Turnip Rock Farm plans for 2024

We want to give an update for our farm plans for 2024! For those that missed the announcement, scroll down to previous blog posts letting folks know that after 14 years, 2023 was our last season of CSA boxes! We are still farming, but not delivering CSA shares. Cosmic Wheel Creamery will be at Mill City Farmers Market every other Saturday and Turnip Rock Farm will be at St. Croix Falls Farmers Market on Saturdays. We will have our online farm stand open for orders of meat and cheese for pickup at The Good Acre during the Summer.

For our local folks and anyone that wants a little day trip, we will continue to have our farm store open and stocked with veggies, meat, and cheese Thursday, Friday, and Saturday from 12-6 from May-October. We hope you will come and shop at the farm! We will also be hosting Sunday Sundaes on the farm once a month and invite everyone to come out to those events for soft serve sundaes and our farm store being open! More details and dates will be available soon!

We have had some inquiries from former CSA members about finding a new farm CSA since Turnip Rock won’t be providing CSA shares this season.

We know that too often when a farm decides to shift away from CSA, some members decide not to continue signing up for a CSA share, but we really encourage you to look into these farms for the 2024 season as a way to directly support the success of small family farms and get the freshest produce in return! Here’s a list with links of some of our neighbors who we can personally vouch for the amazingness of their veggies and farming practices!

Whetstone Farm is very nearby to Turnip Rock Farm. They rotationally graze sheep and beef cows and have lots of opportunities for you to visit the farm each year with monthly community meals and a big harvest party each season. They offer small and large shares and they will be partnering with Cosmic Wheel Creamery to offer a bi-weekly cheese share that can be delivered with your veggie CSA! They do an amazing job with their veggies and have many dropsides that are nearby or the same as our Turnip Rock Sites: Delivery day is Thursday:

River Market, Stillwater

Farrell’s Gym, Selby Ave St. Paul

St. Anthony/Prospect Park neighborhood, St. Paul

Seward Coop, Franklin Store, Minneapolis

Butter Bakery and Cafe, Minneapolis

Lakewinds, Richfield

NE Minneapolis (Site TBA)

Racing Heart Farm is another stellar Western WI farm that serves the twin cities with both large and small Certified Organic veggie CSA shares. They are planning on partnering with Cosmic Wheel Creamery to offer a monthly cheese CSA! They have drop sites at several coops in Minneapolis, St. Paul, and Richfield on Wednesdays.

Growing Lots is another amazing CSA delivering on Tuesdays to both Seward locations. They will be offering a monthly Cosmic Wheel Cheese Share also!

The Good Acre is another great option! This is where Farmer Josh is working now as the Director of Grower Support. Signing up for a Good Acre CSA share helps to support many small family farms, many of them being immigrant or beginning farmers. Good Acre offers add-ons including cheese and has several drop sites throughout the metro area.

Threshing Table Farm in Star Prarie WI offers weekly and bi-weekly CSA shares with drop sites in western WI and at the Rivermarket Coop. They also offer a bi-weekly Cosmic Wheel Creamery Cheese share.

Sweet Top Farm in Amery, WI offers weekly and bi-weekly CSA shares with a monthly Cosmic Wheel Creamery Cheese Share add-on. Dropsites are in Western WI and also in Woodbury on Wednesdays.

We are so grateful to everyone who reached out with thanks and well wishes as we make out move to the next iteration of the farm. We hope that you all will continue to join us in our efforts to localize and diversify our food system!

Please let us know if you have any questions!

THANK YOU AGAIN FOR ALL THE YEARS OF SUPPORT!

P.S. If you are able to, please contribute to the Lucy Laney Kids at the Farm day that we will be hosting again this Spring!

Turnip Rock FarmerComment
Week 20; Final CSA delivery! October 19, 2023

What’s in the box?

Notes on the box.

cosmic Wheel Creamery cheese shares.

Finishing off the season with some beautiful fresh ricotta and Deneb, our gouda-ish cheese. Perfect combo for either a spinach or butternut squash lasagna! If you can’t get enough of our cheese and want to get some during the Winter, you can find us at the Winter Mill City Markets as well as Neighborhood Roots Markets at the Bachmans greenhouse in south Minneapolis. We will also be at St. Croix Falls Winter markets. Then next summer, we will let you know which CSAs we will partner with that will offer Cosmic Wheel cheese as an add-on. We are also looking into some wholesale markets, so hopefully you will be able to find our cheese at some of the coops and specialty cheese shops in the area. If you have any favorites, let me know (and ask them to carry our cheese)!

recipes.

on the farm.

