It’s Week Two of the Summer CSA! It was really wonderful to see so many of your happy faces at the first pickup last week. We hope that getting your share felt easy. straightforward, and that you enjoyed some incredibly fresh salads afterwards. We can’t wait to fill your baskets with more and more fresh goodness as the weeks progress. During the winter we made big plans to get some of the peak summer crops to you a little earlier than usual, and it seems like our plans will start to pay off soon. We dedicated one of our big hoophouses to early zucchini, basil, and cucumbers, and I harvested the first zucchini yesterday. I even saw the first adorable little cucumber (and, impressively, I successfully restrained myself from plucking it off and devouring it immediately). So while we won’t have the big zuke and cuke field harvests rolling in for a while yet, we hope to start getting these early summer crops to you soon!

From my spot at the upstairs computer I can see the transplanted sweet corn in the front field, and it’s growing so fast it almost seems like I can see it stretch higher by the minute. I can hear Cookie, our noisiest cow, bellowing about the injustice of god-knows-what imagined slight, and I hear Maple barking her way down the driveway to intimidate/greet the latest innocent CSA member coming to pick up their share out of the walk-in. Music is filtering in from the part of the house that the apprentices live in, backed up by the chorus of frogs from the old sauna pond out back. The sounds of summer Saturday evenings on the farm.

If you signed up for a chicken CSA add-on, this week is your first delivery! Please let me know if you will not be at your pickup, so that I can keep your bird frozen at the farm until you can come by or arrange to get it. It is an “off” week for the egg/tofu/yogurt/ferment shares. And a slight head’s up — as you may have noticed last week, we’ve already had to veer off the “this week in your share” list. At this time of year some things are jumping up, and others that we think will be ready are, upon uncovering and preparing to harvest, not quite so ready or lovely. So for right now it’s less of a fixed list and a bit more of a “hopefully this will be in your share… then again, something else not even on this list might be ready before we expected!” Part of the surprise, the joy, the frustration of sharing in the ups and downs of a farm. Thank you for being a part of it all with us.

Be well, have a great week, and be in touch with any questions!

Reba and the HCF crew

Summer CSA Week Two Veggies: Salad Mix, Arugula, Pea Tendrils, Pac Choi or Gailon Broccoli or Basil, Swiss Chard or Kale

Week Two Add-ons: Chicken, Milk, Bread, Cheese, Mushrooms, Oil & Vinegar

Cheese Week Two, Oil & Vinegar Week Two

This week‘s recipes: Simple Lemon Pasta with Parmesan and Pea Shoots, Warm Chickpea Salad with Arugula