Wintery Days at the Farm

As we enter December, the farm has been put to bed. We have laid down hay on 8 new no-till beds, mulched the strawberries with hay, planted and mulched the garlic, cut new ground for next year, gotten all of the row cover, hoops, tomato stakes, and harvestable produce out of the fields, and put away the electric tractor for the season.

Next we hope to enjoy several weeks of rest, before getting our seed order together after the New Year. Part of our day (morning and late afternoon) is always spent taking Rocky for a walk. Being a mountain dog, he loves the snow, and is full of energy this time of year. Here's a little video showing what a happy dog looks like.

Perhaps more than anything, since becoming a farmer I have learned to understand and appreciate the annual movement of the sun through the sky. This time of year the sunrise is low on the southeast horizon. The photo below is due east from our kitchen window, as it is zero degrees F right now. Every morning for the next 10 days the sun will rise just a little more to the right. In the old days people rejoiced after the winter solstice since the sun turned around and headed north again.

We celebrate the return of the light in late December too, knowing that another planting season is on the way.

What to Do With Your Thanksgiving Share --- Part 2

Late Fall harvesting

The Thanksgiving holiday is but a week away, and it's time to start planning the menu (and harvesting the vegetables!) In the previous blog we suggested a cheesy root soup as a starter. For this blog I refer you to yesterday's Washington Post's Guess Who's Coming to Thanksgiving Dinner article. Resplendent with recipes from the likes of Julia Child, Alice Waters, James Beard and Fannie Farmer, I can think of no one place to go that has such a wonderful array of recipes to offer.

There are three different greens recipes; for Brussel sprouts, cabbage and greens. Edna Lewis' silken turnip soup sounds familiar, and is also recommended as a meal starter. Jacques Pepin teams with Julia to bone out part of the turkey before stuffing with sage/cornbread stuffing and roasting it. Go to the link to see the many other recipes, from rolls to cranberry sauce to pies. We hope you all have a healthy and happy thanksgiving.

Rebecca and Tom

What to Do With Your Thanksgiving Share Part 1

Tuesday morning at the farm

We are pleased to have had such a mild November so far, with lots of sunshine to keep the crops in the fields growing. Since the season ended, many vegetables still in the ground have doubled in size, making them just right for a Thanksgiving share. While we still have some picking to do (once the snow melts), we anticipate the share to include the following:

Broccoli (1/2 to 1 lb)

Brussel sprouts (2 decent sized stalks)

Carrots (Red Core Chantenay, good for eating or storing)

Beets (our best planting yet)

Bulb fennel (the cool weather makes them mild, sweet and delicious)

Celeriac (adds a subtle celery flavor to veggie mashes and stews)

Endive (a bitter green)

Leeks (maybe only 1/2 lb, but a great addition to any dish)

Garlic (2 nice heads)
Chard/kale (add some greens to an otherwise brown dinner)

Herbs (choice of thyme, sage, mint, or dried)

Onions (1 quart of good storage onions)
Roots medley (1 quart of mix and match radish, rutabaga or turnips)

Cabbage (a large savoy type)

White Soup with Cheese

One thing we hope to become a part of over the years is your Thanksgiving tradition. 2009 has been a good year, with quite a final bounty. We expect most years to have many of these same vegetables available, so you can create dishes that are uniquely local, seasonal and tasty.

One dish that often is overlooked at Thanksgiving is soup. With the usual 10 choices of dishes, piling our plates and digging in can be the norm. I know that this year as we host Thankgiving for Rebecca's family, we are going to try to keep the choices down, and start the meal with a cup of soup. The blending of flavors in the white soup recipe below is just the thing to get one's taste buds ready for the meal of the year.

Ingredients

2 medium onions

4 cloves garlic

2 to 3 Hakurei turnips

1 celeriac

1 bulb fennel

1 rutabaga

1 kohlrabi

(You can also add cauliflower, regular turnips and/or potato. You want about 2+ quarts of chopped vegetables total)

2 tbsp olive oil

2 tbsp butter
1 to 2 tsp sea salt

1 quart stock or water

1 cup milk

1 cup cream

1 cup grated cheese (we used Parmesan)

Clean and chop the vegetables. They all need to be peeled, and their unique shapes require different techniques. Veggies like celeriac and kohlrabi are best cleaned with a large knife. Simply place them on their side and "shave" off the outer layer, as shown in the photos. You can do some final peeling with a paring knife or peeler. Treat fennel like celery, cutting off the root end and ferny tips. Rutabaga can be peeled with a veggie peeler.

