash. The Moroccan flavor profile of the squash would go nicely with some seared lamb chops or grilled lamb kabobs. Add some peppers and onion to the kebab if you have any left over from last week’s share.

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/SPAGHETTI-SQUASH-WITH-MOROCCAN-SPICES-106168

In this week’s share:
½ pound spinach
½ pound salad mix
2 pounds yellow potatoes
1 spaghetti squash
1 pound garlic
3-4 Japanese eggplants
1 pound edamame
1 head of Romaine
2 bunches of beets
1 bunch of carrots

Week 19, Oct. 8, 2008

2008-10-10T09:42:00.000-07:00

Unfortunately, this is the 2nd to last share of the season. Next week is the last.

We’ve been hit by frost a couple of times this week, so some of those warm-weather vegetables you were perhaps surprised to still be getting in recent weeks are now history. But, fortunately, there are plenty of cool-weather vegetables to enjoy.

Here’s what was in this week’s share:
1 bunch parsley
handful of garlic
1 head of romaine lettuce
1 lb of shallots
2 bunches of beets—the regular red beets are Bulls Blood, the rose-colored ones with the bulls-eye pattern are Chiogga
2 delicata squash
Bag of spinach
½ lb. arugula
1 Napa cabbage
1 watermelon

Week 18; October 1, 2008

2008-10-02T07:35:00.000-07:00

While the cooler weather makes most of us long for comfort foods like squash and potatoes (in this week’s share), we’ve been lucky to not yet get hit by a frost here. So we have been able to still include some frost-vulnerable crops like green beans, peppers and eggplant.

Tips:
If you’re “done” with peppers, chop them up, put in a freezer-safe bag and store in the freezer.
Now that It’s cool enough to turn on the oven, try roasting eggplant. Brush the cut side with oil, season with salt and roast, cut-side down first so that it turns a nice golden-brown color. That gives a nice caramelized flavor to the surface while the insides turn a creamy consistency. You can always serve with a roast chicken, rice and a chutney. (If you’re in Cooperstown, Tanna’s extra spicy garlic and ginger chutney—sold at Cooperstown Natural Foods any day of the week—is addictive.)
The mesclun mix has some greens with kick in it. We were thinking of pairing it tonight with some of the butternut squash in this recipe for Roasted Butternut Squash Salad with Maple Sherry Vinaigrette: http://www.taunton.com/finecooking/recipes/roasted_butternut_squash_salad.aspx Just modify the recipe so that you’re using the mesclun mix instead of the greens called for in the recipe.

Here’s what was in this week’s share:

1 head of romaine lettuce
Bag of mesclun mix
1 pound of green beans
2 red peppers
2 eggplants
1 butternut squash
1 bunch purple carrots
Purple potatoes
Cilantro
Garlic
Cured onion

Week 17; Sept. 24, 2008

2008-09-26T06:44:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the delayed posting…
On this wet weekend, you might want to make a soup with some of your veggies. We nursed ourselves through our first colds for the season (that is, the school season) with a vegetable soup made from chicken broth, green beans, spinach (kale would work too), potatoes, leeks, chopped tomatoes and basil. See below for some other cooking suggestions.

Here’s what was in this week’s share:
1 pound beans—green or yellow wax
½ pound cooking spinach
1 acorn squash
1/2 pound mild mesclun mix
bunch of leeks
1 bok choy
1 bunch of red Russian kale
red potatoes
garlic
red onion

Bok choy- well suited to stir-frying; slice leaves into ½-inch strips and thicker, wider portion towards bottom of leaves into thinner strips, about ¼-inch wide, so that it cooks at the same rate as the leafy portion

Acorn squash- not a squash well-suited to peeling; best roasted
Here’s how:
Preheat oven to 400° F and line a roasting pan or rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper or foil
Slice a thin slice off both ends and then slice in half perpendicular to the ribs
Scrape out seeds
Rub cut sides and hollowed center with butter
Season with salt
Roast “bowl” side facing up until very tender when pierced with a fork, about 1 to 1 ½ hours

Kale- good braised or sautéed or chopped up in an early fall vegetable soup (see above); kale goes well with any cured meat—bacon, pancetta, ham—and garlic

Week 16, Sept. 17, 2008

2008-09-18T08:08:00.001-07:00

For all those hankering for comfort-type foods, we’re moving fast into fall crops. Hopefully not too fast. We’re a bit nervous about tonight’s frost warning. We’re covering up delicate crops, like greens, today to keep them protected. And then, well, we pray.

