dec 13 - almost winter

Broccoli           Kohlrabi          Tat Soi     

Black Spanish Radish                        Butternut       

Sweet Potato              Garlic

Herb bag:      Arugula Chickweed     Thyme               Dill         

Thanks for keeping up the good veggie eating.  This broccoli is your reward for sticking with us through this long late season.  Hope you enjoy it too.  It doesn’t need much cooking.  One of the best things we’ve ever done with our broccoli is to mix it raw in a simple carrot salad. 

Here’s the deal – we will be coming to town next week and will be glad to bring another basket of veggies in for anyone who wants it.  After that, we’re taking a few weeks off for holidays, and it could very well be that the gardens will be dormant.  We’ll just see how the peculiarities of this particular winter play out.

Simple Sauteed Kohlrabi

2 medium kohlrabi bulbs, grated      1 tsp salt                     ¼ cup butter or light oil

1 medium diced onion                       1 clove garlic              2 Tbsp fresh thyme, chives, or sage

1) Mix the kohlrabi and salt in a colander and let stand for 30 minutes to drain.

2) Melt the butter in a medium skillet over medium heat.  Add the onion and sauté until translucent, about 3 minutes.  Add the garlic and sauté for 1 minute more.

3) Stir in the kohlrabi.  Reduce the heat to low, cover, and cook for 10 minutes.

4) Increase the heat to medium, uncover the skillet, and cook for 2 minutes.  Remove from heat and stir in the fresh herbs.  Let stand for a couple minutes to let the flavors develop.

Intriguing recipe sent from a Lafayette friend:

Southwestern Pumpkin Hummus

6 cloves garlic                         1 ¾ cups mashed or canned pumpkin (butternut)

¼ cup fresh cilantro               ¼ cup fresh lime juice

¼ cup tahini                           2 Tbsp olive oil, plus more for drizzling

3 tsp cumin                             1 tsp salt, or to taste

½ tsp chili powder                 ½ tsp chipotle pepper

Toasted pumpkin seeds, for garnish

Put the garlic cloves into a food processor and pulse to chop fine.  Add the rest of the ingredients and blend until smooth.  Transfer to a bowl, cover, and refrigerate for at least 8 hours.  Garnish with pumpkin seeds and drizzle with additional oil before serving.  Serve with vegetables, crackers, or tortilla chips.

Thanks for sharing this good stuff.  We appreciate you.

Paul, Coree, Lulah and Levon

week 3

June 7, 2012 week 3
Lettuce     Broccoli    Swiss Chard    Fresh Garlic    Summer Squash
Baby Carrots    Green Onions    Catnip    Parsley   Sorrel   Arugula   Fennel

“This curious world we inhabit is more wonderful than convenient; more beautiful than it is useful; it is more to be admired and enjoyed than used.” - Henry David Thoreau

We can't claim to have lived up to that quote in its fullest sense this past week, as we have exerted great effort to extract USE from our relationship with the living world (he's spot on that it's not convenient to attempt such a thing!), but we have sincerely enjoyed the change in the weather. It's as if we're finally having a Spring, now that it's nearly Summer. It was 47 degrees down in the hollow this morning. The ¾ inch of rain that fell a couple nights ago set our minds at ease.

Mulching and caging 150 tomato plants was much more comfortable in 85 degree weather than 95 degree. And the garlic came out of the ground with much greater ease with a little moisture to help it along. The days have been long and full of labor, but beautiful and filled with gratitude for the good work. The corn will not be early this year, but we can finally exhale and believe that there will be sweet corn this season. The aviary predation seems to have relented and the corn sprouts are tall enough to no longer be easy for a crow to pull up by the root. Interestingly, the best deterrent that we found is to hang old CDs by string off of long sticks pounded into the ground. The CDs dance and spin in the wind and the flashes of light and motion scare away the birds. It is an unusual sight, and we're glad that it works.

The summer squash are just beginning! Varieties this week are the classic yellow crookneck and sunburst pattypan. We're sampling a new pattypan this year. It's an heirloom called Pattison de Melange and it promises to be beautiful, if not abundant. There will be more varieties to come – yellows, whites and greens - as the season progresses.

The baby carrots are just a nice little nibble. Levon and Lulah enjoyed crunching them so much, we thought we'd share the joy. I've been thinking of cooking them whole, with an onion, some garlic, maybe a hunk of ginger and some potatoes, then pureeing the whole thing, greens and all, together for a creamy soup. If you try it, let me know how it goes.

