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Waltham Fields Community Farm
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CSA NEWSLETTER 2016
Week 4 of 20
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PLEASE TAKE NOTE OF THE FOLLOWING CLOSED DISTRIBUTION DATE
Distribution will be closed on this Saturday, July 2nd due to the holiday, but we will be open for pick up on this Friday, July 1st instead. Please plan ahead. Pick Your Own will still be open. We will be open Wednesday (6/29), Thursday (6/30) and Friday (7/01) from 2pm until 6:30pm this week.
Drop In Volunteer Hours are cancelled on Saturday, July 2nd.
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CSA PICKUP DATES AND TIMES
COME ONCE EACH WEEK ON ANY OF THESE PICK UP DAYS
Wednesday, June 29-Oct. 19, 2:00-6:30PM
Thursday, June 30-Oct. 20, 2:00-6:30PM
*OPEN FOR DISTRIBUTION THIS FRIDAY, JULY 1ST 2:00-6:30PM*
Any shareholder is welcome to pick up on any of the above days! You don't have to let us know when you're coming. Feel free to switch back and forth from week to week if that works best for you, or choose a day and stick to it for most of the season. We'll be happy to see you whatever day you come to the farm.
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SUMMER IN THE LEARNING GARDEN 
If you're still in need of summer activities for your children, it isn't too late to sign them up for one or more of Waltham Fields' education programs! Programs include after school, half-day, and week long time frames. Your children will learn how to grow & eat healthy veggies, care for our chickens & learn about the natural sciences all while spending time outdoors having fun!
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WHAT'S IN THE SHARE - Our Best Guess
This is our best guess at this point. Actual crops may vary from what's listed here due to a variety of factors.
In the Barn (Picked for You) 
Napa cabbage
Collards
Escarole
Fennel
Kale
Lettuce
Radish or salad turnip
Scallions
Chard
Zucchini and summer squash
Pick Your Own (PYO):
Shell peas, basil,
parsley, dill
& Perennial garden.
SPRING RECIPES
We have a ton of great recipes on our website, including many different suggestions for collards! Click here to check them out! |
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NOTES FROM THE FIELD
Week 4: Pictures of Summer
From my 9 seasons on this wonderful farm I have lots of photographs. I have been here so long that I have pictures that are actually printed out on paper! (That's how we used to do it.) I have lots of photos of the initial days of spring, onions and tiny brassicas germinating in the greenhouse, picture perfect lettuce starts, the orderly beauty of the first tractor work of the season, cutting furrows directly into winter, exposing the promise inherent in freshly tilled soil. I have photos of favas beans emerging, freshly flame weeded carrots popping up in perfect, clean rows and beautiful cucurbit plantings domed in deep green lines with gaudy yellow flowers showing beneath their foliage. But my photos chronologically usually end right about now and usually pick up again sometime in mid- October, when the light starts to slant away and the beginning of the end appears on the horizon. I have lots of May and June, lots of October and November and a tiny handful of July and August.
This is because now is go time for your farmers, even for part time farmers like me. For the next two-three months we are flat out: greenhouse seeding, transplanting, weeding and cultivating, making beds so we can keep planting, watering (watering!!!) and harvesting, harvesting, harvesting. Picking, washing and packing the beautiful bounty of our work,
...to fill the CSA barn for distributions and to provide for many in need in our communities.
It is a wonderful time of year, and yet it's difficult for me to stop and snap a few pictures, unrelated to pictures of broken things that need to be fixed (what is that part number...?) or pictures of unfamiliar insects or plant disease (whoa, what is that?).
The season is chugging along here, nearly July and hard to believe. Our wonderful seasonal crews are getting tan and trained and faster and better at all of the things that we're throwing at them. It's a joy to see so many people back at the farm after the months of solitary work, adding staff through the spring and then finally an explosion of people as the first shares of the season hits the stand. This year has been particularly enjoyable for me so far, I credit our staff and a healthy dose of sunshine, and a great thanks for the wonderful people in my life. We are all nose down right now, and will be for the next several months, and we will be tired and sore and sunburned. But this job makes it easy to feel like it's worth it and I'm hoping that this is the year that I get a few mid-summer shots, tomatoes ripening, cukes and squash, melons vining out, chilis...you get the picture.
