In Your Box:

• Beans
• Cabbage or Broccolini
• Cauliflower
• Cucumber or eggplant
• Head lettuce
• Red Onions
• Summer squash
• Tomatoes

Farm News

There comes a somewhat alarming feeling every year in late July, when the heat index is well over a hundred and the humidity is so high that you can wring moisture from the air. After a few days of this, I say to myself, “This doesn’t feel so bad.” It might just be that I’m suffering from heat exhaustion and hallucinating, but by this point in the year I can work through just about anything the weather throws at me. I slow down, to be sure, and take lots of breaks, but 90 degrees and humid just doesn’t bother me as much as it did a few weeks ago. Of course, I wouldn’t complain if a cold front would bring us a little moderation one of these days….

As I mentioned back at the beginning of the harvest season, we will be taking one week off in August for our family vacation. There will be no CSA delivery on August 11 or 13. That marks the halfway point in the harvest year, and we’ll resume with weekly deliveries until MEA break in mid October.

This week’s box

We have just a few tomatoes this week, with many more coming your way shortly. The plants look very healthy and vigorous, and frankly I’m surprised at how slowly they are ripening even with the heat wave. So we’ll enjoy just a taste this week, but we should be ramping up the harvest over the next month.

We finally have our first cucumbers this week. Cucumbers have been the only real struggle this year. The first planting I set out in the field was devastated by our frost on Mother’s Day, so I replanted them. The second planting was attacked by some pest (chipmunk? voles?) that dug up the baby plants to eat the seed in the ground. This led to my third planting, which finally looks to be off to a good start but which won’t really be ready until around Labor Day. We’ll have just a few from the survivors for the next few weeks, but the main harvest is still on the way.

Our cauliflower harvest is earlier than I expected, but unfortunately the plants are a little zapped by the sun and heat. Heat stress makes the heads turn purplish, which doesn’t affect the taste but makes for an unexpected appearance. Cauliflower doesn’t keep well, so plan to use it within a couple days. My plan is to offer cauliflower to our Tuesday delivery sites today and broccolini to our Thursday sites, and then reverse that for next week so everyone gets at least one head of cauliflower.

We have a few more massive scallions in the field still, but I thought we’d take a break this week and offer red onions instead. These are an Italian heirloom called “Red Long of Florence.” They have more of a torpedo shape than the usual bulbing varieties, and can be enjoyed with their green tops as well.

Finally, we have our first cabbage this week. This variety is “Caraflex,” a green offering with a pointed, almost triangular top. Even though it doesn’t look like any cabbage in a grocery store, this pointy variety can be used like any other cabbage. I’ve tried growing several different varieties, and this one is the most reliable on our farm. And if it looks weird, all the better! Cabbage keeps well in the fridge for a couple weeks. We do have a red variety that has the more traditional shape, and it should be ready in a week or two.

Stir Fried Cabbage

from Recipes for Social Change, 2011-2012

Ingredients:

• 1 head of cabbage, cut in palm sized wedges and leaves separated
• 2 TB ginger, julienned
• 1/3 c. halved dried peppers
• 2 TB peanut oil
• 2 TB soy sauce

Directions

1. Using a wok or very large saute pan, saute julienned ginger and halved dried peppers in peanut oil for 2 minutes. 
2. Add cabbage and continue to stir-fry.  Add soy sauce and cover with lid to soften cabbage as it caramelizes, turning down heat. 
3. Arrange chilis on top for presentation.  Serve with rice if desired.

Serves 8

Coming up

Next week we are expecting scallions, basil, head lettuce, broccolini or cauliflower, summer squash, beans and tomatoes.