I think last week was the first week in the history of Fresh Earth Farms that I didn’t get around to writing a newsletter. Too much to do, too little time and not enough help. So something had to give, and it was the newsletter. But I’m back, better than ever (or maybe pretty much just the same…)
Garlic Planting Gala, the social event of the fall season, will take place on Saturday, October 7th from 1:00 pm until done with food and fire to follow. This is a great opportunity to see the farm. get some fresh air, exercise and meet your fellow farm friends. This is a kid friendly event! There are all types of activities including stooping and standing. Please let me know if you can attend.
On the labor front, we are still looking for help either as occasional volunteers or regular employees. If you know anyone — including yourself — who has a hankering for farm work please send them our way. Also, we have a couple of major projects that require extensive sitting — no farm work hankering required. If you are able to sit and have some free time on your hands come on out. We will teach you the ancient art of garlic processing. And once you’ve reached master level we can show you the more ancient art of onion processing. Both require you to sit (or stand if you prefer). A firm grip is helpful but if you don’t currently have one by the end of the process you will, or maybe hand cramps. Later this fall, sometime around the first frost, we will be educating all who are interested in the ancient art of sweet potato and squash harvesting. I highly recommend this class. Lots of stooping and carrying of heavy bins. What could possibly be more fun? Plus the grip you acquired from processing garlic and/or onions will serve you well in harvesting squash! Of course if you prefer to only stoop and not carry heavy bins we would gladly carry the bins for you.
Farm News
With the weather cooling many of the warm season crops are slowing down. We have passed peak tomatoes, peak cucumbers and hopefully peak eggplant. The sweet corn is done for the season. The last planting was enjoyed immensely by the deer and/or raccoons. Unfortunately that limited our enjoyment. Hopefully you had your fill of sweet corn. Summer squash is pretty much done; most of the plants are dead. There are still more cabbages; I don’t know if that is good or bad. It seems like we’ve had a lot of cabbages this year. The peak of the second planting of beans occurred last week. We’ll get more from them for a while but probably not pounds and pounds of them. The sweet peppers are producing well and should continue until frost.
How did you like this past week’s carrots? It is a new variety we are trialing this year. Every time we find a carrot we love it goes away. Frustrating. Anyway, I have my opinion of the new carrot but I don’t want to tell you to influence your response. Let me know what you think.
We’ll continue to dig potatoes every other week or so. The variety from two weeks ago was Norkotah, a russet potato. This week we will be transitioning from Norkotah to Kennebec, a large, general purpose potato. Time to find your general purpose potato recipes!
Hopefully we can start finding ripe watermelons that aren’t eaten by the deer (seems to be a trend here). If we are successful, look for them where you typically pick-up your produce — no promises.
Speaking of deer, they seem to have found our fall beets and are grazing on the beet tops. Is there nothing these creatures won’t eat?
Speaking of deer, since we covered the edamame with a plastic mesh we eliminated the deer-eating-our-edamame-plants problem (is there nothing these creatures won’t eat?) but that didn’t eliminated the Japanese-beetles-eating-our-edamame-plants problem. The good news though is unlike the deer, the Japanese beetles leave some of the plant to photosynthesize and vuola we have edamame this year! For those new to this delicious legume, below is how to prepare and eat edamame.
So what all will we have this week? I already mentioned the edamame, potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, eggplants, beans, cucumbers, cabbages, onions, garlic and possibly watermelons. Other than that we might get some kale, and okra.
FruitShare, CheeseShare, EggShare, CoffeeShare, FlowerShare and IceCreamShare are this week. Flowers are slowing down as well but at least the deer aren’t eating them. We’ll keep making bouquets until we can’t anymore. Then on to pumpkins! MeatShare was last week. If you didn’t pick it up please do so this week.
How to prepare and eat Edamame
Edamame are a variety of soybean that is picked at an immature stage. They are a popular appetizer in East Asian cuisines. To my knowledge, no edamame soybeans have been genetically modified. I suspect the market is too small to support the research necessary to bring it to market. In any case, the ones we grow are not genetically engineered. We pick them green before they get hard and starchy. At this stage they are nutty and delicious. We have about five days where the edamame is perfect – big enough to eat but not overly mature to be starchy.
Edamame should be cooked before consuming. Eating it raw may lead to intestinal difficulty in some people. To cook, place the whole pods in lightly salted boiling water for five minutes. Drain and serve hot, sprinkled lightly with a bit of salt for flavor. Do not eat the pod! It is not edible and has a whole lotta fiber! Put the cooked pod in your mouth and pull it out while lightly gripping the pod with your teeth. The beans should pop out of the pod and fall into your mouth with a little bit of salt you used to season them. Chew. Swallow. It’s really that simple!
That is all for now. Do not hesitate to volunteer or send in questions, comments, suggestions, etc.