DAIKON Radishes!

Daikon Radish (Raphanus sativus subsp. longipinnatus) is an everyday component of Asian cuisine. In fact, it is the most widely grown vegetable in Japan. You’ll find it with your meal at almost any Japanese restaurant. It can be prepared almost anyway you like, including raw, fried, grilled, boiled.

Eaten raw, Daikon has a spicy taste but becomes quite mild flavored when cooked. In addition, it has an almost magical ability to bring out other flavors in the dish.

Storage -Keeps well in the refrigerator if they are placed in a sealed container or plastic bag in order to maintain high humidity.

Preparation - This is an extremely versatile vegetable that can be eaten raw in salads or cut into strips or chips for relish trays. It also can be stir-fried, grilled, baked, boiled or broiled. Use the daikon as you would a radish. It may be served raw in salads or grated for use as a condiment (if you don't have a Japanese-style grater, use a cheese grater and grate just before serving), pickled, or simmered in a soup. They are also preserved by salting as in making sauerkraut. Daikon also is used in soups and simmered dishes. To prepare, peel skin as you would a carrot and cut for whatever style your recipe idea calls for.

A Japanese secret to cooking daikon is to use water in which rice has been washed or a bit of rice bran added (this keeps the daikon white and eliminates bitterness and sharpness}.

For Chips, Relish Tray Sticks or Stir Fries - Simply peel Daikon with a peeler and cut crossways for thin chips. Dip thin chips in ice water and they will crisp and curl for a Daikon chip platter with your favorite sour cream or yogurt dip. Cut into julienne strips for relish trays, salads or stir-frys.

Nutrition Information - Daikon is very low in calories. A 3 ounce serving contains only 18 calories and provides 34 percent of the RDA for vitamin C. Rich in vitamin C, daikon contains active enzymes that aid digestion, particularly of starchy foods.

Here's a link to recipe ideas.

When does this year's CSA end?

16 week shares will end with Week 18, as you started on Week 2. That will be September 27th / 28th for Monday/Tuesday shares, or September 30th /October 2nd for Thursday / Saturday shares.

20 week CSA ends the week of October 11th.

We will continue to bring our vegetables and beef to Sweetwater Market on Saturdays 9-1. We'll also sell some veggies and beef at the farm. Call or email to make arrangements ahead of time.

Still to come:

Winter Squashes: Acorns, Butternuts, Buttercups, Kabochas, Delicatas, Dumplings

Pumpkins: Mini decorative, Pie, and at least some large jack'o'lanterns

Potatoes: Russets, Kennebecs and Fingerlings

Sweet Potatoes

Leeks, Onions, & Garlic

Celery & Celeriac

Broccoli & Cabbage (we hope!)

Carrots & Parsnips

Plus Kale, Chard, Peppers, Tomatoes, Eggplant and maybe some other vegetables.

Labor Day

We are still filling share boxes on Labor Day. If you can't pick up till Tuesday, just let us know and we will put your share in the walk in cooler.

Enjoy the change of weather and the Holiday Weekend!

Satina Potatoes

Well, this is the last year we are growing this variety. They seem to have low yields and this year, a lot of heart rot. So cut them open before cooking them. If there's a black spot or whole in the middle, it's safe to cut around it and use the rest of the potato. Sorry - we have no way to tell if they have this until they are cut open!

Satinas are a yellow-skinned, yellow-fleshed potato, normally quite tasty, similar to a Yukon Gold.

Roasting Chickens for sale

Mike and Amanda are butchering their first batch of roasting chickens next Thursday. Let them know if you are interested in any!

231-861-2535.

Arugula

Arugula is one of those greens you either like or don't like, BUT tastes can change. I like it much more now than I did 5 years ago. My favorite way to use it is shredded on top of homemade pizza!

Best way to keep celery

And yes, I should have found the time to tell you with the last bunch of it!

We leave all the leaves on as their flavor is superb. You should separate the leaves from the stalks so all the celery can be bagged. Wash it all well and store in ziplock bags in the refrigerator for 1-2 weeks. It can also be dried to use in the future. This is what I do for winter storage of it.

Our celery doesn't seem as good as in the past because, believe it or not, we have not gotten the heavy rains that have hit a little south of us. Celery thrives on water and mucky soils.

I think there will be one more bunch of it in the 20 week shares, plus some celeriac.

BASIL in BULK!

We have a lot of basil so if you would like some to make pesto, bring a bucket or cut off milk jug to stuff full. It freezes so easily, and stores that fresh basil flavor into winter.

Basil Pesto

Recipe courtesy Food Network Kitchens with additions by Patrice

Prep Time:

15 min

--

Level:

Easy

Serves:

1 cup

Ingredients

• 2 cups packed fresh basil leaves
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1/4 cup pine nuts, raw or toasted
• 2/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil, divided
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan or Romano Cheese

Directions

Combine the basil, garlic, and pine nuts in a food processor and pulse until coarsely chopped. Add 1/2 cup of the oil and process until fully incorporated and smooth. Season with salt and pepper.

