Beet Salad

This time of year I try old ingredients in new combinations.  This week I received some blue cheese and remembered this recipe for beet salad. Boil beets until you can slip the skins.  Chop. Set aside. Toast walnuts or pecans and chop. Set aside. In a serving bowl make the dressing: olive oil, mild rice or white wine vinegar, a bit of honey, dijon mustard, salt and pepper.  Add the beets, chopped nuts, some crumbled …

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Harvest Newsletter

Greetings from the Garden!  This week’s CSA box has lettuce, spinach, salad greens, braising greens, snap peas, beets or carrots, green onions, herbs, and strawberries Field Notes. Although Ken is always planting, right now he is really focused on cultivating and weeding.  If he and the crops can stay ahead of the weeds now when plants are small, those crop plants can establish “canopy” and make shade so they can stay ahead of the weeds …

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Root Cellaring Begins!

Each fall we move produce from the field, sort and store several crops for winter use: potatoes, carrots, beets, radishes, kohlrabi, rutabagas in the root cellar, and squash, onions, and garlic in cool, dry storage.  Yesterday I started burying roots in sand.  We find they store best if taken from soil, trimmed and placed in barrels with sand as quickly as possible.  When we dig them out each winter harvest day they as close to …

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More Recipes: Sofrito and Beet Pepper Soup

This season we have a great crop of beautiful ripe peppers.  I chopped and froze (no blanching) some for future use.  At Ken’s request I made some ripe pepper jam, and today I made sofrito.  Sofrito is a combination of vegetables that are cooked slowly with fat or oil to reduce moisture and preserve color and flavor.  What started as two cast iron skillets of onions, peppers and some garlic became four small freezer jam …

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Harvest Newsletter

Greetings from the Garden!  This week’s CSA box has tomatoes, potatoes, cukes, peppers, onions, garlic, beans, beets, greens and lettuce. Field Notes.  Ken transplanted fall greens.  Ken starts them , moves up to 2″ soil blocks and then transplants to the garden. This means more time in that garden space for other things and more importantly transplanting a small seedling in a clean bed gives the plant a decided edge over the weeds. Ken is …

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