"We LOVE the food you're growing at the Belmont CSA! Having the winter share, our first, is a life-changing experience, just like having the summer share (Waltham Fields) was. We learned how to store the winter vegetables, and we're trying new recipes every week. To be able to say this after nearly forty years of extensive food experience as a discerning eater and serious cook is very cool. I look out my window this morning at the falling snow and remember your snowy field and the rows of dark green kale. Then I remember the sublime Portuguese kale soup Mayhew made with that kale. And the big baskets of butternut and acorn squashes in our basement, then the garlicky soup I recently made with them. The leeks, onions, parsnips, carrots, potatoes--what a bounty even now just seven days from the winter solstice. The multi-farm winter share is a TERRIFIC idea. More, please!"
You might think the winter share LOOKS like too much food for a family of four, but it's not. Not even for two, like my husband and I. The winter share consists of our old friends the Chiller Dillers, the Rootie Patooties, and the Cellar Dwellers--vegetables that can be stored and cooked as needed through the winter, just like our grandmothers used to do.
One thing we did find, however, was that we needed to buy a 2nd fridge and to set up some shelves in the basement.
Cellar Dwellers such as winter squashes can keep for months, no problem. Many even improve with storage.)Or split and roast as many as you can fit on a cookie sheet, scoop the flesh into Ziplocs and freeze the pulp for great soups later.
Chiller Dillers and many Rootie Patooties like carrots, beets, parsnips or celery root keep in the fridge for months (in plastic bags). Cabbage too. If outer leaves start to go, just peel them off and cook the cabbage into something delicious.
Kale can be chopped, bagged raw in Ziplocs, and frozen or first stir fry it in a bit of water and freeze.
I thought I would never say this about winter vegetables, but...yum yum, bring 'em on!