CSA Harvest #21~ The Garlic is In!

Many thanks to our awesome CSA members who spent their Sunday afternoon helping us plant 2,400 feet of garlic for next season! As you can see from the pictures above everyone seemed to have a great time and the old adage of "many hands make light work" rings true! There were a few things about garlic which I forgot to add in last week's blog. For one garlic is the most important crop that we save our seed from each year to replant. The taste of garlic actually improves as it is grown on the same soil year after year. Die hard garlic enthusiast claim the subtle flavors from the soil can be tasted in the garlic much the way a wine aficionado can swirl wine in their mouth and describe the soil it was grown in by the subtle notes in the wine.
The garlic we planted on Sunday was given to us two years ago by our good friends and fellow CSA farmers Norm and Cinda Lehne who farm out Garden Valley Blvd. For the first year or two of our CSA season we really relied on Norm and Cinda for support and growing advice for this climate that was new to us. We traded items back and forth in our CSA (we grow crops they do not and vice versa). Finally we seemed to get a handle on when to get things in the ground so we were able to make it the full 26 weeks with the items we had grown on the farm that we did not need to go pillage Norm and Cinda's fields in search of extra produce to fill that baskets.
Every year around this time we catch our breaths, survey the fields and the storage sheds and hope we have enough product left to make it through the remaining CSA weeks. For the last few years we have pulled though.. this year because the summer birth of Tione we are a little more anxious than usual. One huge bonus is that we have not yet had a frost and we hope that the warm, sunny weather will last as long as possible!

This week you will notice an extra goody in your CSA share and that is the addition of Asian pears that a fellow CSA member told us about. Asinete and I picked them Monday at an organic pear orchard out on Del Rio Rd outside of Roseburg. The man who had planted and tended the trees had passed away and there was no one left to tend to and harvest the fruit. The orchard had been open to u-pickers but there were still soft, rotting fruit in a thick layer all over the ground. It made it hard to pick as we slid around in the pear slurry. We are happy that these will not be wasted and we hope will be relished by you!`

Enjoy and we will see you next week! Five more weeks to go!

Suzie, Asinete, Tione, M.A, Sally, Grandma GG and Violet

Harvest This Week Includes:

Asian Pears (will keep best in your fridge)

Carrots

Watermelon

Kale (Red Russian or Winterbor) *kale chips recipe below yumm!

Red Meat Radish

Shallots

Onion

Yukon Gold Potatoes

Boothby Blonde Cucumbers

Cilantro

Tomatoes (not pretty but all we could muster)

Delicata Winter Squash

How to Cook It

Winter squash is different from summer squash in that it has a hard rind on it that allows it to be stored at room temperature for months at a time. There are many different varieties of winter squash and most need to be cured (well dried for several weeks) before eating but delicata is one of the few you can eat without curing. Winter squash is chock full of vitamins and minerals!
Classic Baked Delicata Squash
1 Delicata squash
1 tablespoon Butter
2 tablespoon Brown Sugar
2 teaspoons Maple Syrup
Pinch of salt
A pinch of fresh ground pepper (optional)
A pinch of cayenne pepper (optional)
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Using a strong knife, cut the squash in half lengthwise. Spoon out seeds and stringy bits in the center of each half. (save the seeds!) Place each half in a baking pan, cut side up. Rub 1/2 Tbsp. butter on the inside of each half. Add a pinch of salt (and black pepper and cayenne if you wish), add 1 Tbsp brown sugar to each half, then drizzle each half with maple syrup. Adding a little water, about 1/4 inch, to the bottom of the baking pan will help keep the squash from drying out.

Bake for an hour, or until the squash is very soft. When serving, if there is any of the sugary butter sauce left, spoon that over the squash.

Serves 2


yield: Makes 6 servings

This is my favorite way to cook winter squash. You peel, and slice it, then cook it in a skillet with cider and winter herbs.
adapted from Bon Appétit

Ingredients

2 medium delicata squash (about 2 pounds) or other firm winter squash
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/4 cup very coarsely chopped fresh sage
1 tablespoon coarsely chopped fresh rosemary
1 1/2 cups fresh unfiltered apple cider or juice
1 cup water
2 teaspoons sherry vinegar
1 teaspoon salt
Freshly ground black pepper
print a shopping list for this recipe

Preparation 1. Squash. If using delicata squash, peel it with a vegetable peeler, cut it lengthwise in half, and scrape out the seeds with a spoon. Cut each piece lengthwise in half again, then crosswise into 1/2-inch -thick slices. Other types of squash should be peeled with a chef's knife, seeded, cut into 1-inch wedges, then sliced 1/2-inch thick.

2. Herb Butter. Melt the butter in a large (12-inch) skillet over low heat. Add the sage and rosemary and cook, stirring, until the butter just begins to turn golden brown, 3 to 5 minutes. Do not brown the herbs. Cooking the herbs in butter mellows their flavor and improves their texture.

3. Cooking the squash. Add the squash to the skillet, then the apple cider, water, vinegar, and salt. Cook, stirring occasionally, over medium heat at an even boil until the cider has boiled down to a glaze and the squash is tender, 20 to 30 minutes. Taste and season with pepper, and additional salt if needed.

Vegan Cheesy Kale Chips (guaranteed delicious!)

First you will need to make the sauce to coat the kale chips. We just use a regular old blender which works fine!

CASHEW CREAM
1 cup raw cashews. Rinse the cashews under cold water. Place the cashews in a glass bowl, cover with 1 - 2 inches of water, cover and refrigerate for at least 8 hours. Remove from fridge, rinse with cold water, place in blender and cover with
1 - 2 inches of water. Turn the blender switch to high and blend until cashew mixture is completely homogeneous.

Step 2: season the Cashew Cream. I added about a teaspoon each of garlic powder, cayenne pepper, freshly ground black pepper, and sea salt, but you can season however you want. A few tablespoons of nutritional yeast add the "cheezy" flavor. Pay a visit to your local health food store for nutritional yeast. (You can often buy it in the bulk section by the scoop and it makes a great popcorn topping!) A lot of recipes called for bell pepper, which would add some great nutrition and flavor.


Step 3: Rinse the kale and tear it into smaller (but not too small because it will shrink a good deal when you bake it) pieces. Pat or spin it dry so the "cheeze" sticks.


Step 4: Coat the kale with the cashew cream mixture. Just pour it on top and toss it with your hands in a large bowl.

coat the kale in your "cheezy" cashew cream

Step 5: Spread the kale thin on a parchment lined cookie sheet (2 sheets should be enough for 1 bunch of kale). Bake at 375 until crispy, wait 15 minutes and then flip with a pair of tongs and bake for another 10-15 minutes until crispy.

Eat right away or else keep sealed up tight as it quickly loses its crisp!

CSA Harvest #20

Welcome to week 20 of eating locally! For many of you this has been a new experience to enjoy food harvested and grown right in your community. Some of you have been with us since our humble beginnings and this will be your 98th week of eating our produce (considering that this is our 4th year running the CSA program).
In these four years we have tried many crops and moved our CSA drop off location three times. As many of you know the first year our drop off was at the old New Day Market location downtown by the Bagel Tree. Having people pick up their CSA shares at New Day provided us cooler space to keep CSA shares cool and fresh on hot days and also it had the benefit of bringing more business in to New Day. We were there for half a season before we had to move due to the uncertainty of New Days time left in the building and lack of space for their product and our CSA shares in their cooler. At that point a CSA member who lived in Hughcrest offered us their home as a drop off and so we finished our first year and second season dropping off there. The third and fourth year has brought us to Broccoli Street where we hope to stay as long as they let us :).

This past weekend was spent spreading cover crop seeds since the rains we have had moistened the soil enough for us to work it up without the ground turning to dust and blowing away. Walking through the cleared fields with a hand spreader to be sure the seeds are evenly dispersed. Planting cover crops is one of my favorite things to do on the farm. It is the one crop that we plant for the health of the ground and the one crop that we do not harvest. We always seem to battle the pigeons though as they appear overnight after we plant the cover crop seeds. There are always seeds that are not buried that the pigeons find. I try chasing them out of the field with the dogs barking behind me. They fly off in a cloud, circling the farm and valley only to land again and resume eating more exposed seeds when we've gone. We always hope there are enough seeds hidden from the pigeons to sprout!

This coming week also marks garlic planting time where we will go through our storage garlic, choose out the largest heads, separate them into cloves and begin planting out. Garlic has the longest growing season of any other crop on the farm. It requires nearly 10 months of growing before it is ready to harvest! When planted now in mid- October it will not be ready to harvest until around the 4th of July. We hope you will still be with us to enjoy it then!


If any of you would care to join us in planting out the garlic please let us know via email or phone. We are planning on planting it out this Sunday October 16th from 1-4pm(ish). Many hands make light work!

Thank you for supporting local farmers!

Suzie, Asinete, Tione, M.A, Sally, Violet and Grandma GG

Harvest This Week Includes:

French fingerling Potatoes

Onions

Garlic

Salad Turnips

Head lettuce (we had to fight the deer for these heads.. you may notice they sampled some of yours).

Hot pepper mix (Serranos, Anaheim and Jalapeno)

Tomatoes (not the prettiest due to the rain!)

Strawberries OR Raspberries

Watermelon (this week for sure!) Last week we were forced to skip it due to lack of room in the baskets and the fact that our second delivery truck died in the field forcing us to fit everything in one truck).

Boothby Blonde Cucumbers

Summer Squash

Italian Flat Leaf Parsley

Eggplant


Recipe Ideas


Roasted Parsley Potatoes

2 lbs potatoes (if you can find fingerling potatoes, use them.)
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
2 tablespoons garlic, minced
2 tablespoons parsley, chopped
1 tablespoon basil, chopped
salt
pepper
grated Parmesan and chopped parsley (to garnish) (optional)

Directions:

1.Preheat oven to 375°F 2. Cut potatoes into large pieces (if potatoes are small, you can leave them whole). Do not peel skin. 3. In a large bowl, fold the rest of the ingredients (except the garnishing) with the potatoes and make sure that the potatoes are coated with all the ingredients. 4. Place potatoes in roasting pan uncovered. 5. Roast for about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until potatoes are golden brown in some spots and cooked through. 6. Garnish with parmesean and chopped fresh parsley if desired.

