Email brown-out

I am taking our children to visit family.  We ask that you limit communication with us from August 2 through August 12.  Please contact us no later than 9 a.m. on August 2 to ask questions, cancel a box, etc.  This is an email brown-out, not black-out.  Steve will check my emails but won’t have much time to respond.  I’ll be back and ready to communicate on August 13.  Thanks for your help with this.  Beth

I will deposit August 1 checks on August 2.  Many of you paid with checks post-dated to August 1.  I will deposit the checks on Friday August 2.

Pat’s recipe featured on NPR.
Our menu chef Pat Mulvey of Local Thyme received an exciting honor this week.  Her Ensenada Slaw recipe and the charming story of its discovery were featured on NPR’s “All Things Considered.”  Go here to listen to the radio clip and to vote for her recipe.  Pat’s recipe is in competition with three other summer recipes featured in short radio segments this week.  She’d love the votes and, honestly, it’s the best recipe of the bunch.  Keep this dish in mind; we plan to send cabbage again in the next few weeks.

First melons

From left, Noah and Michael toss muskmelons at harvest. It’s the best way to get the melons from the field to the wagon.

We’re glad to have melons to harvest.  During the blazing heat last year, the first week we had melons for everyone was July 19.  This year, they are ready on July 25.  Isn’t that interesting?  The weather was so different, but the plants compensated.  All our squash-family crops have stayed on schedule despite the cold spring, probably because they were sheltered under row cover.  That’s melons, zucchini, cucumbers, pickles, winter squash and pumpkins.

Veggie List and Veggie Notes.

Muskmelon OR watermelon
Green beans, 2 lb
Sweet corn, just 1 ear
Sugar snap peas, 3/4 lb (last of the season)
Cherry tomatoes OR slicing tomatoes
Italian frying peppers, 3
Cucumbers, 3
Pickling cucumbers, a handful
Mixed zucchini and summer squash, about 2 lb
Walla Walla onions, 1 or 2
Basil, 1 or 2 large sprigs
One site will receive globe or Japanese eggplant

Next week’s box will contain sweet corn, melons, green beans, tomatoes, peppers, onions and more.

Sweet corn – We realize that one ear of corn is a tease!  Well, they are ready so we are sending them.  We suggest you cut the kernels into any cooked dish during the final minutes of cooking.  It’s the only fair way to share the one ear.  There should be lots of sweet corn next week.
Pickling cucumbers (small cucumbers with thin skins) – These are excellent in salads because of their think skins.  Children (at least ours) love them as snacks.
Italian frying peppers (green or red, long, slender) – These sweet frying peppers are special.  They contain less moisture than normal bell peppers and therefore can be fried in a small amount of oil, preferably over high heat.  They are unbelievably fragrant while cooking.  If you attempt to fry normal bell peppers, they release juices and you end up sautéing them instead.  Frying peppers are also excellent raw.
Here are several things to watch for on the peppers this week:
– Some peppers have minor sunscald, which appears as a white patch on one side of the pepper.  You can eat or cut around this area.  Sunscald abates later in the year, as the growing foliage shades the developing peppers.
– Blossum end rot. Many of the Italian peppers have a black tip. This is related to calcium uptake in the plants.  Again, just trim off the affected part.
Japanese eggplant (only one site will receive this week) – These eggplant are long, slender, and dark purple.  The skin is thinner on this type than on globe eggplant.  These are traditionally left unpeeled in Asian cooking, and are often cut diagonally.  When cutting lengthwise slices of Japanese eggplant, I find it useful to remove a little skin from the outside slices, as they grill or sauté best when the flesh is exposed.

Subversive carrots

This season, we are hosting a large carrot variety trial by UW/Horticulture professor Irwin Goldman and graduate student Claire Luby.  We try new vegetable varieties each year.  Steve evaluates how well the varieties grow, while I judge their sweetness and flavor.  This trial, however, involves much more than taste evaluations.

Irwin and Claire have a radical plan.  In his years as a vegetable breeder, Irwin has observed an alarming loss of traits that used to be available publicly.  As companies patent specific plant traits, they become unavailable for public breeding programs.  For example, breeding for red carrots used to be in the public domain.  Now that trait has been patented, and breeders are forced to license the patented material or forgo breeding carrots for red color.  Red color in carrots is a novelty trait; other patented traits are much more valuable.

In planting this large trial, Claire and Irwin hope to identify unpatented sources of diversity.  Their ultimate goal is to develop “open source” breeding lines for release with the stipulation that any varieties developed from their lines must remain unpatented.  Irwin is a participant in the Open Source Seed Initiative (OSSI), a group of scientists working to develop open-source seeds for a variety of crops.  Irwin told us “The open source model works on the principle that you can receive the seeds if you agree not to tie them up, but you can also use them in breeding, crop production, or even sell them.  We hope this will also foster some additional breeding activities by gardeners and farmers who may want to save their own vegetable seeds and do a little breeding on the side.”   This recent article (see p. 28) describes OSSI, as well as Irwin, Claire and others’ groundbreaking efforts to breed crops specifically for organic farming systems.  These are big ideas that can help farmers everywhere.

