The Harvest Bee Blog

Hello, Friends: One of the beautiful and magical byproducts of farming is the countless lessons that working the soil can teach us. In fact, it is quite uncanny, this relationship between farming and life, whereby a certain reciprocity exists between the two. Farmers routinely apply general life principles to respond to various obstacles they may face in the fields while simultaneously adapting lessons of the land to the many other disciplines we participate in, whether it be relationships with friends and family, exercising, cooking, etc. Presently, our land at The Hive has lovingly reminded us to surrender to living in the moment and to sincerely embrace the clichéd, albeit wise “one day at a time” approach. It is far too easy to allow our dreams of where we see and want our land to be in the future to distract us from not only focusing on the countless tasks that need to be accomplished right now in order manifest that image, but also from truly entrenching ourselves in the beauty that the land currently possesses. Yes, we cannot wait for the tomatoes, but right now, how beautiful are these enormous heads of Napa Cabbage? It sounds so easy, right? We are endlessly being told either by our cronies or by our own minds to live in the now, but how often we do seriously let go and surrender to the moment, regardless of whether that moment is good or yucky. As farmers, especially CSA farmers, the success of a bountiful season absolutely hinges on our ability to subscribe to this surrender. Looking too far into the future, worrying about what crops will be available a month from now or what treacherous weather patterns may arise, is really not productive for farmers, as long as there is some semblance of crop and row planning, basic Farm 101. Instead, we must try to remind ourselves of the ever present ebb and flow of growing cycles throughout the season, with new crops reaching maturity each week while veteran crops are harvested up to make way for a fresh sowing of seeds to grow for later harvests, along with natural environmental occurrences throwing curveballs on a weekly basis. Thus, the only way to deal with a steady dose of these curveballs is to take it one pitch at a time and make sure that no matter how hard we may miss, we cannot afford to dwell on that miss. Rather, we most refocus, get centered, and strive to hit a homerun the next time…or simply be content with a base hit. Zucchini = strike out, so far. However, watermelon radishes, almost as big as baseballs, qualify as a pretty well-hit ball, not to mention how we are pleased to be able to offer some nice harvests from our fruit trees so early on in the season So, with that, we have finally made it to the first week of the CSA and we probably would arrived here this early, considering the sweatbox Fall we’ve had up until recently, had it not been for the resiliency many of our crops have shown to battle the elements and stay healthy and strong through the atypical weather patterns we have faced. With it only being the first week of the CSA, the season has a long way to go, for sure, and we are doing our best to maintain a wise balance of excitement and groundedness by enjoying the experience on our end one week at a time. We hope you will do the same because before you know it, we will be at week 21 shaking our heads at how fast the season flew by. In this week’s shares you will find the following: • Salad Mix • Napa Cabbage • Watermelon Radish • Grapefruits • Bananas • Oregano You can use the Napa Cabbage in any slaw recipe or you can sauté it, as well. However, here is a recipe for Kimchi, in which the hardiness of the Napa variety truly shines out: http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/5529-kimchi-my-way Please feel free to ask us about any other recommendations for any of the listed crops, as well. Finally, just a quick note that if you are picking up at Juicelation on Thursdays, you may pick-up at anytime past 9AM up until 5:30PM. We originally gave a window of 3PM-5:30PM, but you may pick-up your shares much earlier! Heres two a happy CSA season and the ability to say, “Gunga Galunga” when necessary!