Some cooking notes from Maryellen:
winter squash- slice this in half down its length and scrape out seeds (to make a boat shape); brush cut side with oil and gently roast on a heavy baking sheet or baking pan (350° to 425° F is a safe range) ; if you place cut side down on the pan, you’ll get more caramelized flesh, which will taste toasty and sweet; I usually then just serve with butter and a sprinkling of brown sugar or maple sugar

Peppers: taste the Italian sweets—the long tapered variety—fresh; we’ve never tasted a pepper so sweet and crisp

Sweet corn: probably the last you’ll see this season; if you’ve had enough, blanch and freeze it for when you’re hankering for some this winter; or make chowder!

In this week’s share:
2 delicata squash
1 pound green beans
1 bunch parsley
2 ½ lbs. white potatoes
½ lb. salad mix
½ lb. spinach
1 bunch purple carrots
1 onion
bag of red peppers
half dozen or so ears of sweet corn
1 watermelon

Week 15, Sept. 10, 2004

2008-09-11T12:34:00.000-07:00

I’ve been holding off on roasting beets all summer—just because I hate to turn on my oven that time of year. It’s my absolute favorite way to eat them. The roasting seems to concentrate their sugars; they just taste so sweet. I can’t count how many farmers market customers I’ve converted into beet lovers by telling them to try roasting them. Roasting, in general, is a pretty flexible technique in terms of temperatures and times, but here’s a basic guideline:

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.

For 1 pound of beets: trim, peel (or don’t; the peels will slip right off when rubbed with a towel or pressed with your fork after roasting) and cut into 1-inch-thick wedges. Toss with enough extra-virgin olive oil to generously coat (1 to 3 Tbs.). Toss with Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper. Spread on a heavy-duty rimmed baking sheet. Roast for 15 to 20 minutes or until undersides are beginning to turn golden brown along the edges. Flip and continue roasting until tender, about 15 minutes.

I like to then serve with balsamic vinegar and crumbled blue cheese or goat cheese.

In this week’s share:

1 pound edamame (see wk. 12 share info. for cooking instructions)
Salad mix
1 pound of beets
1 large onion
1 canteloupe
7 to 8 mixed sweet peppers, mostly red
10 ears of corn
2 pounds white potatoes
yellow wax beans
1 bunch carrots

Week 14; September 3, 2008

2008-09-04T09:11:00.000-07:00

Our tomatoes are hanging in there, despite the damage from all the rain we had this summer. We haven’t seen or heard of anyone’s tomatoes thriving this summer—on farms or in small gardens—so we’re glad we can still keep them coming thus far.
Now, of course, we’ve hit a dry spell. We just keep nursing new seedlings with drip irrigation so that we’ll hopefully have plenty of fall greens!
Meantime, some of summer’s best are now peaking—like melons! And the peppers are sweet. We’re not one to snack on peppers, but these are so crisp and light on the palate that that’s just what we’ve been doing—when not eating the melon, that is.

