This week felt … very que sera, sera. Beautiful summer days and cool smooth sleeping nights. The various challenges in the field … well, they are what they are. Let the rodents munch, the weeds seed, the deer graze .. we are getting our time’s worth back in the abundant harvests for our meals, our every market and CSA distribution. The tomatoes are finally behaving somewhat – or at least enough of them.

The flawed and the ugly maters are looking like delicious pre-salsa, alongside the similarly damaged heaps of peppers. And we’re even plotting to use the vigorous lambs quarter weeds … we scored an antique seed separator machine last fall, and we’re going to use it to collect and winnow the abundant but tiny edible weed seeds! If we’re going to irrigate and trellis them like a crop, we may as well harvest and eat them like one too!

Our traditional serendipitous luck with all things trailer held up as well, as we worked on how exactly we might manage to head South during the most brutal months of the northern Wisconsin winter. After digging into various types of motorhomes and hitting only walls, we started looking into used pop-up camper trailers, which seemed about perfect for our family’s needs.

Fortunately we didn’t go ahead and buy one, and mentioned our thoughts to Kristin’s folks … and Jim replied “you might want to open up the one down by the field.”

What one?! Oooooh yeah .. about five years ago, Jim had scored a free pop-up camper off of Craigslist. We hadn’t needed it then, so after he sealed up a leak on the exterior of the roof, we parked it, never even opened it, and then forgot it even existed. Well, we figured out how the 1989 vintage camper opened up and took a peek … and it’s perfect! With some canvas patching and waterproofing, it’ll; be ready to roll on our snowbird flight.

Inside Box 14

Spaghetti squash – Halve it, scoop out the seeds, roast in the oven like any winter squash (or microwave it). Scrape out the strandy innards with a fork to use however you like … we like it with a light sauce like butter, parmesean, and herbs. Maybe some chopped and drained tomatoes; a lot of people try spaghetti sauce, but it kinda just turns it to a pile of mush. You could also make fritters – combine the cooked flesh with an egg, salt, pepper, maybe herbs, and a little flour. Fry little patties of the results in a pan.

Onions

Garlic chive flowers – stir fry, pesto, salad dressing … most often used as a pretty garnish for salads and crudite platters but can be added to soups, sauces, and potato and egg dishes. Chive blossoms are also an ideal ingredient to flavor vinegar.

Thai basil – One website says there is no substitute for Thai basil, another website says to use any basil you have. So it goes on the internet. There are recipes for Thai basil pesto too. If you don’t have enough Thai basil for a full pesto recipe, you could make half or add in other mild greens like the microgreen mix.

https://www.bonappetit.com/story/what-is-thai-basil

https://hot-thai-kitchen.com/thai-basil-sauce/#recipe

How to Save Your Basil – Thai Basil Stir Fry Sauce Recipe

Zucchini – you might be familiar

Cucumbers – ayuh

Peppers – fajitas, stuffed peppers, stuffed pepper casserole, chili, roasted pepper sauce, slice them dice them freeze them (no blanching needed!) …

Cherry tomatoes – have you tried roasting them? Have I linked to a recipe for this before? It’s a good thing.

Tomatoes – finally getting some decent quantities of big slicer worthy beasts! Use the ripest first, and save the firmer ones for a little later.

Ground cherries – magical husk fruit from Peru! The riper they get, the more golden they look – but when slightly under ripe theyre still good, just a bit tart. We usually just snack on ours. 

Micro mix – the cool nights have really made the microgreens happy it seems. This week’s mix includes sunflower, radish, red cabbage, kale, amaranth, pea shoots, and broccoli.

Words …

Have we talked about Oak Wilt on our land? Large patches of red oaks are losing their leaves and bark, becoming sculptural sentinels. This bothered me at first. I love the oaks, and it felt like I was losing something. But the changing landscape has grown on me, both as it is and as it may become. .

And the sunlight loves the change. Patches of bright blue open skies above are mirrored below with sun dappled eager young leaves and grasses, as the formerly rather intractable shadowy buggy brambly woods reveal their curves and their intentions.

Plus, it’s making paths and openings without mechanical and human intervention … perhaps we will chose a spot on which to build? Regardless, it’s lovely to see the sunlight pour through the once-dark woods, illuminating the oaken bones and backlighting the emerald understory, bursting forth into the sudden sunlight.

The landscape grows and changes as do all things, and we … we are Here For It.

