We're tempting you with a photo of food today rather than a usual photo of our plants or fields. This is how we love to eat this time of year: Piles of vegetables (raw and grilled) with protein and a simple sauce. You can see the whole write up of how our 13 year old child made this for our family dinner Saturday night here on Instagram.
We shared the following words on social media last week and owe it to you to also share here, as you are our community members eating food we grow each week: We have swirling thoughts about how our country has mis-handled COVID-19 and the fall out for schooling, homeschooling, marginalized communities, people of color, and ultimately us all to unjust varying degrees. As we watch favorite local businesses announce that they are closing up or scaling back indoor exposure after watching other parts of the country, we want to shout from our barn rooftop "WE ARE STAYING THE COURSE!" We are wearing masks anytime we leave our farm. We are not going to friends' houses. We are not going to gatherings. We are not inviting people to our home or farm other than shopping while wearing a mask at our open-air FarmStand. We are not relaxing our "safer at home" behavior. We occasionally get take-out to support our favorite restaurants. We are doing all that we know to do to keep our family and greater community healthy and safe.
And for our every-other-week members, here's a crop update: Oblivious to a pandemic, summer "fruits" (vegetables with seeds inside of them) are in their prime right now! Look for lots of options for Tomatoes, Eggplants, Sweet Peppers, and...the one fruit-fruit we grow: Watermelons! We are also rich from our harvests of Onions and Potatoes. The work days have been very long recently but the rewards are many. We've honed in on the best heat-tolerant Lettuce varieties so we still have hundreds of heads of Lettuce for you. Carrots are now done until the fall harvest (wish them luck germinating in the upcoming August heat!) but Red and Gold Beets are still growing and delicious.
Eat well this week, and please help us wish for some rain. In addition to the record (this July will likely be the hottest on record), it is now very dry at our farm. We haven't had any significant rain in quite some time. Plants are stressed by this, and our irrigation source is not abundant enough for true drought conditions. If anyone has had positive experiences with a water dowser, please get in touch.
Blessings on your meals, and keep masking up and washing your hands ~
