It’s been such a hot, humid week so far that we’re serving up steamed vegetables in the pick-up tent! Read this week’s newsletter to find out what else is affected by the heat and humidity. But first some announcements.
At the end of these newsletters I tell people to feel free to contact me with questions, comments, jokes, brain teasers, etc. but rarely get any. I surmise it is because nobody ever gets to the end of the newsletter; who’s got that kind of time. So today I am putting this request at the top of the newsletter. I’d love to hear how we are doing. Are you getting too much of something? Too little (and don’t say too few tomatoes since we haven’t given them out yet). Anything not meet your expectations? Anything exceed your expectations? Feedback is a helpful and wonderful thing.
Farm News
It seems this week, like every other week, the news is about the weather. The heat. The rain. The humidity. The heat. We’ve had almost as much heat as we’ve had green onions! Many people are asking, “How does the heat, the rain, the humidity and the heat affect things at the farm?” Good question. I’m glad you asked.
The item most affected by these four things are the workers. I find it funny when I’m in my civilian clothes and meet someone and ask them how they are doing and the response is something like, “Trying to cope with this heat! I was working outside in the yard this past weekend and after only fifteen minutes I was covered in sweat. After an hour I had to stop, go inside and cool off.” My frequent response is something like, “Huh.” I’m a man of few words. Now these are people who know I farm but still they feel the need to tell me how miserable it is to work outside in weather like this. Which brings me to an old farmer saying (not sure if the saying was from an old farmer or the saying is old but it is still worth repeating [long term members can skip over this part or recite it with me since I’ve said it sooo many times]) “In farming sometimes you get to work outside and sometimes you have to work outside.” It has been a “have to” lately.
So what do we do to cope with the heat? Our primary strategy is to immerse our arms in cold water, typically up to our elbows. This not only cools us off a bit but allows us to wash the produce we harvested earlier in the day. Which brings us to our next strategy: we try to get all the harvesting done by noon or hopefully earlier and spend the hottest part of the day washing the produce in cold water. A third strategy is to walk into the walk-in cooler occasionally, usually carrying a storage crate filled with just washed vegetables. And the final strategy is to not go back out into the field once all the produce washing and packing work is done. It makes for an early end time but keeps workers from overheating.
We also drink a lot of water.
How does the heat, the rain, the humidity and the heat affect the plants? Maybe I’ll save that for the next newsletter. That way I will have another week’s worth of scientific data from which to extrapolate.
What will we have this week?
You may recall last week I was able to tell you what is in the delivery boxes since we had already packed them. Of course inevitably by the time we were packing the Thursday boxes the contents had to be altered. Instead of bok choi they got eggplants. That is just the nature of farming. We just started harvesting eggplants in the middle of the week and by Thursday we were short on bok choi. So the delivery boxes got eggplants and no bok choi. Not sure I want to tell you our plan for this week. But I will and be aware it is only good for Tuesday. Thursday boxes may be slightly different.
Anyway, we have lots of lettuce (we are picking it smaller due to the heat so this may be the last week for lettuce); lots and lots of summer squash/zucchini (not as much as last year — yet); green onions (we will switch to bulbing onions in the next week or two once they are big enough to harvest); some chard; some kale; and small amounts of eggplants, fennel, scapes, kohlrabi, snap peas, cucumbers, broccoli and beets.
FamilyShares get squash, onions, lettuce, eggplant, fennel, chard, beets, kale, cucumber and cilantro. CoupleShares get squash, green onions, lettuce, eggplant, fennel, beets, cucumber and cilantro. For the most part this week the beets, eggplant and fennel will go out to the delivery members. Next week we’ll keep them for the on-farm pick-up members.
FlowerShare and the rest of the CoffeeShare and MeatShare this week.
Produce Usage Ideas
Some new members might be new to fennel so I will start there. Fennel is an anise flavored vegetable so if you don’t like black licorice you may not like fennel. It has a lighter, cleaner, fresher taste than black licorice so give it a try even if you think you won’t like it. My favorite use for fennel is to lightly saute it with other vegetables and put it over pasta — primavera style. I was reminded of this when one of our members posted her pasta primavera recipe in our Facebook Group, a good place to share your favorite contemporaneous recipes! You can use any vegetables (other than lettuce and cucumbers I suppose) so feel free to create your own.
5 or so green onions, chopped with white parts and green parts separated
3-5 garlic scapes chopped, or garlic cloves crushed
1 fennel bulb, fronds removed and saved for fennel frond pesto, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 eggplant, cut into bite-sized pieces
2 summer squash/zucchini cut into bite-sized pieces
1 bunch chard, stems and leaves separated, chopped
Olive oil
1/4 (more or less) c Butter/heavy cream/other fat optional
In a large pan heat olive oil. Add white part of green onions. Cook for a minute or two. Add garlic scapes. Cook for another minute or two. Add fennel. Cook for another minute or two. Add eggplant, squash and chard stems. Cook until softened. Add green onion tops, chard leaves. Cook until wilted/softened. Add butter or cream. Heat through. Serve over pasta.
As I said, you can add whatever vegetables you like. Last week I used broccoli, snow peas, squash, green onions, garlic scapes, and chard. Go wild!
Fennel can also be eaten raw in a salad. It adds a nice crisp texture and light anise flavor.
One other suggestion (I guess I’m in an Italian mood) is fennel frond pesto. Just use last week’s pesto recipe and for the leafy part use the fronds from the fennel. Cut them into smaller chunks to give the food processor and easier time grinding them up. I find it sweeter and tastier than basil pesto. And you can freeze the pesto for future use. We withhold the cheese and then freeze the pesto in serving sized portions. When you want to use it simply unfreeze it, then mix in the Parmesan cheese. It will turn darker in the freezer but still has the great pesto flavor.
As always, if you have any questions, comments, jokes, brain teasers, or other brain flotsam or jetsam please send it my way!