[Editor’s Note: This newsletter was written on Monday evening before the rain that was not forecasted last night. Please be advised.]
Just a reminder that we will take back pint-size clamshells, egg cartons from EggShare, FruitShare boxes and rubber bands. Please save the rubber bands until you have enough quantity to make it worthwhile.
Farm News
This has been an interesting season so far (like there has ever been an uninteresting season). On the bright side we seem to be better at handling the typical farm challenges we’ve had in the past. Things like weeds, pests, irrigation, etc. The fields look reasonably good. The crops are doing as well as can be expected given the weather we’ve been given. So all-in-all farming is going fine.
However we seem to be seeing a lot more one-off type challenges, challenges that aren’t part of everyday farming. These challenges include things I’ve mentioned before like broken tractors, crashed computers, etc. This past week we’ve seen a couple more new challenges that we are trying to resolve — a couple drop site issues, and a few unfortunate resale item issues. These types of challenges we hope don’t happen since they are unanticipated and require attention that wasn’t allocated so they eat into other tasks’ time or personal time. I guess that is the nature of any small business and isn’t specifically farm related.
Hopefully these side issues can be resolved quickly with little impact. I do appreciate everyone’s understanding as we solve these problems. Which brings up an important point: if you have a problem please bring it to my attention. If you see something, say something. I can’t resolve it if I don’t know about it. Sometimes the problems are isolated to one member. However other times several members are having the same experience. But since we have so many Minnesotans as members we don’t want to complain so the problem persists or we lose a few members due to something we could have solved if only we knew. So please when I say at the end of every newsletter “Do not hesitate to send in questions, comments, etc.” I actually mean it and hope you can set aside your Minnesota nature for a bit and let me know there is a problem. Or let me know that there isn’t a problem and everything is going great. That can be helpful as well!
Other than these few things, we are spending any extra time we have waiting for it to rain. As you can see from the above picture, I tried to show how parched the earth is but the cucumber got in the way. We have had very little rain these last many weeks. If we had as much rain as forecasted we would be way above average. But most of the rain has gone to the north or south of us. So here we sit, waiting for rain.
One fortunate aspect of where we farm is that we have pretty good soil. It has a lot of organic matter which retains moisture quite well. So what little rainfall we’ve had is still helpful. But to paraphrase the legendary urban farmer Johnny Cochran, “If it don’t rain, you can’t retain.” We need the rain! So leave the car windows down. Wash you vehicles and schedule an outdoor wedding. We need all the help we can get! [Editor’s Note: Thank you all for leaving your car windows open last night].
Detours!
Rumor has it (I don’t get off the farm much so this may in fact not be true) that Hwy 95/Manning Ave will be closed at Valley Creek starting this week. If you take Manning Ave from I-94 or points north instead of following the detour signs, take Old Hudson Rd east to Neal Ave. Turn right and head south. Neal parallels Manning so follow your usual directions from here. If you come from Woodbury area use Bailey Ave instead of Valley Creek. I believe everything Bailey related is open.
What will we have this week? New this week is cabbage! Get your cabbage recipes out. Also new this week is fennel (just a few though it will grow in quantity over the next couple weeks)! Below is a great recipe for fennel frond pesto. Broccoli (with this weird hot/cool/hot/cool/hot/no rain weather it has been quite the challenge growing broccoli!), kohlrabi, summer squash/zucchini, beets, onions (might be switching to bulbing onions), a few garlic scapes for the pesto recipe below, chard (you can use chard for pesto as well!), basil (you can use basil for pesto as well!), a few remaining snap peas, a few remaining snow peas, a few cauliflower, a few eggplant, one cucumber, very few tomatoes, virtually no cherry tomatoes, and probably not beans (though if so it would be late this week). We can expect these warm season crops like tomatoes, cucumbers, beans and eggplants to ramp up the next week or two.
This week’s recipe. Fennel frond pesto!
(This recipe is rebroadcast from its original airing on July 14th, 2015).
Hey, I thought you needed basil to make pesto? Not true! You can use any green leafy plant to make pesto. You also don’t need pine nuts. So what do you need to make pesto? Well, follow along below:
A bunch of green leafy stuff, like 6 cups or so. We’ll use fennel fronds for this example.
Some nuts, about ½ cup. Walnuts, pine nuts, macadamia nuts, almonds, whatever you have on hand.
Some hard cheese around a ½ cup. Parmesan works great, which reminds me you need to grate it.
Some garlic. A couple cloves or even more fun is to use garlic scapes!
Some olive oil, like ¼ to ½ a cup or more. I don’t think you should substitute any other oil for the olive oil. Just doesn’t seem right.
Put all the ingredients except the oil into a food processor and grind away. Dividing it into two smaller amounts will make it easier. Scrape down the sides several times between grindings until everything is finely chopped.
With the food processor running, pour in the olive oil until the consistency desired. For dips and spreads use less oil for a thicker consistency. For pasta sauce use more oil. Scrape down the sides occasionally to ensure complete distribution.
Taste and adjust by adding additional amounts of any of the items. It is hard to over mix the pesto so keep on grinding!
That’s it. I find this pesto to be tastier than basil pesto. To me it is sweeter.
This week we have FruitShare, CheeseShare, CoffeeShare, IceCreamShare, EggShare, and FlowerShare.
Cherries arrive this week for those who ordered cherries.
As always, do not hesitate to send in questions, comments, suggestions, jokes, brain teasers, etc. I really mean it!