Tag Archives: Napa Cabbage

Summer CSA Week 9

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Janaki is gone this week, along with the family, to their summer get away in Illinois. He’s probably full up on sweet ice tea and peaches right now. Meanwhile, back at the farm, we’ll just be making things up as we go. Who will tell us to do otherwise? So we’re taking this opportunity to change a few things up – just a few basic improvements that have been needed for a while. Here’s a few of them:

We’ve contacted our organic certifier to let them know we are renaming all the fields. None of us can keep our field no. 15c straight from our 16f or our Z2b. So we’ve renamed them all after our exes. We do have 4 Michael- fields now, but we’ve arranged them alphabetically (north to south) by the brand of the guitar they played. And they all played guitar.

We have added “this side up” stickers to all the tractors, hoes, CSA boxes, fork lifts and to farmer John. If Janaki comes back feeling rusty, he should be able to catch back up with helpful signs like that.

Janaki had been spending so much time irrigating, and while there are aspects (like solar panels!) that make running a pump somewhat sustainable – we think we could take it a step further. So… we will be doing nightly showings of the Titanic followed by the Notebook and we’re inviting you, and all the surrounding communities, to watch in our fields and cry your eyes out into the soil. Please, no tissues. That would be a waste.

Our potatoes are pretty scabby this year- but we don’t think they should go to waste. We have contacted a vaping company and are developing plans for a vapeable (sure, it’s a word) potato essence. Do you love the taste, and that sort of content fullness and slowness that the feeling of eating potatoes offers, but you’re too busy to cook? No worries! Coming fall 2021, you can grab a whatever-they-call-those-canisters of your own local, organic potato essence and vape away for dinner!

Your CSA share might look a little different this week. We know that you, our members, like a fast pace of change, and are always looking out for the next best thing. How many times have you gotten your share just to see… carrots… again. Ugh – no thank you! That’s why this week, you each will get a bag full of MICRO carrots- that’s right! We’ve harvested our ENTIRE 4th and 3rd plantings of carrots to offer you this exciting new treat! And, we think Janaki will be happy that we will save so much time and STORAGE later on in the season since we’ve harvested them all now!

I could go on and on with other changes we’re making this week, but these are just some of the highlights! I can’t wait to see Janaki’s face when he sees how great things are when he comes back.

For the farm re-envisioning committee,

Karin

In your share this week, for real:
Basil – Beets – Napa cabbage – Carrots – Cilantro – Cucumber – Garlic – Kale – Peas – Potatoes – Green Pepper – Hot pepper – Tomatoes – Zucchini

Roasted Cabbage with Walnuts and Parmesan

From The Smitten Kitchen

  • 1 medium-large (1 3/4 pounds) Napa (original calls for savoy…) cabbage
  • 7 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste
  • Freshly ground black pepper
  • Scant 1/2 cup (1.75 ounces) walnut halves and pieces
  • 1 large or 2 smaller garlic cloves
  • 1 large lemon
  • Red pepper flakes, such as Aleppo (optional)
  • Grated parmesan, to taste

Heat oven to 475ºF. Remove any damaged outer leaves of cabbage and cut 8 (for small ones) to 12 (for a large one) wedges. Coat a large baking sheet with 2 tablespoons olive oil. Arrange cabbage wedges in one layer, drizzling or brushing them with 2 more tablespoons olive oil and sprinkle with 1 teaspoon kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste. Roast for 8 to 10 minutes, until charred underneath (don’t panic if you see a few thin black edges; they’re going to taste amazing). Use a spatula to flip each piece over and roast for 5 more minutes, until the edges of the cabbage are dark brown.

Meanwhile, while cabbage roasts, place nuts on a smaller tray or baking dish and roast them next to the cabbage for 4 to 5 minutes. Remove and scatter them, still hot, onto a cutting board and coarsely chop them. Scoop into a bowl and finely grate the zest of half a lemon and all of the garlic over it. Add remaning 3 tablespoons olive oil to walnuts, a few pinches of salt and red pepper flakes and stir to combine. If you’ve got a couple minutes to let it all infuse as it cools, let it rest. When ready, squeeze the juice of half your lemon in and stir to combine. Adjust flavors to taste, adding more lemon if needed; you want this dressing to be robust.

The moment the cabbage comes out of the oven, spoon the walnut dressing over the wedges. Grate parmesan all over, to taste. Serve immediately, while piping hot. There will be no leftovers.

