CSA Newsletter

Greetings from the Garden!  This box has mini greens, cabbage, onions, shallots, garlic, beets rutabagas, black radishes, celeriac, carrots, squash, fingerling potatoes and yellow potatoes.

Field Notes.  Ken and I just returned from a winter break; we visited my parents in Prescott, Arizona, and took a side trip to Flagstaff, Arizona.  One of the highlights of our trip was helping two younger farmers pull the plastic on their new EQUIP grant greenhouse. 

My parents buy vegetables from Sarah and Matt at the Prescott Farmers Market, and had proudly given Sarah and Matt an article I had written about soil and nutrition. Sarah and Matt had suggested we meet when we were in Prescott.  It was such a nice visit, we let them know were coming and they called with a request for help.  It seemed windy, but all went well.

Ken also found a great book on soil, and was reading it aloud to me.  I really enjoyed hearing the stories behind the names of early pioneers in the organic movement.  I shall reread and retell their stories in the future.  Ken took several yoga classes, and we both did tai chi.  We also got in a fair amount of walking and toured ruins of early indigenous peoples. 

Our thanks to Loyal who took care of the farm and animals.  

Before our departure, I did the major seed order, and now wrap that and the bookkeeping up for 2012.  Soon we will have our harvest dates for 2013.  Ken and Loyal are planting micro greens as I type.  They are doing crop plans, animal plans,  and also working in the pottery studio on the new clay found during the excavation on the irrigation ponds.  We have a brief window here when pottery is made and rugs are woven.  Soon planting begins for seedlings to be transplanted outdoors.

From the Kitchen.  Winter!  Time for soups, stews and using the oven.  Ken continues to make squash pies.  I have been cooking leftover cooked squash as follows: toast nuts in a dry cast iron pan, chop them on a board and return to the pan with some butter.  Top with cooked squash, warm, and flip into a larger buttered skillet. 

Shallots are a real treat.  I tend to use them in salad dressings.  They are great in any onion recipe.  The shallots in today's box are a French grey variety that peels fairly easily.  Last year Ken discovered if you pop shallots into boiling water for a few seconds - just like peeling tomatoes - the shallots peel more easily.

Cabbage is a great green treat in winter.  I tend to saute onions or shallots, add cabbage, make a bechamel (white sauce) or a cheese sauce once the onions and cabbage are partially cooked.  Here is the process: saute onions, add chopped cabbage, add a bit of flour, then once flour is cooked, add milk or cream.  With cheese sauce I add some dried mustard with the flour and grated cheese after the milk or cream.

'Til Next Month!
Judith