Salamander Springs Farm/Permaculture Organics

IN YOUR BOX TODAY:

CUCUMBERS!  tender enough for salads, do not have to be peeled, these are wonderful fresh on hot July days.  See the previously posted info & recipes for yogurt/cucumber/mint sauce or in Tabouli Salad.

GREEN BEANS!    These are stringless snap beans, picked when the inner bean is just beginning to form.  They need little cooking, and can be eaten raw in dips, steamed or put into stir-fries, egg dishes, stews.  See nutritional info below.

POTATOES!  We’ll set aside about 2# of baby potato mixes (which we know several of you like) for our CSA folks the market.  You can swap out if you’d like with different sizes or certain varieties on the market table.  This week we have red, whites (“Irish Cobbler”) and purple (“Purple Viking”) potatoes.  This is our first year of growing this type of purple potatoes-- they are big and beautifully streaked in dark and light hues of purple & pink!

You’ll find one of these in your box this week:
CABBAGE, BROCCOLI or SWEET BELL PEPPERS  Cabbage is a versatile vegetable - good raw in salads, in many other dishes from stir-fries to soups, and it is easy to ferment into a highly nutritious, enzyme-rich food like Kim Chi or Sauerkraut. See recipe and nutritional info and below.  See nutritional info in our past postings about broccoli and peppers.

STANDARD RED, CHERRY or HEIRLOOM TOMATOES - We’ll set some aside for CSA members, but you can come early to market to pick your preference (let us know for future weeks).  The tomatoes are hanging in there despite the flooding rains and wet conditions which promote blight.  If you get parsley today, remember the yummy refreshing middle eastern Tabouli Salad recipe in the July 2 posting--so refreshing on a hot day!  We add garbanzo beans (chickpeas) to make it a meal (we’re harvesting our garbanzos this week!).   Do not refrigerate tomatoes--it nullifies tomato flavor and turns the flesh mealy.  Keep them on your counter stem-side down covered with a cloth.  Use according to ripeness--within a couple days to a week.  To ripen further, leave a sunny windowsill (covered with a cloth).

Pick out your preference at the market of  SUMMER SQUASH or ZUCCHINI.  Grated squash is a wonderful addition to last week’s “Morning Glory Muffins” recipe or zucchini bread.  They are sweet in roasted veggies, casseroles, a stir fry or egg frittata, marinated and put on the grill, or our (June 26) Pan Grilled Summer Squash & Zucchini recipe.   Add sliced squash & tomatoes to rice when you cook it.  Zucchini & summer squash store best dry & cool but not too cold. Wash just before use, water causes it to spoil more quickly.  A perforated bag is best so the squash still has air circulation.

STIR FRY GREENS - a super nutritious mix featuring SWEET POTATO GREENS, along with Chard, Kale, Perpetual Spinach Beet, Daikon, Tatsoi mustard, Amaranth, and Leek chives!  Wonderful stir-fried, sauteed or steamed with a little bit of lemon juice or butter.  Great in egg dishes. too.  See the amazing nutritional and medicinal benefits of sweet potato greens in last week’s posting!
 
YELLOW ONIONS - slowly our onions are starting to cure, despite the wet & humid conditions. They are stacked in big recycled bread trays in the new (natural clay-straw) building and we are using a fan as much as possible (with our limited solar electricity). Susana has been working extra hours to finish the upstairs loft space so we can spread them out more.  Please let us know how many onions you use and your type preference (red, white, & yellow sweet, yellow storage or pearl onions).

Take your pick of our other Alliums at the market:   a head of GARLIC, a few PEARL ONIONS, or LEEKS.
PEARL ONIONS are a gourmet’s delight (ours are selling for $4/lb at Good Foods Coop in Lexington!) These little bitty onions are delicious whole with roasted potatoes & veggies or boiled with potatoes & green beans, butter & salt.   The red ones especially are colorful and tasty sliced raw in salads like Tabouli.  The LEEKS area small early variety, sweeter and more pungent than onions.  Enjoy in creamy potato leek soup (see July 2 post) stir-fries, roasted-veggies, frittatas...the green stalks are good, too.

Pick your preference at the market of a bunch of FRESH BASIL or PARSLEY--for your health!  (Look back at the posted nutritional information to see why).

and last but not least...
FRESH BAKED BREAD & SPECIAL TREATS from Clementine’s Bakery!

At the farmer’s market today we’ll have red, white & purple potatoes, beets, edamame soy, carrots, blackberries, hot peppers, green beans, all the Alliums, flowers and much more...   See you there!

*************************************RECIPES!**************************************

Sauerkraut and it’s Korean cousin Kim Chi transform cabbage and your other vegetables into tasty enzyme and nutrient food--see below!  If you don’t have a crock, a gallon 1/2 gallon, or wide mouth quart jar works fine.  Don’t ferment foods in plastic.

