Week 9: Bitter Cucumbers and Tiny Melons

The middle of the CSA season is creeping up fast and I am worried. Worried because we have yet to see significant rainfall and the crops are suffering with the failing of our well. Now, the well was never going to cut it. At 8 gals/minute it can run about 12-14 lines of drip irrigation before it runs the house dry. Most of our crops are planted at two rows per bed so we can irrigate 6-7 beds at a time. To get water to the roots requires that we run the lines for 3 hours. We currently have 330 beds that we can reach with water. If we run the irrigation for 12 hours per day (and I really like to be able to take a shower/laundry/dishes so I need to turn it off)- we can rotate through 24-32 beds per day. So, yeah, it will take a week and a half at the least to cycle through all our crop beds. You can see why we might be feeling a little desperate for rain. Because we just can't keep up with the crop needs. Some things will have to be sacrificed at this point. And so, the cucumbers were definitely not up to par last week. We thought we could eek a little more out of them, but the heat was too much. When we weeded one row, they just died. And in the other rows, the fruits were inconsistent and many were bitter. We are sorry if you got nasty, bitter cucumbers! We can't know without tasting every one, and the few we tried seemed ok, but we got reports otherwise. The melons are also suffering. We have been focusing on trying to keep fall crops alive along with summer crops such as the lettuces, carrots, green beans and tomatoes. The melons are farther away and are now starting to ripen, but the plants and fruits are smaller than they should be. It makes us sad, but we are hoping that they will be so sweet that you forget that they should be twice the size.

In good news: At least it isn't over 90 and the humidity is semi-reasonable. The tomatoes are hopping and

incredibly delicious! Whew!!! AND we have a new apprentice- Colin Everett started last week and has hit the ground running. Most recently graduated from Queen's College in Canada, Colin was working on reforestation projects up in the backwoods of Ontario, but has come home to Holliston and joined us for the rest of the summer and into the fall. He's off to a great start- already learning to harvest and drive tractors and help us through the puzzles of irrigation and designing farm systems for a very new situation. It is great to have the extra set of hands and generous energy to bolster us at this time of year.

Day of Wonder: The whole Farm Team (Appleton Farms, Powisset Farm and Chestnut Hill met our boss, Cathy Wirth, Agriculture Director, at Castle Hill for a day of wonder. We toured the big summer house that once belonged to the Crane Family. He built it for his children to love and explore and to encourage them to always come back to. It is a house filled with nooks and cranny's and because of where it is situated, almost all windows open on to views of the sea. It is no surprise to me that they were all sailors, and I wandered the gardens and grounds, and the widow's walk, wishing that I were in Jane Austen novella. We lunched on the back terrace, where a stage would be shortly built to hold the Boston Pops and then we mosied our way to Crane Beach for an afternoon of perfect temperature ocean waters, salt, sand

between the toes and good company. We went for ice cream at Down River before trekking home the back way to avoid the ridiculous afterwork traffic. Good times.

Events:
HONEYFEST is SATURDAY from 10am-2pm. Bee crafts, Facepainting, games, Cooking demos, honey tastings and celebrating all things honey. We will be cracking hives and meeting the 30,000 plus ladies who make honey and pollinate our delicious vegetables. Come and join us for the fun. $15 for member families and $25 for non-members. Food available for purchase from Culinary Underground: including Panzanella Salad, Honey bacon scones and Honey Butterbeer!

Story Hour on the Farm: Friday, August 8th at 1030am-1130am Join our engagement ranger as she reads some fun stories, learn about the farm and do a craft/activity. For younger children to age 7. $5/child for members, $10/child nonmembers

Farm Full Moon Potluck!!! August 18th from 7-830pm Come join us as we fire up the grill and bring your favorite farm-inspired dish to share! Let's watch the full moon rise over the farm and enjoy good food and company.


Farm to Table Dinner is happening on Friday September 16th. We are planning in incredible evening of delicious farm fresh food. More details to come soon, but put the date on your calendar!

Recipe of the Week:
The beans are about as perfect as you can get right now....I can't even get them back to the house. I eat them standing in the field...marvelling at the velvet skin, the crunch and the sweet sweet beany taste. I fully admit that the dragon beans are my absolute favorite, but the Green Jade come a close second in my heart. If and when they make it all the way back to the house- I like to toss them with garlic powder, olive oil and salt and roast them until they are carmelized and crispy and then drizzle a little balsamic on them. So good. But. They are other ways to eat them.
I recently looked at a bunch of recipes from Real Simple and one seemed perfectly yumtastic....especially since it involved a fairly simple sauteeing of beans in a little butter/olive oil and drizzling some Mustard Viniagrette and adding sliced toasted almonds. Yeah. That sounds amazing. I love Appalachian Naturals Wildflower Honey Mustard Dressing- it's got old world real mustard and local to the Pioneer Valley honey (right around the corner from my parent's house) and is always the perfect consistency. I use it just as often to make Mustard BBQ chicken as I do to dress up a salad. In any case, there are a bunch of other green beany delicious recipes on the same site, if you like to cook your beans in the first place.