Full Share: Salad mix, sweet corn, green beans, sweet peppers, carrots, summer squash, sweet onions, tomatoes, eggplant, and basil.
Half Share: Same in smaller portions, minus the basil.
Hello CSA members!
The national weather service out of Missoula is referring to our current weather as Augtober. It certainly does have the feeling of fall out there at the moment, and our 35 degree low last night sure made for a chilly morning of harvest. That said, no frost yet, and if we can get through tonight, I think we’ll be in the clear for another week. Not that any of this is a huge concern at this point, as most of the remaining crops you will be receiving are either under ground or protected in hoop houses and high tunnels. And if you look in the greenhouse, which is rapidly filling up with garlic, onions, and winter squash, it does seem autumn is near.
The first batch of winter squash curing in the greenhouse
This week marks the end of sweet corn season, and I think our transplanting experiment has proven a huge success. We only did only planting of corn, and this is week 3 of harvest, so you may find that some of the ears are stubby, but that’s what’s left out there and we figured it’s delicious.
You got a problem with stubby corn?!
While the sweet corn was really early this season, the green beans were late, with today being the first big harvest. It’s a soul sucking process to hand pick that many green beans, and we will not be specializing in them any time soon. Look at is this way, today all 5 of us on the farm worked a 12 hour day, which equals 60 hours of labor. Of that, 19 hours were spent picking beans. And I didn’t partake, so that means everyone else spent at least 4 hours in the bean patch. What is a farmer willing to do to get out of picking beans…..well, for any of you who wonder what a typical day of harvest looks like for a Two Bear Farmer, here’s my tally: One tub of salad mix, 70 pounds of cherry tomatoes, 700 carrots ~ lunch~ 560 more carrots, 150 sweet onions, and 700 ears of corn.
Rebecca wanted to give you a reprieve from eggplant this week, but it looks great and we have lot it, so I added it back in. Since I’ll be handing out shares this week, feel free to direct your ire in my direction if necessary 🙂
Here are a few recipes to help with this weeks bounty:
Gluten Free corn fritters : I would use my basil instead of coriander
http://www.thehealthychef.com/2014/02/gluten-free-sweetcorn-fritters/
Sweet corn pancakes:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Fresh-Corn-Pancakes-354171
9 really excellent Eggplant recipes:
http://paleogrubs.com/eggplant-recipes
Have a great week! Todd, Rebecca and Team Two Bear Farm
