EverGreen Farm

CSA Newsletter, Week 10

Zucchini & Crooked Neck Summer Squash

In your share this week:

• salad mix
• kale
• zucchini and/or squash
• fresh garlic
• cilantro
• Japanese turnips
• Snap peas (first picking only gave us enough for Smoot, more to come)

The farm has been a busy place this week.  With a lot of ups & downs, good vs. bad, and heartaches offset by blessings.  We have put in so much extra time and effort to do what needed to be done in some challenging circumstances.  This week's share is a little small again; however, it doesn't come close to representing the work we put in to have food for many coming weeks.  One thing to remember with gardening, sometimes you don't see the results of hard work for weeks to come.  A disaster of some kind could wipe things out instantaneously, but good things come to those who work hard and are patient.

Some of the good:

• The garlic was dug in just two days!  We had a great crew of 12 helpers on Saturday and got 7 rows out by noon.  The remaining 3 were finished on Monday morning before an afternoon of heavy rain.
• Most of our crops pulled through these crazy two nights of freezing temperatures.  The plants are likely stressed a bit, but most will bounce back with the warmer weather I see in the forecast.  The potatoes are the biggest concern, but they didn't die off completely.  Heavily stressed, but not dead.  That's good news considering how cold it got.
• The predictions for golf ball sized hail for our area never materialized. Just heavy rains.  I'll take the rains!
• We have awesome Workshares who keep helping us each week with various "other projects" that are so necessary and very time consuming (like weeding so we'll have crops to harvest, and getting out ALL of our row covers to use on as many crops as possible for only 2 crazy nights in JULY only to turn around and put them all away once it warms up again).
• We see beets, carrots and peas that are so close to being ready to harvest!
• In all our covering and uncovering, I noticed that the onions and leeks look wonderful!

Row covers EVERYWHERE these last few nights!

The not so good:

• Our garlic crops isn't so great.  A lot of it was rotten in the ground, again.  Probably a result of several things but most likely the seed was compromised from last year when a month of rains caused our garlic to mold, and in such circumstances it would have required the most careful of attention (weeding and fabulous soil) to make a rebound.  Sadly, this garlic needs to be replaced with new "seed" (it's not actually seeds, but whole garlic bulbs free of any disease or recent stress) and that is very expensive.  We aren't entirely sure how to go from here on future plantings of garlic.
• We'll have spent about 30 hours this week solely related to helping the crops make it through these 2 freezing nights.  And we still need to put away all the equipment we pulled out.

See - the good out weighs the bad! 

Full honest disclosure - I cried after seeing the garlic come out so poorly.  And I cried again when the below freezing forecast didn't change for the better.  But I was blessed with several reminders that gratitude heals a broken heart.  So I started thinking about all the good we have and all the blessings and all the people who support us and care about EverGreen Farm.  When I apologized about the garlic to Rick, a workshare who was helping us dig,  he said "But your arugula is amazing! And your garlic scape pesto recipe changed my life."  This is the attitude that keeps us going.  Thank you!

Have a great week and ENJOY your produce!

Tara

CSA Newsletter, Week 9

In your share this week:

• salad mix
• kale
• collard greens
• Swiss chard (sorry it's so holey, a true sign of *organic* produce)
• zucchini or squash (given out randomly, not enough yet for everyone to get one of each)
• garlic, fresh
• Japanese turnips
• spinach - only enough for Alpine & Smoot members this week. We will rotate to other pick up locations as more grows.

As I mentioned last week, we are currently experiencing a few weeks of lower crop yields and anxiously waiting for plants to grow bigger for harvest.  Some items that are right around the corner are cilantro, carrots and snap peas.  The forecast looks like things are about to warm up again.  I can't help but get excited about that!  Meanwhile, we have put a lot of effort into much needed weeding.  We have big hopes that this will be a perfect combination for noticeable growth around the farm.  Weeding + water + sunshine + warmer temps = happy, growing plants for the CSA.

This is a picture of our weeding crew getting after two long rows of spinach.  Far left is our first planting of snap peas, then a row of nicely weeded spinach.  On the right is another row of spinach and a lot of weeds (this is what both rows looked like before we started weeding them).  Far right are rows of salad mix and potato plants.  *Happy to report that the spinach weeding is done!*

We start digging up our garlic crop this Saturday and through next week.  This is a big project.  If you've ever have an interest in coming to help on the farm, this would be a great time to come!  Many hands make quick work.  Our goal is to have it all dug and hanging to cure by Saturday, August 1st.

Have a great week and ENJOY your veggies!

Tara

 

 

CSA Newsletter, Week 8

In your share this week:

• Salad Mix
• Collard Greens
• Swiss Chard
• Japanese Turnips
• Zucchini or Squash

This week's salad mix is from our first outside planting.  We were all excited to see how nice it looked after a double wash.  Love that salad mix.

This is our first year growing collard greens.  Like kale, they are considered a super food because of their multiple healthy properties.  In our household, they'll be used a lot in smoothies and fresh veggie/fruit juices.  Some other ideas:  veggie wraps, or added to salads and soups.  (If you have a favorite way to enjoy collard greens, or any other CSA vegetables, we'd love to share it here on the blog!)

The ear wigs have taken a toll on the Swiss chard so please don't be alarmed by the small holes you see on the leaves we bagged up for the shares.   (Believe me, you are getting the very best of what we had available to pick.)  Shain has applied several heavy applications of diatomaceous earth to this crop and many others in an effort to control the bugs.  There's a good chance the chard will rebound and give us many weeks of harvest throughout the summer.