Saute the onions, fennel and celeriac in the olive oil and butter for about 5 minutes over medium high heat. Add the salt and remaining vegetables. Stir and cook for another 3 minutes. Add the stock (just enough to cover the vegetables), cover and bring to a boil. Turn down heat to low and simmer for 30 minutes or until vegetables are very tender.

Strain the liquid from the vegetables and return it to the soup pot. Puree the vegetables until smooth and add back to the liquid. Stir in the milk, cream and cheese and simmer for 5 minutes to blend the flavors. Serve hot.

What to Do With Your Share---Week 24

Rooting in the End
We are glad to have had such a good season this year, and bid the 2009 CSA harvest a hearty thank you. In closing, the fields bring you mainly root crops, vegetables that have the ability to keep all winter long, if given the right conditions. That means making them think they are still in the ground and at rest during the dark winter. The roots we give you are alive, so alive that they will make seeds if planted in the Spring. They need to be treated accordingly.

So if you have more than your fridge can hold, or want to buy some bulk and wonder how to store them, all just get a Rubbermaid container and some sand and follow the lead of the pictures below. After layering the roots with the sand you give them a little watering (wet the top of the sand ) to keep them damp so they don't dry out. A few ventilation and drainage holes in your tub will help too. Keep the tub in the coolest part of your house that doesn't freeze. A basement or heated garage works fine.





Garlic Braids
We several items available in bulk that have been there awhile (see below). We also are adding garlic braids to the list this week. We have a limited number, so it is first come first serve. They are $16 for a braid of 12 Silverskin garlic heads. They are our best keeper. If kept near 32 deg F in a dry place they will last until Spring. If you hang them in your kitchen be sure to use them. A garlic braid that is being used is just as attractive as a full one that dries out.



Bulk Order Week of 10/17/09
Garlic $8.00/lb
Garlic braids (12 heads) $16.00
Chard $3.00/bunch
Kale $3.00/bunch
Beets $3.oo/qt (specify Chiogga (stripped), or red beets)
Jalapenos $2.50/pint, $4.00/quart
Arugula $2.50/bunch
Dried herbs $2.00/tin (thyme, marjoram, dried hot peppers, lovage, lavendar flowers, coriander, oregano, rosemary)

In the Share: Week 24

LETTUCE (F/P)
GREENS (F) cabbage, kale or chard
HERBS (F/P) cilantro, dill or arugula
VARIOUS ROOTS (P) choice of beets, turnips, rutbagas, watermelon radishes and kohlrabi (not really a root, but it looks a bit like one.) Check Tom's blog from last week for a photo i.d. of the various roots.
CELERIAC & CARROT (P) a bit of each for a nice soup or salad
BULB FENNEL (F/P) eat them like they do in Calabria in a salad
BEETS OR KOHLRABI (F) A bumper beet crop this fall. They're still on the bulk list!
FRENCH BREAKFAST RADISHES (F/P) the mildest, most delicate radishes.
WINTER SQUASH OR SWEET POTATOES (F/P) Tis sad, but true, the winter squash harvest this year was a bust. We've got about 60 shares worth between the pumpkins and butternuts that made it. We only grow pumpkins fit for pies and such, so only take one if you plan to eat it. They will keep until after Halloween if you must use them as decorations first.

ALSO THIS WEEK: Parker Farms delivery

NEXT WEEK: Take stock of your crisper drawer. Hopefully you've accrued another week's worth of Fair Share Farm veggies.

END OF THE SEASON
The day is about to come when the CSA season is complete. Since February we have been counting down to this day: the final plantings done, the earlier crops turned under, but somehow it always feels suprising when we arrive at the final week of the season. Last week the chilly, wet weather made the season's end seem eminent. But then the sun came out for the first time in weeks heralding the Indian Summer. The sunshine and warm weather has gotten us moving again. It is just too darn perfect outside not to.

The Saturday crew prepared the seed garlic for planting:


clipping the heads


separating the cloves

We planted the hardneck today and will plant the softneck over the course of this week.

THANK YOU
Tom and I may be the farmers at Fair Share, but we wouldn't be successful without the labor, energy and spirit of many people. A huge thank you to Lori Watley and Kara Jennings, our brave apprentices who slogged it out with us all season long. It is an accomplishment to even stick it out and they did so with such style and grace. We wish them bountiful harvests in all that they endeavor. And to all of you who pay us in advance in the hopes that we will feed your family for 24 weeks, thank you for sticking with this also. Your support and crazy faith in us is just amazing. We were lucky this year. The weather was moderate and the harvest was good overall, unlike many farms in the northeast where blight and flooding dominated. So, finally we must thank the soil that grew our food, the moderate rains that watered it and the mild temperatures that ripened it.

