What's in the box?

sweet corn!
sweet onions
bell peppers (red for "eat like a farmer" shares)
cucumbers
zucchini / summer squash
new potatoes
broccoli
eggplant (large and medium)
celery
green beans (large and medium)
heirloom tomatoes / tomatoes
hot peppers (jalapeno and hungarian hot wax)

garlic for "eat like a farmer" shares

Notes on the box.

Hope you brought your muscles... This is a heavy box!

If you can't eat your sweet corn right away, store it in the fridge. Each day that passes makes it less sweet, so keep that in mind with your meal planning. To freeze corn, I like to cut it off the cob, put it in a bag, and freeze it. We don't bother with blanching.

Sweet onions are uncured and are best stored in the fridge. Good for frying, enjoying fresh in salads or burgers, or making into carmelized onions.

New potatoes are unwashed because the skin is very thin and tender and was getting peeled off just from our sprayer during washing. You are able to much gentler washing them at home.

Eggplant is another veggie that is best when eaten fresh. Bitterness develops as it is stored. This is a nice small variety that holds its shape well through cooking. Great for stir fries and curries. Or see the recipe below for roasted veggies which is my new weekly plan of attack for easy instant meals.

I was just reading a bit about storing some of these summer veggies. It seems that most (including cucumbers, eggplant, and summer squash) store the very best in a paper bag at warm refrigeration temperature or 45-55 F. So if you have a cool basement or a wine chiller, that may be the best place to store these veggies! I store them all in the crisper or the warmest part of the fridge.

The hot peppers are pretty dang spicy. Carefully remove the seeds unless you have a high heat tolerance. The Hungarian Hot Wax are the long tapered ones. Most are yellow, but there are a few red and orange ones out there. Don't take a big chomp out of them or you might be hurting! They aren't sweet peppers!

Cheese Shares.

This week is a recipe that I'm working on for our own original cheese. It is quite a tasty snacking cheese and also great for a grilled cheese sandwich. It is yet unnamed, but we are thinking Perseid in honor of the meteor shower we have been enjoying at night. A midnight snack of cheese and some stargazing? Can't think of many better things to do!

You know how sometimes the cheese or butter your see in the store is bright yellow or orange? This is usually from added coloring like annatto. It's trying to evoke what this cheese naturally has. The intense yellow color of our cheese is because of the cows' 100% grass diet (this is different than dairy marketed as "pasture raised"). The cows give less milk eating all grass than they would if we were feeding them grain, but the milk and cheese is much better for us with high Omega 3s, healthy fats, and Vitamin K. Here's an article that elaborates on these points. I hope that you are enjoying the beauty and deliciousness that comes from our beautiful cows' milk!

Recipes.

Roasted Everything

Cut zucchini, summer squash, eggplant, onions, and bell peppers into slices. Spread sliced veggies into a rimmed baking pan. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Toss gently to make sure all the veggies are coated in oil. Roast in 450 degree oven for 10 min. Remove from oven, flip veggies with a spatula and roast for 5- 10 more minutes until veggies are roasted to your liking. Use these veggies to toss into cooked pasta, top a sandwich, have as a side dish, top a pizza, or any other thing you can dream up. Great thing to do to have veggies on hand for quick meals.

Simple Potato Salad

Bring a pot of salted water to a boil. Wash and large dice your potatoes then add to the boiling water. While potatoes are cooking, finely chop celery and sweet onion. Mix a few big spoonfuls of mayo, a little vinegar, salt and pepper in a large bowl. Add celery and sweet onion. Drain potatoes when they are tender but not mushy. Mix cooled potatoes into dressing and veggies. Chill or eat at room temperature. The wonderful thing about really fresh veggies is that they don't need much dressing up. The flavor of the veggies themselves is so great that you can keep it really simple.

Zucchini or Summer Squash Cinnamon Pancakes

Veggies for breakfast! In a medium bowl, whisk together 2 eggs, 1 tsp. cinnamon, and a pinch of salt. Stir in 2 cups shredded zucchini/ summer squash. Drop batter by the spoonful onto a hot greased griddle. Cook for about 3 min or until centers start to firm up. Flip the cakes over and cook for another 2 min or until the pancakes spring back when lightly pressed on top. Serve with butter and honey or syrup.

Zucchini Corn Fritters

2 cups flour
1 Tbsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 tsp salt
ground black pepper to taste
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup milk
1/4 cup butter, melted
2 cups grated zucchini or summer squash
1 1/2 cups corn kernels
1 cup shredded cheese
oil for frying

in a large bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder, cumin, sugar, salt, and pepper. In a small bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, and butter. Whisk the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. Stir in zucchini and corn and cheese. mix well.

Fill the bottom of a skillet with about 1/2 inch of oil. Fry in batches, adding more oil as needed until fritters are puffy, crisp and golden brown, turning once. Remove to drain on paper towels.

Sweet Corn and Pistachio IceCream

Sweet Corn and Coconut Milk Popsicles

Sweet Corn Polenta with Eggplant Sauce

Sweet Corn and Zucchini Pie (savory)

Cucumber Salsa

On the Farm.

We are super happy to have Josh's dad and Rama's mom and dad visiting right now from Missouri and Texas! Projects that we were unable to get to suddenly are getting done! Things are getting fixed and cleaned up, rye is being harvested, and the kids are having a ball. We really wished we all lived closer. Farming with family makes so much sense. Someday they will realize how much nicer Wisconsin is during the summer than Missouri or Texas and our dreams of intergenerational farming will come true!

Don't forget August 22 is a farm party here at Turnip Rock. We will be eating as much watermelon as we can handle, climbing on hay bales and tractors, you-pick cherry tomato all you can eat buffet, cows, calves, sheep, pigs, chickens, and lots of FUN! We will be grilling and we will have a potluck. There may be an optional work time before hand if we can get it set up in time. Come out starting at 3 and we will plan on eating at 5 or 6. Come see where your food is coming from and meet your farmers! We really love meeting our members and we hope to see you!

Next week... watermelons!