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Harvest Notes – Week 5 July 14th

July 14, 2011 at 9:50 am | Posted in CSA's, harvest notes | Leave a comment

Basil Its pesto time! We have been giving you small amounts of basil to use as seasoning but now the plants are big enough to make pesto sized bunches. Do not store basil in the refrigerator and wait until right before using to rinse it.

Garlic Scapes These are the last of the scapes! Consider using them in a pesto. Next week we will harvest the first heads of garlic so the shape of garlic in your cooking will soon change.

Summer Squash Choose from our three varieties of squash. The flying saucer shaped ones are Patty Pans, the green are zucchini and the yellow are yellow crookneck summer squash.

Kale With this variety, winterbor, you have now had a full tour of our kale patch. Next week we will start repeating varieties that you have already received. I’m sure you are all kale experts by now and you can cook this variety up just like the others or like collards. Store it in the fridge in a bag or in the crisper.

New Potatoes The small amount of early potatoes in your shares this week is a true delicacy. Most potatoes we eat are cured, meaning that they have sat in the ground for months to thicken their skins and increase their storage capacity. These potatoes are freshly dug and have not cured, thus their skins are very delicate and they will not store well. The creamy tenderness of these Dark Red Norland new potatoes is a real treat.

Parsley We grow this curly parsley in addition to a flat leaf variety that you will get in your shares in weeks to come.

Cucumbers Stave off this heat wave with cooling, hydrating cukes. Store in the refrigerator in a bag or crisper.

Sugar Snap Peas We didn’t have a great pea crop this year. At first the seeds didn’t germinate so we reseeded. Because they were seeded late they didn’t grow so well and our yield was very small. We wanted you to at least get a taste of peas this season so we scrounged up what we could find. Sorry it isn’t a larger portion but we think you’ll enjoy these are amazing raw snacks- better than candy. If they make it all the way home with you before being eaten, store in the refrigerator in a bag or the crisper.

Beets Last night, one of our Adamah Fellows roasted some beets simply with olive oil. They were so good that Glenn, the Adamah dairy apprentice, and I sat on the porch chatting and shoveling beets into our mouths one after another. You would have thought we had a big bag of potato chips in front of us! Don’t forget to use your beet greens, either raw in salads or cooked in other dishes. Store in the refrigerator in a bag or crisper.

Kohlrabi This homely vegetable makes up for its awkward looks with surprisingly juicy, delicious flesh. I eat a few raw kohlrabi a week so I’m partial to a simple preparation of biting right in but they are also delicious cooked. Their taste is somewhere between broccoli stems, salad turnips and apples. Store in the refrigerator.

Harvest Notes 7/7 – West Hartford CSA

July 7, 2011 at 4:47 am | Posted in CSA's, harvest notes | Leave a comment
Tags: Harvest Notes

Dear West Hartford CSA Members,

Our Harvest Notes are now online! Each week’s notes will be posted here by Thursday afternoon. In addition to your weekly e-mail newsletter, internet recipes and cookbooks, these notes are a valuable tool for figuring out how best to enjoy your veggies.

Swiss Chard This bouquet of rainbow chard is in the same family as spinach and beets so it will taste a lot like them.

Salad Mix This is the last week that you will get salad mix this spring. In hot summer temperatures, lettuces get a bit bitter so you may notice that this week’s batch isn’t as light tasting as the first one you got. Salad mix and lettuce heads will make a come back in the fall.

Garlic Scapes Garlic plants send up a flower stalk (the scape) about a month before the bulbs are ready for harvest. We remove the scape so that the plant will put more energy into making a beautiful big bulb. Conveniently, the scape happens to be delicious. It can be used in place of garlic in any recipe or you can look up specific scape recipes like scape pesto. Store in the fridge for a few weeks.

Basil These little bundles offer enough to season a dish. As out plants grow bigger throughout the summer we will be giving you larger quantities for making pesto. It is best not to store basil in the fridge.

Summer Squash Choose from our three varieties of squash. The flying saucer shaped ones are Patty Pans, the green are zucchini and the yellow are yellow crookneck summer squash.

Carrots Luckily, the crew restricted themselves from munching all of the carrots as we picked them. They are pretty tasty and it was hard to stop eating them!

Broccoli This variety is called Green Magic and we think that pretty much sums it up.

Dill Some of the bunches have dill flowers in addition to dill leaves.

Kale This variety has many names. It is sometimes called Toscano, Lacinato, or Italian but my personal favorite name is dinosaur kale. We aren’t sure if it is named for the resemblance between its’ leaves and a dinosaur’s scales or for the way that the plant looks like it belongs in the jurassic age. Either way it is tasty!

Harvest Notes – Week 3 June 30th

June 30, 2011 at 11:10 am | Posted in CSA's, harvest notes | Leave a comment

Swiss Chard This bouquet of rainbow chard is in the same family as spinach and beets so it will taste a lot like them.

Salad Mix A triple washed mix of baby lettuce and baby mustard greens, this is pretty fancy stuff.

Mint We grow several varieties of mint which have very subtle differences in flavor. Choose whichever color bunch appeals to you and freshen up a dish.

Bok Choi This Asian cooking green is amazing in stir-fries, braised or even eaten raw.

Basil It must be summer, we’re harvesting basil! These little bundles offer enough to season a dish. As out plants grow bigger throughout the summer we will be giving you larger quantities for making pesto.

Summer Squash Choose from our three varieties of squash. The flying saucer shaped ones are Patty Pans, the green are zucchini and the yellow are yellow crookneck summer squash.

Carrots We’ve bunched these carrots with the greens because they are just so beautiful that way. You can use the greens to make soup stocks or, if you happen to have a pet rabbit, they are a delicacy for bunnies.

Beets Choose golden or red beets. Enjoy the beet root and greens together or separately.

Turnips Probably your last round of spring turnips. Both greens and root are delicious.