CSA Season Tips

As we get ready to kick off share distributions next week, I thought I would share some suggestions for optimizing your enjoyment of the produce you will be receiving throughout the upcoming season:

• Storage - Proper storage will make a huge difference in how long your produce will last.  Leafy greens need to stay refrigerated with high humidity but not wet.  There are several relatively inexpensive storage containers with vented lids that are awesome and will keep greens crisp for a week plus.  Another effective option for keeping greens fresh is to wrap them with a lightly dampened paper towel and place them in an unsealed plastic bag in the refrigerator. Not all produce needs to be refrigerated, several types such as tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, basil, and others actually last better at room temperature.  The University of California, Davis is an awesome resource we use for optimizing our storage after harvest, the following link is a great summary of how to store a wide range of fruits and vegetables:   UC_Davis Link

• Usage - Be open to trying new food and recipes.  We don't grow too many "exotic" items, but veggies such as beets, radishes, kale, swiss chard, collard greens, and others may not have been on your regular grocery list.  We have a continually expanding inventory of awesome recipes on our website to help you incorporate each week's share contents into your weekly meal planning.  Speaking of meal planning, preparing and eating in at least a couple times per week will help to make the best use of your share!  Many of our recipes have been provided by our shareholders - please feel free to share your favorites and we'll add them to the web page.  Recipe Page 

• Extras - If you don't think you will able to consume all of your share before it goes bad, freezing is a great option. We usually try and prep stuff so it will be in the easiest usable format out of the freezer, for example chopping peppers and freezing in 1 cup increments or shredding zucchini and storing it in 3 cup quantities perfect for using in zucchini bread in December.  Herbs can also be chopped and frozen, but I prefer to just let them hang in a warm, dry location for a few weeks and then then run them through the blender or food processor or just crumble by hand and store in a jar. Canning items such as tomatoes or pickling cucumbers and beets is also an easy extended storage option. While many people usually can large quantities at a time, you can process as little as one jar at a time if you like.  Following is a link to the Ball Canning website with all kinds of useful preserving information.  http://www.freshpreserving.com/ 

County Press Article

Following is a link to the great followup article that Krystal Johns did on us back at the end of April

http://thecountypress.mihomepaper.com/news/2016-04-27/News/Fresh_from_the_FARM.html

CSA updates

3.5" of rain so far today has me trying to get caught up on "inside" work :)

Hopefully everyone has enjoyed the strawberries, following is the finalized CSA share pickup schedule for the rest of the season:

• Week of June 20th (next week) - No pickups
• Week of June 27 - 1st week of shares, including the first batch of chickens
• Week of July 4 - No pickups.  We have found over the last couple of seasons that many of our shareholders head out of town for the week, so we going to try and fit in a couple of vacation days this week as well and will not have any distributions
• Week of July 11 - Until hard freeze (hopefully late October) - normal pickups each week

Following are some photos I took in between rain showers this morning to help give you a feel for crop progress

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Hoop house #1 with Leaf Lettuce, Cucumbers, and Tomatoes

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The hoop house tomatoes have a significant head start on their outside counterparts!

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Super excited about the heavy blossoms on the blackberries in hoop house #2

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Potatoes were just recently hilled and weeded.

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Outside tomatoes are starting to make progress and just about up to the first level of string

Planting Progress Report

Our primary round of planting is now complete!  We will still have our weekly succession plantings of carrots, lettuce and other greens, but the bulk of the work related to putting in transplants and seeding corn, beans, squash, cucumbers, etc is now behind us :)  We are experimenting with a number of weed reduction techniques this season, one of which is the use of a weed block paper that is approved for organic production, it has added a fair amount of time to the planting process, but will hopefully payoff with a significant reduction in weeding hours over the next several months.

