THE BEET: Volume 15, Issue 8

FULL SHARE & YELLOW HALF SHARE PICK UP TONIGHT

Pick up today: 5pm - 7:30pm at PS 56 on the corner of Gates and Downing

This Week's Share

  • Lettuce
  • Swiss chard
  • Red cabbage
  • Bunched red beets
  • Bell peppers
  • Cucumbers
  • Squashes
  • Cilantro or dill
  • White (‘Bianca’) onions
  • Snap Beans
  • Tomatoes

The News from Windflower Farm

Something I especially enjoy about my work as a farmer is the diversity of tasks that I must or get to address every day. So, while the harvest team was harvesting, and the packing team was packing, I spent most of my day on a project with my son Nate. This week we will wrap up a project we started earlier in the year. By the end of the week we’ll have enclosed nearly our entire farm inside an 8’ deer fence. The completion of the project will give me a great deal of relief. Deer do thousands of dollars-worth of damage to our crops every year. You, our CSA shareholders get fewer ears of corn, less squash, lettuce, chard and beets, and fewer sweet potatoes, all because of deer. Our work today was preparatory: we were clearing the fence’s path of trees and limbs and mowing the tall grass. Our tools were brush hogs and chain saws.  Alan Davis, the man whose beautiful chicken flock provides your egg shares, and his crew will actually install the fence tomorrow. Their tools include a post pounder, which makes the job of setting the hundreds of 12’ posts a reasonable one. Our goal is to become deer-proof. We have fenced nearly but not all of our farm. We will be leaving plenty of deer habitat outside our fence. We have left four fields, two blocks of woods and two creeks for the deer and foxes, coyotes, turkeys, woodchucks and myriad other creatures that occupy our neighborhood. But we’ll have safeguarded our efforts against the animals that want to eat your vegetables, and I am relieved. If only preventing insects from eating your vegetables was this easy. Next week Nate and I get to build a new walk-in cooler. I can’t wait!

Have a great week, Ted  

Recipe Ideas

Midway through summer all the squash starts to get overwhelming.  But, with summer squash the possibilities are endless.  Huffington Post published this great article on Yellow Squash: What to do when your sick of Zucchini.  It lists abut 20 unconventional ways to make them into a great meal, or side.

My other personal favorite summertime salad is Classic Nicoise Salad!  Now that Chez Oscar is gone from DeKalb Ave, you're going to have to make your own.  Epicurious has a great recipe here, and Serious Eats breaks down the essential elements, to help you get creative while making this fulfilling dish.

Veronica