Curried TurnipsOne chopped onion

2 tablespoons oil
5 or 6 turnips sliced thin
2 teaspoons curry powder
1 teaspoon salt
one lemon, cut into wedges

Sauté the onion in the oil for a few minutes until translucent. Add the turnips, the curry powder and salt and cook until everything is tender. Squeeze some lemon juice over the dish before serving and serve with extra lemon wedges.



Enjoy! Next week: delicata winter squash and kale!

CSA Harvest #19

Nothing says Autumn like a truckload full of harvested winter squash! Asinete, Tione and I and a helper spent Sunday hauling in the winter squash from out in the field. We knew the rain was coming and wanted to get the squash in while they were dry. We will have five varieties to share with you in the coming weeks.. butternut, green acorn, Cha Cha (a green Kabocha variety), delicata and Red Kuri. If you are new to the winter squash world you are in for a treat! Winter squash are sweet, chock full of nutrients and cook up wonderfully in pies and many other dishes (also while they are sitting on your counter waiting to be used they add quite a festive flair!) You can see Asinete above doing his best Jack 'O Lantern face!

The first fall rains on the farm are welcome as they give all the crops a good drenching.. doing a much more thorough job than we do with our irrigation system. The rain is not good for the berries however.. it makes them wet, soggy and quick to spoil so please enjoy your berries quickly!

We spent another part of Sunday erecting a large carport to store our tractor implements under this winter. This year we have invested in our new Kubota tractor along with the costly implements of a new rototiller and flail mower.


In the next coming weeks we will be cleaning up the farm.. tilling in old crops and starting to plant out our cover crops which will arrive this week (all 350 pounds of them!) We will need to make the tough call about when to call it quits on the strawberry patch and till them in before the ground is too muddy to work. The strawberries you have been enjoying this year are now in their second year which is their last year. As the years progress the berries produce less and less, are smaller and not as sweet. This coming Spring we will replant 2,000 new strawberry crowns and will be rewarded soon after with large, sweet berries!

The last big planting we will do this Fall is planting out our garlic. We would love to have some help planting out the cloves. We will be planting it out on Sunday October 16th from 1-4 pm. There will be snacks provided! Please let us know if you can make it out even if just for an hour.

Enjoy the tastes of Fall!

Suzie, Asinete, Tione, M.A, Sally, Violet & Grandma GG

Harvest This Week Includes:

Beets

Red Meat Radish *also called watermelon radish.. cut them open and see why!

Sweet Corn (please excuse the corn ear worm at the top. The tip of the corn is all they should be living in.. simply cut off the tip and eat!)

Strawberries OR Raspberries

Boothby Blonde Cucumbers ( a crunchy, sweet, heirloom gherkin from Maine)

Basil

Tomatoes (large ones only this week.. the rain made all the cherry toms split open)

Sweet Peppers (some are ugly we know. These have been sunburned. Just cut away that part and eat the rest.. they are still good!)

Shallot

Yellow Copra Storage Onions

French Fingerling Potatoes (look at the beautiful blush inside when you cut it!)

Watermelon (finally!) Instead of eating cold out in the warm sunshine you may have to eat huddled up by your wood stove!) Eat it and relive the long days of summer :)


Recipe Ideas

Beet Risotto with Purple Greens

6 cups vegetable stock
1 tablespoon butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 small spring onion bulbs, chopped
1 spring garlic stem, or 4 garlic chives, chopped
1 1/2 cups Arborio rice
1/2 cup dry red wine
3 tablespoons fresh parsley, chopped
3 tablespoons fresh basil, chopped
3 medium beets, peeled and grated
3 cups of greens – use the beet greens, and if you need to make up the difference, you can add chard, kale or spinach.
Salt and pepper to taste
3/4 cup fresh grated Parmesan
Zest and juice of one lemon



Bring stock to a simmer on the stove. In another large, wide-bottomed stock pot, heat the butter and olive oil, then add the onion and garlic and cook on medium heat until translucent, about 2 minutes. Add the rice, stir to coat it, and cook for 1 minute.

Add red wine, stir, and simmer until it is absorbed. Stir in the parsley, basil, and beets, plus some salt and pepper to taste. Combine well, then add 2 cups of the stock, cover and cook at an energetic simmer until the liquid is absorbed.

Begin adding the remaining stock at 1/2 cup increments, stirring constantly until each addition has been absorbed. When you have a half cup left, add the chopped beet greens. When the last ½ cup is absorbed, stir in 1/2 cup of Parmesan cheese. Taste for salt and pepper, and sprinkle with remaining Parmesan. Garnish with parsley and serve.


Watermelon Radish
This gorgeous root crop, also called red meat or red heart radish, is
less spicy than other radishes. It is great sliced thin or grated raw into
salads, roasted with olive oil and herbs or butter and brown sugar, or
sliced or diced into a stir fry or soup. Red heart radish slices are great
chip or cracker substitutes to use with hummus and other dips, and
make great edible garnishes for any dish. The tops can also be sautéed
like any other green.

CSA Harvest #18

Happy Fall! As much as we love the long summer days the beginning of Fall excites us as well. Fall on the farm is all about cleaning up the remains of the season. Much of this clean-up is done after the first hard frost when the last, brave tomatoes, eggplant and peppers succumb to the freezing weather. At this time we can pull out the weed mat, roll up the drip tape, and pull out t-posts that we use for staking tomatoes. This season we planted 520 main season tomato plants in addition to the 120 early Glacier and Oregon Spring toms. We get a little nutty for tomatoes over here!

Fall also means the time to plant garlic (helpers anyone?) and also prepare the ground for planting our overwintering cover crops.
For cover cropping in the winter we plant a cold hardy mixture of vetch, bell beans and cow peas. These three plants are legumes which fix nitrogen (a crucial nutrient needed by plants. Cover crops also help hold the soil in place with their roots to prevent soil erosion. Insects and other animals love cover crops too since it provides a habitat for them to live in. Last it is much more beautiful to us to look out and see cover crops growing then bare mud in the fields and we rest easy knowing we are doing right by the soil.
Winter time for these farmers means some R&R and road trips so unlike many of you who greet the upcoming winter with dread we tend to mark our calendars and count down the days!

In that spirit please enjoy your 18th week of produce.. there are 8 more weeks of CSA left.. 8 more weeks until Thanksgiving.. yikes!

The Big Lick Crew: Suzie, Asinete, Tione, M.A, Violet, Sally and Grandma GG

Harvest This Week Includes:


Salad Turnips (no need to peel... super buttery and sweet!)

Corn

Strawberries OR Raspberries (with shortening/cooler days now not as many)

Salad Greens (please wash again and remove excess water to keep uber fresh)

Summer Squash

Red and Yellow Sweet Onions (get ready for the massive onion onslaught! We have loads of them!)

Eggplant (Purple is called Dancer and the smaller with white stripes is called Fairy Tale)

Garlic

Cilantro (salsa time!!)

Cherry Tomatoes

San Marzano Roma Tomatoes

Hot pepper mix (Hungarian Hot Wax, Jalapeno, Serrano and Poblano)


Carrots


*No recipes again this week.. our apologies.. This farmer/mommy cannot keep her eyes open any longer as the time now is 10:38pm Tues eve) For recipe ideas please check out allrecipes.com

Thank you!

CSA Harvest #17

Thank you to all of you who came and shared scrumptious food at Big Lick Farm's 4th Annual Farm Tour/Potluck. We feasted like Kings and grooved to the smooth sounds of Mato's musical mix and Steve's accordion. We hope you all had as much fun as we did! Getting our CSA members to the farm is an important part of the season. We like you to know where your food comes from and to see the fields that pumped out the produce to you and your family. We are consistently amazed at how much food this small plot of land produces.
Each year we plan on recording the weights of everything we harvest just to keep track of yields but it has not happened yet. We would love at the end of the year to say we harvested 600 pounds of cantaloupe, 1,000 pounds of beets etc. This information would be tallied each year to see if our farming techniques are becoming more efficient or not. Successful farmers (like all business minded folks) keep careful records each season of what they planted and where, crop yields, season challenges, what crops performed best and which should not be planted again and more. We are learning the important art of record keeping. Especially important each season is the dates you plant a certain crop so we know for next season. Organization and record keeping is a skill we still have not yet mastered but we will keep trying!

There were plenty of pictures taken at the potluck and this blog is having trouble posting them. We should have some posted by next week. Also check Big Lick Farm's Facebook site for potluck pics!

Enjoy the last week of summer's bounty.. that is right.. we only have two more days of summer left... Friday is the Autumnal Equinox. Soon time for winter squash and hot soups!

Your farmers: Suzie, Asinete, Tione, M.A, Sally, Grandma GG, Violet

Harvest This Week Includes:

Desiree and Purple Majesty Potatoes

Rainbow Chard

Summer Squash

Shallot

Red Onion

Strawberries OR Raspberries. *both are in a lull. You may get both or you may get one or the other. We are not sure yet as more to harvest in the am.


Heirloom Tomatoes

Mix Cherry Tomatoes

Luscious Sweet Corn (if you find a worm in the top simply cut off the tip. This is the corn ear worm which affects the later plantings of corn.)

Bartlett Pears

Carrots

Grapes

Please remember your sweet corn is best if you eat it now! If you cannot eat immediately store in your fridge.

CSA Harvest #16

If you are what you eat then this week each of you will be sweet corn! Finally after the weeks and months of waiting it is ready and we have lots of it to share! We're sure you remember of us writing about the corn woes we faced earlier this year when the seed kept rotting in the cold soil.
Also we are cursed with the dreaded wire worm at our farm which is the larvae of the click beetle. Crop rotations are a must when dealing with wire worm as they love root crops, corn and brassicas (cabbages/broccoli). In fact the last harvest of carrots you had were looking so beautiful and the next week we went to harvest more of them and the wire worms had moved in and made ugly tunnels through them and we had to share the rest with the pigs and not you.

