Category Archives: Garlic

In the Share: Week 8

Garlic, lettuce, summer squash

CRISP LETTUCE F/P  It took major “babying” of these summer crispheads under their shade cloth, but they managed to get to a respectable size despite the blazing heat.

ROMAINE LETTUCE F  Meanwhile these little romaines were out in full sun and somehow managed to make nice little romaine hearts.

SUMMER SQUASH F/P  Finally the squash has begun to produce, especially the yellow squash.  There are smaller amounts of zucchini so far.

NEW POTATOES F  I am eating maybe the best potato salad I’ve ever had thanks to farmer Tom. See his post for the recipe.

WALLA WALLA ONIONS F  These yummies are in the potato salad too.

CHARD OR GAILAN P  These plants have a thick layer of mulch around them and are happily giving us their green goodness into the heat of the summer.

KOHLRABI P  It’s the partial shares turn to have fun with the alien vegetables.  Peel it well and eat it raw, it’s so easy.

GARLIC F/P  More hardheck, drier this time but not completely cured.

HERB CHOICE F/P  Basil, summer savory or cutting celery.

TOMATOES AND CUCUMBERS ??  We have small amounts of both and we plan to share them with you however we can.  It’ll be a suprise.

NEXT WEEK:  Squash, lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, carrots, beets.

FARM REPORT:
We have really lucked out on the weather this year.  It has been at times uncomfortably hot, but more importantly the rain and sunshine has been just right.  Today we were surprised by a mid-morning shower that dropped a nice 1.7 inches of rain.  After a week of dry weather, it was just perfect for keeping the crops happy.

The dry spells in between the rain showers are key to the farm staying on schedule.  During the last dry spell we planted another round of summer squash, cucumbers and beans.  These crops only produce for a while and need to be succession planted so that we can enjoy their tasty fruits all summer long.

On the left are the newly seeded rows, on the right the squash we are picking currently plus a row of mulched okra.  The row cover is protecting the pickling cucumbers from the dreaded cucumber beetles.

One of the big tasks right now is harvesting the garlic.  Once they start to die back in the fields, they need to be pulled while they still have plenty of green leaves.  The leaves extend to the heads where they form the layers that protect the cloves and allow the garlic to keep for months.

So far all of the hardneck is out of the ground and hanging in the old tobacco-drying barn to cure.  We are now working on the softneck varieties.  We love growing our garlic, which involves saving the best 20% of the heads for seed to plant later in the fall.  The hardneck variety, Musik, is a German Porcelain type that we brought with us from Peacework Organic Farm in Western New York, where Tom and I met.  I can’t help feeling sentimental about our garlic that has weathered the ups and downs through the years with us.

In the Share – Week 30

Garlic, kohlrabi, mulching

KOHLRABI  We ate one today just snacking while we worked and we found it to be crunchy and juicy.

LETTUCE  Mostly red-leaf lettuce this week.  Everyone gets two.
TAT SOI  Bok choy’s dark green cousin. 

CARROTS  Chantennay – type are fat and pointy

RADISHES  High tunnel radishes are so mild and juicy. 

CABBAGE  Small heads just the right size for a cole slaw.  See Tom’s post for several slaw recipes.

CHARD, KALE OR GAI LAN Your choice of greens.

HERB CHOICE  cilantro, dill or dried herbs or dried peppers

NEXT WEEK:  lettuce, sweet potatoes, leeks, spinach, endive and turnips

FARM REPORT: 
The planting of next year’s garlic crop went well this week.  6,000 cloves were planted for the main crop, plus several hundred more for greens. 

The soil hasn’t been the same since the summer deluge and the work was slowed by the need to remove cobbles of soil from the planting row.  We are counting on the winter freeze-thaw activity to soften the soil in time for Spring.  That is if winter ever comes. . .

Yes I am daring winter to come!  It is time for some cold, rainy days to soak the ground and chill the air.  The task of mulching is best performed on a cold day when you can wear layers to protect yourself.  Saturday morning was chilly enough to provide pretty favorable conditions.   

