photo: Ulla Kjarval
Letter from the farm:
Despite last week’s hurricane, we have managed to pull together a relatively diverse share for everyone this week! We hope to distribute corn to everyone at least one time. Some of you received it last week, some this week, and hopefully the rest of you will get it next week. You’ll notice that there are worms in the ears. This is normal for organic corn! (Conventional corn is heavily sprayed with toxic insecticides to keep the corn silk worm out.) Just cut off the tip of the ear where the worm is and the rest is perfectly fine to eat!
Don’t forget to eat the tops of the beets! You can cook the beet greens just like spinach– either sauteed or gently steamed. They’re delicious!
This week we’re harvesting the new planting of green beans, so there is a small amount in the share this week and more to come over the next few weeks.
This is the last week of cherry tomatoes and probably the next to last week of red tomatoes. The cherry tomato plants were destroyed in the hurricane, so they’re finished. The red tomatoes had been severely weakened by late blight despite our constant monitoring and preventative spray regemin. The hurricane finished off the second planting which was not looking good before the storm, so we’re just finishing up harvesting from the first planting and then we’ll be done. Last year was a stellar year for tomatoes and this year was just ok. It’s all part of the ups and downs of farming.
The farm fared relatively well from Hurricane Irene. We lost the rest of our diseased peppers, eggplants and some of the diseased tomatoes, but all in all, we were extremely lucky. Many of our farming friends upstate NY had entire fields flooded and have lost all of their crops. You can find out more about the farmers who were affected by the storm here.
**The red tomatoes need to ripen for a few days on the counter until they reach a uniform, deep red. Please be sure to wash the tomatoes before eating. We have been spraying them with an organically-approved copper spray to protect against late blight infection. The copper spray will wash off with a little soap and water.
Maggie
Vegetable Share
Sungold Cherry Tomatoes, 1 pint
Red Beets and Greens, 1 bunch
Baby Leeks or Scallions, 1 bunch
Red Tomatoes, several pieces
Green Beans, 1 bag
Cilantro, 1 bunch
Corn or Acorn Squash, 5 pcs / 1 pc
Fruit Share
tbd
Herb Share
Chives
Thyme
Lewis Waite Farms
This is a LWF pick up week.
*As always, please keep in mind that the list is subject to change, depending on what’s going on at the farm.