First of all, some good news from our CSA manager Karra: Spring shares are now live! If you were auto renewed, please make changes to your pending order by February 4th. You can view your order by going to: https://www.harvie.farm/
Well, it's nearly February - believe it or not, it's only about a month until we fire up the greenhouse and start planting again!
The longer days and sunshine are a welcome return. Even though it's still mighty cold outside (it was -17 here earlier this week), we know those bitter cold days and nights are numbered. It's still way too cold for spinach to begin regrowing without supplemental heat, so our winter spinach remains dormant, but we expect to resume harvesting it again in March.
Thankfully, though, microgreens are in full swing, giving us something fresh and green to enjoy.
We were having some germination problems with one of the varieties we use in our spicy mix, and I am happy to report that we've got a new seed lot and the spicy micros are looking better than ever again! We'll have a good supply for your CSA boxes next week, so if spicy is your cuppa tea, be sure to add them to your box. Add them to boost the flavor and nutrition of any salad, or stick them in a sandwich in place of lettuce. Your mouth will thank you!
Basil and cilantro microgreens have been a big hit this winter, so we've increased production to try to keep you all supplied. The dill microgreen trials we did earlier this month turned out well, so we'll also have dill microgreens available on a regular basis in a few more weeks (the herb microgreens are slow growers, taking nearly a month of care to reach harvest stage.)
I was surprised to learn that cilantro microgreens are right up there with red cabbage micros as one of the more nutrient dense varieties - not only do they taste great, but they are packed with lots of nutrition as well. We like to chop them up and blend into our guacamole, and add them fresh to tacos as well, but they would work great with stir fry too. If you are a sour cream fan, try chopping the cilantro micros finely and adding them to your sour cream - it's great on top of soups, stews, and chili.
One small change you will notice beginning this week is that the pea shoot microgreens will no longer be packaged in a clamshell, but in a small reusable zip-lock style bag instead. This was not a decision that was taken lightly. The price of clamshells, particularly the larger ones we use for the pea shoots, has exploded in the past several months. They are nearly 3x as expensive as they were a year ago, even when we are ordering 6 months to a year's worth of clamshells at a time.
Truly, it pains me to make the switch to bags - I really really love that the clams are recyclable! - but we just cannot afford to use the large clams without significantly increasing the price of the micros we pack inside of them. We'll continue to use the smaller clams as long as we are able, and hopefully you are able to reuse the pea bags. Thanks for your understanding. And rest assured - if the price of the recyclable clamshells comes back down, we'll order up a pallet or two to stock up and make the switch back to clams in a hot minute.
Outside of microgreens, the other winter crops are holding well in storage. Our supply of cabbage is getting low however, and I anticipate that we'll be sold out of cabbage by the end of February. If you are a cabbage lover, stock up while you can, otherwise we'll all look forward to crunching away on the first fresh cabbages this summer.
Here at Great Oak Farm, we will be looking into getting a loan for a large, pallet-accessible cooler this spring, which would allow us to put away more cabbage (as well as beets, carrots, and potentially parsnips as well) for storage to increase our supply through the winter months. Our root cellar is amazing, but storage space in there is already all accounted for. Also, having a large cooler for pallet bins would allow us to get a jump on fall harvesting. Currently, as many of you are aware, we have to wait to begin harvesting many of our storage crops until the root cellar is cool enough for reliable storage. Especially during fall harvest season, time is of the essence, and the flexibility we'd get from having a large cooler would allow us grow more, harvest more, and store more away for these long winter months.
That's it from the farm this week. Stay warm, stay healthy, and take care of one another.
In community,
Farmer Chris
Great Oak Farm