In the Share – Week 9

cabbage, carrots, chicken coop, Garlic

CARROTS F/P  The carrot harvest is not good, but a few have survived the deluge.  Partial shares have a choice of carrots or potatoes

POTATOES F/P  See Tom’s post for a nice recipe with sage.

CABBAGE F  I did an informal survey with the membership last week, and the results were seem to suggest that there will be no mutiny if we give you more cabbage.  Enjoy!

ONIONS F/P  More fresh onions from the patch

ROOTS CHOICE F  A choice of beets, turnips, radishes or kohlrabi.

HERB CHOICE F/P  Basil, summer savory, mint or sage.

TOMATOES OR FINGERLING POTATOES F  Not a fun thing for us to have to do, folks.  There just aren’t enough tomatoes to go around.

SUMMER SQUASH OR CUCUMBERS F  I am hoping to get the partial shares some of these soon.  We’ll see what is in the patch in the morning.

NEXT WEEK:  Potatoes, garlic, carrots, summer squash, tomatoes and herbs.

FARM REPORT:
This summer we are enjoying the company of my 14- yr old niece, Ariel.  She has chosen to join us at the farm for the summer with some breaks for float trips and other fun summer activities with her cousins.  You can see her blonde head cleaning garlic with the CSA last Wednesday morning. 

Another 2.5 inches of rain fell last night after what was a nice little dry spell during which we were able to plant another round of cucumbers, squashes and beans.  We also got the chicken coop moved to a new a new spot. 

We like to move the chickens to fresh ground every three weeks or so.  This time they are on the highest ridge of the farm, but there were still puddles this morning after the rain. 

The first of the fall transplants, the cabbages, are a week or so away from being ready to go in the ground.

 If we can finds some dry ground in which to put them, that is.    The forecasters say it is about to get hot, sunny and dry.  That is exactly what we need to get the fall crops planted and get the summer fruits to ripen.  So, please no complaints if we finally get some summer weather!

In the Share – Week 8

Allis Chalmers G, cultivating, Garlic

GARLIC F/P  The first of the garlic bulbs, fresh from the field.

BEETS OR TURNIPS F/P  The share is root-heavy while we wait for our fruits to come on.

GREENS CHOICE P  Swiss chard, kale or cabbage

LETTUCE OR TOMATOES F  We will be making this horrible choice for you and will try our best to get everyone tomatoes just as fast as we can.

NEW POTATOES F/P  A mixture of types we dug from the lower part of the field where they were in danger from the soggy soil.

CARROTS F  The non-stop rain has taken many carrots to rot.  Expect less than usual until the second planting comes in August.

SUMMER SQUASH OR CUCUMBERS F  Our first planting of these crops is very soggy and we don’t think we’ll have much of either until the second planting kicks in maybe 2-3 weeks from now.

HERBS F/P  Genovese basil, lemon basil or summer savory

NEXT WEEK:  More squash, cucumbers, tomatoes, carrots, cabbage and onions. 

FARM REPORT:
A break from the rain is a chance to harvest what survives (garlic, carrots, potatoes), tend to the growing plants (tomatoes, sweet potatoes, squash and cucumbers) and prepare for the plantings to come.  Luckily, today it dried out enough that Tom and I spent the afternoon on the tractors while the rest of the crew pulled weeds and dug roots.

That’s me cultivating the squash and cucumber plants with the electric AC G tractor.  Tom was on “Grandpa”, our International 504, pulling the spader, which is the implement we use to prepare the soil for planting.  This is the first time since early May that we have been able to spade the soil and we hope to have at least one more chance before the broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower and fennel plants  growing in the greenhouse will need to be transplanted, not to mention the fall carrot, beet and turnip seeds that need to go in by the end of the month.  We do what we can and hope to keep on the sunny side…

In the Share – Week 29

butterhead lettuce, Garlic, high tunnel, lettuce

BUTTERHEAD LETTUCE 

RED LEAF LETTUCE

SPINACH

YELLOW ONIONS

GREENS CHOICE  Kale, Swiss Chard, Gai lan, or Bok Choy

ROOT MEDLEY  Carrots, beets and Gold Ball turnips

HAKUREI TURNIPS 

RADISHES

CILANTRO OR DILL

NEXT WEEK:  lettuces, greens, garlic, sweet potatoes, cabbage and bulb fennel.

