Sandy Mush Bald with zinnias in the foreground
It’s been a nice week since we last corresponded. We’ve gotten some rain, so no irrigating over the past week. Last Thursday we had a wonderful day dealing with onions & garlic. The loft of our barn was FULL of onions and garlic on drying racks after being harvested a few weeks ago. Well it was time to harvest more onions! Lots more ( and there’s still more out there almost ready). So we had to make room on the drying racks. We topped all the onions and garlic (taking the dried and shriveled “green” top portion off) and putting all those in crates. That gave us just enough room to get all the sweet and some red onions onto the rack to dry. It looks like there are more red onions out in the field ready to be harvested on Wednesday or Friday. More rearranging to do up in the barn!
Harvesting squash and cukes, a ritual every Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning
We spent much of the day on Monday getting a couple of fields changed up. In one we mowed down the buckwheat that was in there. It’s always hard to mow flowering buckwheat down, beneficial insects love it so, but if you don’t mow it down soon enough it will go to seed and that field will continue to produce buckwheat for many months to come. So it was mowed down and disced in. Another field was tilled, fertilized and bedded up for the next few things that are to be planted: more flowers, sunflowers, and lettuce. We mowed down the strawberry plants and pulled up the landscape fabric that they grow on, then disced all that in. So now that area will be ready to plant and sow the early fall crops. The early fall greens. kales &collards are a week or so away from planting!
Cabbage plants, looking sublime
Please return your CSA box next week. These boxes are waxed and are not recyclable, but we reuse them. So PLEASE remember to bring them back next week.
Ideas for Cooking
(We want to thank long time CSA member John Loyd for providing ideas and inspiration in this section!!!)
KNIVES 2 – I didn’t mention Japanese knives last week. They come in two styles. Beautiful works of art and utilitarian. Both have great steel that can be made extremely sharp. The most expensive one’s are made of layering steel in a forge and are called Damascus. These can cost hundreds of dollars but are gorgeous. The others are hard to find and are simple unpolished steel with wooden handles. I was given one, and it was as good as any knife I have ever owned. I didn’t mention ceramic knives either. Don’t bother.
OLIVE OIL – I should of said this at the start of the season. When olive oil is mentioned in recipes, it is always a reference to extra-virgin olive oil. Cook’s tasters could not tell the difference between extra-virgin that was $10 per liter and $80 per liter. Cheaper pure and “light” oils were decidedly inferior in salads, though they might be fine for some cooking.
For most salads and cooking I like Earth Fare’s oil, Colavita and am quite fond of California Olive Ranch. The more expensive one’s are good when the oil is really front and center in a salad.DRESSING OF THE WEEK (Click Link)
Carlyn Berghoff’s Lemon-Dijon Vinaigrette