Nature is the wild card

Welcome to the first week of our Fall 2019 CSA!  It is a new season and my favorite season.  I thought we should start with a little reminder of what Community Supported Agriculture is all about.

Nature is the wild card

Everything we put in the boxes each week is grown right here on our farm by myself, Randy, and our team.  It is the result of weeks and more likely months of growing, and much longer in the planning and preparation.  Since we started the farm we’ve been building the health of our soil and working to promote a robust and resilient biological system, so you could say each leaf of arugula has been years in the making.  We farm in nature and with nature.  And it is unpredictable.  The temperature, precipitation, pests, weeds and plant diseases … there are a lot of variables.  Sometimes the stars align, everything goes right and we have a bumper crop.  Sometimes luck goes the other way and we have a crop failure.  Even though we are getting better and better at what we do, sometimes we even make mistakes.

A different way to eat

Every week we work hard to pack a variety of high quality, delicious, Certified Naturally Grown produce into the boxes for our CSA members.  Some weeks it may be filled with all your

favorite vegetables, things you already know how to prepare and love to eat.  Other weeks, the share box may require you to stretch as a cook and an eater, featuring vegetables of which you are not as fond.  You may find things you’ve never tried or possibly never heard of.  It is a dramatic departure from the way most of us are used to eating; deciding what we want then going to to a grocery store where everything is in season all the time, and buying what we need.  Instead, we are asking you to eat what the farm offers up each week, and to wait for things to come into their time.

We try to keep how much is in the box fairly consistent from week to week, but the fields don’t always offer up the harvest that way.  Some weeks there may be more.  Some weeks there may be a little less.  I hope you enjoy going on this agricultural and culinary journey with us.

I’ll have the salad with a side of relief

This summer has been remarkably wet, and that has meant that we are behind schedule on planting for fall.  In addition to delaying planting, the excessive rain has washed away baby plants and packed the ground so seeds can’t sprout.  I am thrilled that there is kale and salad mix ready to harvest.  I have been hoarding vegetables: stockpiling sweet peppers, potatoes and butternut squash.  We could have taken and sold these at the farmers market, but I have been holding onto them just in case the new field crops weren’t ready for this week.  We might have some bumps a long the way, yet, but I am happy to have some new crops to share with you.

Small Shares

• Red Russian Kale
• Salad Mix with Lettuce and Arugula
• Juliet Tomatoes
• Red Pontiac Potatoes
• Long Beans
• Basil

Full Shares

• Red Russian Kale
• Salad Mix with Lettuce and Arugula
• Juliet Tomatoes
• Red Pontiac Potatoes
• Sweet Peppers
• Basil
• Eggplant