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Cabbage and broccoli on the new weed block paper

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First planting of sweet corn has emerged

The apple trees at our leased orchard had heavy blossoms this spring on the Macintosh and Red Delicious and moderate levels on the Golden Delicious.  Unfortunately we had a couple of clear, cold nights after bloom - we were actually sub-freezing on May 16th, and 18th - with a heavy frost the morning of the 23rd.  As a result, fruit set was not nearly what we had hoped for, but fortunately not all of the blossoms were damaged and we should still have some apples this fall.  The picture below is of one of the Red Delicious trees that does have some fruit started. (You can still see some of the brown blossom ends that were the result of the freeze)

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Some of our Red Delicious just getting started

Strawberries in the hoop house are starting to ripen up!  Distributions of the strawberries will begin this week and go through the next couple.  Watch you email for notification as to when your pickup time will be.

Sunday's berry harvest

The chickens will be entering their 8th week and are growing quickly.  They do seem to be better foragers than our previous Cornish Cross varieties.  I'm very interested to see how the final weights come out

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The chickens are "sizing up" nicely. 

It looks like the first week of regular of share distribution will be either the 3rd or 4th week of June, depending on how well the weather cooperates.  We finally got some rain last evening and have had a couple additional storms move through today.  Before the 1.7 inches we received last night, we had only received 0.3 inches over the prior 20 days!

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One of the Killdeer nesting in our fields (all three eggs hatched and are now little fuzzballs running around)

Updates will be coming more frequently now as we are getting closer to season kick off!

Awesome Eggs

I've shared the details around our source for eggs with several of you individually, but wanted to give some additional insight and background around the the cool chicken activities over at the Roehrer family farm.  I met the Roehrers back in 2014, we share many similar interests and ideas related to farming and food production, and several of their older children work with us on the farm during the season.  Knowing their commitment to sustainable, healthy production, made them a natural partner that allowed us to be able to offer delicious, organic eggs as an option to our shareholders each week.  Following is a brief history of their farm and flock:

Our small farm in Ortonville was established in 2000, with our chicken flock
beginning in 2010 when our eldest daughter expressed her new-found love for
chickens after “chicken sitting” for a friend. And so it was, our very first flock
was established.
After our family of ten experienced the sheer joy of raising baby chicks, we
then began to reap the benefits of farm-fresh pastured eggs, and the rest, as
they say, is history! There was no going back to store-bought eggs ever
again.
We currently grind and mix our own feed, as we found it difficult to find
organic, soy-free feed. Now we are able to be in complete control of the
ingredients in their diets without any surprises. We only procure organic, non-
GMO, soy-free ingredients from regional farmers. Food scraps are limited to
organically raised fruits and vegetables. In keeping with natural practices, we
gently wash our eggs with only cool, clean water.
Due to the large population of fox and hawks in our area, our chickens reside
in a “gated community” for their safety. They have an abundance of room to
run, sunbathe, dust bathe, eat bugs, scratch, forage, and play “worm football”.
Our birds enjoy the great outdoors year round yet have access to large,
roomy coops at their desire.
We take pride in raising healthy, happy chickens for our family, and we are
pleased to be able to share their eggs with you as well.

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April 2016 Update

I know, I'm way past due with the spring update, no excuses, just been putting off sitting in front of the computer vs. spending time outside as long as I can :).  It was a much milder winter for the fruit trees compared to the previous two, which was a nice break!  The apples all have emerging leaves and blossoms so hopefully the sub freezing nights are behind us.

I enclosed the wash station this spring with plexiglass and plastic so we now have a larger space to work with for transplant starts (instead of the south facing window of our dining room)

Chicks arrived two weeks ago, all are doing well!  We decided to go with the Freedom Ranger variety for this batch.  They take a little longer to mature, but supposedly they are better foragers, we'll see how they do once we move them onto pasture in another week or so.

The garlic that went in at the end of October last year is looking good.  We used card board sheets over a slightly raised bed and then planted the garlic into holes cut in the cardboard, I'm hoping that this will reduce the weed pressure that challenged the garlic crop last season.