We wanted to send enough basil so that you could make a small batch of pesto. You may want to look at a recipe to get the quantities you want to make based on how much of your basil you want to use for the pesto. I have always found pesto to be very forgiving, so ratios aren’t the most important, but it is nice to have a ball-park amount.

Summer CSA Week 5

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It looks like it will cool down this coming week- and maybe bring a little rain (fingers crossed). As I write this however, it is in the mid 80s and it’s late evening… so I have the heat on my mind. Hot days, and warm evenings, make it hard to predict when vegetables will be their best. Broccoli and greens especially don’t want to be this hot. How crazy it is to have the number of 80 degree days we’ve had at the early part of our season. I also have a harder time predicting when I’ll be my best in this heat – but it is probably when both my hands are submerged in the dunk tank with bins of lettuce!

This heat also has me looking at today’s share list and thinking: you can eat all this stuff just how it is, you don’t even need to stand over a stove! This will obviously read differently on a 70 degree day later in the week–hold on future self, I’m coming! Truly though, I do love the weeks where the share can almost all be chopped up and served together in a big, colorful heap of verdant goodness. Add some dressing, nuts, and maybe (definitely) feta and you’re good to go! Disclaimer: I wouldn’t eat all the garlic scapes at once…

Picking up your share on hot days (should you be picking up Monday) can also be a bit more work. I have the luxury of raiding the cooler or fields on the farm on an as-needed basis. But getting veggies out of the heat and into cool water or the fridge to freshen back up is important for peak quality. Pick up your share as early as possible on days like this, and don’t hesitate to fill a side of your sink and let things like broccoli, chard and head lettuce rehydrate and cool for a bit if they seem warm. Even if your kitchen feels hot to you, the cold tap water will bring the heat back out of them much more quickly than just going into the fridge dry.

I hope this week’s share finds you all well. And I hope that the abundance of produce brings extra joy to your table- maybe someone else’s table too!

For the farm crew,
Karin

In your share this week:
Beets – Broccoli – Carrots – Cauliflower – Chard – Cucumbers – Garlic Scapes – Lettuce – Napa Cabbage – Green Onions

Mango Slaw with Cashews and Mint

From The Smitten Kitchen

2 mangoes, peeled, pitted and julienned
1 to 1 1/4 pounds Napa cabbage, halved and sliced very thinly
1 red pepper, julienned
1/2 red onion, thinly sliced
6 tablespoons of fresh lime juice, from about two limes
1/4 cup rice vinegar
2 tablespoons oil of your choice
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes, or to taste (or omit this and whisk in a chile paste to taste)
1/4 cup thinly sliced fresh mint leaves
1/4 cup toasted cashews, coarsely chopped

Toss mangoes, cabbage, pepper and onion in a large bowl. Whisk lime juice, vinegar, oil, salt and red pepper in a smaller bowl and pour over slaw. You can either serve this immediately or leave the flavors to muddle for an hour in the fridge. Before serving, toss with mint leaves and sprinkle with cashews.

About the mango: This salad will work with almost any variety or ripeness of mango, whether sour or sweet. Use the one you can get, or that you enjoy the most. In general, a firmish not overly ripe mango (unlike the very ripe, sweet one I used) holds up best but all will be delicious in this salad.

Easy Caesar Dressing

From Cookie and Kate

  • ½ cup mayonnaise
  • 1 medium garlic clove, minced (or you could try a scape!)
  • 2 teaspoons lemon juice, to taste
  • 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
  • ½ teaspoon Worcestershire sauce, to taste
  • ⅛ teaspoon fine salt
  • ⅓ cup (1 ounce) finely grated Parmesan cheese
  • 1 tablespoon water
  • Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
  1. In a liquid measuring cup or bowl, combine the mayonnaise, garlic, lemon juice, Dijon, and Worcestershire sauce, and salt. Stir to combine.
  2. Stir in the Parmesan, followed by the water. Season generously with black pepper, to taste. I usually think the dressing tastes just right, but if you’d prefer a more bold dressing, add another ¼ teaspoon Worcestershire sauce, or for more zippy dressing, add up to 1 teaspoon additional lemon juice. Serve as desired. Keeps 5 days.

Summer CSA Week 6

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It seems that somehow the weather has been colluding with current events – when it rains it pours. When it pours it also hails. If you haven’t yet read Janaki’s storm report from mid-week last week it’s worth reading through, just scroll down this page.

