This Week’s Harvest
Salad Mix
Swiss Chard
Dragon Tongue Beans OR Tomatillos
Tomatoes
Summer Squash and Zucchini
Tendersweet Cabbage
Green Bell Peppers
Jalapeno Peppers
Candy Onions
Sweet Corn
Sungold and Juliette Tomatoes (Oregon District only)
Farm News
In order to keep our CSA boxes and market stand diverse and full we succession plant throughout the season. Ideally, we’d have lettuce, beets, beans, summer squash and zucchini, etc all season long. But weeds and pests take over, so this is only possible by continuous planting.
I noticed while scouting the fields that we’ve got good examples of succession planting at different stages of life currently on the farm. We have a broccoli planting planted out 4 weeks ago, a planting transplanted 6 days ago and tiny seedlings in the greenhouse that will be ready to plant in a few weeks. Hopefully these three plantings will give us a steady broccoli supply in the fall!
We also have currently have beans at various stages of life (and various rates of success). This week we had to do “either/or” with beans and tomatillos because we didn’t have enough beans for every share. And here you can see why: weeds!
There really are beans in there! Unfortunately, the constant rain meant that we couldn’t get in the field to weed and fertilize. Fortunately our next planting has been weeded and will be much more productive. The trouble with this planting is that the field is sloped and the lower section got flooded right after seeding. The germination was non existent and planting abrubtly stops. We lost about 50 foot of beans.
Farmers just keep plugging away and we seeded beans again as soon as we could. Pictured are the results: two 300 foot beds of beautiful beans!
Employee Spotlight
Ben and I cannot operate our 8 acre farm by ourselves. We rely on our employees and have 7 people on our payroll this season. Everyone has specific jobs and specialities and I will spotlight them on the blog throughout the season.
First up is Jennifer Dalton, our packing shed manager. The packing shed is where the vegetables come after the harvest to be cooled down, washed, sorted, and stored. Jen makes all this post harvest handling happen. On Mondays and Fridays (our harvest days) she knows more about what’s in the cooler then we do! Jen also helps with the CSA pack and makes sure I don’t take off on deliveries without the flowers, or pens, or bags, or anything else I need! While the packing shed is where she spends most of her time she also helps with greenhouse seeding, cuts flowers, and is perfectly willing to do any random tasks that come up. This is her second season with us and never before has our post harvest handling run so smoothly.
Jen often starts her long tiring days with us before coming out to the farm doing her other job. She has her own dog walking and dog/cat sitting business and has several very satisfied clients. I can attest, Jen goes above and beyond when it comes to her work so if you are ever in need of a dog walker or pet sitter, I’ll pass her contact info on to you!
Jen is going to be busy this fall and winter taking classes in occupational therapy to begin a career in this field. We wish her luck with all her future endeavors!
Recipes
Summer Squash, Corn and Tomatillos Tacos
Smothered cabbage, peppers and sausage (use one cabbage, finely shredded in place of coleslaw mix