CSA Newsletter

Greetings from the Garden!  This box has arugula and chard, golden beets, celery, tomatoes, cukes, eggplant, green onions, red onions, squash, grapes, raspberries and /or melons or watermelons.

Field Notes.  We have had our first frost. This marks a transition from summer vegetables to fall ones.  Some tender plants like beans are done for the year, and the other heat loving plants in the greenhouse are producing less now.  We will see how long there are tomatoes and eggplant.  The cool weather means we move into fall with our first winter squash.  Ken harvests winter squash after frost so it has fully matured and is sweeter.

This week a new project starts here.  Why you may ask, is there a picture of an open space in the woods and a wood pile in the CSA newsletter?  Well, Ken and Loyal have been cutting and hauling wood into the yard.  

 

Once here in the yard, I help with moving, buzzing, splitting and piling it up.  The reason they are cutting wood is to make room for the heavy equipment operator who arrives this week to work on completing the irrigation pond by the mobile high tunnel and a new dam and pond by the garden

The pond by the high tunnel was not completed and it went dry this season.  The pond by the garden means the end of taxing our well for vegetables.  We are pretty excited as this will enable us to better cope with the wide swings of weather we have been experiencing.

And Ken continues to plan and plant garden and fields.  Now, after frost, he will be pulling things like the cucumber fence and setting up the garden and field for fall and winter.  Soon hoopettes will start to appear.  And we will be digging and storing winter root crops.

From the Kitchen.  Fall!  Both Ken and I love winter squash.  The sadness at the end of some things like basil and beans is quickly gone when the aroma of squash fills the house.  I tend to bake squash.  

I set the squash so it lays flat, cut a hole like you would for a Jack o lantern ( could be on top or a side of the squash), scoop out seeds replace the piece I cut, and place on a dish and set in the oven.  I usually serve with a bit of butter, salt, and pepper.

Chard will take a light frost, so we have chard this week - maybe for the last time.  I tend to use chard in egg dishes.  It is a relative of spinach, and I substitute chard in cooked spinach dishes.  I had a serving of braised chard with bacon bits recently - quite good.

These raspberries are some of the smallest in my memory, but their flavor is concentrated and intense - the reason is so little rain.  With frost and lack of rain, the insects are eating them, too - the yellow jackets eat the tips, the picnic beetles find the ripe ones and I even saw a cucumber beetle on one today.  The insects become desperate for food once frost and dry weather kill their usual food.  So enjoy the berries while we have them.
'Til Next Week
Judith