In this week’s share:

1 cantaloupe
4 heirloom tomatoes
1 bag of mixed sweet peppers (6 to 7)
1 bunch of beets
1 large white onion
12 ears of corn
½ pound of salad mix (these are baby lettuce leaves, so a light dressing like a homemade vinaigrette is recommended)

Week 13; August 27, 2008

2008-08-28T17:59:00.000-07:00

It hasn’t always felt like it, but summer is still here. Here’s what was in this week’s share:

2 bunches of carrots
½ pound salad mix
1 ½ pound shell beans
1 cucumber
1 to 2 eggplants, depending on size
6 tomatoes
1 large onion
1 bulb of garlic
1 bunch of parsley
1 bunch of basil
1 pound of purple beans (unfortunately, these will lose their regal color once cooked; serve fresh with a green goddess dressing or hummus?!)
6 ears of sweet corn

The corn was at its peak of maturity, which is when the bugs love it. So we did our best to find ears that weren’t buggy. That would explain why a lot of the husk was peeled back or off. If you haven’t already eaten it, it holds best wrapped in a damp towel in a zipper-lock bag in the produce drawer of your refrigerator.

The lima-like beans with the mottling on the pods are fresh shell beans. We love these. Cook them just like you would a dried bean. Because they’re fresh, however, they shouldn’t need quite as much time to cook.

To cook shell beans: Remove the beans from their pods. Place them in a pot of water with aromatics, such as onion, peppercorns and a bay leaf (I’ll also throw in carrot trimmings if they’re kicking around). Bring to a boil, and then lower to a simmer until they are tender. Stir occasionally. Depending on the age of the bean, the amount of time needed to cook varies. I recommend tasting beginning after about 20 minutes. We have hard water, so it can take twice that time in my kitchen. I’m going to try adding a little baking soda to the water this year to soften it and, hopefully, speed things along. I know that helps when cooking dried beans.

You can use them with your corn to make succotash. They’re also great in pasta. Last night we caramelized some onion, browned some diced eggplant in extra-virgin olive oil, and then simmered them briefly with chopped tomatoes, more extra-virgin olive oil and minced garlic. Chopped basil was added in at the end. It was great as is, but the beans would have been a nice addition and source of protein. And the good news is that all those ingredients are in this week’s share.

Week 12; Aug. 20, 2008

2008-08-21T15:39:00.001-07:00

Yes, we have corn at last! Our corn crop took a hammering recently from torrential thunderstorms with strong winds (what’s up with all these storms?! Sigh.). But not all of it was leveled by the wind. The kernels on this variety aren’t large but are succulent and sweet. This was picked just hours before we delivered your shares.

You might also be wondering what those fuzzy little green pods are. They’re edamame, also known as soybean. They’re such a treat. We like to just boil them in their pods in well salted water for about 5 minutes. Drain, spread on a baking sheet and sprinkle with Kosher salt (the salt part makes it tasty, but it is optional). They can be served warm, but some recommend serving at room temperature. The best way to eat is to just pinch the beans out of their pods and into your mouth with your teeth or with your thumb and fingers. If anyone else has a take on how to serve these, please comment!

For something different to do with red cabbage, try this Chinese chicken salad with peanut sauce: http://www.taunton.com/finecooking/recipes/chinese_chicken_salad.aspx
If you’re vegetarian, you could substitute tofu or tempeh for the chicken.

Here’s what was in this week’s share:
1 pound edamame in pods
1 Walla Walla onion
4 tomatoes
1 quart of red potatoes
1 bunch of beets
1 bunch of purple carrots
1 red cabbage
1 bulb of garlic
10 to 12 ears of corn

Week 11, August 13, 2008

2008-08-14T13:11:00.001-07:00

We had a rather curious harvest this week. Our walk-in refrigerator broke down over the weekend, and the refrigeration repairman was still waiting on parts Wednesday morning when we needed to harvest the CSA share. So, in the name of getting things harvested as close to delivery time as possible—so that nothing sat out for too long, we didn’t jot down a list of what was in the week’s share. So, this is what we think was in the share:

1 bunch basil
¾ pounds green beans
4 tomatoes
1 quart of potatoes
½ pound salad mix
2 cucumbers
3 bulbs of garlic
1 bunch of leeks
1 large onion
3 patty pan squash (great grilled or roasted or sautéed; they brown really beautifully)