Grad student Claire Luby holds a few of the 150 carrot varieties she cajoled from companies and breeding programs across the USA.

UW professor Irwin Goldman takes a turn planting carrots in a large variety trial at our farm.

We appreciate the chance to participate in this effort, and the opportunity to evaluate such a wide range of carrot varieties.  We almost always host trials when asked by the university.  Vegetable farmers lack the financial clout of the corn, soybean or potato industries.  Hosting trials is one way we support scientists researching organics or vegetable farming.

Veggie List and Veggie Notes.  This week’s veggies show effects from both the recent wet weather and the recent dry weather.  Pretty crazy.  We’re harvesting during hot weather, so we suggest that you eat your lettuce and broccoli soon.  Hot weather at harvest shortens their storage life.  If your leafy vegetables seem wilted this week, submerge in a tub of cold water for 15 minutes to help crisp them up.  This is a good technique for lettuce, greens, herbs and broccoli.

Cabbage, 3 to 4 lb
Sugar snap peas, 0.8 lb
Lettuce, red leaf or red bibb
Cucumbers, 4 or 5
Mixed zucchini and summer squash, 2 to 2.5 lb
Green OR purple bell pepper, 1
Curly OR flat Italian parsley, 1 bunch
Walla Walla onion, 1
Broccoli (1 head) OR kohlrabi
A few sites will receive 2 Japanese eggplant this week.

Next week’s box will probably contain green beans, cukes, zukes, and more.  There might be melons to share too!

Cabbage – This ia a nice salad-type that we grow in summer.  It has thinner, more tender leaves than the usual green cabbage.  Great in salads and slaws but can also be cooked.
Lettuce – We can still grow lettuce during hot weather as long as we harvest it young.  Please ignore the leaf spotting on some heads – it is a remnant of the wet spell that is now fading into distant memory.
Broccoli – Eat soon.  Broccoli harvested in hot weather (and stored with ethylene-producing summer crops) does not store well.

Farm news & photos

The CSA pick-ups went smoothly last week despite the unusual July 4 schedule.  Good job, folks!

For us, July 4 means fireworks and carrot planting.  Steve begins planting our fall carrot crop on July 3, weather permitting.  In a good year, the carrot fields are all planted within two weeks.  In a challenging year (like 2012) we replant multiple times to get a good stand of carrot seedlings.  Hot dry weather will damage the seedlings despite irrigation.  Heavy rains crust the ground and the seedlings can’t emerge.  I’ll keep you posted about this year’s plantings.

The time-consuming strawberry harvests are done.  Now we are busy harvesting early summer crops like peas and cucumbers, and transplanting winter storage crops such as cabbage.  We’re working hard to weed and maintain our summer crops.
Beth

Steve chopped this oat cover crop in preparation for planting carrots.

Steve’s view from the tractor. The lush oats are waist-high.

The cucumber bounty is amazing this week.

Alex and Boi place stakes in the tomato field. Soon we’ll weave string between the stakes to support the plants.

Veggie List and Veggie Notes.
Strawberries, 1 pint
Romaine lettuce
Walla Walla onion, 1
Broccoli, 1 large or 2 medium heads
Fennel, 1 bulb with luxurious fronds
Cucumbers, 4 or 5
Sugar snap peas, 1.1 lb
Mixed zucchini, patty pan and summer squash, 3 lbs.
Basil, 1 or 2 sprigs

Next week’s box will probably contain cabbage, cucumbers, peas, Walla Walla onion, lettuce & more.

Fennel (large vegetable with a fat bulb and lacy fronds) – Fennel is a ‘swing vegetable’; it can be used raw or cooked.  Clean well and slice as thinly as possible for use in raw salads.  It is good simply prepared with olive oil, lime or lemon juice, salt and shaved parmesan cheese.  Cooking softens and sweetens fennel, and mellows its anise flavor.  Both the bulb and leaves are edible.  Here are ideas from Alice Water of Chez Panisse about how to use fennel:  ‘It’s strong anise characteristic seems to suit fish particularly well.  … We use fennel all the time.  We add the feathery leaves to marinades for fish and to numerous salads, sauces and soups and we use them as a garnish, too. … The bulbs are sliced and served raw in salads in various combinations with other vegetables, parboiled for pastas; caramelized and served as a side dish; braised whole; or cooked in vegetable broths & fish stocks.”
Walla Walla onions – These are sweet onions, like Vidalias.  Wonderful raw or lightly cooked.  The crew walked the field to find the biggest onions for today’s box.

