Abbe Hills Farm CSA

Greetings shareholders,

This weekend, we'll have white potatoes, very nice onions, mountains of sweet red peppers, eggplant, chilies, fantastic leaf lettuce, red globe radishes, arugula, green beans, a few tomatoes, kale, chard, and herbs.  We open at 10:00 Saturday morning, although if it is still raining by then, you might want to delay your arrival if possible.  We've got a hayrack in the middle of the shed loaded with vegetables that we thought we might lose in the frost that was predicted this week, and I don't want to pull it out into the rain if we don't have to.  We'll stay open until 2:00, although if we get a late start, I can keep the food out until 3:00.  At 3:30, I have to leave, so please be here before then.

The potatoes are called "Superior".  Make sure they are fully dry (it's been a rainy week and they never dried out from washing them) and in the dark, and they should last a long time.  The onions are "Big Daddy".  Keep them dry, cool, and in the dark, and they should be good keepers.  Never keep onions or potatoes in plastic bags; they need a paper bag or cardboard box so they can breathe a little.  We really do have a mountain of sweet peppers.  They are just marvelous.  I love growing sweet peppers just because they look so pretty this time of year.  Plus, they taste great.  If there are too many for you to use in a week, you can roast and freeze them, stuff and freeze them, or slice and freeze them.  Roasted red peppers make a great side dish when it is snowing and cold.

The lettuce continues to be beautiful.  Lettuce loves cool weather.  We also have arugula now.  Arugula is a spicy green in the mustard family.  I think it tastes a little like walnuts with tabasco sauce.  Some people like to saute it and eat it with pasta or eggs or cheese.  I think it is very good when mixed (in moderate quantities) with lettuce in a tossed salad.  It gives the salad a little spunk.  We should have arugula and radishes from now until the end of October, so you'll have several opportunities to find ways to use them.  The radishes this week are the regular red globes, but we also have a few shunkyo radishes now, and soon we'll have a couple of kinds of daikon.  Radishes also love cool weather.  They can be eaten raw in a salad or sandwich, or shredded for a slaw, or stir fried like water chestnuts.  All yummy. 

No winter squash yet.  As most of you know, I'm a believer is letting the winter squash get good and cold out in the field.  I think it helps with ripening and makes the squash sweeter.  So, don't panic.  There will be squash, and it will be great.  While we wait for the frost, buy some homegrown squash from some farmer's market vendor to get you through.  Then, really enjoy squash when the good stuff is ready in a couple of weeks.

Anybody have a 4-H club or youth group that might like to help with potato digging?  We'll be back at it as soon as the mud becomes a little less muddy.  Let me know if you would like to help.

The Mt. Vernon/Lisbon CROPWalk is going to be Sunday, Oct 11.  Registration starts at 1:45 at the Presbyterian Church.  Walkers walk to Lisbon, then back to the Methodist church in Mt. Vernon for at light dinner.  Everybody is welcome to walk, and EVERYBODY is welcome to make a donation to support a walker.   Donations to CROPWalk are used by Church World Service to support international food relief and anti-hunger development, and to support our local food pantry at the Southeast Linn Community Center.  I'll be walking, and since I know so many people, they are calling me a "celebrity walker".  Please, please, please - don't let me embarrass myself!  Help me maintain my celebrity and help me make a great big donation.  You can donate $1, $5, $500, or anything in between.  We'll have donation envelopes available on Saturday, in case any of you or your kids would like to join me on the walk.

Please take a look inside the hoophouse sometime.  It looks beautiful now with the greens that I'm growing for the Late Fall CSA shares that I will be offering.  I've got most of the details on the new mini-CSA figured out, and will be posting to the website and sending you sign-up information very soon.  There will only be enough for 30 shares, so be ready to register when you hear from me.  It looks like weekly pickups will be on Wednesday afternoons from the first week of November until the week of Christmas.

See you tomorrow,

Laura