Farm News, November 2, 2021
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Please note our Fall Farmstand Hours:
Tuesday & Thursday: 2 - 6 PM (closing a half hour earlier)
Saturday: 9 am - 12:30 pm (opening 1 hour later)
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Looks like the September weather is about to end abruptly. We will finally see a frost this week, but it’s long overdue, and most of the sensitive crops are winding down anyway. We’ve got a lot of ginger to harvest from the high tunnel, and enough escarole left out in the field to feed half of Calabria with ‘scarole and beans, but we’ve tucked those crops in with a warm frost blanket, and there’s heat still left in the soil, so they should be fine. We’ve also got plenty of cold tolerant crops like baby spinach, kale, and collards that taste better with a touch of frost. And perhaps the frost will help jump start us to get that last ton of potatoes out of the ground before it really gets cold.
Connor mixes in compost and a rock mineral fertilizer blend into the future garlic beds.
Our big triumph last week was getting the farm stock of seed garlic popped into individual cloves, and getting the garlic beds spread with compost and fertilizer, and gently mixing it all into the soil with our power harrow. The crew made short work of planting 16,000 cloves, making sure each one went in roots down, shoot up. Now we’ve just got to spread chopped leaves and straw over the bed and let the cloves work their magic next spring.
All hands on deck for garlic popping! Only mighty Paul can make this job look easy…
The days are shortening, and we’ve been making the start time a bit later each week to stay ahead of sunrise. This week we will be fighting freezing temperatures as well as low light. We’d like to gradually continue our later start time until the ground freezes up, but unfortunately the impending change in Daylight Savings –are we going on or coming off? – interferes with our nice steady progression.
The crew collectively bends over 16,000 times to make the garlic crop happen. It’s a task filled with hope for next season.
If you ever hear that Daylight Savings Time is for farmers, please count us out on that one. Very few veggie farmers want to walk out into a dark, frozen field in November to bunch kale!
We hope you enjoy the farm and the harvest,
Paul and Rebecca for the Fort Hill Farm Crew
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BRING YOUR MASK! Due to the everchanging pandemic conditions, we are requiring masks for all individuals, regardless of vaccination status, while visiting in the barn. Masks are not required outside the barn. Thank you!
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Featured veg:
Fresh Young Ginger…. ON SALE this week!: We only have a few weeks of fresh ginger left, as dictated by the weather. We’ve been juicing it in the AM with turmeric, lemon, and apples for a vibrant health elixir - yum!
Magic Molly potatoes: Really, what more could one ask of a potato? Deep indigo color (“blue-all-the-way-through”), moist flesh, rich potato flavor ... all in a plumpish fingerling shape. It’s a winner all around, and has become one of our favorites. Store spuds a room temperature, in the dark, for several weeks.
Also available:
Salad mix, arugula, head lettuce, pea shoots, red radishes, salad turnips, red and green cabbage, red and Chioggia beets, curly and lacinato kale, rainbow chard, parsley, chives, oregano, sage, thyme, rosemary, radicchio, Dark Red Norland, Satina Gold, Blue Gold, Magic Molly, Kennebec and Fingerling potatoes, German Extra Hardy garlic, escarole, leeks, celeriac, baby bok choy, collards, parsnips, butternut and Kogi Nut squash, sweet potatoes, fresh young ginger, limited apples from our certified organic, no-spray orchard
Coming Soon:
Gilfeather Turnips
Pick Your Own:
Flowers: * COME EARLY in the week for flowers, as they will not survive the evening temps this week! BOUQUETS are STILL HALF PRICE!
Perennial Herbs: * please get an herb ring from the barn for bunch size.
Chives, Oregano, Thyme, and Sage for all of those fall recipes
PYO Hours: 1:30 - 7PM. (PYO begins 30 minutes before and goes 30 minutes beyond barn hours.)
Recipes
Suggested by Rebecca Batchie
For more recipes, check out the Fort Hill Farm Recipe Database
Purple Potatoes With Caramelized Onions and Shiitake Mushrooms
From SimplyRecipes
Ingredients
3 slices of thick style bacon
1/2 pound new purple potatoes sliced in half and then in small wedges
1 small yellow onion, thinly sliced lengthwise
4 medium sized shiitake mushrooms, thinly sliced
Extra virgin olive oil
Kosher Salt
Freshly cracked pepper
1 pinch red pepper flakes
1 tablespoon chopped fresh tarragon (can sub with fresh parsley or thyme)
1 tablespoon chopped capers
1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter
Method
Start caramelizing the onions:
In a small sauté pan heat one tablespoon of olive oil over a low heat. Add the sliced onions in one even layer, after five minutes add 1/2 tablespoon of butter, stir and add a pinch of kosher salt.
While rendering your bacon and cooking your mushrooms in the next steps, make sure to stir the onions every few minutes and remove once they are evenly browned. This should take around 30 minutes, remove from heat when finished and reserve.
Cook the bacon:
While the onions are slowly cooking slice the bacon in small batonettes (1/8-inch crosswise strips) on your cutting board. Heat up a larger sauté pan on medium and when your pan is hot add the sliced bacon.
Slowly sauté the bacon until slightly crispy and remove from the pan onto a paper towel-lined plate, reserve for later.
Cook mushrooms in rendered bacon fat:
Julienne the shiitake mushrooms and then add them to the pan which now has the rendered bacon fat.
