Grass Is Greener Gardens

Well, we made it.  Almost. (Lakeview, you have one more drop next week.)  Everyone this week received lettuce or spinach, kale or chard, potatoes, beets, butternut squash, and a pie pumpkin.  Some of you got radishes, and Beloit and Oak Park received parsley.

Lately, our days are spent preparing for winter and saying goodbyes to plants and people (the lovely intern TJ left us today).

More profound reflections to come as the season ends, but thank you for sharing this 20 week journey with us.  We truly enjoyed the adventure and hope you will join us again next year.  As I mentioned last week, you’ll be receiving a survey soon via email.  This will be anonymous and will help make our CSA better.  Thanks in advance for your participation.

Stay tuned for more end of the season reflections.  I encourage you to make some soup and enjoy this fall evening.

Jackie acquired jester costumes.

late afternoon spinach and lettuce.

last farmily dinner.

Well, it’s week 19 of CSA for most of you here at GIGG.  That means that for some of you half share A people, this is your last week of veggies.  Anyone else wondering where the blur that was this season went?

This week all shares have potatoes, kale or chard, carrots, beets, butternut squash, lettuce or spinach.  Most have radishes, and some have a few tomatoes that weren’t hit by the frost.   For those of you with really large radishes that kinda look like turnips, those are watermelon radishes and are supposed to be big. We sliced them very thinly on a spinach/lettuce salad this weekend–delicious and beautiful.

A little bit of logistics: If you are in Beloit School District, Pilsen, Oak Park, or Northbrook, next week will be your last pick up.  Those of you who are half share A in those locations, this week is your last pick up (B shares end next week).  If you’re in Lakeview, you have one additional week because your season started a week later.  Finally, we will be sending a survey soon about this year’s CSA and would very much appreciate your feedback.

In farm news, we are mowing, cleaning, stake removing, seed saving, and preparing to put up snow fences.  That kitten we got awhile back is still really cute.  So are the other four cats and dog.  We planted and mulched garlic yesterday–the first crop of next year!

Until next time, happy eats!

Hello all,

It is fitting that I am doing this week’s post, as I have to report on the weekend’s frost.  Jackie will mock my sentiment, but I always find the first frost a little sad.  So much left in the field that will never get a chance to grow.  But I do appreciate the first frost for its clarity: it’s fall now, and we thank the tomatoes, peppers, beans, basil, and melons for all that they’ve given us and now turn our attention to the very happy spinach, lettuce, carrots, beets, pumpkins, squash, broccoli, cabbage, and kohlrabi.  And I must admit, frosted spinach (plus mixed greens), feta, olives, and honey mustard dressing left me feeling very satisfied this evening, so thank you changing seasons.

I also have pumpkin bread in the oven, so if anyone hasn’t used their pumpkins from last week, this makes a lovely dessert/snack/breakfast.  I use a variation of this recipe: <http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Delicious-Pumpkin-Bread/Detail.aspx>   A lot less sugar, a bit of honey, and the addition of chocolate chips are my main modifications.  To cook your pumpkin:  cut pumpkin in half, scrape out seeds, cut in half again.  Place quarters cut side down in a baking pan with about half an inch of water (to keep moist).  Cover with foil.  Bake at 350F for about an hour, or until tender.  Scrape pumpkin out of shell and use.

As for this week’s shares, everyone has either spinach or mixed salad greens.  Pilsen, Northbrook, and Lakeview have chard or kale, and Oak Park and Beloit have peppers.  Oak Park you got the end of our “little eggplants that could until they got frosted”.  (But who knows, maybe they’ll amaze us once again and keep producing).  All locations received potatoes, butternut squash, radishes, and beets.

Happy October to all!

Butternuts about to enter the cow shed for storage.

Meet our hybrids: the butterkin and the pumpnut

Another triumphant rainy harvest.

Time to compost the tomato plants

it was too muddy to dig but you got lots of good stuff! we’ll see if it is possible to get potatoes for Beloit on Tuesday, stay tuned.

Hard to believe we are nearing the end of the season. There are still so many things to do and so many things yet to mature in the ground. Last week our shares really transitioned from summer to fall. Tomatoes are still on the vine looking lovely and peppers continue to produce, but we know the end is near. Pie pumpkins, Delciata squash & butternut squash appear in abundance. Lettuce, spinach, radishes, carrots, kale, kohlrabi, fennel & beets are still babies expected to produce for us through the end of October. The fall crops are always risky, you never know when the frost will happen. Even though they are tolerant to a light frost, we still worry. They need rain and sun just like summer vegetables. And this weekend we got both. So we’re still bullish on a strong finish to the season with these fresh new veggies. This week is still a mix of summer and fall. And the biggest and best treat are watermelons. Like giant sized. And sweet. So much different than store bought watermelons. We credit Brad Paulson for these beauties. Brad and Cindi Paulson provide our store with a lot of veggies that we don’t grow and their produce has popped up now and again this season in our CSA shares. Many thanks to them for coming through as planned.

This week: Radishes, Eggplant, Peppers, Tomatoes, Black Cherry Tomatoes, Potatoes, Kale, Watermelon, Beets, Winter Squash, Chives & Possibly Pie Pumpkins.

What’s the difference in pumpkins, you ask? Well, pie pumpkins are typically smaller and have more flesh than carving pumpkins. They’re actually grown for eating. Pumpkins make great soups, pies & more. Don’t think of them as decoration only, because they’re very, very healthy vegetables.

how does this happen every year?

Our veggie CSA is humming along and in comes the weatherman to give us bad news, early frost. What? Early frost? We’ll have none of that damn it. We’ve got peppers on the vine, tomatoes still ripening and those stupid eggplant have yet to arrive en masse. Not ready, no sir Mr. Weatherman. So last week the crew spent an entire day covering crops and picking vegetables. If you haven’t seen the storyboard, look here.

