(CSA Newsletter: Week 38)
Meet this week’s vegetables:
- Cauliflower
- ‘Savoy’ cabbage — ‘Savoy’ refers to the crinkly leaves. You can prepare these cabbages as you might any cabbage, except they are especially great with Asian flavors: ginger slaws, cabbage and carrot stir fries, etc.
- Sweet peppers
- Winter squash & pie pumpkins — Your choice of two from a mix of winter squashes: butternut, “Ambercup” (the tasty red-skinned, orange fleshed squash), pie pumpkins (great for making chocolate chip pumpkin bread!), and the last of this year’s Delicata.
- Carrots — This variety, “Napoli,” is just simply the best. Fall calls for new ways of eating carrots: roasted, in soups, and in slaws!
- Leeks — Use in place of onions in any dish!
- Garlic
We’re quickly closing in on the end of our 2010 season — our last pick-up of this year is on December 14, leaving only seven more weeks of this year’s veggies!
As we come to the end of our fifth CSA season, I’m realizing that — WOW — we’ve actually been at this work for a while now! While we’re still young(ish), we’re no longer brand-spanking new farmers. With almost a full five seasons under our belt, we’ve gained a lot experience. Clearly, we always have more to learn, but five seasons gives us vastly more experience than we had before we began farming on our own back in 2006!
I also recently was sorting through our iPhoto library of photos from 2006 to today and was reminded of so many fun (and sometimes crazy!) events in our farming career so far. I thought that it would be fun this week to remember some of the highlights and lowlights with you as sort of a “flashback” newsletter. Not surprisingly, many of our ‘best’ farming stories are about extreme weather, but I’ll try to bring up other topics too. Some of you old-timers will remember many of these events/situations, and the newer CSA members will probably be hearing these stories for the first time.
So, do you remember …
… when we first started our CSA in mid-June of 2006? The first few shares were small and not the greatest quality — lots of bug holes in our Asian greens before we figured out the trick of row covering!
… when we had mandatory CSA work days in 2006? Those workdays were a surprisingly fun way to get to know all of you and introduce you to our farm, but they eventually became burdensome to organize and schedule (which is why they were only a part of our first season). We sure did get a lot of weeding done while they lasted!
… when it got dark in the fall of 2006, and our outdoor on-farm pick-up site at Seven Spoke suddenly became very dark? We strung Christmas lights from the rafters of our little makeshift shed to help you all see the veggies, but between the darkness and the mud it was not very welcoming!
… when it snowed in November of 2006, and we had to use a push broom to sweep snow off the kale before harvesting? We still managed to supply a full (and finally more substantial) share that week!
… when we moved into our newly built house on our new land in early 2007? Finally, we owned land and were living on it! Farming took on a completely new meaning (and new joy) once we could wake up, eat breakfast and then walk outside to start work.
… when we starting farming on our new land in 2007 and suddenly all the vegetables got bigger?! That was also the year we gave out two bunches of big beautiful carrots every week for several months! We were quickly in love with our Grand Island farm!
… when we almost ran out of water in 2007 because we were still using the surface water right and hadn’t gotten our ground water rights yet? We had to move our surface pump mid-September to a deeper spot on the slough and cross our fingers. We made it through the end of the summer okay, but some of our plantings were severely drought-stressed that year.
… when the biggest storm since the Columbus Day storm swept through Oregon in November 2007? We harvested early for the CSA and then hunkered down in our house for three days of driving rain and extremely strong winds. Among the ‘exciting’ events of the storm: our small starts greenhouse was blown apart in the middle of the night, and our kitten Mokum was blown off our second-story landing (and survived!).
… when we offered our first winter CSA season in 2008? There were 64 of you brave hardy households who paid to be a part of a grand experiment in seasonal eating. That year worked out better than we expected (we discovered the joys of every kind of rapini!), but there were also more mustard greens than probably any of us wanted to eat.
… when our irrigation well broke mid-summer in 2008? We were left with just our small surface pump as we scrambled to put in another new well as quickly as possible! We received so many kind words, gifts, and supportive messages after that truly stressful fiasco.
… when we drove our final CSA share of 2008 to town with chains on our box truck tires? Only about half of our CSA members managed to make it to the food bank warehouse for pick-up that week, thanks to ‘Snow-pacoplypse’ of 2008. We made it back home again and then watched the snow fall and fall over the next few days, threatening to crush our greenhouses (the ones we built to replace the one destroyed in the 2007 wind storm).
… when we planted our fruit orchard in early 2009? We harvested several bins of apples this late summer and fall — enough for our household, but someday they will be big trees producing enough apples, pears and plums for the CSA too!
… when we finally hired employees/interns in 2009? Daniel and Erika were extra friendly faces at the CSA pick-up for most of that year, helping to weigh out veggies, offer cooking suggestions, and answer your questions.
… when we lost most of our tender spring greens in the freak hail/wind storm on June 4, 2009? That storm was one of the more dramatic weather events we have ever lived through — it was brief but furious. The winds also tore apart our tomato greenhouse (which was full of tomatoes and peppers), and the hail left marring divots in many crops and caused extra disease all summer long.
… when we had a week-long heat wave in 2009 with highs up to 107°? We couldn’t do much on the farm then, except to move irrigation, cross our fingers, and hope for the best. Ultimately, the farm came through ok, thanks to the plentiful water produced by our new well! But, we sure were hot while the heat lasted!
… when we grew and cleaned our first vegetable seed crops in 2009? That year, we grew Castelfranco chicory and Brilliant celery root seed.
… when we missed our first and only CSA pick-up on the last week of our 2009 season? We had a very good (non-weather related) reason: our son Rusty was born that week! He arrived on the farm on a record-cold night. It was 7° outside as Rusty was born in our bedroom. Although we weren’t thinking about it much at the time, that extended cold spell left some major damage in the field and led to us re-think how we prepare for the winter season CSA harvests.
… when our farm got flooded in mid June this year? We had just planted the last of our summer crops and were looking forward to warming, drying trends. Instead, massive rainfall caused the Willamette to swell and flood the edge of our land, including our freshly planted winter squash (and a bigger portion of our employee Jeff’s farm on our land).
… when we managed to harvest delicious red ripe tomatoes this year, in spite of a terrible (and very odd) growing season? Our new greenhouse (to replace the one last year’s storm destroyed) was the key! Our tomatoes were under cover all season long, through all the cold dry summer months and then the strangely warm and wet early fall months.
… when our fall pumpkin patch open house this weekend was an especially cold, windy, rainy (and fun!) event? (Thanks to everyone who braved the weather! It was our best attended open house of the year!)
… and, what’s next? We’ll see! I imagine we’ll have more extreme weather to add to the list of stories, but hopefully there will also be more fun stories in the future too — more successes, more friends, and more delicious vegetable memories! Thanks to everyone for being a part of our first five seasons! We hope you’ll join us for 2011 (sign-up info in last week’s newsletter). Enjoy this week’s vegetables!
Your farmers, Katie & Casey Kulla
