Week 10, 2016
You MAY have these things: eggplant, corn, lettuce, new crop of summer squash of some variety or color, tomatoes, peppers, chard or beets or kale…cucumbers are back!
It’s still tomato time!!! The tomatoes are beautiful right now, so enjoy! CSA members get the great price of $25/box of gorgeous tomatoes (about 22#). We may have some on hand at your pickup, or email me to get extra sent to you.
Eggplants have arrived! The crop is significantly diminished (as with the peppers) but we are sharing what we’ve got!
Also, the corn is delicious. Yes, the tips are not filled out on most of them…but two things about that: 1. You are getting the same corn as we are selling…there is no way to sort that 2. There’s be a drought on…that means that things like corn kernels do not fill up all the way – but who cares? No one eats the end of the corn anyway.
I am plugging for carrots and I think there will be potatoes soon, but I won’t lie, I have no idea what might show up at this point. 😉
ALSO, the summer squashes, Particularly the zucchini and cousa may look larger than life. We do pick them every other day. Really. Come out and watch sometime. We went from “can’t grow anything” to “explosion”. We had some great rain over the weekend, with the not so great smokin’-hot heat and that makes for fast growth. While the squash seems to love it, the melons are splitting left and right. Can’t win this year. The point is, any of the large squash are still amazingly tender, no large seeds. I just assembled another amazing lasagna with “squash noodles”…Reid brought back the larges zucchini we had and there were the tiniest seeds 🙂
Also check out Vegetale al forno, much like the Tian below, but a little richer
Summer Tian
- 1 Tbsp olive oil 1 medium yellow onion
- 1 tsp minced garlic
- 1 medium zucchini
- 1 medium yellow squash
- 1 medium potato
- 1 medium tomato
- 1 tsp dried thyme
- to taste salt & pepper
- 1 cup shredded Italian cheese
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Finely dice the onion and mince the garlic. Saute both in a skillet with olive oil until softened (about five minutes).
While the onion and garlic are sautéing, thinly slice the rest of the vegetables.
Spray the inside of an 8×8 square or round baking dish with non-stick spray. Spread the softened onion and garlic in the bottom of the dish. Place the thinly sliced vegetables in the baking dish vertically, in an alternating pattern. Sprinkle generously with salt, pepper, and thyme.
Cover the dish with foil and bake for 30 minutes. Remove the foil, top with cheese and bake for another 15-20 minutes or until the cheese is golden brown.
Simple Summer Pasta
Chunk up your tomatoes 1-2lbs, marinate in ½ cup olive olive oil, 2 tsp salt, a clove garlic minced, a big handful of basil chopped, and 8-ish oz of mozz or brie; let marinade.
Add 1 lb of pasta of choice, toss. Let rest for 15minutes or so, serve at room.
We’ve gotten some rain…enough to push a few things along and allow us to not be irrigating 24/7. The new squash we are harvesting has been irrigated and is looking good, the main crop of potatoes we should be harvesting by now is pulling itself together and we are hoping the yields are there as we start digging (no irrigation possibilities for the potatoes). We are trying to keep the late season tomatoes and winter squashes in good health.; this is perfect weather for disease and the last thing we need to happen is some late blight or fungus to wipe us out. You may remember me saying the winter squash did not have much set on it because it was so hot the plants only put out male blossoms. You have to have male and female blossoms to have any production…no runaround, no fix.
Meanwhile, we have had an entire family of bluebirds feeding in the yard every day. They are so stunning! There are piles of turkeys gathering their young together, so seeing a couple hens and 20 poults in the middle of a field is common place these days. It also looks like the deer population is rebounding a little after the horrible winter two years ago, there are little cloven hoof-prints in every field. The Anise Swallowtails have devoured the dill and fennel and the Monarch butterflies are busy in the Milkweed. Faith runs around, collecting the creatures as pets for the day and that is all good, but sometimes they need to stay put. LIKE THE AMPHIBIANS.
Crikey, the frogs and toads throwing themselves out into the road, is tragic, especially when so many are dead because of the drought. It will be nice for them to have a little more room when the waters rise. 🙂
Eat well, Geneviève Stillman