Thank you to all of our shareholders that have signed up for the upcoming season! It's great to have so many of you returning from last year and we are excited to meet all of our new members as well.  We expanded the number of shares again this season but only have room for about 6 more before we will be completely sold out.  We are very thankful for the continued strong support!!

I'll attempt to keep the updates more frequent as we move closer to the start of the season.  Have a great week!

-Wade

2016 CSA SHARES NOW AVAILABLE

Do you enjoy delicious, fresh, organic fruit and vegetables?  Do you like to know where your food comes from and who grows it?  Does receiving a basket of freshly harvested produce each week during the growing season sound appealing?  Well then a CSA share from Decker Farm and Orchard may be for you!

We will be offering both full and half share sizes again this year and in addition to our standard shares which include our organic, pasture raised meat chickens, we will also be offering a meat free share for our vegetarian customers.

2016 Share Prices:

• Standard Half Share - $350
• Standard Full Share - $600
• Meat-Free Half Share - $310
• Meat-Free Full Share - $520

 Add fresh, organic, soy-free eggs to your weekly shares:

• Half dozen - $45
• Full dozen - $75

Joining is simple with our online signup form that makes registration quick and easy, and an online payment option is available as well.  A $100 deposit will hold your share, with the balance due by May 15th.

Check out our CSA page for pictures and week by week listing of share contents from prior seasons.

We are super excited to begin our 3rd season of share production and can’t wait to see everyone out at the farm!

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CSA Week 17

Our final week for the 2015 season has arrived!  A big Thank You to all of our wonderful shareholders that have supported us through another fantastic and very rewarding year.  As I've come to realize, almost nothing on the farm goes exactly as planned, but as I reflect back over the past 17 weeks there have been many more ups than downs, and I am already looking forward to next season.

Sometime in the near future (hopefully before the holidays) we'll be sending out a brief survey to all shareholders for feedback on the past season.  We would greatly appreciate if you could take a few minutes to complete it and help us to make next year even better!

Chickens went from pasture to freezer on Monday as planned.  Average weights were right on target around 5 pounds each. Along with the chickens, this weeks shares include:

• Leeks
• Green Onions
• Parsnips
• Tomatoes
• Radishes
• Turnips
• Sweet Peppers
• Jalapeno Peppers
• Cayenne Peppers

The parsnips look like over sized white carrots, they kind of smell a bit like carrots too.  They are delicious in soup and stews, roasted, baked, or boiled and mashed.

CSA Week 16

We are now down to the last two weeks of the season, this week and next.  We had a light frost last Wednesday night/Thursday morning, so most of the herbs are now done along with the late zucchini, but it looks like most of the sweet peppers made it through and continue to color up and will hopefully be ready for final shares next week.  We are starting to dig turnips this week along with the final harvests of beets and carrots.  Lots of purple this week with beets, turnips and cabbage!

While last week was the final regular distribution for egg shares, out egg supplier will still have a few dozen available this week and next week if any one would like some.  Just give me a day or two notice prior to your pickup day.  They are $3 for a 1/2 dozen and $5 for a dozen

We experimented with some pumpkin varieties this year, trying to decide if we want to plant on a larger scale next season.  We don't have a lot, (20-25) but will make them available on a first come first serve basis.  If you are interested in one, shoot me a note and I will hold for you if your pickup date is later in the week.

This week's shares include:

• Red Cabbage
• Turnips
• Carrots
• Beets
• Tomatoes
• Jalapeno Pepper
• Cayenne Pepper
• Lettuce
• Applesauce - Large Jar

If you didn't get a chance to try the turnip recipes from the June harvest, now is your chance!

caramelized-turnips

tugboat-turnips

CSA Week 15

The recent clear and cool evenings have provided some beautiful skies, the lunar eclipse and super blood moon were awesome this past weekend and this weeks post picture is of the brilliant sunset last night.

