First Frost! & Farm Share for October 25, 2023

The first frost of the season arrived on our farm this morning! Light and patchy, just the way we like it, after a few weeks of gradually lowering temps. This helps the plants adjust their internal composition in order to harden themselves for freezing temps. A frost is not a freeze and plants are fine. But winter is on its way!

We have a special treat in your options for today: Persimmons! This Fuyu variety is delicious when crunchy like an apple. Chomp them like apples or slice them and serve alongside breakfast, lunch, or dinner. OR be like our family and pull off the best cheat dinner ever by serving up a charcuterie/grazing board and include ‘simmon slices beside cheese, meat, nuts, olives, other fruits, etc.

Note: these are completely different than the American Persimmon varieties that are astringent and make your mouth feel disgusting if/when you eat them anything less than completely ripe and soft.

There are just a few available this week, but we're curious about how our Farm Share members like them. Because we may plant 50 persimmon trees if you all are big fans! Our family LOVES them.

REMINDER: this year's final Farm Shares are Nov 18th. For every-other-week members, you may finish the week prior.

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Bread Share members: You just got a SEPARATE email to customize your bread share a few moments ago.

To Customize Your Share:
Each time you are scheduled to have a share, you'll receive an email from us 2 days prior. It should have subject line "Time to Customize Your Share." The software will create a default share for you (based on your indicated preferences and what we have available to harvest) and list those default contents in the email. The email also contains a link saying "Want to make changes to your share or add extras?" Click on that link to customize your share! Customization ends between at 6am on the day before your pick up day.

For Pick Up:

- Please remember to bring your own bags each week.

- At Self Serve locations: Our vegetables are in plastic boxes at the pick up location, labelled with members' names. Find the box with your name on it. - Empty the vegetables into your bag and leave the empty box for us to collect.

- Loaves of bread and bags of Tomatoes during Tomato season, for those who have ordered them, will be near the green boxes, labeled with your name. Pick up your bag(s) if you are due one or more. (Some people have purchased a Bread Share for a loaf each week of the season. Some people order a loaf when they please.)
- Same for cooler(s) at pick up locations with any cold items that aren't vegetables (eggs, fermented vegetables, etc...See below for more info.)

- At Staffed locations: One of us will be there to quickly gather your items for you to bag up and bring home.
- Preparation ideas and recipe suggestions are in your email. Also check out our Pinterest Page for lots of recipe ideas, organized by vegetable.

EGGS: Ring-a-Bell Farm in Pamplin offers their eggs for sale through us. Their chickens live on pasture and are fed supplemental non-gmo feed from Sunrise Farms. Their eggs are fabulous and we trust their farming practices completely. You can purchase their eggs in our self-serve FarmStand at our farm and you can order them through the Harvie system "Extras" when you customize your share.

Our FarmStand is at our farm and open every day of the week, 9am-dusk (or 7pm, whichever is earlier). Visit us to see where your vegetables grow and pick up some extras for yourself or a friend. We have vegetable and herb plants for your garden available in the Spring, in addition to a host of our vegetables, and we have flower bouquets most weeks of the summer. Driving directions here.

You are also invited to shop for our goods at the farmers' market where we vend on Saturdays: Farmers' Market @ St. Stephens.

Finally, we have a Facebook group for our members to share recipes ideas, etc.

Visit and join here.

Any questions? Just reach out! And remember to log in and check your delivery days and location details.

We so deeply appreciate the opportunity to farm for you. Thank you for being the most important part of our farm! We love you!

With blessings on your meals ~
Janet, Dan, and the whole Broadfork crew (Julie, Siera, Leah, Erica, Alisa, Jen, Austin, Clara, Nathan, and the farm kids)

Owned and operated by Janet Aardema and Dan Gagnon, Broadfork is a small family farm in Chesterfield, VA providing the metro-Richmond area with Certified Naturally Grown vegetables, herbs, and flowers.
We use traditional European methods of biointensive, raised bed production while maximizing soil and plant health for nutrition and sustainability. No synthetic/chemical fertilizer, pesticide, herbicide, or fungicide is ever used in any part of the process of growing your food. Everything we sell is grown by us, and we farm full-time, supporting ourselves and our four children through our farm business.

Growing practices at Broadfork utilize only ecological methods: compost, cover crops, organic fertilizer, and minerals are used to feed the soil that feeds our plants. Raised beds are used to prevent soil-compaction, allowing for happier plant roots. We use organic potting soil and fertilizer, as well as amendments like fish emulsion and sea minerals. No chemical fertilizers, herbicides, fungicides, or pesticides are ever used on your food and we are Certified Naturally Grown (which follows the same national standards used for Organic Certification). We are also proud members of the Virginia Association for Biological Farming and Slow Food RVA. Janet and Dan both hold Bachelor’s Degrees in Biology from Davidson and Lafayette Colleges, respectively. Janet holds a Master’s Degree in Education from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. We both thrive on putting our biology backgrounds to use in a farm setting and share a passion for farm education.

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