open heart farm

New Stats to look for

2012-01-19T11:32:00.000-05:00

As most of you have looked at the blog for a few years know, I regularly check the river page to see what level the Winooski is at, this year, I, and surely lots of other farmers, are looking at these numbers, particularly the snowfall for the season and month. The numbers tell a good deal, but not all of the story. They tell us that we have 29 inches less snow than last year this time, which is more than 50% less, or probably more importantly, even if it started snowing at the record rates of last year, we would have still 25% less than last year, and hence signigantly less flooding. If we hang out at average or the even less than average that we are getting so far we could even be looking at some early starts, like we had in the 2010 season. Some of this number crunching is just too much time in the winter, but still, a good way to plan how much one should try to get on the highest ground one has, and to look ahead and say, maybe we will be in the greenhouses a week earlier than last year, so get ready.

heres the link in case you want to watch along with me: http://www.wunderground.com/cgi-bin/findweather/getForecast?query=ICAO:KBTV&almanac=1

Burlington International, Vermont (KBTV)

Weather Almanac for January 19, 2012

	Actual	Normal	Record	Last Year
Yesterday:
Max Temperature	44°	27°	53° (1996)	31°
Min Temperature	9°	10°	-24° (1974)	11°
Precipitation	0.00 "	0.07 "	1.61 " ( 2006 )	0.21 "
Month-to-date precip.	0.93 "	1.19 "	--	1.19 "
Year-to-date precip.	0.93 "	1.19 "	--	1.19 "
Snowfall	0.0 "	0.6 "	9.7 " ( 1978 )	2.1 "
Month-to-date snowfall	8.1 "	12.2 "	--	21.0 "
Season-to-date snowfall	20.1 "	35.5 "	--	49.3 "
Heating degree days	38	47	--	44
Month-to-date heating degree days	754	831	--	785
Since 1 July heating degree days	3010	3590	--	3569
Since 1 Jan cooling degree days	--	--	--	--
Maximum humidity: 86%, Minimum humidity: 45%, Average humidity: 66%					P.S. for those looking for the brochure I will be getting it ready for the end of January beginning of Feb.

Seeds are coming in

2012-01-16T22:20:00.003-05:00

As with most years I start ordering seeds with the new year, which seems appropriate. Well, they are already coming in, probably mostly in by the end of the week, which means the next step will be organizing them. (Reminds me of another thing I like about farming, one step seems to so naturally lead you to the next. You take care of a plant for a while, then you harvest from said plant for awhile. It's probably just as natural in other jobs but I couldn't always figure it out). After that I will get on to making this years brochure . . . before you know it greenhouses.

But to savor the moment a little, there are some seeds I am excited about this year. Mostly tomatoes. Because I have access to hoophouses this year I was able to bring back a few I had given up on. Pinapple, above, is one of those striped ones that I love but are just too darn big and cracky to get reliably in the field. Most of these striped ones (like gold medal) are pretty sweet but large enough to have some nice complex tomato flavors as well. Dad's Sunset was just too nice looking and such a great name couldn't pass it up. I have one other orange tomato, Valencia, that is pretty, but I've never been one hunred percent satisfied with it's flavor. Other tomatoes I'm bringing back for a run in the hoophouses are Cherokee Purple, which in the field always had a week or two of nice early ones but then were worthless, and Brandywine, which I was truly contemplating giving up before I secured our land at South Village (where our hoophouses are and a chunk of higher ground, the need for which, see earlier posts). Brandywines really are as awesome as their reputation but I was getting two usable tomatoes a plant, maybe. Even for field tomatoes I am going back to my old regime of using Serenade for a few weeks in the beginning, probably up until the time they set fruit. It is an organic spray that I think can add about two or three weeks of life to the plants, and when you are talking tomatoes every week is worth it. They're here and then they're gone.

Other veggies that I'm excited about: I just can't stop thinking of the peas. I'll probably be dreaming about them tonight!

What I do during the Winter

2011-12-14T11:06:00.001-05:00

my new book: Cloud Computing (this is the cover photo by Ciaran to your left) which I should warn you, should probably not be read if you want to have a more meaningful understanding of how cloud computing works, at lest in a technological sense, is available on SPD (small press distribution) and possibly amazon as well.

I started it last winter after what had been a pretty good farm season, which left me time to coach basketball, watch the kids and write some at night. A year and much tinkering later and voila.

I do hope to do a reading or two before the next farm season starts in earnest. hope you enjoy the book. Did I mention it is perfectly sized for a stocking stuffer!

Gift Giving

2011-11-26T22:48:00.000-05:00

My choices for gifts to give this season are:

1) non-material gifts such as giving to oxfam in someones name (we and some other families might even try to buy a goat for people in our kids names and explain it to them.)

2) cookbooks that you actually use and like, no one needs another untested dud cookbook, but there are a few (I've recommended them in the past so you can search that) that are eternally useful for vegetarians, carnivores and everything in between.

3) This is the one I'm most excited about, mesh produce bags. Tempted to get a set for everyone in he csa. Over the past year or two I've seen them cropping up more and more but definitely would like to reduce much more substantially the number of bags we use. I haven't used them myself yet, so I'm not sure they are appropriate for absolutely every veg but . . . I did find them at gardeners, where, if you know me I've probably told you ten times, I work this season.

anyways happy holidays, even if all the gifts you give are immaterial.

Big White Eraser

2011-11-23T11:20:00.000-05:00

Ciaran and Francis weren't the only ones shoveling snow this morning. It seeme like every adult wanted to get out there and play in the white stuff, we just had to pretend a little, since it seems even mid-day the snow is starting to melt. I felt like everyone was instantly happier with thoughts of: "This is what we Vermonters love to be doing."

Finally we can all move on, no more even talking about it, the snow is falling.

Beginning of the end of the year assessment

2011-11-19T22:47:00.000-05:00

can you tell it's been a crazy year. Where does one begin with assessment of this one. Well, I'll begin and see how far I get today.

It was our lost year, the way Japan had a lost decade, as another farmer put it: Ctrl+Alt+Del.

That said I learned alot and alot is happening with the general Vermont ag scene that I think is going to make next year pretty darn interesting.

1)Things that don't seem to mind flooding at least on the Intervale soil where they can drain pretty qucikly: Asparagus, garlic (to an extent), peach trees. I'm not going to start a peach farm, but garlic and asparagus are something I am interesting in growing more of. Their limited harvest window also makes them interesting to me. Floods at certain times have no effect on them whatsoever.

2) did i tell you I figured out how to grow lots of chard far easier. Probably cause ive told everyone, but for me this is pretty exciting. It takes less time to pick and is more plentiful. space it in plugs and don't direct seed, just that simple.

3) good to have some higher ground. no way around the fact that that's a plus. for me that could be alot places within the intervale or outside. I am going to be farming some at south village next year. probably about a half acre plus hoophouses. so definitely alot of learning continuing. Haven't dealt that much with clay soils or hoophouses, but I'm excited for the balance, and to see how the relationship grows.

4) this would have been learned in a normal year: deer fence works

5) I can grow corn. I was scared to do this, just having never done it at Quail Hill where rachel and I apprenticed, but spurred by early losses I gave it a go, and half of the CSA did recieve pretty good corn (will be better next year cause actually planned for) before hurricane. deer fence made this possible too.

6) Having a CSA is great. Way beyond the money part, which obviously can't be overstated as important to our continued farming, our members were so supportive, and make me want to come back next year and give them the season they deserve.

More assessment, like limited results from the survey coming out to you next week, have a good thanksgiving!

Yeah Onions!

RACHEL'S READING POSTPONED!!

2011-07-08T14:30:00.000-04:00

THE POETRY READING ANNOUNCED HERE FOR 7/10 AT THE FALLS GALLERY IN WINOOSKI HAS BEEN POSTPONED DUE TO UNFORESEEN CIRCUMSTANCES! PLEASE CHECK BACK FOR NEWLY SCHEDULED TIME (TBD)

THANKS!!

POETRY READING THIS SUNDAY!

2011-07-06T10:36:00.012-04:00

(above image is a photo of Wreath, Anne Cummings, at the Top Gallery in Winooski, VT)

Please join us for a poetry reading this Sunday, 7/10, at 2pm in the Falls Gallery in Winooski!

Rachel will be reading from and talking about her recently-published poetry collection, Plasmos (Fifth Planet Press/3rdness Press). The reading is part of events for the Winooski Pop-Up Arts District, which runs through the end of July.

Get more details about the Pop-Up Gallery District here:

http://artmapburlington.com/winooskipops/

Read a little bit about Plasmos (and buy it at 40% off) here:

http://www.spdbooks.org/pages/events/summer_white_sale.aspx

Please join us!

New Life

2011-07-02T17:43:00.000-04:00

So these are the eggs of two killdeer that have been hanging out between two beds of leeks for the past two weeks. Forgot if I mentioned them. Now the eggs are hatched so I could finally clean up that super grassy aisle, which was nice. And the four chicks and the mom and pop (I guess are roaming around the farm chirping. They are all so loud I almost feel like, "how can that be safe? Aren't hawks going to come eat you?" But they probably have it figured out.

Well, we to have a sense of new life at the farm. This week we had our first working members out and our crew (Jamie and Jeremy) were working longer, we hilled the potatoes and leeks. Starting to seem like a normal season a little more, and I think there are even some chances for prosperous growing. The leeks are a nice size already. I'm really liking the hilling as a weed control method. We will hill them one more time and hopefully have nice long white shanks. Also had a nice farmer's market this weekend.

I think it's summer.

Wild Ride

2011-06-14T21:20:00.000-04:00

It's been a crazy few weeks down at the Intervale, and probably around most of the state, as far as agriculture goes. It finally feels like things are starting to even out and normalize. We (Jeremy, Jamie, and I) have been hoeing and re-hoeing things. The soil is just so saturated with water that it is taking a few passes to kill most of the weeds, but kill them we shall. It finally looks like we are not too far away from our first radishes, turnips, head lettuce and lettuce mix. That plus beet greens and garlic scapes are looking like early staples this year. We just put in our new chard, the first time I have ever grown it from plugs and in three rows, as opposed to direct seeding (the seeds go into the ground) and in two rows.

That seems to be a theme so far this year. Doing things in a different way that may in fact be better, and make us a significantly better farm over the next few years. Other examples, you inquire. Well, we put in an electric deer fence, something I normally wouldn't have thought we had time for but in the weird schedule of this year we do. I'm hoping this means an extra planting of lettuce in the fall and no eaten winter squash (we would normally lose 10% or more of that and the melons), and also unmolested beans and fall carrots and beets. We are also moving the hearb circle to higher ground and actually making it into a circle instead of rectangle. Probably most exciting is the 150 asparagus plants which are doing fine. If we could get two or three weeks of asparagus next year (it then increases about a week a year of harvesting I think) wouldn't that be sweet.

The first cosmos and zinnias are flowering, so come and get them.

WTF (carrots)

2011-05-27T09:57:00.002-04:00

after the flood, after 5 floods, we must believe that somewhere, somehow, there will always be carrots: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jr_YSYAjei4

2011-04-29T08:37:00.000-04:00

I was thinking about the last post and realized there were two things I forgot to say that contribute to my being able to have such a bright outlook re the flood. The first is the silt, which you can see in this picture dumping into lake Champlain. May not be great for the lake, but for farm land in that delta, it's basically like the Nile, we are getting a lot of nutrients dumped on our soil. That plus pretty quick draining is an overall positive.

The second thing is extra labor. In a more normal season I get things in over a long period, maybe a month. It's mostly just me planting. It will cost money but at least it is possible to do the same thing in a week or two with enough help.

There, a more complete picture.

For those still looking to sign up, a link to the brochure is on your right.

NOT Turning on a dime

2011-04-27T22:42:00.000-04:00

The dime is stopped in mid-air. For the uninitiated, what am I talking about? The Flood, or more appropriately this year, The Floods. As members and veg lovers who have been with us and other Intervale farms for a while will know, we do get flooded from time to time. Usually it is in March or April when the snows melt and then maybe again in mid to late October, but the late one is only every once and a while. Well, with the extreme snows we all knew we were going to get something, but add the late spring and almost three times the average amount of rainfall this month and you've got some continuing and large floods.

I had just looked at this graph page before I went out and seeded radishes, carrots, parsnips, and hakurei turnips (which are awesome if you haven't had them, a tender sweet turnip you can eat raw. I will include a pic just to have something a little more fun than a graph.)Well, just like the weather, the predictions side of the graph is not always right, in fact you can often count on it being wrong. Despite things being a few weeks late I have a feeling it will still be a very productive growing year. To keep it in perspective, all we have really done at this point is pushed back carrots and early lettuce a week or two, assuming it doesn't rain forever.

It does make perennials look really attractive to me. The rhubarb is looking happy as a clam, and the trees are starting to take off (I planted to more this year (one peach, one plum). With that in mind I have decided to add two beds of asparagus this year, instead of one. I think I will still have a few asparagus plants to give away to members, worry not (extra rhubarbs found a happy home a few years ago).

On a "how politics actually effects me note" it turns out this flood gauge page that I and lots of farmers look at a lot is being shut down for lack of funding. They're asking for donations at the web-page. They should let the military hold a bake sale and let us keep our flood gauge.

Turning on a Dime

2011-04-03T20:53:00.000-04:00

This is shaping up to be the week I think where we move into that next gear on the farm, and I think as Vermonters also finally see Spring as sprung. This week on the farm we hope to

1. Compost the fields

2. Disk at least where the alliums (onions and leeks) will be going. The disk is one of my most used implements. As you can see in this pic, it basically just chops the first 6 inches of soil or so into a crumble.
3. Put our first plants in the cold frame (with remay on top, a blanket that will give the plants a few degrees frost protection (though its just onions we will be starting with so they don't really need frost protection))
4. Start mulching the garlic with some peace corp volunteers help (Rachel and I were in the Peace Corps in Ivory Coast (we had nothing to do with the current problems I swear!))

we were out today helping Half Pint farm get there hoophouses up, and it was so nice to hear the hum of the John Deere running.

remember, brochure is linked to on your right.

It's April (Really!)

2011-03-29T21:36:00.000-04:00

Well, it's almost April. Though you would hardly know it, right? We had a few snow flakes today.

What does all this cold mean for the farm. Well first, let's quantify it. It seems a little more crazy than it is cause last year was crazy warm. At this point last year we had had a few weeks of fifties. This year we have been consistently below the average by 5-10 degrees. Wouldn't even register as a blip if it was just a week, but it's been about three, so . . . I think it will slow things up a little at the beginning. Our first lettuce may be a week later, but still ready a week or two in advance of the CSA, just a little late for our first market in Shelburne.

These little guys are brassicas that we have started in the greenhouse. And the truth is that the greenhouse insulates us from a lot of the weather at this end of the season, always the same temp in there. As you can see perfect germination - I am actually pretty excited about our new broccoli varieties. Limba is the name of one of our first new ones, supposed to have lots of juicy side shoots.

Looking at the bright side of all this cold: the weeds aren't getting any head start. While at the field today I saw all the first leaves of rhubarb and the garlic coming up, spring to follow shortly everyone, believe me.

If you are looking for a link to our brochure, look no further than the sidebar of the blog, it's right there.

Look forward to seeing everyone on the streets of b-town as it warms up.

Earthworms

2011-03-16T17:16:00.000-04:00

We are in St. Louis for our last break before the season starts in earnest (I know, sounds a little weird when the snow isn't even off the ground, but the greenhouse gets intensive quick). It is about 65 here today and Ciaran was out in his Grandma's garden digging when he found an earthworm.

He's 3 now, so each passing summer still produces a vastly different Ciaran. He already seems much more able to handle himself in the garden, by which I guess I mean, able to not step on things and interested in playing in the dirt for a long time. Just hearing about the earthworm was so joyous for me, and kinda reminded me of the importance of doing things the way we do them at Open Heart, which is not certified organic, but we do do everything in that way with a smattering of biodynamic practices as well, and hearing about the earthworms reminded me of how much I like seeing them when we unearth the garlic (which we mulch with leaves, perfect moist spot for the worms), and all the ones we find while digging the potatoes. It's nice to know we are providing a safe, non-toxic environment for those fellows. You probably can't overestimate the importance of having them their, if only as a sign of all the other life in the soil. Which is why I always loved the name of one farm in the North Fork of Long Island where Rachel and I started farming: The Golden Earthworm Farm. They are that important.

Can't wait to get back to VT and see them.

Brochure Link

2011-02-23T09:58:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone, I put a link to our brochure on the sidebar there, so you don't have to go sifting through the posts. Duh, can't believe it took me five years to think of that (and actually it wasn't even me, it was Rachel). Enjoy the sun.

Golden Beets

2011-02-20T22:16:00.002-05:00

I've had two potlucks in the past two weeks and I've made almost the exact same thing - golden beets with Italian dressing and either goat cheese or feta. People who know me know this is kinda standard for me. Find a simple way to cook the veg and stick with it (which is also why we have to have a working member who will supply a little more variation with weekly recipes on the blog. Only so many times people want to hear me say garlic olive oil and sea salt.) I love this dish for lots of reasons. I mean, look at that color, it's like sunshine in a bowl. This time of year it cheers me up just to look at, and I was pleased our beets were so vibrant so close to March. We had some roasted rutabaga that was also still looking great. The carrots are starting to have little hairy roots on them, but everything else looks great in the cooler. I think that can be corrected by putting the carrots in bags next year instead of crates which retain too much moisture. Still have a nice chunk of potatoes.

But, back to the golden beets: if you haven't had this kind of beet before it's a little sweeter than the red, or as I often say, "less earthy." the taste is more a straight sweetness, and so balances really well with salad dressings. I think something about its consistency lends itself to boiling rather than roasting, but I'm happy to hear comments on that cause it's just my hunch. Anyways, a great beet all the year round.