Caesar Salad, safely made with cooked egg yolks.
I gave up Caesar salad years ago.  Who wants to eat raw eggs?   The beautiful Romaine lettuce made me long for Caesar salad, so I researched ways to make it safely.  Food scientist Harold McGee has developed a method that works.  We add snap peas for crunch instead of croutons.  Many Caesar salad recipes call for 10 Tbsp. oil, but you can reduce the oil to 6 Tbsp. and the dressing still works.

Harold McGee’s method to sterilize egg yolks
Use a clean fork at each step to avoid re-contaminating the cooked yolks.
2 large egg yolks
1 & 1/2 tsp. water
1 tsp. lemon juice
Mix the ingredients in a clear glass bowl and beat together with a fork.  Cover the bowl and microwave on high power until the mixture bubbles (about 45 seconds).  Uncover and stir with a clean fork.  Cover and microwave until it bubbles again (about 20 seconds) and let it bubble 5 to 10 seconds more.  Stir again with another clean fork.  Let cool.  The mixture will be custard-like.

Caesar Salad
2 large eggs yolks, cooked as described above and still in the clear glass bowl
2 – 3 Tbsp. lemon juice
1 tsp. Worchestershire sauce
1 clove garlic, grated
2 tsp. anchovy paste
5 Tbsp. olive oil (or less)
5 Tbsp. canola oil (or less)
3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
black pepper

1 head Romaine lettuce, cut into 2-inch pieces, washed and carefully dried
croutons and/or snap peas

1.  Add the lemon juice, Worchestershire sauce, garlic and anchovy paste to the cooked egg yolks.  Stir together with a fork.  Let stand 5 – 10 minutes.
2.  Slowly drizzle the canola and olive oils into the mixture while beating with a fork to emulsify.  Stir in 1/2 cup Parmesan and black pepper to taste.
3.  Mix the dressing with the prepared Romaine and croutons (or peas) in a large bowl and toss to coat.  Taste and add the remaining 1 Tbsp. lemon juice if needed.  Sprinkle remaining Parmesan over top.  Serve.

Virtual u-pick tour

Final reminder: All “Thursday” sites will get their boxes on Wednesday 7/3 due to the July 4th holiday.  Friday members are unaffected and will get their boxes on Friday as scheduled.

Here are photos from the u-pick on Sunday, for those who could not attend.  The weather was perfect.  Steve and I really enjoy the u-picks.  It’s a chance to meet members and share the farm.

The berry field.

Strawberry picking was the main attraction.

The mulberry trees are loaded, even on the lower easy-to-reach branches.

These folks enjoyed all three u-picks: strawberries, shell peas and mulberries.

Steve (in black shirt at center) starts the farm tour while berry picking continues.

There’s a happy family.

Thanks to everyone who let me post their photo here.

Veggie List and Veggie Notes.  Local Thyme will have their menus ready early this week.
Strawberries, 1 quart
Sugar snap peas, about 2/3 lb
Snow peas, about 1/2 lb.
The two types of peas are combined in one bag, with snow peas on top.
Napa cabbage, large, about 3 lb
Cucumbers, 2
White salad turnips, 1 bunch
Zucchini/summer squash, 2 to 3 lb
Scallions, 1 bunch
Basil, 1 sprig

Next week’s box will probably contain peas, cucumbers, cabbage, lettuce, strawberries (maybe) and more.

Strawberries – The berries are ripe.  Eat them right away.
Napa or Chinese cabbage – This is the large pale green head.  This Asian vegetable can be eaten raw in salads, or cooked in simple stir-fries.  Napa stores very well.  Cut off wedges as needed and keep the rest covered and refrigerated, and it will keep for several weeks.  Peel off the outer layer and it will be ready to use.  Here are a few preparation ideas from the ‘Asparagus to Zucchini’ cookbook.
– Chop raw napa into green salads.
– Substitute napa in traditional coleslaw.
– Chinese cabbage cooks quickly.  Steam 3-5 minutes, or until leaves are wilted down but remain slightly crisp.
– Substitute napa cabbage for common cabbage in recipes, but reduce the cooking time by 2 minutes.
– Napa cabbage is the main ingredient in egg rolls.  Try making an egg roll mixture to eat as a cooked side dish instead of preparing time-consuming egg rolls.
Snow peas (flat pea pods) – These are excellent stir fried or in raw salads.  The thicker pea pods will usually have two strings along the edges.  Remove them when you snap the stem off.
Scallions – These green onions are large but remain quite tender.  Use raw or for cooking.
Basil (stem with frilly green leaves) – This is the variety ‘Napoletano.’  The leaves are larger and more frilly than most basils.  We like this variety because the its leaves remain tender and flavorful even as the plants mature.  Basil will blacken if stored in the refrigerator.  It is best stored at room temperature, with the cut ends in water, for example in a glass or teacup.  You will receive one or two sturdy stems this week.  This are from the first pruning to shape the plants.

Camaraderie

Billy, Kyle and Boi share stories while harvesting collard greens.