Inside the box

• Sweet Peppers  – Kristin says peppers are her favorite crop today.
• Jalapeños – if they have that “checking” on the skin, they’re extra spicy. Remove the seeds to tone them down.
• Zucchini – you won’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone.
• Cabbage – we didn’t get enough of the large boxes back to use them this week (ahem ahem ahem) so these beasts challenged some laws of space.
• Onions – two of ’em
• Carrots – more genuine babies. Agricultural Mad Scientists have discovered that you can magically stunt carrots growth through an intensive canopy of vigorous weeds. Weeding baby carrot plants is … something. They share the bag with:
• Broccoli Side Shoots aka Baby Broccoli FER CUTE 
• Cherry tomatoes  – a quart of em
• Salad Turnips – just eat one like an apple; amaze your friends.
• Tomatoes – These were very difficult to Tetris into safe nestlings within the boxes. Eat the ripest ones fist – regardless of color, you can feel a ripe tomato’s slight overall give in the skin when cupped.
• Italian Basil – it loves tomatoes
• Cucumbers
• Corn – still sweet, still juicy – but less tender. I continue to relish it raw, but this is also good in dishes in which you slice it off the cob and use … like the corn chowder Kristin made last night. (sans any potatoes)
• Pea microgreens

This week marked the beginning of tomato preservation season – when the tomatoes with cracks and bruises and bites are salvaged to be smoked and sauced and salsaed. The Frankensmoker was disassembled from the “temporary test” location where it sat for several years, and rebuilt in a more convenient location, new and improved.

In other news, our former WWOOFer friend Madball hit the road after two weeks on the farm – but not before helping us forage plenty of mushrooms, set up for two markets, and knock out the final roofing of the processing area, at last. Now we can pack veggies protected from the rain and sun for the first time! How civilized we feel.

The deer are on an absolute rampage in the brassica row overnights … destroying fall broccoli and cauliflower and brussels sprouts like some kind of demonic plague. I might be biased. But no, I think that these deer are objectively evil, and I’m hopeful that this week our exorcist friend with the deer rifle will banish at least one from this realm because this carnage hurts our souls to see.

on the Twelfth Week Season my farmer gave to me:

OK I’m not actually going to do all the lyrics and make a song of it, my fingers have written a silly check that my brain cannot cash. But here’s what you’ve gotten:

• a melon – most likely a watermelon, although two lovely cantaloupes went out as well. Kristin picks the ones she deems most likely to be delicious, based on the arcane witchery of divinitory melon dowsing. (If you are saddened because you really wanted a watermelon, but got a different variety, let us know and we will try to hook you up next week if possible.)
• Sunflower Shoots – the most popular microgreen

• Brussels Sprouts Plant Tips with Broccoli Bonus Bag – use the tender topped plants like kale! We cut these off to stimulate the plants to grow the desirable sprouts later in the season.
• Peppers
• Eggplant
• Salad Turnips

• 1/2 Dozen Ears of Sweet Corn – I never loved sweet corn until I ate it fresh from the field. Oh my. Yours was harvested this morning … go!
• Zukes – the workhorses of CSA cooking

• Onions
• Cukes – these make great teethers, if you or an infant you know has teeth coming in. Also, they are food.

• Two Tomatoes – one less pretty than the other. The best available from our beleaguered plants. They are looking a bit better though … hopefully the warmth lasts and they continue.
• Cherry Tomatoes – I’d take these out and make sure none have split; they were all intact at harvest this morning, but some were ripe enough that they split their skin afterward.

It was a fruitful week and yeah I’m intending that pun, without apology. It rained some and the wild mushrooms finally started popping. We hunted wild cherries and picked runty weird pears and offered false salvation to the bird-menaced apples and juiced buckets of grapes gathered from our neighbors at Quiet Meadows.

The garden was productive, too. I think one of the many cycles we go through on this farm is the one where in early summer our focus is on the failures; the weeds that got away, the stunted crops and the sparse pickings and the ones that got devoured en terra utereo,

But then, right when we might teeter on the verge of psycho-spiritual collapse, the ABUNDANCE kicks us in the asses and we can’t overlook the sweet scent of successes.

OK, so the full-sized tomato crop is kind of messed up this year, and that is hard to swallow after last year’s perfection combined with the expectations we couldn’t help but harbor (secretly I’m still hoping they turn it around … any day now). Sure, the deer are making like brontosauruses amongst the dino kale, and the Vole Collective has masterminded a record number of heists, eliminating an impressive array of baby plants. And the weeds, and the drought, and inflation and dystopia and bears; oh my.

But … the melons are candy cannonballs and the sweet corn is off the hook … I tasted a cob this morning and for the first time really understood the evolution of corn to syrup to a can of high frutose. The cabbage worms aren’t inflicting their usual frass-holeness, the cherry tomatoes are lovely, the winter squash sure seek poised to achieve greatness. The kids are learning and exploring and clearly our finest output, and this ridiculous lifestyle we live is shaping us, providing us with the daily bread of Meaning.

