Circle M Farm

Even though we’ve got a gorgeous fluffy foot of snow on the ground, we notice the days are already longer and the increased sun is making a difference in our energy and focus. Time to inventory seeds, order anew and devise a planting schedule! Hard to believe this point comes in the “dead” of winter, but really as soon as the solstice passes (this year’s shortest day was Dec 21) and the light changes, we find that while our bodies still crave the rest that winter brings, our minds are slowly awakening to a new year in the gardens. continued »

Yuck! What a dismal ending to the growing year. We’ve spent this week slogging through some very messy fields to bring in the last of the crops. You always wish your final days in the garden could be balmy and warm, but they rarely are. You imagine yourself triumphantly plucking great beautiful brightly colored beets like jewels out of the black dirt, but you generally get to bring in some cold muddy lumps that only reveal their beauty with a firm scrubbing. The great thing about a rainy cold fall is that it makes you wish for snow! And that is just where our thoughts are turning. How much fun would it be to cook up a hearty Potato Leek Soup with Pumpkin Pie for dessert while watching clean white snow cover up the mucky driveway? I guess there will be plenty of time for that sort of fun soon. Here’s what else is in your final box: continued »

I had the great privilege this weekend of seeing Wendell Berry read and speak at the Overture Center. One of my absolutely favorite and most important authors, Berry was invited to Madison by the Wisconsin Book Festival and the Aldo Leopold Foundation. He read a short story from one of his collections, and then answered questions from the audience. I’m seldom tempted to take notes these days, but I certainly wish I had brought a pen to the event. The story Berry read, “Making It Home,” brought me to tears years ago when I first read it in my own bed, and again when Berry read it aloud Sunday night. But the biggest impact of the evening for me, the thing that kept me up for a while that night when I got home, was a rather rambling statement he made in response to a question I have no recollection of. I don’t even know the exact statement, but there was some talk about a local economy, about community and about farming. And Berry said something about the community that happens when farmers and customers in a local setting realize they are interdependent. continued »

Such a bittersweet week in the gardens as we say goodbye to most of the plants in anticipation of tonight’s frost. I felt like the bunny in “Goodnight Moon” as I went row-by-row touching the plants for the last time while harvesting the final fruits. “Goodbye eggplant. Goodbye peppers. Goodbye squash. Thank you all very very much and goodbye.” Soon we will actually be putting the garden to bed for winter as we mulch perennials and clear off debris. continued »

This box’s vegetables have been harvested in an 80-degree afternoon, a chilly rain, a clinging fog, a terrifying wind and an evening so cold we wore winter coats. (That was last night – hauling in all the squash and watermelons before they got damaged by the predicted frost.) All in one week! continued »

Yesterday I witnessed 10 geese leaving. They were silent, which was odd. Did they feel bad leaving in the steamy hot weather? Do they have a secret about the winter that we don’t know? Either way, it was rather disturbing to watch their departure southward from underneath my sweaty sun hat. continued »

Hard to believe we are harvesting fall crops and now we’ve finally got summer weather! The plants really don’t seem to know what to do. Except the watermelons. They seem to be the happiest I’ve ever seen. Huge, juicy and sweet as can be. Consider these the last taste of summer. Here’s what else is in the box: continued »

Now that our houses are cold more evenings than not, it seems natural to use the oven at night to roast meats and vegetables for that lovely, smokey fall flavor. I’ve mostly put up my frying pan in exchange for baking sheets and the Dutch oven. You can roast a lot of what you got in the box this week – the peppers, tomatillos, kohlrabi, onions, eggplant, yellow squash and fennel will all surprise you with the subtle changes in flavor that occur with roasting. Mostly things get sweeter. Here’s what else is in the box: continued »

Boy, we had a close call this weekend. Sunday the overnight forecast was for 37 and in our valley we can generally count on being 5 degrees colder. With the threat of actually hitting freezing, we headed out to the gardens in twilight and draped the basil and peppers with floating row covers. Thankfully, we only dropped to about 34. Had it been much colder, we would have lost all the bean plants, the corn still on the stalks, the tomatillos and maybe even all the uncured pumpkins and winter squash we’ve been tending for so many months. Cold as it was, we are seeing some stress on the cucumbers, zucchinis and melons. Oh, but we feel lucky! The gardens are still producing lots of beautiful food, while our thoughts are turning to the rich and warm recipes of fall. We’ve included some for you below. Here’s what’s in the box: continued »

