Farm News October 29, 2024
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FALL Farmstand & PYO HOURS:
CLOSED FRIDAYS
Tuesday & Thursday: 2 - 5:30 PM
Saturday: 9 am - 12:30 pm
Our LAST farmstand day is Tuesday, November 26.
* Online ordering begins on Nov. 30 *
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This week’s farm news is being brought to you by our farm operations manager Elliott McGann. Elliott keeps the train on the rails each day and makes sure the farm’s tasks get done each week. He keeps track of the many hundreds of field plantings we do each season and keeps everything irrigated to boot. Elliott writes:
The unusually dry weather pattern has continued, with yet another week without rain!
These dry, windy, and dusty conditions are challenging for humans on the farm, but the remaining crops in the field are thriving from the sunny days and lack of disease promoting wet and cloudy conditions that are more typical of fall in Connecticut. Our late-season offerings are plentiful with arugula, lettuce, kale, chard, collards, herbs, leeks, fennel, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, and more still going strong.
The greenhouses are stocked up for the next few months.
With the large harvests of winter squash, potatoes, sweet potatoes, and beets behind us, only a few carrots remain in the field to bring in. This week, we will shift our focus to "popping" garlic – breaking thousands of garlic bulbs by hand into individual cloves for planting. We’ll need over 20,000 cloves to plant next year’s crop! We will also begin to have a little more time for cleanup and repair projects that were set aside during the busy spring and start construction of a new high tunnel.
It’s hard to believe that there are still good dahlia blossoms to be had after this scene from Monday morning – but it’s true!
One of my roles here is to stock the farm store with locally sourced products, and I’m excited to highlight a few new additions:
Cows Around The Corner - Located in Bethlehem, this husband and wife team make their delicious and award winning Greek yogurt, chèvre, and feta using milk sourced right here in New Milford. I’ve been enjoying Greek salads loaded with their feta!
Sacred Grounds - From right around the corner in Sherman, they have been providing us with a rotating variety of coffee beans from around the world all season long.
Cross Culture Kombucha - Brewed down the road in Danbury - we have two new, limited-time seasonal flavors in stock right now: Apple Chai and my personal favorite, Hopped Peach.
We also continue to stock local farm products from all over Connecticut. We have maple syrup from Ridgway Farm from West Cornwall, Peter Sadlon’s honey from Lakeville, salami from Oui Charcuterie in Woodbridge, delicious cheeses from Cato Corner Farm in Colchester, shiitake mushrooms from Sea Coast Mushrooms in Mystic, and a wide variety of meats from Howling Flats Farm in Canann. And let’s not forget fruit from our talented orchardists: Hidden Gem in Southbury, Maple Bank Farm in Roxbury, and Averill Farm in Washington.
Thank you for supporting the farm and enjoying these local products with us!
Paul, Rebecca, and the Fort Hill Farm crew
Featured veg:
Mixed Eggplant: Eggplant didn’t exactly flourish this year, but we do have a fine last hurrah … a nice last big pick of smaller-sized fruit, composed mainly of the classic Italian and a bit of Asian, Rosa Bianca, and Graffiti thrown in too. Check out the recipe below for a refreshing change of pace.
Hot Peppers: Another end-of-season affair from the pepper patch that, along with the dahlias, Paul has been frost irrigating to prolong the harvest. There are plenty of Jalapeno, which you may have noticed are considerably larger this year after many, many years of trialing; the popular, Easiest Side Dish Ever award winner, Shishito, which are mild (except that 1 in 10 or 20 might light your mouth on fire!); Poblano ("Ancho" when dried) (again, much larger this season…), which have a richly flavored, mild spiciness - perfect for a pot of beans or the classic Chile Rellenos; and you may even see some Cayenne, the Chile-shaped, deep red, hottest pepper we grow. Dehydrate or oven dry for a bit of spice all winter long. If you prefer a milder heat simply de-seed the pepper and be sure to thoroughly wash your hands with soap and water immediately after handling hot peppers (better yet, since the capsaicin doesn’t wash off completely, wear gloves!).
