Another rather nice fall CSA share this week! Thanks to no killing frost so far, we’re still picking beans (Jade), peppers (Gypsy, Ace, Cayenne Long Slim), and zucchini (Golden Dawn III). There’s also winter squash (Table Gold acorn), cauliflower (Minuteman), onions (Stuttgarter), beets (Scarlet Supreme), carrots (Nelson, Purple Haze), spinach (Spargo, Bloomsdale), parsley (Green River curly, Plain Italian flat), and garlic (Music). Plus a newsletter. Monday shares are left at a drop-off spot, with shareholders’ names printed on the handles…
CSA
CSA set-up at the farmers’ market
This year’s mostly self-serve approach to CSA pick-up at the farmers’ market has gone along smoothly. The bin set-up has evolved into one long row, cafeteria-style, I guess you could call it—shareholders bring their own bags and move down the line. It definitely cuts hours off of Friday packing, which makes the weekly harvest a lot more fun. We’ve also had time for “extras,” like two or three herbs every week…
Fall harvest…
We’re definitely into fall weather now: the thermometer may still read “warm” but there’s always a cool edge in the air. This is the best field-working weather, you can go on for hours. Today was a bit damp, and the abundant root crops were muddy from the overnight rain (they get rinsed, with a spray of the hose on Jet for the roots, then a dunk in the laundry sink to rinse off the leaves). Carrots were in 2 lb (900g) bundles, by the trusty kitchen scale we’re still using…
We bundled the beets in the field—these are the red standbys of the season, Scarlet Supreme. Always reliable, they’re in great shape and flavor, and the greens are particularly substantial…
The tomato harvest was fairly slim and motley, maybe 120 lbs (54kg), enough for CSA shares only. We’re picking them even partially ripe—frost may come at any time, no sense in waiting. The toms may not be too pretty, but they’ve somehow become real tasty in the last couple of weeks, steadily developing from the milder flavors of the first pickings, to really quite fine! Was it the recent sunshine? Whatever the reason, it’s a pleasant surprise!
Weighing eggs
Egg production has been moving along smooth as anything. The girls are great, easy going, seem to be having a good time, and they’re pumping out 23-25 eggs a day. Besides giving them out to everyone around here, there’s been enough to take to market every other week as a CSA bonus, usually, half a dozen per share. Bob unearthed an old egg scale from somewhere in the barn, and I’ve been playing with it lately (for actual distribution, there’s no sizing, everyone gets a mix). Egg size has definitely increased. Where they were mainly medium with a few small at the start, they’re now maybe half medium, half large. The scale is the kind of old school tech that I love, with everything simple, open, obvious, and FIXABLE. It may be a little hard to read in the pic: there’s a little pointer, with a fleck of red paint on it, at the bottom of the open triangle of the indicator—this egg’s Large, just on the border of XL…
CSA share check-in
Monday morning means a quick small harvest for about half a dozen CSA shares. What’s in each share is my main harvest concern each week. The goal is to maintain the basics, like lettuce, carrots, onions, and also have some exciting new stuff each time. In a year like this one, with slow growth, this can be tough. But we’re doing OK so far. Today’s veggie menu, taken directly from the CSA newsletter: “In your share this week: basil (sweet); bean (Jade); beet (Scarlet Supreme); carrot (Touchon); garlic (Music); green onion (Ramrod); mesclun (all-lettuce); parsley (curly & flat-leaf); potato (Yukon Gold); Swiss chard (Bright Lights).” This season, shares are packed in really nice reusable shopping bags from one of the supermarket chains. They’re big and roomy, decorated with an assortment of veggie and fruit photo blow-ups, cost a buck, and can be replaced free of charge when they wear out. Much cooler than the hundreds of plastic grocery store shopping bags with the farmers’ market logo on ’em that I used to go through, and we also pass on the bags at cost at the market.
Pick your own CSA share pick-up
CSA shareholders coming to the farm this year are encouraged to harvest as much of their share as they feel like! Here, it’s sorting through mesclun and spinach on the screen table, removing bad leaves and the odd weed, before packing in their own bags. This approach is great fun all around, with me explaining what to do and helping out when needed. There are only a couple of on-farm pickups (most are at the farmers’ market), so this approach might be a little more personalized than if the number of shareholders was bigger. Regardless, this DIY approach is a tiny farm first that seems to work!
Tiny harvest!
Spent the early morning harvesting a few CSA shares for a Monday drop-off. This is the first week of shares, and they’re still small, mainly greens… There are many tiny farming routines, things you’d probably never do in a bigger operation, that I find extremely relaxing and fun: the final rinsing and putting together of a handful of shares is one of them (it’s not really economical to separately harvest and drop off less than 10 shares or so, this is an…exception). There’s something deeply satisfying about this final post-harvest step, with the veggies together at their finest, the memory of the different quick individual harvests—picking, cutting, pulling—still fresh, that’s…cool! The spinach (above) was quickly dunked in cold well water to rinse off dirt splashed up from recent rain, then allowed to drip dry for a bit on the screen table.
Picked two types of beet greens, Golden Detroit and Scarlet Supreme. The stems are a little long on these—it all depends on the density of the rows, the weather, the harvest timing, leaf size is the luck of the draw since these are really thinnings, they’re not being grown just for the greens. Still young and tender, the baby beets and all can be cooked up, or the leaves used raw in salad (or as a salad!). Really tasty…
And mesclun, of course. This all-lettuce salad mix is a staple crop this year as usual, always on my mind! This cut’s nice and clean! Unrinsed—I let the morning dew dry off a bit on the screen table… More simple pleasures for the simple of mind! ;)