FARM REPORT:

November arrived with a cold snap that has all but ended the outdoor harvest season.  What is left in the fields are hardy crops under heavy cover or in the high tunnel.  High winds have made the row cover a challenge to keep on, but a calm day today allowed us to re-cover the lettuces, fennel and endives that remain in the fields.  The high tunnel provides a much better cover for cold temps. and wind and we should be able to eat well for the next few weeks from inside the bubble. 

This week the spinach, Hakurei turnips, radishes, herbs and many of the greens are coming out of the high tunnel. 

The change in the weather also signals the garlic planting season.  All 4800 cloves are in thanks to many hands.  The fine folks from Milsap Farm in Springfield, MO couldn’t have timed their visit better to get the job done.   If you are ever down in their neck of the woods, tell them we sent you and count yourself lucky if you get there on a Thursday for their weekly wood-fired oven pizza nights.

The next step for the garlic is to mulch the entire planting with a good layer of straw which will protect the cloves over the winter and keep the plants happy through til harvest in June.  This time of year we like to have enough help on CSA mornings to complete the harvest early and have time to get in some mulching.  Last week the strawberries and over-wintering leeks got the treatment.  This week it will hopefully be the garlic’s turn.  If you haven’t completed your shifts for the season, come on out and join in the straw throwing.

In the Share – Week 15

Allis Chalmers G, Garlic, sweetpea

GARLIC F/P  Musik hardneck

TOMATOES  F/P  We ended up with a lot of green-when-ripe heirloom tomatoes this year – Green Zebra, Aunt Ruby’s German Green and Emerald Evergreen have all done well.

DESIREE POTATOES F/P  They look like they are blushing.

SALSA PACK F/P  Partial shares get a choice with eggplant.

GREEN BEANS F/P  We will pick the Roma, flat-podded, beans tomorrow.  They’ll be a choice with the usual ones.

HERBS OR HOT PEPPERS F  Parsley, hot peppers or dried herbs.  See Tom’s post for more on the hot peppers.

CHERRY TOMATOES F 

SWEET PEPPERS F/P  We are looking forward to several more weeks of these pretty ladies. 

CUCUMBERS OR SUMMER SQUASH F  Perhaps the last week for these two.

NEXT WEEK:  More tomatoes, beans, peppers, eggplant and tomatillos.  Carrots and onions.

FARM REPORT
Whitey, the newest member of the farm team, was put straight to work delivering the Saturday shares.  Sweetpea, the VW, is taking a break until we can get her to the mechanic.  The new van is a completely different reality – bland perhaps, with an automatic transmission, power steering, a/c and even a radio (!) doing deliveries has become a pretty cush gig.  Thanks to Lawson Bank for loaning us the money to buy a good used solution to what had become a serious problem for the farm.

For the first time in weeks, the soil has dried enough to cultivate.  Monday we tackled the fall crops with machinery, hand tools and hands.  By the end of the day we had the tidied-up many rows of cabbage, broccoli, kale, cauliflower, kohlrabi, turnips, radishes and greens.

2010—Our Seventh CSA Season

apprentices, community supported agriculture, csa, fair share farm, Garlic, kansas city, solar irrigation, strawberries, transplanter
Hawk wing impressions, and one less rabbit on the farm.

In 2010 the focus was better ergonomics.  The farm had grown for the past six years and we were realizing that we needed to find more efficient ways of farming so that our bodies would hold out for many years to come. Organic vegetable farming entails a lot of stoop labor.  Farming smarter involves improving the ergonomics of the work. Sometimes that means that you let a machine help you do the job, as in the case of tractor-mounted transplanters and cultivators.