A new employee remarked on the camaraderie among the work crew.  That’s how we get through difficult jobs.  Yesterday we sent everyone to pick peas in a muddy, muddy field.  People sank ankle-deep into the mud.  By this morning, everyone had a funny story to tell about the experience.  Steve and I were relieved – we knew it had been a difficult task.  But it was OK because everyone was together, it was warm, the rain had stopped, and the peas were in beautiful shape and therefore were enjoyable to pick.

It was a dry month for us – until Friday.  Surprised?  The storms drenching southern Wisconsin slipped by our farm until Friday.  It was eerie to watch them on the weather maps.  It’s been so dry that we began irrigating two weeks ago.  We can put the irrigation equipment away for a while.  We got six inches of rain in six days.  That’s plenty.  We hope it will stay dry for the next week to protect our strawberry crop.  The berries we picked this week are quite soft because of the rain.  Plan to eat them right away, as they will not store well.

Strawberry U-Pick
Check this week’s email for u-pick information.

Reminder:  We will make our Thursday deliveries on Wednesday July 3 next week.  Friday deliveries will be on July 5, as scheduled.

Veggie List and Veggie Notes
Strawberries, 2 quarts
Sugar snap peas, 1.75 lb
Zucchini/summer squash, 3+ lb
Collard greens, 1 bunch
Rhubarb, about 1 lb
Garlic scapes
Broccoli (about 1 lb) OR kohlrabi (1 – 2 bulbs)

Next week’s box will probably contain strawberries, sugar snap peas, zucchini and summer squash, spinach, basil and more

Strawberries – The berries are soft because of the rain, and should be eaten promptly.
Garlic scapes (curly green things) – We buy these from John Hendrickson of Stone Circle Farm who is growing organic garlic for our CSA again this year.  The scapes grow at the top of garlic plants.  John snaps them off to direct the plants’ energy into forming garlic bulbs underground.  Use scapes as a substitute for garlic cloves.  They can be minced, mixed with olive oil, and added to stir fries or simple pasta dishes.  The scapes can be sautéed, but will not brown like garlic cloves.  Expect them to retain their crunch even when cooked, and to be milder than garlic cloves, closer in pungency to the green garlic we’ve sent.

Bike the Barns at our farm this year.

2008 Bike the Barns at Tipi Produce

Our farm has been chosen to host the lunch stop for FairShare’s Bike the Barns fundraiser this year.  This is a big honor.  When we hosted the event in 2008, I was nervous about accommodating 600 bicyclists and their cycles.  It was easy.  We discovered that 600 people+bikes don’t take up that much space.  The ride begins and ends in lovely Lake Leota park in Evansville.

Registration is open for the ride.  Go here for information and to register.  There are two routes this year.  Choose the 30 mile route or the 70 mile route.  Both routes stop at our farm.  Registration opened on June 17 and 120 riders have already signed up.  I see a few Tipi members among them!

Strawberry U-Picks.
Please read this week’s email for information about upcoming strawberry u-picks at our farm.  The u-picks are for Tipi members only, so I don’t post the details on-line.  Check your email this week and next.

July 4 schedule.
The holiday falls on a Thursday this year.  WE WILL DELIVER TO OUR THURSDAY SITES on WEDNESDAY JULY 3.  Friday deliveries will not change and boxes will be delivered on Friday July 5, as scheduled.  It is a purple EOW week.

Veggie List and Veggie Notes.  This is the final asparagus delivery.  It’s been an excellent year for asparagus but now it’s time to let the plants grow and store root reserves for next year.  We’re thrilled to send asparagus to you folks for five weeks.  That’s the most we can expect. This week, we will pack …

Asparagus, 0.8 lb
Strawberries.  Most will get 1 pt.  A few sites will get 1 quart.
Snap peas, l lb
Zucchini/summer squash, about 3 lb
Rainbow Swiss chard, 1 bunch
Red bibb lettuce
Scallions, 1 bunch
Broccoli (1.1 lb) OR kohlrabi with greens

Next week’s box will probably contain strawberries, snap peas, zucchini and summer squash, garlic scapes, broccoli OR kohlrabi, greens and more.

Strawberries! – These first berries are Annapolis, our earliest variety and always the first ready to harvest.  These are the largest Annapolis berries we’ve ever grown.  The first flowers on Annapolis are almost always lost to frost.  That’s the risk with early varieties.  The flowers survived this year, giving us large “king” berries in our first harvest.
♦ Strawberries are perishable.  Ripe berries should be eaten immediately, or stored in the refrigerator.  Most berries are quite clean.  If you want to clean your berries, rinse gently.  Don’t soak them, just rinse.  Do not be concerned if you receive a partially-filled container.  Sometimes we fill them partially in order to distribute berries to all the members.
♦ Please recycle your strawberry containers this year.  We no longer collect them for re-use.