We take a lot of pride in the food we send in the shares each week. The plants get a lot of TLC around here between greenhouse time, or field weeding and hoeing time (not to mention the tractor time and watering time). Janaki and Dave are always considering this or that about the appearance of the leaves, or the way plants look when they sprout, or how to perfectly place pac choi in a box so it’s as unrumpled it can be. The care and precision for every aspect of a plant’s life is time consuming, and it rubs off on everyone who works on the farm.

Doing things to the best of our ability is all we can do, and there is so much that isn’t up to us.. It is disappointing, and a little nerve wracking to see plants we are counting on look like someone stepped all over them. We can still do our best to care for the plants and to harvest them tenderly, but nothing is going to change the pock marks in the peas, or the dead carrots or other crops now open to more pressure from pests or disease.

During this whole insane time we find ourselves in as a society, I have really struggled to pull myself back from the precipice of “everything-is-horrible-and-it-shouldn’t-be-and-if-only-people-had-done-the-work-in-the-beginning-or-at-least-tried-even-later-or-just-did-anything-at-all-even-small-things-this-wouldn’t-be-happening-and-if-I-get-mad-enough-at-strangers-in-the-grocery-store-will-that-fix-how-terrible-I-feel”. It’s a long name for a precipice. I should consider an acronym.

This year so far has been a lot of rubber meeting the road and wool being pulled from our eyes. It is a lot to digest, and it feels like it’ll digest us. It’s not easy to put one’s head down and keep doing right, and keep working for better when it seems like a hail storm is going to come along and undo whatever you’ve worked for. Or even trying again after a hailstorm of life- it’s hard to keep on when maybe the damage that’s been done won’t be out-weighed by the effort and vulnerability of our attempt for better.

In pulling myself back from the aforementioned precipice, I have to constantly remind myself that I am only in control of what I do and don’t do. I can not control most of what happens to me, or other people. I can not control what the weather does, or the climate, or the people in the grocery store.

On the farm, we’ll keep tending to the crops tenderly, even though (especially because) they’re in rough shape. We’ll harvest them well and pack them for you as gingerly as we can. That’s what we can do. We can keep on doing the right thing for the soil on the farm, year in year out and keep making choices that keep us as off the grid as possible.

Thanks for doing your part by using our vegetables, and for sharing in the ups and downs of farming and life with us. None of this would be happening without all of you choosing to eat our food for yourselves and your families.

For the farm crew,

Karin

 

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In your share this week:

Beets – Broccoli – Cauliflower – Carrots – Cucumbers – Head lettuce- Snap peas

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Straw all stacked -done and done!

Napa Cabbage Salad with Buttermilk Dressing

From The Smitten Kitchen

-I am including this recipe mostly for the dressing, because having a good dressing on hand can be a key part of getting veggies from your fridge and into your mouth! Also, did you know that Napa cabbage (should you have any left from last week) can be stored for quite a while, well wrapped in the fridge? Not maybe as long as hard cabbage, but for at least a month.

1/2 cup well-shaken buttermilk
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
2 tablespoons cider vinegar
2 tablespoons minced shallot
1 tablespoon sugar
3 tablespoons finely chopped chives (or green onions!)
1 pound Napa cabbage, cored and thinly sliced crosswise (4 cups)
6 radishes, diced
2 celery ribs, thinly sliced diagonally

Whisk together buttermilk, mayonnaise, vinegar, shallot, sugar, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper in a large bowl until sugar has dissolved, then whisk in chives.

Toss cabbage, radishes, and celery with dressing.

Summer CSA, Week 8

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The agate; a treasure to find for north shore residents. We scavenge gravel pits and construction sites looking for those glossy banded rocks. We look with bent necks along the shores of Superior. And each time we come across an agate it’s an exciting surprise.

Some believe agates should go back where they were found, perhaps for the next person to find the joy. Others hoard them in jars around their homes or in the cup holders of their cars.

Our radionics padawan Garret, refers to them as energy boosters. Walking around the farm it’s common to find them piled up waiting to put a smile on someone’s face.

The last two weeks have been a collective effort to weed the 3rd and 4th planting of carrots. With burnt knees and blistered knuckles we damn near completed all 39 beds worth. By the time you read this we might have finished the last seven rows.

Sam and Garrett enjoy tucking agates between carrots. Someone will find it along the way and put it in a row next to them for someone else. Little energy boosters.