With that goal in mind, I made the 300-mile round-trip to Morgan County Seeds near Barnett, Missouri and ferried back a transplanter on John’s 16-foot trailer. No task causes me more anxiety than over-the-road hauling. I’ve hauled 50 greenhouse barrels strapped 3 high, our Allis Chalmers G, 100 square bales of straw, and entire kit for the high tunnel.  Each trip has given me more respect for the power and control necessary for such activities.

 the new Water Wheel transplanter

Farm apprentices Emily Lecuyer and Matt Maes joined us in late March. Emily had returned from a Peace Corp stint in the Phillipines and was ready to learn about CSA and biological farming. Matt was to get married that July, buy land nearby, and start a farm and a family – what a busy year! Emily and Matt pitched in during what would turn out to be a cold Spring and hot Summer.

Emily and Matt in the Spring greenhouse

We had our new Water Wheel transplanter, but no tractor to pull it. The Graff family tractor (aka Grandpa) was having some problems after 45 years of farming. Valve cracks, a rotted out radiator, and numerous other issues meant an overhaul was in order. Luckily FSF beekeeper, CSA member and all-around helpful soul, Keith Stubblefield, volunteered to share his mechanical knowledge and saved the day. He walked us through all of the repairs and gave the muscle of the farm a new life.



Keith adjusting the engine

Once Grandpa was back in service, we found that we could plant rows and rows of broccoli, cabbage, squash and sweet potatoes with the transplanter and made good use of it. Some plantings still required the tedious tasks of mulching and row covering, but such efforts have a payoff in improving the chance of a good harvest.

A quick planting of broccoli and cabbage

Mulched and covered to survive the cold Spring
Transplanting sweet potato slips

2010 was the year of a terrible outbreak of tomato blight on the east coast. It wasn’t much better here, as our early planting was stunted by the cold, wet Spring. The later plantings of tomatoes that missed the bad conditions grew much better and saved the tomato crop from being a total bust.

Tomato plants with wet feet on a cold day

2010 success stories included 1,000+ quarts of strawberries (the record so far), 1,000+ lbs of beans, excellent onions, and our best winter squash harvest yet.  Efforts for the squash crop included cutting vine borer worms out of the stems of the plants. It saved a lot of plants and helped increase the harvest.

Garlic harvest
Lots of cukes
CSA bean picking morning
Winter squash in the barn

Our Allis Chalmers G had been with us for several years now and were were starting to realize it’s full potential.  Along with seeding and cultivating, we increasingly used it to “gutter”, using discs to make a raised bed. Guttering the beds has become one of the most important tasks we perform to improve drainage.

Emily cultivating and guttering

2010 was also the year of the Federal Stimulus.  Through University Extension, we learned that funds were available for remote solar irrigation systems on farms. In the end, we received 75% cost-share on purchasing over 2,000 feet of below ground irrigation pipe and four more solar panels. Trenching, laying and covering the pipe and appertunances took some doing, but was well worth the effort. Having a permanent supply line from the pond to our fields saves us countless hours previously spent rolling out and rolling up hose each year—yeah!  The additional solar panels improved our ability to reach the highest points in our fields with life-giving water.

New panels on left

On November 6th, 2010 Rebecca and I made it official and got married.  It was a great day!  With some help from the Graff family, we traveled to Hawaii in December and soaked up the sun and gorged ourselves on tropical fruit.

Star fruit tree on Kauai

Next up—putting it all together, Outstanding in the Field, barn facelift, and a long, hot Summer.