When farming you must learn to roll with the punches since many of the things you plant and tend and care for never come to fruition. The bugs or deer eat them or the weeds take over seemingly overnight. Farming definitely teaches you the art of letting go. Each Fall we watch sadly as the first hard frost kills off the tomatoes, peppers and eggplant. Of course this sadness is quickly overshadowed by the growing excitement we feel at having some down time in the winter.

At this time of year on the farm we are busy clearing up spent crops (such as the cantaloupe which are done now). Also the large block of early tomatoes that you enjoyed early this summer. We are still planting as well, lettuce, spinach, chard, bok choy, radish and turnips. Enough things to carry us through the last weeks of CSA harvests.

We are embarrassed to be showing off the fields this year to those of you attending the potluck. Dealing with weeds on an organic farm is a battle and this season it is a battle we have lost! Instead of calling the farm walks "farm tours" we may be instead calling them weed identification walk. C'est la vie! Next year is a clean start!


We hope to see you all this Sunday for the potluck and weed identification walk! :)

Your farmers~ Suzie, Asinete, M.A, Violet, Sally and Grandma GG


Harvest This Week Includes:

Easter Egg Radish (we are more impressed with the leaves on these! Recipe ideas for the leaves below!)

Baby greens (a mix of arugula, mustard and green bibb lettuce)

Jalapenos (salsa anyone?)

Heirloom Tomatoes

Cherry Tomatoes

Luscious Sweet Corn

Cucumbers

Summer Squash

Watermelon

Summer Squash

Bartlett Pears

Grapes

Garlic

Yellow Sweet Onion

Raspberries


How to Keep it Fresh and Eat it!

The Bartlett Pear!~
The Williams' bon chretien pear, commonly called the Williams pear, or Bartlett pear in the U.S. and Canada, is the most commonly grown variety of pear in most countries outside Asia. It is the pear that is most commonly used for canned pears. It is wonderful eaten fresh and also when baked. If your pears are still too firm to eat leave them at room temperature to ripen. Once they are ripe and soft to the touch they will last longer in the refrigerator.


Pear Frangipane Tart
Servings: 8

Pastry for 9-inch tart pan

1/2 pound blanched almonds

2/3 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar, divided

3 eggs

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 teaspoons grated orange zest

1 tablespoon Oloroso or other sweet Sherry

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons butter, cut into 8 pieces

3 ( 1/2-pound) Bartlett pears, firm but ripe

Apple cider vinegar

1 tablespoon butter, melted

1. Prepare the pastry and fit it into a 9-inch tart pan with a removable bottom. Refrigerate until well chilled, about 20 minutes. Prick the shell with a fork and bake until lightly golden, about 10 minutes. Remove from the oven and let come to room temperature.

2. Heat the oven to 375 degrees and place a baking sheet on a low rack.

3. In a food processor, grind the almonds. Add 2/3 cup sugar, the eggs, vanilla, orange zest, Sherry and salt, and process to make a smooth, sticky paste. With the motor running, drop in the butter through the feed hole, piece by piece, and process until smooth.

4. Peel the pears, cut them in half lengthwise and with a spoon remove the vein for the stem and the seed pit. As you finish each pear half, slip it into a work bowl filled with a mixture of 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar and enough water to cover all of the pears.

5. Spread the almond mixture in the base of the tart, using the back of a spoon to spread it as evenly as possible.

6. Pat each pear half dry and carefully cut it into thin crosswise slices, about 1/8 inch, keeping the pear in its original form. As you finish each pear half, lift it, using the flat of the knife as a spatula, and carefully place it in the tart pan, with the narrow stem end toward the center. Gently press down into the frangipane. Place each subsequent pear half next to the previous one in a spoke pattern until the tart is filled. Brush the pears with the melted butter and sprinkle with about 1 tablespoon sugar.

7. Place the tart pan on the baking sheet and bake until the almond mixture is puffed and golden and the pears are tender, 40 to 45 minutes. Serve at room temperature.

Each serving: 355 calories; 149 mg. sodium; 89 mg. cholesterol; 21 grams fat; 4 grams saturated fat; 37 grams carbohydrates; 9 grams protein; 5.04 grams fiber.


Pear and Apple Salad with Cranberry Vinaigrette

Total Time: 25 minutes

Servings: 4

1/2 cup rice vinegar

1/2 cup cranberry juice

1/4 cup minced dried cranberries

1 tablespoon minced shallot

2 teaspoons sugar

1/2 teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary

2 teaspoons olive oil

Salt

Cracked pepper

1 pear

1 apple

1 lemon, cut in half

1 endive, sliced crosswise

5 cups mixed salad greens

1/4 cup toasted walnuts, coarsely chopped

1. Combine the rice vinegar, cranberry juice, cranberries, shallot, sugar, rosemary, olive oil and salt and pepper to taste. Let the dressing stand for the flavors to meld.

2. Meanwhile, cut the pear into quarters then core and slice. Place the slices in a shallow dish filled with water and the juice of half a lemon; the liquid should cover the fruit. Cut the apple into quarters, core and slice. Place the slices in a shallow dish with water and the juice of the remaining lemon half to cover.

3. Just before serving, drain the pears and apples. Toss together in a large bowl with the endive and salad greens. Arrange the salad on a platter and sprinkle with the toasted walnuts. Serve the dressing alongside.

Each serving: 250 calories; 1,143 mg sodium; 0 cholesterol; 7 grams fat; 1 gram saturated fat; 46 grams carbohydrates; 2 grams protein; 5.99 grams fiber.


Honey-Poached Pear with Greek Yogurt and Toasted Walnuts
Total time: 50 minutes, plus cooling time

Servings: 4

1/4 cup plus 4 teaspoons honey, divided

2 cups sugar

1/2 slice lemon

3 black peppercorns

1/2 vanilla bean, split lengthwise

2 large Bartlett pears

1/2 lemon

1/2 cup Greek yogurt

1/2 cup toasted walnut pieces

1/2 teaspoon melted butter


1. Combine 4 cups water, one-fourth cup of the honey, the sugar, lemon slice and peppercorns in a large saucepan. Using a knife, scrape the seeds from the vanilla bean and add to the mixture. Bring to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer 10 minutes to blend the flavors.

2. Add the pears and simmer until they are tender, about 15 to 20 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and lift the pears into a glass bowl, then pour over the juices. Let cool to warm. Refrigerate at least 1 hour, or up to overnight.

3. When you are ready to serve, remove the peel and stem from the pears. Halve each pear lengthwise and remove any seeds, if necessary. Cut each pear half into 4 wedges.

4. Arrange two pear wedges on a plate and squeeze a few drops of lemon juice over them. Spoon 2 tablespoons of the yogurt on top. Drizzle 1 teaspoon of the honey over the yogurt and around the pears on the plate. Repeat with the three remaining plates. Toss the toasted walnuts with the melted butter then scatter over the pears and serve immediately.
449 calories; 5 grams protein; 84 grams carbohydrates; 4 grams fiber; 13 grams fat; 4 grams saturated fat; 6 mg. cholesterol; 11 mg. sodium.
Copyright © 2011, Los Angeles Times

Radish Top Soup

Don't throw out your radish greens. Believe it or not, those fuzzy leaves can be transformed into a smooth green soup, with a hint of watercress flavor.
6 Tb butter
1 cup chopped onions or leeks
8 cups loosely packed radish leaves
2 cups diced peeled potatoes
6 cups liquid (water, chicken stock)
Salt
1/2 cup cream (optional)
Freshly ground pepper

Melt 4 tablespoons butter in a large saucepan, add onions or leeks, and cook until golden, approximately 5 minutes. Stir in radish tops, cover pan, and cook over low heat until wilted, 8-10 minutes.
Meanwhile, cook potatoes until soft in liquid along with 1 teaspoon salt. Combine with radish tops and broth, and cook, covered, for 5 minutes to mingle flavors. Puree finely in a food processor. Add cream if desired. Season to taste with butter, salt and pepper.

Spicy Stir-Fried Radish Greens
(Makes 2 servings, can easily be doubled.

8-10 ounces radish greens and/or swiss chard, washed and cut into 1/2 inch slices
2-3 tsp. peanut oil
2 large garlic cloves (for seasoning the oil)

sauce mixture:
1 T soy sauce (I like Kikkomans)
1 tsp. rice vinegar (not seasoned)
1 tsp. Agave nectar
1/4 tsp. (or less) Sriracha sauce or other hot sauce


Wash and dry radish greens and/or swiss chard. (I used a salad spinner.) If desired, soak greens for about 30 minutes in very cold water. (This makes sure they're crisp for the quick stir-frying.) Working in batches, cut greens crosswise into 1/2 inch slices.

Mix together sauce ingredients and set aside. Preheat the wok or large, heavy frying pan until it feels very hot when you hold your hand there, then add the oil. When oil looks shimmery, add the garlic cloves and cook about 30 seconds, making sure garlic doesn't start to brown. Remove garlic and discard.

Add chopped radish greens and/or swiss chard all at once and immediately begin to stir-fry, turning greens over and over just until they are almost all wilted. (For me this was only one minute, but I have a great gas stove with a burner with really high heat.) When greens are almost all wilted, add sauce ingredients, stir, and cook 30 seconds more. Serve hot.


Yummy!! Enjoy!!

CSA Harvest 15 and the arrival alas of the sweet corn!

The month of June is considered strawberry season in this neck of the woods but with the variety we have planted (seascape) our strawberry season last for 6 months out of the year. Above you can see Tione supervising the strawberry picking and Suzie's Mom lending a helping hand in the harvest (we truly are a family farm!) Tuesday and Friday are our strawberry harvest days. Tuesday we harvest for the CSA and Friday for the Sat Market in Roseburg. In the peak of strawberry production harvesting can take two people up to four hours a day. Today as we picked my Mom asked me what my favorite crops were to harvest.. definitely not the strawberries only because it can be so back breaking. My top two favorite crops to harvest are melons (love to see them turn yellow and then slip right off the vine) Also I love harvesting eggplant.. moving along the row with a sharp pair or pruners cutting the beautiful fruits and piling them into the box gives me a feeling of satisfaction.

