Hi everyone,
We are coming up to the halfway point in the season. It’s pretty crazy to compare the photos of shares from the beginning of the season to now. The volume of greens has been replaced by a dense array of colors. The bounty of this time of year is truly unmatched. As I munch on green beans, or melon, or cherry tomatoes, or corn, or anything of the other things in the shares these days, I often find myself thinking “I love the summer.”
I wanted to share a little bit from Nichols Farm’s newsletter last week. Todd Nichols writes;
As a diversified family vegetable farm i want to take this moment to let you know just how important you are to us. I say this after severing ties with a local grocery chain who wanted to offer our produce this season. They simply wanted the very best produce we could produce for insultingly low prices. This and they rejected something every week. This is the problem with our global food system. More food goes to waste for being too big or too small than you could imagine. This is why a direct consumer relationship is so important to the small family farm. Thank you for supporting us and allowing us to stay in business.
We know that being part of a CSA can sometimes feel like a burden, especially when life gets busy. It can be a lot of food and sometimes things that are foreign or difficult to use. The ambition of Gard Mo is to lessen some of that burden, and we hope that we’ve been able to do that for you all thus far in the season.
If the goal is a local food system that can support our communities (we believe it is), the stability of CSA members goes a long way in enabling the small farms needed for that vision. We’d like to echo Todd and thank you all for supporting us, and the local food system.
-Ben
We love corn, and with that like to add it to just about everything we cook this time of year. With it off the cob, its easy to just toss into a pan with whatever else were cooking (like maybe the green beans). Similar to peas earlier in the year, they freeze well just like this, but best practice would be to first blanch.
These French Green beans are a slender variety of green beans. They tend to be one of the more fragile vegetables. Because of this, local ones are much tastier than those at the end of long supply chains. These are sweet, crisp, and have a depth of flavor that’s lightly floral with notes of fresh mushroom. I enjoy snacking on them raw, but with a quick sauté and some shallot they are exceptional.
There are a couple different varieties of cherry tomatoes in this mix. A yellow one that is a nice burst of tartness. A skinny red one that has a more mild flavor. And one that is more similar to the multi-colored heirlooms that are coming into season at farmers’ markets.
August is for tomatoes and at their peak like this, we like to enjoy them just as they are (plus a little salt).
Similar to garlic, we like to peel our shallots and then keep them refrigerated. That way its a lot easier to add them to whatever you’re cooking. Shallots have a little more complex flavor than onions and can be used like you would garlic (in a larger amount), or just like you would onion. They would do the green beans justice.
Muskmelons are the subcategory of melon that includes cantaloupe (orange) and honeydew (green),. There are lots different varieties that often are just called one of those two more popular names. Growing up, I never really saw the appeal of them. My first season of a CSA changed that. These melons are intensely sweet with a flavor that reminds me of a milk caramel candy.
Another variety of potatoes, in their new form, Butterballs are particularly creamy with a mellow flavor. Simply boiled with some butter is not a bad way to go with these.
These peppers look like they would be spicy, but aren’t. A fun range of green to red, melrose peppers have a lighter flavor. Thin skinned, they’re great for grilling or roasting whole.
These are sometimes called cape gooseberries, but gooseberries are something entirely different. If you’ve ever had ground cherries before, their characteristic tartness is probably what you think of. These ones from Nichols are absent of that tartness, and because of that notes of cotton candy and vanilla are noticeable. They sort of remind us of cream soda.
These are long slender varieties, which makes them a little easier to cook with. Eggplant is great at carrying flavor. Roasting, or grilling it gives it a nice smoky tasty that goes great as the star of a sandwich, dip, or just with other veggies.
