We’re feeling the shift on the farm this week from the summer weather to the cool, fall weather. The crew is coming to work with their long johns, stocking caps and layers of warm clothing. We are excited to be harvesting some of our favorite fall crops these next couple weeks.
With frost in the forecast this week, are looking at possibly saying goodby to some of our favorite summer crops like tomatoes and peppers. While frost this time of year is appropriate and always a possibility, we are a little sad that our harvest window for these crops is being cut a bit short as they would continue to produce for a couple more weeks if frost did hold off.
We finished harvesting the rest of our winter squash last week and it feels good to have it safely put away in the packing shed for now. We will move into sweet potato harvest this week. We dug a few plant up for a sneak peek as to how they are looking. The plants that we did dig up looked like they had large, beautiful, bountiful tubers attached to them. We’re excited to dig up the sweet potatoes this week and see what the full harvest looks like.
Sweet potatoes go through a bit of a curing process after harvest. They need to be cured in a heated room at 85 degrees with high humidity around 80-90% humidity for 4-14 days. This curing process helps any cut end of the potatoes to heal, cure and dry properly so they don’t rot and it also develops the sugars in the potatoes. We store them unwashed because once they are washed their shelf life is more limited. We will have sweet potatoes in the last two CSA boxes of the season.
This week we will also harvest our leeks and celeriac root for the last couple summer share deliveries. We also have daikon radish, kohlrabi, storage cabbage, and more broccoli to share. We did not have good spinach germination for our fall boxes, so sadly we will not be harvesting spinach for the fall boxes. We do have some fun herbs like thyme, sage and oregano we would like to find the time to harvest and share.
We are also looking forward to our Fall Potluck that we will be hosting at the farm this Sunday from 3-6pm. We will be offering wagon ride tours of the farm for kids and adults alike. We will have pony rides available being put on by our daughter and their horse-loving friends and neighbors for tips for the first couple hours base on interest. There will be cider pressing as well using our old-fashioned hand-crank cider pressing machine where YOU will be needed for cranking on the handle to grind up those apples. It’s fun for the kids to toss the apples into the machine. There will be Turtle Stack beer as well!
The Potluck will begin at 5pm where everyone will set out a dish to share. We can celebrate the harvest and share a meal together down by our packing shed. Please bring your own dinner ware if you are able. We will have a dish-washing station set up in the packing shed for washing dishes as well! We hope you can join us for a fun afternoon on the farm this Sunday!
Tomatoes- Another 7.5lb bag of tomatoes! We expect that we will have one more giving of tomatoes next week. With the frost this week our tomato harvest will be cut short a bit.
Garlic- One bulb of chesnook garlic for your everyday cooking.
Acorn Squash- A classic winter squash variety. These acorns have a dark green skin with a creamy, orange flesh on the inside. We like to cut them in half lengthwise, discard the seeds, and bake them face down in a pan with a little water for about an hour.
Onion- One yellow onion for your everyday cooking.
Brussels Sprouts- We cut these brussels sprout stalks down and left the work of snapping them off the stalk to you. Snap them off the stalk and store them in your fridge in a plastic bag.
Sweet Peppers- 2-4 sweet peppers per box this week. Many of the peppers may have some green on them this week. We harvested peppers more aggressively this week knowing there was frost in the forecast in an attempt to save anything we could. Peppers will ripen to color once picked a little sometimes.
Hungarian Hot Wax Pepper- These are also called banana peppers. They are the smaller hot peppers that range from orange, to red to lime green in color. They are delicious any color.
Broccoli or Cauliflower- Our fall broccoli and caluliflower are looking fabulous this Fall! Keeps best in a plastic bag in your fridge.
Lettuce- One head of green leaf, red leaf or green buttercup lettuce per box this week.
Sun Gold Cherry Tomatoes- 1lb bags of cherry tomatoes. Some of these tomatoes may need a little washing at home, but many of them were just fine. There were some split tomatoes in the bins we had to pick up which juiced on some of the other cherry tomatoes. We were thrilled to offer one more giving of this delicacy tomato!
Stuffed Acorn Squash by Girl with the Cast Iron
Pasta with Fresh Tomato Sauce by Martha Stewart
Shakshuka (Poached Eggs in a Home-made Tomato Sauce) by Aline Made
Smashed Parmesan Brussels Sprouts by The Whole Cook
