CSA Member BBQ Dates

Last year, we had such fun at our Wickham Farms CSA Member BBQ! We regretted that some of our members couldn't join us due to vacations and other conflicts. This year, we're trying to give more members a chance to attend. We're setting the dates earlier in the season, and we're giving members two dates to choose from: Tuesday, July 30 and Wednesday, August 14. We will be sending information via our CSA email newsletter, but wanted to promote the dates well in advance!

Sneak Peek: Garlic!

Mary Pat, Claire and Amy planted garlic early in November.

Although we are months from planting most of our CSA crops, one crop is already in the ground -- garlic! Garlic is unusual in that it's planted in the fall. The garlic scapes will come up in early summer, likely within the first few weeks of the season (mid June is typical). We will pull the bulbs around the end of July or early August, but we will to wait for the tops to start to die off before we distribute them. (Unlike onions, we won't wait for the tops to completely die back.)

If you haven't had garlic scapes before, they are delicious! Garlic scape pesto is probably the most popular use for garlic -- there are quite a few good scape recipes floating around on the internet. You may want to bookmark a few possibilities for spring! Another alternative is to boil the scapes for just a couple minutes then sautee them as you would asparagus. They are quite tasty like that too.

Some interesting tidbits about garlic:

We planted under plastic
to control weeds.

~ Although they are planted the previous season, they are one of the lowest-maintence vegetables. Deer don't eat them, there are very few diseases to which they are susceptible, and they actually benefit many other plants by repelling harmful insects. The biggest concern for a large-scale grower is keeping weeds at bay, because garlic that has been crowded by weeds will not grow as large. That's why we plant ours under plastic mulch!

~ Garlic is a super food that supports digestive health, heart health, and boosts the immune system all at the same time.

~ Although it is common to see minced garlic packed in oil at the grocery store, that is not a safe way to store garlic at home. The oil provides an ideal growing environment for contaminants like botulism.

- Garlic is best stored with the bulb intact, in a cool and dry place with little sunlight. Claire, our chief grower, puts her garlic in large brown-paper bags and store them through the winter in her downstairs laundry room.

~ The variety that we've planted at the farm are all hard-neck varieties. The benefits to hard-necks are that they make scapes (so it's like getting 2 crops from one plant), They also typically have a better flavor and aroma. The only down side to hard neck varieties is that they generally have a reduced storage life compared to soft-neck varieties. Properly stored, they should be good until December or so.

Our story of 2012

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Odds and Ends Dinner Pancake

Odds and ends dinner pancake. Try substituting extra veggies that you've been meaning to use!

1 medium onion, diced
2 small heads of broccoli, cut into very small pieces
3 leaves of kale, ribs removed and roughly chopped
2 carrots, diced

2 tbs olive oil, plus more for the pan
1 cup corn meal
3/4 cup whole spelt flour (or any whole grain)
3 eggs
1/2 cup chicken stock
Salt and pepper to taste

Over medium heat, sauteé the carrots, kale, broccoli, and onion in the 2 Tbs olive oil for about 7 minutes, until softened a bit.

Mix the sauteed veggies with all the other ingredients in a mixing bowl, it should be the consistency of pancake batter (plus veggies, of course).

Heat the extra oil over medium high heat in a non-stick pan, use just enough oil to coat the surface of the pan, and gently pan fry 3/4 cup of batter at a time. Allow to cook on one side undisturbed for 4 minutes, flip and cook for an additional 3 minutes.

We ate them warm over a bed of baby spinach, with a spicy pepper sauce on top. Very yummy and versatile!

What's growing this week...

We harvested the first of our green beans this week. Yellow beans aren't far behind.

We're seeing a lot of deer damage to our beans. See all those sticks pointing straight up? They should have flowers and/or beans on them. The deer aren't killing the plants but they are reducing and delaying the harvest.

Beets are looking great! We will most likely harvest and distribute next week.

We've planted a lot of broccoli. We distributed our first of it this week. It will likely continue next week (and beyond).

Broccoli is interesting because plant produces one large primary head. On this one, where you see the grayish cut, the primary head has been harvested. Then, we get more shoots, which are smaller. Some people prefer the smaller shoots because their stems are not as thick.

