2011 CSA Week 20

The conditions this past weekend were a sort of autumn ideal in which warm, summer-like days were transplanted perfectly between cool October nights. The days bore no humidity and the nights no threat of frost, and all hours continued their concessions to the softening light of the season.

Before the weekend, though, there were cold nights, and for the first time this season we were subject to the unique discomforts of harvesting in near-frost conditions. It stings our fingers and stiffens our hands to pick crops that are sheathed in icy condensation, and on such mornings the time we spend working before the sun rises enough above the trees that our fields are fully lit and slightly warmed can be arduous. Last Thursday, to divert my attention from the stinging pain in my fingers, I wrote a short song and then sang it repeatedly, sort of out loud. It's basically a recap of all the Spanish I have learned in the last six months:

Lechuga, batata

remolacha, albahaca

vegetables en Espanol!

Not only did the song not distract me from the fact that my hands might as well have been submerged in ice-water, it was accompanied by the sad realization that although I have been working alongside a native Spanish speaker for half a year, and our work has consisted entirely of growing vegetables, I have learned to say the names of only four vegetables in Spanish, and one of them is really more of an herb.

Which reminds me-- The weeks pass quickly, and things left until the end are often left undone, which means that the antepenultimate week of our season is as good a time as any to thank Gustavo, our native Spanish speaker and tireless helper, whose fault it certainly is not that my capacity for language acquisition has scarcely improved since the beginning of our acquaintance, in terms as sincere as can be expressed on a blog, for his hard work, his positive attitude, and his friendship. We are indebted, and we are grateful.

The share this week:

Lettuce

Mizuna

Winter Brassica Greens

Beets or Mixed Roots (Kohlrabi, Parsnip, Rutabaga)

Broccoli or Cabbage

Sweet Peppers

Hot Peppers

Onions

Parsley

Notes about the food:

* Mizuna is a feathery green in the mustard family. Its peppery flavor and subtle spiciness are reminiscent of arugula, but it is generally milder than that crop. Consider it a good compliment to lettuce and other salad greens, and don't overlook the decorative aspect of its shape when adding it to any dish. We are harvesting these leaves when they are still young and tender, so their tendency to wilt may be noticeable, especially if the day of harvest is warm. As always, cut the stems slightly when you get home and place the greens upright in a bowl of cold water, and they will revive.

Two recipes from The New York Times:

Mizuna with Potatoes and Shallot Vinaigrette

1/2 pound potatoes, cut in irregular bite-size chunks

Sea salt

6 1/2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

2 tablespoons Champagne or white wine vinegar

1 large shallot, slivered

4 ounces mizuna

2 hard-cooked eggs, peeled

1 teaspoon freshly crushed black peppercorns

Place potatoes in a saucepan with cold water to cover. Season water liberally with salt. Bring to a simmer and cook just until potatoes are tender, 6 to 8 minutes, then drain. When potatoes stop steaming, transfer them to a wide bowl.

Combine oil, vinegar, and salt to taste, and drizzle about one-third of this dressing over potatoes. Add shallot. Fold together with a rubber spatula. Dressing will pick up creaminess from potatoes. Set aside.

Place mizuna in a second wide bowl suitable for serving. Toss with half of the remaining dressing. Add potato mixture and fold in gently. Halve eggs lengthwise, and cut in crosswise slices 1/8-inch thick. Scatter over salad, add remaining dressing, and fold once or twice very gently. Dust with crushed pepper, and serve.

Turkey and Mizuna Salad

For the salad:

2 cups mizuna

3 cups shredded or diced cooked turkey

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 serrano chili, seeded and chopped

1 bunch scallions, white part and green, thinly sliced

1 small cucumber, seeded and diced

1/4 cup chopped cilantro

1 small red bell pepper, cut into thin strips

2 tablespoons coarsely chopped walnuts

2 broccoli crowns, cut or broken into small florets, steamed 4 to 5 minutes, refreshed with cold water and drained on paper towels

For the dressing:

2 tablespoons fresh lime juice

1 tablespoon seasoned rice wine vinegar

1 garlic clove, minced

2 teaspoons finely minced fresh ginger

1 tablespoon soy sauce

2 tablespoons sesame oil

2 tablespoons canola or peanut oil

1/3 cup low-fat buttermilk or plain nonfat yogurt

1 tablespoon turkey stock or water, for thinning if using yogurt

Line a platter or bowl with mizuna.