This same week that I made them twice I got a call from someone interested in joining our CSA for this year specifically wondering whether we grow them. Happily, I said yes.

As far as farm work goes I am making the last preparations before going into the greenhouse. And our subscription rate is at a good clip this year. I am actually anticipating a lot of new interest in CSAs in general. Another wave. It seems like a tipping point or whatever you call it: lots of media stories, Peter Shumlin goal of a lot more grown here by whatever year. That's our governor saying eat local and I get the sense lots of people are listening. In fact, if you are looking for our brochure for this year, check out the post below.

What I Learned Organizing the Seeds

2011-02-04T09:23:00.003-05:00

All the boxes and mailing pouches were in, so it was time to put the seeds in the red toolboxes they live in until they go in the ground or the seeding tray. Always a good time to check in and make sure everything is on track. It's early enough so I can always go back to the seed stores and get what more I need. And this year there was one such case:

This first onion is from Johnny's

Red Long of Tropea

Tall, elongated, red bulbs.

Traditionally grown in Mediterranean Italy and France for harvest just at maturity in mid-late summer. Not for storage. Nice specialty variety. Adaptation: 35°-48° latitude. Packet: 460 seeds. Days to Maturity or Bloom: 90

And this one from FEDCO

2485RT Rossa Lunga di Tropea Onion (110 days) Open-pollinated. My father helped design torpedos in World War II, but none like this, the famous Italian heirloom torpedo onion. The name means Long Red of Tropea, and Tropea in Calabria near the southern tip of Italy is the site of a famous onion festival every August. Elongated like torpedos, these are thin-skinned glossy maroon bulbs with lighter interiors that slice easily into even rings. Sweet, mild and delicious for fall enjoyment, but not for keeping. Plants died back in the first week of October for Donna Dyrek. Intermediate-long day for middle latitudes: 35–48°.

So, that is the torpedo shape both are supposed to look like. Last year was the first year FEDCO had anything like the one that Johnny's has offered for years. I love this onion for a few reasons: Beautiful, sweet and mild for a red, and it is my second early onion after crystal white pearl onions. BUT, do you notice any differences in the description, besides FEDCOs interesting prose. That's right, the FEDCO onion is 20 days longer, 3 weeks is a long time in a Vermont summer. Last year we had generally good onions, but this one was smaller than usual, and I never figured out why until I was putting the packets in there places this year. Already ordered the replacements, so here's to sweet red onions.

Also, a new link to our brochure. A little bit more direct, thank you Intervale Center. For those interested in bread shares, I just have to touch base with O Bread one more time, but you will be able to buy bread and cheese shares after sampling at the first pick up.

What do I spend most of my time doing in the Winter? Watching kids build snow forts (note the flag).

21st Century Farming / Here is the 2011 brochure

2011-01-28T20:27:00.002-05:00

Well, I just created my own website. I know, you all have been doing it for years, but thanks to my friend Ben who recommended google, and I guess thanks to google for making everything possible for free. I mean, what do those guys not do. Grow vegetables, I guess. Not yet anyway. All of this was necessitated by the continued shrinking capabilities of the Intervale Center, who used to host the brochure. But let's rather thank them for helping me become self-sufficient in a new way.

Here is a link to the brochure. You may have to download, then print. Slightly less efficient, but still works.

Looking at the Stella Natura calendar this weekend to see which will be the first days of seeding. For more info on that look back to posts of the past.

Sunglolds and Bottlenecking

2011-01-22T15:37:00.000-05:00

This year I might do something that I haven't done in any of my previous nine years of farming: not plant any sungold tomatoes (even though this picture makes them look mouthwatering). They have been the standard for cherry tomato sweetness and have a great color, and won the Tomato Taste-off all the years we were at Quail Hill Farm. For the past two years I've had so much splitting - and I feel like the taste has been dropping off earlier and earlier each year. This description from Johnny's says alot

Exceptionally sweet, bright tangerine-orange cherry tomatoes leave customers begging for more. Vigorous plants start yielding early and bear right through the season. Tendency to split precludes shipping, making these an exclusively fresh-market treat. The taste can't be beat.

You know if the catalogue is admitting splitting then there is some major splitting. So instead I am looking at this one from FEDCO

WOW! Cherry Tomato OG (58 days) Ind. An open-pollinated cherry tomato better than Sun Gold? That’s been the holy grail of tomato breeders. Garland, ME, breeder Relentless and our tasters think he may have it: the orange color, the Sun Gold Brix with more tomatoey flavor and an added resistance to cracking. A selection from Relentless’ SunWine group with Brandywine, Sun Gold and a grape tomato in the parentage. Nearly fully stabilized; this is the F-8 generation. Earth Passionate Agrarian™–grown. Open source seeds.

This is what we farmers do during the winter, puzzle, like an eye doctor going, "A, or B, B or C . . . " I like that WOW is open Pollinated. To me it indicates that it will be easier to keep a healthy gene pool going once it is stabilized, but here is where my knowledge is really fuzzy (or made-up), so correct me if you know something about how seed population bottleneck. Is this how it always happens in commercial agriculture. Maybe it's par for the course and it shouldn't seem as weird as it does: we have really bred these plants, almost all the ones that are on our fields, to be good at one thing, so it should be no surprise that they are a little fragile genetically. I felt like this same thing happened to Merlot lettuce. A beautiful color, and it used to have reasonably sized heads. But over the years they started to shrink and shrink, and now if you read the seed catalog it says

This Merlot adds as much to your baby salad mix as a good wine adds to your dinner, providing incredible color, excitement and full-bodied flavor. Slow to grow, slow to bolt, plants never achieve much size or density, but are ideal for the baby leaf trade. Not for mature-head production,

It did not always say that about the size. I also felt like a lot of my FEDCO brassicas were bottlenecking and getting just generally weaker, so I switched a bunch to Johnny's last year which I think worked well.

Does anyone want my weather prediction? After this next few days, nothing lower than twenty and basically a trend towards spring. See you then.

Vermont Winter

2011-01-16T23:01:00.000-05:00

I think this is the most wintry Vermont Winter since Rachel and I have moved here, five or six years ago (forget which) - The weather forecast thus far indicates that it will keep chugging along as same. And I am shocked to announce that I think we are handling it pretty well. We haven't gone skiing or anything yet (I bet it will be Ciaran who finally forces us to go), but we just keep going to the Y and the library, and keep plugging away at farm tasks (the ones less fun than seed ordering, like securing permits, buying biomulch and row cover, etc.), but I also know winter isn't over yet, and I better not predict our victory over it when I almost had a near hallucination looking at this curious George book. I saw this page and I almost started having a reverie thinking about what a nice vacation spot it looked like.

Well, more from the farm soon, did I mention we are trialling some new varieties of potatoes (blue gold Yukon-y flesh, blue outside) - I liked the red gold so much last year I decided why not do both.

New Year

2011-01-02T23:07:00.001-05:00

I haven't ordered the seeds but all the numbers are written down, so lots of supply orders go in next week. Always so much to be excited about this time of year, seed-wise. They all seem like wise choices. I think I'm holding true to my word of consolidating the tomatoes - although that still somehow means about five new varieties.

Every year has its theme I think. Last year to me was the year of learning to do it right, not just by the seat of my pants (which had tended to work but it's nice not to have to be lucky). This year could be summed up (isn't it awesome I'm already summing up 2011) by two phrases: core competencies and KIS (Keep it simple). They're the same but from different angles: the first, economic: stick with what you do well and just work on doing it better. In the case of OHF, we know vegetables, CSA vegetables, i.e. the basic ones plus just a few to keep it interesting. Core-competencies are what keep small Davids beating Goliaths, so long as they stick to what they know, their own business model, they are not really ever in the same competition as those big guys. This is how the economics people also justify the otherwise impossible fall of giants like Ford to Hyundai.

KIS might have originated with AA, but all the same . . . this year especially, the first season with two kids, it's all about getting quality cauliflower to people, not purple cauliflower, sorry purple cauliflower lovers, let's get this year under our belt and I'll bring it back!

Was reading the Marriage of Heaven and Hell by Blake and I loved how this image had so much going on underground, I really felt it gave the true sensation that it is the ground actively doing something to feed the trees and us. Also reminded me of the Tom Waits line, there is a world going on underground.

A few pages later Blake says, "Without Contraries is no progression"

So true Blake, so true.

Look for more farmy updates soon, we get into the thick of it quick.

And the Survey Says

2010-12-03T21:29:00.000-05:00

Well, the flip side of my review is what our members said in the annual survey. Twenty of our 80 members filled it out, approximately, which is good I guess when you think of the sample for political polling. It's never too late you members out there, I'm always looking for more feedback.

The results were far less uniform than I thought they would be. As I might have mentioned I thought there would be an outcry against the continual lettuce greens, but perhaps the fact that they we've got the quality part down a bit more meant everyone could in fact eat more of them, though I should say there was still a sizable contingent that thought it was a bit too much. Eggplant and peas and tomatoes were the things that were most more requested, if that makes sense: people want more of them. The last can be expected (which doesn't mean that I too wouldn't have liked to give out more tomatoes, in fact I think it's very possible to accomplish next year, both length of season and volume) but the first two I was a little more surprised about. The peas I don't think will be a problem, in fact it fits into the category of things that, like the carrots, I am simply getting better at by doing it again and again. The eggplant are more of a mystery to me. The past two years the plants have looked good but production hasn't been great at all. I am going to have to talk to some other growers and see what I can learn. We have had good crops at OHF so I know its possible. Not to make excuses, but part of me wonders whether in New England eggplant remains dicey. The general revolt was against mustard and collards. Duly noted, I will be subbing in other things much earlier and having more spinach, which was also heavily requested. There were a few requests for less radishes, which I hope will be doable if we can produce more early salad turnips (does that count as a non-radish?) and rhubarb and a stronger early spinach and brassica crops. Also people wanted less herbs or at least smaller bunches, or maybe just more choice. Would scallions as an option help? Please comment, really!

There always seem to be about the same number of people who ask for more greens as ask for less greens, which brings me to the perennial CSA dilemma, how to get everyone exactly what they want. Well, obviously that's hard, but every year it reinforces in me a little more that as many things as can be choices the better. Like maybe something or lettuce one week. I also may encourage the greens lovers just to bring a little cash if they want more one week, cause I often have more of those. Some people have already started doing this, realizing that I am a little slow on the uptake.

In general the quality was highly regarded, though unripe melons continue to be an issue. I'm happy that we can deliver things fresh enough (usually picked a few hours earlier) that that's not an issue. One interesting comment was that the tomatoes were too ripe. I may try to pick some a little earlier, so I hope people will tell me if it is working for them next year.

Thanks to everyone who filled out the survey, and thanks to our members all, you really are the thing that makes it all work. I've already gotten most of the seed catalogs for next year and am trying to resist looking at them for at least a little. Next weekend of another Winter Farmers Market in Shelburne, we'll have all the goodies you love, including our chamomile tea.

End of year Review

2010-10-29T22:04:00.001-04:00

I haven't read the Survey Responses yet, so that may be a separate post, but here is the end of season review:

People ask me lots towards the end of the season how it went, and I heard myself saying, "average" more often than anything else. This is a more complex average though than some. This year was certainly better than the last one, and basically equal to the one the year before that, which at that time I would have characterized as great. But great is the new average for Open Heart Farm. In other words, our curve is continually sloping upward, our expectations are greater for the future. Three years ago getting great fall carrots was difficult for us, but with the help of Dylan from Digger's Mirth, who told me the timing for fall seeding, it seems like it will be a snap to repeat from here on out (knock on wood for all these things). There are many cases like this. Potatoes, melons (still have to learn how to gauge ripeness a little better, but we had twice as many). Our lettuce mix was of far better quality this year, we just asked the experts their drying process and followed it. Onions and garlic were probably the best size so far for us (onions may have been slightly bigger our first year), and we had more of our own garlic seed than ever (which I just finished planting yesterday).

Tomatoes were average I would say. Lots of new varieties that worked and a few that totally didn't work, so my goal for next years are to retrench to the classics plus the super-successes. I do think that the consensus is that we gave out a bit too much lettuce, which was mostly due to the death of 1/3 of our kale, which in turn was due to a little fly known as sweet midge. It just wiped out one entire variety of the three. So that too is an easy fix, stick with the good two and just do more of them. Brassicas were the one area that keep us at a B and not at least an A-. I would have liked to have more early and fall broc and cauliflower. Some of that is fixable, and some will be dependent on what we and the rest of the Intervale farmers can find out about sweet midge (its getting everyone and I suspect will spread).

Eggplant and Peppers continue to elude us, at least in the numbers I would like, so more winter projects. I think the cold fall robbed us of a few eggplant, but you'd like it to be a little more sure-fire. Leeks were the allium that got away mid season, only to be at least a little saved by Jessyloo and her mini-scythe later. That was a loss I could live with. There is always one thing that gets away from you, and as long as its a more minor thing, fine. Fall spinach was probably its best for us so far. As I'm going through it all I am realizing that in part the addition of more land has been such a giant factor in allowing me to do succession planting, which means if the first spinach, carrots etc. doesn't work, the next one probably will, and if they all work well then you have a lot of x.

One thing that can't be underestimated in this years success (remember this average was last year's great) was our Working members and Workers. Jessyloo and Natalia and Addy all worked tirelessly. And the working members brought lots of work, but also lots of positive attitude. Every one of the four went the extra mile, often on those hot or rainy days, and I can't tell you how much an extra hour or two of work can accomplish on a small farm.

Please comment. Like I said, I haven't yet read the surveys, which will definitely give a bit more direction to next years plans.

orzo, green bean and fennel salad with dill pesto

2010-10-15T12:29:00.003-04:00

Orzo, Green Bean and fennel salad with dill pesto

8 ounces green beans, trimmed
8 ounces orzo (1 1/4 cups)
2/3 cup (packed) chopped fresh dill
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons white balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
2 cups 1/3-inch cubes unpeeled English hothouse cucumber (about 8 ounces)
3/4 cup diced fresh fennel bulb

Cook green beans in large saucepan of boiling salted water until just tender, about 5 minutes. Using slotted spoon, transfer beans to plate. Add orzo to same boiling water. Cook until tender, stirring occasionally; drain.

Blend dill, oil, vinegar, and lemon juice in mini processor until almost smooth. Season dressing with salt and pepper.

Cut beans crosswise into 1/2-inch pieces. Place in large bowl. Add orzo, cucumber, and fennel; mix in dressing. Season salad to taste with salt and pepper.

Thanks for a great year everyone. Happy fall and winter.
Carin

Beyond Cultivation

2010-09-29T16:47:00.000-04:00

OK, that may be an exaggeration of a title, but, in thinking of my plans for next year (something I inevitably do around this time of year), I have devised two plans to radically reduce the weed pop on our farm, something those of you who have been down there know we could use. It took me this long to get in the mental space of cleaning up the fields (of weeds), the first few years were just about muddling through the creation of this thing that is now open heart farm.

So what are these things: the first is landscape fabric. A few of the farmers in the Intervale use it. I plan next year just to try it on my melons, so one 24'X300' piece will be plenty. I liked the way one of the agro-ecology students described its effect on the weed population. It's not as tho the fabric just kills all the weed seed, maybe some germs and dies, but the main reason it will help in future years is the "cascade effect," i.e. all those weeds that never went to seed that year. I just get so excited as I think of that cascade effect moving around the field. And if it works potentially expanding it to one or two other heat loving crops.

The second is Sudan grass, which as you can see is very broad leafed. Rachel thought, and almost everyone who passes it does, that is was corn for a second. That broadness will count for a lot of organic matter and also it what helps it be a smother cover. So the plan is to so winter wheat now in my next years fallow area, and then instead of letting the weeds grow between that wheat all year next year, disk it in a few times, try to stale bed some, and then hit it late to mid summer with the Sudan grass. I hope that sounds as exciting to everyone else as it does to me.

Anyway, in veggie news, we will be spending alot of our time harvesting roots for the CSA and for our winter market. More time than ever before.

A yummy soup

2010-09-24T20:17:00.000-04:00

I love winter squash, just like Josh, and am so excited about it. Below are two recipes that I've used for the past few years. One simple, one less so.

simple maple glazed acorn squash (my own recipe):
Cut them in 1/2, scoop out seeds. Place flesh side down in shallow pan. Prick tops a couple places with a fork. Combine a couple tbs butter with 1/4 cup maple syrup. drizzle over the squash, cover them with tin foil and roast at 425 for 1/2 an hour or longer, til nice and soft. May want to rotate them.
I then serve them straight up with a little added maple syrup poured into the bowl part. Yum. Can always add cinnamon or nuts, too.

Winter squash soup with gruyere croutons.

Soup

1/4 cup ( 1/2 stick) butter
1 large onion, finely chopped
4 large garlic cloves, chopped
3 14 1/2-ounce cans low-salt chicken broth
4 cups 1-inch pieces peeled butternut squash (about 1 1/2 pounds)
4 cups 1-inch pieces peeled acorn squash (about 1 1/2 pounds)
1 1/4 teaspoons minced fresh thyme
1 1/4 teaspoons minced fresh sage

1/4 cup whipping cream
2 teaspoons sugar

Croutons

2 tablespoons (1/4 stick) butter
24 1/4-inch-thick baguette bread slices
1 cup grated Gruyère cheese
1 teaspoon minced fresh thyme
1 teaspoon minced fresh sage

*addendum: I roast the squash first. 425, Cut in half, covered with tin foil, drizzled with olive oil. Use a fork to prick to see how soft it is... Also, the croutons are sooo good! Don't not make them... and use gruyere. I'm all about using whatever is around... except in the case of gruyere.

For soup:
Melt butter in large pot over medium heat. Add onion and garlic and sauté until tender, about 10 minutes. Add broth, all squash and herbs; bring to boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer until squash is very tender, about 20 minutes.

