(CSA Newsletter: Week 25)
- Cauliflower OR Summer squash — Your choice between a head of tasty cauliflower or several delicious summer squash or zucchini. Both are delicious raw, roasted, or added to stewed curry vegetable dishes!
- Fava beans — We discovered a tasty new way to eat fava beans for breakfast! Peel down to the inner green bean and then roast whole in a pan with chopped cauliflower. Salt to taste, serve on a plate, and top with fried eggs. What a treat! (Would also be good at other meals too, of course.)
- Lettuce — Cool off with a big green salad for dinner this week.
- Caribe potatoes — New potatoes!!!!!! After a winter without many potatoes, we are excited to give out delicious Caribe potatoes for your July potato salads (or whatever else you want to eat). These are beautiful potatoes with a bright purple outer skin and smooth white flesh inside.
- Salad turnips — The spring standard, just a little bit later in the year. These are most delicious raw, chopped onto salads or sliced and dipped in ranch (or your favorite dip of choice). The greens are tender enough to add chopped to salads as well!
- Carrots — Do we really need to give any suggestions here? Probably not! Eat them!
- Beets — Try the beet salad recipe included in this week’s newsletter.
- Sweet onion — Delicious raw or cooked!
What is July? … July is a time for a breather on the farm as we rest between the spring planting and the fall harvests … a time to go hiking in the Mount Jefferson Wilderness Area … a time to sweat … a time for potato salad and hambugers (or bean burgers) … a time to sit in the shade … a time to weed … a time to plant fall cabbages and broccoli … a time to sow fall kale … a time to marvel at the growth in the fields … a time to go swimming in the river … a time for babies to be naked … a time to eat salad for dinner … a time to wake up early and enjoy the cool mornings … a time to wear sandals and shorts … a time when it feels like time stands still and winter feels impossible … a time to forget being cold … a time to feel lazy … a time to work hard … a time to watch the sweet corn grow … a time to go to market … a time to anxiously await blackberry season … a time to can and freeze and put up foods … a time to be.
Enjoy this week’s vegetables!
Your farmers, Katie & Casey Kulla
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What does a farm baby eat?
Answer: Good stuff! Since I’m always writing about the yummy things that Casey and I eat on the farm, I thought I’d take a moment this week to talk about our son Rusty’s diet so far.
Up until very recently, Rusty has had a diet of all breastmilk, all the time. And, now that Rusty is older than six months, we’ve begun exploring solid foods too!
But, we’ve skipped making Rusty purees and have been introducing solids by the philosophy called “Baby Led Solids” or “Baby Led Weaning.” The idea is that babies over six months can feed themselves real food.
Although these early explorations in food don’t actually result in much nutrition (99% of the food usually ending everywhere except baby’s tummy), the self feeding process teaches them extraordinary things: fine motor skills, how different foods taste or feel on the tongue, how to chew and swallow, etc. Food is cut into baby-sized pieces (usually long strips that are easy to hold rather than small bite sized pieces that pose choking hazards and are hard to pick up).
Obviously the baby needs to be ready and willing, however. When we first starting trying giving Rusty real foods at the six-month mark, he was excited but not quite ready. He gagged anytime food actually got into his mouth. Even when it wasn’t far in (we could still see it on his tongue), he would gag in an attempt to get it back out, and sometimes this was dramatic enough to be disturbing to us. This wasn’t life threatening (gagging is not the same as choking), and Rusty didn’t seem disturbed, but after a few tries we decided to wait longer before doing more foods.
So, he continued breastfeeding and chewing on spoons at the dinner table. But now at seven and a half months old, Rusty has shown a renewed interest in Mama and Papa’s food, so we’ve begun giving him his own unsalted portion of whatever we’re eating: curry cauliflower, hamburger, sourdough bread, cole slaw, fresh ripe blackberries.
The difference in his ability to feed himself now is amazing! Obviously, the softer foods like cooked cauliflower have a better chance of getting swallowed, but Rusty has clearly enjoyed tasting all of them and has good enough control over his tongue and hands that he keeps the food in the front of his mouth where he can “chew” it without gagging. Still, most of it is coming back out after a thorough tasting session, but we have proof that some of it is getting down (I will spare you the details of the evidence, however).
We’re excited about this new phase of Rusty’s eating life. He’ll continue to get most of his calories and nutrients from breastmilk for the next few months as he slowly eats more and more food each day. While I hope to continue breastfeeding through two years, it’s wonderful knowing that Rusty is learning to feed himself and enjoy good quality foods. The only things we’re avoiding for now are foods that pose a clear choking hazard (nuts, popcorn), foods that are unnecessary (such as cow’s milk), any added salts, and foods that pose known risks for young babies (such as honey).
In the end, who knows what sorts of foods he’ll end up preferring, but at our table he’ll be exposed to a wide range of vegetables (of course) and local meats, cheeses, breads, and other yummy stuff. We’ll keep you posted on his favorites as we go, but so far cauliflower seems to top the list!
And, absolutely the best part of the experience is how much fun Rusty has been having and how easy it is for us. There are no fights about getting a spoon in his mouth or trying to figure out whether he’s had enough — he determines everything, and gets to experiment with being in control of his own body (a unique experience for a baby).
You can find out more information about the Baby Led Weaning concept at: http://www.rapleyweaning.com/.
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CSA Potluck on Sat, August 21!
Our next on-farm CSA event is coming up. Hope you can join us! Save the date now! (More details will come soon.)
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Wear a Grand Island t-shirt!
Want to publicly support the Grand Island quarry fight? Consider buying and wearing a Protect Grand Island t-shirt. We’ll be selling them at the pick-up for $10 each. If we don’t have the size you need at the time, let us know and we can bring it the following week.