Also available:
Head lettuce; salad mix; arugula; sweet winter spinach; pea shoots; curly and lacinato kale; rainbow & ruby chard; purple, red and French Breakfast radish; cilantro, parsley, red beets, chioggia beets and gold beets; red and green cabbage; baby Bok Choy; limited heirloom and beefsteak tomatoes; sweet fall carrots; limited romanesco; German Extra Hardy garlic; red and yellow storage onions; jalapeño, cayenne, poblano and shishito peppers; red bell peppers: limited sweet red Italian and orange snacking peppers; limited Classic Italian, Graffiti, and Rosa Bianca eggplant; Dark Red Norland, Magic Molly, LaRatte Gold and Pinto Gold fingerlings, Kennebec, and and Satina Gold potatoes; leeks; celeriac; fabulous fall fennel; collard greens; escarole; radicchio (round and Treviso); fresh ginger; Honeynut squash; Jester Delicata squash (limited); sweet potatoes; Murasaki Japanese sweet potatoes Butternut squash; Koginut squash; Brussels sprouts; certified organic parsnips and Gilfeather Turnips from Picadilly Farm, NH (farmstand only)
Pick Your Own:
Perennial Herbs:
There are HERB RINGS provided to establish the bunch size.
Chives and Oregano: trim long lengths from the base of the plant, leaving 1” behind
Sage: clip 4 - 6 inches from the largest stems
Thyme: clip 4-6 from the perimeter of the plant
Dahlias:
It may no longer be a Dahlia Meadow, but there are still some good flowers to be had if you don’t mind moving around a bit. Be sure to use the flower ring provided to establish the bunch size.
Recipes
Suggested by Rebecca Batchie
Not into this particular recipe? For more recipes outlined by crop, check out the Fort Hill Farm Recipe Database.
The Best Eggplant Shakshuka
From the ImmigrantsTable
Ingredients
2 large onion
2 medium eggplant
8 TBs oil
8 large tomatoes or a can of canned tomatoes
6 cloves of garlic
2 tsp of salt or more, to taste
2 TB paprika
1 TB cumin
2 tsp chili flakes or ½ of a fresh jalapeno - this would depend on your spice tolerance level
1 tsp sugar
Juice of ½ a lemon
a handful of parsley to taste
8 eggs
Instructions
Chop onions finely. Dice eggplant and tomatoes into ½ inch cubes. Place eggplant in a colander, and salt it to draw liquids out. Mince garlic finely. If using a fresh jalapeno pepper, chop ½ a pepper finely.
Heat a large pan to medium heat - the pan would preferably be either non-stick, or enamel-coated (trust me, you want something that you're not going to have to scrape eggs and sauce from). When pan is hot, add one TB of vegetable oil, and onion. Saute onion on medium heat for 5 minutes, then lower heat to medium-low and cook for another 5.
When onions have turned golden, add 2 TBs of oil and eggplant cubes - but do not crowd them! It's better that you use less eggplant than crowding it, because it won't result in an even browning. Let eggplant brown for a few minutes, then when the eggplant has soaked up all the oil, add another TB of oil, and toss eggplant to coat. Continue browning eggplant for 10 minutes, turning pieces occasionally to ensure equal coverage, until all have coloured evenly.
Add tomatoes to pan. Let tomatoes draw water on medium heat, stirring occasionally, until they all break down into a chunky sauce (this can take anywhere between 15 and 25 minutes). Add chopped garlic cloves and spices.
Crack eggs into a bowl. Traditionally, eggs are simply poured into the shakshuka sauce, one egg per hole; but some people, myself included, prefer the eggs scrambled separately, and then mixed with a bit of sauce in their little nests. If you're unsure what you will prefer, try both methods.
With a wooden spoon, create holes in the sauce for the eggs. Pour eggs into holes, one egg per nest (or a bit of egg scramble per nest, if going the scrambled route). On medium heat, cover pan (this is important!), and let eggs cook between 8 to 10 minutes, testing for doneness after eight (you want the whites of the eggs to set and change from translucent, while the yolk should still be a little jiggly). Squeeze the juice of half a lemon on the shakshuka.
Sprinkle with chopped parsley, and serve immediately with a little bit of yogurt and crusty bread, to taste. Don't forget to sop up the sauce when you're done.
Notes
To make this dish into a vegan eggplant shakshuka, sub the eggs for pieces of extra firm tofu. Dice the tofu into 1-inch cubes, and then crush the cubes into crumbles with a wooden spoon or spatula. Stir the tofu crumbles into the sauce in the same way you would stir in the eggs - and voila! You've got a killer plant-based dish.
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