Harvest season is in full swing here and it is awesome!  Onions are finished and winter squash is starting to fill up the bins in our storage room.  Watermelon and cantaloupe are getting sweeter every day, and the corn!  The other holiday we wait and wait for all summer- sweet corn is finally ready!  We grow an organic bi-color variety called 'Luscious' it is really sweet and we just love it.  Our flower garden is in full bloom right now, this is my favorite field on the farm despite that it is by far the weediest field- I think that is due to the fact that Shane has deemed it my territory to maintain.  

The other new thing this week is Tomatillos!  They might not be the most exciting, but harvesting them is pretty fun.  When the tomatillo is ready, it's husk has split open and it hangs a bit lower to the ground on the plant, and there are tons of them!  Here is my basic recipe for tomatillo salsa-

This week in your share
Cantaloupe, Tomatoes, Cucumber, Sweet Corn, 
Eggplant, Garlic, Onions, Herbs
Sweet Pepper, Kale or Cabbage & Tomatillos

Our rainy growing season is finally paying off.  I feel like this is our thank you from mother nature- these sweet juicy amazing melons we just harvested.  And how do we enjoy the very first fruit?  Well by cracking it open and having a snack right in the melon patch, almost everything tastes better when eaten in the field!  

We grilled up almost an entire shares worth of vegetables the other night when we had family in town.  This time I made a cucumber salad to go with it.   I scooped out the seeds and let the sliced cucumber sit in salt water for a bit, then poured off the brine and added apple cider vinegar, fresh dill, olive oil, salt & pepper.  At the table we added rice and plain yogurt,  Shane covered his plate in Sriracha while the rest of us just topped it with some feta cheese , delicious both ways! 

This week in your share-
Watermelon! Swiss Chard or Kale, Pepper, Broccoli or Cauliflower, Tomatoes, Garlic, Scallions, Choice of 3- Cucumber, Zucchini, Summer Squash & Cabbage
Fresh herbs this week include-  Sweet Basil, Purple Basil, Parsley, Cilantro, Thyme, Sage, Rosemary and Dill.

August is one of our favorite months on the farm, everything is in full swing and the rhythm of the farm just feels good this time of year.  But really it's our favorite because it is full on tomato season in Vermont.  You can push the season early and late with greenhouses, but really it's all about right now.  Once the seed catalogs start showing up in early winter the tomato anticipation begins.  Hundreds of varieties to choose from  big red beefsteaks, heirlooms in every color and stripe you could dream, cute little cherry tomatoes, paste tomatoes for canning and cooking.  This year we planted 26 different varieties of heirlooms, 6 combinations of grafted beefsteak tomatoes, 9 different cherry tomatoes and 2 paste tomatoes.  
In the next couple of weeks we will have cherry tomatoes and heirlooms in your CSA share!

This evening for dinner I started off by making a really simple slaw-
-1 mini cabbage-sliced thin
-1 lime juiced
-pinch of salt
-1 T sugar
-1 T cumin


That led me to- beans and rice with veggies- I sautéed a red pepper, zucchini and scallions together and then added in back beans at the end.  I made a quick fresh salsa to go with it-
-1-2 tomato chopped
-a little bit of scallion chopped
-cilantro
-Hot pepper or hot sauce
-Lime juice
-salt

This week in your share-
Celery! Tomatoes, Scallion, Carrots, Potatoes, Lettuce
Herbs, Garlic, Beans!
 Red or Purple pepper and your choice of 3 -
zucchini, summer squash, cucumber and cabbage