Fair Share Farm Art

The submissions are short of expectations, but still coming in for the Fair Share Farm Art Project. We hope you are still thinking of showing the world what you think of food. We have extended the deadline until the end of October. So, if you were going to enter but felt you didn't have the time, now's your chance to catch up on things.

Even if you don't enter, you are encouraged to view the entries for fun and inspiration. Click here to find out what a cherry tomato rainbow is, as well as to see a tomato quilt and some fine drawings.

In the Share - Week 19

freshly dug potatoes

TOMATOES (F/P) Another week out of the last planting
POTATOES (F) An assortment of types from the last of the crop. Sweet potatoes will fill their shoes starting next week.
ONIONS (F/P) Yellow storage types
GREEN BEANS (F/P) Everyone gets a choice of the green Jade, yellow wax or Roma flat-pod types.
PINK BEAUTY RADISHES (F/P) They are pretty. Partial shares get a choice of okra with theirs.
COLLARDS OR KALE (F) The fall greens are here. See Tom's blog for more info. on the collards.
BROCCOLI, SWEET PEPPERS OR CUCUMBERS (F) The first of the fall broccoli looks good with hopefully much more to come. This will be the last week of the cucumbers.
LETTUCE (F/P) Finally some nice big heads. One in each share.
ARUGULA, BASIL OR PARSLEY (F/P) Arugula is back along with the parsley. The basil is still kicking.

ALSO THIS WEEK: Bread of Life Bakery delivery

NEXT WEEK: More tomatoes, peppers, beans, lettuce and broccoli. Perhaps Hakurei turnips. Sweet potatoes and sage. Garlic and some bok choi. More radishes and arugula.

Well, the internet is a bit dicey tonight, so I dare not take too much time in posting. This week has been real pleasant. We have the fields cleaned up pretty nice. Every summer things get a little hectic and we fall behind until around mid-September when we finally catch up.

We planted another round of head lettuce on Monday. We were a bit late with that planting in the greenhouse, so it will be awhile before it's ready. We'll have lettuce for another couple of weeks and then it looks like we'll have a gap before this last planting is ready in October.

Before last night's .75 inches of rain we were able to sow the winter cover crops of rye and vetch. Tom also prepared some new ground above the strawberry patch. It will take awhile for the sod to decompose, but after a few spadings and a spring cover crop it should be ready for 2011 fall crops.

Well, I better get off of here before I get kicked off. We have a big day tomorrow. Lots of beans and greens to pick. If you have some free time, we'd love to see you out in the fields!

What to Do With Your Share---Week 19

The shares they are a'changin' right now. We are starting a shift from the fruits of summer to the heartiness of the fall crops. Here are a couple of suggestions for you.

Collards: A green often boiled until it's super soft, try Collards with Onions over Rice, or last week's Kale with Vinegar and Egg, substituting collards. If you are a meat eater, it's great to saute your veggies in bacon grease instead of olive oil. Mmmm...baconey.

Radishes: Try a radish sandwich. Some good quality bread, butter, salt, lettuce or arugula and radish slices is a known winner. Check out Google for some images to get you thinking.

We hope the rest of the items in the share...tomatoes, potatoes, onions, lettuce...are ready for use in your favorite recipe and need no such suggestions this week.

Farm to Table
We love the fall, and the harvest that it brings. But the vegetables don't plant themselves. Here is a little stop action action from August 23rd, when the kohlrabi went in the ground. They are doing quite well at the moment, green and happy, and much larger.

A sharper version of this is on YouTube.

What to Do With Your Share---Week 18

In the Spring we often tell ourselves "if we can make it to Labor Day, things will be a lot easier." I don't know why we think that, because this is always one of the busiest and best times of the year.

Preparing the fields for winter, harvesting Missouri grapes, stocking up, feeding the CSA. We enjoy being tired out by such good things. And look forward to some good rest.

Marjoram
A new fresh herb choice, it is a favorite in our kitchen. Marjoram is very versatile. It brings body to vegetables such as summer squash, turns tomato sauce into pizza sauce, and imparts a wonderfully savory flavor to meats.

Its aroma is quite intense. It is also known as wild oregano. Store bought oregano can be a mix of oregano and marjoram.

Pickled Beet Juice and Greens
The cooking of greens often involves the addition of a liquid, to help steam them and create a sauce. This liquid is often water, wine, soy sauce or vinegar. For us pickled beet juice beats them all (pun intended).

A recipe such as Kale with Vinegar and Egg is a great one to try this out on. Just substitute about 1/3 cup of pickled beet juice for the vinegar and water.

Yet Another Front
The sky is a constant show at the farm. This cloud bank to our north probably extended all the way to St. Joe. Looked like a giant dust cloud. It quickly moved on its way.

In the Share - Week 18

this week's harvest

TOMATOES (F/P) The last planting of the season is giving us some real red beauties.

GARLIC (F/P) Artichoke soft-neck.

