Week 9; August 4, 2016

What's in the box? 

Sweet Corn! 
New Potatoes
Broccoli
Bell Peppers
Zucchini/ Summer Squash
Tomatoes!
head lettuce
carrots
sweet onions
 

Notes on the box.

Nice box of Summer favorites! 
Remove tops from carrots before storing.  These guys got pretty big.  Nice for cutting up and dipping into hummus or grating for salad or carrots cake.  Some shares got purple carrots, but we had pretty poor gemination on them, so there weren't enough for all. 
Sweet corn should be stored in the husk in your fridge.  The sooner you eat it, the better!  The sugars start to turn to starch after it's picked, so eat soon for the best flavor. 
Sweet onions are not cured and should be kept in your fridge.  They are so nice and mild.  Perfect for potato salad, piled onto hamburgers or BLTs, or if you are Otto or Sadie, you can eat the whole thing like an apple! 
Store tomatoes with stem side facing down on your counter.  The flavor and texture changes if you store them in the fridge, so we suggest storing on your counter.  If you don't get to some of them and they start getting too ripe, I will usually put those tomatoes in the fridge and use them for cooking. 
 

Cosmic Wheel Creamery Cheese Shares.

Fresh cheese curds!  Perfect snack for a hot day.  Or you can add them to salads or put some into a soup at the end as a nice cheesy garnish.  Or go classic and fry em up!  To get the squeak back, let them warm up. 
Moonglow is our alpine style cheese.  It's so beautiful and golden.  Nice for cooking, but also wonderful on its own. 

Recipes.

Liberty's Carrot Salad
fresh carrots grated (about a pound)
1 handful finely chopped parsley (or carrot tops)
1/2 sweet onion finely chopped
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
2-3 pinches Red pepper flakes
salt and freshly ground pepper to taste Kosher or coarse sea salt

Herbed Pasta with Sauteed Summer Vegetables
Dice sweet onion, bell peppers, and summer squash or zucchini and sautee in butter until tender in an oven safe pan.  Once tender, top veggies with cheese of your choice (cheese curds, mozzarella, grated cheese) and put in broiler until cheese is melted and slightly browned.
While your veggies are cooking, make your pasta.  Put a handful of herbs of your choice (basil, parsley, oregano, mint) into food processor or blender with one clove garlic, some olive oil, lemon juice, and a little salt.  Puree.  Mix blended herbs into warm pasta.  Put veggies on top of the pasta. 

Tonight's dinner here at the farm. The Moonglow cheese is going to be really nice with it!   Summer Squash Pizza from Smitten Kitchen

Grilled Corn and Cheddar Quinoa Salad

 

On the Farm

Today is the first delivery of meat for our Eat Like a Farmer and meat share members.  Your Meat Share is in a large box with an insulated box liner.  Feel free to bring the whole box home, but please bring it back to your drop site next week so that we can pick it up and reuse it.  The box liners aren't cheap! 
Try to pick up your meat share ASAP after we drop it off and send the email to get it into the freezer.  Please email or call if you have any questions or issues. 
The chicken in the shares are a slower growing and more flavorful breed called Freedom Rangers or French Rangers.  They are great foragers and have much fewer health issues than the standard chicken which is called a Cornish Cross.  The freedom rangers don't have the giant breast and they grow quite a bit slower, but the flavor is quite a bit better.  I suggest roasting at least one of them as simply as possible with just some garlic, lemon, salt and pepper and butter or oil rubbed on the skin so that you can enjoy the flavor of this type of chicken.  We hope you enjoy the first meat delivery!  The next one will be pork in late October. 

Next weeks boxes will have more of the same sorts of summer goodness.  No lettuce or carrots next week, though.  But beets will be included and and maybe melons will be ripe!
 

Week 8; July 28, 2016

What's in the box? 

broccoli
red long onions
cucumber
lettuce
new potatoes
first of the tomatoes! (medium and large)
hakuri turnips
green bell peppers
summer squash/zucchini
carrots
garlic
 

Notes on the box.

Please note:  all veggies are hydro-cooled and rinsed, but we suggest doing a final wash at home before eating to remove any remaining dirt. 

We always look forward to the first BLT week!  Here it is!!  We are enjoying veggie sandwiches multiple times per week at this point in the season.  Piled high with cucumber, onion, lettuce, tomato, and peppers and some cheese!  Or fajitas with onion, peppers, and zucchini and summer squash and beans! 

Remove tops from carrots and turnips for longer storage. 
New potatoes and garlic are both not cured, so they won't store for as long as the ones you typically get from the store.  Try to use them within a week or two.  Store them out of the fridge.
The very first of the tomatoes are coming ripe!  Store them on your counter with the stem side facing down.  If you cut into one but don't use the whole thing, move it to the fridge. 
Red long onions should be stored in your fridge.  You can use them raw or cooked. 

Cosmic Wheel Creamery Cheese Share.