Season the turkey with salt and pepper, and combine in a large bowl with the chili, scallions, cucumber, cilantro, red pepper, and walnuts.

Combine the ingredients for the dressing, and mix well. Toss with the turkey mixture. Arrange on top of the mizuna and serve.

CSA Week 20

Our work on the farm is a healthy mix of the tasks that are daily (tending the chickens, watering whatever plants are in the greenhouse), tasks that are recurring (sowing seeds, transplanting crops, harvesting, weeding), and tasks that are undertaken only once or twice a season. In this latter category are things such as harvesting and cleaning garlic, a job that occupied some afternoons in late July and was followed by our annual harvest and cleaning of the onions, and which will directly lead to the one afternoon this fall that we spend planting garlic. The sweet potato harvest was also a once-a-year job. Over the course of several days--many of them conveniently timed to coincide with the final September heat wave--Joshua and I and a few occasional volunteers dug by hand the entirety of the sweet potato crop. Prior to this season neither of us had extensive experience with sweet potatoes, so it was without expectation that we planted two beds of the things this spring, weeded them twice, and then watched as their vines spread low along the ground to the complete occlusion of the soil. And it turns out beneath that soil monster sweet potatoes had been growing. To dig them was laborious, but each potato was a happy discovery. I collected those that were shaped and sized like human organs, and I arranged them on a table in the greenhouse in an approximate human shape that included two lungs, a heart, stomach, liver, intestines, something I decided to call the duodenum, and some miscellany. I also dug a hummingbird and narwhal for our sweet potato zoo, and Joshua dug a potato exactly the size and shape of a duck. It was my intention to learn to control lightning and then bring these things to life (I commented that once animated and ambulatory the collection of sweet potato organs would be sort of gross, but a friend of the farm pointed out that no, they'd be sweet), but before I could do so we moved all of the potatoes to the barn, where they have been curing and awaiting distribution. Along with the other items we have arranged in that dry place (garlic, onions, winter squash) they will contribute heft to the remaining shares, a weighty once-a-year harvest that we'll offer alongside the greens and peppers and all that we pick on an ongoing basis.

The share this week:

Lettuce

Mizuna

Red Russian Kale

Swiss Chard

Heirloom Tomatoes

Sweet Peppers

Hot Peppers

Parsnips

Sweet Potatoes

Onions

Garlic

Sage

You-Pick Tomatillos

You-Pick Husk Cherries

*The parsnips have been in the ground for a long time. We sowed them in April, they germinated slowly, they survived (rather, most of them survived) a brush with the rototiller, and they have been growing ever since. That's six months in the ground, for those keeping track. I don't know what to tell you to do with the green leafy tops, although it will be obvious that those have grown to be as abundant as the root. Feed them to your rabbit, if you have a rabbit, or add them to your compost, if you have compost. Like carrot tops, they can probably be cooked as part of a vegetable stock and then discarded. As for the root, here are a few suggestions:

Pureed Roasted Parsnips

From Simply Recipes: "The easiest way to prepare parsnips is to slice them, steam them, and dress with butter and salt. However, to get the fullest, richest flavor from the parsnips, they should be roasted. The browning caramelizes the natural sugars in the parsnips. In this recipe we first roast the parsnips with some butter, then puree them with added water. It's quite simple, but if you've never had parsnips this way, you're in for a treat."

2 lbs parsnips, peeled and chopped

3 Tbsp butter, melted

1 1/2 cups water

1/8 tsp nutmeg

salt and pepper to taste

1. Preheat oven to 400. Peel parsnips and chop them.

2. Place chopped parsnips in a medium-sized bowl, add the melted butter, and stir to coat. Lay the parsnips on a roasting pan in a single layer. Roast in the heated oven 20-25 minutes, until lightly golden, turning the parsnips once halfway through the cooking.