SWEET PEPPERS (F/P) It is pepper season. With many green fruits on the plants we are hoping for a couple more weeks of warm weather to keep them ripening.

CUCUMBERS (F/P) They won't be around much longer so enjoy them while you can.

LETTUCE (F) Some small heads from the first fall planting that is starting to bolt.

YELLOW POTATOES (P) With all the rain last week we couldn't dig the potatoes for the partial shares. Here they are now.

CHOICE OF OKRA, HOT PEPPERS, SALSA PACK OR GREEN BEANS (F) Lots of okra and hot peppers. Only a few salsa packs and hopefully a decent amount of beans finally.

CHOICE OF GREENS: KALE OR SWISS CHARD (F) We may fill in with sweet potato greens if the kale and chard aren't enough.

HERB CHOICE: (F/P) Basil, marjoram or garlic chives.

ALSO THIS WEEK: Parker Farms delivery

NEXT WEEK: More tomatoes, cucumbers, okra and peppers. Potatoes for the full shares, lettuce for the partials. Arugula and maybe radishes. Yellow Onions.

Spring 2004

Eight years ago this November, Tom and I moved to the abandoned homestead of the family farm. The 1930s era farmhouse and the 100+yr old barn were still standing although wildlife seemed more at home in them in the beginning than we did. We had apprenticed on organic vegetable farms for two years and thought we knew what we were getting into. In reality we found that while the apprenticeships were invaluable, there really is no way to know how to farm a particular piece of land than through doing it.

We knew that our topsoil was a silty clay loam with a clay subsoil beneath. We would be farming wind-blown soil, or loess, blown here during the end of the last ice age as the glaciers receded. The Loess Plateau extends up through Iowa and is one of the most fertile regions of America's Breadbasket.

That is all fine and dandy until we realized what lay below our pretty glacial dust. Good ole Missouri clay. Just like the ponds that dot every farm around, our soil holds water. The clay forms an impermeable layer that allows excess moisture to pool and suffocate the roots of tender plants. We learned this lesson our second year of farming when all of our tomatoes and potatoes rottted in what had been productive ground the season before. Lucky for you, eight years later we have a few strategies that are helping us cope with the 7 inches of rain over the past 2 weeks. Here are a few examples of how the crops are doing.

Bolting lettuces after the rain.

It's interesting that different varieties respond differently to the weather. While the Forellenschluss and Quattro Stagioni lettuces are bolting, the New Red Fire in the foreground is holding firm.

Summer squash with mildew

Right next door the sweet potatoes show no signs of stress.

Mulching the Strawberries

If anyone ever asks what CSA members do at the farm on a work day, just point them to this video. Believe me, a lot of work got done in a very short time thanks to the membership. Go team!

A larger version is on YouTube.

In the Share - Week 17

TOMATOES (F/P) There is a few more juicy jewels of summer left
POTATOES (F/P) More of the yellow-fleshed, creamy type
ONIONS (F/P) We're clearing out the last of the sweeter varieties, some red, white and yellow.

SWEET PEPPERS (F/P) We grow bells and marconis, the latter being the elongated pointy ones.

SUMMER SQUASH (F) We still have lots of these dependable summer fruits. Check Farmer Tom's blog for the Ruggieri family recipe.
BUTTERNUT SQUASH (F) You know fall is coming when you start eating the winter squash. We have a bumper crop this year of butternuts, acorns, carnivals and pumpkins. While we wait for the other fall crops to mature, we are filling the lull with the smaller ones. They keep well so there's no rush to eat them.
SWEET POTATO GREENS (P) Okay partial shares, it is your turn to try something new. Check last week's blog for all the info on cooking these satisfying greens.
CUCUMBERS (F) That 4 inches of rain last week was a bit too much for the cucumbers but they are starting to pick up again.
SMALL LETTUCE (F/P) Ditto on the effects of the 4 inches of rain, however the lettuce is less forgiving. Our first planting for the fall is beginning to bolt, i.e. send up a flower stalk and turn bitter. We are picking it at 'baby' size in order to that we may all eat it while it is still edible.
OKRA, HOT PEPPERS OR EGGPLANT (F) The okra is in it's prime right now. Take advantage as the season won't last much longer. We're hoping on a flush of peppers and eggplant to come later in September.
HERB CHOICE (F/P) Basil, thyme, garlic chives or a dried herb

ALSO THIS WEEK: Bread of Life Bakery shares delivery

NEXT WEEK: More tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, summer squash and okra. Garlic returns. We're still waiting on the kale. Partial shares will get their butternut.

The end of August is here and we feel like we've finally passed over the hump of the growing season. Most all the crops are planted and all we have to do is tend to them and harvest. Well, not exactly. There's a big ole list of things that should be done. However, at the end of August it does become harder to keep up the same intensity of work that has been the norm since April. We wonder if it is the barometric pressure, but undoubtedly we are just tired.

This is not to say that we are unhappy with our lot. On the contrary we consider ourselves supremely lucky to breathe in the fresh air and eat well off of the fruits of our labor.