Add a pinch of salt and fresh cracked pepper to the Shiitake mushrooms, don’t shake the pan but let the mushrooms brown evenly on one side.
Once browned, flip the mushrooms delicately and remove from pan onto a smaller plate, reserve.
Brown the purple potatoes:
Add 2 Tablespoons of olive oil in the pan and add the evenly sliced potatoes to the hot pan in a single layer; make sure not to crowd the pan. Add a pinch of red pepper flakes and a good pinch of salt to the potatoes.
Don’t move the pan, this is very important so that the potatoes can evenly brown. Serves 3-4.
After 3-5 minutes, when they are browned flip potatoes and brown the other side, turn down the heat to medium low to evenly cook the potatoes.
Add capers, onions, mushrooms, bacon:
Once the potatoes are thoroughly cooked, add the capers and let crisp up for a minute. Then combine the caramelized onions, mushrooms, and bacon to the large sauté pan with the browned potatoes.
Re-warm over low heat. When hot, turn the heat off and garnish with a sprinkle of fresh picked tarragon.
Vegan Butternut Squash Soup
From BonAppetit
Ingredients
1 large onion
3 garlic cloves
1 2" piece ginger
A small handful of cilantro, with stems
1 large butternut squash (3½–4 lb.)
1 13.5-oz. can unsweetened coconut milk, divided
2 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil
¼ tsp. crushed red pepper flakes
3 tsp. kosher salt, plus more
½ cup unsweetened coconut flakes
2 limes
1. Preheat oven to 300°. Trim the ends off of 1 onion. Cut in half through root end, peel and discard skin, then coarsely chop. (No need to sweat the knife work here—it's all going to get blended anyway.) Transfer chopped onion to a medium bowl.
2. Using the flat side of chef’s knife, smash 3 garlic cloves. Peel and discard skins, then coarsely chop. Transfer to the bowl with the chopped onion.
3. Using a spoon, peel 2" piece ginger. (We always like to use a spoon to peel ginger, which is way better for navigating all of those nooks and crannies than a vegetable peeler.) Thinly slice and add to bowl with onion and garlic.
4. Trim a handful of cilantro leaves with tender stems; set aside for serving. Coarsely chop remaining stems and transfer about ¼ cup chopped stems to bowl with onion. Clear your cutting board.
5. It’s time to break down your squash! (We promise it’s not as scary as it sounds.) Trim off both ends of 1 butternut squash, then cut through where the neck meets the bulb. (This makes it easier to peel.) Peel both pieces of squash with a vegetable peeler. Cut squash neck and bulb in half lengthwise. Using a spoon, scoop out seeds from each half of the bulb; discard seeds. Place squash pieces cut side down on board and cut each piece in half lengthwise. Cut squash crosswise into 1"-thick slices. Again, you don't need to worry about beautiful knife work here, but it's good for the pieces to be similarly sized so they cook at the same rate.
6. Vigorously shake 13.5-oz. can of coconut milk for a few seconds so everything gets well mixed. Open can and set aside 3 Tbsp. milk to swirl over finished soup.
7. Heat 2 Tbsp. oil in a large Dutch oven or saucepan over medium. Add onion mixture, ¼ tsp. red pepper flakes, and 1 tsp. salt and cook, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon, until onion is translucent and soft, 5–7 minutes.
8. Add squash and give everything a stir to coat. Add 3 cups water, or enough to just submerge the squash, remaining coconut milk in can, and 2 tsp. salt, then stir to combine. Raise heat to high and bring soup to a boil.
9. Once soup is boiling, reduce heat to medium-low and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are very tender, 12–14 minutes.
10. Meanwhile, prepare your garnishes. Spread ½ cup coconut flakes on a rimmed baking sheet. Toast in oven until golden brown, about 5 minutes. (If you can't find big coconut flakes, shredded is okay, too, but it will probably take less time to toast. Just make sure to avoid any pre-sweetened stuff.) Keep an eye on them—coconut flakes can go from golden to burnt in seconds. Cut 1 lime into wedges; set aside for serving. Using a fork or citrus reamer, juice the second lime into a small bowl.
11. You’re almost ready to blend—so let’s do this! First things first: set up your workstation. You’ll need your pot of soup, blender, a large bowl, a ladle, and a clean kitchen towel all within arm’s reach. Using ladle, fill blender pitcher no more than halfway with equal parts broth and vegetables (if you fill it up, it will overflow as it blends!). Now, here’s the most important step of this entire recipe: When you secure the blender lid, make sure there is a vent for the steam to escape (many blender lids come with removable vents). If you skip this step, the lid will blow off and you will end up with soup on every inch of your kitchen.
12. Holding the lid down with a folded kitchen towel, carefully blend soup, starting from the lowest speed and working your way up to high, until smooth and silky, 10–15 seconds. Transfer to a large bowl. Repeat, working in batches, until all soup is blended.
13. Wipe out Dutch oven and return to stove. Pour soup back into pot and heat over medium, stirring occasionally, until you can see steam rising from the pot. (You may be tempted to serve the soup straight from the blender, but it loses a lot of heat in the blending process and gets lukewarm. Trust us—you want to reheat it.) Stir in lime juice. Taste and add more salt if needed.
14. Ladle soup into bowls. Top with a swirl of reserved coconut milk, toasted coconut flakes, and cilantro. Serve with reserved lime wedges.