The phrases “Look up!” and “look out!” are sadly tarnished with negative and fearful connotations, but I try to remember their more positive reminders as well. Look out of our heads, out of our dusty concepts and grim narratives and limited framings. Look up from the problems at hand, unbend and look up at the trees, the sky, the sun, the bigger picture, the vista buena. Pardon my French, but life is fucking beautiful, and if – when – I’m not awestruck, I know I’m not really paying attention.

There is a lot of love and sunshine in the boxes this week, I hope it can be tasted.

Inside Box 11

• Microgreen Mix – eat it soon; in the dim morning light I added a tray of amaranth & kale that was kind of sad, and we don’t think it will keep well for long. Or it might even be grody? We thought about tossing them all but it was already all boxed and I think it looks really good still overall … do what you must. (PS – yes we’ll reuse the containers if you return them.)
• Sweet Corn – so JUICY. Might be our best-ever sweet corn year. As usual I will promote eating at least one ear raw and without any butter or salt. I love them both, but they’re usually only required because the corn one usually gets is stale and sad. This corn is magic and will put sparkle in your spirit and add 10 points to your attributes, I think, so open one up and eat it right now please. After that … eat more? The sooner you get to it the better – once picked, the sugars start converting to starch. You can cut it off the cobs and cook it with zucchini and peppers, maybe a few tomato chunks. That’s what Kristin likes to do and she knows stuff.
• Zucchnis and Summer Squash – the versatile unsung heroes of CSA boxes
• Cucumbers – it’s been a good run but it’s coming to the end.
• Onions
• a Melon – one of a variety of types we grew this year, carefully chosen for most-likely ideal ripeness.
• a tomato or two – the big tomatoes are problematic this year; blossom end rot, cracking and splitting skin, and some annoying invisible caterpillar are taking their toll. These are the survivors, the chosen ones, blessed by the gods and ushered through the myriad tomato trials and tribulations to arrive by some miracle onto your table.
• Cherry Tomatoes – these grow out in the field, not in the greenhouse – and for whatever reasons, they’re happy and fine. Not too shabby.
• Salad Turnips – these are the mild kind. You can even eat em like apples! But if that’s still too “turnipy,” know that the flavor is concentrated in the skin, so peeling them makes them super mild. Roasting is good too.
• Hot Peppers – Jaleneos & Hot Wax – Don’t get confused: here are the hot ones:

• Sweet Peppers – Purple Bell Islander, Glow (orange-trending)
• Red Cabbage – this is a good recipe. Or just eat it; cabbage is delicious.

We have entered cherry-stained fingers season on the farm. The chokecherries are ripe and abundant, the small trees out in the Sterling Barrens heavily laden with them. There’s a learning curve to be navigated – it’s been years since we last had so many to work with, and we’d forgotten how to best extract the juice from them, which made for a late night and a lot of mess and stains as we reinvented the cherry-juicing wheel. They’re a hassle, but worth the effort – the tart flavor makes for a complex tasty jelly. We’re hoping to get back out into the Barrens later this week for more, which should be a bit easier to work with now that we are reoriented to the Way of the Cherry.

In similar efforts, the Elderberry bush we planted a few years ago put out an abundant harvest – Kristin watched carefully to time it just right; too soon and the berries are toxic, a little too late, and the birds will have stolen your hoard. Her vigilance yielded an impressive harvest of berry in clusters, which I picked off the stems one by one, a pleasantly productive way to pass a lovely screen-porch evening.

The rodents ate well, their numbers diminished only slightly by our efforts to keep them from devouring every tender seedling that we put out in the field. The drought is also doing well, with only a couple misty days and sprinkles to bother it. It’s been a challenging year for sure, with hugely reduced helpers and available time (two kids is more than double the work, at this point). There are times when it feels stressful. I remind myself that that’s ok to feel anxious, or experience our efforts as a struggle.

Sometimes, it is a struggle – no need to pretend otherwise. But it’s a struggle that we enjoy, filled with problems are are lucky to have.

And we get to eat such rewarding meals amongst it all. Hope you’re enjoying your veggies, too.

What’s Inside Box 10?

• Radish Microgreens – the stems are especially zippy. Awesome in tacos, sandwiches, etc.
• Green / Purple Sweet Peppers
• Onions
• Cherry Tomato Medley
• Cucumbers – slicers & picklers
• Italian Basil – if you clip the bottom of the stem and put in a vase / glass of water, it will keep nicely on the countertop. Don’t refrigerate … basil tends to turn black when it’s chilly.
• Zucchini / Summer Squash / Patty Pan Squash
• Eggplants (Italian & Asian)
• Melon ( either Sarah’s Choice, Hannah’s Choice (both cantaloupes), Arava (green fleshed yellow skinned tropical, or that kind we still can’t remember the name of)
• Potatoes (Red, White & Blue) – they have a cosmetic skin condition that won’t affect flavor.
• Kale – either Curly or Dino variety