The News from Windflower Farm
Winter greetings from all of us at Windflower Farm! Your fourth and final share of the winter season will arrive on Saturday, February 5th.
What’s in the share?
- An Allium bag (yellow onions and red shallots)
- A bagful of carrots, beets, red and purple turnips
- A spinach bag
- A fruit bag containing Ruby Frost and Empire apples
- Sweet potatoes and potatoes in a bag
- Celeriac loose in the box
- And a jar of jam from our neighbor Deb’s Country Kitchen
To fill out this last box of the winter season, we reached out to organic farmers in our neighborhood. These are some of the people who will be a part of our more collaborative CSA in the future. Our friends Brian and Justine at Denison Farm provided the celeriac in this month’s share. Andrew Knafle at Clearbrook Farm helped with potatoes. Adam Hainer at Juniper Hill Farm helped with beets and carrots. And the Bordens provided the tree fruit. Everything else came from Windflower. Our friend Deb has a yard that contains berries of virtually every kind, including blueberries, Concord grapes, elderberries, red raspberries and blackberries, and makes hundreds of jars of jam each summer. She has made the jam in this month’s box.
We know that turnips are not much in fashion these days, but you should know that they make for excellent soup stock. Most of their off-putting flavors are eliminated during the simmering, and they add a good deal to any broth, giving it a creamy texture. Here’s a link to a spinach-turnip-carrot-onion soup: https://www.eatingwell.com/recipe/252800/creamy-turnip-soup/.
Celeriac should be part of every roasted root vegetable medley, adding color, texture and a delicious celery flavor. For something more interesting, try celeriac fritters. Peel the celeriac, cut into strips, deep fry, then serve with a little Dijon and mayonnaise. Numerous recipes exist; here’s one: https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/celeriac-comte-fritters.
For several hours yesterday we harvested greenhouse spinach in full sunshine in temperatures in the upper 60s. A few hours in the sun does wonders for the spirit. During the nights this week, this space will have been well below freezing. Winter greens production is always risky in unheated greenhouses, and this has been a particularly cold winter. Twenty-one days in January were significantly colder than normal. But spinach is a hardy green, and you’ll get a bag of it this month. Soon we’ll be turning the heat on these very greenhouses. It will be time to sow the seeds that will become next year’s produce, starting with tomatoes, peppers and onions.
We’d like to thank you for being with us this winter. We hope you’ve enjoyed your share. Please drop us a line if you have an idea that will help us improve future winter shares. You’ll hear from us about summer shares later this winter or in early spring. In the meantime, we hope you enjoy the rest of winter.
Best wishes, Ted and Jan
PS: Here is a note from Kristoffer Ross about your final grain share.
Hello folks,
Your final winter Grain Share Item is a 1 pound bag of Oat Groats. They can easily be cooked into an excellent oatmeal or porridge, for which you can find directions on the ‘Grain Recipes’ page of our Website. Our sincere thanks for supporting our continued efforts to sustainably diversify our farm, and to the Blomgren Family for allowing us to partner with them. If you would like to order more products before the next CSA season, you can do so directly via hickorywindfarm.net, and they will be shipped to you affordably via USPS. Kristoffer Ross
PPS: Your pick-up time and location is noted below.
Central Brooklyn (1251 Dean St., 4:30 to 6:00)
Please note:
1. A friend, family member or neighbor can pick up your share for you if you are not able to make it to distribution. Please ask this person to sign-in under your name.
2. Site hosts are not obliged to save shares for members who miss the distribution window. Any shares leftover after distribution will be donated to community fridges or food pantries and will help other community members in need.
3. The farm is not able to send you a make-up share if you miss a distribution. The farm will send your shares on the distribution dates only.
4. The farm will send you a newsletter a day or two before distribution. Please save these two emails to your preferred contacts list: windflowercsa@gmail.com and tedblomgren@gmail.com and check your SPAM folder if our newsletter does not make it into your inbox.
5. Watch for updates from site hosts on social media. Many sites post updates about the share on Instagram and Facebook.
Central Brooklyn CSA 