And finally the sweet corn! It could have gone another day before harvesting to really fill out the kernels but if we waited until next week it would not be good. This is our first planting of corn! We have three more plantings maturing so there will be more to come! The variety we grow is a bi-color sweet corn called Luscious. Corn is the best picked straight off the plant, prepared accordingly (alot of times for us in the field preparing simply means peeling back the husk and munching!)and eaten. Immediately after picking sweet corn the sugars in it begin turning to starch. It is especially good grilled on the bbq.

Unfortunately this year has not been a good one for our sweet peppers. You will get a few today but it is a sad harvest compared to last year when we were literally harvesting wheelbarrows full of the fruits. Many of the peppers that have formed have developed huge scabs that are caused by the sun (called sun scald).. it happens to tomatoes as well and you may have noticed a bit on your raspberries (the white areas). Early this week I went through and removed bucket loads of the peppers that were the worst marred from the sun scald. If you notice a small spot on any of your peppers simply cut that part away, the rest is still good!


Potluck Sunday September 18th from 2-6pm! Please RSVP

Harvest This Week Includes:

Sweet Corn

Shallots

Red Torpedo Onion

Ambrosia Melon

Sweet Pepper

La Ratte Fingerling Potatoes (please wash well before enjoying)Don't worry about peeling these.. very thin skinned!

Beets

Strawberries

Raspberries (hopefully enough for all)

Basil

Cherry Tomato Mix

Heirloom Tomatoes

Summer Squash

Eggplant

How to Store it and Enjoy it!

La Ratte Fingerling Potatoes.. please excuse the mud on these. Their skins are so thin that we tried to rub dirt away and ended up rubbing off all the skin. They should be stored at room temp until ready to use. Only wash right before cooking!
This is the first time we have grown this certain variety of fingerling and we are very impressed with its high yields... will definitely be planting more of these next season. We will have two more varieties of fingerlings for you all to try as well.. French fingerling and rose finn. yummy!
More info about La Ratte fingerlings....
Long prized by French chefs as a top quality fingerling it is an absolute delight to cook with. Long uniform tubers, yellow flesh with firm waxy texture and a nice nutty flavor, holds together very well. Especially good for potato salad or as a boiled potato. Commands a high price both in the restaurant and fresh market trade

CSA Harvest #14

Good day everyone! We are excited to announce that there will now be fresh baked artisan breads avail for those of you picking up your baskets in Roseburg. Anthony (the baker) and Sandee his wife will be offering samples of their difft loaves with some avail to buy for $3 loaf. We have had their bread and it is delicious! The bread will be avail. for sampling and purchase from 5-6:30pm tomorrow (Wed) at the pick up site on Broccoli Street.

Here is a letter from Anthony regarding his breads!~

Hi, My name is Anthony Szlachciuk. I am a new baker and my specialty is Artisan sourdough bread.


Some of my clients are : "Black Bird Bar and Grill", "Mystic earth" and "Till it shines" coffee and deli.
You might have also seen me selling my loaves at Roseburgs "Old Town Market" on Thursday nights or "The Lookingglass Farm Market" on Fridays.


This week at the CSA pickup i will have four kinds of sourdough boules and batard loaves.


The types are:
1. Walnut Cranberry loaf
2. Currant loaf
3. Roasted Jalapeño and cheddar cheese
4. Plain Seeded(Flax, sesame and sunflower seed)
Come and see me for free samples of these tasty breads and I will have fresh bread for sale. loaves cost 3 dollars.


Thank you so much and sincerely at your service
anthony

We hope you find some time to sample their breads. We support community through community supported agriculture (and baked goods) ;)

Suzie, Asinete, M.A, Violet, Sally and Grandma GG


Harvest This Week Includes:

Fennel

Ambrosia Cantaloupe (super ripe.. eat promptly and store in fridge!)

Rainbow Chard

Garlic

Yellow sweet onions

Peaches OR Plums

Peppers (jalapeno and Anaheim. Chile Relleno recipe below!~

basil (finally)

Heirloom tomatoes

Cherry tomatoes

Strawberries

Raspberries (hopefully enough for all!)

Cucumbers

Summer squash

How to Use it!

Bruschetta with Tomato and Basil Recipe

Prep time: 15 minutesCook time: 10 minutesIngredients

1 1/2 lbs ripe tomatoes
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
6-8 fresh basil leaves, chopped.
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 baguette French bread or similar Italian bread
1/4 cup olive oil
Method
1 Prepare the tomatoes first. Parboil the tomatoes for one minute in boiling water that has just been removed from the burner. Drain. Using a sharp small knife, remove the skins of the tomatoes. (If the tomatoes are too hot, you can protect your finger tips by rubbing them with an ice cube between tomatoes.) Once the tomatoes are peeled, cut them in halves or quarters.
2 Make sure there is a top rack in place in your oven. Turn on the oven to 450°F to preheat.

3 While the oven is heating, chop up the tomatoes finely. Put tomatoes, garlic, 1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil, vinegar in a bowl and mix. Add the chopped basil. Add salt and pepper to taste.

4 Slice the baguette on a diagonal about 1/2 inch thick slices. Coat one side of each slice with olive oil using a pastry brush. Place on a cooking sheet, olive oil side down. You will want to toast them in the top rack in your oven, so you may need to do these in batches depending on the size of your oven. Once the oven has reached 450°F, place a tray of bread slices in the oven on the top rack. Toast for 5-6 minutes, until the bread just begins to turn golden brown.

Alternatively, you can toast the bread without coating it in olive oil first. Toast on a griddle for 1 minute on each side. Take a sharp knife and score each slice 3 times. Rub some garlic in the slices and drizzle half a teaspoon of olive oil on each slice. This is the more traditional method of making bruschetta.



5 Align the bread on a serving platter, olive oil side up. Either place the tomato topping in a bowl separately with a spoon for people to serve themselves over the bread, or place some topping on each slice of bread and serve. If you top each slice with the tomatoes, do it right before serving or the bread may get soggy.

Serves 6-10 as an appetizer. Or 3-4 for lunch (delicious served with cottage cheese on the side.)

Yield: Makes 24 small slices.


Caprese Salad
Yield- 4-5 servings

Ingredients
3 vine-ripe tomatoes, 1/4-inch thick slices
1 pound fresh mozzarella, 1/4-inch thick slices (found this at Fred Meyer in their salad bar area)
20 to 30 leaves (about 1 bunch) fresh basil
Extra-virgin olive oil, for drizzling
Coarse salt and pepper
Directions
Layer alternating slices of tomatoes and mozzarella, adding a basil leaf between each, on a large, shallow platter. Drizzle the salad with extra-virgin olive oil and season with salt and pepper, to taste.

Baked Chile Rellenos with Corn and Crema
serves 4

Prep time 45 minutes, total time 1 hour
6 Anaheim chiles
5 ears fresh corn, husks and silks removed
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 red onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
½ teaspoon salt
Black pepper
2 cups Monterey Jack cheese, or other Mexican melting cheese
½ cup Mexican crema
Procedures1
Adjust oven rack to upper middle position and preheat oven to 375°.

2
Meanwhile, if you have a gas stove, turn heat to high on one of the burners, and set as many of the anaheims as will fit on the grate. Cook, flipping and moving the chiles often with a pair of tongs, until blackened on all sides. If you don't have a gas stove, turn on broiler to high. Place chiles on a baking sheet covered with aluminum foil, and place underneath the broiler. Cook, flipping occasionally with a pair of tongs, until blacked on all sides.

3
When chiles are blackened, transfer to a plastic bag and seal. Let them steam for at least five minutes. When done, peel off the blackened skins. Cut a slit down the side of each, starting under the stem and continuing down to the tip. Carefully remove the seeds, being careful not to tear the chile.

4
Using a sharp knife, cut the kernels off the corn cobs. Heat the olive oil in a large skillet set over medium-high heat. When shimmering, add the onion and garlic. Cook until onion is translucent, about two minutes. Add the corn, and season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring often, until corn turns golden brown, about five minutes. Turn off heat and set aside.

5
Carefully stuff each chile with a layer of ½ cup of the sauteed corn mixture, ¼ cup of the shredded cheese, and 1 ½ tablespoons of the crema. Finally, add a 1 ½ tablespoon of cheese on top of each slit. When stuffed, place each chile slit side up on a baking dish.

6
Transfer baking dish to the upper middle rack in the oven and cook for ten minutes. Turn on the broiler to high, and cook until the cheese is golden brown, about five minutes. Serve immediately.

CSA Harvest #13~ the halfway mark!

Here we are at the halfway point for CSA deliveries and the climax of the amount of produce you will be getting in your baskets. As you noticed in the early part of the CSA deliveries leafy greens reigned supreme, now the heat of summer and longer days have allowed the later maturing crops to ripen! Hello this week to eggplant, shallots, peaches and melons!
For those of you who love your lettuce it will be back as the days cool off. We have another planting of lettuce in the ground and the deer have found it. We do not have deer fencing... living on the flood plain of the river we are not willing to invest that much money into a project to have it wash away when the river decides to flood again. This means each year in the late summer when the hills dry up we have deer to contend with. By day they sleep in the shade along the river and at night while we sleep they help themsleves to their favorite things on the farm~ beans, lettuce, corn and carrots. In a few weeks you may find your carrot tops nibbled down or jagged edges on your head lettuce, the telltale sign that a deer has smapled it before you. Our dogs do their duty and bark from our fenced in yard but we do not like to let them loose to chase the marauding deer since we live right off of Highway 99 which is highly traveled at all hours. So please excuse any cosmetic flaws you may see (especially in your lettuce greens) in the next coming weeks!

We wanted to include some images from the great onion harvest of 2011! With Geronimo's help we were able to haul in the walla wallas, red torpedo, red marble, cipollini, red zepplelin, Alisa Craigs and copras. We store the onions on pallets under the shade of the fir trees. Be prepared for the large onion flood coming your way!