Cheddar cauliflower seems to be coming along well -- so far. Cauliflower is temperamental, which is why a lot of local CSAs don't grow it. It prefers consistently cool temperatures, which is why almost three fourths of commercial cauliflower is grown in the coastal valleys of California. The other disadvantage is that one plant produces only one head, unlike broccoli. We are giving it our best shot, though, because we know a lot of people like it.

Concord grapes look beautiful so far. Because these vines have not been pruned for years, we are not sure how productive they'll be and how much we'll be able to offer our CSA members.

Because of the heat, this should be a good year for melons. We re growing smaller "Sugar Baby" melons. The smaller melons are the most practical ones to grow in our climate because melons need lots of long, hot days to grow. We usually  don't have as many of those days as the bigger melons need. This year has been very different, though! We wish we knew that back during the cold month of April!

We've seen some deer nibbles on our melons, but a bigger concern is crows. Some growers encounter serious trouble with crows in watermelons, and not much can be done in terms of control. They wait until they are just ready to be harvested and then start pecking away. We have seen some crows in the field -- we're just hoping they aren't savvy ones!

We're starting to see baby peppers. We're still weeks from being able to harvest them.

Pattypan squash -- two colors of them -- look good, and should be ready next week.

Summer squash and zucchini will continue next week.

We've planted sunflowers for our members to enjoy. We have just one in bloom right now. It looks a little lonely.

A lot of people have been asking about tomatoes. We understand -- we love them too! They are coming along but are still a few weeks away from being ripe.

Shares, weeks 1-5

WHEW!!! We've survived four weeks of harvesting and distribution, and we've entered week five. It's hard to believe that we're almost a quarter of the way through the CSA. We're getting a lot of positive feedback and constructive suggestions, and we've already made a number of adjustments along the way. Here's a quick recap of weeks one through five.

Week 1 was, as expected, a fairly small harvest as we're just beginning to harvest. It included some beautiful tender lettuces, kale, mizuna, radishes, spinach and rainbow Swiss chard. Some hungry deer made our sugar snap peas a bit later than expected, but everyone got a handful -- enough to nibble on the way home!

Week 2: Everyone was excited to see plentiful snow peas! They are definitely popular among our members. We also harvested our first arugula and red Russian kale. In addition, we had various lettuces, mizuna, radishes, spinach and spring onions. We swapped with another local farmer who uses a high tunnel farming technique to get some early zucchini and squash. We also started to cut some herbs and wildflowers. People with cats especially enjoyed the catnip!

Week 3 brought our first harvest of kohlrabi! It was a first-time veggie for a lot of members. Early-season greens continued; to avoid palate fatigue, we allowed members to weigh (1.75 pounds -- that's a lot of greens) their choice of greens from arugula, tatsoi, mizuna, kale and red kale. Leaf lettuce greens continued, as did snap and snow peas.

In week 4, we continued to offer a choice of greens, including arugula, tatsoi, mizuna, kale and red kale. Leaf lettuce continued, as did sugar snap peas, snow peas, kohlrabi and radishes. We also offered yellow squash, which was not harvested in time to make our picture.

Week 5 began the transition to some of our popular summer crops -- broccoli, green beans and cabbage! We also had zucchini, yellow squash and the tail end of snow peas. We had three kinds of lettuce to choose from (2 heads total). Our choices of cooking greens continued, with a choice from arugula, tatsoi, mizuna, kale, red Russian kale, and Swiss chard. Our herbs really came on this week, with several available for cutting.

Harvest Pick-up Begins Monday!

We are so excited to start harvesting! Our member pick-up begins on Monday. Here's a sneak peak of what's coming.

Kale

 

Radishes -- these are Easter Egg radishes. See how they are shaped like Easter eggs?

Lettuces will be small "baby" lettuce.

Rainbow Chard

More baby lettuces

Spinach. Use the small "baby" leaves for salads. Use the larger leaves in cooking.

Mizuna. You can use this raw or cooked.

If you haven't received your email with your pick-up dates and times, please contact us at the farm as soon as possible!