Shares this week will include:

• Potatoes
• Tomatoes
• Carrots
• Apples (red delicious)
• Brussels Sprouts
• Lettuce
• Butternut Squash
• Parsley
• Jalapeno Peppers
• Cayenne Peppers
• Applesauce

We are clearing out a few remaining cases of applesauce from last season's production.  This week's share will have 3 sampler jars, one of each variety. Try them all and choose a favorite as we will be including a large jar next week

Following are a couple of recipes that utilize some of this week's produce.  The Brussels sprout recipe was provided by one of our shareholders (thanks Kim!)

Roasted-brussels-sprouts-with-bacon

indonesian-carrot-soup.html

Our chickens continue to size up nicely, they should be ready for shares the week of October 12th.  I expect that we will have 6-8 extra birds if anyone is interested.  Pricing is $4.50 per pound for shareholders or $5.00 per pound for non-shareholders. Average size should be in the 4-6 pound range.  Shoot me an email or let me know during share pick up if you would like to reserve any.  Following are a couple of pictures provided by shareholders of chickens from our batch earlier this year (Thanks Carmen & Ashley!)

CSA Week 14

More fall vegetables this week, including spaghetti squash and leeks.  Spaghetti squash lives up to its name with both the look and texture of pasta, still tastes a bit like squash but milder than butternut or acorn, and it is delicious served with marinara sauce!  Most squash recipes have you cut the squash in half and scrape out the seeds before baking, however they are hard and can be a pain to cut through without a large knife or chain saw...I just put them in the oven whole and cut and scoop out the seeds after they are are baked, which is a lot easier.

The leeks are the things that look like giant green onions.  They have a wonderful flavor and make great soups, the following recipe actually has you caramelize some of the leeks in the oven to use in the soup, they are delicious!  http://dfo-recipes.weebly.com/roasted-leek-and-potato-soup.html

I also wanted to pass along a most excellent zucchini dessert recipe that Melissa, one of our shareholders sent me.  http://dfo-recipes.weebly.com/zucchini-brownies.html  I made them on Monday evening and they were all gone by this morning!

The chicken's pasture this past week was the old sweet corn planting, the corn takes a large amount of nitrogen from the soil so I figured moving the chickens in would allow them to clean up any left over ears and add back some serious nutrients

This week's shares include:

• Potatoes
• Tomatoes
• Leeks
• Spaghetti squash
• Green beans
• Swiss chard
• Carrots
• Basil
• Jalapeno Peppers

CSA Week 13

Fall is by far my favorite of the four seasons.  The weather is one of the reasons, I love the cool, crisp mornings and evenings, and a warm sunny afternoon in September always feels better than one in the middle of summer.  The cooler weather also means its time to start harvesting some awesome fall crops, we continue to have apples in shares this week and we have also begun picking squash and onions.  This week's squash variety is acorn.  If you have never prepared acorn squash, or even if you have, following is a delicious recipe that uses several of this week's crops (and the parsley from last week if you have any left).  We made it for dinner on Monday night and everyone really liked it.

http://dfo-recipes.weebly.com/sausage-and-apple-stuffed-acorn-squash.html

Their back..... our late zucchini plants are starting to produce so the big green guys are appearing in shares again this week! 

If you haven't tried the zucchini crisp recipe yet, this may be your last chance of the season, you will swear it is apple crisp!

http://dfo-recipes.weebly.com/zucchini-crisp.html

This weeks shares include:

• Potatoes
• Tomatoes
• Cherry tomatoes
• Beets
• Acorn Squash
• Yellow Onion
• Green Beans
• Jalapeno Peppers
• Cayenne Pepper
• Oregano
• Apples
• Zucchini

Following are a couple of pics of today's harvest and the fields this morning as the sun was coming up before the fog burned off

CSA - Week 12

Hopefully everyone had an enjoyable Labor Day weekend and for those of you with school age children or that are teachers, I hope you survived backed to school Tuesday! 

We received almost 6" of rain since last Thursday, and since several of this weeks items grows underground so we will be doing plenty of washing with this week's harvest.