This year we have also experimented with growing shallots.. that delicious onion family member that tastes like onion crossed with garlic. Shallots are usually a delicacy item.. very expensive to plant from bulbs and seed. The shallots in your basket were started from seed way back on the cold day of February 2nd.. they did great and now hang in our barn drying for storage. You will see the shallots as regular visitors to your basket now too!


Please don't forget about our upcoming annual potluck at the farm happening September 18th from 2-6pm... please RSVP as soon as you can to let us know you will be attending, what you will be bringing and how many in your group.


This Week's Harvest Includes:

Potato Mix ( yukon golds, purple majesty and mountain rose) use combined for great colors!

Green Haricot Vert Beans and Yellow Wax Beans

Carrots

Strawberries (we are so impressed with these seascapes and how long they pump out these berries!)

Shallots

Tomatoes

Cherry Tomato Mix (includes sungolds, red cherry, isis candy, brown berry and lemon drop)

Cucumber

Summer Squash

Red Marble onion and Cipollini Onion

Dill (great with potatoes!)

Eggplant! (finally!)

Melons

Peaches (we are hoping enough for everyone) Please bear in mind the trees are young (only three years old) and only a few are really loaded with fruit. Also much to our dismay earwigs have come out at night and started to nibble into the ripening fruit. Next year we know now to apply tanglefoot (a sticky paste that you apply to the base of tree that prevents insects from crawling up the trunk) For this year please cut away any superficial holes you may see in these sweet, fragrant beauties!


How to Keep it and Eat it!

Eggplant~ these fruits are members of the nightshade family like their brothers tomatoes. They keep best loose in the crisper drawer of your fridge. They should be eaten within 5 days for best quality.

Baba Ganoush~ no eggplant introduction is complete without including this recipe! A wonderful dip for pita wedges or spread for sandwiches.

Ingredients
1 eggplant
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup tahini (sesame seed paste in natural food section of grocery store)
2 tablespoons sesame seeds
2 cloves garlic, minced
salt and pepper to taste
1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil

Directions
1.Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Lightly grease a baking sheet.
2.Place eggplant on baking sheet, and make holes in the skin with a fork. Roast it for 30 to 40 minutes, turning occasionally, or until soft. Remove from oven, and place into a large bowl of cold water. Remove from water, and peel skin off.
3.Place eggplant, lemon juice, tahini, sesame seeds, and garlic in an electric blender, and puree. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Transfer eggplant mixture to a medium size mixing bowl, and slowly mix in olive oil. Refrigerate for 3 hours before serving.

Spicy Szechwan Eggplant

Ingredients
1 large eggplant, diced
4 tablespoons soy sauce
1/4 cup chicken stock
1 teaspoon chili sauce
1 teaspoon white sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
2 tablespoons oyster sauce
1 tablespoon cornstarch
4 tablespoons water
2 cloves garlic, minced
4 large green onions, finely chopped
1 tablespoon chopped fresh ginger root
1/2 pound medium shrimp - peeled and deveined (can substitute chicken here)
1 pound lean ground beef
1 tablespoon vegetable or sesame oil

Directions
1.Remove the eggplant stem and cut into 1-inch cubes. In a medium bowl, combine the soy sauce, chicken stock, chili sauce, sugar, ground black pepper and oyster sauce. Stir together well and set aside. In a separate small bowl, combine the cornstarch and water, and set aside.
2.Coat a large, deep pan with cooking spray over high heat and allow a few minutes for it to get very hot. Saute the garlic, half of the green onions, ginger and shrimp for 3 to 5 minutes, stirring constantly, until they begin to brown. Stir in the ground beef and cook for 3 more minutes, again stirring constantly, until browned.
3.Pour the eggplant into the pan and stir all together. Pour the reserved soy sauce mixture over all, cover the pan, reduce heat to medium low and let simmer for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in the reserved cornstarch mixture and let heat until thickened. Finally, stir in the rest of the green onions and the sesame oil.

CSA Harvest #12

The colors and tastes of summer can be experienced in your basket this week. Finally so many of the crops that we have had our doubts would produce anything have finally started to come alive and decide to grow and produce something edible for us all. The corn is tasseling (finally!) Neon purple eggplant are appearing and we will harvest the first ripe melons tomorrow! A true sign that summer is upon us.

This week and last week we have been busy getting many of the fall crops planted. More broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, kohlrabi, cilantro, baby greens, radishes and turnips. Soon as the days shorten and turn cool again it will be too late to start more things so we take advantage now of our warm days to get things to grow!

Also on the farm we are doing our big onion harvest. When we see the tops of the onion leaves start to turn brown and die back we know that the onion bulbs are done growing and it is time to stop irrigating them and let them start drying to cure for storage. We grow lots of onions (perhaps too much!) but we figured that onions were a staple that many of you use to cook your meals plus the onions can be stored for many months once cured and added to your baskets over a long period of time.
This week in your basket you will find a tremendous yellow onion, perhaps the biggest you have ever seen! This variety is an heirloom sweet variety called Alisa Craig.

Next week will be CSA harvest #13.. this means our halfway mark with 13 more weeks to go. It also means for some of you that the second half of your payment is due. If you are unsure of your balance please email us.

Also we hope you all can make it to our 4th annual Potluck/Farm Tour Sunday September 18th from 2-6pm. Please RSVP via email if you think you can make it!

Enjoy this week's bounty!

Suzie, Asinete, Tione, Grandma GG, M.A, Sally & Violet


Harvest This Week Includes:

Strawberries

Dill

Glacier and Oregon Spring Tomatoes

Summer Squash

Head Lettuce

Cucumbers

Cantaloupe (possibly on rotation) Small variety called Tasty Bites and larger Sarah's Choice.

Fennel Bulb

Beets

Alisa Craig Sweet Onion

Garlic

Yellow Wax and Haricot Vert green beans (half share this week)

Sungold Cherry Tomatoes (possibly on rotation.. hoping we can get more ripe ones on vine before delivery tomorrow!)

Raspberries (like cherry tomatoes possibly on rotation depending how many more ready to harvest in the am.)

How to Use it!

Roasted Beets with Dill

yield: Makes 6 servings

This simple side dish is even easier to prepare if you roast the beets the day before you plan to serve them.

Ingredients
2 pounds beets, trimmed (about 6 medium)
1/4 cup water
6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) unsalted butter (can use less and still tastes great!)
1/4 cup chopped fresh dill
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
print a shopping list for this recipe

Preparation Preheat oven to 400°F. Place beets in small roasting pan with 1/4 cup water. Cover pan tightly with foil. Bake until beets are tender when pierced with knife, about 1 hour. Cool slightly. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover and refrigerate.) Peel beets. Cut into 1-inch pieces.

Melt butter in heavy large skillet over medium heat. Stir in dill and lemon juice. Add beets and toss until heated through, about 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Transfer to bowl; serve.


Creamy Beet with Dill Soup

Serves 8

Ingredients
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 pounds raw beets, cut into 1-inch chunks
1 large onion, cut into large dice
1 tablespoon butter
1 pinch sugar
3 large garlic cloves, thickly sliced
1 teaspoon toasted caraway seeds*
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
3 cups chicken broth, homemade or from a carton or can
2 tablespoons fresh dill
1 1/2 cups half-and-half (or whole milk)
Salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
Garnish: chopped hard-cooked egg

Directions
1.Heat oil over medium-high heat in a large, deep saute pan until shimmering.
2.Add beets, then onion; saute, stirring very little at first, then more frequently, until squash start to turn golden brown, 7 to 8 minutes.
3.Reduce heat to low and add butter, sugar and garlic; continue cooking until all vegetables are a rich spotty caramel color, about 10 minutes longer.
4.Add caraway seeds and cayenne pepper; continue to saute until fragrant, 30 seconds to 1 minute longer.
5.Add broth; bring to a simmer over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to low and simmer, partially covered, until beets are tender, about 10 minutes.
6.Using an immersion blender or traditional blender, puree (adding fresh dill) until very smooth, 30 seconds to 1 minute. (If using a traditional blender, vent it either by removing the lid's pop-out center or by lifting one edge of the lid. Drape the blender canister with a kitchen towel. To 'clean' the canister, pour in a little half-and-half, blend briefly, then add to the soup.)
7.Return to pan (or a soup pot); add enough half-and-half so the mixture is soup like, yet thick enough to float garnish. Taste, and add salt and pepper if needed. Heat through, ladle into bowls, garnish and serve.
Footnotes

*To toast caraway seeds, heat 1/2 tsp. caraway seeds in a small skillet over medium-low heat until they start to gently pop and smell fragrant. Cool slightly, then crush with a rolling pin.

CSA Harvest #11

Eleven weeks down and 15 more to go and the best things are still to come! Peaches which are ripening, sweet corn tasseling, melons growing, eggplant, basil, shallots, winter squash, pears, brussels sprouts, and much more!

For many of you this is the first time you have tried a CSA program. As you wade through new and possibly strange vegetables (ie: kohlrabi!) each week you may wonder again what the benefits are of eating locally. We found this list of reasons why it is important to eat locally and in season. This list is not complete but it is a good start!

10 Reasons to Eat Local Food

1. Eating local means more for the local economy. According to a study by the New Economics Foundation in London, a dollar spent locally generates twice as much income for the local economy. When businesses are not owned locally, money leaves the community at every transaction. (reference)

2. Locally grown produce is fresher. While produce that is purchased in the supermarket or a big-box store has been in transit or cold-stored for days or weeks, produce that you purchase at your local farmer's market has often been picked within 24 hours of your purchase. This freshness not only affects the taste of your food, but the nutritional value which declines with time.

3. Local food just plain tastes better. Ever tried a tomato that was picked within 24 hours? 'Nuff said.

4. Locally grown fruits and vegetables have longer to ripen. Because the produce will be handled less, locally grown fruit does not have to be "rugged" or to stand up to the rigors of shipping. This means that you are going to be getting peaches so ripe that they fall apart as you eat them, figs that would have been smashed to bits if they were sold using traditional methods, and melons that were allowed to ripen until the last possible minute on the vine.

5. Eating local is better for air quality and pollution than eating organic. In a March 2005 study by the journal Food Policy, it was found that the miles that organic food often travels to our plate creates environmental damage that outweighs the benefit of buying organic. (reference)

6. Buying local food keeps us in touch with the seasons. By eating with the seasons, we are eating foods when they are at their peak taste, are the most abundant, and the least expensive.

