Open House at the Farm This Saturday

Yikes, the weather forecast for the week is for highs to be near 94 and little chance of rain.  I think we are all getting accustomed to the drought, but darn it seems way too early to be in the mid 90s. Fortunately here at the farm we have been blessed with some moderate rain showers over the past week or so; nothing measurable but enough to keep the dust down to some degree. If you come to our open house this coming week, you'll see where we have begun plowing up some of our spring crops to make room for some of our summer plantings.

Speaking of our open house, it will be held at this coming Saturday between 4 & 7. It is open to all so please feel free to bring your family and friends. The open house will be held at our "ol' school house" which we relocated to our farm several years ago.  Originally built in 1912, we have modified it to have a working kitchen, dinning area and rest rooms. Depending on the weather, we may have most of our  activities outside, i.e.  pickling/canning demonstration and our "pot luck" dinner. We need to plan so we ask everyone to send us an email to csa@woodduckfarm.com  if you're coming (RSVP).     PLEASE LET US KNOW HOW MANY WILL BE IN YOUR PARTY, Adults and Kids. We're going to smoke some BBQ treats and will have plenty of water, ice tea and apple juice. When you enter the front gate, bear to the right and drive on down and we'll be waiting for you.

What Should You Bring?

·         This is a potluck, so if your last name begins with the letters

                  A~I = a side dish (slaw, beans, casserole, potato salad etc.)

                  J~R = fruits, salads or breads

                  S~Z = Desserts

·         Be sure to bring chairs and of course your family! 

·         Coolers welcome - filled with beverages of your choice.  Please drink responsibly!

·         PLEASE NO DOGS

R.S.V.P. by Wednesday, May25^th

csa@woodduckfarm.com

If you would like to help with any of our open house planning please let us know!

 What to do with Kale and Squash? We received these recipe below from two of our CSA members  

I wanted to share a SUPER easy and delicious Kale recipe. I made these just now and they are incredible! Apparently, you can do this with a lot of different greens but Kale is the most popular. 

Thanks,

Jennifer

Kale Chips 

• about one bunch of kale, rinsed and dried
• Olive oil
• Salt, to taste

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
2. Make sure the Kale is dry- try a salad spinner if necessary. Cut the tough ends off the kale, and pull bite sized pieces off the inner stems. 
3. Place kale chips in large bowl. Toss in about 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Lighter is better! Then sprinkle in sea salt. Salad tongs work great for tossing. 
4. Put the kale pieces in a single layer on a baking sheet, using parchment if available.
5. Bake for 12-15 minutes or until crisp, watching the baking around 12 minutes to ensure they aren't burning and to check to see if they are crispy enough for you! 
6. Experiment! For more smoky or spicy flavor, lightly dust the kale chips with paprika or cayenne pepper power.

  
Summer Squash casserole

Ingredients

• 1 small Vidalia onion, chopped (about 3/4 cup)
• 2 pounds yellow squash, cut into 1/2 to 1-inch cubes
• Kosher salt and freshly cracked black pepper
• 1 cup good quality mayonnaise
• 1 1/2 cups grated Gruyere cheese
• 1 1/4 cups crushed Ritz crackers, divided
• 1 1/2 tsp. fresh thyme, chopped
• 1 to 2 Tbsp. olive oil

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

In a heated skillet, add olive oil.  Add the onions. Cook until lightly brown. Add the squash, season with salt and pepper, to taste, and cook until the squash is tender, about 8 to 10 minutes. Remove the skillet from the heat and stir in the mayonnaise, 1 cup of the cheese, 1 cup of the crumbled crackers, and thyme. Pour the mixture into a 1 1/2-quart baking dish. Sprinkle with remaining cheese and top with remaining 1/4 cup of butter crackers. Bake until the casserole is bubbly around edges, about 25 minutes. Remove the casserole from the oven and serve hot.

Kristina

Below are a few photos over the past  two weeks.

It takes a lot of manpower to pick wash sort and pack our CSA boxes.  We do everything outside, so tents are required to protect the veggies from the sun.

 Lots of Baby Carrots last week. More coming this week.

 

 Week of May 17th Full Share Above which included cucumbers, microgreens, salad mix, baby carrots, cauliflower, radishes, snow peas,onion, rainbow swiss chard and russian  banana potatoes.

 Week of May 12th, Full Share Above, 2 bags of Salad Greens, Summer Starburst Squash, Cheddar Cauliflower, Broccoli, 2 heads of Cabbage, Radishes, Beets or Salad Turnips, Snow Peas, Onions

Tomates Are Coming Soon

Trying to harvest our spring crops while planting for the summer requires the farm to be run in "full throttle mode," which makes idle time scarce. This hopefully explains why we have not had a lot of time to update you in more than a week. We've provided a few pics below that will hopefully "tell a thousand words."  As with most farms this time of year, we're currently wishing that there were eight days in the week rather than seven. Guessing though in retrospect that wouldn't make a much of a difference though as goes the adage "... a farm's work is never complete."

