Announcements!
We are now taking orders for the 2015 season. Order now and reserve your pick-up day and location. $100 deposit is all it takes; no need to fill out an order form unless you are a new member or your contact information has changed. Just send in a check with “2015 share deposit” in the memo.
We are also taking orders for winter FruitShare, MeatShare and CheeseShare. We do not have final pricing yet so it is more gaging interest. Please let me know if you’d like to participate in any of these delicious shares this winter.
Garlic Planting: For those of you who were disappointed that you couldn’t participate in the garlic planting I have great news, it has been rescheduled for this Saturday, October 11th from 1:00 to 5:00! The soil was too wet this past Saturday and with the forecast of sunny skies this week it should be perfect conditions for planting this weekend. Plus the forecast for Saturday is a delightful time with plenty of sunshine, comradery and laughter. Please let me know if you would like to partake in the sunshine, comradery and laughter. We could really use as much help as we can get. After garlic planting we will sit around the bonfire and enjoy a hearty dinner!
Thank you to those who helped dig sweet potatoes last Saturday! It got pretty cold Sunday night (there was ice on the puddles) so getting the sweet potatoes out before they froze was critically important. We are curing them now – it takes about 10 days. We plan to hand them out the last week of the season. When you get them DO NOT EAT THEM RIGHT AWAY. Sweet potatoes need time to sweeten, typically 6-8 weeks. So Thanksgiving is a reasonable time to eat them. The end of the year would be even better.
MeatShare is over for the season. We have one more CheeseShare, EggShare, FruitShare, CoffeeShare, SeafoodShare and SalmonShare. We also have three more weeks of VeggieShares!
What will we have this week? New this week – and new to our farm – is celeriac. Celeriac is also known as celery root. It is a relative of celery where you eat the root instead of the stalks. Let me know if you have any good recipes! Also new this week are shallots. We’ll also have winter squash, carrots, potatoes, garlic, bok choi, some broccoli (ramping up), kale, possibly leeks, a few Napa cabbages, the last of the beans, and who knows what else we find out there.
Farm News
Though it appears from your perspective that this farming thing is an easy endeavor the reality is it takes the work of a few dedicated people to make it happen. Without their hard work we would all starve – literally! So every week of each season I take credit for all the hard work that went into providing you the delicious produce we distribute week after week – except for the one week I acknowledge the others who do the real work while I drive around on the tractor trying to look busy. This is the week for the acknowledgements. So in order of seniority here are this season’s employees.
The one employee who has been here almost as long as I have is Rebecca. Many of you have met her over the many years she has been here. And some of you have run across her at her other job. A lot of the expertise we’ve gained here at the farm is stored within Rebecca’s brain. New employees ask her instead of me what needs to be done next. I assume it is because the tractor is really loud so it makes it difficult to ask me. Nonetheless, she has been an invaluable asset to the farm for I’d guess around 10 years.
The second most senior employee is Simon. This was his third year here at the farm. It is a wonderful thing when employees come back year after year; the training is vastly reduced. If we had a position of wash station manager Simon would be it.
The next person is Nick. Nick – or spud Nick as we’ve come to know him – is new to the farm this season. He comes with experience farming commodity crops in his native North Dakota. Nick was looking for something to do during his down time from selling solar panels. We were lucky to have him show up here!
Next on the list is Chris. He has lived here as long as I have but finally got interested enough in money to actually do some work around the farm. Actually he has worked here off and on for quite a few years so I wasn’t sure where I would put him in the seniority list. I have to say he really knows his way around the farm.
Finally the last two workers are the sister team of Rachelle and Linnea. Rachelle is a member of the farm and heeded the call for help this fall. She dragged along her sister Linnea. The two have been immensely helpful with all the heavy lifting here at the end of the season. Without their help you would not be overwhelmed with produce like you have been this fall.
This season has been a success in many ways mainly due to the hard work of these individuals. They have kept their sense of humor even in the heat, the rain, the freezing cold and while carrying 70 lb harvest crates full of squash. If you get a chance to thank them please do so.
Interviewer: “Congratulations on winning the $140 million dollar Powerball lottery.”
Farmer: “Thank you.”
Interviewer: “Do you have any special plans for spending all of that money?”
Farmer: “Nope. Not really. I’m just gonna keep farming until the lottery money is all gone.”