Snap peas – These peas should be eaten pod and all.  They are delicious raw, or very lightly cooked or stir-fried.  They might need a quick rinse to remove faded gray blossoms.  Store in the refrigerator.  Here’s how to remove the strings from the snap peas.  Snap off the stem end and pull the string down the concave side of the pod (the inward-curing side).  Throw away the string and eat the pod.

Summer squash/zucchini – You will receive yellow summer squash or green zucchini.  Some squash are oddly shaped but are fine to eat.  This is typical for the first picking, and reflects that the first squash were not completely pollinated.  The plants were hidden under row covers where pollinators couldn’t find them.  The honeybees settled down to work once we removed the row covers and the newest squash look great.

Swiss chard (pretty bundle of greens with mixed-color stems)  – This is a close relative of spinach, but requires a bit more cooking.  Use as a substitute in any recipe that calls for spinach, just cook the chard a little longer.  Both stems and leaves are delicious.  The stems requite longer cooking, so cut them free from the leaves when preparing.  That allows you to cook the stems longer.

Kohlrabi (green bulb with leaves) – See last week’s newsletter for information.  The leaves have grown since last week, and are now the consistency of collard leaves.  Remember to remove the stems before cooking the leaves.  Peel the bulbs and use in salads.

Like folding a quilt

From front, Clint, Bri and Alex fold row cover to remove it from our zucchini field.

‘Twas time to unveil the zucchini field this week.  We’ve kept the plants under row cover to speed their growth, but now it’s time to remove the covers to allow bees to pollinate the flowers.  Big sheets of row cover are unwieldy.  Our largest ones measure 50 feet by 500 feet, and cover more than a half acre.  Here’s how to remove one from a field.

Step 1.  Choose a calm, dry day.  Wet row cover is astonishly heavy.  Wind will carry it away.

Step 2.  Gather a group of workers.  Fold the cover lengthwise to remove it from the field.  Fold repeatedly until the bundle is about 5 feet across.  As Clint says “It’s like folding a quilt … a very big quilt.”

Clint and Alex roll row cover.

Step 3.  Start to roll it up.  One person can begin the roll but two are better.

From left, Boi, Clint and Bri

Step 4.  Add more helpers.  By now the roll is getting heavy.  Roll it quickly to make use of momentum.

From left, Alex, Boi, Clint and Bri

Step 5.  Finish the roll and collapse for a bit.  Someone will carry the roll back to the buildings by tractor.

Member etiquette: Please scratch your name off the checkoff list.
It helps our site hosts identify unclaimed boxes.  Thanks.

Scallion Ideas.
We are very enthusiastic about scallions at our house.  Here are our favorite uses:
Scallion biscuits
*Scallion dumplings
Scallion pancakes
*Penne, spinach, asparagus and cashew salad, with scallion dressing
Egg drop soup with spring greens, topped with sliced scallions
*Grilled scallion, asparagus and turnip salad
Sliced scallions are good on sandwiches and salads
Grilled beef bulgogi wrapped in lettuce leaves.  Easily adapted to tofu.
Salmon patties with scallions

* indicates the recipe is in the archives on our website

Veggie List and Veggie Notes.
Asparagus, 1.3 lb
Escarole, 1 head
Spinach, 1 medium bunch
White salad turnips with greens
Red bibb lettuce
Scallions, 1 bunch
Kohlrabi with greens OR broccoli, about 1 lb

Next week’s box will probably contain asparagus, peas, strawberries?, zucchini?, Swiss chard or other greens, broccoli OR kohlrabi and more.

Escarole (large green head that looks like lettuce) – This member of the chicory family can be eaten raw or cooked.  Its slightly bitter flavor is a good addition to mixed salads.  It is excellent cooked alone or mixed with other greens.  It cooks quickly, but not as quickly as spinach.  Refrigerate.
Spinach (small bundle of dark green leaves) – This is probably most useful for salad this week, as the quantity is small and leaves are tender.  They will wilt down substantially when cooked.  Plus there are all the other greens (turnip, escarole, and for some members kohlrabi) for cooking this week.
White salad turnips with greens (bundle of white roots with tops) – The turnip greens are tender again this week, and are good for cooking.  Cook like mustard greens.  The turnip roots are more abundant this week.  There is minor insect damage on the roots this week, so some will need trimming.
Kohlrabi (round, pale green exterior, crisp white interior) – Kolrabi is an unusual vegetable that I enjoy introducing to new CSA members because almost everyone likes it.  Crunchy and sweet, it’s a great addition to salads.  Storage:  Kohlrabi bulbs will store for a month in the refrigerator.  Uses:  Kohlrabi are good peeled and eaten out of hand, or added to sandwiches.  It is good mixed into salads, or prepared as a salad on it’s own.  You can grate it, slice it, or cut it into matchsticks.  It’s also good cooked.  If you have it, the Asparagus to Zucchini cookbook has a long list of kohlrabi suggestions.
The kohlrabi greens are quite nice this week and can be cooked.  Steve tried a new variety with smaller, more tender leaves.  Texture and waxiness are similar to young kale or collards.  Cut out the midvein before cooking.