7. Buying locally grown food is fodder for a wonderful story. Whether it's the farmer who brings local apples to market or the baker who makes local bread, knowing part of the story about your food is such a powerful part of enjoying a meal.

8. Eating local protects us from bio-terrorism. Food with less distance to travel from farm to plate has less susceptibility to harmful contamination. (reference)

9. Local food translates to more variety. When a farmer is producing food that will not travel a long distance, will have a shorter shelf life, and does not have a high-yield demand, the farmer is free to try small crops of various fruits and vegetables that would probably never make it to a large supermarket. Supermarkets are interested in selling "Name brand" fruit: Romaine Lettuce, Red Delicious Apples, Russet Potatoes. Local producers often play with their crops from year to year, trying out Little Gem Lettuce, Senshu Apples, and Chieftain Potatoes.

10. Supporting local providers supports responsible land development. When you buy local, you give those with local open space - farms and pastures - an economic reason to stay open and undeveloped.

As farmers we would also like to add that commercial farmers only collect about 10 cents of the retail food dollar. The majority of that food dollar goes to brokers, advertising and shipping cost. Local farmers like Big Lick Farm who sell directly to the consumers cut out the middle person and get full retail price for their food. Farmers can earn a fair wage to raise their families.


Upcoming Farm Tour and Potluck!

We hope you can all join us for our annual farm tour/potluck. We have decided on Sunday, September 18th from 2-6pm. More details to come as we near the date! We hope you can all come out and see where/how your food is grown!

Enjoy this week's goodies!

Suzie, Asinete, Tione, Grandma GG, M.A, Sally and Violet

Harvest This Week Includes:

Kohlrabi (peel until you get to the tender flesh inside)

Garlic

Walla Walla Onion (please store in fridge!)

Green Simpson Lettuce

Cucumber

Squash mix (zephyr and costata romanesco zucchini)

Italian Flat Leaf Parsley (recipe ideas below)

Tomatoes

Strawberries

Raspberries OR Sungold Cherry Tomatoes

Maxibel Haricot Green Beans (full share only this week.. new planting just kicking into production).


Recipe Ideas:

Flat leaf parsley is a mainstay of our gardens each year. It grows all season and as we cut it it just comes back again better than before. Parsley is so good for you too! It is rich in Vitamins A and C and the minerals, iron and calcium.

Your parsley will keep very fresh stored in a plastic bag in the crisper drawer of your fridge. We love it especially chopped very fine and added to our fresh green salads. If you would like to get more fancy here are some ideas!

Tabouli
2 cups bulgur
2 cups boiling water
1 bunch Italian flat-leaf parsley
1 bunch mint
3 cloves garlic
4 tomatoes
3 scallions
juice of 4 lemons
⅓ cup olive oil
Fresh ground pepper
Salt to taste

1. Place bulgur in large bowl, add boiling water and toss well with a fork. Let rest in refrigerator for ½ hour.

2. Finely chop mint and parsley; peel and finely chop garlic. Cut tomatoes into ¼” cubes. Slice scallions finely.

3. Add all vegetables to bulgur. Combine lemon juice and olive oil. Pour over bulgur-vegetable combination. Add salt and pepper to taste.

4. Let flavors blend for at least two hours before serving. Serve chilled or at room temperature.


Chimichurri a traditional Argentine spicy condiment that is typically served with grilled and roasted meats

1 large bunch flat-leaf parsley
8 cloves of garlic, peeled
3 tablespoons minced onion
1/3 cup vinegar
5 tablespoons water
1 teaspoon coarse kosher or sea salt
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon hot pepper flakes (optional)
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 cup extra virgin olive oil

1. Finely chop the parsley and garlic in a food processor. Add the onion, vinegar, water, salt, oregano, pepper flakes, and black pepper and process until the salt crystals are dissolved.

2. Add the oil in a thin stream. Do not over process. The chimichurri should be fairly coarse.

3. Correct the seasoning, adding additional salt or vinegar to taste. Let stand at room temperature for several hours before serving.

CSA Harvest #10

Hooray for summer that is actually outside and now reflected in your CSA baskets! Tomatoes, beans, cucumbers, squash and berries. The luscious bi-color sweet corn will not be far behind. We would have been getting ready to harvest the first crop by now if our first two sowings had not rotted in the cold, wet spring soil. Many of the other U-Pick farms in our area will have corn long before us since the seed they plant is treated with chemical fungicides to protect them from rotting in the uncertain Spring weather. Due to our certification with Certified Naturally Grown we are not allowed to use these seeds and chemicals and instead we need to rely on Mother Nature to let us know when the time is right for the corn to grow on its own. Of course this method resulted in quite a bit of wasted seed that rotted and time planting and replanting only to have nothing sprout. Still we would not farm any other way!

We wanted to include a picture of our faithful helper who arrives every Monday and works nine hours straight stopping only for an occasional sip of water. Geronimo comes from Oaxaca,Mexico and is a great help to us this season. His help allows us more time to play with Tione and make sure his needs are met. The pictures above show Geronimo digging up the potatoes that you will be enjoying in your baskets this week. Potato digging is hard work and I am not very good at it. I seem to find the potatoes best by spearing them underground with my digging fork. If you see spuds in your basket that have nicks or cuts it's a safe bet that they are ones I harvested. Please enjoy nicked ones first since they do not store as well. In your baskets this week is a mix of Red Pontiac potatoes, Mountain Rose (look inside when you cut them and see the beautiful rose colored hue!) Also the magnificent but stingy yielding Purple Majesty Potato. We have over 8 other varieties of potatoes growing at the farm yet to harvest!


Enjoy your bounty!

Suzie, Asinete, Tione, M.A, Violet, Sally and Jeanne


Harvest This Week Includes:

Potato Mix

Romano Beans

Carrots (new crop! yummy!)

Green Onions

Strawberries

Rainbow Chard

Summer Squash Mix

Cucumbers

Raspberries (this week we do hope for everyone! If not enough for all those who did not get last week will!)


How to Cook it and Store it!

Rainbow chard is one of the favorite crops we grow at the farm for a number of reasons. First of all every time we pick a bunch we don't know whether to cook it up or put it in a flower vase to enjoy its vibrant colors! Another reason is that chard is a crop that we can keep harvesting from almost all season. As we harvest the outer, largest leaves the new leaves keep coming up from the middle. The majority of the crops that we grow at the farm are harvested once and done (carrots, potatoes, beets, onions, turnips, radish, head lettuce). The last reason we love chard is because it is so darn tasty, easy to prepare and so good for you! Chard has high levels of magnesium, calcium, vitamin K, iron, potassium, vitamin A, folate, zinc, copper, vitamin C, dietary fiber, and vitamin E. Not only beautiful but good for you too!

Your chard will keep best wrapped in plastic bag in crisper drawer. Use by the weekend in one of the recipe ideas below.

Stuffed Chard Leaves

ingredients

1 pound 90%-lean ground beef
1/2 cup plain dry breadcrumbs
2 medium shallots, minced, divided
1 1/2 teaspoons Italian seasoning, divided
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper, divided
8 large Swiss chard leaves, stems removed (see Tip)
1 14-ounce can reduced-sodium chicken broth
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper
1 28-ounce can crushed tomatoes
1/2 cup freshly shredded Parmesan cheese (optional)

directions

1.Gently mix beef, breadcrumbs, 1 tablespoon shallot, 1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning, garlic powder and 1/4 teaspoon pepper in a large bowl until just combined. Divide the mixture into 8 oblong 3-inch portions.

2.Overlap the two sides of a chard leaf where the stem was removed and place a portion of beef there. Tightly roll the chard around the beef. Place each roll, seam-side down, in a large nonstick skillet. Pour in broth, cover and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to a simmer; cook until an instant-read thermometer inserted into the center of a roll reads 165°F, 8 to 10 minutes. Discard any remaining broth.

3.Meanwhile, heat oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add the remaining shallot, 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning, 1/4 teaspoon pepper and crushed red pepper. Cook, stirring often, until the shallot is soft, 1 to 2 minutes. Stir in tomatoes and cook, stirring occasionally, until slightly reduced and thickened, about 8 minutes. Serve the chard rolls topped with sauce and Parmesan cheese, if desired.

4.Tip: Remove chard stems, including the widest section of the rib at the base of the leaf, by making narrow triangular cuts.


Chard with Olives and Goat Cheese

ingredients

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1 pound chard, stems and leaves separated, chopped (see Note)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
1/4 cup chopped pitted green olives (can use kalamata)
1/4 cup currants
1/2 cup crumbled goat cheese (2 ounces)

directions

1.Heat oil in a Dutch oven over medium heat. Add chard stems, salt and pepper and cook, stirring often, until softened, 3 to 5 minutes. Stir in chard leaves and cook, stirring constantly, until wilted, about 2 minutes. Stir in olives and currants. Dot goat cheese over the top, cover and cook until the chard is tender and the cheese is melted, about 2 minutes more.
2.Note: After washing the chard for these recipes, allow some of the water to cling to the leaves. It helps steam the chard and prevents a dry finished dish.

recipe source
eatingwell


Easy Chard Recipe

Ingredients

1 large bunch of fresh Swiss chard
1 small clove garlic, sliced
2 Tbsp olive oil
2 Tbsp water
Pinch of dried crushed red pepper
1 teaspoon butter
Salt

1 Rinse out the Swiss chard leaves thoroughly. Remove the toughest third of the stalk, discard or save for another recipe. Roughly chop the leaves into inch-wide strips.

2 Heat a saucepan on a medium heat setting, add olive oil, a few small slices of garlic and the crushed red pepper. Sauté for about a minute. Add the chopped Swiss chard leaves. Cover. Check after about 5 minutes. If it looks dry, add a couple tablespoons of water. Flip the leaves over in the pan, so that what was on the bottom, is now on the top. Cover again. Check for doneness after another 5 minutes (remove a piece and taste it). Add salt to taste, and a small amount of butter. Remove the swiss chard to a serving dish.