By the way – if you are ever struggling about what to do with a vegetable that you've received in your basket, please don't hesitate to drop us a line. We'll try to help guide you toward something appropriately tasty. Your feedback about these baskets is always helpful to us. We want to provide a good service.

Clearly, this is the week of broccoli! Enjoy it – we'll be lucky if there's any left in the field next week. If you don't want to eat it all this week, just blanche it for 4 minutes, cool it fast, and pop it in a zip lock in the freezer. It’s wonderful a little al dente – don’t overcook it!

Eating seasonally is akin to raising children. There are distinct phases, each with its own special effect. Just when you think you never want to see Chard again, its gone, and won't return until Fall, or maybe even next Spring. Broccoli is a flower of the Spring and Fall. Tomatoes, in their most enjoyable form, are truly a seasonal fruit. We hope you will be creative and savor the tastes of each season of the garden as it passes.

Your herb bag this week is quite the mix. Four different tastes are represented in that little sack. The Arugula represents pungent tastes. This picking is SPICY. The heat of early spring is reflected in the taste of this salad herb. The fennel, on the other hand, is all sweetness. There will most likely be fennel bulbs coming some time later, but for now, use these feather fennel fronds in a salad, or dip them into dressing and eat them like celery. Parsley is technically a bitter tasting herb (though there are certainly much worse out there!), and sorrel is sour. These basic tastes each have different effects on our bodies, and in balance, each contribute to our well-being. We hope that is will be so for you.

 Catnip is not a usual taste in the American palate, but it is edible for us as well as our feline friends. Snip a few leaves into your salads to get a feeling for it. Some folks claim that it works well as a meat seasoning. We like it in an herbal tea – alongside lemon balm or chamomile and a taste of honey. It is a relative of mint, has a soothing and digestive effect, and is mild enough to be safe for children. The effects of catnip on humans are markedly different than what it does to cats!

Here's a nice Broccoli Salad for you from Simply in Season:
3 cups broccoli florets                        1 cup raisins
10 slices bacon, fried and crumbled, or ½ cup bacon bits
½ cup red onion, diced                       ½ cup sunflower seeds
½ cup cheese, shredded (optional)
Mix together in a bowl. Set aside.

2 Tbsp sugar                                    1 Tbsp apple cider vinegar
¾ cup plain yogurt or mayo
Combine sugar and vinegar and stir to dissolve. Stir in yogurt until well blended. Pour over the broccoli mixture and stir together.

And one more from Angelic Organics - Broccoli with Asian-Style Dressing 
 For variety, try adding matchstick-size strips of steamed carrots or daikon. Serves 2 to 4
1 medium head broccoli                          1/2 cup rice wine vinegar
3 tablespoons peanut oil                         2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger                1/2 teaspoon minced garlic
1/2 teaspoon toasted sesame oil              1/2 teaspoon hot chili oil (optional)
1. Separate the florets from the stalk; break into smaller florets. Cut the stalk into 1-inch lengths and then into matchstick-size strips.
2. Place the broccoli in a steamer basket set over 1 1/2 inches boiling water and cover. Steam for 5 minutes. Transfer the broccoli to a bowl.
3. Combine the remaining ingredients in a small bowl; stir until well combined. Pour the dressing over the broccoli and mix well.

Next week the first flush of green beans will arrive. Until then, be well and eat your veggies.
Best regards, Paul, Coree, Lulah and Levon

week 2

Lettuce      Swiss Chard         Fresh Garlic
Baby Beet Greens        Parsley           Broccoli
Sorrel              Green Onions       Purslane       Oregano
Mint & Lemon Balm

The heat is on. With luck, by the time you read this the rain will be moving in and with it a “cold snap” taking temperatures back down into the seventies, where most of humanity is comfortable.

We spent the weekend getting the last few summer crops planted, including our beloved Indian Field Corn, which we haven’t given ourselves space to grow for a couple seasons. Now we will be defending it and the sweet corn from marauding crows and turkeys until it gets large enough to be un-pluck-able. We are hoping for some sweet rewards in the summer.

In other news – everything is growing fast, and will grow even faster once it gets an honest rain. The green beans have a nice set of flowers, green tomatoes are getting larger by the hour, and the summer squashes are buzzing with pollinators and setting a good load of fruit. Garlic is ready to dig a full three weeks early. Summer is as Summer does.