In the Share - Week 23

LETTUCE (F/P) We will be pulling them out from under their blanket of double row cover.

FALL CARROTS (F/P) Finally found the Bolero carrots that I know I planted somewhere amongst the storage carrots. Darn sweet and long-legged, perhaps the best of the season.

GARLIC (F) Mostly our artichoke variety. Partials have a choice with the herbs.

GREEN PEPPERS (F/P) A long, slow frying releases their sweetness

BROCCOLI, CAULIFLOWER OR THE LAST TOMATOES (P)

CABBAGE (P)

VARIOUS ROOTS: HAKUREI TURNIPS, RUTABAGAS & WATERMELON RADISHES (F) See Tom's blog for an identification lesson.

GREENS CHOICE: KALE, SWISS CHARD OR BOK CHOI (F) See if you can taste the difference after a couple of frosts.

HERB CHOICE: CILANTRO, DILL OR ARUGULA (F/P)

ALSO THIS WEEK: Bread of Life Bakery delivery

NEXT WEEK: Our last CSA distribution for 2009. Next week we'll have lettuce, herbs, greens, more carrots, beets, kohlrabi, celeriac and radishes. The few winter squash that we harvested plus the last of the sweet potatoes and bulb fennel.

THE FIELDS: Fall is in full expression at the farm. Frosty mornings, the yellowing leaves and some glorious sunrises. All that remains after the frosts last week (29 degrees or thereabouts) are the brassica family standing solidly with no need for cover, as are the last of the leeks and celeriac. Then, there are those that are hardy with a bit of help from us: the lettuces, beets, carrots, arugula, herbs. The summer crops are in various stages of decomposition. After we remove irrigation tape, trellising, stakes and cages, we mow and then spade the crop under. When not deconstructing the season, we mulch. This week it's the speedy kind. Take an empty 200' bed, a round hay bale and three farmers and in 20 minutes or less it is covered with a thick winter blanket of organic matter.

After a morning of cold-weather farming, the farm crew appreciates a pot of tea and some indoor work. Today we inventoried what is left of this year's seed and processed seed we had collected earlier this season. It's a necessary step in the process of planning for next year's harvests. Can I say I'm already looking forward to next season??

What to Do With Your Share---Week 23

Roots Medley
Roots, the hardiest of the vegetables, dominate the last few weeks of the season. We had good but mixed results with the roots this Fall. The beets, carrots, and Hakurei turnips were as good a crop as we have ever had. The purple top turnips, rutabagas and radishes however have struggled at best.

For the full shares mixed root choices (next week for partials) we have a refresher photo below to tell things apart. From left to right are rutabaga, Hakurei turnip, and 2 varieties of watermelon radishes.



Carrot and Pecan Soup
While we were in the field today I was thinking about coming up with a good recipe. As we started our carrot harvest Irealized I had to cook something with the great carrots coming out of the Fall beds. Carrot and chestnut soup came to mind, so making due with some Missouri pecans I adapted a recipe from Cooking at the Academy.

Ingredients
2 tbsp olive oil
5 medium carrots, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
1 potato, chopped
1-1/2 cups shelled Missouri pecans
1-1/2 tsp salt
6 cups stock or water
Optional
1 cup heavy cream
1/4 tsp grated nutmeg



Method

Use the food processor to chop the pecans into a coarse meal or flour. Don't bother to wash the food processor, as you will need it later to puree the soup.

Saute the carrots and onion in the olive oil for 2 minutes over medium high heat.
Turn heat to medium and cook 5 minutes more, add the pecans, stir and cook for 2 more minutes.
Add 2 cup of stock, bring to boil, cover and simmer for 10 minutes
Add remaining 4 cups of stock and simmer for 30 minutes
Strain the soup and puree only the solids. Blend puree with liquid part of the soup, adjust taste with salt and pepper. At this time you can also add some cream for even more richness of flavor.



Bulk Order Week of 10/12/09
(Sorry for the late posting)
Garlic $8.00/lb
Chard $3.00/bunch
Kale $3.00/bunch
Beets $3.oo/bunch (specify Chiogga (stripped), or red beets)
Jalapenos $2.50/pint, $4.00/quart
Arugula $2.50/bunch
Dried herbs $2.00/tin (thyme, marjoram, dried hot peppers, lovage, lavendar flowers, coriander, oregano, rosemary)