echnical difficulties are making getting photos on the blog impossible right now. I hope to update soon once I figure out what is going on!

What’s in the Box?

Napa Cabbage (Large and Medium)
Lettuce
Carrots
Cucumber
Zucchini/ Summer Squash
Fennel
Hakuri Turnips
Radishes (Meduim and Large Shares)
Red Onions (Medium and Large Shares)

Notes on the box.

Small shares got either two lettuce or a lettuce and a napa cabbage.
Fennel is a new vegetable this week and might be new to you. It has a nice anise flavor. It can be sliced thinly and eaten raw in salads or it can be roasted. More details about fennel here! Otto likes to make a salad with sliced cucumbers, cabbage, thinly sliced fennel, and fennel leaves. I like to make a quick pickle with the fronds. Recipe Below.
Summer has started with the beginning of the squash and cucumbers! More will come in the following weeks.

Cosmic Wheel Creamery Cheese Shares.

Fresh, whole-milk Ricotta and Cygnus, our swiss-style cheese. Ricotta is usually made from the whey from cheese making. Our whole-milk ricotta is thicker and more rich than whey ricotta. It’s a personal favorite of mine and I hope you enjoy it, too! I’ve included a hefty pint so you have enough to enjoy in a couple of meals. I encourage you to try some fresh on a nice piece of toasted bread with a drizzle of good olive oil and some salt and pepper. You can also go sweet with it. There’s a lot of recipes for ricotta cakes and pancakes and other sweet treats. Just remember that this ricotta isn’t as liquid as a lot that you might get at the store, so you might have to adjust baking recipes by stirring in a little milk or whey if you have it.
The Cygnus is a swiss-style cheese. I can’t get those nice big holes in our swiss. That requires different aging rooms with different temperatures, but the flavor is nice! I hope you enjoy it!

Recipes.

Carmelized Carrots and Fennel with Ricotta and Walnuts

Roasted Fennel

1. Preheat your oven to 425.

2. Remove the fronds and core from the fennel bulb and roughly chop.

3. Toss the chopped fennel with 2 T extra virgin olive oil, sprinkle with salt and freshly ground pepper.

4. Place the fennel on a baking sheet and roast for 30 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes or so to ensure the fennel does not burn.

You can add lemon zest and juice and put this on just about anything! Including the recipe below!

Lemon Ricotta Pasta with Zucchini, Summer Squash, Roasted Fennel, or Greens

• Spring Onions and/or garlic scapes, Sliced

• Olive oil, as needed

• 1/3 cup ricotta cheese

• 2 tablespoons or more Parmesan or another gratable, flavorful cheese such as CWC Antares

• Zest and juice from 1/2 lemon

• 1/4 teaspoon salt, to taste

• 1 pinch dried red pepper flakes

• veggies of your choice

1. Boil pasta in well salted water. Drain and set aside, retaining about 1 cup of liquid from cooking the noodles.

2. Saute onion in olive oil. Add zucchini, summer squash, or greens such as kale or chard and cook until tender. OR

3. Roast fennel as above recipe

4. Combine the ricotta and Parmesan in a small bowl, and add the lemon zest and juice, salt, and red pepper flakes. Add to the veggie mixture in the saute pan and mix well.

5. Add cooked pasta and some of the pasta water as needed.

On the Farm.

We got 6 inches of water in 2 days. That’s a lot! I mean, it was really dry, but the water came faster than the ground could absorb. This is a perfect recipe for erosion. We would have lost a lot of soil and veggies if we hadn’t changed to low/no-till, raised beds, and using landscaping fabric to grow our veggies.
We are watching the broccoli and scratching our heads about what’s taking so long. We hoped it would be ready this week, but maybe next week…

Next Week.

lettuce
beets
cillantro
fennel
squash
cucumbers
cabbage?
broccoli?

What’s in the box?

Spinach
Arugula
Head Lettuce
Napa Cabbage
Green top Carrots
Radish
Green Onion

Notes on the box.

It’s still pretty green and leafy, but the summer crops are growing beautifully.
Napa Cabbage makes an amazing Summer slaw or great in a stir fry.
Remove tops from green-top carrots as soon as you get them home so the carrots stay crunchy. The greens are edible and can be made into a pesto. Give them a taste to see how you like the flavor. After a winter of storage carrots, these are really exceptionally tasty!
Remove tops from radishes, also. The radish tops are edible and can be used along with your arugula. They are both a little bit spicy greens.

Napa Cabbage

Red Romaine

Spinach and Arugula

Cosmic Wheel Creamery Cheese Shares.

Deneb is our gouda style of cheese, but it has a natural, uncoated rind. It’s good for snacking or making a quick cheese plate when you don’t want to cook dinner. Include sliced radishes, cured meat or fish if you have some, nuts, fruit or jam, and crackers.
Our cows milk feta is really good on a pizza or flatbread. Or in a Spinach Feta omelette. If you want to save it for longer than a week, you can make a brine to store it in. Mix 2 tsp salt into 2 cups of water and keep it that way in the fridge.

