Wow, was last week a wet week! On the farm we got something like 4.5 inches of rain since last Tuesday night. We are looking forward to the sunshine this week to dry things out a little before the rains really set in for the fall and winter.
Regardless, lots of veggies are making their debut! Our winter squash is curing nicely and we have lots of sweet peppers ready. We are preparing to pull out our outdoor tomatoes, so we have green tomatoes available for a short amount of time. These are great fried, of course, but also make great green tomato salsa (more similar to tomatillo salsa) and green tomato chutney (great for cheese plates.)
Escarole and radicchio (chicories) season is also here! TBH, I will chose a chicory salad over a lettuce based salad 100% of the time. For more info about chicories and why/how to eat them, check out our friends at Chicory Week. To prepare any chicory for salad, we cut into bit size pieces and soak briefly in cold water before spinning it dry. This will help take out some of the bitterness. For beginners, definitely serve with a creamy dressing. We will have radicchio available from now until next March!
Not only are these delicious and beautiful, this is a small way to help climate change! Our reliance on CA and AZ grown lettuce and salad mix through the winter months are not sustainable in the long term. We are eating exported Californian WATER that has been piped into a desert harvested with exploitative labor practices to satisfy our craving for caesar salad in January. Chicories are a leafy crop that is ideal for our PNW climate and thrives all winter. We farmers would love to see more people switch to locally grown, wildly biodiverse chicories for the winter and decentralize the extractive corporate salad industry!
Busy week ahead, preparing for the last rounds of cover crops to be sown outside, a little more indoor tunnel planting to make sure we have greens all winter, and receiving and stacking something like 8 tons of hay for our sheep to eat all winter.
Just a reminder:
Flowers are available this week, not sure how many more weeks we have left! Add a bouquet to your order to enjoy these late season blooms.
Eggs are also available.
Members who do not work at Pierce County Offices, our pick up window is 1-2pm at the Tacoma Mall Plaza parking lot.