Working in batches, puree soup in blender. Return soup to same pot. Stir in cream and sugar; bring to simmer. Season with salt and pepper. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Chill. Rewarm over medium heat before serving.)

For croutons:
Preheat broiler. Butter 1 side of each bread slice. Arrange bread, buttered side up, on baking sheet. Broil until golden, about 1 minute. Turn over. Sprinkle cheese, then thyme and sage over. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Broil until cheese melts, about 1 minute. Ladle soup into bowls. Top each with croutons and serve.

Roasted Corn and Edamame Salad.

2010-09-11T17:45:00.000-04:00

A simple recipe that I plan on trying tomorrow night, throwing in some chicken and a bit more cilantro...

Roasted Corn and Edamame Salad

from Shawn Edelman of Ruby Foo's

Yield: Makes 4 servings

2 ears fresh corn, unhusked, or 1 1/4 cups cooked corn kernels
1/2 cup shelled edamame
1/4 cup chopped red onion
1/4 cup small-diced red bell pepper
1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh cilantro
1 tablespoon light mayonnaise
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 1/2 teaspoons finely chopped or grated ginger
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Soak fresh corn in cold water about 30 minutes. Heat grill on high. Grill corn in husk, 10 to 15 minutes, turning once. Let cool. Remove husks. Cut corn from cob into a bowl; combine with remaining ingredients. Cover and chill in refrigerator until ready to serve.

Enjoy! (What a gorgeous weekend. I hope everyone has been out supporting local artists at the ArtHop... if not, theres still time :) Some of the artist's are fellow CSA members and are amazing, and, yes, I'm one of them, so I'm biased, although I'm not referring to me when saying "amazing"...)

Gazpacho!

2010-08-28T11:49:00.001-04:00

So, I was all excited about the cool nights for: soups! But then we get this heatwave, so, how's about some gazpacho with a little Mexican flair? This one came highly recommended from a friend (who has lived South of the border no less), from Epicurious:

Tomato Tomatillo Gazpacho

1/2 pound fresh tomatillos, husked, rinsed, and quartered
1 1/2 pounds tomatoes, chopped, divided
1/2 cup chopped white onion, divided
1 fresh serrano chile, coarsely chopped, including seeds
1 garlic clove, quartered
2 tablespoons red-wine vinegar
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup chopped cilantro

puree tomatillos, half of tomatoes, and half of onion with chile, garlic, vinegar, and 1 1/4 teaspoons salt in a blender until smooth.

Force through a medium-mesh sieve into a bowl, discarding solids.

Stir in remaining tomatoes and onion, water, oil, and cilantro. Chill until cold, at least 1 hour and up to 4 hours.

Also recommended from a fellow CSAer, LeAnn Smith:

Here's a swiss chard recipe that I really liked. I used fresh farm share tomatoes instead of the diced, I also used the onion and garlic from you guys.

http://www.eatingwell.com/recipes/skillet_gnocchi_with_chard_white_beans.html

Enjoy!
Carin

Abundance is right!

2010-08-14T22:00:00.000-04:00

If Anyone is wondering why I seem in a daze for the next few weeks, it's due to Francis Michael May, born Friday the 13th, 7 pounds, seven ounces (I'm definitely going to get a numerologist in on that one). We will still be having all the veg, just have to thank Jessyloo in advance for working her self silly for a week or two while I get it together. Got a nice set of beans coming and the brasicaas are so far free of sweet midge (super small fly that has messed them up in previous two years, and has wreaked havoc with spring kale).

Couldn't help but include this shot of Ciaran and I enjoying Champy's Birthday. All the other mascots in town come to help him celebrate. I bet you didn't know that both Ponderosa steakhouse and Hannaford's have mascots.

Abundance: canning and freezing, flatbread and zucchini caponata

2010-08-13T14:43:00.000-04:00

Enjoying the abundance? I am. Although, it can be overwhelming, as well as our intentions of what to do with all of it. As in, canning, etc. But, I know with a little extra effort, in the middle of the winter, I will be thanking myself... as well as Josh, because, if anyone desires more tomatoes, we can contact him and get them for 1.50$ a pound! Nice, eh? So, just drop him (not me :), I just am the recipe girl) an email at openheartfarm@yahoo.com.

So, the little extra effort. First of all: Tomatoes can just go into the freezer in a freezer bag, whole. Then throw them in soups or sauces or whatever. Not too much effort, if you have the space and no desire to can. And second and third: tomato sauce and salsa recipes. Both could also go into the freezer, or canned.

Tomato Sauce from Alice Waters Art of Simple Food

Peel, seed, and dice 2 lbs ripe tomatoes.
Save the juice, strain out the seeds and add juice to tomatoes.
Peel and smash 5 garlic cloves
Add garlic to 1/4 of olive oil in a pot over medium heat.
When garlic sizzles, add tomatoes in juice with a large pinch of salt.

Cook at a simmer for 15 minutes. Pass through a food mill for a smooth sauce.
Variations:
Add some herbs a few minutes before done.
Add some onion and saute before adding garlic
pinch of chile for spice...

(my own additon) Or why not saute other veggies and throw 'em in (eggplant...)

Salsa canning recipe, from my archives:

Throw together:
4-5 jalapenos, do not remove seeds
3 green peppers, chopped
8 cups chopped tomatoes, do not remove seeds or skin
6 carrots, chopped
3 medium onions, chopped
4 cloves of garlic, minced
1 tbsp salt
1 6oz can tomato paste
1/2-1 cup of vinegar

Also, as I'm not going to be around next week, and I'm not positive I'll be able to be online. If so, I will email out the veggie list, but consider this next week's recipe, as I will be quite occupied. This one is for a simple flatbread for using to make an sort of veggie concoction on top of.

Oat-Whole Grain Flatbread (from my Mother-in-law, who got it from a Quaker Oats recipe pamphlet from the 60s.)
2/3 cup milk
1/4 veggie oil
1 1/4 cup flour
3/4 cup oat flour (just grind up some oats.), or substitute 1/3 cup flour if you don't have
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt

Combine all the dry ingredients, then add milk and oil. Knead 10 times. Bake at 425 for 7 minutes. Add toppings, bake again until golden, about 10 minutes. We usually do pizza toppings, either a red sauce or pesto, both are good.

Lastly, a link from a fellow CSAer, Keren Turner, for yummy zucchini caponata. Thanks!

http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/zucchini-caponata-recipe#reviews

Bon appetit!

Shell Beans and Summer Vegetables Stewed in Their Own Juices

2010-08-07T09:10:00.000-04:00

Today's recipe is from Deborah Madison's Local Flavors, my workhorse cookbook for cooking from the CSA and farmer's market. The recipe is the most used of all the rest in the book... I don't follow it too closely--I throw in what I have, and if something is missing or substituted, that's fine. That said, definitely don't skip the basil puree!

Shell beans and Summer Vegetables Stewed in their own Juices:

6 T oil (sunflower or olive oil (save 3 T for Basil Puree))
2 bay leaves
2 onions (chopped into large pieces)
8 cloves garlic (plump, peeled and halved (1 clove set aside for Basil Puree))
3 thyme sprigs (fresh)
6 sage leaves
12 small carrots (3-5")
salt and freshly ground pepper
3⁄4 lb new potatoes (small)
1⁄2 lb beans (yellow wax or green, ends trimmed)
5 tomatoes (medium, peeled, seeded and chopped into large pieces, juice reserved)
1 bell pepper (yellow or orange if possible, cut into 1-inch strips)
1 lb summer squash (cut into large pieces)
1 lb shelling peas (shelled)
1⁄2 c basil leaves (packed)
1⁄2 c parmesan cheese (grated, optional)

1 . Warm the 3 T. oil with the bay leaves in a large casserole or dutch oven over low heat. When fragrant, add the onions, 6 of the garlic cloves, 2 of the thyme sprigs, and the sage. Cover and cook while you prepare the vegetables.
2 . Leave small carrots whole or cut fat ones into 4-inch lengths. Add them to the pot right away since they take the longest to cook. Season with salt and pepper. If the potatoes are like large marbles, leave them whole. But quarter large ones and cut fingerlings in half lengthwise. Lay the potatoes on top of the onions and carrots. Cut the beans into 3-inch pieces and add them, along with the rest of the veggies except the shelling beans, to the pot, seasoning each layer with salt and pepper.
3 . Strain the tomato juice over all, than cover and cook until the vegetables are tender, about 40 minutes to an hour. If tightly covered, the vegetables will produce plenty of flavorful juices. If the pot seems dry, add a few tablespoons water or white wine.
4 . While the veggies are cooking, simmer the shell beans in water to cover with the remaining garlic and thyme and a little oil. When tender, after 30-45 minutes, season with salt and pepper. Add the beans, with any liquid, to the pot.
5 . Make the Basil Puree shortly before serving: Chop the basil and garlic in a food processor with the oil and enough water to make a puree. Stir in the cheese .
6 . Serve the veggies in soup plates and spoon the Basil Puree over them.

High Summer, No Greens

2010-08-06T21:59:00.000-04:00

So, we're right at the midpoint of the farm season, and I haven't done much blogging, in part because Carin is doing such a good job keeping everyone up to date and in the know re veggies, but thought I'd give some thoughts from the field.

As any of our long time members know, every year is different, and this one seems to be no exception: we will be giving out melons the earliest ever, and they taste great, and furthermore, for the first time we will be doing two weeks of melons. Tomatoes also doing well, and we are likely to move up to two pounds a person for next week, but what is lacking this time of year is greens. It seems odd to me, Chard and Kale are such standbys at Open Heart, but this year one third of our kale patch got wiped out by sweet midge, a little devilish fly that likes to kill the growing center of brasicas (cabbage, cale, broc, etc) - which is why I planted a super-ton of collards along with our normal fall planting of cauliflower and broc, and it looks good, and I suspect it will be ready for eating in a few weeks.

Most other things in the field are coming along smashingly. The only issue with the pumpkins is how to get them into your hands: they are giant. You might have noticed all cucurbits are doing fairly well this summer, the cukes and squash are constant. It also looks like the eggplant is setting up for a fall run, lots of flowers I think helped by these cool nights we are starting to get.

I have been trying to seed lots of greens too, like arugala and a second round of spinach, so eventually some of those will start to be coming our way.

Also been thinking about this shady section of our newer field. It has never produced that well, most veg just doesn't like shade, even if it doesn't like super hot either (like you think lettuce or peas or spinach might do well with shade, but I think what they really like is spring and fall), so, pictured right is the answer to all our shade issues, jerusalem artichokes. Besides being a perennial cutting flower for members they will yield a little tuber that doesn't really taste at all like an artichoke to me, but is a yummy compliment to all those other ones you get in the winter, at least something different.

Pico de Gallo, Grilled Eggplant Sandwiches, and a nice "dealing with the remaining produce" recipe

2010-07-30T20:07:00.000-04:00

I'm getting hungry just thinking about these next recipes, both of which I have not had yet this year. Both are from a CSA that I was a part of in Michigan years ago and have been staples since... Pico de Gallo and Grilled Eggplant Sandwiches.... Plus an added "what to do with all the leftover veggies before you pick up the new ones" recipe--this one from Beth, a fellow CSAer (thanks, Beth.)

Pico de Gallo:
2 large tomatoes, diced into small chunks
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
3 serrano chiles or 1jalapeno (seeded), diced
1/2 cup onion, chopped
2 tbs cilantro, chopped
salt to taste
juice of 1 lime or 2 tsp cider vinegar
water and maybe a touch of olive oil if not watery enough.

Combine. Yum.

Grilled Eggplant Sandwiches:
2 small eggplant (or 1 big one :)
1 garlic clove sliced in half
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 french baguette
6 oz goat cheese
basil leaves
caramelized balsamic vinegar--heat 3/4 cup to boiling, reduce heat and boil for 10 minutes until 1/4 cup--thick and syrupy.

slice eggplant 1/2 inch thick, salt and drain, rub with garlic cloves and brush with oil.
Grill for 8-10 minutes (or broil), until tender
Load up the baguette to your liking.

And, finally the "Clean your fridge" recipe, verbatim from Beth, below:
Something I’ve been doing towards the end of every week this summer to use up remaining veggies is – Take whatever you’ve got left, stir fry, add peanut sauce (I use “It’s Arthur’s Fault”.) Then do roll your own burritos with rice (I usually have leftover rice in the fridge by the end of the week, and tortillas are a staple,) any remaining lettuce or other greens, grated cheese, and salsa. Quick and easy dinner that my family likes a lot.

Enjoy your week!

Tomatoes!

2010-07-24T15:13:00.000-04:00

Here are a couple recipes that celebrate the incredibleness of Josh's heirlooms. Enjoy

Tabouli: (recipe from an old friend that I've had forever.)

Add 2 cups of water to 1 cup bulghar. Let sit for 2 hrs of more until soaked up
1/2 tsp cumin, mint (more if fresh), oregano, pepper
1 tsp salt
2 large tomatoes, chopped
1 bunch green onions
1/4-1/2 cup parsley

And, below: Watermelon and Tomato salad. Had a version of this at Shelburne Farms once. Because of the heirloom tomatoes, it was one of the best concoctions I have ever tasted, seriously. (I haven't tried this version, yet. Plan to this week. Let's hope it will be half as amazing. I know Josh's tomatoes are just as tasty.)

4 cups watermelon cut in large dice
4 cups tomatoes (about 5 medium) cut in large dice
1 cup thinly sliced red onion
2 tablespoons thinly sliced (chiffonade) basil, divided
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon kosher salt
Pepper

1. Place the watermelon, tomato, onion and half the basil in large mixing bowl. Drizzle with oil and vinegar.

2. Season to taste with salt and pepper, toss, sprinkle with the remaining basil, and serve.

The bounty has begun!

2010-07-17T12:02:00.003-04:00

One simple recipe, and then what to do with an eggplant...

A simple Greek Salad:

1/3 tomatoes, cut in big wedges
1/3 cucumbers, big slices (note: if you can keep the skins on, I just learned that's where most of the healthiness is.)
1/3 lettuces
Add some feta
and olives, if desired...
And the red onions might work well, too.

Dressing is a combo of 1/2 olive oil, 1/2 red wine vinegar, and a little garlic, if desired. Always nice if it can be chilled for a couple hours...

And, then, dealing with eggplant...
Firstly, let me say that eggplant scared me until I joined a CSA and then had to deal with them, they always seemed bitter and chewy...but then my former farmer filled me in...

Firstly, use them within the first few days of getting them... To prepare, I slice them 1/3 of inch thick and then sprinkle salt on them and let them sit for twenty minutes to pull out the moisture. I then wipe them down with a paper towel. That seems to cut down on the bitterness.

For the chewiness, I brush them with olive oil and broil until they brown a little on either side and get a softer consistency. Then, I throw them in whatever recipe I choose to use.

And the recipe I choose: Thai Spicy Eggplant with Sweet Basil, from Vegetarian Times

1 cup jasmine rice
2 Tbs. peanut or vegetable oil
1/2 to 1 tsp. crushed red pepper, or to taste
3 baby eggplants, cubed into bite-sized chunks
1 medium-sized onion, diced
1 medium-sized red bell pepper, seeded and diced
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 Tbs. white vinegar
3 Tbs. dark soy sauce, such as tamari
2 Tbs. dark brown sugar
20 leaves fresh basil, shredded or torn

Cook jasmine rice according to package directions.
Meanwhile, heat a deep skillet or wok-shaped pan over high heat. Add oil and crushed red pepper, and let sizzle for 10 to 15 seconds. Add eggplant, and stir-fry for 2 to 3 minutes. Add onion, bell pepper and garlic, and stir-fry for 3 minutes more. Add vinegar and soy sauce. Sprinkle with sugar, and toss for 1 or 2 minutes longer.
Remove pan from heat, add basil leaves and toss to combine with eggplant. Serve over hot cooked rice.

Squash Soup with Parsley Mint Pesto, etc

2010-07-09T17:32:00.001-04:00

One of our fellow CSAers, Charles Goodnight, sent out a perfect recipe for what we've
been getting that I thought I'd share with you:  Potato-Swiss Chard Curry.  And, the other
recipe I found on Epicurious, which I wouldn't have even considered in yesterday's heat, but
in todays perfect weather, at least in Michigan where I write from, it sounds tasty:  
Squash Soup with Parsley Mint Pesto
Potato-Swiss Chard Curry
 
1 lb red skin potatoes cut into 1inch chunks
olive oil
1 tsp sugar
1-2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1 onion sliced white and green part
1 clove garlic or 2 garlic scapes diced
1 bunch (4c) swiss chard
2 tomatoes (or 1 14.5 oz can) peeled and diced, retain liquid
 
Boil potatoes for 4-6 minutes until just barely cooked, drain.
 
Heat oil in large skillet, add potatoes, spices, onion and garlic, cook 
for 2-3 minutes.
Add Swiss Chard and Tomatoes, reduce heat to low, cover and simmer 4-6 
minutes. 
  
This could be dressed up with more curry spices (maybe some turmuric for 
a yellow color), but frankly its a great dish as is.

Squash soup with Parsley Mint Pesto:For squash soup

3/4 stick (6 tablespoons) unsalted butter, cut into pieces (can use a lot less)
1 medium onion, halved lengthwise and thinly sliced crosswise (try the scallions, diced, otherwise)
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 lb yellow summer squash, halved and thinly sliced
2 carrots, thinly sliced
1 yellow-fleshed potato (1/2 lb), peeled, halved,
4 cups chicken stock or reduced-sodium chicken broth

for pistou

3/4 cup loosely packed fresh mint leaves
1/2 cup loosely packed fresh flat-leaf parsley sprigs
1 large scallion, chopped (1/2 cup)
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons water
1/4 teaspoon salt

Make soup:
Melt butter in a 6- to 8-quart wide heavy pot over moderate heat, then cook onion with salt, stirring, until softened, about 8 minutes. Add squash, carrots, potato, and stock and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, then simmer, partially covered, until vegetables are very tender, about 20 minutes. Remove from heat and cool soup, uncovered, 10 minutes.