Recipes.

Quick Fridge Pickled Radishes

Lemony White Bean and Arugula Salad

Arugula Pesto

Carrot Green Chimichurri

Crunchy Napa Cabbage Salad

On the Farm.

It was brought to our attention last week that some of the bagged greens went bad right away. We are really sorry that that made it into the shares. Our cooler went out on Tuesday and when we checked the greens on Wednesday before packing boxes we believed them to be alright. We got the cooler fixed and delivered boxes on Thursday, but when we opened ours in for dinner on Friday we were sad to see the state of them and a CSA member alerted us that theirs was already in rough shape, too. We wanted to let you know what happened and hope that if you got a bag of greens that were already turning, that’s what happened. Cooler is back up and running and things are back to being fresh and beautiful in the boxes.
It’s still pretty leafy out there! But we have some summer crops that are growing along beautifully. Cucumbers and Summer Squash will be here before you know it.

harvest time!

extra help from our friends at Steady Hand Farm

Crown Princesses of LettuceLand

Our buddy Watler on quality control tasting lettuce during harvest.

Next Week

lettuce
carrots
napa
radishes
garlic scapes
possibly strawberries?
cucumbers?
summer squash?

What’s in the box?

head lettuces
herb pot
dill
bagged spinach or arugula
radishes
bok choy
green onions
rhubarb
red kale
bagged salad mix

Notes on the box.

Another box with lots of green leafy things! Salads are the star at this time of year. Favorite quick dinners in our house include protein of choice cooked in the broiler with a big big salad and a “cheezy face” (bread with cheese melted on top), or a grain as a side.
Use Dill and herbs from your herb pot to make an herby dressing for salad greens.
Remove the tops from the Radishes for longer storage. Radish tops are edible and can used as you would arugula.
Rhubarb was grown at our friends at Sleepy Root Farm. You can cook it down with some sugar on the stovetop and make a topping for waffles, pancakes, or icecream. Or you can make a nice dessert like a tart or a cake!
All green leafy veggies will store best in an open plastic bag in your fridge.

Cosmic Wheel Creamery Cheese Shares

Fresh Cheese Curds! A favorite snack. Let them come to room temp to get the squeak. If you don’t like the squeak, leave them in the fridge for a few days before you eat them.
Lyra is a recipe that I’ve been working on for a while now. This batch is really what I’m looking for with this cheese. I LOVE when it has the beautiful holes. I like to snack on it, but it’s also a great melter for a decadent grilled cheese. I hope you enjoy it!

Recipes

Lemon Dill Salad Dressing

• 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil

• juice from about 2 medium lemons

• 3 tablespoon finely chopped fresh dill

• 2 teaspoon Dijon mustard

• 1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest

• 3/4 teaspoon kosher salt

• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

• 1/4 teaspoon granulated sugar or sweetner of your choice

• Place all ingredients except for the oil in a medium bowl and whisk to combine. Gradually drizzle in the oil while continually whisking until the mixture is emulsified. Add salt to taste. Keep refrigerated. You can also use an immersion blender for a fully emulsified dressing.

Greek Lamb Meatballs with Creamy Dill Dipping Sauce

Dill Roasted Radishes
1 pound radishes and/or salad turnips, trimmed and cleaned
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons chopped dill
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon black pepper

1. Preheat oven to 425.

2. Toss the radishes with the olive oil, dill, salt and pepper. Spread out on a baking sheet coated with aluminum foil coated with cooking spray.

3. Bake at 425 for 15 to 20 minutes or until the radishes are crisp tender.

Pistachio Rhubarb Yogurt Cake

On the Farm

Things are chugging away and moving quickly on the farm. We are seeing lots of grass wanting to grow everywhere due to some of the more mild temps and rains we’ve had. Not great in the garden, but really wonderful for the pastures! Lots of weeding and seeding and now harvesting, too. We are getting fall plantings in at this point! We hope that you are all staying safe and eating well. We are seeing little fruits on cucumbers, tomatoes, and summer squash. All of that will be here before you know it! Below the photos is a list of what to expect in the box next week. If you have recipes or pictures to share, email them to us. We love to have member contributions to the blog!

a big stack of hay that was loaded into the barn led to the discovery of this window that we didn’t know was there!

Hannah with a new addition to the farm, Mittens the kitten

quail and chicken chicks that Otto is raising

roses

family planting sunflowers wherever we can find space among the vegetables

looking good out here!

Maddy and Hannah - glamorous milkers headed to the barn

glorious garlic!

Next week…

head lettuce
Napa Cabbage
Radishes
Garlic Scapes ?
carrots!
zesty mix
baby kale
spinach