Nothing ever produces exactly as planned but one crop I had been disappointed in this year was green beans.  The primary plantings were stunted a bit from the overly wet June and just never got up to full yield.  Fortunately they are still producing and the two additional plantings that I did in early July are now kicking in. We picked 65 lbs of beans between Monday and today so heavier bean bags in the shares this week!

Prima apples are wrapping up, and we are now starting on McIntosh.  While the Prima's don't have a long shelf life, they are very resistant to apple scab. Meanwhile the McIntosh stay firmer longer and store better, but they are extremely susceptible to apple scab.  Apple scab is a caused by spores that infect the leaves of the apple tree in early spring following warm rains and then the spores on the leaves drop onto the apples as they are forming and cause black splotchy surface defects.  As long as the the scab is not too severe the apples are fine, just not very pretty.  In cases where it is more severe it causes the apple skins to crack as they grow larger.  The organic fungicide spray that we have used gets washed off with every rain, which also happens to be the time when the spores are released, as a result it isn't very effective.  So when you get both Prima's and Macs in your shares this week, the ones with the black surface blemishes are the McIntosh, they won't win any beauty contests but they are delicious!  :)

This week's shares include:

• Parsley
• Basil
• Potatoes
• Carrots
• Green Onions
• Jalapeno Peppers
• Tomatoes
• Cherry Tomatoes
• Green Beans
• Lettuce
• Apples

CSA - Week 11

Well its now September, so time to start harvesting some apples!  Our earliest variety, Prima, is hitting peak ripeness this week and I picked 6 bushels on Tuesday for this week's shares.

The chickens have moved onto pasture and are enjoying adding grass, seeds, insects, and grubs to their diets.  The biggest challenge related to moving the chickens outside is getting them all back into the coop at night.  I put down a small amount of feed for them in the coop to entice them, but it usually takes several evenings for all of them to get into the routine and those evenings involve us chasing and catching several chickens to get them all put away.  This batch of chickens were fairly quick learners and so by night four there was no more chasing required. :)

This weeks shares will include:

• Potatoes
• Tomatoes
• Cherry Tomatoes
• Lettuce
• Green Beans
• Jalapeno Peppers
• Beets
• Cabbage
• Basil
• Oregano
• Apples

Don't forget you can use both the beets and the greens, recipes for both can be found at http://dfo-recipes.weebly.com/beets.html

The Prima apple variety is a softer apple so its not great for long term storage but its awesome eaten fresh, used in pies and crisps, made into sauce,  or sliced and frozen for later use.

More basil and jalapenos this week. If you can't use them all right away you can chop up and freeze the jalapenos for use in chili, nachos, and other dishes this winter when you need some extra heat.  And the basil will stay fresh longer if you keep in a glass or vase of water out of direct sunlight at room temperature, or you can also hang it up to dry.

CSA - Week 10

This week feels more like the end of September not the end August!  Not complaining though, it sure is more enjoyable harvesting and weeding in cloudy 60 degree weather than when its humid and 90.

We have the return of sweet corn this week as well as beets and we are transitioning to Russet potatoes which we starting digging this week. It looks like it will also be the last week for zucchini and summer squash (I know, some of you won't be sad to not see any more of them for awhile) :)

This weeks shares include:

• Potatoes
• Tomatoes
• Sweet Corn
• Green Peppers
• Jalapeno Peppers
• Beets
• Cilantro
• Basil
• Zucchini or Summer Squash

CSA - Week 9

Well the raccoon have stayed out of the next harvest of corn so far, but that is probably because it isn't quite ripe yet.  They've been coming back to clean up on what's left from last week and so far 3 are now available for coon skin caps if anyone is interested.

The chicks are getting their white adult feathers in, they should be ready to move on to pasture about this time next week. 

This week's shares include:

• Arugula
• Basil
• Cilantro
• Dill
• Zucchini / Summer Squash
• Tomatoes
• Green Beans
• Red Potatoes
• Blackberries
• Green Peppers
• Jalapeno Peppers

Hope everyone has a great week!