Quark flavored with Basil, Garlic, and Nasturtium flowers!  A little taste of summer for nice sandwich or wrap spread.  Or just spread right onto crackers. 
Vega is a nice snacking cheese.  It's a good melter, too.  I hope that you enjoy it.  It's one of my personal favorites! 

Recipes.

Broccoli Quinoa Salad with Butterilk Dressing from Bon Appetit

Zucchini Flan from NYT

Chocolate Zucchini Cake in case you are feeling too healthy

Grandma Sara's Summer Mush - I know this doesn't sound so great, but I don't know what else to call it and it tastes so yummy!  It's how my grandma used to cook squash from the garden at her home in South East Texas.  Slice summer squash and zucchini (more than you think you'll need because you will cook it down) and dice onions.  Put a nice sized knob of butter or bacon fat (or other fat) in a pan and add the onions.  Saute until translucent.  Add Squash/zukes and cook down, stirring, until they become a kind of mush.  Salt to taste.  You can fancy it up by adding some fresh thyme or other fresh herbs if you like.  Serve with biscuits or rice and hot sauce or red pepper.

On the farm.

Okay, we've had enough rain for a bit here.  The melons and tomatoes really don't like it!  It's supposed to get pretty warm again, but not as humid, which will be nice for those Summer crops that often get taken out quickly by foliar disease brought on by too much dampness.  Speaking of summer crops, looks like Sweet Corn will be coming next week! 

Hey!  Are you looking for something fun to do not too far from the city, but want to get out of town?  A to Z Produce and Bakery (AKA Pizza Farm) is in Stockholm, WI and is one of the very first places that began doing Pizza on the Farm.  Their pizza features wheat, veggies, and meat from their farm and Cosmic Wheel Creamery mozzarella from our farm!  We've had a farm crush on the A to Z farm for a long time.  This week I delivered their cheese myself when the delivery service didn't pick-up and was so glad I had an excuse to make the drive down there!  I was treated to some breakfast pizza, fresh peaches from a peach tree on their farm !!! and had some nice laughs with the farmers there.  I really recommend you visit.  Bring a picnic blanket, some plates, make a salad to bring to go with your pizza, and get ready to relax and enjoy a beautiful atmosphere and see an amazingly beautiful farm.  Check it out!  Tuesday evenings 4:30-8 PM though October. 

CSA members, we just need to tell you that we love you and appreciate you so much.  Thank you for letting us be your farmers!  This time of year is lovingly referred to as "the heart of darkness" by CSA farmers.  We are weeding like crazy, harvesting, planting, and sweating.  We often feel pretty run down and stressed out at this point, but we are so grateful to be able to do this work without the added stress of trying to find markets for produce that is already grown.  The CSA model is why we are here and why we are able to do this work that we love.  Thank you for letting us do this work!  This article by the New York Times has the local CSA farming community abuzz and feeling a lot of gratitude for those of you that stick with and understand and support the true meaning of CSA.  Take a moment to read it if you have the time! 

Week 7; July 21, 2016

What's in the box? 

New Potatoes
Carrots (medium and large)
beets (small)
green bell peppers
head lettuce
red spring onions
cucumber
summer squash/ zucchini
fresh garlic
broccoli

Notes on the box.

New this week is New Potatoes and bell peppers.  The new potatoes can be stored on your counter.  The skin is very thin and fragile and they should be eaten sooner than later.  If you store them in the fridge for very long the starches will convert to sugars and they will taste sweet, so we suggest storing them on the counter and eating them soon as you can.  Perfect weather for potato salad! Or they are really wonderful roasted. 
Bell peppers should be stored in your crisper.  They are great in stir fry with carrots, onions, and summer squash.  Or chopped into salad or dipped into your favorite veggie dip. 

Cosmic Wheel Creamery Cheese Shares.

This week we have an aged cheese called Draco.  It's a grana style meaning it's meant for grating.  It's not a good melter, but is nice on top of pasta or grated onto a salad.  We also have some nice whole milk Ricotta.  I'm including a link to a recipe for a zucchini ricotta galette that I highly recommend if you have the time for it! 

 

Recipes.

Zucchini and Ricotta Galette from Smitten Kitchen

Homemade Ranch Dressing Recipe

Broccoli Slaw from Smitten Kitchen

Steamed and Buttered New Potatoes with Herbs
Wash potatoes and cut into halves or quarters depending on size.  Steam for about 12 minutes or until they break apart when pierced with a fork.  Mix in a tablespoon or so of butter and chopped herbs of your choice (parsley is a classic).  Serve right away. 

On the Farm.

There were some serious storms last night that brought down some trees and had our power go out.  Thankfully it was back on by the time we had to milk the cows!  Your veggies would have been pretty late getting delivered if we would have had to milk all the cows by hand this morning! 

It was a wet and muddy week of harvest and today is a hot day!  So goes without saying that you should get your veggies as soon as possible and into the fridge.  Keep yourselves cool and hydrated.  And enjoy salads and some meals without turning on the stove! We are happy that this hot weather will be helping the summer crops ripen.  Tomatoes will be coming soon!