Volume 23, Week 13

Full share &🥗green🥗 half shares

218 Gates Avenue between Classon and Franklin
(IMPACCT Brooklyn at the Gibbs Mansion)
5:00 to 7:30 pm

Meet the Clinton Hill CSA Core Group!

Curious how the CSA is run? One of the ways that the CSA keeps costs down is by being fully volunteer run! Member shifts at at distribution are essential, and we have a core group that steers the planning and execution of the season. Each week for the remainder of the season, we’ll feature a member of the core group that steers the CSA and tell you what they do!

Meet Chad!

Role in the CSA: I’ve been a distribution manager since 2020 when we were at JACK Theater. I love handling the distribution logistics and working with the fellow CSA members volunteering for their shifts to make the pickup process easy and efficient!

Favorite vegetable: I’m really into the leafy greens this year. The kale, lettuce, and mustard greens have been outstanding, making my salads top notch. I also adore the cherries. While I love most of the fruit in the share, the cherries are the #1 reason I get the fruit share and they never disappoint.

Something you wouldn’t guess about me: I have an alter ego called Hydration Guy. From June through October, I set up a hydration station for the runners of NYC who are out doing their training runs for fall marathons (or just running for the joy of running). Cold water & Gatorade, ice, sunscreen, music - it's an oasis! It's always free for anyone who stops, but I take optional donations that are then given to a charitable organization of the week. Last year I raised $4500 for 15 different charitable organizations! Follow me on Instagram at @thehydrationguy!

This week’s share

  • Assorted tomatoes

  • Basil

  • Lettuce

  • Mixed mustard greens

  • Spinach

  • Sweet peppers

  • Yellow onions

  • Garlic

  • Chiles

  • Fruit: Windflower’s organically grown watermelons! Note from Ted: Lizet, who is a new member of the staff, made agua de melonis (an agua fresca) for us last night. If ever your cantaloupes or watermelons (or peaches or strawberries) are mealy or otherwise not desirable for eating plain, puree the fruit, add water and a sweetener if needed, stir, chill and serve. It makes a wonderfully refreshing drink. It’s enhanced by adding a few small cubes of the fruit.

  • Extras: bread, eggs, coffee, granola

News from Windflower Farm

Distribution No. 13, Week of August 26, 2024

Somehow, we find ourselves in the second half of the CSA season. Soon, school will resume, ponds will be too cold for swimming, County Fairs will be a distant memory. Days are getting shorter by 2 ½ minutes per day. It’s dark now when I get home from my NYC deliveries. Soon, your shares will take on the look of fall: potatoes, carrots, beets, Butternut and Delicata squashes, leeks, sweet potatoes. Although we have fresh garden salads every day of the week, it’s these fall crops that I most look forward to. 

What’s new on the farm?

A pair of foxes have been wandering through the farm, evidence of which has been found in our greenhouses. Jan was once a scatologist for Halloween and offered a variety of chocolate treats intended to mimic the look of, well, scat, so I believe I know what I’ve been looking at. I appreciate the reminder that we coexist with grey and red foxes, along with coyotes, Fisher cats, stoats (adorable short-tailed weasels) and occasionally even black bears and moose. (This past weekend we enjoyed watching the flights of Great Blue Herons and the antics of loons while paddling through the Adirondack’s St. Regis Wilderness.)

We started digging potatoes last week, and if the machinery - a small Italian digger and an old, clanky brusher-washer - continues to work properly, you should see them next week. Yields appear to be so-so, but flavor is very good. We’ll be sure to send rosemary at some point soon, too.

Pumpkins are already mostly orange and we’ve also begun to harvest them. If past seasons are a guide, they don’t seem to keep very long, so we’ll send them to you soon (I am aware that this is two months early). We’ve grown a variety that can be turned into pie or painted or even carved, although they are a bit small for that. Delicatas, too, are showing good color. Warm summers and ample rainfall produce early winter squash crops. I am hoping that their foliage remains healthy long enough to produce a sweet crop. Butternuts, acorn squashes and Kabochas will round out this year’s squash harvest.

This makes me think that I should peek under some sweet potato vines.

Next week, we’ll send potatoes, tomatoes, peppers, lettuces, onions, garlic, carrots from Denison Farm, and some other odds and ends.

Have a great week, Ted

Veronica