If using immediately, add all the remaining oil and pulse until smooth. Transfer the pesto to a large serving bowl and mix in the cheese.

If freezing or storing in the refrigerator, transfer to an air-tight container and drizzle remaining oil over the top. Use within 3-4 days or Freeze for up to 3 months. (I've had it remain good for a year!) Thaw and stir in cheese.

What are Heirloom Tomatoes?

An heirloom is generally considered to be a variety that has been passed down, through several generations of a family because of it's valued characteristics. In the past 40 years, we've lost many of our heirloom varieties, along with the many smaller family farms that supported heirlooms. The multitude of heirlooms that had adapted to survive well for hundreds of years were lost or replaced by fewer hybrid tomatoes, bred for their commercially attractive characteristics.

In the process we have also lost much of the ownership of foods typically grown by family gardeners and small farms, and we are loosing the genetic diversity at an accelerating and alarming rate.

Every heirloom variety is genetically unique and inherent in this uniqueness is an evolved resistance to pests and diseases and an adaptation to specific growing conditions and climates. With the reduction in genetic diversity, food production is drastically at risk from plant epidemics and infestation by pests. Call this genetic erosion.

It is up to us as gardeners and responsible stewards of the earth to assure that we sustain the diversity afforded us through heirloom varieties.

Beans for canning or freezing?

We have a lot of Green Beans right now. They are for sale to CSA members for $1.50 per lb - half off the normal price. Let us know if you are interested!

Hot weather crops

Are coming on strong. The melons are very early and of great quality! Let us know if there's ever a problem with ripeness. We do our best and try to only grow the varieties that are easier to pick.

Sweet corn is bountiful. We've been through the Spring Treat (2 different plantings) and are now picking the Tuxedo. Kandy Korn will be next week, and an old heirloom Silver Queen will be the last variety.

Tomatoes! No blight in sight! But we are having some trouble with blossom-end rot and splitting because of uneven rains and watering. The Heirlooms coming this week are Costulato Genovese, Prudens Purple, Kellogg's Breakfast, Old German, Cherokee Purple. One of the best sites to look at pictures of the different varieties and read about them is www.tomatofest.com. There are paste tomatoes, yellow slicers, red slicers and smaller cherry and oval tomatoes, too. Finally!

Thursday - Saturday shares are getting a Jenny Lind muskmelon. The flesh is light green and they have a turban-like blossom end, and are quite sweet.

Whew!

I haven't written anything here for awhile. We've been plugging away, doing a lot of picking and a lot of planting and maintenance. This is the time of year when we have to get seeds in if there's a hope of a late crop before frost and snow. More beans, carrots, lettuces, beets have all been seeded. And we are putting in flats and flats of brassica plants: broccoli, cabbages, cauliflower. These are all cool-weather crops and can usually withstand a little cold weather.

Tomatoes are getting strung up every few days to keep them up off the ground and staked. They are starting to ripen more each day. We've had a lot of blossom end rot but no late blight! And the tomato worms are wreaking havoc. They are so gross.

What you are getting: still some early red varieties: Sophie's Choice, Belii Naliv, Siletz and others. The Glaciers and Yellow Taxis are done, tho more Taxis are coming. A few shares are getting an early heirloom Costoluto Genovese - red, smaller and ruffled. The red ovals are Juliets, one of my favorites for salads, drying or cooking. The little tomatoes are red Sprite (grape shape), Sungold (orange round), Principe Borgese (round red). We picked a few Kelloggs Breakfast (I think) and Cherokee Purple that had blemishes but were still good enough for lunch!

Sweet Pepper Bonanza!

There are multiple kinds of sweet peppers in the CSA boxes today ~~

• Jimmy Nardello are the ones that look like chili peppers only they are green. They are called frying peppers.
• Mild Jalapenos look like hot jalapenos, but they aren't! They have great flavor for eggs.
• Cubanelle are the light green long peppers.
• New Ace are the standard green peppers.
• Lilac are the beautiful purple peppers.
• Feherezon are the small yellow ones.

Hot peppers are available to help yourself at the Farm, or in ziplock bags in boxes, marked HOT.

We certainly should get a good crop of red peppers this year! We have Ace Red, and medium red bell, Carmen, an elongated type, Lipstick, a smaller pointy pepper, and Red Knight, larger bell-shaped. Last summer was so cool we hardly got any red peppers.

The potatoes are French Fingerlings - a favorite. We don't have as large a crop as last year so this is the only time you will get these. They are a gourmet variety, just need to be steamed or boiled and served simply with olive oil or butter, salt, garlic, pepper.

Check out those boxes today!