3. Put the cooked parsnips into a blender or food processor. Add the water and pulse until pureed to the desired consistency. Add more water if necessary. Add nutmeg and salt and pepper to taste.

Or include the sweet potatoes in this version from Gourmet:

Sweet Potato and Parsnip Puree

2 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch pieces

4 parsnips, peeled and sliced 1/4-inch thick

3 Tbsp unsalted butter

1/4 cup whole milk

3 Tbsp packed light brown sugar

1/2 tsp salt

Bring a large saucepan of salted water to a boil. Add potatoes and parsnips and boil gently until tender, about 12 minutes. Drain well and transfer to a food processor. Add butter and puree until smooth. Add milk, brown sugar, and salt, and blend well. Season with pepper.

*Mizuna is in the share for the third and final time this season. It's part of a small arsenal of greens that we are offering this week (along with the lettuce, swiss chard, and red russian kale), all appropriate for the season. For tips and recipes concerning mizuna, scroll to week 15.

*This week's heirloom tomatoes will be the last. The plants have finally been felled by the season, but to this point they have thoroughly exceeded our expectations. (Our expectations, admittedly, were reserved--blight eliminated the tomato crop of most small-scale organic farmers in the northeast last year, and in light of that disaster we were reluctant to raise our hopes for this year.) The hot and dry conditions were favorable, and each week we were happily surprised by the number of healthy tomatoes we were able to harvest for the CSA. It's hard to believe that during the last week of August Joshua and I agreed that if we had tomatoes for one more week we would be happy. That was eight weeks ago, and the fact that we have been able to offer tomatoes through the middle of October has been one of our happiest accomplishments this season.

CSA Week 15

The quality of today's harvest is belied by the picture at the left, which was taken with a cell phone and makes our bell peppers look like they are in an aquarium or something. I'm including it anyway, because I like the murky luminescence of the produce, and the way the peppers appear to be situated in defiance of gravity. The image is a striking contrast to the reality of our recent days on the farm: The air is clear, the light is clean, and our produce is copious. It is September, and although we are psychologically accelerating toward the end of the season and a time when growth is slow, our harvests have been getting bigger, and with a total of fifteen items (not including you-pick snap peas) this is our largest share thus far.

It comes at a time when we truly are thinking of the season's end. With the tractor we erased half a field's worth of cucurbits (squash, cucumbers, melons), and many of our empty beds have been sown with cover crop. And each week our astonishment at the date is renewed: The calendar is moving while our hands and minds are on vegetables, and the conversations that last week began "I can't believe it is the last week of August" this week begin "I can't believe it is the first week of September," with no diminishment of actual surprise. Time is moving fast, it's past before we realize it is present. Here's a lot of produce for ballast:

Lettuce

Mizuna

Heirloom Tomatoes

Sungold Cherry Tomatoes

Beets

Summer Squash / Zucchini

Bell Peppers

Fennel

Scallions

Jalapenos

Garlic

Tomatillos

Husk Cherries

Parsley

Sweet Corn (from Volante)

*Is it obvious that I'm not really a cook? We spend the majority of our time growing food, and it would make sense if we were accomplished preparers of the food we grow. Joshua, I think, has some kitchen experience and enough intuition to make consistently good meals, but for me food preparation is a regular source of shame. I eat a lot of vegetables (I don't think we grow anything that I don't like to eat), but my preparation methods are rudimentary, to say the least. So it is with some irony that I provide a few recipes each week. Some of them I've made, but many of them have been sent to me by friends of the farm or culled from an internet search. I try each week to select recipes that prominently feature at least one item from the CSA share, and ideally include a few items. If you have a favorite way to prepare anything we grow, please be in touch, and we'll share the tips and recipes with the CSA community. Until then, I'll keep providing the recipe findings of a kitchen incompetent.

*It was a cursory internet search that helped me find these two recipes that include mizuna, the spicy green in the share the past two weeks. The first is from the Whole Foods website (I have mixed feelings about this) and the second is from epicurious.

