Farm News

Lately all the bad news surrounding Hurricane Katrina and the tragedy for people in New Orleans, high gas prices, and our ‘business as usual’ response to it all has me doing some serious ruminating. Most of it seems very interconnected to me. Energy use in this country is completely unsustainable and is having a dramatic effect on the world’s climate, yet our response is to drive ever bigger cars ever longer distances while building bigger houses burning more oil. We seem to be in denial of the fact that fossil fuels ain’t being made any more, and our increasing consumption of them is heating up the planet. That the world is heating is only debated by oil-industry funded quacks. We Americans are willing participants, in fact the main players, in a huge experiment in global climate change. One predicted outcome of increased ocean temperatures is increasingly severe storms, and storm data from the last decade is showing that to be true. It is ironic that our petroleum refining capacity was knocked back by Katrina. Maybe Mother Earth is trying to tell us something.

We have reached a point where citizens have only a few options. We can bury our heads in the sand, scream to our leaders about the high price of gas, and demand that they lower it immediately. We can head for the hills, find a cozy cave, and check out of society. Or we can tell our leaders that we are willing make the sacrifices to FUND better solutions to our energy insecurity than invading countries with large oil reserves or wringing the last six drops of oil out of the Alaskan permafrost . (Tragically, the Arctic is heating up much faster than the rest of the planet, and the permafrost is predicted to become ‘perma-mud’ pretty soon, hindering efforts to drill for Alaskan crude. Another memo from our Mother?) It will take decades to come up with a sustainable energy infrastructure, but we must make this investment NOW. In the meantime, we all need to work to conserve the energy we use.

And I have been giving my own energy consumption a hard look. I am not happy with it. Sure, I drive a compact car, and spend a lot of time and money growing most of the farm’s nitrogen fertilizer using cover crops (energy used in the production of conventional nitrogen fertilizer is the largest fossil fuel input to American agriculture). But the farm uses coolers, furnaces, tractors, and trucks, all fired by oil. I haven’t been in a financial position to invest in alternative forms of energy, but I want to give it a closer look. Organic farmers, and citizens in general, aren’t immune to the laws of economics. I just hope the laws of ecology don’t do us in first.

Paul, for Janine, John, Leah, and Bob.

Pick Your Own is winding down for the season. There are gleanings available of pumpkins, flowers, and herbs. PYO hours are Tuesday and Friday from 2:30 to 6:30 PM and Saturday 8AM to noon. Go to the front of the white barn and follow the “PYO” instructions on the white board.

“HOW LONG DOES THE CSA DISTRIBUTE FOOD?” We will definitely distribute produce through the month of October, we’ll give you an end date soon.

“WHAT ABOUT NEXT SEASON?” We will send sign-up info to CSA shareholders for the 2006 season by February (note for split shares: we only keep contact info for the member whose name the share is in). We will give members a two-week head start, and then send brochures to our mailing list. Shares are available first come, first serve, and we expect to sell out rather quickly next year. Shares cannot be reserved before then as I need some time to reflect on this season and make changes. It’s heartening to know that so many of you are interested in another season at the farm!

Featured this week:

Sweet Dumpling Squash: a great tasting squash with sweet, dry flesh. Bake like any winter squash or see recipe below. Will store at room temperature, out of direct light, for several weeks.

Cauliflower: great tasting fall crop this year.

Salad mix: small-scale organic growers started the “mesclun craze” in the US about a decade ago, sowing seeds by hand, harvesting with a knife, and washing in buckets. Salad mix is now big business, with huge acreages in the desert Southwest supplying grocery stores year round. Salad mix harvestering machines and enourmous washers have dropped the price dramatically. We still grow and mix it the old fashioned way, by hand, and we hope you enjoy this special fall treat.

Salad turnips: encore appearance, they were a big hit this spring. Slice the roots into a salad and steam or sauté the greens.

Fingerling potatoes: these shwanky spuds are the stars of the potato world. These old world varieties are great roasted or in soups and stews. They are very expensive in stores and are costly for us to grow as the seed is expensive, and they are low yielding and require a lot of hand work to harvest. But worth the effort!

Also in the box: bok choy, onions, kale, beets, and garlic.

Recipe:

Cauliflower-Cheese Soup, from “The Moosewood Cookbook”

1 medium-large potato, peeled and diced (about 2-3 cups diced)

1 large cauliflower, cut or broken into florets (put aside 2 cups of florets)

1 medium carrot, peeled and chopped

3 medium cloves garlic, peeled

1 ½ cups chopped onion 1 ½ teaspoons salt

4 cups water 2 cups (packed) grated cheddar

¾ cup milk 1 tsp. dill

½ teaspoon caraway seeds black pepper, to taste

Place potato, cauliflower (except 2 cups reserved), carrot, garlic, onion, salt, and water in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil, then simmer until all the vegetables are very tender. Puree in a blender or food pro cessor, and transfer to a kettle or Dutch oven. Steam the reserved cauliflower pieces until just tender. Add these to the puree along with all remaining ingredients. Heat gentl , and serve topped with a little extra cheese. Six or more servings.