Remember, recipes and menus will be posted on the Local Thyme website each Thursday afternoon.  Contact us if you need help setting up your account on the Local Thyme website.

Korean visitors

Steve (black shirt and cap) leads the tour.

We hosted Korean visitors this week.  It was an animated group of farmers, scientists and extension agents interested in organic agriculture.  They asked many questions and wanted to touch everything.  They were particularly interested in irrigation, cover crops, and the CSA.  Their translator struggled to explain the CSA concept but they seemed to understand.  We packed the CSA boxes with an attentive audience.

Visitors examine a roll of plastic mulch on the mulch layer.

Steve showed them a field of pepper seedlings planted into rows covered with plastic mulch, similar to the onions in this post.  Then he showed them the equipment he used to install the thin sheets of plastic, above.  The translator could barely keep up with the questions and discussion.

Coopers Tavern dinner – Thanks to everyone who came to the Partner Shares benefit dinner at the Coopers Tavern.  We enjoyed an excellent meal with current Tipi members, former Tipi members, former employees, food activists and old friends.  My favorite dish was the pickled spring vegetable salad, a mix of individually pickled asparagus, radishes, bok choy stems and morel mushrooms.  The asparagus was pickled in a fennel-scented brine, very yummy.  The beer was donated by Peter Gentry of One Barrel Brewing Company.  Peter was a member of our farm for many years, so it was fun to re-connect over our food and his beer.

This Week’s Box – I’ll list the box contents here (as well as in the sidebar) so it appears in the RSS feed and when printed.  Weekly members and PURPLE every-other-week members get a box this week.
Asparagus, 1.25 lb
Spinach, medium bunch
White salad turnips with greens, 1 bunch
Romaine lettuce
Bok choy
Cilantro
Young scallions, 1 bunch
Rhubarb, 1.5 lb

Next week’s box will probably contain asparagus, white salad turnips, lettuce, scallions and more.

Veggie Notes
White salad turnips (bunched white roots with green tops) – I know that returning members look forward to these sweet and delicious turnips, which taste nothing like the turnips that are harvested in fall.
– Storage: Cover and refrigerate.
– Uses: Both the turnip roots and tops are edible.  Slice the sweet roots and add to salads.  They can be cooked and are especially good when lightly sauteed in butter.  Stir as little as possible so they brown on at least one side.  The turnips greens are excellent cooked.  Treat them like mustard greens.
– Our favorite use:  Slice the roots very thinly and combine with a mixture of rice vinegar, mirin, soy sauce, sesame oil.  Eat immediately or marinate.

Bok choy (large rosette with thick white stems and green leaves) – This Asian green is good for stir-frying or sautéing or in soup.  You can think of the stems and leaves as two separate vegetables.  The stems require longer cooking.  The leaves will cook almost as quickly as spinach.  Bok choy stores well, so feel free to pull off leaves as you need them, or use the whole head at once.  Refrigerate in a plastic bag.
– The plants started to bolt so we harvested them a bit younger than usual.  You can eat the entire plant – cook the central stem with the leaf stems.  Each spring, we face the decision of whether to cover the bok choy seedlings with row cover or not.  They tend to bolt (flower prematurely) when under row cover, but get damaged by flea beetles if left unprotected.  We tried both methods this spring.  Wow, the uncovered ones were devoured by beetles.  I’m glad we had these under cover.

Cilantro (bundle of fragrant green leaves) – This herb is good in salsa, chutneys and salad dressings, or added to stir-fries.  Used in Mexican, Asian and Indian cooking.  We are delighted to send cilantro in combination with bok choy and scallions because they are so tasty together.

Rhubarb – This is our last rhubarb delivery for a few weeks.  We’ll send more once the strawberries are ready.  Remember, rhubarb is easy to chop and freeze.  We add frozen rhubarb to cakes, muffins, or pies.  Rhubarb pancakes are excellent with sweetened yogurt.

The prettiest sight on the farm.

Strawberry plants in bloom. On frosty nights, we irrigate to protect the plants and blossoms, using the irrigation pipe at left.

That’s our strawberry field in full bloom.  We tend a new strawberry field for a full year before the first harvest, so it’s exciting to see the plants survive the winter in good shape.  We lost the entire strawberry crop last year.  The plants broke dormancy too soon because of early warm weather, and the blossoms were killed by frost despite our efforts to protect them.  Let’s keep our fingers crossed for this year.

Strawberry leaves covered in ice after we irrigated early Friday morning to protect from frost.
As water crystallizes into ice, it releases heat which keeps the plants safely at 32^o F.

The irrigation worked and the blossoms were not damaged.  At center is a flower whose petals have dropped.  You can see the developing green strawberry.

I will deposit June 1 checks on June 4.
Many of you paid with checks post-dated to June 1.  Remember?  I will deposit them on Tuesday June 4 so everyone has enough time to adjust their account balances.  If you are uncertain of your check dates, you can send yourself a receipt that lists your payments by date.

