This weekend I made a broccoli salad for a family pot luck. Before I chopped the broccoli into a thousand pieces, I showed my grandma. I told her why I knew (thought) it was ready to pick, and what the variety (Imperial) looks like in the field next to other broccoli. She got a kick out of it –or she humored me. Either way, she wasn’t going to get that kind of information in that morning’s paper. I know she would rather I go back to school, but she’s happy enough to learn about what I’m doing. The broccoli salad was a hit, and I was bragging just a little bit about the fact that I had helped to grow it.

It has taken me time to get there. Years. To brag in the simple, and not let that weird extended-family pressure (to do more, be more, have more) change how I talk about my life or vocation. As a still fairly young person, I clearly remember the stressful feeling of some conversations before graduating high-school, and after, and again after a two year degree. Well-meaning and loving people just wanted to know what I was up to; I know that now. At the time, however, it painted how I talked about what I choose to do with my life. Do you know that feeling? –where you try to make what you’re doing sound as snazzy as it possibly can but really it’s just 90% simple day-in-day-out stuff. Like trying to print double-sided tri-fold programs, counting broccoli, sitting in meetings, or listening to children’s music all afternoon. No one’s job is a fairy tale. And if it is, they work in Disney World and that’s it’s own sort of thing.

Adding anything into one’s life or taking anything out of it that isn’t a part of our culture’s value system takes work. It takes deciding on a new culture and new values. Like choosing to repair things instead of buying the latest and greatest, or to participate in a CSA.

Parts of our society are so bent on the next new thing or some strange sense of the American Dream that we end up allowing the best things to seem like burdens. Like preparing food or growing food. There’s a notion of “why would you do that if you could be doing X?” I’m doing it because it’s not a burden. It’s an honor. I am happy to work on the farm and I’m happy to wash a little dirt off my refrigerator shelves once in a while. And I’m proud to tell my family that I do so.

For the farm crew,

Karin

P.S. Dave wanted to let members know that this will be the last of the head lettuce for a while until cooler temperatures set in. A few cut worms have been found as we have harvested. Wash this lettuce more carefully than you normally would.

P.P.S. Dave also wants people to be aware that the basil is young, fresh and delicious. It won’t keep long, so unless you use it soon, he recommends tossing it with some oil to keep in the fridge for a bit longer.

In your share this week:

• Basil
• Cabbage (red or green)
• Carrots
• Cucumbers
• Kale
• Lettuce
• Green Onions
• Snap Peas
• Peppers
• Tomatoes

Kale and Cucumber Salad with Ginger Dressing

There is a growing list, never a shrinking one, of things do do on the farm. This time of year it all needs to be done right now. Or last week. This past Friday the crew finished close weeding the second planting of carrots. It is slow detailed work done crawling around on one’s hands and knees. The completion of weeding each carrot field is like a quarter, half, and three quarter chime to an hour when it’s finally done. Two down one to go.

There are a lot of things getting done on the farm and I don’t really know how. It is amazing what gets done. There is even more getting done than I know because half the time I don’t know what Janaki is doing on the tractor and more than half the time, veggies pop out of the ground and I realize Dave snuck seeds in at some point.

This past week on the farm my contribution to crossing things off the list has been superseded by my adding things to it. Mostly adding broccoli. I’ve been spending a fair bit of time zig-zagging across beds of broccoli with my head down and my brow furrowed wondering if I really should be harvesting of all this. But yes, I really should. The first and second planting of broccoli (out of 8 plantings) both came on strong and at once. Luckily Janaki has a list of people he can call who might be interested in extra broccoli and John is good at sweet talking restaurants and grocery stores into ordering
just a case more.

Having such a bounty to manage is a good thing. Too much broccoli? What a lucky problem for a farm to have.

The harvest is what really matters even if I find myself thinking of other things I could be getting done instead. Like starting to weed the third planting of carrots. But the work  we do is given meaning by the harvest, and by the produce ending up in your home. Otherwise what would this all be about?

For the farm crew,

Karin

Broccoli

Carrots

Cauliflower

Cucumbers

Garlic scapes

Greens mix

Lettuce

Green onions

Snap Peas

Juliet tomatoes

Cauliflower Slaw

1/2 cup thinly sliced almonds
Juice of half a lemon (about 1 tablespoon), plus more to taste
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt or table salt, then more to taste
3 tablespoons (30 grams) dried currants
5 tablespoons olive oil, plus more for frying
2 tablespoons (about 25 grams) brined or salt-packed capers
oil for frying
1 head of cauliflower (about 1 1/4 pounds)
Freshly ground black pepper
3 scallions, thinly sliced (use green and white parts)
2 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley (optional, mostly for color)

Heat oven to 350 degrees F. Spread almonds on a tray and toast them until they’re a deep golden color, tossing them once or twice to ensure even cooking. This will take 10 to 14 minutes. Set aside to cool.**

Meanwhile, place lemon juice, vinegar and 1/4 teaspoon salt in a small bowl. Add currants; set aside and let them soak while you prepare the other ingredients.

