In Your Box:

• Basil
• Broccolini
• Cabbage or cauliflower
• Carrots
• Cucumber
• Head lettuce
• Summer squash
• Sweet onion
• Tomatoes

Farm News

On Monday I planted out my final transplants of the year. Besides fall spinach and radishes, which are directly seeded in the field, everything that we’ll be eating this harvest season is now out in the field. I’ve had plants in the greenhouse since late February, keeping them watered, warm, shaded, inspected, and counted daily for months. Now that they’re all in the field and enjoying the rain we’ve received, I can feel the weight of all the responsibility lifted off me. There’s still a lot of farm work left to go this year, but having one less item to monitor is a great relief!

Just a reminder that we’re coming up on our family vacation. There will be no CSA delivery on August 5th and 7th as we enjoy some time away from the farm. We’ll be off to Bayfield, Wisconsin, and the Apostle Islands area. After enduring the heat and humidity this past weekend, jumping into Lake Superior sounds mighty tempting! Regular delivery will resume on the 12th and continue weekly into October.

This week’s box

This week we take a week off of scallions in favor of sweet onions. Some of these have grown unbelievably large! I’ve kept these well weeded, and with all the rain they’ve had they have really sized up nicely. If you can’t use the whole onion in one dish, you can chop it up and keep it in the fridge for 7-10 days. Just be sure to use a good plastic container to make sure the aromas don’t take over your fridge. The greens are still in good shape and are edible, as well.

Primed by the heat and humidity, our squash plants are producing more than I can keep up with! If you are getting behind on using summer squash, it’s easy to freeze. It can be pureed in a blender and frozen directly for use as a soup base, or grated and frozen for use in bread or muffins. Also, you’ll find our favorite recipe for zucchini cake, linked below.

My favorite delivery days are when we have basil. All of that fresh-cut basil leaves a great aroma in the van as I drive to our delivery sites, more than making up for my own odor after such sweaty days in the field…. 

Our cauliflower is starting to form heads, and it looks like a decent crop overall. It doesn’t all mature at the same time, so if you don’t receive cauliflower this week there will be cabbage instead. I’ll keep track of who has received it to make sure it evens out.

Finally, we offer our first harvest of carrots this season. They haven’t sized up like I would have expected, but I’ve planted a lot and there’s not much better than baby carrots. They’ll keep sizing up in the field and we’ll have many more to come this year.

Vietnamese Style Lettuce Rolls

from 1,000 Vegan Recipes

• 2 green onions or one sweet onion
• 2 TB soy sauce
• 2 TB rice vinegar
• 1 tsp sugar
• 3 TB water
• 3 oz. Rice vermicelli
• 4-6 large lettuce leaves
• 1 medium carrot, shredded
• ½ cucumber, peeled, seeded, and sliced
• ½ sweet pepper, cut into strips
• 1 c. fresh cilantro or basil leaves

Directions:
1. Remove the greens of the scallions or sweet onion, chop, and set aside. Mince the onion bulb and transfer to a small bowl. Mix with soy sauce, rice vinegar, sugar, and water. Stir to blend and set aside.
2. Soak the vermicelli in medium bowl of hot water until softened, about 1 minute. Drain the noodles well and cut them into 3” lengths. Set aside.
3. Place a lettuce leaf on a work surface and arrange a row of noodles in the center of the leaf, followed by some of the onion greens, the carrot, cucumber, pepper, and cilantro. Bring the bottom edge of the leaf over the filling and fold in the two short sides. Roll up gently but tightly. Place the roll seam side down on a serving platter. Repeat with remaining ingredients. Serve with dipping sauce.

Serves 4

Coming up

There will be no delivery next week while we are on our vacation. In two weeks we are expecting beets, chard, scallions, beans, head lettuce, cucumber, tomatoes, zucchini, cabbage and broccolini.