Heirloom Harvest

Paging Members, Pesto on Line #3

Apple Share Deadline

Apple share deadline is this week, and there’s no shortage of remaining shares. The first apple distribution is this Sunday. More info here at this previous post.

Comings and Goings

Pretty soon, the farm workers who are students and teachers will be going back to jobs. So we will have some transition among working folks. We have a new farmhand starting named Stephanie Fletcher, and a few new workshares coming. Farmhand Trish Stefanko will probably add some hours because the other part-timers will be going back to school.

To Hire Out Work Hours

People who would like to hire Fawn Stella to do their work hours should contact her soon. Her phone number is 508.836.3765.

What to Expect

In the pickups this week, the vegetables you’re mostly likely to see include eggplant, tomatoes, bell peppers, green peppers, carrots, and mustard greens. There might also be more tomatillos and sauce tomatoes, but that depends to some extent on the pickup day. As for herbs, what you might see includes more parsley, and possibly some basil this week. There may be some lettuce – it’s there, but we haven’t definitely decided to harvest it.

As for what won’t be there, at least for a while, we’re done with cabbage until fall. And we will harvest the winter squash soon, but after we harvest it we have to cure it for a while before we give it to members.

Viva Los Tomatillos! Viva!

Whit’s Recipe for Smoky, Spicy & Sweet Tomatillo Salsa

12 ounces fresh tomatillos
½ cup fresh cilantro
1 colorful bell pepper or ethnic sweet pepper (red, orange or yellow)
¼ cup fresh chopped chives
Freshly squeezed juice from ½ lime
½ teaspoon smoky chipotle powder
2 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons rice vinegar
1 clove of garlic peeled and smashed
1. Pull off the tomatillos' husks and rinse the fruit to get the stickiness off. Set aside.
2. Place all the ingredients, EXCEPT the tomatillos, in a blender or food processor, fitted with a chopping blade. Whit uses a food processor.
3. Pulse at high speed until ingredients are coarsely chopped.
4. Now, add the tomatillos to the blender and pulse until all the ingredients are blended to desired consistency. Whit recommends blending to the consistency of course sand, say, pinhead size. It is OK if there are few tomatillos that are chunks, as it adds character and flavor to the salsa. Also, the bell or ethnic peppers are mainly for color and crunch, less for flavor, so no big deal if they're missing.
5. Lift the salsa from the food process or blender container with a slotted spoon to reduce wateriness. Serve either at room temperature or chilled with tortilla or pita chips.

Out here in the fields

Stephen Kurina and his son, John, picked cherry tomatoes today. Caught candidly, Stephen was gracious and posed. If you see your blog editor picking next to you some enchanted afternoon, don't you hesitate to vogue either.
       

Meet Sheila

Sheila Schilling (right) is a former AmeriCorps volunteer who worked with Farmer John Mitchell at a nonprofit community farm in 2003 in Waltham, Mass. Sheila grew up on her family's corn and soybean farm in South Dakota. She had not considered sustainable organic agriculture as a career until she was introduced to it while working with John on an Americorps project in Waltham. She is now finishing an internship at at organic farm in Ohio.

One of the advantages of the AmeriCorps program is in exposing young Americans to the many challenges and opportunities this country has to offer. We tried to bring AmeriCorps to the farm in Westborough, but were unable to secure local housing for a crew (housing must be provided by the sponsoring agency).

One important issue that faces the farming community is finding and training the next generation of American farmers, and I'm glad that Sheila seems to be well on her way, and maybe some day will be able to take over the family farm in South Dakota and introduce organic, sustainable techniques. Way to go Sheila!

Sheila sent this message recently:

How has everything been going on your farm this year? Has the weather been good this season? Do you have a large CSA like you had at Waltham Fields? If you have a website for your farm I'd really like to check it out. [Editor's note: We sure do!]

I have been having a fantastic summer with my farming internship. It is hard to accept the cooler mornings with the promise of fall just around the corner. There is still so much to do and the days are warm so I can keep telling myself that there are still a few weeks of summer left.

I also will begin looking into bachelor degree programs and schools. I am leaning towards a degree that will focus on sustainable agriculture, but haven't looked at what options are out there yet. The farm managers mentioned looking into some sort of satellite programs where I could possibly get a degree while working on the farm. I would love that, but haven't had time to research that either. So there will be a lot for me to look into.

I just thought I'd write and let you know what I'm up to. I'm so glad that my AmeriCorps team was able to work at Waltham Fields; it had really sparked my interest and opened up so many great opportunities.