In the Share – Week 8

Garlic

pea wash

LETTUCE (F) The first of the summer lettuce, ‘crisp’ types that can take the heat.
CARROTS (F/P)
SUMMER SQUASH (F/P) The summer squash grew quick on us this week! Full shares get 2 nice ones, partial shares one.
FRESH GARLIC (F/P) The garlic harvest is in full swing. These are freshly dug, not cured, so keep them in the fridge until you use them.
CUCUMBERS OR PEPPERS/BROCCOLI (F/P) The cucumbers are being shy so far. Full shares get a choice with the first sweet green peppers, partial shares with the last of the spring broccoli.
FRESH ONIONS (F/P) Keep these in the fridge too.
HERB CHOICE (F/P) Summer savory, parsley, basil or a dried herb.
SUGARSNAP PEAS OR KOHLRABI (F) The last of the sugarsnaps and kohlrabi.
SWISS CHARD OR KALE (F) Add either to your standard pasta sauce and enjoy.
ALSO THIS WEEK: Parker Farms meat and egg share delivery
NEXT WEEK: More squash, cucumbers and lettuce. The delayed new potato harvest.
The crops continue to be about a week behind their regular schedule due to the cold temps in the springtime (it’s hard to remember now, but, yes, it was cold not too long ago!). We are hopeful that the cucumbers, tomatoes and beans will be coming on soon. There are tons of flowers and green fruit. The summer squash is the notable exception. Squash has a reputation for bountiful crops and we are happy to have them right now while we wait for everything else to catch up. Enjoy the big beauties this week as we will be harvesting them at a smaller stage from now on.
The last two days have been filled with the garlic harvest. Garlic is a crop that holds a special place in the heart of the farmer. While most of our crop seed is purchased from the seed companies every year, we save our own garlic seed. The garlic grown at Fair Share Farm then, is unique to our farm, it’s soil, climate and the abilities of the farmers that tend it. The heads of garlic we are harvesting now began as individual cloves planted last fall. These cloves came from our best heads that were harvested a year ago. Thus the garlic crop continues from year to year, from clove to head and back again. As we harvest, we set aside the largest heads for ‘seed’. About a tenth of the crop each year is not sold, but saved for seed.
one-third of the crop
This year’s crop is a good one. The heads are not enormous, but there are plenty of good-sized ones for the shares and large ones for seed. We have almost no rot this year which has been a problem in the past. The dry weather that we have had leading up to the harvest was ideal. Once harvested, the garlic is sorted, strung up and hung in the barn. In a few week’s time they will be fully cured and good for long-term keeping. We like to hand out garlic every other week for the rest of the season.

In the Share – Week 3

Garlic, Parker Farms
green garlic harvest
This week I will be brief. We are expending all of our energy on planting the crops and very little is left for the blogging. Finally the gods have given us a break from the wet and our fields are prime for planting. So far this week the winter squash, pickling cucumbers, melons and tomatoes are in. This adds to our earlier plantings of summer squash, cucumbers and tomatoes that have been sitting with cold feet. If we’re lucky once the shares are harvested tomorrow, we’ll get the peppers, eggplant and basil planted. Still on deck are pole beans, more squash, cukes and melons.
And there’s the strawberries. The crop is starting nicely. We harvest the patch every morning. Everyone gets a pint this week. By next week we may be up to a quart per share. Also, the lettuce is much, much improved over last week’s offerings. I apologize for the sad state of the lettuce last week. It was a muddy mess out there, I tell you. But this week, we’ve got some beauties and lots of them. So, the full shares are getting 3 heads, the partials 2. Here’s the list:
LETTUCE (F/P)
STRAWBERRIES (F/P)
GREEN ONIONS (F/P)
RADISHES OR HAKUREI TURNIPS (F/P)
TAT SOI (F)
HERB CHOICE (F/P) Cilantro, tarragon or mint
EXTRA: Shallot tops – 1 bunch for all if you who want them. They are the chive-like tops off the shallots. We have heard that trimming the shallots gives a boost to their root development, so we might as well eat them.
While the ground was still soggy we headed over to the Parker Farms picnic on Saturday. Their farm, as always, was beautiful. The animals seemed to be enjoying the spring. Here’s the hen house where our eggs come from.
the lovely ladies