News from the farm:

Rain:  About a week ago, we received over an inch of rain which was so very welcome. The bad news was that it all came in about 30 minutes, which resulted in a little flash flooding on our fairly flat farm land. Oh well beggars can't be "choosey." We only wish that all of our farm friends could have participated in it as well.


Summer CSA Registration To Begin in mid-June:  Yes, we were able to begin our 2011 Spring program early enough to have a summer program as well. We're planting lots of summertime favorites such as watermelon, cantaloupe, grape tomatoes, sweet corn, purple hull peas, as well as your normal staples such as cucumbers, squash, green beans, eggplant, and green garlic. Just like last summer, we're hoping to participate with other local farms so that we can add summer fruit, such as peaches, blue berries, figs etc., to your farm shares. More info soon, but you can contact me directly at csa@woodduckfarm.com if you'd like to go ahead and sign up.

Farm Open House    Looking at the calendar, we're thinking the weekend of Saturday, May 28th may be a possible date to welcome some of you that are interested in seeing the farm. More info later. We are going to try and find someone to demonstrate canning summer veggies like cucumbers for pickles etc. Let us know if you have someone in mind.


Website Facelift  We're working to make our website more user friendly. This should ultimately help us with some of our back-office "organizational/growing pains." We'll keep you posted as this develops.


Pick Up Location Punctuality:  We have ideas as to how improve our delivery "on time" scoring which has been dismal of late, especially for those of you that pick up in the west Houston area locations.Please hang in there as we fully understand your frustration. Hopefully you'll begin to see a difference this week.

Meat & Poultry Subscription Plan: Our next and second delivery for our Spring 2011 Meat/Poultry Share is scheduled to be next week, May 17th. FYI the meat subscription plan is for three deliveries over ten weeks.
  

Shown above is our commercial pea sheller, a "used" but new edition to our farm. Although  We're hopeful that this pea sheller will come in handy during our summer CSA program. This "gem" is supposed to shell 1 bushel of peas in 3 minutes; compare this to when I used shell about 1 pint in about 30 minutes.

Well summer is coming and we're growing purple hull peas. For those of you not familiar with PH peas, they're "cousins" to black-eyed peas, an "ol' time" summer southern favorite. I remember shelling PH peas as a child, usually watching either "Dark Shadows" or the Atlanta Braves. (I  was about 7 or 8 yrs old, growing up in Georgia, played Dixie Youth baseball, slept via an attic fan (no AC), and watched TV on a RCA Black & White model w/outdoor antenna being required.  If I was not at baseball practice, I was usually riding my bicycle, playing in my "tree house" or reading an army book. Lots of good memories, but I'm not wishing shell peas anymore.)

"Rocky Raccoon" an unwelcome neighbor

We have not had predator problems in a long time, but a few mornings ago we started seeing chicken parts laying outside the chicken coup. Not sure if this raccoon is the culprit, but it got caught in our "have-a-heart" trap. Overall we lost around 15 chickens. Not to worry "Rocky Raccoon", it'll be okay as we'll release you down near the river. Hopefully your short time in confinement will result in your being rehabilitated into a "kindlier gentler raccoon." Yea Right?

Some of our pastured poultry enjoying some fresh forage after their pen was just moved to a new location a few feet away.

Like a lot of commercial growers we use stakes and twine to support our field grown tomatoes. Above is an example of our tomatoes planted on plastic mulch to inhibit weeds and enhance moisture retention and supported with baling twine. Notice the green tomato. Just a few weeks away before CSA shares begin receiving tomatoes.

Lots of time needed to plant, stake and maintain our tomato plants

Normally we get rain here in SE Texas which requires adequate spacing between rows for good air circulation. This helps retard fungal development which is the primary "bad guy" for tomato plants in the south. So far our plants are looking pretty healthy. Perhaps a silver lining to the drought?

We picked a few tomatoes today. Real small, almost plum size. Bigger ones coming soon.

Our full share for the week of May 3rd included summer squash/zucchini, 3-4 sweet onions, green beans, Russian banana heirloom potatoes, 5-7 red beets, 5-7 Japanese turnips, radishes, kale, 2 bags salad greens.

Full share from the last week of April,  Micro Greens, 2 bags salad greens,  3 bunches kale, large bag of spinach, green beans, beets, turnips, potatoes, radish.

 

2011 has been a hot dry spring for growing spinach. Here we are washing some after harvest a few weeks back.

Baskets of fresh cut lettuce, arugula and assorted mixed greens ready for rinsing.






Until Next Time,


Van