If using brined capers, drain and spread them on paper towels until most of their moisture has wicked out, about 5 minutes. If using salt-packed capers, soak them in water for 10 minutes to remove the saltiness, then drain, rinse and pat dry on paper towels. Pour a 1/2-inch of olive oil or another oil that you prefer to fry in in a small skillet or saucepan. Heat it over medium-high. When hot enough that a droplet of water added to the oil hisses, carefully add the capers and step back — they’re going to sputter a bit for the first 10 seconds. Once it’s safe to get closer, give them a stir. Depending on how dry they were, it can take 1 to 2 minutes for them to get lightly golden at the edges and then crisp. Remove with a slotted spoon. Drain on paper towels.

Trim cauliflower leaves and cut head into quarters. Cut cauliflower, stem and florets, into 1/4-inch slices. Add to a large bowl.

Scoop currants from vinegar mixture with a slotted spoon and add to bowl with cauliflower, along with almonds, capers, scallions and parsley. Slowly whisk 5 tablespoons olive oil into remaining vinegar mixture in a thin stream. Add several turns of freshly ground black pepper. Pour over cauliflower and other ingredients and turn gently to coat all pieces. Taste and adjust seasonings, adding more lemon juice, salt or pepper to taste. Dig in!

Israeli Salad

2 medium juliet tomatoes, cubed
1 1-pound English cucumber, cubed
1/2 medium red onion, cubed, or 4 scallions, finely sliced
3 tablespoons finely minced fresh, flat-leaf parsley
Juice of half a lemon
2 to 3 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 teaspoons sumac powder
Salt and pepper, to taste

You can either toss all of the vegetables in one large bowl, and pour over it the parsley, lemon juice, olive oil and sumac mixture you whisked separately in a small bowl, or if you’re in a hurry just toss everything all at once.

Other additions: 1/2 to 1 cup crumbled or cubed feta, 1 bell pepper, cut into cubes, 1 15-ounce can of chickpeas, rinsed and drained, 1/2 to 1 cup coarsely chopped olives, 1 to 2 tablespoons finely minced mint or dill or pita chips (see below). You could also whisk a couple tablespoons of tahini into the dressing for a thicker, sesame-coated flavor. Serve with pita chips, or just eat it plain!

We have been having some pretty hot days out at the farm. It makes me thankful for my forays into the root cellar. What a lovely reprieve: to be out of the sun and having one’s arms submerged in the dunk tank. I have to remind myself -the tank is for the vegetables not for the humans. They need it more than I do.

Some days after work, I go for a dip in the lake. The queen of dunk tanks. It is nice to go during a weekday evening when there aren’t so many people around. People tend to keep a respectful Duluth-y sort of distance from one another, which I appreciate. Plus, everyone on the beach looks pretty good from a city block or more away. Not exactly like Bay Watch, but somewhere in the ballpark. Of course, get closer and bodies are just bodies. Cuts and bruises, hard times, bearing children and bearing years – it’s all there to see if you get up close.

My first couple of years farming, a few people would say things like “It’s just, like, so cool how you are all out here doing this, ya know? It’s, like, so peaceful. I’d love to do what you do”. And I would say something positive and polite and half true in response. But in my head I’d think – you wanna come out and do this? That’s great, because I’m tired and I’ve been in the sun for 10 hours and I’d love to go into town and get a burger and see a brainless movie.

Of course, these people were well meaning and I did like what I was doing. It would just hit me how there were gaps in what people from outside the farm thought versus what it was actually like doing it day in day out.

That is how it goes –sometimes from a distance things look just great. Like farming is frolicking through fields with baskets of kale and flowers being followed by lambs and dragonflies. That sounds lovely. Janaki, I want lambs. The following me kind.

When you get closer though, you see the real deal. The cellulite, the endless close-weeding, the age spots, the character flaws, the washing of the same bins again and again. Life is less like a storybook when you get up close to it all.

It is the being up close that really matters though. People are a different kind of beautiful when you are close to them. And farming is tiring, and full of things that don’t involve frolicking. Like walking behind a planter getting coated in dust and trying to finish a greenhouse and wandering around looking for something you just had a minute ago. Even tasks like picking up your CSA share and putting it away week after week, freezing extra garlic scapes and looking for ways to eat more greens looks snazzy when in a photograph in someone else’s (perfect) kitchen. Up close, it is work, and it is worth it.

Thank you for being a part of it all with us –from the more romantic aspects of farming (that do happen in real life, alongside all the other parts) to the dirt in your sink. It remains beautiful to me up close, and I hope it does to you too.

For the farm crew,

Karin

P.S. Dave says that the greens mix would be good if they were braised. It’s not quite as tender as ours usually is, but still good.

Broccoli

Sweet and Sour Roasted Napa Wedges