Archive for the CSA Newsletter Category

People come to the farm for all different reasons. You come for the fresh produce. Others come for a birthday party, pumpkin picking or maybe lunch and an ice cream. Right now, and for the two weeks, many people are coming to the farm for the the sunflowers.

If there is one crop that the crew loves to harvest, it’s watermelon. I’m not sure if it’s because it brings back memories of playing ball or the idea that when it’s time to stop for a break, there’s a nice, sweet, juicy melon waiting for them but, they love their watermelons.

Our watermelons and cantaloupe are picked ripe. The crew can tell when they are ready when the tendril on the vine, closest to the melon is dried up. With watermelons, we look for the tendril and a yellow spot on the melon where it was laying on the ground.

Three years ago now the farm crew planted a small orchard of peaches and this week they began to harvest them. They might be a little small (we need to do a little more thinning) but they are delicious. Sweet and juicy only begins to describe them. If you need to gorge yourself on something, I would vote for the peaches!

Up until now, we have dug them with a machine, crated them in the field, and then walked them through what feels like beach sand to a 16 bushel bin. As you can imagine it was back breaking. Now we just stand there and let the machine mow the plants, dig the potatoes and the conveyor sends them into the bin. All we have to do it sort the rocks out. This make potato harvesting pleasant and will save the crews energy for other tasks that need to be done. It will also save a few trips to PT or the chiropractor. HURRAY!

It has been wonderful seeing all of you at the farm as you enjoy the summer. From the beginning, our goal was to create a space that we could share with the community – and all of you are a part of that. We wanted to offer good food and a space for people to engage with nature and farming. And over the years, we’ve realized that people have similar questions. How do I preserve the produce I’ve picked? Is it hard to make pickles? Can you teach me how to can the sauce I have made from all these tomatoes??

Here’s a nice word to describe this weather, “sultry’. It conjures visions of sitting on the veranda sipping sugar tea. Really, it won’t that be nice.

It was a glorious week to be working outside with perfect temperatures and low humidity. That doesn’t mean that it was all wine and roses though. Steve, our farm manager, is a list maker and task master and he gets the best out of his crew and they respect him for it. The list was long but it’s Friday and they only have a few more things to accomplish before next weeks list is made on Sunday night sometime.

It’s always good to get the first week of CSA behind us. And we did it with grace. There are a couple of snags related to pick-up days but, that’s normal. Your bounty looked great and I’m sure many of you are preparing some new veggies for the first time. The beginning of the season is alway heavy on the green stuff. But honestly, we know that’s what we should be eating anyway. So do your best to find some new recipes and embrace all that is green and leafy.