Shain dug up a few bulbs of garlic this week to see if it was ready to harvest.  He says "Not yet, but soon."  This could be a theme for us on the farm for a week or two.  We have a LOT of food planted and growing, but not quite ready yet.  This is partially a result of getting so much rain in the spring which prevented Shain from planting outside on a schedule that would give us a continued, even, weekly harvest.  It's also because many crops that did get planted outside waited for warmer weather before growing.  Our crops get planted in succession (meaning we give sufficient time in between the plantings so everything isn't ready all at once), but that doesn't guarantee they will grow in succession.  That part is heavily dictated by the weather.  Shain predicts that we are going to have a lot of food coming on all at once, a bounty we can hardly keep up with.

Meanwhile, we are getting a lot of weeding done.  We have nearly all of the greenhouses in tip-top shape.  And now we are getting after the outside crops before they get over run with weeds to the point of not growing well enough to harvest.  Again, with all the rain - we have a lot of weeds to take care of so we can enjoy as much food as possible.

For example, this is a photo of us working out in field 1 on Wednesday (after we finished harvesting and putting the shares together).  The first row on the left is cilantro.  Half of the row was weeded on Saturday evening, the other half on Monday morning.  In just these few days, the plants have doubled in size.  Weeding is THAT important to having food to harvest.  With the little bit of extra time we have right now, I fully anticipate having all of field 1 weeded by the end of the week and all of the greenhouses weeded by the end of next week.  Then we can switch over to another field where spinach, peas and salad greens are growing.  If you are a CSA member who only evaluates the farm based on the weekly food delivery, this is one of those times where you are going to have to trust us and know that there is a lot of work going on back on right now that will reap big rewards in the future. 

Have a great week and ENJOY your veggies!

Tara

 

CSA Newsletter, Week 7

In your share this week:

• radishes, small bunch, LAST OF THE SEASON
• Japanese turnips
• baby zucchini or squash, just starting for the season
• garlic scapes, LAST OF THE SEASON
• Romaine head lettuce, LAST OF THE SEASON
• kale

Several foods above are done for the season.  We pulled out the last row of radishes and salvaged any that were still good to eat.  Now this empty row is available for Farmer Shain to plant another crop.  We also had to harvest the rest of the Romaine head lettuce this week.  It has been growing in greenhouse 6 and was getting too big and buggy for us to think we could leave some for another week.  So it all had to come out too.  It was quite a feat trying to fit the large lettuce heads into a produce bag.  :)  That same day, we were able to plant more tomatoes and cucumbers into the newly emptied space. 

This is also the last of the garlic scapes, a nice big bunch.  Shain and I made 15 batches of garlic scape pesto last week.  Some with pistachios, some with walnuts.  Both were delicious.  Then Shain used some as the base "sauce" on a tomato and artichoke pizza.  Oh my!  Good eating!

It's nice to have new crops coming on too.  Kale this week.  Very first of the zucchini and squash (I had to go back and pick some very small ones to make sure everyone could get one). 

No salad mix this week as the old greens were too far gone and the new salad mix growing outside isn't quite ready yet.  Salad mix is more subject to weather conditions throughout the summer.  We understand it's a favorite, but we can't guarantee it on a weekly basis when it's growing outside (greenhouses are too hot for growing salad greens in the summer).  Bad storms and bugs make a mess of tender salad greens, but we'll do our best!

Some other projects we've had going on this week:

• Put wire cages on some tomato and cucumber plants.
• Pulled up old salad rows to make way for planting new crops.
• Transplanted basil, cucumbers and tomatoes.
• Shain planted several succession crops including:  carrots, cilantro, parsley, salad mix, etc.
• Lots of weeding! 

Have a great week and ENJOY your veggies!

Tara

 

 

CSA Newsletter, Week 6

In your share this week:

• Salad Mix
• Romaine Head Lettuce
• Garlic Scapes
• Radishes
• Japanese Turnips

Farmer Shain says we can start harvesting kale next week.  We are also hoping the first outside planting of salad mix will be ready very soon.  We prefer the smaller sized greens, but had to make do with what was available (a second cut from the larger salad greens still growing in greenhouse 7)  Why the wait?  Remember how long those spring rains lasted?  This put Shain's planting schedule a little behind and we are eagerly waiting for the next batch of greens to be ready.

Don't panic on the larger quantity of garlic scapes you are receiving this week (and probably next week too).  I highly suggest you take the time to use them in your cooking this week and then preserve the rest.  Scapes will store for quite a while (weeks) in your refrigerator produce drawer in just a loose bag.  They also store very well in the freezer (I cut them up small with scissors and freeze in baggies).  If you make pesto, this amount will make about 2 batches (which also freezes very well).  I know pistachios and many other nuts are very expensive right now, but making pesto it's worth it!  We have had great success with combining a more expensive nut with a cheaper alternative without too much difference in taste.  Many recipes need only 1/2 cup nuts per batch, so a little bag goes a long way. Try it!

This should be the last bumper crop of radishes for the season.  The radishes growing in greenhouse 7 have bolted and it's uncertain if the crop in gh 2 will make it another week.  Today's talk among the workshares was to turn the bounty into jars of pickled radishes.  There are several recipes on line and they look very easy to make.  Basically it's just slicing the radishes, adding to mason jars, pouring in various liquids, add a few seasonings, and voila!  **Edited to say that Carol's pickled radish recipe has been to this website.  Click here.

This week's farm projects will include a little more transplanting (basil goes in the row from where we just harvested the Romaine heads) and a LOT of weeding. 

We have family coming for the 4th of July holiday, so there's some fun on the schedule too!

Have a great week and ENJOY your veggies!

Tara