News from the field:
The 2007 season – it’s a wrap! Today’s the last basket of the year and tomorrow [we wrote this Friday so actually today] is our last market. It’s a good thing too because harvesting in the freezing rain and snow was getting old.
But excitement is already starting to build around here for 2008. We’ve already had one intern application and two seed catalogs arrive. Waverly’s been listing all the things she wants to grow in her garden next year. Her friend Zaia has grown and sold gourds at the Waitsfield market, and Waverly is talking about growing and selling gooseneck gourds. And salad turnips and tomatoes. And Mimi was reviewing melon varieties with her in the Johnny’s catalog and then gee Ma can’t we put in some blueberry and raspberry bushes and ahh winter is the time to dream and dream big.
The height of the growing season can be insanely busy for us, and so the holidays are the time to slow it down, snuggle on the couch with the kids, visit with family and friends, and be very thankful for our wonderful life.
Have a great Thanksgiving and I hope we’ll see you next year!
In the Basket:
Spinach - Waverly told Henry at the dinner table to eat his spinach because it is sweet like candy. It is coarse, to be sure, but sweet from the cold, full of flavor and great raw or cooked.
Broccoli - It was a great year for broccoli!
Carrots - I love the frost touched carrots like these. So sweet and juicy and orange.
Squash - Perfect for Thanksgiving.
Onions - Keep these in a cool dry place or in the bottom of your fridge and they should hold till New Year’s at least.
Potatoes - Try Robyn and Tim’s yummy – and totally doable – recipe on the back!
Kale - My favorite winter vegetable. I like it steamed then dressed with tamari and sesame oil, and there are multiple recipes on the blog for it too.
Ingredients:
2 large Onions
4 Medium Potatoes
Equal amount Carrots
1 tablespoon butter
Sea Salt
Fresh Ground Pepper
Parsley
Sour Cream
Directions:
Chop onions. In large fry pan, stir fry onions in butter, add salt and pepper (generous amount). Let brown slightly (4-5 minutes). Meanwhile, thinly slice potatoes and carrots. Add to pan with 1/8 inch water. Cook 20 minutes (or until potatoes are soft) stirring occasionally so pan does not burn. Serve with spoonful sour cream, fresh ground pepper, and chopped parsley.
News from the field:
Last week the cold wasn’t any big deal. This week, the consistent nighttime temperatures in the teens and twenties are starting to affect the veggies. For example, this week you will find the spinach kind of tough, but extremely flavorful. The cold typically increases the sugar content of the veggies, making them taste better, but the cold also starts to beat up their cell structure, making things tougher, and in some cases, deader. For example, this week we add romaine to the dead list, which means no more lettuce until spring.
But these gray days aren’t for mourning spring – they are for making hearty soups and eating lots of bread. So try the recipe on the back and eat it in front of the woodstove.
In the Basket:
Potatoes – These are a variety that has red skin and white flesh. They are more toward the moist end of the spectrum, which means they are great for soups, for boiling, potato salad, and even roasting in cubes. But they are not the greatest baked potato in the world. Don’t be shy about using these because there will probably be a few more potatoes of a different variety in the basket next week.
Broccoli - People seem happy with the broccoli, and it is super tasty and bountiful right now. Try the recipe on the back, with the potatoes as well, for a yummy fall soup.
Spinach – A big bag – about one pound. As was mentioned above, the cold has made this spinach a little tough, but extremely tasty.
Cabbage – A dense storage cabbage. Pretend you live in Siberia and make some cabbage soup!
Garlic – Everything in this basket tastes better with garlic!
very loosely based on a recipe in Deborah Madison’s Vegetable Soups
3 large, dense, moist potatoes (like the red ones this week)
3 cups good chicken (or other) stock
1-2 pounds broccoli (half or all of the broccoli this week, depending on how you like it)
1 onion
½ tsp marjoram
½ tsp thyme
1 bay leaf
1 big clove garlic
1½ tablespoons butter
1½ tablespoons milk
½ cup milk
1 cup grated cheddar cheese
Peel the potatoes, dice, and put in a pot with the stock and set to simmer. Add onion, chopped. Take the broccoli stems off, peel them, dice them, and add to the potatoes too. Add the herbs and minced garlic. When the potatoes are tender (10-15 minutes), remove the bay leaf and then blend in at least two batches. Blend gently and leave less than totally smooth because otherwise the potato might get gummy. Put back in a big soup pot.
Chop the broccoli florets into bite size pieces. Peter likes chunky soup so I left them on the large side of bite size.
Melt the butter, add the flour, stir for a minute or two, then slowly add the milk to basically make a milky sauce.
When you are ready to eat, heat up the potato etc. base of the soup, add the florets and cook just a minute, then add the milky sauce and grated cheese and enjoy.
Mimi - our beloved intern - does not drink milk or cheese so she had the soup without the milky sauce and cheese and it was pretty darn good that way too, she said.
Deborah Madison says to add mustard and cayenne, but I didn’t. She list curry as an option.
News from the field:
Getting chilly. The cool nights keep getting cooler, the leaf peepers have all gone home, and it is time to wear your blaze orange when you go out to walk in the woods. But somehow we still have a few veggies for you. We feel a little bad about throwing more broccoli at you, but the stuff is good right now, and it will be the first to fade as our evening tempts consistently fall into the 20s.
As for us, we are getting the fall chores done, and we are almost ready to put the fields, greenhouses, and equipment asleep for a few months. Hard to believe that Thanksgiving is less than three weeks away!
In the Basket:
Buttercup squash - This is a dark green squash, with the yummy yummy orange stuff inside. Its not as beautiful as acorn squash, but it kicks acorn squash’s butt on taste. So much so that we’ve basically stopped growing acorn squash. Try Susan Houle’s soup recipe on the back.
Onions - Use in the soup recipe on the back or whatever. These are cured so they’ll keep.
Broccoli - People seem happy with the broccoli. Its super tasty and bountiful right now, and the predicted cold may knock it back, so we’re giving it to you again.
Hearts of romaine - Great for fall salads. If you still have beets left from last week, Peter made a great fall salad with romaine, grated (raw) beets, and dried tomatoes. Maybe throw in a few of the carrots below.
Carrots – These are a variety that are a little sweeter than average, but that also don’t store so well. So don’t count on having them around three weeks from now. Make a yummy carrot salad today!
1 BUTTERCUP or BUTTERNUT SQUASH, cut in half (preferably with no fingers amputated) and the seeds scooped out.
1 large ONION, chopped, sauteed in OLIVE OIL in a large pan while squash bakes.
Bake squash halves cut sides down in an inch of water in 9x13 pan, another 9x3 pan inverted over the top so you're steaming the squash. Takes about an hour at 350-400 degrees. Check as you go along-done when a fork slides into the squash. When squash is done, take it out of oven (let it cool a bit if you want) and scoop it out of the skin, adding it to the pot with the onion. Mash and mix, add BROTH or MILK to thin as you wish.
Flavor with CURRY POWDER (I hate to recommend an amount as it varies, but start with 1/2 teaspoon and keep adding to taste). Season to taste with salt, pepper, bouillion.
So easy. I fix it often- this fall [I actually got this from Susan last fall] at a course at Yestermorrow we were all working industriously in class all afternoon. Meanwhile the squash was happily cooking in the adjoining kitchen and was ready for famished people in 5 minutes after we had finished. Served it along with french bread and cheese, wine-delish.