WEEK 18: September 14 – September 20, 2009 CSA Newsletter

This Week’s Share:  Tomatoes, Potatoes, Beans, Sweet Corn, Pepper’s, Cucumber, Chard Greens and “Grower’s Choice”.

Information, Recipes and Expressions: 

We’re welcoming the return of  Sweet Corn  this week, as the last planting is now ready. Our daughter Ava loves her corn on the cob. Raw and cooked. We hope you do too.

Also, returning to your share this week are  Chard Greens.  The greens that have been absent a few weeks are back. Hopefully you remember how you best enjoy them, braised, raw or crisped into chips. Here is the Chard-Chip link once again in case you missed it. Enjoy! http://oddkitchen.wordpress.com/2009/01/17/chard-chips/

You will also welcome back more heirloom  Tomatoes, Cucumber, Beans, Pepper’s and Potatoes  this week as well. Hopefully you are ready for more.  Please see past weeks post for more info on them. I’d love to post your recipes as well, so if you have some great ones to share, please let me know!

The  “Farmer’s Choice”   item this week might be Broccoli, Summer Squash, Melon, Cabbage or something  new. We hope you will enjoy it!

FARM NEWS:

The farm continues on course. Not by some mystical force (well sort of) of the universe, but by hard work, planning, preparation and luck. Mostly by the incredibly hard work we call help, of our outstanding  field crew consisting of Joel, Kody and Dean (Farmer Kip) does the farm truly thrive. We rarely have a ton of help or volunteers out here. Needless to say, all the weeds don’t always get pulled. Although this can look a bit messy at one’s first glance, it in turn encourages beneficial insects and diversity in general. Some may call it choas, but we can still find the good stuff! Yet, the farm continues to grow and the plants in the ground continue to flourish and we all continue to eat. Eat well. That said, no one should go hungry. If you are willing to trade a small bit of your time, you are always welcome to come out to Love Farm Organics and take home food, just let us know.

Our small groups of spring chickens are starting to come to size and soon begin laying. We took them on more for experiment sake than for actual egg production.  However, we may have a small amount of egg shares available next year. I will keep you posted. We have 6 different breeds and hope to keep them all separate to possibly breed them. It’s an optimistic little dream and already seeming too time consuming amidst the regular everyday farm chores, but we will see how it goes. Like the bees we acquired this year, we were hoping to integrate the chickens into semi-self sustaining roles on the farm. Even with chicken tractors in place, this is easier said than done!

Zoe, our newest addition to the family, is growing very well. Ava has become much more patient and understanding of the new little one in the house. She accepts and wants to love on her now, so for that we are grateful! Not a ton of rest around here yet, but that is what late winter is for ;-> Right?

If you have not yet heard, fast approaching is the …. 2009 Fall Farm-Member Harvest/Work Party….to which we hope you can all attend. Save the date!…. October 10th, Saturday  from 10 am – 4ish pm. You are welcome to come late and/or leave early or however it fits into your schedule. We would love to see you and of course have you see your farm. Just 5 weeks of the 2009 CSA season remain.

 Thanks again for all of your support!!