Meet this week’s Mac veggies:
(Photo!)
- Sweet corn — I’m pretty sure we’ve never received so many rave reviews about our corn before. It sure was good. Here’s the second (and final) batch of this summer. Enjoy!
- Hot peppers & green peppers — You can choose between some “Czech Black” hot peppers or green peppers (or take a few of each). The little red ones are hot and great for adding to salsa or chili. The green peppers are a perfect shape for blanching, cutting in half, stuffing with yummies, sprinkling with cheese, and then roasting until heated through (and browned on top).
- Sweet peppers — We gave out a sampling of sweet peppers at the George Fox Food Meet, and boy was it fun! First of all, people were a little taken a back by the offer of a free sweet pepper (free things are so rare these days — especially for fresh whole foods!), and then they were confused … a pepper? What should I do with a pepper? Eat it, we said!!!! And, then they did! And, wow, were people impressed by these peppers! Enjoy yours this week too!
- Tomatoes
- Chard
- Lettuce OR broccoli
- Red potatoes
- Summer squash
- Torpedo onions & garlic
For this week’s newsletter, I am sharing the text of a brief talk I gave Monday evening at George Fox’s “Food Meet”:
Good evening. I was asked to share brief thoughts tonight on the topic of “taking root in seasonal eating.” For context, my husband Casey and I are farmers here in Yamhill County. Since 2006, our farm has been providing vegetables to local eaters through our farm’s customers, harvesting year-round.
Because of this occupation, Casey and I naturally eat seasonally, and have done so since we first started working on a farm in Bellingham, Washington, back in 2004.
Eating seasonally right now, at the end of September, is easy. Almost every kind of vegetable is available for us to harvest: broccoli, lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, corn, potatoes, onions, carrots, and so much more. These are foods that Americans are quite familiar with.
But, as we move deeper into fall and then into winter, the picture of seasonal and local eating changes significantly, veering away from those standard American staples. I want to explore briefly what that means for us as eaters.
First of all, I want to note what seasonal eating is not — eating seasonally is not a form of self-imposed deprivation. Far from it.
In fact, I would say without a single doubt that eating seasonal vegetables enhances the eating experience on so many levels.
First of all, I bet that most supermarket shoppers find themselves buying the same fruits and vegetables every week, year-round. I know that pre-farm, my husband and I were in a serious produce rut, buying the same items every week: carrots, broccoli, onions, and apples.
Eating seasonally forces us out of our ruts and introduces diversity to our meals. As foods go out of season, they drop out of our meals, and new ones come in their place. While we are still enjoying fresh tomatoes today, in a few weeks, they will be done, and we will begin enjoying new vegetables: winter squash, beets, kale, Brussels sprouts, radicchio salads, etc.
Casey and I have had to learn how to prepare these cold season foods, since they are much less common in American diets today. But, we have learned to truly love all of them. I even once went so far as to write a sort of poem in honor of parsnips, a vegetable I felt had been neglected and was worthy of praise.
Seasonal eating also enhances our ability to savor foods. All of these vegetables, including the cold season ones, come and go from our diet over the year.
Eating a fresh tomato sandwich today, knowing that tomatoes will go away soon, causes me to be inherently more mindful — I find myself thinking more about the flavor and texture of each bite, savoring it while it lasts.
And, finally, with seasonal eating comes an increased level of connection to the natural world. It is so hard to remember our connectedness when consuming processed, non-seasonal foods, wrapped up in packaging, disconnected from the source.
In contrast, eating whole fresh, local vegetables necessarily connects us to the natural world in a simple, daily way.
Back when we first started farming and eating seasonally, it was in fall and winter that we felt the keenest and most significant change in our eating experiences. Yes, summer had felt fuller and more abundant than ever before as we hauled home boxes of tomatoes and lettuce, but the fall and winter felt richer, darker, and — for lack of a better word — cozier than we every imagined possible.
I can remember that first fall when we ate seasonally: Casey and me sitting at our kitchen table for dinner, while the rain beat against the window, completely dark already. On our plates were heaps of cabbage sautéed with caramelized onions and roasted potatoes and beets. As I dug into that sweet cabbage, I remember thinking that the food I was eating meant something to me — that it connected me to that rain on the window and the darkness and my partner with whom I had grown and harvested it.
Now, years later, that feeling hasn’t gone away. Casey and I now have a toddler son running around as we cook and eat dinner, and life on the farm can feel hectic and distracted. But, the food itself continually draws us back to our center and acts as a nourishing reminder of where we are in the year.
And, where we are today is approaching that darker time — a time of foods that fill our bellies and warm us when we come in from the cold rain. After savoring summer treats for the last few months, I welcome and look forward to the change in our diet, just as I take delight in the turning of the leaves and the sound of returning geese.
What a simple and powerful way to savor every moment of this brief life and its cycles!
Enjoy this week’s vegetables!
Your farmers, Katie & Casey Kulla
P.S. Thanks to everyone who has returned their survey so far. If you haven’t yet, we hope you will! It’s great to hear from you!
~ ~ ~
Final payments due Oct 1!
For those of you paying over the course of the season, your final payments are due by October 1. By this date, we need you to pay off your remaining balance. Make checks out to “Oakhill Organics” and bring to pick-up or mail to us: P.O. Box 1698, McMinnville, OR 97128. Here are the basic payment installments:
- Mac Medium share ~ $157
- Mac Large share ~ $243
- Mac Double Medium share ~ $304
- Newberg share ~ $180
Email me if you have any questions about your balance! farm (at) oakhillorganics (dot) org
