| Harvest Potluck Entertainment and Volunteers Needed |
We are looking for 10 to 12 people to help with set up and/or clean up
for the Harvest Potluck, which is on Sunday, November 18th at 6PM. Set up volunteers will need to arrive at 4PM,
and clean up volunteers will need to stay an hour after the event. If you can help out, please contact
Nathan Weston. Thank you! We're also looking for a band to play at the Harvest Potluck. The potluck will run about two hours, with two half-hour time slots for the band.
Please email Nathan Weston if you're interested. |
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Chestnut Farms Meat Shares Available at Waltham Fields!
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Beginning in January of 2008, we will be partnering with Chestnut Farms
in Hardwick to offer sustainably raised local meat shares. Meat shares
come in several sizes to suit any household. They can include a range
of delicious cuts of beef, lamb, pork and chicken, or choose lamb- or
pork-free shares. Shares will be distributed once a month, on the
first Sunday of each month at Waltham Fields Community Farm. Visit Chestnut Farms' website
for more information, and to take advantage of the one-month exclusive
sign-up period for Waltham Fields Community Farm shareholders.
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| Third Sunday Gatherings |
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Third Sunday Gatherings are back this season! For those of you who are new to the farm or to Third Sunday Gatherings, they are a great opportunity to meet fellow shareholders and learn about various topics related to our mission.
November 18th - Harvest Potluck - Join us for a celebration of the 2007 growing season! This potluck starts at 6PM inside the field station, and the evening includes live music and a tribute to the bounty of the year. Details to follow.
December 16th - Winter Solstice - Experience the farm at (almost) the darkest time of the year, and help our farm staff put the fields to sleep for the winter. More details coming.
January 20th, 2008 - CFO Annual Meeting - Get to know the good people on the slate for our 2008 Board of Directors, vote on the slate if you are a member, and hear a review of our 2007 and our plans for 2008. Stay tuned for more details.
For more information... |
Celeraic and Apple Salad with Tarragon and Roasted Walnuts
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From Angel Organics Kitchen. Serves 4-6
It probably isn't often that you think ooooh, celariac, and your mouth waters. But this recipe could change all that. The key here is to be sure to cut the celeriac to matchstick-size, no bigger; it will hold the sauce better. Also, don't be tempted to skimp on the pepper, as pepper and apples have a certain unexplored appeal.
4 cups water
juice of 1 lemon (about 3 T)
2 tart apples, peeled, cored, sliced into
1/4-inch strips
1 large celeriac, peeled, cut into
matchstick-sized strips
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1 1/2 T white wine vinegar
2 1/2 T mayonnaise
1 T heavy cream
2 t Dijon mustard
1/2 t dried tarragon
1/2 t freshly ground black pepper
salt
1. Combine water and lemon juice in a large bowl. Add
the apple slices and celeriac strips and let stand for 15 minutes (this acidified water will keep the celeriac and apple from turning brown).
2. Toast the walnuts in a dry skillet over high heat, stirring frequently, until they begin to darken in spots, 3 to 5 minutes. Let cool.
3. Drain the celeriac and apple mixture; return to the bowl, add the vinegar, and toss.
4. Combine the mayonnaise, cream, mustard, tarragon, pepper, and salt to taste in a small bowl. Pour the dressing over the celeriac and
apple mixture; toss to coat. Add the walnuts and toss again. Chill for at least 1 hour before serving (2 or 3 hours is even better).
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Bring Us
Your Leaves!
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Your old leaves will help us make great compost at the farm! Bring leaves loose or bagged in paper bags (no plastic bags, please!). Drive on the farm road just to the left of the field hoop house to the big leaf piles on your left. Thank you!
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| Welcome to the 2007 Harvest Season! |
Watch your email inbox for our 2007 Shareholder Survey! Your input will help us improve our CSA for the 2008 season. Last share pickups at the farm are:
- Tuesday, October 23, 3-7:30 PM
- Thursday, October 25, 3-7:30 PM
- Sunday, October 28, 3-7:30 PM
Last share pickup in Somerville is Tuesday October 23 from 5-7 PM.
