CSA Newsletter - Week 10 - August 14, 2019

Week 10

WHAT’S IN THE BOX:
carrots
sweet onions
potatoes- Bintje
lettuce
summer squash-an assortment
slicing tomatoes
sungold cherry tomatoes (half of you)
beets or chard
basil or rosemary
green cabbage
corn!!!!!
slicing cucumber
lemon cucumber

VEGGIE ID:
Bintje potatoes: This variety is an accidental favorite of ours. A few years ago, when our old standbye Yellow Finn was unavailable, we were steered toward Bentij (pronounced Ben-gee). Apparently it is the “go-to” potato in the Netherlands and is very comparable to Yellow Finn or Yukon Gold. Bentji is amazing no matter how you prepare it. Baked, mashed, oven roasted, grilled, fried, hash browned….. You really can’t go wrong. (They aren’t as pretty as they could be. A quick swipe with a potato peeler will take care of that. It is just pesky surface damage. Darn flea beetles….)
Corn: “Cuppa Joe” This is a bicolor variety with a silly name and amazing flavor. Corn starts turning it’s sugars to starch as soon as you pick it, so eat it tonight or tomorrow for maximum enjoyment.
Lemon cucumber: This is the round, yellow, probably unidentifiable veggie in your box. My apologies for not mentioning them last week. The choas of pickle season causes my administrative duties to suffer a bit. Anyhow, lemon cucumbers taste just like slicing cucumbers. They are only lemon-like in appearance (sort of, in the right light, without glasses….) A quick Google search indicates that it hails from India and has been around a loooooooong time. It was introduced in America in the late 1800’s. The skin is thin enough that there is no need to peel. Just slice it up and enjoy.
Beets and Chard rotation: I think I screwed up and didn’t properly flip-flop the beet/chard rotation. If that is the case, I hope you love the double dose of whatever you got. If not, I hope the barter box offered an alternative. I blame it (and everything else) on “pickle brain”.
Beans: No beans this week. You have been inundated and we are between plantings. Win-win. You will see them again in a week or two. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, no?

THE AUGUST LULL:
It happens every year where there is a brief lull in farm work in August. We are caught up on weeds (yes, you read that right), we are done seeding and mostly done transplanting, We are tilling in old beds so there is less to irrigate. Harvest takes more time, but we have a big crew so it feels manageable. It’s like the calm before the storm-the storm of late summer/fall projects. Pretty soon everything will need to be done NOW! Most fall crops ripen all at once and need to get harvested en masse. Onions, potatoes, and winter squash all fit into that category. Cover cropping and garlic planting are also part of the fall frenzy. But nay, let us not think of summer’s end. Let’s just savor our corn and tomatoes and pretend it can stay like this forever.