Enjoy the harvest!
For all of the crew,
Dan
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WHAT'S IN THE BARN
Giovanna Gelato e Sorbet
Giovanna Gelato e Sorbet is inspired by the rich Italian gelato-making traditions, which have long been practiced in Argentina, where founder Eduardo Kreindel grew up. After leaving his job as an architect, he started Giovanna in a 350-square-foot space. Before long, he outgrew that space and opened a much larger facility in Malden, Massachusetts. The products are made in small batches with premium ingredients then hand-packed in the Malden facility.
We currently carry Chocolate & Sea Salted Caramel gelatos and Lemon & Mixed Berry Sorbets. See new flavors throughout the summer.
All of our retail products are available for sale to the public. For our own produce offerings, we prioritize giving shareholders a good return on their investment and meeting our food assistance goals (22% of what we grow - which should amount to $80,000 of produce for low-income households this year)
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Early in the season, crops for sale to the public will be those that we have an abundance of and later in the season, if production is going well, we hope to operate as a full-fledged farm store with a wide range of vegetables available to the public during our weekly CSA distribution hours.
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SWEET SHIITAKE PEANUT NOODLES WITH COLLARD GREENS
Serves 4-6
Ingredients
- 1/4 cup of tamari or soy sauce
- 1/4 cup of maple syrup
- 1 Tbsp. of unrefined + roasted peanut oil
- 1 Tbsp. of rice wine vinegar
- 2 - 3 Tbsp. of coconut oil (or your favourite cooking oil)
- 1 lb of shiitake mushrooms, stems removed, sliced
- 2 large cloves of garlic, finely chopped
- a large knob of ginger, finely chopped
- 1/2 lb of collard greens, stems removed, and thinly sliced (about 4 cups)
- 1/4 cup of finely chopped peanuts + more for garnish
- 12oz of dry brown rice spaghetti noodles, cooked and drained.
- A few scallions, finely chopped, for garnish.
Instructions
- Prep note: Cook the noodles as you're prepping the shiitake mix. It comes together pretty quickly and it's best to combine the hot shiitake mix with freshly cooked noodles right away, so estimate the timing appropriately depending on your pace and the cooking time for your type/brand of noodles.
- Measure out the soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, maple syrup, and peanut oil. Whisk gently to combine and set aside.
- Heat 1 Tbsp. of the coconut oil in a large skillet.
- Cook the shiitakes in batches, to maximize the amount of surface area that is touching the skillet, adding more oil in between if necessary. Start with about 3 - 4 minutes for each batch, toss, cook another minute or two, and switch it up. Once all the shiitakes have a some browning, remove them from the pan and set aside.
- Warm another few teaspoons of oil and sautee the garlic and ginger until fragrant (about a minute).
- Add the shiitakes back to the pot and stir fry for another few minutes.
- Add the soy sauce mix to the pot, toss with the shiitakes, and immediately turn heat to low and cover.
- Let the mushrooms simmer in the sauce for a minute or two to absorb some of the seasoning. You don't want them to absorb all of it, just enough to add flavour to the mushrooms and leave some behind for flavouring the noodles.
- Add in the collard greens, toss, and cover again for about 15 - 20 seconds just to wilt them.
- Finally combine everything with the pasta + 1/4 cup of the peanuts and toss.
- Taste a few noodles and season with more tamari, if necessary. Add more peanut oil if the noodles seem dry.
- Serve right away, topped with scallions and more peanuts.
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Waltham Fields Community Farm Staff
Year-Round Staff:
Seasonal Staff:
Assistant Grower: Janelle Plummer
Greenhouse Production Supervisor: Naomi Shea
Equipment Supervisor: Dan Roberts
Field Crew: Heidi Blake, Stacey Daley, Allison Ostrowski
Weed Crew: Annie Carter, Jenny Grossman, Jack Spiva, Rebekah Waller
Learning Garden Educators: Autumn Cutting, Alannah Glickman, Jack Leng
CSA Assistant: Danielle Barmash
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