Category: Harvest - Page 17

Harvesting Brussels sprouts

5 Jun 202618 Oct 2007 by Mike (tfb)

That was interesting! I’ve harvested Brussels sprouts by picking the individual heads, but for our first bigger harvest of about 60 plants, to speed things up, I decided to take the whole thing.

First try: chopping the base of the stem with the machete-like harvest knife was like hitting a piece of hardwood. Wow! Tough and cut-resistant… Next up, a sharp hatchet fared no better: a solid whack hardly penetrated.

So, we pulled ’em up, roots and all. They set in pretty good, but the main roots are shallow, so even with knocking off the clumped soil, this went quickly.

Next, we discovered that removing the roots is easily accomplished with a short, fairly rigid hand saw. Once we figured out the right starting angle, one and half strokes cut through the stems like butter: zip-zip!

Then to the harvest knife: swipe off the head, and then, holding the base of the stem, about four downward lopping strokes, rotating after each, to shear off the leaves. Kinda odd looking results, but efficient all around.

The sprouts, catching up from the summer drought, haven’t all filled out, still, a healthy yield of full-size to tiny heads from each one.

It was a completely novel, different harvest process than for all the other veggies. All the chopping and cutting was…fun!

UPDATE: The kind of odd presentation was loved at the farmer’s market—certainly said, “Fresh!”

Seasonal eating

15 Dec 200713 Oct 2007 by Mike (tfb)

The veggie selection changes over the season, but it’s not necessarily reflected too dramatically on the stand at the farmers’ market this year. Compared to mid-August, the absence of snap beans and tomatoes is clear (with the mild weather, some vendors did have standard field tomatoes today). As for early June, well, more variety now is to be expected. Still, most of the cool-season crops for around here, like broccoli, cauliflower, and collards, also, winter squash, I have only enough of for CSA. On the stand, two types of radish (White Icicle, French Breakfast), three types of beet (Golden Detroit, Scarlet Supreme, Bull’s Blood, in smaller sizes here), two types of carrot (Nelson, Purple Haze), Red Russian kale, two types of bok choi (Mei Quing, Joi) and mesclun, plus Yukon Gold potatoes, Music garlic and Stuttgarter onions in baskets. The stand could be a lot bigger, offering more display space, and the harvest could be expanded (there are still herbs, summer squash, sweet and hot peppers, tomatillos, Brussels sprouts,…) but the marginal sales for many “secondary” veggies at this slowing down time of year don’t make it worthwhile. I’m still working on the balance between production planning, labor, harvest selection, post-harvest prep, and presentation… Sounds complicated, but it’s just…work! ;)

Big beets

16 Oct 200712 Oct 2007 by Mike (tfb)

Something excellent and hard to pin down happened with the last planting of beets: they became HUGE. This was the fourth planting of the season, around mid-July (see them on the left), and the seedlings got caught in the near drought, although they were around the top of the irrigation list and got a decent share of water. In mid-September, the steady, plentiful rains started, along with continuing warm weather, but that was well into their growth (they’re all 50-60 day varieties). And thinning was good, though just the usual. Whatever the cause, all of them—Scarlet Supreme, Golden Detroit, Bull’s Blood, Chioggia—blew up, most weighing in at 1.5-2.5 lbs (700-1100 gms). Maybe I don’t get out enough (to check out other people’s produce around the country and the world :), or maybe more irrigation would do the trick, but to me it’s somewhat of a mystery how these got to double and triple size. I’ve tasted them all, raw and cooked: they’re firm, tender, with great color and flavor. Smaller beets are more convenient for some purposes, but these big guys are versatile and…easy to harvest and pack… Two to a beet!

After the harvest

21 Aug 200810 Oct 2007 by Mike (tfb)

Finally, today, no more potatoes in the ground! After a near-pristine potato patch for much of the season, field priorities got switched around and pigweed had its turn with the taters. Eradicating the weeds before digging up the last 50’x50′ section seemed to take forever (but was actually a few hours spread over the last couple of weeks). Anyhow, this last haul is about 200 lbs (91 kg). It’s not much when you can buy a 50lb (22 kg) bag of great, unsprayed, unwashed potatoes for $14CDN at the farmers’ market. But in my crop mix, it makes sense. We harvested somewhere around 1,000 lbs (454 kg) this year. In the usual 1-2 lb bags, some sold at a by the pound (not bulk!) price, and the majority used for CSA shares, that works out just fine… Of the Yukon Gold, Norland and Gold Rush, YG performed the best, from small, early, supertasty new potatoes to a good amount of nicely big mature ones—they’re not for storage, but who stores a pound!

Winter squash

8 Sep 20116 Oct 2007 by Mike (tfb)

The Friday harvest finally included winter squash, and a tiny little harvest it was. These guys were on their own when it came to water, we just didn’t have time and gear to irrigate—given a bit of a rain break, they’ve tended to make out. Unfortunately, the timing of this year’s drought caught the plants later on in the season, late July into August, as they tried to fill out. Bottom line: super low yield and small squash this year, drip irrigation a must…next year. In any case, we did get enough for two rounds of CSA. Typically, the acorn squash came through best (Table Ace, Table Gold, Cream of the Crop), the butternut (Early Butternut) are…minuscule. Delicata was a first this year, I’m not sure how large they are usually, but likely bigger than this. And so on. Even the usually prolific and reliable, bright orange Uchiki Kuri, a Hubbard-type (Japanese Kabocha), didn’t do so well. Only the Sweet Mama buttercup came through with some decent dry weather size! So, off to the farmers’ market with an assorted 50 or so, none for sale, all for the CSA shares!

Autumn harvest action!

2 Dec 20095 Oct 2007 by Mike (tfb)

A steady harvest through a warm, hazy afternoon wound up quite early, with just about everything sorted, rinsed and bunched or bagged by around 8:30 pm. Smooth! The end-of-season crew has settled down to Jo, Lynn, Conall and me. Here, Jo and Lynn are harvesting a sparsely germinated but bountiful spinach patch (the second growth leaves are HUGE, fleshy, tasty and tender), while Conall cuts all-lettuce mesclun on the Greens Machine. When not snapping pics, I’m bunching kale in the last stand of brassicas. Filling in between the veggies, lush expanses of oats. In front of Lynn, a sprinkler from the last days of irrigation. The large clear leaf bags are used once for greens harvest, then saved for collecting mulch, or at least, trash. All is in order… It flashed through my mind how over the course of a few short weeks, everyone who came regularly to work in the field started with, in most cases, no experience, and casually transformed into a cheerful, efficient crew. Tiny farming must come naturally!

Rainy day harvest fashion

2 Dec 200928 Sep 2007 by Mike (tfb)

Jo sports a borrowed rain jacket with snap-on drawstring hood, in striking work yellow—perfect protection for a rainy harvest day. Today was probably the wettest harvest Friday of the year, and it wasn’t bad. A couple of heavy downpours kept us indoors for quite a while (snapping farm fashion shots out of the Milkhouse door…), otherwise, a light drizzle for part of the afternoon hardly slowed us down. For the occasional wet work, Conall favors a full rainsuit, jacket and pants, while I so far make do with a hooded rain jacket—I’ll pop inside and wait out the heavier stuff. Lynn arrived after the major downpours. Today’s four-person crew made good time despite the weather. For the record: mesclun, spicy salad greens (arugula, mizuna, tatsoi, red mustard), collards, kale, spinach, radish, carrots, beets, green onion, summer squash, bok choi, tomato and potato (harvested yesterday), and garlic and onions from storage!!