Medieval folklore suggests farmers in Europe believed agates could protect their dairy cows.

To prevent milk from spoiling during lightening storms they would hang agates inside barns. This had the added benefit of keeping the witches away from riding their cows at night. A witch will not enter a building protected by an agate.

Agates were also fastened to equipment to ensure a healthy productive crop.

As much as I’d love to see a witch riding a cow, I’d rather have a glass of unspoiled milk.

From a witch weary farm crew,

Tiffany

In your CSA Box: Broccoli – Carrots – Cilantro – Cucumber – Dill – Napa Cabbage – Green Onion – Peas – Green Pepper – Jalapeño Pepper – Tomatoes – Zucchini

Cucumber and Napa Cabbage Coleslaw

  • 1/4 cup Cilantro
  • 2 Cucumbers
  • 1/2 large Napa Cabbage
  • 1/2 cup peanuts-roasted
  • 1/2 tsp garlic powder or some scapes if you have them from last week
  • 1 tsp red pepper flakes
  • 1/4 cup lime juice
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 2 tsp sugar
  • 1/3 cup peanut or canola oil

Chop cucumber and Napa cabbage into thin elongated slices. Dress with cilantro roasted peanuts. Combine peanut oil, lime juice salt sugar and garlic powder to drizzle over slaw.

Summer CSA, Week 6

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What a week!

The weather is scorching hot and vegetables are growing like crazy. The bounty of food we harvest everyday takes my breath away.

You want to know what else takes my breath away? More or less out of primal hunger …LUNCH and how good everyone on the Food Farm is at cooking! It’s kind of a job requirement.

Each day someone on the farm crew is designated to make lunch. And each day the arrangement of vegetables grows more and more impressive. On a hot, hot day caring for cabbage or carrots it is so wonderful to eat a cold salad with cold dressing and drink a glass of ice cold water.

So the salad bar has become a staple during lunch. It is common place to lay out a cornucopia of choices so we can all free range. Shredded turnips or beets, chopped cucumber and carrots, sun gold tomatoes and a pile of greens mix. Of course one cannot survive the rest of the day purely off of a salad.

Sam likes to bring bread he made over the weekend. He is an incredible baker and the bread does not last long. Jane makes kombucha and a delicious hard boiled egg. Teri often dazzles us with a quinoa dish she prepared the night before. She sometimes will even bring homemade ice cream! I constantly want to make cookies. And Garrett made an impromptu tofu beet salad this week that was stellar. Oh and Patricia likes to bring watermelon or mango from her backyard.

The possibilities of what to do with a refrigerator full of vegetables can be overwhelming. Attempting to create a new and exciting dish to please the masses can be challenging. Luckily out here when we file in for lunch no one is picky and we are all purely grateful food is made and it’s time to relax.

When food tastes this good who needs fancy sauces and spices. Wash that carrot off and start munching!

Above is Garrett, who landed a hitchhiker while hoeing in the squash field. Also in the squash field are a lot of rouge milkweed plants. Bless their hearts they didn’t realize they were growing in a field so now Janaki will have to drive around them when cultivating. Thankfully everywhere you look around the farm is milkweed. And if you look close enough you might find a caterpillar enjoying their lunch.

From a lunch happy farm crew

Tiffany

In your CSA box:

Broccoli – Carrots – Swiss Chard – Cucumber – Napa Cabbage – Garlic Scapes – Green Onions – Lettuce

Spring Rolls!

You can make spring rolls with so many different ingredients. Now that napa cabbage is ready though mmmmmm they sure sound delicious.

Thinly slice into small elongated pieces

  • Carrots
  • Cucumber
  • Napa Cabbage

You could also add

  • Avocado
  • Rice Noodles
  • Tofu
  • Beets

The list goes on and on….

Place hot water in a bowl or cake pan, submerge one spring roll rice paper at a time for about 20 seconds. Take out and apply vegetables, roll like a burrito. Don’t forget to tuck the ends in!

Add a tasty peanut sauce for dipping and you’ve got yourself a delectable summer meal.

Garlic Scape Hummus

  • 2 cups cooked chickpeas
  • 1/3 cup chopped garlic scapes
  • Juice of 1 lemon
  • 1/3 cup olive oil
  • 1/2 tsp salt

In a food processor pulse scapes, lesson juice and salt

Add chick peas and blend, adding olive oil as you go

Top with herbs and spices such as dill and sumac