CSA Harvest #9

Hi faithful blog readers and CSA members! This week I am going to make the newsletter very short.. my apologies.. long day harvesting, long day tomorrow harvesting, 11 pm and 5 week old baby that doesn't sleep for very long require me to do so!

The main events going on at the farm currently are weeding like maniacs, planting like maniacs and harvesting like... yep you guessed it.. maniacs! This is the time of the season when the produce just oozes out of the field by the truckload and we have to struggle just to keep up with the picking, especially with crops like beans and squash that require you to constantly harvest.

Also we are looking forward to our first peach harvest this year! Three years ago we planted 43 peach trees at our farm. Last year the 43 trees produced 6 peaches! This year there are too many to count. They are not big but they look beautiful and we guarantee they will be luscious!

Also later this season we will have our annual farm tour and potluck. Most likely the potluck will happen in September. We will give you all plenty of time to mark your calendars!

Harvest This Week Includes:

Kohlrabi

Strawberries

Raspberries (we hope enough for everyone! We will harvest Wed am)

Early Tomatoes! (Glacier and Oregon Spring)

Sweet Red Torpedo Onions

Yellow Zephyr Squash

Italian Flat Beans (also know as Romano Beans)

Green Slicing Cucumber

Beets

Garlic


Since the new items this week are all things you are accustomed to I am going to skip the recipe section and instead direct you to a great recipe source and that is allrecipes.com When you get to the website simply type in the vegetable you want to find recipes for and hundreds will come up! Sorry I promise more recipes next week!

Enjoy!!!!

CSA Harvest #8

Here we are another week deeper into summer and still lamenting the rainy weather! The silver lining to all this rain is that we have not had to run around irrigating. Of course with the wet, warm weather we are worried about fungal diseases breaking out in our crops. Especially susceptible to diseases in this wet weather are the melons, tomatoes, beans, cucumbers and squash. We have to take preventative measures to avoid fungal outbreaks by not working in these crops when the leaves are wet. Beans are notorious for becoming diseased when you work in them and their leaves are wet. For this reason we had to wait until this afternoon when the day was late enough that the leaves of the beans were as dry as possible before we could harvest them. The beans in your basket this week are a variety called Italian Flat Pod. They are delicious and we hope you think so too!
Also today marks the first potato harvest of 2011! Thank you to our helper Geronimo who braved the mud to get them to you. Please do not wash them until just before cooking them. Once the skins get wet they will not keep. This variety in your basket today is an early maturing variety of potato called Red Pontiac.
Hooray also we wanted to start thinning out the largest Walla Walla onions and share them with you. Walla Wallas are a seasonal treat and we like to use them first since they do not store well.

We hope you enjoy these new tastes in your basket this week!

Locally yours~

Suzie, Asinete, Tione, M.A, Violet and Sally

Harvest This Week Includes:

Broccoli (last harvest until Fall)

Chinese Cabbage

Radishes

Raspberries (use quick! Rain made them soggy. Won't store)

Strawberries (also use quickly!)

Red Pontiac Potatoes

Walla Walla Onions

Lettuce

Italian Flat Leaf Parsley

Yellow Zephyr Squash

Italian Flat Beans


How to Cook it and Store it:

Potatoes~ wash only right before cooking. Store at room temp in a dark place (paper bags work well).

Walla Walla Onions~ these will keep best in a plastic bag in the crisper drawer of your fridge. They will store for a week before drying out and losing their flavor. We like to chop us the green leaves of the onion and use that in stir fry. Walla Wallas are the perfect sweet onion to top your favorite burger or however you can enjoy them raw!

Walla Walla Sweet Onion Salad

2 Walla Walla Sweet Onions thinly sliced
4 Cucumbers thinly sliced
1 Cup mayonnaise
2 Tbls. white vinegar
1 Tbls. of sugar
Separate sliced onions into rings and combine with cucumber in a large bowl. Combine remaining ingredients and beat until smooth. Pour sauce over onions and cucumbers and mix thoroughly. Cover and refrigerate at least 1 hr. Serve well-chilled.

Walla Walla Sweet Onion Rings

1 Large Walla Walla Sweet Onion
12 oz Beer (light or dark)
1 1/3 Cup all purpose flour
1 tsp. Salt
1 1/4 tsp. Baking Powder
2 1/2 tsp. sweet Basil leaves
Peel and cut onion into 1/4-inch slices and separate into rings.

Heat oil (1 inch deep) to 375 degrees in a large skillet. Beat remaining ingredients with rotary beater until smooth. Dip each ring into batter, letting excess drip into bowl.

Fry a few onion rings at a time in hot oil until golden brown, turn once, drain.

Mixed Green Salad with Apples and Walla Walla Sweet Onions
Serves 4 - 6
INGREDIENTS:

4 tablespoons olive oil

1 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

Salt and pepper to taste

1 medium Walla Walla Sweet Onion, peeled and cut into 1/8ths

1 large Granny Smith, or Red Delicious apple, unpeeled, cored, thinly sliced

8 cups (about 6 ounces), blend of greens

12 basil leaves

1 cup thinly sliced shaved Parmesan cheese, (about 2 ounces)


DIRECTIONS:

1.Whisk together the olive oil and vinegar in a small bowl. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside.
2.Toss Walla Walla Sweet Onion together with the slices of apple, greens and basil in a large bowl. Add dressing, toss to coat. Top with shaved Parmesan cheese.


walla walla sweet onion and cherry tomato bruschetta

Servings: 8
Ingredients:

•20 cherry tomatoes, cut in half
•1 medium Walla Walla Sweet Onion, cut into thin slices
•15 kalamata olives, pitted and finely chopped
•2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh basil
•1-tablespoon capers, drained
•1/2 cup olive oil
•2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
•1 teaspoon finely chopped garlic
•Freshly ground black pepper
•8 slices Italian country bread, about
•1/2 inch thick and 4 inches wide
•4 ounces mascarpone cheese


Instructions:

1.Mix together tomatoes, onions, olives, basil, capers in a small bowl. Whisk together the olive oil, balsamic vinegar, garlic, and black pepper. Pour over the tomato-onion mixture, and toss. Set aside.
2.Brush the bread with olive oil and grill slices directly over medium heat, turning once, until toasted, 2 to 3 minutes total. Divide the mascarpone evenly among bread slices, spreading it with a knife. Spoon the tomato
onion mixture over the mascarpone cheese, dividing evenly and serve at room temperature


Italian Flat Beans~~ these beans are an Italian variety that are very tasty. They can be used the same way you would use any green bean. Please be aware that overcooking will cause them to become mushy. They will store best for up to a week in a plastic bag in the crisper drawer of your fridge.

Italian Flat Beans with Tomato and Garlic
4 servings

Ingredients:
1 pound Italian green beans or string beans, ends trimmed; cut on the diagonal into 2- to 3-inch pieces
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
3 medium cloves garlic, cut into very thin slices (a scant 1/4 cup)
1 medium tomato, preferably peeled, cored and seeded, then cut into 1/2-inch dice (8 ounces)
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
6 to 8 large basil leaves, cut into chiffonade (stacked, then rolled tightly and cut into very thin strips; optional garnish)
Directions:

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil over high heat. Add the green beans and cook for 5 to 7 minutes, until tender. Drain immediately.

While the beans are cooking, heat the oil in a medium saute pan or skillet over medium-low heat. Add the garlic slices, distributing them evenly. Cook for 4 to 5 minutes, until the slices become almost translucent and start to brown on the edges; be careful not to let the garlic burn. Add the diced tomato and salt and pepper to taste, then reduce the heat to medium. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes, so that the tomato is heated through. Add the cooked green beans and heat through for 1 to 2 minutes; mix well. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed.

Transfer to a serving dish and top with the basil, if desired. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Italian Style Fried Potatoes
Ingredients:

*Two large potatoes
•1/2 pound of flat green (Romano) beans
•3 cloves of garlic
•2 tablespoons of tomato paste
•1-2 teaspoons of hot pepper flakes (optional)
•1/2 cup of extra virgin olive oil
•Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
Process:

Begin by peeling the potatoes and cutting them in 1/8 inch slices. Next, submerge the potatoes in a large bowl of water and repeat process until the water turns clear (you're looking to remove the starch from the exterior of the potato as it will help during the cooking process). Add the olive oil to a large fry pan and add your potatoes (making sure the potatoes are well dried). After adding the potatoes, allow them to cook, untouched, for 5-7 minutes. Stir the potatoes and make sure both sides begin to brown and crisp up. Remove the cooked potatoes and place in a bowl with a few paper towels. Next, remove the stems from the green beans and quickly steam the beans for 2-3 minutes. Chop your garlic cloves into think slices and add to the fry pan with oil. Next, add the steam green beans and the tomato paste. Season the ingredients with salt and pepper and add the fried potatoes back the fry pan. Combine the ingredients until the tomato paste is dissolved and the potatoes and beans are coated with the paste.

CSA Harvest #7

Happy.... errr.. summer???? We have our doubts at this point if it is summer after all! Today when getting a head start on the CSA harvest Asinete dug out the rain gear that we had buried away for later months. I braved the drizzles to get some of the delicate raspberries harvested. Rain and ripe raspberries are not a good combination, the berries are so delicate that the rain turns them to mush and then to mold. For this week the raspberries will begin their rotation through the half share baskets. We still do not have enough of them for all but we do foresee that being a possibility soon (when the sun and warm weather return anyways).

Also this week marks the first week we were able to fill a bowl with our early Glacier and Oregon Spring tomatoes. Not enough to share with you yet but in another week or two yes!

Yesterday with some much needed help we were able to get the garlic all harvested.. just in time too as we need it to be dry to avoid molding. It is now hanging in the storage sheds to dry further. In the next week or so you will be getting some dried garlic bulbs to add to your recipes.

Asinete is still doing 98% of the harvesting and farm work on his own.. it is amazing to see how much work one person can do. Especially considering we are growing on 5 acres. I find that I no sooner step outside to try to help Asinete then the baby monitor is filled with Tione's wails and he needs feeding again, or a changed diaper, or a cuddle (but really no complaints here! Just don't let Asinete know I prefer taking care of baby more than I enjoy weeding :) ) Really just relishing in enjoying these first few weeks of our baby's life... they are going fast and we will not get them back.

