This Week's Vegetable Harvest:
- Red Potatoes
- Green Beans
- Beets
- Sweet Corn (not from our farm. See below for more info.)
- Basil
- Cucumbers
- Eggplant (Wednesday pickup sites)
- Bell Peppers (Thursday pickup sites)
This Week's Fruit Harvest:
- Peaches
- Red Plums
- Purple Plums
- Blackberries
- Blueberries
Notes from the Farm Kitchen
This week's sweet corn comes from Scott Koster's farm near Lake Geneva. It is not organic but it is local and delicious!Tomatoes, eggplant, potatoes and peppers all belong to the Solanaceae family. It's interesting to note that although they are native to South and Central America, solanaceous crops don't always handle hot weather very well. This summer's intense heat has delayed the flowering and fruiting of some of our pepper varieties, but other varieties are coming along right on schedule. Most of the pepper fruits are still pretty small, but as the weeks go by these smaller green peppers will continue to grow bigger and many will eventually turn from green to either yellow, orange or red. The fact that green peppers are simply immature colored peppers is one of those interesting things I never stopped to consider before I started farming. Another curious thing about sweet peppers is that certain varieties never even have a green stage. For example, we grow a variety called Islander that starts out purple in its immature stage and slowly matures to a bright orange.
Eggplant is another solanaceous vegetable that doesn't typically starting bearing fruit heavily until early August. This year we're growing it for the first time at the Brodhead farm where the sandier soils seem to be just what the crop wants. Once again, high temperatures in June delayed fruit set on some of the plants, but the fruits that we have harvested so far have been big and beautiful. Eggplant does not need to be peeled, but you may prefer to do so. Before using it in a recipe, I recommend lightly salting eggplant slices and then letting them sit in a strainer for at last 10 minutes. This helps reduce the water content in the eggplant, and improves texture and taste.
This week's share contains more beautiful red potatoes. Digging them Monday was a bit of a chore given that the temperature was near 100 degrees. Matt, Travis, Donna and I dug about a thousand pounds Monday afternoon, enough to give each of our members 3 pounds this week. I would characterize our method of harvesting potatoes as one part mechanization to three parts old-fashioned grunt work. Matt used the tractor-mounted potato digger to lift the potatoes out of the ground and onto a moving conveyer where they bounced around with bits of plant roots, rocks, soil and weeds until they dropped off the back of the conveyer and onto the ground again. Travis, Donna and I followed behind picking up the potatoes by hand and depositing them into crates weighing about 50 pounds each. It was hot, sweaty work to be sure. In an average year we probably would have called it the hottest day of the season. This year it was just another 100-degree day.
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| We dug two types of red potatoes this week. Red Norland has red skin and white flesh while Adirondack Red has red skin and pink flesh. Both types work well for boiling, roasting, making potato salads, etc. |
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| Our crew bagging potatoes as they come off the wash line. |
This Week's Recipes
Julia Child's Chilled Beet and Cucumber Soup4 medium beets, trimmed
3 to 4 scallions, chopped
1 cucumber, peeled, seeded, chopped
1 teaspoon grated fresh horseradish
1 tablespoon wine vinegar
1 cup chicken broth
Salt and freshly ground pepper
sour cream and dill for garnish
- Cook beets in large pot of boiling water until very tender and knife pierces through to the center easily, about 50 minutes. Drain beets, reserving about 2 cups of the cooking water; cool beets slightly. Peel and coarsely chop.
- Transfer beets, scallions, cucumbers, horseradish, and wine vinegar to food processor. Add some of the cooking water to blend. Puree, but not too fine. Thin to desired consistency with cooking water and broth. Transfer to bowl, season, and chill several hours. Check seasoning before serving. Pour into individual bowls and garnish with spoonful of sour cream and sprinkling of dill. Can be made up to 3 days in advance, covered, chilled.
by Martha Rose Shulman in The New York Times, May 24, 2010
3/4 pound green beans, trimmed and broken in half
1 pound red potatoes, scrubbed and cut in 2-inch wedges
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 to 3 large garlic cloves (to taste), minced
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
2 hardboiled eggs, diced (optional)
- Steam the green beans above 1 inch of boiling water for four to five minutes until tender. Remove from the steamer, and rinse with cold water. Set aside. Add the potatoes, and steam for 10 to 15 minutes until tender.
- Heat the oil over medium heat in a large, nonstick skillet. Add the garlic, and cook for a minute or so until the garlic is fragrant. Stir in the beans and cook, stirring, for three minutes until quite tender and coated with oil (but still bright green).
- Gently stir in the potatoes, and add salt and pepper. Cook, stirring, until they begin to color lightly. Scatter the diced hard-boiled eggs over the top, cover and turn heat to low. Cook another three minutes. Serve hot or warm.
Fun Photo of the Week
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| I've been going through some old photos recently and discovered this gem. Ever wonder how Matt Sheaffer, a kid from the Chicago suburbs, ended up going into farming? I think maybe his parents still aren't sure, but here's evidence that his agricultural interest dates back to at least 1975. |
