CSA week 23 2020: it’s the end of our CSA season. Alas, summer doesn’t last forever, and neither does summer’s produce. We definitely have a fall distribution this week. Our farmers at Dancing Meadows Homestead are already planning ahead: they’re taking subscriptions for next season’s CSA – and I’ll certainly
CSA week 22 2020: it’s definitely autumn now. We’re getting the very last of the tomatoes, some cool-weather radishes and greens, and some lovely apples. Not to mention last week’s box, about which I mysteriously failed to post! Taken together, these boxes are a picture of autumn on the farm. This
CSA week 20 2020 brings more big green tomatoes to be ripened on the counter, plus at least a quart of cherry tomatoes. This year has not been good for tomatoes. We started with a long cold spring and are ending with early frosts. There are a lot of ways
CSA week 19 2020: big green tomatoes this week, due to be ripened on the counter. Our farmer tells us that this year, they’re just not ripening quickly: they’re starting to show cracks, so they’re being harvested now. The weather isn’t on our side, either; we’ve been flirting with freezes
CSA week 18 2020: larger tomatoes this week, though we’ll need to ripen them on the windowsill. The weather’s turned cooler, so I guess that tomatoes suffer a bit. It has not been a good year for tomatoes around here. We also have a big bunch of chard and lots
CSA week 17 2020: a big basket this week, and full of great stuff. We have our first chard, little baby leaves. There are more tomatoes (yay) but the rest of the basket is green, green, glorious green. Some of these vegetables are destined to become snack material for the long
CSA week 15 2020: We have corn! 4 beautiful ears, which we’re going to devour tonight. In fact, we have all of the traditional “3 sisters”: corn, beans, and squash. This week we have 2 pattypan squashes. They look a bit like flying saucers but taste delicious. I’m going to
CSA week 14 2020: The abundance continues, oh yes it does. We’re getting a larger distribution each week, which isn’t surprising, as the farm is producing at peak now. Our box contained more zucchini (and larger ones at that!), and even more beans. We can’t eat the whole box in
CSA week 13 2020: You can tell it’s summer because of the sudden abundance. My basket was overflowing this week, and among the goodies are the very first tomatoes from the farm. It was a long cool wet spring, which delayed tomato season by about a month. I hope we’re about
CSA week 12 2020: bring on the beans! We have green beans, yellow beans, and purple beans (those will turn green when cooked). Summer’s here, and so are the summer veggies. Fantastic! We might even have enough beans to make a pint or two of pickled dilly beans. If you’ve
CSA week 11 2020: heavy on the vine crops like squash and cucumbers. This is great news, since I want to do some pickling. Starting next week, we’re moving to Friday distributions, by the way. Making pickles is easy! In the simplest variation I know, I pack sliced cucumbers and
After a week’s hiatus for 2nd planting (did you know farmers are like hobbits? There’s 1st planting, yes, but what about 2nd planting?) CSA week 10 2020 starts summer distributions: crops that love warm or hot weather, often in great abundance. If you’re curious about the different day, Dancing Meadows
I’m Maurita Plouff, and I write about cooking and preserving the local harvest in Southeast Michigan. Any recipe you find here is something I have cooked myself, and enjoyed, and think you might like too. I invite you to try the recipes, and leave comments.