Our dear friends and CSA members! We are SO grateful for allowing us to be your CSA farmers! We have had a nice long run and been so happy to feed all of you! We want to say the biggest thank you and acknowledgment of all the incredible people that have worked on Turnip Rock Farm over the years, several have gone on to start their own farms or continue as farm workers or working in the food system or conservation in some capacity. The last 3 years having the incredible Magdalen and Alayna working with us has been an absolute delight. They are some of the most dedicated people that have taken so much pride and showed so much appreciation for the land and animals and joy in the work that they do! Farm work can be tedious and challenging and it takes A TON of perseverance and resilience. Especially in the heat and smoky conditions that so much of this past season dealt. Magdalen and Alayna showed up fully every day and put everything into their work. They are truly THE BEST! None of the food that we eat would be possible without the efforts of farm workers! Please always think of the people doing the hands on work to grow your food! We are all dependent on their hard work and well being!

We will soon be switching over to Winter deliveries of storage veggies, meat, and cheese. And next growing season we will still be growing a little something and I’m sure we will send you an update on how you can still get some food grown on our farm. We will also be happy to suggest a CSA farm for you for the 2024 season. So much love, gratitude, thanks, and big feelings happening over here right now. We are welcoming change and still committed to caring for this land and working on re-localizing our food system!

Thanks to all of you, again! Cheers!


Turnip Rock FarmerComment
Week 19; October 12, 2023

What’s in the box?

Notes on the box.

Cosmic Wheel Creamery Cheese Shares.

Feta! So great with so many different veggies. Especially the spinach. Yum! And for the aged cheese, Lyra which has a wine washed rind. I really love how this batch turned out. Hope you enjoy it, too!

Recipes.

Balsamic Brussels Sprouts with Feta

Roasted Beet Salad with Beet Greens and Feta

Maple Sage Carrots

Roasted Butternut Squash with Sage and Brown Butter

Spinach Apple Radish Salad

On the Farm.

Just one more week of CSA deliveries after this! We will be opening our online farm stand for deliveries in November so you can get some local veggies and cheese and meat for holiday feasts!

I’m reposting our announcement from last week for those that missed it. A big thank you to those who’ve reached out with kind words! We appreciate you all so very much!

I want to celebrate the fact we have been supported by our community of eaters for almost 20 years with some of you! And 14 years from the start of Turnip Rock Farm. We’ve had an amazing run with the CSA! Years of abundance and joyful growing as well as some losses and strife, but much more of the former than the latter. We’ve been helped by so many amazing farm workers and fed SO MANY incredible people! CSA is a fantastic model that has made our farming possible and we truly believe it is one of the very best ways for small farms to make a living. That said, we are feeling like it’s time for us to change course. I (Josh) have taken on a role at the largest food hub in MN- The Good Acre, as the Director of Grower Support - I’ll be using my 20 years of experience growing vegetables to help other farmers find stability and success on their own farms, and helping direct a food hub organization in what real equity and market access can look like. On our farm, we will continue to make the best 100% grass-fed cheese we know how- by hand, seasonally, with nature, and from our small herd of cows. We will be more paired down in our vegetable offerings and less extensive in our delivery range. But we do wish to continue to grow food for you, work with other farmers, and come up with better models that fit your needs. We are still imagining what next season will look like, but there will likely be a switch from a CSA model to something more similar to what we offer during the Wintertime. Bi-weekly or monthly online orders that can include meat, cheese, and some veggies. We will still sell cheese at farmers markets and have an on-farm store during the growing season. As we scale back our veggie growing, there may be space for beginning farmers hoping to have a go at growing to share some of the land and infrastructure that we have built over the years… There’s so many possibilities! We are still going to be growing food, soil, and caring for this piece of land that we love so much and are so fortunate to get to exist on! We have so much gratitude to all of you who have been with us for so many years! We have loved feeding you and your families and we hope to continue that going forward! More details will come as plans come together.

Change is constant, and so we roll with it. Please continue to support and know your local farmers!

Next Week

cabbage
kale
brussels sprouts
squash
onions
beets
carrots
leeks for some
spinach
parsley
turnips
radishes

Turnip Rock FarmerComment