SAUERKRAUT
1-2 pounds of cabbage
approx. 2-3 tablespoons of non iodized salt (sea salt)

OR
KIM CHI  -adapted from Sandor Katz and others, plus our own changes along the way (adjust according to your tastes)
2-3 tablespoons of non iodized salt (sea salt)
1 pound of cabbage
1-2 carrots, radishes (including daikons) or beets (or mix of all)
3 cloves of chopped garlic
1-2 chopped onions or leeks
3-4 hot red chilies, more or less if you like (fresh or dried), mince and remove seeds
3 tablespoons of freshly grated ginger
Salt, pepper and other spices you want
Koreans also add several tablespoons of fish sauce (which you can get at an Asian or natural foods grocery)

Mix the salt thoroughly with the water to make a brine.  Keep back a little of the brine before adding the vegetables so you can add more brine once the vegetables are packed in the container if they aren’t fully submerged.

Cut the cabbage (and other vegetables) into thin slices and mix.  Let it soak an hour or two in the salted brine.  Pound or mash in a sturdy pot--use your fist, a potato masher, or small jar.   Pack the cabbage (and other veggies) tightly into your crock or mason jar; sprinkle salt & pepper and your own spices as you go.  Pack as tightly as you can so the salt can draw out the water from the cabbage for the fermentation to occur.   Make certain there is about an inch of brine at the top; you will likely not need to add much of your extra salt water brine to top it off; when you pound and pack the salted cabbage in the container you  the cabbage weeps enough water to form more brine.

A weight on top of the cabbage mixture packed in the jar or crock should keep it completely submerged in the brine with no air exposure that will cause mold or bad bacterias.  I have made a weight by filling a sturdy plastic bag (or doubled plastic bags) with water, and tightly twist-tie.   Cover your container with a cloth and rubber band and keep in a dark place where the temperature stays fairly even while it is fermenting. These recipes take 1-2 weeks to ferment, depending on your kitchen temperature (the warmer, the faster the fermentation).  Usually it starts to bubble when it is ready:   so check on your Kim Chi or Sauerkraut each day--taste it and smell it, once it has the flavor you like it, put lid on it and refrigerate to eat and as you please.  If you see a little mold forming at the top, don’t worry, just skim it off.  It is a sign of the presence of air; make sure your cabbage and vegetables are fully in the brine while pushing your weight down.

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"Transitions at the Farm"   -a note from Susana

Hello CSA family,

It is the middle of July, in a season we will remember for its intense rains.  We still have standing water in the fields.  Our farm tour Saturday (with more than 50 people and not enough roof space) started with another downpour which took down a huge tree limb near our outdoor kitchen.  We and the crops are ready for the drying of sun, even though it means humid hot days!

We have started harvesting a new crop--snapping turtles from the duck pond, who’ve eaten a few of our baby ducks!  I set up a snag with some fish line and a bottle float.  We have a big angry one in a tub now and at least one more who’s eaten bait but so far avoided getting hooked.  We shall have turtle soup soon!

We are in transition at Salamander Springs Farm, having today to say good-bye to our WWOOFer David Veltser, who has been part of our team since the beginning of June.  David is in route to a remote community in New Mexico and we look forward to seeing him again upon his return to the east coast.  On Thursday we will welcome our next WWOOFer, Richard Goerwitz, coming from Eastwind Community in Missouri.  David’s blog last week made mention of the WWOOF program, an acronym for WorldWide Opportunities on Organic Farms.  This program provide a first step on a farm for many, to see if the hard, if rewarding, work it requires suits them.  Kayla and Mirra came to Salamander Springs Farm last season through this program and have returned this season as full season apprentices and co-managers of the CSA.  They are 2 amazing and beautiful souls--and in David’s words, the strongest, hardest working women he’d ever known.  One of the most rewarding parts for me in running a permaculture farm has been the growing extended family of young permaculture-minded "back-to the-landers."  They give me much hope for the future!  One of the hardest parts of running this farm is saying good-bye to members of our farm family who have lived and worked together intensively every day.  

Our new addition, Richard Goerwitz is not your typical WWOOFer, having spent the last several years managing the gardens at East Wind, a long-established intentional community in MO (some of you may be familiar with their peanut butter sold at Good Food Co-op in Lexington and other organic food stores).  Richard is taking a WWOOFing “sabbatical” to look at other ways of living and working on the land.  We hope that each of you can help us welcome Richard to Berea. 

Blessings on your meals,
Susana

P.S.  Mirra’s birthday is next Monday August 22, so remember to give her lots of love at the market! 

**************************NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION************************

Cooking vegetables leads to slight nutrient losses, but heat also helps activate some plant enzymes, vitamins and antioxidants. Cook for short periods of time and use liquids too. Vegetables loose vitamins to air so using soon is always best.