This was our final week of planting here at Circle M. In spite of the present fullness of the gardens, with the squash plot now over waist high, onions literally popping themselves out of the ground, orange pumpkins suddenly appearing in places we’d forgotten we’d put them and edemame pods fattening in the tight rows of lush soybean plants, we sort of feel like the season is coming to a close. We’ve seeded our last rounds of lettuce, spinach, arugula, rapini, radish and turnips and transplanted the fall brassicas that had been waiting patiently in the greenhouse since early July. Obviously the joy of exuberant planting is at the core of market farming, but we definitely feel a great sense of relief in being done at this point. Less weeding, less organizing, less stress over what has to come out of the ground so something else can get in.

Though we now have daily harvests of beans, summer squash, cucumbers and peppers (thank goodness, no tomatoes this year!) and the looming tasks of eventually bringing in all the potatoes and winter squash, we neverthless find our minds turning to inside occupations like preserving and baking; even flirting with the off-season joys of spinning, knitting, dyeing and otherwise playing with our wool. I’ve longed to build a fire more than a few times during these unseasonably cool August nights and we actually sipped hot chocolate as a bedtime snack last night. I’ve switched from Modelos and lagers to stout with dinner and I’m thawing a pot roast to fix tomorrow.

And reading! I’ve started to read fiction again, which is a sure sign that fall is just around the corner. Having visited Taliesen with a friend this spring, I’m ploughing through the three current books on Frank Lloyd Wright and his various love affairs and architectural masterpieces. But however much I might wish to immerse myself in a novel next to the woodstove, the fact remains that there is a lot of food still to be gathered out there. We are thoroughly enjoying the appearance of late-season stars like chard, leeks, beets and Brussels sprouts. Beauties, all. Here’s what’s in the box:

Early Jersey Wakefield Cabbage – I just LOVE these sweet, little, pointy-headed cabbages. Notice how some of the ribs turn purpley-pink. What a pretty pretty vegetable.

Swiss Chard - Talk about pretty – wow! Use this just like spinach, or try out one of the recipes below. Chard is a relative of beets, one cultivated over the years for leaves, the other for roots. This week, it’s easy to see their similarities.

Leeks – We’ve had so much fun with onions the past few weeks, and now we introduce some baby leeks. These will get really big eventually, but skinnier ones are a bit easier to cook with since they are less fibrous. Enjoy in soup, quiche or in the terrific combo with Swiss Chard we’ve published below.

Baby Eggplant - Absolutely fabulous roasted with squash. This is a great time of year to roast pretty much anything coming out of the garden. These young skins aren’t bitter at all and don’t require the salting, baking and breading that giant specimens entail.

String Beans – The first planting of green beans is all picked out, and now we’re on to yellow wax and purple string. The purple are cool in a salad, but will turn green when you cook them. More green beans will be ready to pick in a few weeks!

Basil - These leaves are starting to look ragged – but the taste is still terrific. Freeze, freeze, freeze! Make big batches of pesto and freeze whatever you don’t eat in one night.

Baby Beets - These bunches are a mix of our spring-sown beets and those we planted in the middle of summer. Can you see the difference in size? Nope? That’s ‘cause there isn’t any. We don’t really know how to explain this, but other local farmers have reported the same experience with their early beets not growing. Too cold? Too damp? We’re not sure, but we do like the look of these two varieties and their different colored roots and leaves together. Don’t even think of peeling these, just wash and use!

Brussels Sprouts – We don’t usually harvest these mini cabbages until the middle of fall, but this year, they are so large and mature that the sprouts on the bottom of the plants are starting to burst. So – here’s an early harvest of the most precocious brussels sprouts, with more to come later. A nice way to enjoy these as a side dish is to simply slice in half, sauté in butter, then salt and pepper to taste. We’re having this tonight!

Onions

Garlic – Much of the garlic we planted last year to harvest this summer rotted under the winter mulch that sat wet most of early spring. But we did get some bulbs out of the patch and we are happy to give you this delicious hard-neck variety. Very strong and spicy.

Tomatoes and Tomatillos – Thanks to Hillspring Eco Farm for sharing this week. As the blight spreads, we are ever more thankful for these generous neighbors with un-touched tomatoes. All of the tomatoes we’ve included are perfectly ripe – some red, some black, some pink, some yellow. The small oval Romas are less wet and just perfect for sauces.