Purslane is a new one this week. Its native home is the Indian sub-continent, but it now grows almost everywhere as a thriving weed. It is a healthful little weed, though. Purslane contains more Omega 3s than some fish oil, and quite a lot of Vitamin A too. The sour to salty taste and succulent crunch are well suited to salad fixings, but you might find other ideas if you look on-line. Keep it in a bag in your crisper drawer and eat it while the leaves are still fresh and crispy.

We will finish thinning the beets this week, so this will be the last of the beet greens until we send the beets. The oregano will also be finished with its seasonal haircut. We’re slowly reclaiming a portion of the herb garden that has been over-run with beautiful mint and lemon balm for too long. Dry your oregano (put it in a paper bag – tie and hang in a drafty shady place for awhile) and other herbs to use later. Here are a couple of easy suggestions for excessive amounts of fresh herbs.

Mixed Herb Butter

2 cups (1 pound) butter, softened

¼ cup finely chopped fresh herbs

1 Tablespoon minced fresh garlic (optional)

In a large enough bowl, cream the butter until it is very soft and fluffy.  Add the herbs and garlic and mix until thoroughly combined.  Cover and refrigerate until the butter is just firm enough to shape into sticks.  Working quickly, use your hands to shape the butter into 4 sticks or logs, each about one inch thick.  Transfer one or more of the sticks to a covered butter dish in the fridge, or wrap the logs in waxed paper and store them in the freezer for up to six months.  Use on bread, melt over vegetables, potatoes, steak, or anywhere you want.

Fried Herb Topping

¼ cup extra virgin olive oil               1 cup chopped fresh herb or combination of herbs

1-2 cloves garlic                                 ½ lb hot cooked pasta

½ cup freshly grated parmesan or asiago cheese

Heat the oil in a small skillet over medium heat until it is very hot but not smoking.  Add the herbs and garlic; cook until the garlic is fragrant and slightly golden and the herbs are crisp but not burned.  Remove the skillet from the heat.  Pour the fried herbs and flavored oil over the warm pasta or vegetables of your choice.  Top with grated cheese and enjoy right away.

It is a great pleasure to bring this beautiful spring broccoli to tow. Planting broccoli is always a gamble.  The plants take up a lot of room and need a good deal of fertility to make a nice head.  Then they need good weather, and defense from hungry cabbage worms.  Please consider soaking your broccoli is cold salt water for ten minutes or so before cooking, just to dislodge these pernicious worms.  Remember, evidence of organic bug life indicates truly natural farming practices.  We don’t like them either, but we consider them the least evil.  Eat your broccoli in a salad, or if you must cook it, don’t cook it long.  The flavor and texture of fresh broccoli is such a different experience than the California-box-store broccoli.  However you eat this broccoli – do it soon – it’s best that way. 

Here’s one more good looking recipe, in case you want some help with the Chard (and I bet you could throw in the broccoli as well as a few mint leaves too).

Chard Utopia from Simply In Season

2 cups minced onion                                                  1 tsp dried basil

1 tsp dried oregano (2 tsp fresh, at least!)                ¼ tsp salt

In a large frypan sauté in 1 Tbsp olive oil for 5 minutes.

2 lbs Swiss Chard, stemmed, finely chopped

Add and cook until wilted, 5-8 minutes

4-6 cloves garlic, minced                               1 Tbsp flour

Sprinkle in, stir, and cook over medium heat, 2-3 minutes.  Remove from heat, and mix in….

2 cups feta cheese, crumbled             1 cup cottage cheese              Pepper to taste                      

1 lb frozen phyllo pastry sheets, thawed

Place a sheet of phyllo in an oiled 9X13 pan.  Brush with olive oil.  Repeat for 7 sheets.   Spread half the filling evenly on top.  Add 8 more sheets of oiled phyllo.  Cover with the rest of the filling and follow with remaining phyllo, oiling each, including the top sheet.  Tuck in the edges and bake uncovered in a preheated over at 375F until golden and crispy, about 45 min.

Good news from Hidden Springs Orchard – we’ll likely be making those awesome blueberries available at the end of June! 

Eat well – Be well.  Thanks for your support.

Paul, Coree, Lulah and Levon

The greatest delight the fields and woods minister is the suggestion of an occult relation between man and the vegetable.  I am not alone and unacknowledged.  They nod to me and I to them.  ~Ralph Waldo Emerson