2007 CSA Week 12

News from Windy Willow Farm: 2007 Week 12


This week’s share includes:
¼ bushel tomatoes
2 zucchini – I’ll be the first to admit that I dropped the ball on these guys. They are huge, and please accept my apologies if you prefer your zukes smaller. They are perfect for cakes, breads and muffins though!
2 yellow squash/ patty pan squash
4 cucumbers + 2 lemon cucumbers- on a whim, I grew these cute lemon cukes. I haven’t found a big difference between these and our regular cukes (we use two varieties of these: our favorite, Marketmore 97 and Olympian). Some say that there is a slight citrusy flavor. Whatever they taste like, I eat them like an apple.
1 bunch Sugarsnax carrots – These foot-long carrots are amazingly sweet, and I’m always thrilled with how long and straight they grow for us. Carrots like a loose soil, which they can stretch their toes down as far as possible. We make sure that our carrot growing areas have been deeply tilled, to have the largest carrots achievable. We’ll have these for the rest of the season. If you get tired of them (as if!) let me know and I’ll give you a week’s break.
2 heads garlic – With the nice, dry weather last week, these dried in 2-3 days. We’ve cut off the stalks, and are in process of trimming the roots, and sorting by size. We have a bin of heads that are too small or otherwise imperfect due to shape or damage of one clove (I speared some when digging). I’ll put these out at pickups for you to help yourself. If you want a larger quantity, I’ll be selling them for $5.00 per pound. They are good for keeping throughout the winter (usually till May or so, depending on your storage) or for planting your own. Let me know if you’re interested.
2 sweet onions
1 pt Sun gold and grape cherry tomatoes – a friend of mine reminded me of what she does with her extra Sun gold tomatoes (as if!): she puts them in the freezer on a cookie sheet, and bags them once frozen. Then, when she makes soups or broths, she throws in a couple and has found that it enhances the flavor of most soups. I thought this was a great idea and have frozen several bags full.
1Qt red potatoes
1 Qt fresh shell beans –We always try to add new vegetables to our annual offerings, and we’ve always been curious about these. You can use them fresh, or let them dry on the vine for dried beans. I picked half of our row to try them both ways. You shell these and use them like lima beans, or any other beans. I’ve been looking and finding soup recipes.
1 bunch cilantro
1 Qt snow peas
1 green Bell pepper – for some reason, our peppers tend to go bad before they turn to their final color (I have red and yellow peppers growing, but they all start out green.) So, to ensure that we have some peppers to enjoy, here are some greens. I recall a farmers’ market customer who purchased a green pepper from me only to find that within a few days’ storage, it turned red. They did not understand that most peppers ripen from green to their final color.
1 bunch oregano

Best guess for next week’s share: Edamame soybeans, swiss chard, parsley, carrots, cabbage, peppers, eggplant. Don’t hold me to it!

I live for tomato season! Every winter as I’m poring through the seed catalogs, I’m dreaming of a day like today. I imagine how lovely it would be to bite into a sun-warmed and –ripened tomato. I interview and discard dozens of tomato varieties. I like to try new varieties, but always select several tried-and-true varieties. Mark’s favorite is Sun gold, so we always grow a bunch of these. I insisted on trying the improved variety, Sun Sugar and think it’s quite similar (Mark is staying loyal to his old favorite). Then I selected a grape tomato, since it seems like the kids will eat these like crazy. However, our greenhouse partners who grow for me, did not do well with my preferred grape variety, and sent me home with theirs. So I don’t know which variety I have and I don’t like it too much: the skin is quite thick, and the sweetness is moderate. But the fruits are large for a grape tomato, and would probably be rated higher for flavor if they weren’t compared to Sun golds.

Then it’s on to the main tomato crop. We always start with an early variety, just to start the season. We’ve been growing First Lady II for several years: it’s not a bad, early tomato; not much exciting about this variety. My two main/mid season favorites I’ve grown for several years: Celebrity and Thessaloniki. Celebrity is a nice tomato, with good taste. Thessaloniki I selected for it’s beauty as well as flavor: it is the most sun-scald tomato I’ve found, and presents beautiful (but on the small size) fruits, almost devoid of that nasty sun-scald that plagues most of our other varieties. Then I always get an heirloom that will be ugly but flavorful. In years past I’ve gotten Red Brandywine, but this year I fell for Caspian Pink. Completely ripe, they are delicious, but very ugly. It takes some creative knifework to get some good tomato to eat. (the mice seem to like them as well, for as many ripe ones I get, I have to throw away an equal amount due to bite marks). We do grow a couple of paste varieties, but they mostly get reserved for our own use. If there are any left after I’ve canned my sauces and salsas, I’ll share them with you.