CSA shares still available.
We have 17 shares still for sale.  There’s room at all sites except Atwood, Buckeye and the Outpost in Wauwatosa.  We would especially like to find new members for our site at the Outpost on Kinnickinnic Ave. in Milwaukee.  Tell your friends.  We’re eager to settle the membership and focus on farming. Thank you.

Bonnie trims rhubarb stalks. Note the slew of trimmed leaves in the row behind her. Our field consists of 12 rows but we only needed three rows to fill the CSA boxes last week. Wow.

Veggie Notes.  The big story this week is rhubarb.  We divide and refresh our rhubarb plantings every five to eight years to keep the plants growing strongly.  Rhubarb stalks get thinner and thinner as the crowns become crowded.  Early this spring, Steve mused that might be a problem this year.  Ha!  This is the most vigorous rhubarb growth we’ve ever seen.  We had to cut the stalks in half so they will fit in the CSA boxes.  We plan to send rhubarb again next week because of the bounty.

Asparagus – See last week’s newsletter for info on storage and preparation.

Rhubarb – FYI, rhubarb freezes beautifully.  Chop into chunks and freeze in a bag.  No need to blanch.  You can also freeze rhubarb sauce.  See last week’s newsletter for more info about rhubarb.

Parsnips (long white roots) – We had a bumper crop of parsnips last fall, so we stored these over the winter for the spring boxes.  Those long, white roots are not carrots, they are parsnips.  The two vegetables are related.  Unlike carrots, parsnips are rarely eaten raw.  When cooked, parsnips are sweet and starchy.  Brown them so the sugars caramelize, to give the best flavor. Here are a few ideas about how to prepare parsnips:
– Caramelize the parsnips by roasting them in a vegetable medley.
– Parsnip fries are delicious: cut like French fries, coat very lightly with oil, place on a cookie sheet and roast in a hot oven until cooked through and browned.  Farm cook Lacey made those for us this week.
– Substitute grated parsnips in a potato pancake recipe.  They brown beautifully and are very tasty.
– We often pan-fry onions with onions and garlic.

Button mushrooms – These organic mushrooms are from the folks at Hidden Valley Mushrooms in the Wisconsin Dells.  We often buy mushrooms from them for our spring boxes.  They enliven spring salads when our crop list is short.

Mustard greens (small bundle of flat green leaves) – These are “salad quality” mustard greens, so young and tender that you can use them raw in salads.  They are excellent cooked until wilted, but will shrink considerably.

Lettuce – The lettuce is still very young and tender.  Handle carefully.

Ready, set, eat.

Deliveries begin.  Yeah!
Our CSA deliveries begin this week for weekly members and for PURPLE every-other-week (EOW) members.  GREEN EOW members, your first delivery is next week.

We are thrilled the season has finally begun.  It was a slow, cool start.  We planned to begin deliveries on May 16, but pushed them to May 23 to let the crops grow.  Our greenhouses were bursting with seedlings.  Once the weather cleared, we hurried to get the plants in the ground.

Carla transplants onions and realizes the transplanter has gotten too far ahead.

Transplanting requires teamwork.  One group rides the transplanter and lays out the seedlings, while another group plants them in the ground.  The second group stays close to the transplanter in case there are problems.  We upgraded to a newer, faster transplanter this year, which threw our pace off.  We continue to experiment with reflective silver mulch to control insect problems in our onion crop.  It’s an interesting no-spray approach to a problem we face each season.

Tipi Facts: Things you need to know.
♦  Recipes will be on the Local Thyme website this year, instead of in our newsletter.
♦  The first few boxes of the season are always the lightest.  Every-other-week (EOW) members, please do not worry that you have signed up for the wrong share.  Later deliveries will be larger.
♦  We post our newsletter online each Wednesday night, then send a reminder email.
♦  EOW and weekly members, we assume that you read all the newsletters, even on your “off” weeks.  We rely on the newsletter to communicate with everyone.  You do not want to miss important information about the veggies, or a farm event announcement, or an opportunity to purchase extra tomatoes or peppers.

Local Thyme menu service = New this year.
We are excited about this change.  We hired Pat Mulvey and Laura Gilliam of Local Thyme to prepare menus and recipes for our CSA this year.  I’ve cooked extensively with their recipes and find them quick and delicious.  We provide this service free-of-charge in 2013 to help you enjoy all your CSA produce, with less veggie waste.  We hope you enjoy it.
♦  They will provide three menus: omnivore (ie, no dietary restrictions), vegetarian and gluten-free.  Members can view all three menus.
♦  The menus will be customized to use every item in your box.
♦  Check out their weekly shopping lists, cooking tips and vegetable advice.  Their searchable recipe archive is extensive.
♦  The menus and recipes will be housed on their website.  You have to register on their website.  Go to www.localthyme.net/register and enter the access code that I sent in my May 22 email.  Pat and Laura work hard on their recipes, so access is restricted to Tipi members.  Please don’t share the website with friends.
♦  Once registered, you’ll receive their Thursday afternoon announcement when the menus are ready.
♦  Their website will be available to us for one full year, so use it in winter too.
♦  A Tipi member with access to Local Thyme last year wrote “It was great for me. Menu planning is an additional task I usually don’t have time for.  We end up wasting produce or using the same recipes that I feel are safe.   It allowed me to show up at my pick-up site with a shopping list in hand of everything else I needed.”  That sums up our hopes for the service.