Sweet and Hot Peppers - For sweet peppers this week, you’ve got white Feherezon, Purple Beauty bells, almost-mature Red Ace bells and the absolutely amazing, mostly-red Jimmy Nardello frying peppers. (We’re still looking for the Valencia orange bells, but this weather just isn’t what peppers like. )Oddly enough, the hot peppers really seem to be thriving. You’ve got tiny little red Thai Hots, little yellow Ho Chi Minh cayennes, green chilis, long yellow Hungarian Hot Wax and the absolutely stunning purple Czech Black.

Sweet Corn – Hooray! We are pretty pleased with this harvest. After losing last year’s corn to a 15-minute windstorm and the year before that to an August flood, we are soooo happy to have sweet corn this year!

Cucumbers

Squash - Still going strong out there in the gardens, though we see the plants starting to die back a bit. We’ve got Black zucchini, ribbed Romanesca and the typical flecked variety. We’ve got long yellow buttersticks, lumpy crooknecks and round Lemon. Finally, we’re starting to see the lovely Bennings Green Tint pattypans. If you’ve grown tired of eating these fresh, now is the time to grate and freeze in 2-cup bags to use in bread and cake recipes this fall and winter. A farmer and chef friend of ours recently turned me on to chutney made with squash. Another farmer friend steams and purees summer squash, then freezes it to use as a soup base in the winter. Try the recipes below.

Garlic Chive Blossoms - Pull the flowers apart and use them in recipes just like garlic. Or, float them in vinegar to infuse it with a nice light flavor, or use the flowers to garnish a savory omelette or cheese dish.

Summer Savory – this delightful herb is new to us this year and we are just loving it in place of thyme, our usual summer standby that goes in everything. The thyme is a bit crispy right now, but bouncing back, while this savory is just amazingly lush and fresh. Pick off the leaves and sprinkle in tomato sauces, egg dishes, beet recipes and squash sautes.

Pineapple Sage – This gorgeous sage is a tender plant, so it doesn’t overwinter in our region, but we grow it new every year because it is just such a stunning herb. The foliage is so many shades of blush and green, and the flowers are a shock of fuschia. Most years, that is. Ours hasn’t blossomed yet, likely because it’s been too cool. We’ve still got time. The flavor is quite special, too, more of a summer taste than typical sage. Use it in iced tea, lemonade and in savory breads and muffins.

Flower Bouquet: We’ve got a lovely combination of Butterfly Bush blossoms (that heady fragrance!), tiny Black-eyed Susans, pink Anemones, wild purple Joe Pye Weed, Miscanthus and delicate Cosmos.

Seared Rainbow Chard with Leeks
1 bunch (1lb) rainbow chard
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 large leeks (white and pale green parts only), halved lengthwise and cut crosswise into 1/4-inch-thick slices
3/4 teaspoon fine sea salt

Cut stems from chard (if leaves are large, cut out coarse portions of rib), then cut stems crosswise into 1/4-inch-thick slices. Stack chard leaves and roll into cylinders. Cut cylinders crosswise to make 1-inch-thick strips of leaves. Heat butter and oil in a 12-inch heavy skillet over moderately high heat until foam subsides, then sauté chard stems and leeks with sea salt and pepper to taste, stirring occasionally, until slightly soft, 3 to 5 minutes. Add chard leaves and continue to sauté, stirring frequently, until wilted. (If greens begin to brown before they wilt, sprinkle with a few drops of water.)

Stuffed Zucchini
1/4 pound ground lamb (yes, we do have a few packages of ground lamb left)
1/4 cup basmati rice
2 cups tomato puree, divided
1/2 teaspoon dried mint
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
2 pounds small zucchini or yellow squash (medium patty-pans also work)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon dried mint

Mix together the ground lamb, basmati rice, 2 tablespoons tomato puree, 1/2 teaspoon mint, salt, and pepper; mix well, and set aside. Slice the ends off of the zucchinis and hollow out the centers using an apple corer. Stuff with lamb mixture. Stir together the remaining tomato puree with 1/2 teaspoon salt in a large skillet. Place the stuffed zucchini into the sauce, and add enough water to cover the zucchini. Bring to a simmer over medium-high heat, then reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer for 30 minutes. Stir in the garlic, lemon juice, and remaining 1/2 teaspoon of mint. Recover, and simmer an additional 15 minutes. To serve, cut the zucchini crosswise into rounds and arrange on a serving plate. Spoon sauce over the top.

Follow this link for a great Zucchini Coconut Cookie Bar recipe.