Peppers and basil were picked fast because they are the first to succumb to frost. Tomatoes covered, just in case. The last huge patch of green beans was covered. We did in fact get a frost and you can see a hint of frost bite on many of the sensitive plants now. But they have perked up and we are betting we get a little more out of those true summer veggies before the real frost comes.

Good news. The fall crops are ready and your shares changed shape and color this week. Winter squash and pie pumpkins have arrived. Radishes are back. Next week we expect lettuces to return and growing strong for the final few weeks we expect spinach, more radishes, kale, carrots, chard and possibly even surprises like more broccoli and kohlrabi.

This week savor your shares as they are a transition from straight up summer to fall. Happy eats all. Make a pumpkin pie and freeze some peppers for winter use. Enjoy!

Hello all,

This week brings the return of another cool weather crop: the radish.  Enjoy these baby radishes, one of our favorites. You will also see the little eggplant that could, which we are so very excited to see flowering and producing fruit.  Our basil unfortunately frosted during last week’s unseasonably cool evenings–we have a fall crop of basil that weather depending will produce, but for now savor this fresh basil.  Some of you may be relieved to hear that our current crop of beans is slowing down (others of you may be happy to hear that more are on the way).  Everyone this week gets dragon tongues, and then most are getting green or purple beans.  Also included are french fingerling potatoes, onions, jalapenos, bell peppers or red sweet pimento peppers, chard or kale, parsley for some, black cherry and grape (the small red ones) tomatoes, and  heirloom tomatoes.

Lettuce and spinach are growing every day, so you should see them in the coming weeks.

In other farm news, our neighbor marked us for suckers (and we confirmed it), so we have a new addition to the farmily.  Meet our new kitten here:

I will distract you.

As always, happy eats.

It is late summer and sort of bittersweet. Many think of back-to-school as the end of summer, which often feels like the end of food growing in the midwest. Good news, we expect a few more weeks of summer vegetables like tomatoes, beans & peppers. The eggplants we tried to kill are finally coming and there may be enough for everyone over the next couple of weeks.

You have to see the photo of the eggplants. You may recall our blathering on about how we have tried to kill them. Look at the flea beetle bites to the leaves. (They do not eat the fruits, don’t panic!)

organic eggplant

It probably won’t surprise you that the first of our fall crop to arrive on the scene is the beet crop. You might wonder why you get beets all the time from GIGG. They happen to be a best seller at markets and very healthy. They require a lot of weeding and attention to detail. They are awesome pickled. Beets are a good food. Eat the tops. Eat the tops!

Beets aren’t the only fall crops though. The following are forward looking statements about fall crops. Fall crops are highly risky and weather dependent. Optimism prevails for fall crops, despite the risk of sounding all-forward-looking and stuff.

Beets, Mixed Lettuces, Spinach, Kale, Broccoli, Cabbage, Kohlrabi and Carrots germinated in the last two weeks. A fall crop of basil and fennel looks up-and-at-em. Winter squash germinated in June makes an appearance soon. You never know, as with spring crops, fall plantings depend on perfect weather. We shall see.

This week though – Carrots. Bigger.
Green Beans,Dragon’s Tongue Beans,Basil,Oregano,Kale, Heirloom & Black Cherry Tomatoes
Jalapeno Peppers,Beets,Potatoes,Onions, And of course eggplant ~ A smattering of little finger eggplants arrived today. Not everyone received them. We expect a good solid harvest next week and hope everyone will get some. These babies are harvest small.

Enjoy your shares! We enjoy driving them to you…..

going to town

Okay, so we may have been in the bean fields a little too long.

the vegetables are here. en masse. bushels and bushels. they are here. about three weeks late, but the onslaught of vegetables has arrived. your shares grew overnight and we expect an abundance through September. The fall crops have been planted. I’ll tell you about that in a bit. This week’s shares include:

A mixed bag of yukons and beautiful French fingerling potatoes

Peppers; some will receive bell peppers this week along with hot peppers, others will receive a mix of hot peppers. The peppers look super good on the plant and we think next week is the peak. Look for sweet and hot for everyone next week.

Tomatoes, Tomatoes, Tomatoes Our heirlooms might look a little funny but they have great flavor. There’s a kinda funny story that happened last Saturday at the Beloit market. A customer came to our stand and looked at our tomatoes. Then she went to another vendor and looked at theirs. They buy their tomatoes from a produce wholesaler. We grow ours. She asked why they looked funny, and then bought the tomatoes from our neighbor. (Which are like Canadian greenhouse tomatoes) She came back just to tell us that she was glad tomatoes had been improved over the years. To each his own, we’ll take a real tomato anytime.
Kale and Swiss Chard continue to provide for us. Use them as accents for any dish. They are packed with nutrients.

Green Beans will be in shares for another week and then will take a break for about three weeks. Some of you will receive Purple Beans this week and some will receive the Striped Dragon’s Tongue. They are all good fresh or in a sautee. If you can’t eat them all, blanch, shock and freeze for winter soups.

Basil just keeps coming, thank you Basil!
Chives are headed out to our Beloit members.
Parsley goes to Chicago.
Rosemary to Oak Park

And everyone gets small and medium sized red and yellow onions this week.

We’ve planted all of our fall crops and baby beets are coming back. Carrots, lettuce and radishes have germinated. We hope to see more broccoli, cabbage and spinach. We also have fields of lovely squash vines we hope will produce an ample supply for everyone.

Happy late summer. We still have plenty of good food to come. Enjoy!