Working in batches, pur&eacutee; soup in a blender until smooth (use caution when blending hot liquids) and transfer to a bowl. Return puré to cleaned pot and thin with water if desired; simmer 3 minutes. Season with salt.

Make pistou while vegetables simmer:
Pulse mint, parsley, and scallion in a food processor until finely chopped. With motor running, add oil in a stream, then add water and salt, blending until incorporated.

Swirl 1 tablespoon pistou into each bowl of soup.

And, lastly, had an enjoyable visit to the farm...

Swiss Chard Frittata

2010-07-02T22:14:00.001-04:00

This week's recipe is a bit of a copout, because it is taken verbatim from acookinglifeblog.blogspot.com. The blogger is a professional chef who does amazing stuff. I'm always looking for things to do with the healthy swiss chard. And you can use the onions too. Enjoy!
Swiss Chard Frittata
2 T. Olive oil
4 or 5 spring onions, minced (white and some of green)—about 1 cup
1 clove garlic, minced (optional)
5 to 6 oz. cleaned Swiss Chard, cut in a wide chiffonade
Salt & Pepper, to taste
7 to 8 eggs (room temperature), lightly beaten
2 oz. grated Gruyère, Fontina or Provolone
2 to 3 T. grated Parmesan

Heat 1 1/2 T. of oil in a 10-inch nonstick skillet. Add the onion and cook over medium heat until tender—about 5 to 10 minutes. Add some salt and the garlic and cook just until fragrant. Add the chard. Cover and cook until wilted and tender—another 10 minutes or so. Uncover and continue to cook until any liquid given off by the chard has cooked off.

When the chard is cooked stir it into the eggs. Season with salt and pepper. Wipe out the skillet and return it to the heat, increasing the heat to medium-high. Add the remaining ½ T. of oil to the skillet. When the skillet is hot, add the egg mixture. As the eggs begin to set, shake the pan back and forth and with a rubber spatula lift the edges of the coagulated eggs in order to let the uncooked egg run underneath. Continue cooking and shaking and lifting until the eggs are mostly cooked but still moist on top. This should only take a few minutes.

Place the skillet under the broiler and broil just until the surface is no longer moist—about 30 seconds. Sprinkle the cheese over the surface and broil again until the cheese melts—another 30 seconds.

Slide the finished frittata onto a platter or cutting board and let sit for a minute or two. Cut into wedges and serve. The frittata may also be served at room temperature. Serves 4.

Some simple recipe ideas

2010-06-25T16:31:00.001-04:00

Simple squash recipe: I throw it in, thinly sliced, with penne pasta 3 minutes before the pasta is done boiling. Drain pasta and squash and then add olive oil, 1/4 cup parsley, 2tbs basil, 1/2 cup ricotta, 1/4 parmesan, and salt and pepper to taste.

Simple, divine, beets recipe: I chop them up into big cubes (1.5 inches). For 3 or 4 beets. Drizzle to coat them-- 2 Tbs balsamic, 1tbs olive oil and a little salt. Roast in a covered dish at 375-400 for 40 minutes or so--they're done when soft when pricked with a fork.

Also, a couple recipe(s) deal with a couple of salad ideas for broccoli/cauliflower taken from Recipes from Americas Small Farms by Joanne Lamb Hayes and Lori Stein.

First, steam/boil or prepare the broccoli however you desire until crisp/tender. (until bright green, if chopped 3-5 minutes, steamed). Recipes for 1.5 lbs broccoli/Cauli

then, a few choices:
Sesame:
whisk 2tbs of: soy sauce, rice wine vineagar, sesame oil and honey
toast 1/2 cup sesame seeds in a skillet. Mix broccoli, sauce, and 1/2 of sesame seeds. Marinate at 30 minutes-2 hours. Transfer to serving dish, sprinkle remaining seeds on top.

Pasta or Wild Rice:
Mix 2 cups pasta or wild rice with the broccoli, add 1/2 cup sauteed mushrooms. Dress with a vinaigrette or mayonnaise. Season with your choice of fresh hers, green onions (scallions), salt and pepper. Add pine nuts if desired.

Walnut, Raisins and Red Onion:
Mix 1/2 mayo or plain yogurt, 3Tbs sugar, and 1tbs cider vinegar until blended. (best if you can refrigerate this overnight, but who can plan that far ahead?). Toss with broccoli, 1/4 of: chopped walnuts, raisins, and red onion.

Enjoy!

Weather Report

2010-06-25T07:19:00.000-04:00

Yesterday we wrapped up our third week of the CSA, which is hard to believe. All day was hot and muggy alternating with torrential dowpours, it (the weather underground) says that we got an inch of rain before it turned into a beautiful night.

A few people asked how the weather effects us: "very directly" is the short answer. As I was sitting at my table handing out veggies (yeah for peas!) I was noticing some differences over last year for example: this weeks share seemed about one item short to me, and I realized that item would have been broccoli or beets (both of which are ready next week). The broccoli at least is a pretty clear example of how we deal with the weather, and how that isn't always as straight-forward as you might think. Normally I "remay" the broccoli. Remay is this white fabric that lets light and water thru, but not bugs, and acts as a blanket, keeping things three-4 degrees warmer underneath. Well, that's good. speeds up the growth of the plant, less stressed without the bugs, but broccoli in particular can "button up" (lots of fun quoted terms in this post, huh), making the head unusable, if it gets a temperature spike, so after much consternation, I decided it was going to be a spring of temp spikes and left it off. Hence, we have broccoli, but a week late.

The warmth and rain (we are two inches above the average for the month) are going to have some great consequences. Potatoes thus far are looking like they want to be crop of the year, with tomatoes not far behind. Onions also look to be a bumper crop like we haven't seen in years. Also carrots just a few weeks away, so, lots in our future.

Pics from the Farm

2010-06-20T17:25:00.000-04:00

All of these pictures of from Jessyloo, who, if you haven't met yet, I am sure you will. First, the flowering potato plant, and we all just think of it for food, quite pretty.

next up is this wonderful view of the hilled potatoes. really shows how high up we try to get the dirt on the plants. This year I hilled twice, as opposed to once in other years, both to try and get a few extra tubers, and to keep them clean (you can kinda see how flipping up all that dirt on them would smother the weeds and also cut them up from the ground surrounding them

here, an earlier shocking view of just how weedy the potatoes were before the hoe-athon, and the effects of the hoe-athon, side by side.

All of this is to say, we are looking forward to a nice potato crop. no need to jinx it, but at this point all looks good.

on a non-potato note one of many squash blossoms. Which I think means squash certainly within two to three weeks, probably on the earlier side of that.

and one contemplative end of the day one.

Thanks Jessyloo for the photos, I did finally get another camera so more of the flowers at the farm are on their way.

Sauteed Peas and Scallions, Garlic Scape Pesto...

2010-06-18T16:49:00.001-04:00

Today I have a simple recipe that, I must confess, haven't tried, but am excited to this week: sauteed peas and scallions. And a garlic scape pesto recipe, if you still have them kicking around... The recipes will get heartier as we get more into summer and enjoying the bounty.

Sauteed Peas and Scallions:

1 bunch scallions, washed and trimmed
2 teaspoons olive oil
16 ounces frozen or fresh shelled peas (2 cups)
1 tablespoon chopped fresh tarragon or ½ teaspoon dried tarragon
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Slice the scallions in half lengthwise and then crosswise into ½-inch pieces.
In a large skillet, heat oil over medium heat. Add the scallions and saute until soft, about 4 minutes.
Stir in the peas, cover the pan and reduce heat to medium-low. Cook until the peas are tender, 3 to 5 minutes. Stir in the tarragon and season with salt and pepper.

I figure last week's recipe should work for the chard, and I did have a radish recipe request. They're great to add a little "zing" to just about anything: chicken salad, mixed into plain yogurt for on a baked potato, throw them in a stir fry... I'll also try to throw in another greens recipe next week. (You can never have too many of those as I find the greens just keep coming.)

Also, I mentioned cilantro and dill last week, and I got a wonderful reply from Jessyloo, one of our farmers this year at Open Heart. She made a wonderful post on her blog all about those herbs. Feel free to peruse: http://herbaloo.wordpress.com/2010/06/14/musings-from-the-field-cilantro-dill/

And, lastly, if you still have those fabulous garlic scapes floating around, here is another recipe I'm excited to try:

Garlic Scape and Almond Pesto (found on the web somewhere, but lost the link. Oops. Let me know if you find it):

Makes about 1 cup

10 garlic scapes, finely chopped

1/3 to 1/2 cup finely grated Parmesan (to taste and texture)

1/3 cup slivered almonds (you could toast them lightly, if you'd like)

About 1/2 cup olive oil

Sea salt

Put the scapes, 1/3 cup of the cheese, almonds and half the olive oil in the bowl of a food processor (or use a blender or a mortar and pestle). Whir to chop and blend all the ingredients and then add the remainder of the oil and, if you want, more cheese. If you like the texture, stop; if you'd like it a little thinner, add some more oil. Season with salt.

If you're not going to use the pesto immediately, press a piece of plastic against the surface to keep it from oxidizing. The pesto can be stored in the refrigerator for a couple of days or packed airtight and frozen for a couple of months, by which time tomatoes should be at their juiciest.

What to do with those Greens?

2010-06-11T11:17:00.001-04:00

And I apologize for the lack of napa cabbage last time! If any of you have buttermilk languishing in your fridge, I would suggest simple buttermilk pancakes, as you wouldn't want to waste it. Supposedly, it's incredibly good for your digestive and immune systems, packed with vitamins, low fat, and tasty in recipes to boot. Alas, I'm not the pancake maker in the household and wouldn't trust my judgement on a good recipe.

Today is just a simple greens recipe, that will work with any greens, and just requires one "strange" ingredient: Oyster Sauce.

Greens with Garlic and Oyster Sauce--Madhur Jaffrey

12 oz greens

3 garlic cloves

1 tbs oyster sauce

2 tsp crushed yellow bean sauce or soy sauce (I used soy)

2 tbs any kind of stock or water (don't you just love choice?)

3 tbs. veggie oil

Seperate and trim greens.

Bring a large pan of water to a rolling boil.

Drop in greens and boil rapidly for a few minutes, just until tender (diff greens take diff times)

Drain and plunge in cold water immediately. Drain well.

Finely chop garlic. Set aside. If you wanted to use the garlic scapes, they are much milder than the garlic, but so tasty so I would just chop a whole bunch of them and throw them in instead. (Otherwise, they're great diced into a salad).

Combine oyster sauce, bean or soy sauce and stock in small bowl.

Set a wok, or saute pan, to high heat. Add oil. Once hot, saute garlic until golden, thrown in greens, stir for a minute,. Add stock, cook on high heat for a minute and then pour out extra liquid into serving dish. Give the greens a final stir, then lift out and lay out over the liquid in the dish. Serve immediately.

Enjoy! Nothing like cooked greens...

As far as the dill and cilantro go... well, dill is so tasty chopped and sprinkled on anything. I love it on simple buttered bread. Or with blue cheese in salad. And the cilantro goes into my my guacomole (avocados, onion, garlic, olive oil and cilantro.)

Recipe time!

2010-06-03T19:23:00.004-04:00

Hi, I'm Carin Lilly, a member of Open Heart farm for the past few years, which has been great. Heirloom tomatoes, anyone? Anyhow, at the end of last year I mentioned to Josh that I thought it would be fun to email out recipes along with the list of the following week's veggies, and he followed up on that conversation...

And, so, now, that is what I'm doing, and I'm excited for the season to begin! I am positive that there are many of you who are much more seasoned in the kitchen than me, and may have tons of wonderful recipes (No pressure on me whatsoever. Nope.) My goal is to just make it a tiny bit easier to use up some of the veggies we get each week in a yummy way by eliminating the step of searching for a suitable recipe. I will be gleaning from Alice Waters and Deborah Madison, my favorite ladies, some Asian cuisine cookbooks, and my own stash of recipes from who knows where, as well as some internet sites...

So, without further ado,
Next week's veggies and recipe:

Spinach

2 heads of lettuce

Radishes

Napa cabbage

and a potted herb

Napa cabbage slaw with buttermilk/blue cheese dressing:

(adapted from Epicurious.com)

1/2 cup frothy buttermilk

2 tbs mayo (try olive oil if mayo is not something you're interested in)

2 tbs cider vinegar

2 tbs shallot (or onion and garlic if you don't have it)

1 tsp sugar

1/4 cup blue cheese crumbled

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

3 tbs finely chopped chives

4 cups Napa cabbage, cored and sliced thinly

6 radishes, diced

2 celery ribs, thinly sliced

Whisk together buttermilk, mayo, cider vinegar, shallot, sugar, blue cheese, salt and pepper until sugar has dissolved, then add chives.

Toss cabbage, radishes and celery with dressing. And enjoy!

Oh, and also, I'm in charge of planning a potluck party... We were thinking late summer, early fall. Stayed tuned for details as they figure themselves out. That's it for now. Happy eating local food!

All is well

2010-06-03T08:53:00.001-04:00

We've been getting some rain the past few days, just a week or so before our CSA starts. It looks like we will have all the standard stuff for a first week of a Vermont CSA, even though this hasn't been the most standard spring. The field is looking the best it has in years, in part because the dry weather has allowed us to get in there and hoe, and in part because Jessyloo is such a darn good hoer (is that a word?).

My Camera is fixed, so eventually pictures will return to the blog, in fact, maybe today is a good day to take one of the first cosmos. There are about five, and the sooner they get cut the sooner there will be ten, twenty one hundred etc.

A bit of a late start today, off to hand weed our second bed of carrots. By the way, here is a link to Jessyloo's blog, she's in to the medicinal/spiritual qualities of all plants and will occasionally be writing about the healing properties of he vegetables we are growing, so check it out.

also by the way, we are full for this year, but feel free to contact us re: the waitlist for next year.

hoe-a-thon 2010

2010-05-19T21:53:00.000-04:00

Rachel gave me the marvelous Idea of having a hoe-a-thon this year. The hoe-a-thon is something from our time at Quail Hill Farm. It consists of head lamps and hoeing through the night etc. Pizza and beer are often required.

Well, we are in need of a hoe-a-thon this year, so next week, on Tuesday (Wednesday if it rains and if it rains Wednesday it becomes a weed-a-ton) Jessyloo and I will be hoeing from 9-5 straight (OHF is only 4 acres, Quail Hill probably had 15 hoeable acres), we will be accepting donations of hoeing, i.e. you can come down and hoe with us that day. If you are a late afternoon hoer with ID beer will be offered.

We are going to try to get a bit of a head start the next few days, but I assure you, you will have a chance to hoe, and put the Community back in Community Supported Ag.

Since our camera is still not working, here's a photo of Rachel and I practicing the art of hoeing from the aforementioned Quail Hill. Oh how little has changed (we look a little bit younger now but . . .)

NOFA-VT Farm Share

2010-05-13T22:27:00.001-04:00

I'm sure alot of you know that NOFA-VT does alot of stuff around the state year-round to help farmers, but I would like to single out one that effects us pretty directly. Every year around this time we get an application or two from NOFA for people who would like to get a farm share but can't afford one. NOFA actually forwards me their handwritten application, which puts a human face on it, even before I meet the actual human face.

I suppose I identify with people who can't afford farm shares because part of why I started farming was to eat lots of healthy stuff without breaking the bank, and that is also why Open Heart tries to keep its share price reasonable.

I am also really impressed with how easy NOFA makes this program for both the farmers and the customers. This always seems like a barrier to entry for me with alot of programs that might finally be able to subsidize farm shares. For a small farm (and I imagine a busy family who wants to eat healthy), too much bureaucracy can be hard to wade through, but the farm share program has been very easy. The goal is that the customer pay 50% of the price, NOFA pays 25%, and we, the farm and hopefully its members who can afford to help, pay the other 25%. Thus far our farm has never been able to get our end, but that hasn't stopped NOFA from being extra generous, so, yes, this is a little reminder that should you have a few extra bucks kicking around, NOFA has also made it super-easy to help fund other peoples veggies. You can do it one of two ways, send them a check and just make sure it is labeled with our farm name, or send it directly to us. The benefit of sending it to NOFA is that it is tax deductible.

On another note: If you are wondering where the pics are of all that is happening on the farm (which is alot), the cameras on the fritz, so . . .

The Weather, Part Whatever

2010-05-02T21:26:00.000-04:00

The weather seems to deerve some continued comment, as we were roughly 20 degrees over the norm today, and even had our first thunderstorm last night which Ciaran and I were happy to be caught in on our way home from the park.

I would say this, it definitely has psychological impact. In talking to all the farmers down at the Intervale, everyone is on schedule as per where they were last year and where they are supposed to be this year, but we still all feel a little late, which I think is ok, cause that really means that we are all just fairly chomping at the bit to get more done. I forget if I wrote last before or after the snow (everyone remember that), but I have checked and the snapdragons and poppies made it. Next things I hope to see up are carrots, potatoes, and chard, and I will be putting out the leeks this week, seeding the summer squash and cukes. Also, potting up of eggplant and peppers, all while friends and family are in town (which we are all super excited about).

As for where we are membership-wise we basically have about 15 possible slots left, which is on par with last year, still I'll be happy when they are all filled up, cause it means les time looking at the computer and more time tending to the plants.

So, in that spirit, one more link to the brochure.

