Greetings,
As we approach tomorrow's Co-op Farm Tour open house, we have been getting the farm in order and tidying us some neglected areas of the grounds. While a midsummer event like this can put some strain on our already slim crew, it is nonetheless a good opportunity give the farm a little facelift. Please consider joining us between 10:00 and 4:00 on Saturday, July 10th. Here are the highlights:
- Guided tours on the hour from 10 to 3, plus the farm is open for self-guided tours
- The Local Plate food truck will be here dishing up amazing meals using mostly our produce
- Lost Capital Foods will be here sampling and selling their sauces, which use some of our peppers
- Native plant sale for those who want to plant or expand their existing pollinator gardens - over 50 species available!
- Tractors on display and large straw bales to play on
- Meet your farmers!
Winter Farm Share Signup. We still have Winter Shares available, which are delivered every other week in the same Family/Personal share sizes. We may end up reducing our winter share capacity if our labor situation doesn't improve, so don't wait too long if you want to receive a share November - January. You can click here to sign up, or from your Harvie member page, click on "My Farms" and then "Place Order" under Sogn Valley Farm. Keep in mind there are select pickup locations that are not available for winter, so if yours is missing, you may want to look for a nearby alternative.
Notes on items in this week's shares:
- Sweet onions: These are fresh, uncured onions, best stored in your refrigerator. They have mild flavor and great cooked or raw. There may be a few partial dried layers on the onions that you should remove before chopping, but otherwise these white bulbs should not need to be peeled like regular dry onions.
- Broccoli: Our first pick from our second succession of broccoli. This illustrates how much broccoli growth and development are influenced by growing conditions. This is the same variety as the broccoli you received in boxes 2 and 3, but you'll find the heads bear almost no resemblance. In this new planting, the heads are bigger, the beads are much smaller and tighter, and the color overall is a lighter green. The highly variable temperatures we've seen over the last month have caused some unevenness the the shapes of the heads. A portion of the heads going into shares will appear a little lumpy rather than the smooth dome we are shooting for. Overall, we find this to be nicer quality than what we got from the first planting, but we just wanted to mention that we're including some heads with moderately imperfect shape - it all tastes the same!
- Sprouting broccoli: This may be the final week we are offering this item - remember to eat the whole thing, florets, stems, and leaves!
- Salad Mix: Having grown through a month of excessive heat, we noted a tad more bitterness than we've tasted in prior successions, making this week's salad a good candidate to serve with a creamy, flavorful dressing. The lettuce varieties we grow for salad are generally heat tolerant, but July and August are NOT ideal lettuce harvest months, so this is sometimes the tradeoff in trying to have salad available all season.
- Tomatoes: We have a modest amount of cherry tomatoes, which we are doling out in 1/2 pints this week to spread them around to more members. We also just harvested our first large tomatoes - heirlooms and slicing tomatoes. They are very limited this week, but will be increasing each week moving forward. The few we have tried have been superbly delicious!
- Parsley: Our first picking of this fragrant, nutrient-packed herb. Sarah and Justin shared the following recipe: Orange Orzo Salad. They recommend adding cherry tomatoes (halved) and cucumbers (diced) to this light and refreshing summer dish.
- We are also offering 1/2# bulk bags of basil that you can swap into your share or purchase as an extra. This is a great time to make pesto!
What's coming up? We are excited about carrots and green beans being ready for box 7. We may also have a first, smaller picking of sweet corn! Plus more widely distributed tomatoes.
Have a great week, and we hope to see some of you tomorrow!
Dana and the crew
