Month: September 2010

What’s in Upic?……

Flowers      Herbs         Cherry Tomatoes

Cabbage, cabbage, cabbage…Yes there is more cabbage this week. Hope fully not too many of you are cursing us humble farmers every time you open the fridge and see…cabbage. Here’s the reason we have had so many weeks of this hefty vegetable. The last week of August and the first week of September was the hottest and longest heat wave to span those days on the calendar in Maine history. This pushed our end of the season cabbage forward by many weeks. We plan our plantings for temperatures to be gradually cooling starting at that time and when the weather doesn’t cooperate…we have a lot of cabbage, all at once. While we did plan on giving you all of this cabbage, we didn’t plan on giving it to you in so many consecutive weeks. Look for take-home cabbage recipes at pickup.

There was a great article in the New York Times this past Saturday about Americans and their dreadfully low consumption of vegetables (cabbage is a vegetable). Amongst the many interesting points in the article (including carrot vending machines in the NYC schools) was that in today’s fast paced world, cooking vegetables is a substantial effort and this is the big stumbling block to increasing their role in the American diet. This hits the nail right on the head –eating well is an effort. By choosing to work with raw produce each week instead of opening boxes and cans is, all of you are bucking the trend and making an investment in your family’s health. Here’s the link to the article: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/25/health/policy/25vegetables.html?_r=1&hp

Tranquil Tuesdays and Frantic Fridays. Over the course of every season many of you who started out picking up on Tuesday slowing drift to Fridays. We want you to have flexibility in your pickup days but if you are finding Fridays to be too busy here for your taste you might want to try to switch to Tuesday, which is always much quieter.

CSA sign-up for 2011 begins this week. We will be taking deposits ($100) for next years CSA shares starting this week. These deposits help us plan for next year and support the farm through the winter months as well. By signing up now you also get on our winter payment plan which divides the share cost over three payments in February, April and June. As always, payment in full is great too. We will begin opening up shares to our waiting list starting art the end of the month so if you would like a share for next year please don’t delay.

What to expect in your share this week…

Lettuce                 Potatoes                   Broccoli

Cabbage               Arugula                    Carrots

Kale                     Chard

Asian Greens       Chickories

Onions                 Winter Squash

When will it end? We will continue to harvest through the end of October, making Friday the 29^th our last pickup day of the season.

Local Food Feast. The Brunswick-Topsham Land Trust will be holding a local food feast called “Hand and Hand with the Land” Sunday October 17^th from 4-7 pm at Frontier Café in Brunswick. The event will celebrate the 25^th anniversary of the land trust and celebrate their efforts to save open space and important agricultural land (like Crystal Spring Farm). Local farmers and chefs are pared together to create a seasonal menu and bluegrass music will round out the event. There will be activities for the kids run by Cathance River Education Alliance. We will be working with Henry and Marty’s restaurant. Tickets are $25 for adults ($40 per couple, kids are free) and will be available at CSA pickup, during the Saturday market and at the land trust office on main street.

Crystal Spring Farm Lamb. Starting this week we will have order sheets for whole and half lamb for your freezer. Talk to us a pickup for more details.

What’s in Upic?……

Flowers      Herbs         Cherry Tomatoes

Transition is in full bloom around here these days as the leaves are lightening, the nights are chilly, and we have both Napa Cabbage and Winter Squash in the share this week. We will be giving out the last round of tomatoes and peppers this week. It is always sad time, but the cycle of things coming and going seems to make everything taste better over the course of the year.

Napa cabbage is a great vegetable. We sometimes call it “cabbage light” as its flavor is more subtle and its texture much lighter than European cabbage. If you are unsure of what to do with this crop, start by treating it as you would standard cabbage. We often shred it into the last moments of a stir fry, just letting it wilt a bit. If you like to make stuffed cabbage the tender leaves lend themselves to the rolling process and make eating easy as well.

We start winter squash this week thanks to about twenty of you who came out to help us harvest this past Saturday. What a great crew! We had just enough kids to help their parents pass the squash into our 20 bushel bulk bins. By our estimate we gathered about 6000 lbs in about an hour and a half. The first variety we will see this week is sweet dumpling. This white and green squash is great roasted. Cleave it in half, scrape out the seeds, brush the cut side with oil or butter and cook skin up on a cookie sheet at 400 dgrees for 35-40 minutes. For those with a sweet tooth or reluctant children at the dinner table, turn the cooked squash so the cut side is up, brush amply with butter and shake/drizzle brown sugar, maple syrup or honey and set under the broiler until golden brown.

CSA sign-up for 2011 begins next week. We will be taking deposits starting next week for the 2011 season. A deposit of $100 will not only secure your share for next year but will get you on our winter payment plan. Having all of you sign up early is a great help to us by reducing the administrative duties next spring, when we are busy in the fields.

What to expect in your share this week…

Lettuce                 Potatoes

Cabbage               Arugula

Kale                     Chard

Peppers                Tomatoes

Asian Greens       Chickories

Beets                    Winter Squash

Sheep breeding has begun this week. We turned two rams out with the girls this past week and they seem to be going well. To monitor the process we make a paste by mixing pigment and vegetable oil together which is slathered all over the rams’ chest. As the ram mounts the ewes he leaves behind a mark on their hind quarter. We change the color each week and can then find out who has been bred when and how efficient the ram is doing his job. As you pass by the farm, look for brightly colored marks on the hind quarters of the ewes.

