BGF NEWS - August 6, 2024 - VOL. 52, NO. 10

In this week’s box:

Basil: Sweet

Beans: Yellow & Green Mix

Beets: Cylindra

Broccoli: heads or florets with edible leaves

Cabbage: Ruby King

Cherry Tomatoes: Jubilee Mix

Cucumbers: Corinto, Generally, Marketmore or Dragon

Head Lettuce, assorted varieties
Scallions

Summer Squash: Golden Glory, Patty Pan, Safari, Slik Pik, or Zephyr

and perhaps one of the following: (see **NOTE below)
Okra: Candle Fire, Bowling Red & Okinawa Pink

Tomatoes: slicers (see 7/30 newsletter for descriptions)

Herb It! option: Purple Basil, Pink Celery, Lemon Verbena

Jam It! option: Tart Cherry Jam & Blackberry Peach Jam

Spice It Up! option: Roselle Salt

Featured Recipes:

Cucumber Scallion Salad

Sweet and Sour Red Cabbage

Cabbage Beet Coleslaw

Roasted Beet Hummus

What’s up on the farm?

Precipitation in the past week: 3.20"

It's hard to believe, but here we are at Week 10 of the CSA season, half way through! It surprises me every year when we hit these milestones. We hope you are enjoying your CSA experience.

This past week was something! I don't remember many years with severe storms coming so many days in a row. We managed to avoid any structural damage but we did have some rough looking crops by the end of the week. I'm happy to report that much of our corn that had been laid down by the winds has stood back up. By the end of the week we received a total of 5.8" of rain. Much less than some areas had, but more than we needed.

It made for some challenging harvesting last week and now we are starting to see some stress response in crops who aren't happy about having soggy roots for nearly a week. So far the biggest issue looks to be in our carrots (and a few of our dahlias) where stretches of plants are rotting in the ground. Hopefully that trend won't continue.

The challenging weather probably hastened the end of our summer squash plants. They were already failing due to insect pressures but being bashed about in the winds and deluged for 3 days didn't help matters. So here is your heads up, summer squash/zucchini season is ending soon, if you haven't yet, make that zucchini bread and try the zucchini quesadilla recipe before it's too late!

But, all is not lost! The tomatoes are finally ripening so everyone should get at least a little sampling of tomatoes this week. The peppers are also getting close and we anticipate starting to harvest them later this week. The fall transplants are filling out nicely and we'll probably start putting them in the ground in a couple of days. And the cover crops we sowed right before the rains are starting to come up! Woohoo! Covered soil is happy soil!

A little detail on your produce this week:

Basil hates the cold and will turn black with exposure. Keep long stemmed basil in a glass/vase of water on your counter top (out of direct sunlight). Stems that are too short (trimmings/tops) should be placed in a glass or plastic container with a dry paper towel. Then put inside of a paper bag (for insulation) and put in the warmest part of your refrigerator (usually the door) or on the top shelf towards the front.

Beans: Fresh beans are an easy "store." Just leave them in their plastic bag and keep them in the produce drawer. Can last up to 2 weeks.

Beets: Cut off greens, leaving an inch of stem. Refrigerate the unwashed greens in a closed plastic bag and use with your chard mix as beets and chard are closely related. Store the beet roots, unwashed, with the rootlets (or “tails”) attached, in a plastic bag in the crisper bin of your refrigerator. They will keep for several weeks, but their sweetness diminishes with time. Just before cooking, scrub beets well and remove any scraggly leaves and rootlets. If your recipe calls for raw beets, peel them with a knife or vegetable peeler, then grate or cut according to your needs baby/young beets usually don't need to be peeled.

Broccoli/Cauliflower: Wrap loosely in a plastic bag and keep it in the vegetable bin of your refrigerator for up to a week. Immediately before cooking, soak head down, in cold, salted water (1 teaspoon salt to a 8 cups of water) for 5 minutes. Any [organic] critters will float to the top where you can rescue them or allow them to suffer a salty death. (Note: If soaked in salt water before storing, it will become too rubbery and wilted to enjoy.) Slice the juicy, edible stems and use them wherever florets are called for. Peel particularly thick skin before using.