Wok Sauteed Mizuna with Minced Chicken

1 egg white, lightly beaten

1 1/2 tsp tamari or soy sauce

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breast, finely chopped

2 tsp canola or peanut oil

1/3 cup finely chopped carrot

1/3 cup finely chopped yellow onion

1/4 cup finely chopped water chestnuts

1/2 tsp chile paste

1 tbs lime juice

1 pound mizuna

1/4 finely chopped scallions

In a medium bowl, mix egg white with 1/2 tsp of the tamari, garlic, and chicken. Cover and refrigerate for one hour. Heat 1 tsp of the oil in a large skillet or wok over high heat. Add chicken mixture and cook, stirring constantly, 4 to 6 minutes, or until chicken is cooked through. Transfer chicken to a plate and set aside. Heat remaining 1 tsp oil in skillet or wok. Add carrots, onion, and water chestnuts and cook, stirring constantly, for 1 minute. Add remaining 1 tsp tamari, chile paste, lime juice, and mizuna and cook, stirring often, until slightly wilted. Return chicken to wok and toss well. Garnish with scallions.

Heirloom Tomato Salad with Burrata Cheese and Kalamata Dressing

3/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

1/2 cup pitted kalamata olives

5 tbsp red wine vinegar

5 ounces mizuna

3 pounds heirloom tomatoes (assorted colors and shapes), cut into slices and wedges

1 pound burrata cheese (burrata is a fresh mozzarella filled with cream and curds)

1/4 cup thinly sliced fresh basil

Puree oil, olives, and vinegar in blender. Season to taste with pepper. Scatter mizuna over large platter. Arrange tomatoes over mizuna. Sprinkle tomatoes with salt and pepper; drizzle with some of the dressing. Cut burrata into 1-inch slices; scatter over tomatoes. Sprinkle burrata with salt and pepper; drizzle with some of the remaining dressing. Scatter sliced basil over salad. Serve salad with remaining dressing.

CSA Week 14

The rain broke after four full days, as you know. I was surprised that night to wake to the sight of moonlight through my window and to the sound of insects instead of the sound of water falling from the sky. Those were four days of November transplanted to late August, and now that they're over they have been replaced (as you also know) with a dry, baking heat that we expect to continue until Friday. When it is raining it is hard to think of anything but the rain, and when it is hot it is hard to think of anything but the heat, but the contrast between these two consecutive periods of weather reminds me that though we cannot often see beyond the horizon of our present condition, moments are replaced often and easily. This is as true of the weather as it is of the mornings I wake with a headache and a stiff body and am immediately consumed by thoughts of my own mild discomfort. They are conditions that will pass, and once gone will feel as distant and unknowable as a cold and blustery August day from a hot and dry vantage point that is only one day later. May we no time soon be subject to the sort of personal or meteorological calamity that gives permanence to our discomforts and finally teaches us how fleeting they have always been.

Was that a downcast paragraph? This isn't downcast: Here is what's in the share this week:

Sungold Cherry Tomatoes
Heirloom Tomatoes
Eggplant
Edamame
Mizuna
Husk Cherries
Tomatillos
Carrots
Scallions
Hot Peppers
Cilantro
Sweet Corn
You-Pick Snap Peas (optional)

*We did not grow the corn that is offered in this week's share. Because it uses a lot of space for a relatively scant yield, corn is a tricky crop for small-scale farmers. Each corn plant, planted at 1-foot intervals the length of a bed, will grow to be nearly eight feet tall and will produce only one ear of corn. The plant feeds heavily from the soil to attain its height, and it offers little in return. A single ear of corn sells for very little money, which means that a full bed of corn will use far more of the farm's resources (soil fertility, human labor, etc.) than it is worth. For these reasons, and because it is our first year planning a crop schedule for a CSA, we decided not to grow our own corn. That said, in the CSA model the value of a crop is more than its direct monetary worth: Each distinct crop that we grow adds diversity to the CSA as a whole, and enhances the experience of the subscribers. And because corn is something that we feel it is safe to assume people like to eat during the summer, we decided to buy corn from another local farm and offer it in three weeks worth of CSA shares, beginning this week and continuing for the two weeks that follow. We placed inquiries with several local farms, and we decided to order our corn from Volante Farms in Needham. What you need to know about this corn is that unlike everything we grow ourselves (that is, everything else in the CSA shares) it has not been grown using organic methods. The difficulties I mentioned with corn are slightly (and only slightly) abated by the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. They skip some of the steps of soil building and weed management that require so much time on an organic farm, and therefore allow the farmer a slightly improved (again--only slightly) profit on his crop. For this reason it was easier for us to source corn from a grower using non-organic methods--they devote more acreage to the crop and grow far more corn than most organic farmers in the area, and they therefore had some to sell to us.

