CSA basket: Week of 6/29

Summer's here and baskets will be a bit more colorful!

And other cute news on the farm: we've got 3 8-week-old pigs. They are happily rooting around in the woods.

Expect the following in this week's basket:
Cabbage, green beans (just a taste), sugar snap peas or shelling peas, kohlrabi, bok choy or chard, hakurei turnips or radishes, kale, lettuce, arugula, basil, parsley, scallion, cilantro

CSA basket: Week of 6/22

We've tasted the first few ripe cherry tomatoes, a sign that they're growing well and will be abundant in a few weeks! Lots of greens this week, so keep enjoying those salads. We also have been making a very simple pasta sauce with them, see recipe here.

Expect the following this week:
Sugar snap peas, hakurei turnip, collards, kale, bok choy,arugula, lettuce, basil, parsley, cilantro.

Recipe w/ greens

Creamy greens pasta sauce
(adapted from here)

Ingredients: Greens (e.g.,  sorrel, collards, tatsoi, spinach, bok choy, kale, arugula), heavy cream, onions or leeks or garlic (or a combo), butter, s+p pasta

Preparing: Saute chopped garlic, onions and/or leeks in a few tablespoons of butter. Meanwhile, roughly chop greens of your choice. Add greens to pan and cook until slightly wilted (less cooking time for spinach, sorrel, arugula; more cooking time for tatsoi, bok choy, collards, kale). Add 1/2 cup to cup of cream and any herbs you want (e.g., tarragon, oregano). Let cream thicken for a minute or two. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve over pasta.

Eating: We like a squeeze of lemon juice on the pasta and some shaved Parmesan. Our favorite version of this is with sorrel, which has a lemony taste.

Dish history: We tried the original recipe (see here) because we had an abundance of spring sorrel and eggs. And then we used it for a supper served over homemade pig kidney tortellini. The strong lemony-creamy sauce paired well with the powerful kidneys.

CSA basket: Week of 6/15

Garlic scapes!

Somehow the varieties of peas we planted this year have resulted in sugar snaps ripening before the shelling. Expect a fun basket this week:

Sugar snap peas, garlic scapes*, lettuce, bok choy, kale, radishes, hakurei turnips, arugula.

* Scapes are the flowering stems of the garlic plant... they come only once a season, are mildly garlicky in taste and can be eaten raw or cooked.

CSA basket: Week of 6/8

A few days of sunshine and our shelling peas will be ready. And the garlic plants are scaping. June is here.

We are full of lettuce! You'll be getting quite a few heads this week. And likely last of the spinach
(spinach is a long-day plant that is starting to flower with so many hours of daylight).

Expect the following in your basket this week:
Lettuce, Tatsoi cabbage, arugula, kale, collards, spinach (we hope), radishes

~ ~ ~
Radishes are our favorite pickles! Use this recipe for quick pickles that just go right into your fridge: http://longhauling.blogspot.com/2011/08/recipes-with-radishes.html.

CSA basket: Week of 6/1

Finally, some rain! This always seems to happen: serious downpours just as the lettuce is big enough to harvest and the pea plants are getting heavy with pods. This soaking will really make the vegetables boom.

And now that we've arrived in June, with all of the transplants and seeds in the ground, it's time for garden maintenance: weeding, mulching and tomato trellising.

Expect the following in this week's basket:
Radishes, kale, lettuce, spinach, braising mix, arugula, basil, chives.