Expanding rhubarb and Asparagus patches

2010-04-20T21:33:00.001-04:00

Easter seems miles behind us already but I couldn't resist putting this picture up. For those who don't know this is Rachel and Ciaran, my better halves, at Callahan park at a . . . oh, you can probably figure that part out. It was such a pretty day that day that I felt compelled to go out and mulch the garlic, which is long since finished and seems to be progressing well.

The rhubarb (the mulched thing pictured below) that I started from seed just last year also is doing really well, and looks like I am going to harvest some starting in about a week. Very exciting and a convincing argument for doing it from seed and not from crowns. So besides doing a ton more this year (the goal is about 200 feet of rhubarb), I am also filing in our asparagus bed with stuff from seed, which also germinated very well. Since its been so warm and the rhubarb is ready even a little earlier than normal, I am going to try to get some to this years members. As these patches become well established it makes the case for possibly starting the CSA a week earlier.

Other things in the ground are spinach, onions, chamomile, potatoes, peas, and napa. Tomorrow out goes alot of brassicas (kale, broccolli, cauliflower etc.)

The Weather: what does it mean for us? Part 2

2010-04-10T21:35:00.000-04:00

On again off again, this is Vermont Spring. Still, on average it's been alot more on again, and hence we are about a week ahead of where we were last year. I just finished composting the fields today and I think I will be putting in potatoes and possibly peas on Saturday. Very Excited about both: the potatoes because I am using the perfecta, a new tractor implement, to prepare the beds, and it should make for much fluffier, i.e. less compact beds, and maintain the soil structure alot better than rototilling, which acts like a giant blender. You can kinda see n this picture: the tines cultivate and aerate the soil, and then the back part smooths it all out. So I hope will give those tubers the space to get giant. The peas are exciting, because I am doubling the seeding rate, which I might have mentioned, so I'm kinda planing for a bumber crop, leaning a little heavier to the sugar snap varieties this year, though one other exciting addtion is the shelling pea. I bought one pound of those, every year more and more people ask me if I have them.

Tomatos

2010-03-28T21:53:00.002-04:00

So, tomatoes are one of the crops that differentiate us from other farms. I seeded our tomatoes (and peppers and eggplant) yesterday, and we I did 27 varieties of heirloom tomatoes. I'm pretty excited by this year's mix: it's about 50% old ones that are basically essential for me (like jaune flamme, eva purple ball, sungold, brandywine), and half new or returning gems, alot from Baker Creek Seeds, like Chalk's Early and Yellow Mortgage Lifter (Yes, Tomatoes have great names). Some of them may not even look that different, I'm realizing as I look at the pics, but they all have their distinct time of the season and taste.

It sounds like it's going to warm up to the extreme, like 70 degrees later in the week. It will be a good week for starting to prepare the ground, and probably by the beginning of the week after that we will be putting a few things in the ground. As they say in Cote d'Ivoire, "On Va Voir."

If you are interested in getting a farm share this year, here is the brochure. We may soon have an online payment system in place, no promises though.

Flood Part Two & Things Growing

2010-03-25T17:18:00.000-04:00

I did get out to the field today. Had to get through some wet patches, some two feet deep, but our fields themselves are now all dry. I suspect that at the peak of the flood (cause by the Winooski and a really high water table if I didn't mention it before) the water was three to four inches over the field. The garlic, I am happy to report, looks great, though it does have to be remulched (luckily, I went totally overboard gathering leaves last fall). This picture is of the Half Pint Fields, hope you all don't mind me using it for purposes of demonstration, which is I guess just demonstrating what a big puddle of water looks like, with Spencer standing in front of it. My boots could not keep out those puddles.

Also today, I started to ready an area for some of our plants to go out, and harden off (technical term for getting them gradually used to outdoor conditions). Hard to believe, but I will be hardening off the onions in a week or so, beets not far behind that. Definitely seeing the rhubarb crowns.

The Weather: what does it mean for us?

2010-03-24T16:10:00.000-04:00

You may be wondering what do two weeks of 15 degrees above average + a return to normal or slightly below normal temps + 1 heavy rain = for the farm season ahead. The answer is . . . probably nothing too different than the last, at least so far. The ground seemed like it was going to be ready to break into a week or maybe two early, and things might have been a week or a week-and-a-half early, but I'm scaling back my guess (and it is totally a guess (we are still far enough out that lots of stuff can average)) to everything being the same as it always is due to the flood (that's right, those of you who have been with OHF for a while have heard about those (at this point I'm such a pro at them I just think of it as flood managment)).

And if you've been following this blog for awhile you've seen one version or another of this chart. This one indicates a fairly substantial flood, and it seems to be accurate (I tried to look at the field today but didn't get past the gate). What does that mean for the crops you ask? Well, only the garlic is in the ground right now, so overall I'm taking the philosophic view that we are farming on a Nile delta like thing, and this flood and others leaves lots of nutrients in the ground, especially the micro ones veggies are good at using up, so it's fine that it floods, as long as its now and not a month from now. I do think that while it rained pretty hard for 10-12 hours, I'm surprised that that was enough to create this kind of flood, all of which probably means the ground wasn't as unfrozen as I thought.

Feel free to post any questions. Comments won't appear immediately because I now have to mediate them, I guess spam has arrived on the blogs.

The brochure is in the post below, in case you are looking.

Onions Started, Recipe Czar, and Subscription to the CSA

2010-03-11T09:34:00.002-05:00

That is about how close I get my face to the onions, and to most of the starts actually. Besides seeing how well the seeds germinated (what percentage), I'm also looking to make sure the moisture level is right, so that I don't either underwater or over water (the side I am more prone to) - one thing to look for, if I over water consistently enough, is green stuff starting to form on the Vermiculite (the sparkly rock stuff sprinkled on top of all the cells). The Vermiculite is also there to self-regulate the moisture levels a little. This Spring has been really easy so far, the constant sun has made it impossible to overwater, and the germ has been so far great. Yeah For Onions!

This is our first year with a recipe Czar (I won't use that word too many more times, don't worry), Carin, a member of our farm now for four years, will be sending out recipes each week, both on the blog, and to our members via email, with things to do with the vegetables that we happen to have that week (also including a list of what those veggies will be). Very excited to have this be a little bit more regular because every week that we did manage to do it last year lots of members were excited about it.

CSA subscriptions are right about average for this time of year. Right now is often when an uptick occurs, and there was an article in the Free Press about CSAs which might remind people, if the weather hadn't already, that we will in fact be able to grow lots of food right here in Vermont. One thing I'd like to stress that the Freeps might have missed, "check out small family owned farms in your area." One thing that the Organic movement has proven time and time again is that bigger isn't always better. At Open Heart we are committed to being sustainable at a level that doesn't require us to become too big to be able to serve you personally. That is alot of what we like about the CSA model, we really get to know our members over the years. Speaking of which, I'm putting the link to our brochure here again.

One Last Fantastic Winter Stew & the importance of a good cookbook or two

2010-02-27T15:39:00.001-05:00

Rachel and I just finished an amazing winter stew. We had already dubbed this the winter of soup, and we have mostly lived up to that with various dressed up versions of tomato or butternut soup, both of which were fine and dandy, but, now, at the time when we (and I imagine everyone else) is getting sick of their root veggies, we came across just an awesome (can you tell I am searching for the super right superlative) winter stew from the vegetarian epicure book two. The secret, without going through the whole recipe, was a white wine mushroom combo (1# mushrooms), and also a rue involving a lot of paprika (which I think is generally underused), molasses and worchestershire. I think all the winter veg you use after that has a lot of room for play, we used brussel sprouts, lots of leeks, golden turnips, potatoes - but carrots could have easily been part, possibly even parsnips, but then you'd really have to make sure your wine was dry (we hadn't). Anyway, totally deliscous, and now it's time for Spring, right.

The stew also had me thinking of how necessary just a few good cookbooks are. Members always ask me what to do with different veggies, and in the past I have generally been the cook who throws things together in the simplest way, but this year Rachel has really struck on some wonderful recipes in some wonderful cookbooks. We are kinda vegetarians. For any one else who is kinda one I would suggest getting a peter burley book and/or one of the moosewoods, which we have also used alot the late summer/fall/winter. Those three plus the Joy, and I feel like we can mix it up enough to not just be eating garlic olive oil plus blank.

As we find good recipes for the veggies that are in season, we will be sending them your way.

For those looking for a link to the brochure, look in the post below, I have actually updated the brochure so that you can order cheese and bread now, though we will be sampling it all the first weeks, and you will have time to order then as well.

Stella Natura & Brochure Link

2010-02-12T21:59:00.001-05:00

This is always the time of year that I mention Stella Natura, the biodynamic calendar that I use to tell which days to start planting. Well, this year, though the magic of internet I'll stick a picture of March at Open Heart Farm, at least half of March.

As you can make out, it has numerous columns, the phases of the moon being the obvious one, but then, to the left of that astrological signs, and to the right, the part that is most pertinent to me, orI should say the most easily decodable, is what plants are good to seed or work with on that day (actually, there are little blocks that break it down to the hour, with blacked out periods you might notice). Not all veggies are totally intuitive, rhubarb and asparagus are causing me some consternation (yes, I am doing more of both from seed this year). The pages above the calendar pages are essays by noted farmers and biodynamic workers in other fields, like Wendell Berry etc. This year features one by Gunther Hauk that I am excited to read, he is a biodynamic bee keeper who lives in New York State, and from my limited experience talking to bee keepers biodynamics is to some degree successful in beating whatever that thing is that is killing the bees (slipping my brain at this hour).

In other exciting news our brochure for this year is up online, and if you would like to download it in pdf form click here.

More later, probably next time, from the greenhouse.

new brochure and blog related things

2010-01-28T10:19:00.000-05:00

A much cropped version of this photo (magical heart potato in case you couldnt tell) is the cover photo of our new brochure. Cover shots are thekind of thing a farmer can really obsess over in the winter, it would be just too easy to sit back and relax. I am sending out brochures to our members today, to give them all the first chance at getting slots and the early bird special discount, but soon after I will find a way to link it to the blog, and just be generally getting it out. It's interesting, the tenor of this year already seems so different from last. I have already had a few emails of interested new members, and I get the sense we will have no problem filing our 80 spots this year.

I also can't help getting excited about the way this year is shaping up: starting off with at least a little of our first crops of asparagus and rhubarb, and then the peas i might have mentioned (I'm doubling the seeding rate to ensure a better germination (and germ with peas is everything, because if they are not thick, they are weedy, and if they are weedy they just die)).

In slightly less exciting news, IO have had to change the blog protocol with regards to comments, because we got spammed with comments actually containing pictures inappropiate to a farm blog. I was torn, it's not like alot of kids read the blog and would see it, and I want to encourage comments (I actually find them very useful), so if getting them up there is too hard please email me at openheartfarm@yahoo.com and I will change them back and see how it goes.

Anyone who would like a copy of our brochure can also email us there, or call 802-881-8125.

We will be starting in the greenhosue in less than a month, first some of the farmers will be getting together to re-skin it, more on that later.

And The Survey Says . . .

2009-12-27T12:24:00.001-05:00

Last week I finished reading the surveys from our Farm Share Members and here are the results:

1. Too much cut lettuce, and what was there went bad too quickly. This was one of the more universal preferences among the 35+ respondees. It is also an easy one to solve: less cut lettuce given, and I think it is possible to fine tune our drying of it. I intend to ask one of the farms that does it on a larger scale what their procedure is. This is one of the beauties of the Intervale. Sharing info, it happens so constantly down there, it's easy to forget that it's a bit harder on your average more separated farm.

2. Other likes and dislikes were harder to pin down as trends, but some were: less beets (this was a surprisingly one, and the second largest contingent after the lettuce thing, and also easy to fix.) I think I got it in my head a few years ago that everyone loved beets and basically ALWAYS wants more of them. Turns out this is not true and exactly what the survey is for. People also wanted more EGGPLANT, and less GREENS, on average. The eggplant thing, which I may have explained in an earlier post, is also fixable via the aforementioned info sharing, I basically have to keep on top of those potatoe beetles, perhaps adding some neem to my spray mix. Neem is one of those organic superstars that can give you just enough of an edge to tip the scale (mixed metaphor?) in the eggplants favor. As you probably know, it is derived from a tree native to India and gnerally seems to ward off numerous insects.

3. The most general take away for me from the survey was more choices. The greens thing is the perfect example. I know there is a sizable chunk of members who could never get enough greens and another chunk who ask themselves what to do with more kale/chard/spinach/broc raab etc. So that plus hopefully a few more peppers.eggplant/peas in the mix will allow for people to customize a bit more. At Open Heart Farm I never pretend your never goingto get kale, but its also not something I'm hell bent on giving you all the time.

4. Another interesting point for me was that people all felt the produce was of high quality, this is something that has always been important to Rachel and I. It is always easier for us to get our members fresh produce, just because of our model of distribution, than it is for a supermarket, so that is where most of the credit belongs. On a scale of one to five the average was probably about 4.7. I didn't actually add it up though.

So, what happens with all this info, you ask? Seed buying. Which I'm starting NOW, a week or two earlier than last year, mostly for scheduling reasons. It's already begun, but now is the time to comment right here, and I will see, if there is something you think was missing from my analysis, or just an extra chime in.

The reminds me:

5. People also universally seemed to feel the size of the share was generally right, both pricewise and veg wise. This is another good example of how surveying I think, has helped. So the share will stay basically the same price and same size, people do always want more winter squash, and tomatoes and onions. That plus trying to make a living doing this means I am likely to raise the price 5-10 dollars, with the potential for already members to avoid that increase by getting a share early and/or telling a friend about open heart.

One last thing, this is the first year I am ordering seeds with at least a few less paper catalogs, and just using the computer. Is there any math out there on which is more green, using paper or electricity?

ginger jack

2009-12-18T12:13:00.004-05:00

I was washing some dishes, and putting our used bottles of Ginger Jack up above the cupboard, and thinking about how great a product it was, and thought I'd at least give a shout out for it to all. Rachel and I drink it mostly at the first sign of illness. I feel (no scientific data in) that it has really helped stave off the worst part of coughs and stuff. Shortened them at least. And the bottles are a total bonus, we have started using them for bulk oils and maple syrup at city market. It's the type of stuff you drink with a shot glass, so it can last a week or two once you open it.

In Farm News, I am finishing reading the end of season surveys, and starting to buy implements/supplies for next year, starting (already) to meet prospective employees and chefs about what we will do for next year.

Happy Holidays

Next Year

2009-11-29T19:02:00.002-05:00

I know it is a little early to be thinking of this, but this is also the time when there is so much time to reflect, and also, each year, there seem to be an increasing number of surveys us farmers in the Intervale (and probably all small farmers in Vermont*) are supposed to do, and hence a lot of forced reflection on our businesses and lives. So already, just two weeks or so since the end of the year wrap-up below, I am formulated opinions about the possibilities of next year, and they are: professional. That's right, I'm deeming next year at open heart the year of the professional. It's strangely in step with the Intervale center's own five year plan for us there. This will be my fifth season, and I feel it will be my first as an owner (we had three not-included seasons as apprentices and managers) that I can go about the farm as a whole with a bit more of a level head, clear vision. I should say, it's not as if we ran around like chickens with are heads cut off over there on our four acres, but I'm hoping/thinking that things will seem less like putting out one fire and going to the next, and rather more like accomplishing one job then the next. As I say that I realize its mostly a difference of attitude, but that's a pretty important difference. More on this later, as I feel like the way I'm putting it out is pretty nebulous, and it's time to read some mother goose.

* I guess everyone, now that I think about it, is more and more treated like a natural resource of minable data, in farmer cases directly tied to grants, but, in all cases goes back to money

End-of-Season wrap-up

2009-10-24T13:38:00.007-04:00

Spoiler alert, members who don't want to be biased on their survey may want to wait to read this post.

People ask me alot every year how the season was, and so I start thinking of answers practically as soon as the season starts, and usually in my mind then it has this character that is building and fairly unified, in short, the answer this year is "Weird" - weird in my book is neither positive nor negative. One example of this years weirdness was the tomatoes: once ours had generally made it past the blight, I think they were some of the best tasting we have had since farming in Vermont (4 years). That was extra weird cause alot of farms had none. On the other hand, our brasicaas did not do that well, which you might expect they would given the temps and weather. Lots of stuff was exactly as you would expect for a wet cool year, our parsley and spinach have done (and are still doing) really well, eggplant were a big bust - oh, I remembered another weird positive: melons. It might just be that I finally planted enough, but we finally had enough for all our members to get two, and I thought they tasted better than they ever have (for us). I always say melons are not my specialty, but I think I hit a few good Varieties that I will have to check my notes on and order again come January. Celery was also better, in part due to a new Variety and in part weather. Our garlic is also improving every year. Our seed for this year is the best I have ever seen it.And I think we have more of it than in previous years, so I am hoping this sets us up for an even better year next year.

This year was also weird because of our transition to new fields which had not been maintained in any way for the previous two years (ie lots of weed seed). This move has kind of set us up it what seems a more permanent configuration, permanent enough for us to have started our first perennial beds of rhubarb (which worked great from seed, and asparagus (which worked only so-so from crowns), we will be adding more of each in the coming years, hopefully providing extra goodies in the early weeks of the CSA.Here is the rhubarb, I even made a pot of jam or two at the end of the season, yeah!!

Now onto what we'll call the room for improvement section: as I already mentioned: brassicas were overall weak, basically due to weeds. In fact, without hopefully sounding silly, weeds were a larger problem than they should have been this year, alot of that is weather related (if its always raining its hard to hoe), alot is the fact that we almost doubled our size, some part is that our new aforementioned field was full of seed, another part was our lack of working members, and another large part is a lack of a system for staying on top of a farm the size of the current Open Heart. The good news is I think alot of that is do-able, and that eliminating even 25%-50% of those weeds would make an extreme difference in the crops, and, that even just the regular tilling of the new field is vastly improving it, even for next year, because about half of our weeds there were rhizomatic (they spread via their root systems in addition to seed head), and I have been fairly vigilant about breaking those up. Irrigation was also way more of an issue than I hope it will ever be again (those kinks are mostly ironed out even now.)