Our tomato season is short, but delicious. We expect our annual Late Blight infestation in the coming weeks, so enjoy your tomatoes while they last. (Late Blight is a common tomato disease that is transmitted via the wind. It causes the tomatoes to have “leathery” patches and quickly kills the plants. We plant our tomatoes in different spots every year to try to avoid this and other tomato diseases, but it’s practically inevitable.)

Our potato digging party was a big success! Our intrepid diggers accumulated over 10 bushels of the “red gold”! There are only 20 or so feet left to dig of the reds, and 3 rows of whites. Keep your eyes peeled for another potato digging party!

Mark your calendars: Saturday, September 22nd is our annual CSA picnic and bonfire! Plan on arriving at the farm at 4 pm with your potluck dish with a bonfire at 6:30 pm. We hope you and your family will join us for a season wrap-up celebration. I’ll put out a sign-up form next week.

Thanks for your enthusiastic support!
Gwen, Mark, Sarah and Jason


© 2007 by Gwen Hyde


Gwen’s Favorite Tomato Recipes

To make the following recipes, start with:
Chopped tomatoes
Chopped sweet onion

And then add the following, depending on your preference:

For fresh salsa: add chopped cilantro, hot pepper (optional), a tablespoon or so of lime juice, and salt.

For fresh tomato sauce (toss with hot pasta): add chopped basil, a little chopped fresh garlic, good olive oil, and salt and pepper.

For Bruschetta: add chopped basil, a little chopped fresh garlic, good olive oil, salt and pepper. Heat through (but don’t cook) and finish with balsamic vinegar. Use to top bread that’s been brushed with garlic olive oil (I crush some cloves and soak in olive oil) that I brown under the broiler). Grate parmesan cheese to top.

For cooked sauce: sauté the onion until translucent in a big saucepan, adding crushed garlic near the end. Add chopped tomatoes and cook down for several hours. Season with chopped basil and oregano (I use a 3:1 ration basil to oregano), salt and pepper and a pinch of sugar.

Sesame chicken Salad
I made this for dinner last night, and omitted the chicken. (I found it in a Parenting magazine) It was a crowd-pleaser, including the kids. I would recommend that the peanut butter sauce get heated up a bit, because it was hard to incorporate into the pasta. I would also recommend to grate some of the carrots small, and some big, so that they make their presence know. Let me know what you think.

Salad:
8 oz. long fusilli (I used spaghetti)
1 cup snow peas, chopped into 1-inch pieces
1 cup shredded cooked chicken
½ cup shredded carrots
1 Tbs sesame seeds
1 scallion, thinly sliced (optional)

Dressing:
¼ cup creamy peanut butter
2 tsp brown sugar
2 Tbs soy sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp rice or apple cider vinegar

Cook pasta according to package directions; add snow peas to the boiling water about one minute before pasta is done. Drain. (the instructions say to rinse under cold water, but you can skip this step and serve the pasta hot). Mix the peanut butter, brown sugar, soy sauce, sesame oil and rice vinegar in a large bowl. (I recommend you warm this a bit to ensure good incorporation into the pasta) Add the pasta and snow peas; mix well. Add chicken and carrots, toss to combine. Top with sesame seeds and scallions.

Nutrition info: (1 cup) 279 calories, 8 g fat (2 g saturated), 277 mg sodium, 20 mg cholesterol.

Pasta Salad with Summer Beans
12 ounces dried pasta shapes, like fusilli or gemelli
6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 pound assorted long beans, such as yellow wax, green, or haricot vert, ends trimmed
2 pounds assorted shell beans, shelled (types could include cranberry beans, scarlet runner, lima, or edamame)
5 tablespoons red wine vinegar
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons Italian parsley, minced, plus sprigs for garnish
1 tablespoon chopped fresh mint, plus sprigs for garnish
1 teaspoons chopped fresh oregano, plus sprigs for garnish
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

1. Cook pasta in boiling water according to package directions until al dente. Drain and place in large bowl. Wile pasta is still hot, add 1 tablespoon olive oil and toss well to coat. Cover bowl and chill in refrigerator.
2. Boil long snap beans in boiling salted water 4 to 6 minutes, until crisp-tender. Drain and rinse in cold water, then add to pasta in fridge.
3. Boil shelled shell beans in boiling salted water until tender, 5 to 10 minutes, depending on the type used. Drain and add to pasta in fridge. Allow bean and pasta mixture to chill completely, at least 1 hour, or up to 24 hours.
4. Whisk the remaining 5 tablespoons of olive oil with the vinegar and garlic in a bowl. Pour this dressing over the pasta and beans, then add the fresh herbs. Toss to combine, and season to taste with salt and pepper.
5. When ready to serve, transfer the salad to a serving bowl or individual salad plates and garnish with fresh herb sprigs.
Serves 6.