Harvest Newsletter

Greetings from the Garden! This week our CSA boxes have potatoes, tomatoes, lettuce and salad greens, cucumbers, green onions or Walla Walla sweet onions, garlic, cabbage, the first beans, basil and parsley.

Field Notes.  After a damp spring, we have moved into dry soil conditions.  Ken is irrigating the garden by the house and the fall crops in the field. 

The egg mobile has been moved and the soil outside the mobile high tunnel prepared so  Ken could start planting the area outside the mobile tunnel.  After the tomato season we will move the mobile tunnel over those crops for fall.

With cool nights the heat loving crops are later this season. Ken has been wrestling with the tie up twine on the tomatoes.  It looked fine to use for a second season, but it has been breaking so Ken has to get out new twine and tie them up.  Our theory is most farms throw out twine and plastic after each season.  We prefer higher quality supplies we can reuse.  So the search is on for multi-season twine.

With August the days are noticeably shorter.  The annual crops are pushing to produce, and so picking things like tomatoes and cucumbers require frequent picking.  The first crop of beans that struggled with cool and damp conditions is starting to produce!  Ken is watching the corn as well.

This year Ken ran an experiment with an early potato variety.  Early potatoes are not as productive as the late season varieties, so we have avoided them.  They have been more popular than expected with the on line orders, so we plan to do this again next season. Please share your opinion with us, too!

From the Kitchen.  Two favorites this week.  These potatoes have soft red skins, and do not need to be peeled.  Just scrub, cube and boil.  They require less cooking time, so I usually check them after 7 minutes.  The parsley in your box would be a great topping along with butter or sour cream.

Ah, tomatoes.  Most people wait for months for "real" ones, and we believe a fresh tomato grown in good soil is well worth the wait.  I have made mayonnaise for tomato sandwiches.  And tomatoes pair well with the basil in your box.  Like all the heat loving crops, it has grown more slowly this year.

We have lots of cucumbers and if you want to make cucumber pickles, NOW is the time.  Email or call me.  'Til Next Week, Judith