Cabbage: Store dry, unwashed cabbage in the refrigerator, preferably in the vegetable bin. The outer leaves may eventually get floppy or yellowish, but you can remove and discard them to reveal fresh inner leaves. Cabbage can keep for more than a month. Once it’s cut, seal it in a plastic bag and continue to refrigerate for several weeks. Rinse the cabbage under cold running water just before use. Peel away a few of the outer leaves, then cut the cabbage according to your needs with a big, sharp knife, and then chop, sliver, or grate

Cucumber: Store unwashed cucumbers in a sealed plastic bag in the vegetable crisper bin for about a week. Keep cucumbers tucked far away from tomatoes, apples, and citrus—these give off ethylene gas that accelerates cucumber deterioration. You can do a lot of fancy things to the skin of a cucumber, but when it is young, fresh (and unwaxed), it really only needs to be thoroughly washed. However, if the skin seems tough or bitter you can remove it; if the seeds are bulky, slice the cucumber lengthwise and scoop them out.

Herbs: Generally, except for basil, set unwashed bunches of fresh herbs (with stems) upright into small jars filled with 1 to 2 inches of water, cover loosely with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for up to two weeks. Rinse fresh herbs right before use. To release their scents and flavors, rub them between your hands before mincing or chopping. If you have no idea what to do with fresh herbs, there is one great default answer "compound butter." Finely mince leaves and knead them into a stick of room temperature butter. Roll the butter into a log in plastic wrap and store in the freezer. Then simply slice off the amount you need to add delicious, ready-to-use flavor to vegetables, bread or meats.

Okra: These lovely, dark red, horn-shaped vegetables are a warm weather treat. Extremely cold sensitive, wrap with a dishcloth or paper towel and store in their plastic bag in the warmest part of your fridge, or place the plastic bag in a small paper sack and store in the crisper drawer and use within the week. Traditional southerners will cut into rounds, bread in cornmeal and fry, but our favorite version is our dear friend Annie's method, "All I do is rinse off the pods and lay them in a saucepan with a little water in the bottom. Ten to fifteen minutes is all it takes...twenty if the pods are really big and "woody" feeling. I put salt on them and eat as finger food. It reminds me of young sweet corn."

Scallions (green onions)- are best kept upright in a glass with about 1" of water in it, more like flowers than vegetables. Loosely cover the tops with plastic and you will be amazed at how long they will keep. We like to throw a handful of chopped scallions into nearly any savory dish, right near the end of the cooking time.

Summer Squash/Zucchini: Refrigerate unwashed zucchini and summer squash for up to a week and a half in a perforated plastic bag or in a sealed plastic container lined with a kitchen towel. These do not need to be peeled to use, just slice them up and go!

Tomatoes: always store whole tomatoes at room temperature, out of direct sunlight. Once cut, store in a sealed container in the refrigerator.

A few other details: All of your GREENS will keep best if stored in a plastic bag, with the top folded over and placed in the produce drawer of your refrigerator.

** NOTE: You will notice over the course of the season that some box contents listed above say "Perhaps one of the following..." These are items that we can’t harvest in sufficient quantities for the whole CSA to receive at one time. We do track who gets what and we will do our best to ensure that everyone eventually receives each item. On some items this may take several weeks, so please be patient.

Is a weekly newsletter not enough for you? Do you want to read more about our life on the farm and see more pictures? Follow us on Facebook at Blue Gate Farm or on Instagram at bluegatefarmfresh. CSA members can also connect with other BGF members to share recipes, photos or ask questions on our FB community page at Blue Gate Farm Community.

That's about it for now.
If you have any questions or comments, be sure to let us know.
Best from the farm,
Jill & Sean (and the whole BGF crew)