Fresh, the Movie. Fresh, a hopeful new film about our food system and, where it’s going and how to make it better for all humans. Showing at Bowdoin College Searles Hall, room 315 this Wednesday, September 22^nd at 7pm. Here’s a link to the bowdoin calendar http://www.bowdoin.edu/calendar/event.jsp?bid=480229&rid=55410

More apples from our friends at Willow Pond Farm in Sabattus. Low spray macs, cortlands and pears along with the world’s best cider will be for sale at pick-up. Really, can cider taste this good or am I dreaming?

Bags. Please bring clean dry bags for your produce to pick-up…If you have extras bring them along to share.

What’s in Upic?……

Flowers      Herbs         Beans (waning)

Cherry Tomatoes

I’m cold as I sit here in my sweatshirt writing. It is entirely too early to be cold. Especially since just a week ago I was hot, really hot. The vegetables don’t like these swings of temperature either, especially tomatoes. The quality and quantity of tomatoes will be falling off this week as we enter the time of year when all of these heat-loving crops begin to disappear and are replaced by those that grow and even thrive in the cold months ahead.

Along these lines, look for cabbage in your share again this week. Nothing is quite so versatile as the cabbage. It keeps forever, is packed full of vitamins and is great raw in slaw or cooked. This stuff is Maine soul food.

Before we take the headlong dive into winter and winter vegetables, we all love this period of September that is in between. Like June, the temps are crisp and comfortable. As it turns out, most of our greens crops also thrive this time of year. The arugula in your share this week is some of the nicest we have cut all year. It’s a bit spicy, probably from the heat at the end of August but the overall flavor and texture is great. Lettuce mix and chard are also is perfect form.

This will be the last week of beans in the upic field. What is out there is a bit long in the tooth but we thought we would leave them for you hardcore pickers to go over once more. With any luck the fall peas will be in before the end of September.

What to expect in your share this week…

Lettuce                 Potatoes

Cabbage               Arugula

Kale                     Chard

Peppers                Tomatoes

Asian Greens       Chickories

Beets

High Tunnel. Some of you may notice the looming high tunnel next to the Upic field. This is the structure we built with a USDA grant that will allow us to extend our greens growing season starting next year. Our hardworking team of pig excavators prepared the 28 by 200 foot site earlier this summer. The pigs are now putting the finishing touches on next year’s upic field expansion project. Those pigs can work!

Fresh, the Movie. Fresh, a hopeful new film about our food system and, where it’s going and how to make it better for all humans. Showing at Bowdoin College Wednesday, September 22^nd at 7pm.

Heavy Equipment. The dump trucks and excavators in our sheep pasture are working to improve the drainage to these areas. With less waterlogged soil we can grow better grass to feed healthier sheep…

Apples arrive from our friends at Willow Pond Farm in Sabattus. Low spray macs and pears along with the world’s best cider will be for sale at pick-up. If you are looking for something to do this next weekend there is apple picking at Willow Pond Farm with horse drawn wagon rides into the orchard and acres and acres of beautiful trees. Maura, the kids and I spent some time there this last Saturday frolicking.

Race 4 Space. The Brunswick-Topsham Land Trust’s annual running and walking benefit event will be this Sunday September 19th. This is a great event for the whole family with a 4 mile run to the ocean, a mile timed run, a kids fun run and a guided walking tour of historic Pennellville, center of Brunswick shipbuilding past. More info and at www.btlt.org

or call 729.7694.

Bags. Please bring clean dry bags for your produce to pick-up…If you have extras bring them along to share.

What’s in Upic?……

Flowers      Herbs         Beans

Cherry Tomatoes

September is here and with it comes cooler weather (thankfully!) and the beginnings of our fall vegetables. Superstar among these is the potato, which arrives this week in force thanks to all of you who showed up today to work with us in the fields. By our estimation we had over fifty folks young and old getting dirty, helping us pick somewhere around 5 tons of spuds! We got some great shots which will you can see if you scroll down the web posting. This help was priceless to all of us in two ways. First, your two hours of help saved the crew what would be about 4 full days of work. Second, all of your joy and enthusiasm keeps us excited and reminds us why we do this work and who we do it for. Thanks.

Canning and preserving demos this week during pickup at the farm. Come watch Kathy Savoie of Maine Cooperative Extension demonstrate the basics of water bath canning. Kathy is also an expert in all types of food preservation and storage (including freezing) and will be on hand from 2-4 on both Tuesday and Friday (September 7^th and 10^th) to demonstrate and answer questions.

Bags. Please bring bags for your produce. From here out you will need at least 4 or five each week. By bringing used grocery bags you can help us put less plastic into the waste stream.

What to expect in your share this week…

Potatoes               Arugula

Cabbage               Carrots

Kale                     Chard

Peppers                Tomatoes

Asian Greens       Chickories

Pigs. We will be taking orders for whole and half pigs staring this week. Think of bacon, hams and pork chops in your house whenever you what them, all winter long. Talk to us at pickup for more details.