These are the final pickups of the season. See you in the spring!
Winter CSA share pickups will be Sunday, November 18 and Sunday, December 16 from 3-6 PM at the farm. Winter shares are sold out for the season. If you have a fruit share from Autumn Hills Orchard please remember to pick up your fruit when you come get your vegetables. Bring your own household compost if you don't mind the walk to the compost piles. Thanks to everyone who has brought compost! Bring bags for pickup if you have them. If you're coming late in the evening, you may want to bring a flashlight! |
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What's in the shares
this week
Please
note: this list is prepared the week before we harvest your share. Some guesswork is
involved: some things may be in the share that are not on the
list, and some listed things may not be in the share. - Sweet Potatoes
- Potatoes
- Parsnips
- Turnips
- Celeriac
- Collards
- Butternut Squash
- Brussel Sprouts
- Cabbage
- Leeks
Have
you checked out our Recipe pages?
Feel
free to submit recipes and cooking ideas to us via email. We'd love to include your family's favorite recipes!
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Pick your own crops this week
- Parsley
- Dill
- Cilantro
- Perennial Herbs
 CSA
shareholders may visit the farm to pick your own Sunday through Thursday
during daylight hours.
Check out our red pick-your-own kiosk in the fields for a list of available crops and picking
supplies. |
Notes from the Field: Thanksgiving
"Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground." -- Rumi
When I was a little girl in Southern Maryland, we had two kinds of people in my county: farmers, and fisherman. Fisherman, called watermen in Southern Maryland, tonged oysters from black mud in the winter and hauled crab pots in the summer. Farmers grew tobacco on red sandy soil and dried it in the open barns in the warmth of autumn. They were all up before the sun seven days a week in all weathers, ruddy, wrinkled, smelling of a combination of crabs or oysters or tobacco and grease, dressed in worn clothes, perfectly dirty. I thought they were all crazy.
I remember riding in the bow of my father's boat on a summer evening, looking over the rail at the low lines of the Potomac River coastline in the long rays of the evening sun as we turned north towards our home creek, and wishing heartily that time could stand still, that nothing could ever change, that this landscape that felt like home to me might never be altered by time or departure. No heaven, I thought, could ever be as beautiful as this familiar shore.
 When I was a little older, of course, I could not wait to leave those shores, and it was a long time before I found a landscape that felt like home again. I spent two years in New Mexico, a place that I loved but that never felt like home to me. When I first arrived in Boston as a college undergraduate, I was sure that I would leave as soon as my four years here were up. People were unfriendly, winters were too long, the city was crowded and the streets were a nightmare. For the first time, I remembered those farmers and fishermen and wondered if they might have had something right after all.
On a week-long research trip to the Land Institute, a sustainable agriculture research organization in Salina, Kansas, I met Brian Donahue, their director of education. "I love it here," I told Brian, "it's too bad there are no farms around Boston, where I live." Brian, it turned out, had founded a little community farm called Land's Sake in a town called Weston, which I immediately sought out when I got back to Boston. And there, in the suburbs, I found my heaven on earth again. The smells, the physical contact with the land, the folks who, unlike my college classmates, didn't talk too much: I felt like I was home again every time I set foot on a farm. It was a fleeting feeling that came and went, and it was many more years (including a couple in Utah and Colorado) before I was lucky enough to find a place that I could stay.
 Now
I spend five (and more) days a week outside, in all weather, ruddy,
wrinkled, in worn clothes, perfectly dirty -- and perfectly happy. Now, no matter how nervous I am about the crops or the weather, I feel at home every time I kneel down to harvest, or look up from a bed that I am cultivating to see the leaves change. It still seems strange to me that I have been fortunate enough to find this in a crowded suburb of a big city. On my days off, I blend into the suburban mothers at the grocery store -- yes, a little sunburned and a little dirty around the fingernails, but certainly few people would guess at the origin of that dirt. I love to stroll with Jonah down Moody Street in the crowds of people from all over the world, or kayak on the Charles, visit the Children's Museum or the Science Museum, listen to music in Davis Square, visit Fenway Park, knowing that a short bike ride will bring me back to the fields that feel like home. I am so grateful for the chance to learn that, while time does not stand still, we can come home again to the beloved familiar landscape, and that its changes and seasons can be as powerful in the midst of the city as they are in any wild place. I am grateful for the chance for my child to grow up on a farm, but not at all in the way that I once imagined that to be.
