CSA Share Notes:

We hope you’re having a wonderfully scary halloween today. Our little ghoul (almost 2 y/o) is heading to her very first trick-or-treat event today dressed as cookie monster.

The big frost that settled in had us really spooked this week, considering how our most vulnerable crops would fare, so Justin and Tara spent hours Tuesday and Wednesday getting row cover on several of garden rows that have the most tender crops in them.  The super lightweight fabric comes on 1000 ft rolls and we cut it to length as we go.  It keeps the air temperature under the cover up to 3 degrees warmer than outside, so if the temps just barely dip below 32, it offers great protection. If temps are in the low 20’s the row cover can’t save ’em. We’ll be getting frost a few more nights, so once we get a nice sunny day, we’ll lift off all the row cover and see how it all fared.

Here’s the vegetable line up this week (more cool weather crops are coming soon!) :

• Bell Peppers—Large shares received these this week. We grow a huge array of colors, and each color has a slightly different flavor. Red and orange will be the sweetest, purple, or green will all taste more like your standard green bell pepper. The frost will likely bring this crop and all other pepper crops to an end tonight.
• Italian Peppers—Regular shares received these. These are another type of sweet pepper, like a bell, but with thinner walls. They’re great to slice into small rings to top a pizza, or just to snack with some hummus or pesto.
• Cayenne—Regular shares received a handful of small, super spicy cayenne peppers. These should be one or two ticks hotter than a jalapeño, but not as hot as habaneros. They’re long and slender, a little like the Italian peppers, but smaller, so be careful not to confuse them!
• Jalapeño—Large shares received these. If you want less heat, remove the seeds and skeleton, or if we want to really heat up a meal, we leave them in.
• Kale/Collard—Everyone received our super tender and healthy Red Russian Kale variety. A few received collard. This crop may need an extra week to recover from this cold dreary weather, so you might not see it for a bit.
• Swiss Chard—Large shares received this tender green.  The plants are really small right now so the bunches are small. We’ll give them a couple of weeks to recover, and if we get plenty of sunshine, we’ll have lots more of this crop.
• Zucchini—Tender and flavorful. This crop and the squash have row cover on it, but being a hot weather crop, it can’t tolerate even the slightest dip below 33, so today may be the last of it.
• Squash—Super interesting and pretty Zephyr variety, which is green on one end, yellow on the other.
• Winter Squash—Today we’re giving you more acorn squash.  These are fantastic stuffed, sliced into rings and roasted or grilled, cubed and put into a hearty soup, etc. enjoy!
• Onions—Nearing the end of this crop! We’ll see if there are enough for one more week next week.
• Garlic—More of our Heirloom Red Hardneck garlic. Nothin’ beats fresh garlic.
• Sweet Potatoes—These lovely taters are not grown at Red Moon Farm. Sweet Potatoes take up a huge amount of room and Red Moon Farm is working on a pretty small scale. They do incredibly well in our East Texas soil and seeing as there are 3rd generation sweet potato farmers right down the road who do a bang-up job, we leave it to them. Tony Phillips grew these babies for you and you’ll be seeing them quite a lot over the coming weeks.

Veggie Storage tips:

The squash, zucchini, hot peppers, and sweet peppers can be stored at room temp for a few days, or they’ll last at least a week in the fridge. The squash blossoms and the leafy greens like kale will want to be kept really cold. Make sure they’re sealed up so they don’t get wilty. Onions, garlic, and winter squash prefer to stay at room temp.  Everything will need a significant washing before cooking, but leave the dirt on until you’re ready to use them to prevent faster spoilage.

We’d love to hear stories and recipes of your culinary adventures this week. Send us a note or post a comment of how you’ve used your CSA share.

Your farmers,

Jess & Justin

Large Share

Large Share:  (top left to right)  Collard and garlic, Bell peppers, sweet potatoes, zucchini and squash, acorn squash, jalapenos and habaneros, chard and onions.

Regular Share

Regular share: (top left to right) Kale, Italian peppers, zucchini and squash, in a column: cayenne peppers, acorn squash, onion, and garlic, and sweet potatoes at the end.