We hope you are enjoying your produce so far! Next week we will have our first potato harvest so you can look forward to some potatoes along with some walla walla onions!

Harvest This Week Includes:

Carrots

Kohlrabi (recipe ideas below)

Green Onions

Head Lettuce

Bok Choy

Chinese Cabbage (please see recipes from last week!)

Raspberries (on rotation)

Summer Squash (on rotation)


Kohlrabi~ We know we threw you a curve ball the week Tione was born and you received this Dr. Seuss looking vegetable in your CSA share with nary a note or recipe to accompany it. Well this week we will let you in on the wonderful world of kohlrabi! Kohlrabi can be eaten raw or cooked, and it taste a lot like broccoli stems. The word kohlrabi is German for cabbage turnip (kohl as in cole-slaw, and rübe for turnip) though kohlrabi is more related to cabbage and cauliflower than to root vegetables. We usually eat them raw, just peeled, sliced and added to a salad, but they are also delicious cooked.

ROASTED KOHLRABI
Hands-on time: 10 minutes
Time to table: 45 minutes
Serves 4 (smallish servings since roasted vegetables shrink so much)

1 1/2 pounds fresh kohlrabi, ends trimmed, thick green skin sliced off with a knife, diced
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon garlic
Salt
Good vinegar

Set oven to 450F. Toss the diced kohlrabi with olive oil, garlic and salt in a bowl. (The kohlrabi can be tossed with oil and seasonings right on the pan but uses more oil.) Spread evenly on a rimmed baking sheet and put into oven (it needn't be fully preheated) and roast for 30 - 35 minutes, stirring every five minutes after about 20 minutes. Sprinkle with a good vinegar (probably at the table so the kohlrabi doesn't get squishy).


NUTRITION ESTIMATE
Per Serving: 64 Calories; 3 g Tot Fat; 0 g Sat Fat; 8 g Carb; 4 g Fiber; NetCarb 4; 31 mg Calcium; 1 mg Iron; 23 mg Sodium; 0 mg Cholesterol; 2 g Protein;

Kohlrabi Puree
4 kohlrabi bulbs with leaves
2 Tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
4 ounces mushrooms quartered (*optional)
3 Tablespoons cream (or milk, chicken stock, olive oil, or water)
salt and pepper to taste

1. Trim the kohlrabi bulbs, peeling them if the skins seem tough. Rinse the leaves (discarding any that are yellow) pat them dry, and coarsely chop. Set aside. Cut the bulbs into 1-inch chunks.

2. Bring a saucepan of lightly salted water to a boil, and add the kohlrabi chunks. Reduce the heat and simmer until tender, about 15 minutes.

3. Meanwhile, heat the olive oil in a skillet. Add the onion and sauté over medium-low heat until softened, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and cook, stirring, another 1 to 2 minutes. Don't let the garlic brown.

4. Add the mushrooms and the reserved kohlrabi leaves to the skillet. Cover, and cook 5 minutes. Then uncover, and cook, stirring, until all the liquid has evaporated, 3 minutes. Set the skillet aside.

5. Drain the kohlrabi chunks and place them in the bowl of a food processor. Add the mushroom mixture and the cream (or whatever substitute you're using). Purée until smooth. Salt and pepper to taste.

6. Transfer the purée to a saucepan and reheat over low heat, stirring, 2 minutes. Serve warm.

Makes 6 portions

CSA Harvest #6

Hi everyone! We wanted to share the artistic talents of fellow CSA farmer Sandee McGee from Oh My Gato Farm. Sandee gave us the precious gift of a newborn photo shoot with Tione! Sandee and her husband Anthony operate Oh My Gato Farm out of Winston and Anthony is a baker supreme! You can find some of their baked delicacies at the Lookingglass Farmer's Market every Friday afternoon outside of the Lookingglass Store.

We have been blessed by the spirit of camaraderie among fellow CSA farmers here. We have been helped along the way greatly by longtime Roseburg Farmer's Norm and Cinda Lehne who also operate a CSA program. When we got our new tractor and were in need of a brush hog for it to keep our land mowed Norm called us up and said we were welcome to indefinitely use theirs since they had other mowers. Also our first two years running our CSA program here were alot more crazy. We were still learning about the growing conditions in Oregon and Asinete was a first time farmer. We still had our CSA program going until Thanksgiving. Of course several hard frosts came in and knocked out 95% of our crops. Norm and Cinda called us up again and said their CSA had ended and we were welcome to come out and harvest whatever we could for the CSA out of their fields.
It is this generous spirit among our fellow farmers that we are so grateful for!


Hope you enjoy this week's harvest!

Suzie, Asinete, Baby Tione, and the Crew!


Harvest This Week Includes:

Strawberries (Half shares)

Raspberries (Full shares) *they are just now coming on.. we foresee enough for all soon!

Scallions

Beets (use the tops like Swiss Chard!)

Cheddar Cauliflower (high in beta carotene due to orange color)

Chinese Cabbage

Peas (Rejoice! This is the last of 'em.. the heat has done them in)

Italian Flat Leaf Parsley

Cilantro

Romaine Lettuce

Yellow Zephyr Summer Squash (we are hoping there is enough for everyone but if not there will be plenty coming on soon!)

How to Cook it and Store it:

Beet time! These beauties are chock full of vitamins and minerals. The beet greens can be used just as you would use Swiss Chard. Beets will store best with leaves removed, in plastic bag in crisper drawer of fridge. If you plan to use the leaves rinse well, and store in plastic bag in crisper drawer too. Beets are the King of storage, so if you don't get to them right away fear not! They will stay fresh and happy for as long as a month in your fridge (but we hope they get eaten this week!)

We wanted to include this recipe for any definite beet haters. Whip them up in these chocolate brownies and no one will be the wiser! The beets make the brownies ubermoist and also impart a wonderful rosy glow on the brownies.

Beet Chocolate Brownies (trust us these are delish!)
You need:

•3 oz (90 g) Dark chocolate (I used a 75 % cocoa dark chocolate)
•3.5 oz (100 g) flour
•3.5 oz (100 g) almond powder
•3 oz (90 g) sugar
•3 oz (90 g) butter (soft)
•4 eggs
•7 oz (200 g) shredded raw red beetroot
•Vanilla extract
•Confectioner sugar and cocoa for decoration
Steps

•Start by peeling and shredding the beets. Set aside
•Melt the chocolate in a double boiler.
•Mix together (using a food processor) the butter with the eggs, then add the sugar.
•Mix until lighter, then add the chocolate, flour, almond powder, the beets and the vanilla extract, and mix well.
•Butter a small mould (round mould or square one works well) and place greased parchment paper at the bottom)
•Pour the preparation in it and bake in the oven for about 30 mns in a preheated oven, 350 F (180 C)
Note: Your brownies are cooked once the blade of a knife comes out dry after you insert the blade in the cake.


< Beet Risotto
ingredients

1 bunch red beets with greens (about 1 1/2 pounds)
6 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth or vegetable broth
5 tablespoons balsamic vinegar, divided
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
1 small sweet onion, such as Vidalia, cut into 1-inch cubes
2 cups arborio rice
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese (optional)

directions

1.Remove greens from beets; cut off and discard stems. Cut the greens crosswise into 1/2-inch strips; set aside. Scrub beets; place in a saucepan large enough to hold them in a single layer. Add broth and, if necessary, enough water to just cover them. Bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to a gentle boil and cook until the tip of a sharp knife can be easily inserted into the beets, 30 to 45 minutes.

2.Transfer the beets with a slotted spoon to a cutting board to cool. Measure the cooking liquid; either add water or reduce over high heat to get 6 cups total. Strain through a sieve lined with paper towels into a medium bowl. Slice off beet ends and slip off skins. (To avoid Lady Macbeth hands, wear rubber gloves or hold beets in a paper towel.) Cut the beets into 1/4-inch dice; transfer to a medium bowl and gently mix with 2 tablespoons vinegar. Set aside.

3.Heat oil and butter in a Dutch oven over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until translucent, about 3 minutes. Add rice, increase heat to medium-high and cook, stirring constantly, until all the rice is opaque, about 1 minute. Add the remaining 3 tablespoons vinegar and 1 cup of the reserved beet-cooking liquid. Stir until almost all the liquid has been absorbed, adjusting the heat as necessary to maintain a simmer, about 4 minutes. Continue to add the beet broth, 1 cup at a time, stirring after each addition until all the liquid has been absorbed and adjusting the heat as necessary to maintain a simmer.

4.Add the reserved beet greens to the rice along with the final cup of broth. Cook, stirring, until the greens are wilted, about 2 minutes. Add the reserved beets and continue stirring until all the liquid has been absorbed, about 2 minutes more. Season with salt and pepper. Serve with Parmesan cheese, if desired.


Chinese Cabbage~ yet another vegetable that may leave you scratching your head and wondering what to do with it! Good news is it is very simple to prepare. Add it shredded at the last minute to your stir fries or try it in the super easy Cabbage Salad recipe below. Stores best in plastic bag in your crisper drawer.

Chinese Cabbage SaladIngredients
2 tablespoons sesame seeds
1 1/2 tablespoons rice vinegar
1/2 teaspoon sesame oil
2 tablespoons white sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/3 cup olive oil
4 cups shredded cabbage
2 carrots, shredded
1 (3 ounce) package ramen noodles, crushed
Directions
1.In a small skillet, toast sesame seeds over medium heat until golden brown and fragrant.
2.In a small bowl, mix together vinegar, sesame oil, olive oil, sugar, salt, pepper, and ramen seasoning packet.
3.In a large bowl, mix together cabbage, carrots, and crushed ramen noodles. Toss with dressing to coat evenly. Top with toasted sesame seeds.


Sorry~ that is it for recipe ideas for this week as it is now 11:38pm Tuesday eve.. baby Tione was fussy until 10:45pm making the usual blog posting time unavail... Now off to sleep while I can! ~ suzie