Every harvest morning, when I take a deep breath and kneel to harvest lettuce, releasing all my fears about the day and the season, becoming simply a rhythm and a motion, a familiar rhythm in a familiar place, I am so grateful to all the eaters who make it possible. You shareholders, who take the risk with our land each season, help to sustain that land -- the kestrels and coyotes and woodchucks and redtails, asters and maples, jewelweed and wild grapes -- and also help to sustain a way of life that makes every day, for me, a kind of thanksgiving. Thanks to all of you, once again, for a season of these thanksgiving days. We hope you enjoy the harvest and have a peaceful winter.
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Comings and goings on the farm
"We come and go, but the land is always here. And the people who love it and understand it are the people who own it -- for a little while."
-- Willa Cather
This final week of our distribution season, we say goodbye to our Assistant Growers, Kate Darakjy and Martin Lemos, who have done so much for our farm this season. Kate will be heading back home to Vermont after her work on the farm is done. Martin doesn't know exactly where he's bound, but we feel confident that he could do just about anything.
Assistant Grower positions on our farm are seasonal jobs, but the people who fill them each season are much more than seasonal laborers, and Kate and Martin are no exceptions. They have each brought so much to the farm this year, and we will miss them terribly and be better off because they were here.
Kate is one of the hardest workers you will ever meet on a farm. She is powerfully strong and incredibly fast, and she is constantly thinking about efficiency and task management, whether she's on the farm or in her own private life. She has a great mind for people management, and often has great suggestions about how to best deploy farm staff and volunteers; at the same time, she is a powerful force as an individual worker. In her first two weeks on the farm, Kate single-handedly removed a huge pile of old wood that  had been harboring woodchucks in our Back West field for more than four years, saving our eggplant, peppers and sweet potatoes in the process. She cleared the embattled rhubarb patch at the Lyman Estate Field in the spring, and transplanted almost two beds to our Field Station site in the fall. She managed the busy Sunday harvest and CSA distribution with grace and good humor. She learned the finicky ways of our Gus Super A tractor and became an expert pathway cultivator, and she was a fearless user of the our tine weeder, singlehandedly rescuing our leeks from the weeds more than once. More than this, however, Kate is a warm and inviting presence on the farm, and she has made the experience of interns and volunteers in the fields this season more fun, more personally satisfying, and more meaningful. We will miss her commitment to community and to the land, and we wish her love and peace in the great white north.
If Kate is an incredibly hard worker, Martin is an incredibly wise one. He knows when to expend effort and when to sustain himself; he is a speedy blur when harvesting alone, but he can slow down to carefully basket weed a bed of arugula or lead a volunteer group. Martin survived a week-long fast at the beginning of the season to manage our Thursday harvest and CSA distribution, cultivate with our Gretta Super A tractor and keep a close eye on our greenhouse seeding. He has a remarkable and surprising sense of humor that our crew of interns thoroughly enjoyed, and he was a gentle and thorough teacher for our interns and volunteers. His keen eye for  vegetable presentation and quality made a big difference in our harvests. He also turned out to be an excellent cook -- his dulce de leche on cardamom cookies will long be remembered with fondness in the farm office. Martin is a man of many talents and interests, and if farming is in his future, we know that a piece of land somewhere will benefit from his careful and knowledgeable management. We wish him good meals and good company in his travels.
Please take the time this week to thank Kate and Martin if you see them! Their hard work made this challenging season successful for us, and we are so grateful to them both as they move on. |
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Warmly,
From all the staff at Waltham Fields Community Farm:
Meg Coward, Executive Director
Amanda Cather, Farm Manager
Andy Scherer, Assistant Farm Manager
Kate Darakjy and Martin Lemos, Assistant Growers
Mark Walter, Children's Learning Garden Coordinator
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