 Plough and Barrel Dinner.
Coopers Tavern is hosting a fund-raising dinner for Partner Shares on June 3.  See my previous post for details.

Veggie Notes.  Check this section each week for information about the veggies in the box.  I’ll provide extra info on cooking and storage the first week that we send a vegetable.  Does an item need extra washing?  Does it have special qualities?  This is the place to find out.  For example, please, please refrigerate the potatoes.  We explain the reason below.

Asparagus – This is the most asparagus we’ve every sent in one delivery.  Enjoy this spring treat!  You will receive either green or purple asparagus.  The purple variety will turn dark green when cooked, and the flavor is almost identical to normal green asparagus.  The best way to wash asparagus is to submerge it in water, soak briefly, then swish vigorously and pull out of the water with the tips pointing down.  The draining action helps pull the grit out of the asparagus tips.  Repeat several times.
Storage: Asparagus is perishable, so eat it as soon as possible.  To store it, wrap the bundle in a paper towel and then store it loosely in a plastic bag.  The asparagus tips tend to rot if in direct contact with the plastic bag.  We snap our asparagus at harvest, rather than cutting it.  Therefore, there is no need to snap the stalks to remove fibrous ends.  For the same reason, it is not necessary to peel the asparagus stalks.  It’s OK to trim the end a bit.
Cooking:  If your asparagus stalks vary greatly in size, you will want to cook the thicker ones longer.  Put the asparagus in a steamer pot over water.  Alternatively, you can lay spears flat in the bottom of a broad pan, with ½ inch of water.  Cover and steam over medium heat until just tender.  Use two forks or a spatula to turn the asparagus during cooking, rotating the bottom spears to the top.  Drain and serve.  Also excellent broiled or grilled.  Good dressed with vinaigrette.  We always eat our first asparagus dressed with lime juice, salt and pepper.

Rhubarb – Refrigerate in a plastic bag.  FYI, 2 lb of rhubarb will yield about 6 to 6.5 cups when chopped.
Stewed rhubarb:  This is the simplest way to prepare rhubarb.  Chop rhubarb into one inch chunks.  Stir over medium heat with a small amount of water in the bottom of the pan.  The rhubarb will release moisture as it cooks.  Stew until it softens and falls apart.  Sweeten to taste with honey or sugar.  Eat warm on its own, over vanilla ice cream, on pancakes, etc.

Potatoes – You will receive white Superior potatoes or Gold Rush russets.  Please refrigerate these potatoes.  They are in great shape now but will sprout within days if stored at room temperature.  They’ve been stored all winter and want to grow!  Store in a paper bag to protect from light, even in the fridge.  We grow everything we send in our CSA boxes except potatoes, garlic and mushrooms, which we buy from organic growers that we trust.  We purchased these potatoes from Jesse Perkins at Vermont Valley Farm.  Jesse says the potatoes have a higher sugar content because of starch to sugar conversion during cold storage.  The potatoes taste a bit sweet, and will blacken slightly when fried.  It’s a harmless color change due to the sugar conversion.

Green garlic – (looks like scallions) – Steve planted 50% more green garlic than usual last fall.  I wondered at the time if it was wise. Well, it was brilliant.  This winter was hard on garlic.  Every farmer I know lost a portion of their garlic planting over the winter, probably due to freezing and thawing cycles.  I’m glad we have enough green garlic for everyone this week.  That’s it until garlic scapes are ready to harvest.
♦  The cloves we planted last fall sprouted and grew into the stalks we’ve sent today.  If left to grow, the slim white bulb on this week’s garlic would divide and form the usual cluster of cloves in a garlic bulb.  Green garlic is more pungent than scallions, so slice thinly and use sparingly when raw.  It mellows when cooked.  Chop and add to any cooked dish that would benefit from garlic.  Use the white bulbs and pale green stems. Avoid the dark green stems and leaves, as these are fibrous.

Arugula – (small bunch of green leaves with pungent scent) – This is good mixed with lettuce or spinach in salads or in cooked dishes such as lasagne or quiche.  I love it on sandwiches  This batch of arugula has begun to bolt (stretch into a flower stalk) but remains tender and good eating quality.  It is thin-leaved and will not store for long.  Eat soon.  Cover and refrigerate.

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Local Thyme will send an email on Thursday afternoon once the menus are ready to view.