Wow, it looks like a taste of summer! We had enough little sweet peppers to give one to everyone! And cucumbers and tomatoes! We checked - we didn't have tomatoes and peppers to give out till Week 10 last summer, Week 8 the summer of 2008, so we are really early this year. It looks like eggplant may be ready next week!

The garlic bulbs are small. They were supposed to be green garlic (like scallions), but because of the heat they bulbed up right away. Even tho it doesn't look like they have skins, even the individual cloves have to be peeled.

See the post below for info on the potatoes.

The onions are a very early variety. The smaller ones can be cooked whole or any of them can be used like any kind of onion.

This is the last big week for peas. There may be a few straggling in next week.

Please let us know if you would like any herbs. A lot are on now and ready for harvest.

Not-Very-Pretty Potatoes Today

We tried out growing potatoes in black plastic, and while they grew well and produced an early crop, they do not look as nice as usual. There's a small amount of these for everyone, and we will start digging the field-grown potatoes in a week or so.

Tomato plants are on the left with their stakes and the first few lines of string. Then there are rows of potatoes, hilled and mulched. We have 3 kinds of fingerlings, russets, red norlands, kennebecs in. You can see a bit of onions, leeks and garlic on the right edge of the photo.

Cows and calves, hanging out in the shade.

Update

Please remember there are no CSA veggies this Thursday, Saturday, or next Monday and Tuesday. We will resume CSA veggies with Thursday shares on July 8th. We will be at Sweetwater Market on Saturday from 9am till 1pm with whatever will not hold till next CSA Day.

In the meantime we are getting hay baled, weeding weeding weeding, planting later summer and fall crops in cells for transplanting in a few weeks, and seeding some things directly in the ground, doing bug patrol and spraying with the biological controls when needed, making compost, stringing up tomato plants, mulching. Etc. etc. etc.

When CSA resumes, we will have yellow and white early onions, potatoes, more peas, and summer squashes ready. We will also have peppers and cucumbers soon. We've picked 4 sweet peppers, and the cucumbers are almost ready to snitch some early ones. We ate fresh-dug Red Norland potatoes a few days ago - so creamy and flavorful! Can't wait to share them with you all.

On Saturday, July 3rd the Sweetwater Local Foods Market celebrates its 5th Birthday (since founding in 2005) with cake and music in celebration of the 100th birthday of our official "Queen of the Market" - Jeanette Keiser of Marne. Jeanette's son Paul is a regular vendor and brings his mom to share in the fun. She still gets a long pretty well and is a joy to be around. We will also begin a month-long "Pasture-Raised Local Meat" sale with samples of Creswick Farms sausages.

For CSA share holders, remember you can stop by the Market and pick up fresh herbs any Saturday. I'd appreciate an email on Friday letting me know what you want so I can be sure to bring enough. And if you let me know ahead of Earthly Kneads deliveries, I can add special order herbs to your box. We have Italian Parsley, Dill, and Basil in quantity now.

Farm work and veggies coming soon:

Snap peas. Beets with greens. Cabbages. More carrots, scallions, snow and shelling peas. Cucumbers are about 1 inch long. We've picked about 10 summer squashes and 3 smallish green peppers. Melons look great and are blooming and setting fruit.

We have gotten about a half inch of rain in the last 2-3 weeks - all the storms have gone south or north of us. It's quite dry here, but we have the irrigation hooked up to most of the gardens now.

The summer onslaught of weeds and weeding is in full pull-and-hoe mode. If we don't keep ahead of them now, we are behind all the rest of the growing season. We bought a new weeder this year that pulls behind a tractor with a person riding it and controlling the tined weeders. Very cool!

A woodchuck has been eating beans and carrot tops. We have the live trap set and the guns loaded. They are so destructive. They also dig huge holes in fields that will break a cow's leg.

All the melons are planted now, and doing well. We still have more cucumbers to plant, many more beans to plant. All the winter squashes are in, and pumpkins, too. Corn is growing well. The tomatoes are in need of trellising but are doing well. We are picking and eating a few each day and hope to have them for you all soon.

Laughing Tree Brick Oven Bakery

Will have bread available for sale at Thursday's CSA pickup. Try some samples! Buy some to treat your family to more wholesome food! Read the post from a few days ago to know more about this delicious opportunity.

A week off

Remember we are taking a week off of CSA around July 4th. There will be no pickup on July 1st or 5th, and no deliveries on July 3rd and 6th. We are not going out of town, but this gives us time to catch up on the maintenance and get the Fall crops planted. We are also usually putting up hay and doing large farm work, too. AND maybe, just maybe, we will get time to go to Lake Michigan, visit friends, have a few days off. We haven't been to the lake yet - Farming doesn't allow for much leisure time in the normal vacation time of Summer.

We will still be at Sweetwater Market on Saturday, July 3rd, selling the things that won't keep till next CSA day, July 8th. Come visit us there!