I hope all is going well for you this summer!

Sheila

Eeeeeeyaaaah!

Here is a tomato hornworm, which not a worm, of course, but a caterpillar. A very LARGE caterpillar, as evidenced in the hold your editor has on it, under Farmer John’s sharp but unpictured eye. If you picked up your produce Sunday before last, you may have met this worm where John had it set out for show and tell later in the day.

If not, then you probably didn’t see one, as Farmer John applied Spinosad that Sunday night to reassert the members’ desire for the tomatoes. Spinosad, as you can read for yourself, is a means of controlling pests which is also responsible and is approved for organic use.

Sun, flower

Hot tomatoes

Please the Bees

Editor's Note: Tragically, native North American honeybees are greatly reduced due to modern environmental stresses. The bumblebee is a major replacement in terms of providing pollination services in the wild and in cultivation. Bee gentle with them. (Sorry.) This one was working on a cherry tomato blossom last Sunday. By now, the blossom is already changing to a tomato fruit, thanks in part to the bee.

Squashed

There is ample summer squash. Your editor, who has been known fervently to pray for the dreaded squash vine borer when he is managing his own vegetable garden, has risen to the challenge this year. I recommend (yes, this is an Editor's note) the use of the Baby Squash Saute Szwarc recipe, which allows you also to use up some of that vermouth that's been gathering dust since your uncle who like martinis visited in 1975 and then never came back. (As for the chrome shaker and the jar of little plastic swords, that's your lookout.) Vegans who would prefer to omit the butter might try margarine or just plenty of olive oil.

Ripe and Shine

Teach a Member to Google and He or She Will Eat Forever

When stymied by an ingredient, feel free always to turn to the cooking method your editor recommends, which is the use of Internet search engines to generate recipes that match your needs. What you do is go to any search engine blank and type

+ingredient1 +ingredient2 +ingredient3

and type in your ingredients instead of the variables above. So for example, if you have dill and carrots, your search would look like

+dill +carrots

and if you ran that search on Google, you would get this, which at least as of the writing of this post, would return a handy "Dill Carrots" recipe. If you ran it on Exalead you'd get different results, as you would on Teoma, for that matter. Tell us what you find!

Hat Trick: Dill, parsley, tomato in the same easy recipe

The Matthews Family, whom we've already had to thank for several excellent recipes, today bring us one from Recipezaar titled Orzo and Tomato Salad with Feta Cheese. All you're going to need from the store on this one is the olives, orzo pasta, the feta cheese, the olive oil and the lemon juice. The recipe notes that if you don't want to chop up a big tomato here you can always go to the cherry tomatoes. Sounds like a winner to us.

Go and Get Your Beans, Boy

Color

Ratatouille Soup

1 TB olive or veg oil
¼ c chopped (small) onion         
1 garlic clove, crushed
2 c ½ -in slices zucchini ( about 1 med)
½ c chopped green bell pepper
¼ tsp salt
¼ tsp pepper
1 small eggplant cut into ½ in cubes
1 can (10 ½ oz) condensed chicken broth   (or use straight broth and skip the water)
1 broth can water

Heat oil in Dutch oven over med-high heat. Cook onion and garlic in oil about 3 mins., stirring occasionally, until onion is tender. Stir in remaining ingredients. Heat to boiling; reduce heat. Cover and simmer about 10 mins or until veggies are crisp tender.

(Thanks, again, to the Matthews family!)

Learning Lessons

The deer have staged a comeback and we have discovered that they like soybeans. We have more than 50% failure on soybeans due to deer. We’re just finding out what they eat this year. So, now we're doing some research on deer fences. You will start to see some floating row cover like what's in this picture to foil deer (and other pests).

Graphic Arts

Editor's Note: I suspect that many of the farm's members may find this mood piece of a graphic novella, Salamander Dream, as compelling as I did. The themes are suburban sprawl, the resilience of life and love for the land, and the romance of science.

Now She Is Six

On the hottest, most humid day of the year so far (July 19th), we took a long lunch and held a birthday party for the farmer's daughter, Josephina, who turned 6.
Farm Intern Amanda Smaltz (left) along with other  farm member children look on as Josephina gets ready to start opening presents. The theme of the party was tropical, hence the ukele, lauis, brightly colored "dew rags," etc. Farmer John Mitchell made Portuguese Kale Soup for the main course. Workshare Christine Scott (not pictured) baked a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting.