I asked my 10 year old daughter what she thought I should write the newsletter about this week. She sees me sit in front of a blank page on Monday nights while dad prepares to put her to bed. Sometimes the blank page is up for awhile with the cursor blinking. She says, ”Write about the animals, mom. All you ever talk about is vegetables.”
Your share in our CSA farm is primarily because of your interest in fresh, local and organic produce. Vegetables are what you receive from the farm either weekly or bi-weekly. But maybe there are some of you who signed up with our farm because you’re interesting in fostering a connection with the farm as a whole as well. After all, this is not a large scale production farm. Our family lives here and we have pets and flower gardens.
Of course there is our dog, Leche. He’s a 3 year old golden lab who is so spoiled, I really do think of him as like a fourth child. He’s about as needy as one. He is very vocal and very social. He barks to be let into the farm truck while we’re working in the fields. He barks to be let out of the farm truck. The whole crew obliges him and lets him in and out of the trucks whenever he ask. It’s excessive and ridiculous, if you ask me, but I don’t have the time to train him out of it. And because he’s so fluffy and adorable, we all pet him and love him and welcome him along for the ride wherever we’re going. The same goes for the farmhouse. He barks to be let in and out of the house depending who is on the most interesting task in Leche’s view. Leche loves chewing on bones he drags home from the neighbors farm. We’re finally past the puppy stage with him and he’s ‘maturing’ into a pretty good boy outside of his weird dog quirks.
We do have two farm cats, Shish (short for shish-kebob) and Biz (short for Bismarck). They’re Shish is black and Biz is yellow. They’re neutered males who spend their days laying on the hay bales in the shed or prowling in the pastures for mice. They’re helpful and friendly. I’m not a major cat person, so I should leave it up to Aliza to tell you more about them sometime.
We have three sheep that we milk on the farm that live in the upper pasture near the house. The provide more milk than our family could ever dream of using. This summer I’ve been experimenting with separating the cream, enjoying cream in my everything, making butter and some very simple soft cheeses. I don’t have a lot of time for processing the milk, so I haven’t gotten fancy with cheesemaking at all. Butter is a proud accomplishment! We have a lot of milkshakes, chocolate milk, and home-made ice cream. It’s the life! I love the sheep and their sweet energy and they help keep the pastures mowed down while also giving us milk. In a separate paddock there are 5 more sheep consisting of the younger lambs who were born this Spring.
We have about 27 chickens that we feed that are supposed to be giving us eggs. We do get a lot of eggs, but many of them are not producing anymore. We have an eclectic collection of breeds that lay brown, green and blue eggs. They’re also a vocal addition to our homestead. I believe we have three roosters right now which we’re going to have to do something about at the end of the season.
We did raise about 45 broiler hens this season. We always raise a small batch of chickens every year, mostly for ourselves. We did just harvest them about a week ago, so we have one less chore now.
We have two steers that we raise for ourselves who are always out to pasture.
The kids also have a horse that lives at the neighbor farm. Her name is Ginny and she’s a gingery-red-ish brown Arabian Quarterhorse Cross. The neighbors also have two daughters who are about the same ages as our daughters who know a lot more about horses, horse care and riding than we do. They give the girls riding lessons once a week. It’s a beautiful at-home hobby that seems to be fulfilling the dream.
The children all each have a pet rabbit as well.
We have many amish neighbors in our community where milk, eggs and meat (although I’m not sure about meat anymore) are abundant and available for much cheaper than what it costs for us to raise them organically. We could make our lives much more simple by not having to care for these animals and just buying our groceries like most other people. But the lessons the children learn in animals husbandry when witnessing birth, death, mating, and animal communication styles is priceless. The animals on the farm seem to bring the farm to life in a way. And I come to life when I watch the children with the animals.
What’s in the Box?
Melon– You may have received either a small yellow watermelon or a cantaloupe.
Cucumbers– 5 per member this week. We have two successions of cucumbers producing right now, so we’re really getting a lot at the moment!
Zucchinis and Summer Squash– 4-5 The squash are still going strong but the plants are starting to look like they’re getting a little tuckered out from all the heavy harvesting.
Green Beans– .5 lb bag of beans per member this week. I love it when we get to pick the beans when they’re a little smaller like this. They’re so much more tender when they’re small. Not a huge bag on the first giving, but there will be more!
Eggplant or Purple Pepper- Either one standard eggplant, one asian eggplant (the longer, thinner variety), or a purple pepper. Just 15 people or so got a purple pepper, we came up just slightly short on eggplants.
Lettuce x 2- Two heads of lettuce per memeber this week. The varieties we picked were curly green and romaine. It’s very difficult to have lettuce in the heat of the summer like this. The lettuce may be a little more bitter than what we enjoy in the Spring months. It’s the heat that makes the leaves a little tougher. I’ve just learned to adapt and we make our summer salads more fun with sunflower seeds, cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, reduced balsamic and olive oil. The lettuce is also good on sandwiches or in wraps.
Onion- One white onion per member this week. All the onions for the year have been harvested. They’re all ‘curing’ in the greenhouse now.
Sweet Corn– 5 Ears per member. This is the first picking of sweet corn for the year. We’re hoping to have at least a few more weeks of corn to share like this as long as we can continue to keep the racoons out of the corn. So far so good though! There is nothing like fresh sweet corn! Did you know that sweet corn needs to be kept very cold to preserve the sweetness? Put it right in your fridge when you get home and keep it as cold as possible until you get a chance to eat them.
Celery- One head of celery per member this week. The Celery this year have been loving all of the rain. Usually local celery is a little dry on the insides of the stalks if they aren’t irrigated regularly and have a stronger celery flavor, but this year many of them were very juicy. They still have a darker green color than California celery and are bursting with celery flavor. The greens of the celery plant can also be used in soup, garnish or however you like! Keeps best in a plastic bag in the fridge. Also, there will be celery now for a few weeks in a row, so get your celery mojo workin’!
Tomatoes- They’re starting! You may have received either 1-2 Tomatoes or 1 half pound of sun gold cherry tomatoes. Sun Gold cherry tomatoes ripen orange, so don’t wait for them to turn red!
Next Week’s Best Guess: Green Beans, 2 melons, sweet corn, celery, cucumbers, squash, onion, fennel, tomato, collards? carrots?
Recipes-
Green Bean Salad with Balsamic and Tomatoes
Quinoa Tabbouleh with Lemon Garlic Dressing