FERMENTED FOODS ARE SO GOOD FOR YOU!
Fermenting cabbage and vegetables preserves and stores their nutrient value--and so much more!  Fermentation provides a low-calorie, high fiber super-food that can be used to help heal many ailments and improve overall health.  The fermentation process of SAUERKRAUT and KIM CHI (see recipes above) creates a rich source of probiotics, the healthy bacteria your body needs to maintain a balanced state of bacteria in your colon and fight off various infections.  They are packed with vitamins and minerals such as vitamin A, some B vitamins, iron, calcium, and selenium, which help support muscle growth, improve your immune system and blood flow.
Research has shown that these ferments have the ability to lower cholesterol levels when eaten on a daily basis.  Garlic, one of the ingredients in kimchi, is a great source of both allicin and selenium. Allicin is a well-known compound that can reduce cholesterol levels, which will help decrease chances of developing strokes and heart attacks. The selenium, another active compound in garlic, can help lower cholesterol levels by preventing cholesterol plaque from building up in your artery walls.
The cabbage provides powerful antioxidants and flavonoids known to help prevent cancer and a rich source of glucosinolates.   When digested, glucosinolates, convert into a compound known as isothiocyanate (an effective anti-cancer phytochemical found in many cruciferous vegetables). The lactobacillus bacteria helps lower blood sugar levels.  Other ingredients used to make kimchi, such as ginger, pepper, and garlic, have all been known to support the immune system and are believed to have the ability to stop or shorten cold and flu symptoms. The antioxidants help protect your body from free radicals.  
Fermentation also makes digestion of cabbage for many people easier because the vegetables have been predigested by the enzymes during the process.

CABBAGE - one cup of chopped cabbage has 89% of your daily recommended allowance of Vitamin K, 86% of your Vitamin C, and an average 17% of B6, manganese and fiber!  Potassium and folate average 10% and Vitamin B1 and calcium 6-7%.
Cabbage has special cholesterol-lowering benefits, especially cooked by steaming or fermented (see recipes). The fiber-related components in cabbage do a better job of binding together with bile acids in your digestive tract when they've been steamed or fermented. When this binding process takes place, it's easier for bile acids to be excreted, and the result is a lowering of your cholesterol levels. Raw cabbage still has cholesterol-lowering ability, just not as much as steamed cabbage.
Cabbage is an especially good source of sinigrin.  Sinigrin is one of the cabbage glucosinolates that has received special
attention in cancer prevention research. The sinigrin in cabbage can be converted into allyl-isothiocyanate, or AITC.  This
isothiocyanate compound has shown unique cancer preventive properties with respect to bladder cancer, colon cancer, and
prostate cancer.  Short-cooked, raw and fermented cabbage demonstrated these cancer preventive benefits—long-cooked (like
in soups) or microwaved cabbage failed to demonstrate measurable benefits.  Two minutes of microwaving destroys the same
amount of myrosinase enzymes as seven minutes of steaming, and you need those myrosinase enzymes to help convert
cabbage's glucosinolates into cancer-preventive compounds.

GREEN (SNAP) BEANS - a great source of folate, manganese, fiber and vitamins A, C & K.   They also have significant amounts of B vitamins, calcium, magnesium and potassium, lutein, carotenoids, beta-carotene, violaxanthin, and neoxanthin.  Antioxidant flavonoids found in green beans include quercetin and kaemferol, flavonoids like catechins, epicatechins, and procyanidins.  Enjoy green beans while they are fresh  and crisp to obtain the most nutrient value--weeks old beans in the store have lost much of their value! 
We think of carotenoids as being in the yellow/orange veggies but their presence in green beans is actually comparable to that carotenoid-rich vegetables like carrots and tomatoes. The only reason we don't see these carotenoids is because of the concentrated chlorophyll content (green) of green beans. 
Green beans can be a particularly helpful food for providing us with the mineral silicon.  While less well known that minerals like calcium and magnesium, it is very important for bone health and for healthy formation of connective tissue.
The protein content of green snap/stringless beans is about 5% (protein is much higher in heirloom pole beans which are harvested larger, when the bean seeds inside has filled out more).
When frozen (fresh beans) and cooked, green beans retain as much as 90% of their B vitamins (B6 and B2). Recent studies have shown that canned green beans, on average, lose about one third of their phenolic compounds during the canning process. They lose B vitamins as well but in the case of some B vitamins like folic acid, as little as 10%.
To freeze green beans blanch 2 minutes in boiling water; use a colander to dip them in then dip immediately in ice water, shake dry in the colander then on a towel, and pack tightly in freezer bags.  Suck out as much air as possible as you seal the bag.   Freeze immediately in the coldest part of your freezer.