CSA - Week 8

We have had our first significant pest issue of the season and unfortunately it effects our sweet corn.  Over the past weekend and through the beginning of this week several local raccoon families have been dining in our sweet corn fields each night.  They do an immense amount of damage to the stalks and ears and have essentially wiped out our 2nd planting.  I'm hoping to get the population in check before the 3rd planting begins to ripen next week.

Most of the other crops are fairing much better and we will have hefty totes again this week

This week's shares include:

• Red Potatoes
• Tomatoes
• Cucumber
• Zucchini / Summer Squash
• Cabbage
• Green Pepper
• Jalapeno Pepper
• Chives
• Basil
• Parsley
• Cilantro
• Blackberries
• Lettuce

There are two new recipes added this week, one that utilizes the potatoes, chives, and basil and another one that uses the zucchini/summer squash, potatoes, and basil. We had the Herb Roasted Summer Vegetables for dinner on Monday and it was awesome.

This week Recipes

CSA - Week 7

Summer harvest season is in full swing now!  While there is always plenty of weeding to do, the bulk of our hours this week are being spent on picking, washing, cooling, and packing. Our newest batch of chicks arrived yesterday afternoon and have settled right in to their new homes.  You can check out a short video of the chicks that Kate posted on our Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/kate.decker.3726/videos/1901243843434188/

This week's share contents:

• Lettuce Mix
• Cucumber
• Red Kale
• Arugula
• Jalapeno Pepper
• Zucchini/Summer Squash
• Red Potatoes
• Sweet Corn
• Tomato
• Beans
• Blackberries
• Basil
• Dill

If you haven't enjoyed Red Kale or Arugula before, check out the recipe page for some ideas. Arugula is one of my favorite greens and I was starting to think we were not going to have any this year.  The first two plantings got washed out by the June rains and the 3rd planting (in this week's share) is a bit "holy" thanks to flea beetles.  It has a very distinctive peppery aroma and flavor.  It's a nice addition to a salad or in Arugula Pasta 

CSA - Week 6

We started digging potatoes this week! Of all of the different fruit and vegetables we harvest, potatoes are one of my all time favorites. It's like a treasure hunt at each plant you unearth :) Last season's harvest had been disappointing at less than a pound per row foot, however this year has been much better, with increased size and number per plant with yields averaging just over 2 lbs per foot!

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The recent heat wave has been fantastic, although I did catch myself reminiscing about an air conditioned office while I was unloading a trailer load of horse manure yesterday afternoon....

This week's shares include:

• Lettuce mix - we'll be harvesting a combination of green romaine, speckled trout back romaine (green with cool reddish splotches) and some leaf lettuce
• Radishes
• Cucumber
• Jalapeno Pepper
• Zucchini/summer squash
• Red potatoes
• Chives
• Swiss chard

Enjoy!

CSA - Week 5

This week's shares include:

• Broccoli
• Zucchini / Summer Squash
• Snap Peas
• Basil
• Cilantro

We have a couple of fresh herbs included this week - Basil and Cilantro. Both are delicious when used fresh but they can also be dried and saved for use later.  The simplest approach is to hang the herbs in a warm place out of direct sunlight to dry for for a couple of weeks or until they crumble easily.  If you hang them inside a paper bag with slits cut for ventilation the bag will catch any leaves that break or drop off as they dry.  Once they are dried store in an airtight container.

Check out the recipes tab for several good ways to use those zucchini and summer squash.  The zucchini bread is my favorite but they are all delicious.  The pasta recipe also utilizes fresh basil!

http://dfo-recipes.weebly.com/zucchini.html

You can also freeze any extra zucchini to use in recipes later this winter.  Just shred it and measure it into freezer bags, don't forgot to write the quantity on the bag.  (I usually do 3 cup bags, perfect for zucchini bread)

Pictures of broccoli, zucchini, and one of of this year's fawns (hopefully he continues to stay on the outside of the fence)