Other improvement areas?!?! despite planting probably about 33% more carrots than last year, I could probably still double the amount and use them easily at CSA pick-ups and at market. I'm still having a hard time figuring out how early you have to plant that last planting of beets and carrots. This year was a good object-lesson in how growth can potentially slow to a halt right around sept 15th, that is what you should count on and then if you get Oct 15th youre ahead of the game. Winter squash (esp pumpkins) didn't do that well, mostly cool weather on that one (and when I say this I think I'm referring to a summer that was basically between 5-10 degrees cooler than the average, and especially never had a real scorching week)). That said, there also remains a tension (I think) of how many winter squash to give the CSA members. This crop is a real space eater, so on a four acre farm I would feel silly having a half acre of squash but . . .

Overall, I'm rating this year as slightly below average, just in terms of gross production. That said, I actually feel better about the farm as a whole than I did at the end of last year, when all the growing had seemed a bit easier. Maybe I enjoy the idea that I learned alot.

And to think, it's not all over yet, come see me at the Shelburne Winter Market on Oct 31st.

The BVT

2009-09-28T14:16:00.004-04:00

This recipe is adapted from Elongo Dev's (of Digger's Mirth) JFK sandwich. I have been craving one and we happen to be giving out many if not all of the farmy ingredients for it in this weeks share:

one baguette
wilt turnip greens in olive garlic and one chopped cayenne pepper (you can go hotter if so desired)
place that hot cooked green mixture onto the baguette which already has thinly sliced provolone and procuttio (sp) or hard salami. If you are not a meat person, add some strips of tofu in the early part of the garlic cayenne cooking and some sea salt.

I like simple recipes that I will actually make, and tunip greens are one of my favorite this time of year, especially as I am (we all are) getting sick of chard and kale. By the way, I totally forget or never knew how that sandwich got its name, so if you see

If you are looking for something fun to do with the turnips themselves, may I suggest Irish Stew, which I have been having a real hankering for as well.

Here are some pics from a little earlier in the season:

tomatoes at their height

sunflower from the kids garden (some things did manage to work there (I even found some acorn squash there last week)

Nick holding a heart shaped potato, does pitch fork farm find pitchfork shaped ones?

Autumn, & the best tomatoes

2009-09-02T21:04:00.005-04:00

Let me start with the last part first.

I think the best tomatoes of this year have been the pink (eva purple ball, brandywine) and the black ones (paul robeson, nyagous, and cherokee purple), with orange being a runner up, leaving the red ones suprisingly in the dust. To explain a little, I'll add that different tomatoes fair better on different years. There are probably a lot of factors, like soil ph and minerals, weather, and others. My theory on this years major factor is when we got our rain and the quality of light (ie not much sunshine overall). The final results have let this tomato year be not too bad for us, tho i suspect the ought nine season will be generally remembered over Vermont as the season of the blight.

Now, on to Autumn. My friend from college andrew was in town and helping us on friday with the harvest and mentioned that his favorite Keats poem was "To Autumn," well, I read it, and if ever there was an inverse equation to a picture is a thousand words here it is

TO AUTUMN

SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drows’d with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;

definitely one of those the more things change the more they stay the same moments for me, tho i guess we are all going to have to look up garden-croft.

Summer in Vermont 2

2009-08-17T22:28:00.002-04:00

O that question mark of the last blog post seems a distant memory. We've had our heat wave, and to look at the long range cast that would be it for summer, but we'll see - I think we've all learned Vermont can thrrow a few weather curve balls. Well, despite the blight we've been fortunate to be giving out tomatoes for a few weeks, and I suspect we will get a few more weeks of them before all is said and done.

This has been our best year for melons (something that just hasn't worked well for us in the past), that said I feel like there is a lot of room for improvemnt on the productivity end, ie it would be nice if members got melons two weeks instead of one.

For those who have not heard via email, we are having a potluck down in the intervale this saturday, come one come all, members and friends past and present. It's at five at the community barn right after gardener's supply.

The camera is now in the truck, so now alls i got to do is take some pics, of our sun flowers or zinnias for instance.

Other things on the horizon: different greens (yeah): I seeded mustard, boc choi, arugala, and we have a bunch of collards and cabbage in the ground. Furthermore, the fall brassicas are looking fairly good. Also seeded turnips and the last (hard to believe) bed of carrots.

Yep, more updates soon?

Summer? in Vermont

2009-07-17T07:30:00.003-04:00

Blog entries a month apart, the surest sign this year that it is actually summer. It seems that temps have been an average of 5 degrees cooler than last year or so. This said, most plants keep chugging along, possibly a little slower, but things as a whole are actually starting to look even more in control (ie neater) at Open Heart Farm. The weather turned what was seeming like a loser of a pea season into an about average one.

The weather has also played a major role in the largest farm story of this year. Late Blight on tomatoes. Let me first assure all members and well-wishers that our tomatoes look amazingly healthy (knock on wood) - and while they, like alot of stuff, are seeming a bit late, I hope that we will have a nice warm fall and a long tomato season. That said, this dark humid cool weather is the absolute most conducive weather for late blight, which as I understand it is a bacteria that travels on the wind, up to fourty miles a day.

What happened to make this the year for late blight? The aforementioned weather was necessary, but it was all helped by the big box stores selling tomato starts from South Carolina. Like I said, once your plants are within a few miles of your neighbors tomatoes, there is cause for concern.

One thing thaat I think has kept our tomatoes so nice looking is the compost tea that we spraying about three weeks before this news hit the scene: it brewed for two weeks with stinging nettle tops and horse tail, two high-silica plants (along with other attributes I don't know). This year has me appreciated the possibilities of biodynamic farming more than ever. The organic alternative is copper sulfate, which isn't all that bad for people, but is more covering the plant than giving it health, and leaves me potentially washing all our tomatoes.

I'll try to bring the camera today, and post again before the month is out.

The tendril end of spring

2009-06-18T14:49:00.002-04:00

On these last days of Spring 09, a spring I have much enjoyed, I offer a poem by DH Lawrence (well, an excerpt anyway) in praise of non-summer, pre-summer, the just-before-the-frenzied-showiness-of-summer time, in praise of this time which yet offers on occasion a little bit of shadow and sluggishness(...and peas!)

Grapes

So many fruits come from roses
From the rose of all roses
From the unfolded rose
Rose of all the world.

Admit that apples and strawberries and peaches and pears and blackberries
Are all Rosaceae
Issue of the explicit rose,
The open-countenanced, skyward-smiling rose.

What then of the vine?
Oh, what of the tendrilled vine?

Ours is the universe of the unfolded rose,
The explicit
The candid revelation.

But long ago, oh, long ago
Before the rose began to smile supreme
Before the rose of all roses, rose of all the world, was even in bud

Before the glaciers were gathered up in a bunch out of the unsettled seas and winds
Or else before they had been let down again, in Noah's flood,
There was another world, a dusky, flowerless, tendrilled world
And creatures webbed and marshy,
And on the margin, men soft-footed and pristine
Still and sensitive, and active,
Audile, tactile sensitiveness as of a tendril which orientates and reaches out,
Reaching out and grasping by an instinct more delicate
than the moon's as she feels for the tides.

Of which world, the vine was the invisible rose.
Before petals spread, before colour made its disturbance,
before eyes saw too much.
In a green, muddy, web-foot, utterly songless world
The vine was rose of all roses.
There were no poppies or carnations
Hardly a greenish lily, watery faint.
Green, dim, invisible flourishing of vines
Royally gesticulate.

Look now, even now, how it keeps its power of invisibility!...

The grape is swart, the avenues dusky and tendrilled,
subtly prehensile,
But we, as we start awake, clutch at our vistas
democratic, boulevards, tram-cars, policemen.
Give us our own back
Let us go to the soda-fountain to get sober.

Soberness, sobriety.
It is like the agonised perverseness of a child heavy
with sleep, yet fighting, fighting to keep awake;
Soberness, sobriety, with heavy eyes propped open.

Dusky are the avenues of wine
And we must cross the frontiers, though we will not
Of the lost, fern-scented world:
Take the fern-seed on our lips
Close the eyes, and go
Down the tendrilled avenues of wine and the other-world.

kids garden and more

2009-06-07T18:06:00.004-04:00

Our members are in full swing. when we arrived this afternoon there were a few picking flowers and herbs (the herbs remain weedy, but I think we have Hannah and working share members devoted to this task next week). So, new this year, a sign to help you actually get Chez Nous, it was done by Lee, a grad student who we worked with some last year. It looks wonderful and we are psyched to have a more permanent sign (don't worry, it wasn't us who cut down that tree it is attached to, thats a whole 'nother long blog post).

Here are said flowers. The cosmos are the only thing out yet, except for the one sunflower, which I see someone got (I'm very happy it seems like people are going to come down for some flowers this year because); we have a pretty large bed of zinnias on the way, along with some bachelor buttons, statuc and maybe globe amarant if they made it through the frost. In any case, this little rain should be speeding everything along.

Here we have Ciaran hard at work in the Childrens (or Kid's) Garden. Today he put in a few cherry tomato plants and some husk cherries (pictured below), which are a child pleaser, and a Josh pleaser, a nice sweet fruit, related to tomatillos (which we are also growing for the first time this year), which have a taste that I just cant describe, and look cool.

CSA 2009 reminder!!!

2009-06-03T21:41:00.003-04:00

Just in case you forgot!!

OPEN HEART FARM CSA 2009 starts NEXT WEEK!

That is, Monday, June 8 for members picking up in the SOUTH END at CHAMPLAIN Elementary.

Thursday, June 11 for members picking up in the NORTH END at HO Wheeler school.

Pick-ups run from 4-6:30pm. Please bring shopping bags if possible. Also, if you want to recycle plastic shopping bags, we will take them for us with the CSA or for our stand at the Shelburne Farmers Market.

BERRY CARDS will be distributed next week. Adam will be sending out emails as each batch of berries become available for picking. (Just in case you don't know: strawberries first, then blueberries towards mid-July, then raspberries late August). STRAWBERRIES are rumored to be opening "June 10th-ish."

Re: flowers and herbs. Chives, peppermint, "regular" mint, and cosmos are currently open! If you'd like to pick some, give us a call at 881-8125, as we haven't yet posted signage but we'd like to help you help yourself!

If you have any questions, please call or email us at openheartfarm@yahoo.com.

See you soon!!

RD summer 09 chronicle 01

2009-05-24T11:59:00.005-04:00

Ciaran made his first trip to the farm about a week ago. Luckily, I chose a day when we had the good fortune to be witness to lots of Josh-on-tractor business, specifically, Josh laying down almost 20 rows of bio-mulch for tomatoes, melons, winter squash. Fun with big loud machinery!

...the fact of thinking about winter crops pre-June used to startle me some, but I guess after 7 years of farm-season scheduling, not so much anymore...

Ciaran, however, is startled and engaged with almost anything outside at this point. Earlier this spring, we had a crash course in birdology and we found the Cornell website to be fantastic for many indoor-birding pleasures:

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/NetCommunity/Page.aspx?pid=1189

Baba and Joshers had to reel-in the monitor-watching, though. No more than 7 minutes in one sitting. But we got very familiar with red-wing blackbird, chickadee, blue jay, cedar waxwing, pileated woodpecker, goose, turkey, robin, cardinal, mourning dove, mockingbird, crow, gull..(also chickens ducks and sheep on YouTube). Ciaran has startled me all spring by identifying many of the birds we heard and saw online while walking down the street or playing in Leddy or Ethan Allen Parks, or even just in our parking lot or outside our window (many blue jays and robins).

Being able to go outside, though has made our computer searches for wildlife a thing of the past. Though some may think it odd or even crazy, I leased a small plot at the Starr Farm Community Gardens, and C and I do our thing there a couple times a week, just a quick jaunt down North Ave. So far we've put in morning glories, beans, zinnias, and are to plant corn, sunflowers, some tomatoes and husk cherries today. Whatever. It's nice to have a whatever garden.

Though, the farmy farm will quickly become The Place To Be. Plans for a children's garden are in the making, to include fun flowers and edibles in the landscape, shady spots, a water cooler, digging implements and insect havens. Of course, more birds.

But for the day, our work is done.

Farm Share

2009-05-09T21:41:00.003-04:00

Wanted to say a brief word about NOFA's Farm Share Program, since this is the second year running they have supported us in helping someone who couldn't otherwise afford it, get vegetables from our farm. Um, I've basically explained the whole gist of the program. It's not complicated, just great. They even keep a little bank of donations made by our farm members to go directly to other people who want to become our farm members, then NOFA has paid the difference that cannot be met. Just one of the programs they organize, and if you haven't checked out their site, they organize lots of programs, for farmers, gardeners, and eaters of Organic food. Every year they also hepl organize small farms like ours into a bulk order to make thinks like chicken manure and cover crops more affordable.

OUR ROAD IS MUCH BETTER!!! - I also wanted to get that out there. I know this has been a deterent for people wanting to cut flowers, so I am excited that the ride will be less bumpy, and that it may help the farm be a more open space for everyone. We have already planted two beds of flowers, including tons of Zinnias and Sun-Flowers, cosmos, bachelor buttons, and more. I also am planning a little kids garden with husk cherries, a delicious little fruit each wrapped in its own paper lantern, so . . .

2009-04-23T15:28:00.003-04:00

So, I probably mentioned our new shed before, but if you haven't seen it, it is an eye-popper. The shed and paint job is courtesy of Kolya, who ran Troika farm for two years on the piece of ground open heart is moving onto (which is adjacent to the original piece, which I should mention we are keeping. We are just adding his piece to come to an approximate 3.5 acres. The addition is mostly to aid us in cover cropping and rotation, ie general soil health.). We have a very pretty layout now so I encourage all to visit.

This second picture is of our red gold see potato. I haven't planted red golds for the past few years, but had a hankering for them and hence we shall (I hope). In worse potato news, Adirondack Blue seed from Johnny's was recalled due to fusarium wilt. I really liked both the flavor and yeild of it, but, them's the breaks, and we will try all blue, which is more of the standard one, and I'm sure will taste fine. You can be the judge.

In the ground are onions, spinach, asparagus, carrots, parsnips, chard, and maybe one or two other things. Planting season is upon us, and lots of the rest of things will be going out in the next two to three weeks. Open Heart's field help is starting early this year, Rrahke, who I have no current picture of, has already put in a few hours, and is the only reason we are remotely close to on schedule. Enjoy the Weather.

The photos I spoke of, the new van, Adam's Berry Card Update, and possibly more

2009-03-29T20:38:00.002-04:00

So, I found my camera, and now you can see if my description of them at all matches the mental image you conjured up from my attempts at description:

The First Spring Rain
The Accidentally Well-Dried Peppers

And this is the new OH Van. It is not the traditional farmer model, and yes, it did come with an oriental rug and futon inside. I bought it so that we could expand our CSA and possibly Shelburne market. The Toyota that you see next to it was basically bursting at the seams every week. I can't help but mention that the Creampuff, as our mechanic calls it, saved our butts the past two years and was the generous gift of Shana and Seth, who since then are have had two babies, James & Zephyr. Thanks to you and any Haines' born in the future.

We have a bit more of a fleet than I ever would have guessed, but . . .

News about Adam's berry cards, they are going to go up in price, and I will have to retroactively refund or get a few bucks, this is mostly due to my eagerness to get the brochure out. Just wanted to let anyone who bought one or was thinking about it know, definitely a solvable problem.

Just reposting the link to the Brochure: http://www.intervale.org/programs/agricultural_development/documents/OpenHeartCSAbrochure.pdf

and rachel and ciaran with the last of the snow

Spring Rain

2009-03-28T21:37:00.002-04:00

I know blogs are supposed to have pictures, but in the spirit of the prologues in King Henry 5, let my words paint the pictures (and, because I have temporarily (hopefully) misplaced my camera): the first picture is a wet shimmering dark street, the shimmers are neon signs on the glistening on North Street, taken from our apartment during the first Spring Rain. Now when I go down to the Intervale to water plants, or to the parks with Ciaran, I see litile sprigs of green grass, as opposed to the snow of a month ago, and the straight brown of 2 weeks. I think its going to cool down a little, but this warmth is making me think i should be tractoring and mulching our new asparagus beds.

The second picture was of some found objects in the greenhouse, where I spend most of my farming hours right now: three or four dried yellow and red peppers. not perfectly dried. but I had just left them on the table over the winter. two kinds, the long red cayenne and the ho chi minh. definitely inspired me to more intentionally dry this year. It kind of strikes me that the theme of this season might be intentionality. Last year we kind of sailed through the season by our lucky or graced seat pants. I feel like its going to be more planned and effective work this year that really pays off, But as they say in the Ivory Coast: on va voir.

Well, I bet now your hoping I find my camera as much as I, for I'm no Shakespeare with the images, which, when I find my camera I will stick up, and you'll go wow!

Important CSA news: we are filling up steadily. If you are interested I would think of the next two or three weeks as a very good time to sign up, see a link to our brochure below.

Farm News

2009-03-15T21:42:00.003-04:00

After a slow start things are really picking up quick regarding our membership. Kinda mirrors the weather, huh. I also noticed that someone has found a way to spam blogs via the comments. Oh well.

The onions are up, I'll get a picture on Tuesday.

I wanted to say a few words about Biodynamics w/r/t Open Heart Farm. It seems timely, because I am getting more involved in certain aspects of Steiner's philosophy (for more on Rudolph Steiner click now) I realize how un-deep I am in to some of it, at least as of yet. The farm does plant by the cycles of the moon and use two very simple versions of compost tea. I'm realizing as I describe this that you kind of have to know what's lacking to understand that Open Heart is a loose interpretation. Many biodynamic preps call for very specific measurements of like up to ten or more things, some of which could be powdered alminum, ground bone of importantly different animals, certain plants at special time of the year (that's the part we come closest to). Anyways, didn't want to give any false impressions that we did the steer horn. I have my own ill-informed beefs with Anthroposophy and Biodynamic which basically come down to not being local enough. I feel, nay, guess, that, for instance, Steiner didn't take into account the sheer amount of electro-magnetics we are dealing with, especially in urban ag.

I think the Flack Family may practice a few more of these things, but one thing I wanted to stress, is that I bet all farms use a combination of proactices that are all their own. Even alot of conventional farmers do one or two things that are technically organic, or are intentionally a hybrid.

Um, maybe more on t his topic later.

2009-03-04T14:08:00.004-05:00

For those looking to a link to our CSA flyer, it is in the post below. We still have shares available.

So, this is what it looked like the day we started seeding in the greenhouse this year. I could pretend I'm surprised, but a quick look back at blog posts from previous seasons will show similar pictures. In fact, last year there were quite a few more inches. So far I have done about half of the alliums (leeks, onions, shallots). Things seem to be progressing smoothly, if slowly.

Looking back at the blog I saw that Spencer from Half Pint Farm found out that Johnny's is not in fact owned by Monsanto, which is good to know, and I'm happy to have the facts straight. They do still sell seminis seeds, which I think (now I'm realizing I'm not even sure of this) is owned by Monsanto, that is some, not all of there seeds. It should also be said for Johnny's that they have developed alot of award winning seeds through breeding, bright lights chard being an example of one that I use on the farm. Anyways, all to say that the relationships between these entities are probably not as black and white as I would have them be.

In other news, I just did my first winter sport ever today, cross country skiing. Uh, I fell alot, despite being on perfectly flat ground. But it was fun.

Have to include this one of Ciaran looking so grown up.

CSA Brochure online and pumpkins (still!)

2009-02-11T22:11:00.003-05:00

I think I have found a way to get the CSA brochure online: click here. (Thank you Mandy for the Brainstorm.)

Just today I finished making pumpkin bread from the Marina di Chiogga pumpkin shown in various views here. I was wondering if any other CSA members still had theirs. I know I sound silly in October saying "Oh, just keep it on your table as decoration for a few months, it will keep fine." But, here we are in February and this one smelled so fresh when I cut it. I still have two Queensland blue pumpkins in the basement, which is far from ideal storage.

This pumpkin is known as a great tasting dry fleshed one, which would have been great for soup, but I was souped out. When I split it open there was alot more space in the cavity than I thought, so I thought there was not going to be alot of flesh, but somehow or another it produced more usable pumpkin than any other variety I have used, and was extremely sweet. It also had over 100 beautiful seeds and I started wondering why I wasn't saving them, especially as it is an open-pollinated heirloom, which I think would stay true (look the same next year and not revert to one of its parents), but I also know squash cross pretty easily, and that now I've got a project for next year.

and, I have to put up a picture of Ciaran, pre-haircut

Farming without a Computer

2009-01-29T20:51:00.005-05:00

No, I don't use it to make furrows, I don't take it into the field to cultivate, not even to the green house as a thermometer, but, still near impossible to farm without it. How would I know, you ask. It's simple, our brand new hp went kablewy last weekend. It seems to be the hard-drive. Made by seagate, just to give everyone a heads up. So many many pictures are gone, and songs and even some hard data re the farm. It's also, as you probably know, extremely hard to get in touch with anyone today without one of these things. Certainly can't post a blog without it (uh, that may show how out of it i am blackberry crowd).

Well, Rachel has a labtop that I feel we've turned into a rube goldberg machine, with disc drives and printers, and well, do-hickeys with wires, sticking out every which way, on top of old computers parts. And amazingly, data has been recovered from hither and yon (or there are plans for same anyways) - enough that I've just finished this year's brochure, with a picture of fresh heirloom tomatoes, different sizes, shapes, pretty, ugly and all delicious, on the cover.

So, with that finished, I'll first send it to last year's members, then start getting it out to the rest of you as I walk around town with hard copies. I would link to it right here, but I don't think blogger does that. I guess that is the difference between a website and a blog. I think it will be up at the Intervale site soon (More computers!)

I'm pretty eager to get into the dirt, it's hardrive can't break.

seeds of change, seeds of tradition

2009-01-19T20:58:00.004-05:00

Last week I finished ordering the seeds last week and already the first shipment has arrived from Johnny's*.

As I'm sure it is often noted, ordering seeds is as emotional as it is a question of numbers (of heads you need, carrots, how many days does it take to mature, what temp does it germinate at). As I was flipping back and forth, mainly between Johnny's and Fedco and side ventures into Baker Creek and Seed Savers Exchange, I was definitely watching my hopes for next year take shape, in part via reflections of what has and hasn't worked in years past.

Some of the excitement? Melons! This little picture here is of Hanna's Choice, which, to show you the rationality (or lack thereof) of the whole thing, was chosen primarily to honor Hannah Beal, who was pretty much the whole labor force at open heart last year. Why Else? Cause I have not yet found a good combination of melons, and this one sounded good. Check out the catalogue description:

Hannah’s Choice Muskmelon (87 days) With more than 30 years’ experience growing awesome melons, Adam Tomash of W. Gardiner, ME, knows when he’s found a good one. Tomash “was mightily impressed with all aspects of Hannah’s Choice. I’ve grown a lot of different kinds of melons and this is clearly a superior variety.” He reports that in 2007 two hills with 2–3 plants per hill produced 22 melons of about 4 lb. or more each. 20 of the 22 were perfect, marketable and almost all were uniform in size. “Flavor is rich and perfumed without the strong chemical smell that some melons have.” Nikos, our trials manager, describes it as a tropical fruit cherimoya “custard apple” flavor—smooth, perfumy, juicy with syrupy sweetness. The 6-1/2 x 5-1/2" large netted oval muskmelons average 3–5 lb. with a high Brix rating of 13. As stunning on the inside as it is imposing on the outside, its rich green rind contrasts with the deep orange flesh. Kudos to the Cornell University breeding program for developing this gourmet melon rated #1 at trials in both Freeville and Jamesport, NY, where it had an astonishing 96% marketable fruits by weight. At Freeville it bested Delicious 51, Earliqueen, Athena and Burpee Hybrid in color, depth, Brix and over-all quality. Resistant to PM, tolerant to F2, ZYMV, PRSV, WMV.

So, things I liked about that description were a) flavorful b)decent amount of production per plant c) of those many melons, many matured without blemish or rot (some varieties can be closer to 60% than 96% (esp in wet year), and d) lots of disease resistance (definitely more important with cucurbits than other things)

I am now noticing an additional thing to like: it was bred at Cornell, which means not a totally different environment from ours. Sadly, I am also noticing one negative now: its a little long on the days to maturity, which can be bad if the temps drop off early

Those are the considerations, imagine hashing those out 200+ times, plus a few extra ones like how many seeds do I need. Haven't I already bought way too many varieties of lettuce already, etc., etc.

On a note of sad seeds of change, the melon sweetie number 6 is no longer with us, last year was johnny's last year for it, and our last season were taken over by winter squash. This was one of the seeds of tradition, gotten from Quail Hill. Still alot of those traditions carried on at Open Heart, and as I note them, I'll pass it along.

Anyways, while the break has been short I am excited to be farming again, and 09 seems full of possibilities (we probably all agree on that), not the least of which is Asparagus! (In my head I'm yelling these things in my Oprah voice)

Part of ought-nine, I foretell, is a bit more blogging, both by Rachel and myself.

CSA BULLETIN CSA BULLETIN CSA BULLETIN

The brochures will probably be ready the first of the month, at least for e-consumption, so any of you anxious to sign up and get the early bird discount will not have long to wait.

Have a fun day tomorrow!

* I am trying to buy less from Johnny's each year, and we are. Not only are the owned by Monsanto but they are expensive. Why get stuff from them at all, you may be wondering: there are just some things that only they have (at least without ordering from thirty places).

I saw the last picture on there and . . .

2008-12-01T11:22:00.001-05:00

Ciaran looks nothing like that now so

of babies and blogs

2008-12-01T11:15:00.003-05:00

so, uh, it's been awhile. to make a long story short we had a very successful growing season (more details on minor mishaps survey results etc following), but a less successful blog season. Given Ciaran, I was happy to keep the garden going this year, but I do hope for a little more blogging soon. Including pictures.

anyways, there are lots of specifics abut the season past that I will be re-hashing as I get ready for the new one, and I'll try to share the details right here.

ps it makes me feel slightly better that I have learned you need not check the blog daily, Ara told me that you can set blogs up as "RSS Feeds" (I think thats the name), so that your computer will tell you when we've updated the blog, - thank god for the modern - so if you don't have that feature hooked up yet (am i the only one?!?!?), try it out

post-Parturition

2008-07-16T15:45:00.003-04:00

Feeling a bit behind the scenes from the farm scene as of late - but with the power of publishing at my fingertips - I felt the situation demanded a bit of on-the-scene-ness...

behind-the-farm-glamour scene is the not-so-glamour-shot support of the farm scene, namely, continual support of Ciaran by Rachel, Rachel by Ciaran, not anywhere near the farm, but with farm evident in its absence (to me) - also, I'm wearing one of the many OH Farm shirts GranBarb made/gave me which have oddly become a staple of post-baby-birthing-body wardrobe

but, we're both here, Farm! and trying to take much advantage of you, with not a lick of gratitude after work of meal-making, admittedly - this being the MO of most swarthy July critters (shout out here to all other hard-working others like deer, beetles, ants, and land pirates) as our day goes on well after darkness falls

Baby Steps

2008-06-29T10:40:00.005-04:00

Well, we've taken many baby steps this year at OHF: each year our sunflowers get a little larger, last year we planted lots of tithonia, which are also called torch sunflowers (even tho they are not really sunflowers), this year we have the real deal (by which I mean genus and species), but they turned out to be dwarf sun flowers. The positive side being that we already have a lot flowering, the negative being I'm not sure how they are going to react to being cut. But cut them we will! we have a great bunch of stems on our kitchen table and all of our members are invited to come down and get 'em and the zinnias and snapdragons and others. You can also note in the picture that it is exceptionally lush in Northwestern Vermont these days - weeds included. In case you're wondering how I ended up with dwarf sun flowers, they are some of the many replacement seed packets I've had to get this year. Let's just say in January I was less than organized.

Baby step #2: we have our first employee, Hannah, who I've mentioned before. It's going splendidly, and Hannah is even planning to make salsa with the tomatoes and peppers that don't make the cut for sale or for members. I'm speculating, but I think she might appreciate suggestions for a name for her product.

She along with working members and members who have been with us since the beginning (3 years that have seemed both a long time and flying by) received this bag, all of which were donated to us by Rachel's Mom.

Baby Steps number three is probably pretty obvious: Ciaran is, if not up and running, then crawling at a slow paces and obsessed with reaching the highest point he can by climbing and holding on to things, here he can be seen in his new tie dye (thanks Madelyn) at the greenhouses this Friday.
Beside the aforementioned weeds things at the fields are going really well. If I have any worries it's that the tomatoes are not too keen on so much fog, which acts as a pretty good disease carrier, but I don't really think I even need to set off that alarm. We are shockingly beginning week four of the CSA tomorrow: what will be in the share? Let's just say lots of little surprises!

Week One CSA

2008-06-12T20:51:00.004-04:00

The first week of our CSA went off pretty well, two nice days for delivery, and I really enjoyed our new south end location: in front of champlain elementary. Always nice meeting new members and seeing old ones again, returning I should say.

One small problem was the deer eating alot of head lettuce, hence why the north side got lettuce greens. It won't take too many events like that to convince me to buy a deer fence, I swear.

This week we also had a close call with our baby eggplant and peppers, theylike heat but I think a few days of ninety and no water was more than they were bargaining for, once I saw them on monday it was off to the plumbing supply store to get the parts to fix the irrigation and then got the plants back on track the next day.

Our working members have thinned the next two bunches of carrots for us all, so thanks for that. looks like a few nice days ahead, perhaps even some needed rain right on schedule, after suaturday market.

More?

2008-06-04T21:13:00.002-04:00

so it's been awhile. after we capped our membership, I realized it was time to do double time on planting: we got in the tomatoes wintersquash first round of cukes and summer squash eggplant peppers (sweet) and direct seeded alot and hoed practically the whole field once. Who is this we, Hannah and I. Hannah started at the tail end of May (and so actually want there for all of the aforementioned). Without Rachel I was just about at my wits end, both mentally (talking to self out in field alot) and work-wise. I won't say I'm totally sane now but we are on top of the work: I can make it official, we will have parnips this year! yeah for parsnips, as we spent the afternoon thinning them we figured our 200 foot bed is holding about 1600 parsnips, and it is definitely well composted so we will see what happens. Little side note: did you know parsnips have a phitotoxic (sp) chemical that reacts with the sun, so that when you are touching the leaves its best to wear gloves or else you'll end up with blistery hands, something which would be a real drag on the rest of your farm season. yes, it happened to me. well, eventually i will get a picture of hannah and some of the field up here.

we have already had some members come out to the field and the first flowers are starting to appear, and we have lots of herbs in the herb circle, so i encourage all farm members to come down (sorry burlington, it may not be enough for everyone)

i should also mention that we have two working share member who have stated helping: it is a grace de them that the herb circle is functioning at all, and that our peas are up and running, which I assure you they are.

All the news II

2008-05-06T20:13:00.001-04:00

Sorry for the lack of pictures from the field. I will try to bring the camera down this week. Things are shaping up suspiciously well so far. The weather has been totally cooperating, and aside from a few major projects everything . . .

spinach, something we have not been too successful with the past two years has germinated excellently

carrots germed well too, same with just about everything, I even think I saw a parsnip or two starting

today I put in a second smaller round of spinach, for those that don't know it doesn't care for the heat, won't germ or grow very big before bolting, going to seed, so I may try a few small round for baby spinach.

As opposed to last year we've gotten some nice rain (not too much) and some warm temps, so the plants have done well keeping in front of the flea beetle, I mean can you believe we have to deal with these things! They are slightly less scary at their true size, which is about a speck.

We are also all full for this years CSA, and look forward to getting in contact with and meeting our new and returning members, just for the record: it took about one, maybe one and a half more weeks this year to fill up, I think partly attributable to the late spring and partly to more farms offering more shares.

All the News . . .

2008-04-26T21:18:00.003-04:00

This week it seems like the farm started to take shape, I (with some help on Friday from Rebecca), put in trays and trays of plants, and directed seeded oodles of stuff, in preparation for all the rain we are going to be having. The dryness has been a problem for our starts, this time the flood has been working for us, the water table being high enough that the ground is kind of self-watering. And now as the temps go down it looks like we will get at least a little rain so I am pretty confident that we will have parsnips this year, though the official word won't be out for another two weeks (that is how long they take to germinate).

So long as I can get all these things covered up in the next day or two with remay, a fabric that keeps the plants about three or four degrees warmer (there is one night that has a low of 34 posted which is cutting it a little too close), we should be off to a nice start. This week of cold and clouds seems right up my alley: give me a chance to pot up tomatoes, maybe get the potatoes in the ground, compost the rest of the field, and finish mulching the garlic.

We are also getting closer to filling up the CSA. Which reminds me, besides helping some in the field, Rebecca has asked if she can gather recipes for the CSA to make it easier for us to distribute them to members, so that will be nice. Everyone was very appreciative of them the few times I managed to get it together last year.

BFP

2008-04-13T18:00:00.004-04:00

some of you probably saw an article that included us about CSAs in the BFP, well the nice folks there have also gone so far as to create an audio-visual slideshow featuring OHF, check it out

http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/legacy/slideshows/041108openheart/index.html

Weather Watchers

2008-04-06T12:25:00.004-04:00

It may not be a hundred percent true, but I think Scott Chasky, the director/head farmer of Quail Hill farm was right when he said that farmers are never happy with the weather. A year can be pretty darn good but there is generally a little something along the way to quibble with mother nature about.

For instance, here we have just avoided a major flood; one day last week it was supposed to be sixty three with some rain and we got about fifty five and little rain and a lot of wind and we dodged a bullet. Not only no 15.5 feet of river, no 11.5, which is when we start to flood at OHF. It ended up at about nine feet. Sounds pretty good right. Yeah, but this would have been the best time to flood if it has to happen, and now I'm looking at a week of some sixties, should be pretty happy, but I'm wondering if we got rid of enough snow to avoid flooding this week, which if we do, by the end of it, I might get my first plowing in.

Hence the continual checking of NOAH, which stands for something and has fun graphs like this:

If you want a case of maybe some early season-too-much-time-on-my-hands over-reading I look at this chart and I see an ice jam that is going to let loose in concert with some high temps and get us our flood. Also might be a case of as John Ashbery said, "saying things to keep them from happening."

In more normal news: I finished the cold frame for this year. Cold Frames are a little mini-hoophouse designed to hold three or four additional degrees so the plants can harden off, ie get reading step by step for the real outdoors. The tomatoes and Okra have shown themselves quick, so I'm getting excited.

Calling All Working Members

2008-03-30T17:41:00.003-04:00

"Working member" is a term that has sprung up with CSAs, probably isn't even in the dictionary yet, seeing as CSAs in America are at most twenty years old, with ninety percent I bet formed in the past ten years, and probably fifty percent in the last five (I like statistical breakdowns). It means "a member who spends some time every week helping out his or her CSA farm, whether it be in the field, or just as commonly at pick-ups, and gets a discount or upgrade." Though, it should be noted, some CSAs, especially the older ones I would guess, more or less mandate helping out, and think of those who don't as having to pay more for it, rather than those working getting a discount.

Open Heart Farm had its first working members last year, 3. It went pretty well. Ours received a discount and then we tried to give them some extra greens and flowers each week. Our working members were really remarkably productive: Rachel and I hardly ever thinned carrots or weeded mesclun the whole season. The money that they received wouldn't be considered a livable wage, but I think most of them were really happy doing it. I won't guess why but to say it probably has some intersections with why I like to be down there myself. One of our working members is going on to apprentice on an organic farm in Maine (apprenticing being a more full time, full season affair) this year, so I guess that her experience with us was positive and even slightly inspiring.

Why mention all this now? Cause now is when we are signing up members (little bit more than halfway there for those wondering) and we haven't gotten any working ones yet. Thought I had one but that one going on to apprentice, as mentioned above. No guilt intended Rebecca. So I'm here making the plea to those in Burlington who think they have four hours a week and want to see things grow, thrive, have fun, learn some about organic farming, get in some exercise, etc.

This year I am making it a larger discount ($90), and offering the possibility for members to do that work on Saturdays, at our market in Shelburne.

Anyways, that is what a "working member" is. The more I think about it the more I like just the fact that are gradiations of levels of employment, a little grey area somewhere even between barter and time equaling money. If your up for it you know where to reach me (info to the right).

IN OTHER NEWS: Greenhosue and Farm report

A new flower for us this year, spurred snapdragons, are up and running, though the more regular rocket mix snapdragons are taking a little more time. beets popped right up and lots of the first brassicas, like broccoli and cauliflower, are up too. Here you can see Ciaran playing with the Calendula, which is probably the biggest thing right now since it loves the cold nights (we keep the greenhouse to cold I think (it is pretty expensive on a zero degree night)):

and here you can see that the last days of March in Burlington can in fact be pretty darn cold, yeah for the last snow of the season. They say it's going to be 63 degrees Tuesday, yeah for the flood?!?!?!?

The Rhubarb Dilemma

2008-03-23T17:28:00.005-04:00

So, I bought two bags of rhubarb crowns at ACE, which sells them way cheaper than Johnny's or FEDCO. Each bag contains three plants. Doesn't sound like much of a dilemma does it. The plants sit in saw dust in my closet for a month or so and then I stick them in the ground and if we can keep them relatively weed free we get rhubarb, and, as a special bonus, if we keep it healthy a few years, we can start splitting the crowns and expanding the rhubarb row (six plants is really only enough for me and the occasional gift (I like rhubarb alot, just make an easy jam with it all summer long))) for free! yeah! but also the dilemma, and this is the Open Heart Farm Dilemma with all perennials (ie plants that come back season after season) like asparagus, or fruit trees for that matter. Let me put a disclaimer up front, if it is not fully a dilemma of our own making, it is one we walked into pretty much with full knowledge and without further ado let me elucidate: it is this: we may, let me stress: MAY, only be able to stay down on Intervale land for five years. So why do I bother even buying this stuff (last year I started asparagus from seed, so that is going to take about five years just to become reasonably productive (though some people (the French) like to talk about there 125 year old asparagus beds), and this year, besides the rhubarb I bought two pear trees which I wrote a little bit about a few weeks ago)? Um, the answer's probably not anything special, I think most farm people like to try new things, and besides eating them ourselves, think it would be neat to bring to market, or CSA pick-up. None of my members have specifically asked for any of these foods, but I'm sure, out of the sixty, there are a few that would bite at each, which, if I were to think of it economically, would add nice value both for them and me.

All that said, I haven't gotten into by-laws, nor political miasmas, and I probably shouldn't. I think I hear Ciaran stirring, and for now I'm solving the problem by buying all the stuff and acting as if there is a long-term future for us down there. before stirring turns to crying I'll leave you with a recent pic of mister Ciaran held by his uncle, meeting his first cousin, who is held by the grandma of both*:
* uncle is also uncle of both, other boys name: Tom Patrick

Old, New

2008-03-05T10:46:00.003-05:00

Last night we had some roasted roots, still tasting great. I was surprised how vital everything still looked. We also had daikon radish, which I have saved from the end of last year, with some chard (which we did buy at City Market.) We actually have had all winter a sizable store of roots, and last night it made me think that a winter share might not be that farm off for Open Heart Farm. At our new apartment (that is the new part, we moved to the New (oh, another new) North End March 1st, we even have a well heated basement for winter squash, which was one thing holding us back. The greens is the last peice of the puzzle, which would require a hoophouse, which, if you've been following the Intervale Story (I can't follow it all so you are excused if you can't (I think the short version is no hoophouses in floodplain, but even that might be wrong)) you know is not a sure thing. We have the money at least for a modest one, one that might supply 20 families, which would make year round living in Vermont much closer to affordable. As they say in Cote d'Ivoire, "On Va Voir!"*

It is true I have finally started the onions and in fact going in a few minutes to finish them up. Also close to purchasing the drip irrigation system (see below). Things move slowly, glacially you might say, this time of year. The trickle of members is still trickling.

* One will see! in French

A busy but Fun Year

2008-02-21T11:53:00.003-05:00

I am getting a feel for this year already, call it a vibe if you will: Busy but fun, sleepless nites aren't even that bad when you wake up to Ciaran and a sunny day (which we occasionally have in Vermont). Believe it or not, we will begin seeding in about two weeks, with the onions. I've just been plotting out the first month of Greenhouse work in the Stella Natura Calendar, which as I mention every year, plays a big part especially in the first few months of the season. Besides being an organizer (which I am always sorely in need of) it guides you easily into planting with the lunar cycles, one of the Biodynamic practices that we practice, and probably actually the most cross culturally accepted around the world as a real helper to your little seedlings.

Busy but fun winter dreams to everyone for next few weeks, despite what the groundhog says, I'm betting my next blog entry comes from mud season . . .

Open Heart Farm Capital Improvements Ought Eight

2008-02-11T10:38:00.000-05:00

Last year at Open Heart our capital improvements were a wheel hoe and an earthway seeder, the latter of which was provided used and free by Digger's Mirth (thank you!), so it might not count as a capital improvement. The wheel hoe and attachments finally cost about four hundred. This is about two orders of magnitude below a larger farms capital improvements (hereafter CI). Those two devices did in fact help us streamline cultivation and production in order to produce more stuff for more families. Look back to last years posts for an in depth report on how those things work . . .

This year's CI's are: drip irrigation, electric deer fence, and tomato cages. Drip irrigation is something I have not used before so I've been reluctant to try it. Does that make me conservative? But I was convinced by last years more dry weather and having a little bit more land that it would be helpful; and the more I look into it the less hard it seems to actually set up, i.e. fear's based on ignorance. Drip irrigation works by setting up lines of "drip tape" down each row, and the water just slowly goes right into the ground. Some advantages over traditional overhead irrigation (which is what we would use at Quail Hill) are less water use (both because there is no evaporation and because you are not watering the aisles), and less weed growth in the aisles because of aforesaid not watering them. It also hopefully will mean alot less time running around trying to set up hoses and using garden sprinklers which is what rachel and I did last year. Our little farm is just getting slightly too big for that to be practical (2 acres).

The deer fence I am less excited about but it seems the two year trend in deer pressure is up, and if it goes up anymore . . . we want to be protected. So why the hesitation. Also from experience at Quail Hill, in Long Island, where deer pressure was immense, we found the fences to not stop the deer if they really really wanted in. That said, I am hoping that here in semi-woodsy Vermont they will only require a mild deterrent. Last year Rachel and I lost a lot of time and lettuce covering it up each night with remay, and carrots I now remember.

The Tomato cages are a no brainer. We had our first thirty gotten pretty cheap last year, and used them primarily on the brandywines. This year we will see what another few hundred dollars can get us and continue expanding them to other larger tomatoes that we do. This is something we never used at quail hill (to continue a theme), because the scale was simply too large, probably a half acre or more of tomatoes (just for the CSA, not counting paste). As long as we continue having all of our tomatoes be field tomatoes, the cages seem to extend the life, productivity and appearance of the fruit pretty well.

Speaking so much of Quail Hill, let me share one picture of the tomatoes the last year we were there. They have a Tomato taste off every year there. It might not be a bad idea for Open Heart too, seeing as how this year we are going to have 25 varieties.

It Was Two Years Ago Today . . .

2008-01-25T11:19:00.000-05:00

It might not have been today exactly, but close. We started the blog, after having moved into town a few weeks earlier, to see if we could connect with people electronically. I have alwoays been surprised how well it has worked, people who aren't my relatives say "I read about that in your blog," and while I like the stardom, it's mostly felt like writing in a journal, which is I guess always a useful way to define some of one's ideas. Well, one of the first blog entries was about shaving soap the old fashioned way. It's not that I love old fashioned things (though I do love that tune especially by Chet Baker), but the thought of all that energy going into the making and recycling (if we are lucky) of all those cans (I wonder about the energy of pressurizing them as well)) always bothered me, then I stumbled upon some soap that fit in a much that was formulated to lather with shaving, and it was cheap, and I bought it. It turned out, that brand, Williams mug soap I think, was the same one my grandfather used and sold in his five and dime in WIlmington, NC. I have nothing against that kind, but now two years later I found one that I think works (shavewise) and smells alot better: Herban Cowboy. How many cars would be taken off the road (standard measure?) if American men who shave used this stuff? Mindboggling, plus, like I said, it's cheaper and has many more servings of shave than the cans.

Enough product placement, I've doing gradual amounts of farm work like sending out brochures to members, who get a chance at a early bird discount, and now I am beginning my general distribution. Then there are reports for intervale and taxes. Not always the fun stuff, but kind of interesting and revealing about what worked and didn't work in the overall business.

Rachel made me promise to put a few shots of Ciaran up, so:

A Fine Tree

2008-01-19T16:04:00.000-05:00

so, we have finished the seed order and some have even begun arriving. As promised I got some fun things, couldn't resist. I tried to make sure that we got lots (more) of the things that worked - and we did - but we definitely have some things that will be interesting for us out in the field. Well, I should preface by saying it's not just weird things that we like, but also just ones we haven't done in awhile, like acorn squash. It's a favorite of all and has higher yield than alot of squashes we have done in the past. We are still doing sweet dumpling and butternut but also added a buttercup, which is another classic I think people will like and Rachel and I will enjoy seeing again. By the time we got to watermelon (I order alphabetically using Johnny's (which I just learned is owned by Monsanto (Rachel is reading the Barbara Kingslover Book))) I went a little bonkers. I got the standards, but even those haven't been that great for us, in large part because something about the timing in the season has led to lots of weeds, but giving us even another leg up this year is golden midget. Shown here, It not only ripens quick, it also turns this golden color when ripe which takes out some of the guesswork (not that we mind the guess work it is just that we eat half of our melons in the process. It is hard to believe it will ever be warm enough for watermelons, but I guess I can believe it if I think of scallions and onions, which will be starting in about a month, so possibly still snow on the ground.

I am adding a link to epicurious dot com on the side bar. It seems like the most helpful of sites, or at least a good place to start. I also have an unlikely cookbook to recommend. It is Rodale's cookbook, might have some other prts of the name if you are looking up but it is a very good one for whole grainy foods and healthy versions of non healthy things and fun desert ideas that aren't necessarily made of chocolate (they exist!). The recipes are basic compared to some of our other cookbooks but sometimes you don't want to do twenty steps or crush and bake your spices before getting to the rest of the recipe.

This is a poster Rachel made for Ciaran and put about our bed. Trying to stimulate him via shiny things, but I'm putting the picture up cause I just think its wonderful, the crinkles in the paper and the lettering and "A Fine Tree," which reminds me, I am planting a few pear trees this year. Someone suggested digging a whole throwing the placenta in and planting a tree over it, nutrients spirit and such. When they (forget who) suggested it I didn't think much of it but then when it was there (in our apartment) I didn't feel like throwing it away so now it's in our freezer and will eventually be in our field and feed at least one of the trees.

Happy New Year, The Start of Seeds, and Inevatably More Ciaran

2008-01-02T21:41:00.000-05:00

I always wait for the hew year to start the seed order. Sticking up the new calendar and a bit of the lengthening of days makes all those numbers and varieties make a little more sense. So far (about 1/4 through the seed order) this year seems to be about perfecting alot of what we liked about the past two years, and losing as much dross as possible. That said, it's hard not to go crazy seed buying, it's definitely the kid in the candy store mentality, I think most farmers feel that way. Some things I'm excited about so far are sempasoi, an asian collard that I think will be kinda flea beetle resistant, and red carrots (a heirloom variety called red cored chantenay), and a better yellow one (last years was just ok flavor and slow grower). Yes, someone out there is thinking "excitement" is too strong a word for these things, well then, I'm not going to tell you about the golden celery . . . ok, I will. I guess I'm feeling a little defensive about the golden celery, both because it's golden and because it's celery. Everyone thinks its so wierd when I show up for CSA drop off or market with celery. Is celery all the sudden an alien veg? - and then the golden part will make it truly wierd, but it is discribed as not being too strong, and now that I see a picture it's not totally yellow or anything.

I'm sure tomatoes will be a day unto itself, rachel and I really like to think that one through, and we have quite a few slots to play with as we are getting rid of about five or six varieties from last year, and will surely add one or two without really meaning to.

now on to the big stuff: Ciaran is edging ever closer to twelve pounds, and still looks cute as all get out. Below is some evidence . . .

Ciaran

2007-11-16T13:02:00.000-05:00

I'm so neglegent with the posts and now all farm news is eclipsed by le petit noir as ciaran translates to in french, but in english the irish means little dark one, which we all thought would be totally not true but a nice name anyways and now is totally true and a nice name. See below.

If there are details I've forgotten about Ciaran Daley May, you just ask away, and I will include all the farmy photos I had planned before (he was two-three weeks early, so my plans were really going to work I swear).

Um, additionally the garlic is in and semi-covered/mulched, it is about twice as much as last year, which is good, cause we'd like to hand it out to CSA members more, have some more of our own seed (which accounted for about half of it this year), and even have some to sell.

These are some of my jars, from left to right: chamomile, calendula, and various soup beans, all grown this year at OHF

and this one is of Rachel at 6:30 on the day of our last CSA pick-up, you can see it's a bit dark at that time, but no snow like last year.

Enjoy thanksgiving.

Fall

2007-10-06T18:25:00.000-04:00

Pretty hard to believe I was in the ocean a few weeks ago and It looks like tomorrow will be the onset of real fall weather, you can see the sprig of color in the house next door to our's on Dan's Court, below. Well, it's true I look pretty apprehensive trying to go in the water, but I still maintain it was bearable once you did.

Up 'til now we have had the remnants of basil and a really great pepper and eggplant season. I guess we will be harvesting the rest of the peppers green over the upcoming days. The Fall is also a really great time for greens and our main problem seems to be finding happy homes for all of them. Our member have had a choice of two different cooking greens the past few weeks and will continue to for the next three weeks. Besides that we bring some to our markets, one of which ends next week and the other goes potentially til the day before the end of October. We would like to wholesale some (we have extra cases of arugala, totsoi, collards, mustard, etc.) but the reason we have great green and lots of them is why everyone has them: the fall is great growing weather. And since we have been concentrating on getting a steady stream of things to the CSA and retail markets we're not really en place to sell to the local stores. Anywho, not terribly worried, and hoping the food shelf can make use of them if no one else can, and still hoping that the we can sell some of our root crops to City market, as I planted a lot of rutabaga and turnips.

Of Beauty and Bumps

2007-09-09T11:38:00.000-04:00

In tomato-season time we, who have the luxury of NOT having a hoophouse full of thriving tomato plants which threaten to hang on producing for another 4 weeks even while the frost is on the pumpkins and our feet ache a lot and also just a little bit more each day and our largest-sized t-shirts are all stretching over the site-line of our feet, are reaching the 11th hour. And so, time to reflect, but really refract, a bit on what time it was:

The intact tomato on the left, a forsaken Brandywine (chosen neither by OH Farm members at a veggie pic-up - no offense taken, members - nor by gawkers and handlers at the ONE farmers' market) is one of the most remarkable things we had the good fortune to harvest this season. It resisted any hopes for symmetry in knife-approaches, displayed absolutely no pattern of clues for how it sewed itself up so successfully on the bottom-end (just a fascinating maze of sinews and cleaves), and then of course it tasted absolutely amazing. And I am not really even that big of a fan of the Brandywine, the heirloom commoner around these parts.

To the right is a sliced-up Nyagous, a late-season variety, peerless in terms of taste and color. (Well, the ever-evasive Druzba might be its slightly larger Doppelganger, and we'll research that next season).

Strangely, high-tomato time is coinciding with other events which inevitably evoke thoughts on conventional perceptions of beauty:

I have to admit these days that I simply do not have the same shape that I had a year ago today. Walking by shop windows downtown is always a shocker (no full-length mirrors in the apartment) and while I never considered that mirrored reflection beauteous in conventional or non-conventional terms pre-pregnancy, I now must reconcile the fact that strangers now DO look at me with smiles and hellos quite often. While walking through a crowded street I imagine I am accompanied by Gweneth Paltrow or Leonardo, fielding innumerable double-takes and shameless gapes.

Of course, those stares are focused squarely on my mid-section. But it's nice to know that even if I wouldn't get taken home at $3 a pound, people still are curious enough to stop to take a second look. Perhaps another definition of the power of beauty.

I should also note about this photo that I was really serving as a reflector for the light of the flash, whose flashing was allowing Josh to get some of the really interesting skyline we glanced last night through the streets of downtown B-town. Despite the mish-mashedness of the architecture (the funny-shaped, almost un-Christian shaped, Cathedral; the dreadful yet beckoning high-rise Courtyard Marriott), it's always fun to look upwards across the horizon at my favorite time of the day.