So: The corn is not organically grown, but we are happy to be supporting a local business, and we're proud to be able to offer corn this year from Volante. If you are uncomfortable with the contradictory growing methods the corn represents, don't feel obliged to take it. Like I said, the corn is a bonus that we wanted to offer to any of our members who want it. It is likely that with a year of experience under our belt we'll try to incorporate corn into our crop plan in the future. Until then, we're interested in any feedback you have about this issue. Please feel free to leave a comment on this blog post or send an email to doverfarmcsa@gmail.com.

*I mentioned last week that we were offering husk cherries as a you-pick item. The plants are producing so well, though, that we decided this week to pick them ourselves to ensure that everyone in the CSA gets a pint. They're packaged for you in shell that is like a paper lantern. Remove this and you'll find the ripe yellow cherry itself. They're sweet, with a flavor a little unlike anything else we grow. Eat them as they are, add them to salads, use them for jam, or try them in this pie:

Husk Cherry Pie

2 1/2 - 3 cups husk cherries
2/3 cup brown sugar
4 Tbsp flour
2 Tbsp water
3 Tbsp sugar
2 1/2 Tbsp butter

Place the husk cherries in an unbaked pie shell. Stir together the brown sugar and 1 Tbsp of the flour. Put this evenly over the husk cherries and sprinkle everything with water. Stir together the 3 Tbsp sugar and the remaining 3 Tbsp flour. Cut in the butter until it is crumbly, and place on top of pie. Bake at 425 for 15 minutes, then turn down to 375 and bake another 25-28 minutes.

*You may have more experience with them than I do, but the only thing I know to do with Tomatillos is make salsa. That said, they make some of the best salsa I've ever had.

Salsa Verde

1 1/2 lb tomatillos
1/2 cup chopped onion
chopped garlic to taste
1/2 cup cilantro leaves
1 Tbsp fresh lime juice
1/4 tsp sugar
2 hot peppers
salt to taste

Begin by heating the tomatillos whole in a skillet until their papery husks have blackened and the fruit is soft. Puree with the remaining ingredients. Easy!

*This eggplant recipe was sent to me from Austin, Texas. It originally appeared in the Austin Chronicle.

Caribbean Griddled Aubergine

5 Tbsp olive oil, plus 2 Tbsp to brush on eggplant
3 sweet peppers, deseeded and diced
3 sticks of celery, diced
1 cup butternut squash, peeled and diced
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 large eggplants, cut into rounds about 1/2 inch thick
1 hot pepper, deseeded and finely chopped
3 Tbsp tomato Puree
3 Tbsp tamarind paste
2 Tbsp brown sugar
2 Tbsp fresh cilantro or flat-leaf parsley leaves, to garnish

Preheat oven to 350. Heat oil in a large saucepan and add the peppers, celery, squash, and garlic, cooking until almost soft (about 10 minutes). Meanwhile, brush the eggplant with oil and fry very quickly in another pan, on both sides, to brown.

Add the chile, tomato puree, tamarind paste, and sugar to the softening diced vegetables along with 4-5 Tbsp of water and cook for another 5 minutes. Taste, and add more tamarind or sugar as necessary to get a good sweet and sour balance. Put eggplant in an ovenproof dish. Top with dollops of the suace and cover with foil or a lid. Cook in the oven for 20-25 minutes, or until the eggplants are tender. Served garnished with the cilantro or parsley.

*This has been a lot. There's barely room to mention the mizuna. It's an asian-style green with a spicy, mustardy taste, great in salads and on sandwiches, and a great addition to any stir-fry.

*I'm temporarily out of current photos of our produce, so this is what you get: