Summer Week 6

Basil production is peaking already! It’s luscious and tender, and perfect for Pesto!

THIS WEEK’S SUBSCRIBER MENU:
• Sugar Snow Peas
• “Yukon Gold” New Potatoes (best steamed, roasted, or boiled)
• Carrots
• Garlic
• Swiss Chard
• Fennel
• Genovese Basil

Click on the links above for information and recipes about these crops.

COMING SOON:
Spinach
Green Beans
Fava Beans
Summer Squashes
Cucumbers
Broccoli
Cauliflower

Canning Class at the farm this Saturday!
We still have a few spaces left in the class on July 27, 1:00. Just $25 to learn how to make small batches of jams and canned fruits. You’ll even get a jar of goodies to take home! Let me know ASAP!

We’re into the full swing of summer, so get ready to eat more veggies! The summer squashes, cucumbers, and broccoli and cauliflower are nearly ready, as are the snap beans. We are also into the height of farm-work season, because not only are we working to clean and harvest (and keep planting) summer crops, it’s also time to get the fall and winter crops in. It’s double duty, and we are getting used to (somewhat) 12- and 14-hour work days. I apologize if we’re hard to reach right now.

So what is the frilly, ferny vegetable you got this week? It’s Fennel, also called Finocchio. Think of it as celery, but flavored like licorice. Use the stems chopped up in tuna or chicken salad, or in a green salad. Slice the bulb thinly and eat raw, or try cutting the bulb into wedges and grilling or roasting it. It’s delicious!

Due to the wonder of WordPress, who hosts our website and farm blog, I am able to “view statistics”. Sometimes I poke around at the top of my WordPress window, and see what I can see. Among the interesting topics are 1. Number of views per day (page views and individual visitors), 2. Search Terms, and 3. Pages viewed.

I like to see the change in the bar graph from day to day, because it helps me decide if people find what I’m writing to be interesting. There’s always an upswelling when I get a new post posted, which is reassuring. And I like to see if visitors are looking at the newest post, or a particular recipe page, or if people are interested in our CSA.

But the most interesting one is “Search Terms”. I can actually see what path people took to get to our website, and via which search engine! What always surprises me is how many people find us by searching “Chicories” or “Escarole” or “Radicchio”. Really? We are one of the top results for the bitter greens?

This summer, we are getting a lot of hits from people searching for “Ice Plant Edible”, meaning Purslane. But today here are my top favorite search terms:

1. Mink waterer (I don’t know what these folks found out)
2. Farm bunnies eat beet leaves
3. How to do a farmer’s whistle just your mouth
4. Edible Spaceship (which leads to Kohlrabi)
5. White roots, red green leaves
6. Salsify production in India
7. Only bean known in Europe before new world (being the Fava bean)

At any rate, the list goes on. I can search up to a year in the past. It just fascinates me to have created something that might be so useful to people all over the world. Someone actually visited our site from Lithuania and the Philippines, and yesterday from Zimbabwe and Spain. I’ve received crazy questions about chickens and cows from all over the world. THAT is the world wide web.