Winter News from Windflower Farm
Warm holiday greetings from all of us at Windflower Farm! Your second box of the winter season will arrive this Saturday. Delivery details can be found below.
What you’ll get this month
- ‘Rangitoto’ spinach and ‘Red Russian’ kale from our winter greenhouses
- A bagful of sweet potatoes and Irish potatoes
- A sprig of Rosemary
- A butternut squash (from friends at Denison Farm)
- A bagful of yellow onions and ‘Ed’s Red’ Dutch shallots
- A bagful of carrots and beets
- Honey from Derek Woodcock at Harry’s Honey Patch
- ‘Honeycrisp’ and ‘Jonagold’ apples and ‘Bosc’ pears from the Borden Farm
News from the farm
I am writing at the end of the day on Thursday of winter share week. We’ve just wrapped up harvesting your greens and packaging all that will go into your second winter box. It was a cold, windy and sunny day, and I am grateful to have been harvesting greens in the relative warmth of a greenhouse. The quality of our spinach has never been better. Salvador and Candelaria are spending the holiday season in Mexico, so we were a team of five. We managed to harvest about 300 lb. of spinach from three beds, giving us enough to fill a 12-oz bag for each one of our winter share members, and the three kale beds that we harvested produced a bunch for everyone. We do not wash your greens in the winter, but you should wash them at home with cold water and then spin dry prior to storing them in your refrigerator.
It rained all day yesterday, giving us nearly two inches of much needed rainfall. Hydrologists have said that 9” are needed to restore aquifers to normal levels, so we have a start. For those of us who like to ski, it is sad to think that the unusually deep early powder has just been washed away, but it’s only early December and I’ve been fortunate enough to have enjoyed several days with friends in the Vermont backcountry.
A note on the potato and sweet potato bag – these vegetables have not been washed either. They’ll keep best if they’re stored as they are in a cool place. If potatoes are kept too warm for too long they will sprout. The sweet potatoes are ‘Covingtons’ and the potatoes are ‘Peter Wilcox’ (if dark blue) or ‘French Fingerling’ (if red and oblong).
The ‘Bosc’ pears in your box will appear somewhat shriveled because, at this late point in the season, they have become slightly dehydrated in storage. I have found them to still be good to eat.
Here is a link to a winter CSA article that offers numerous tips regarding the care and handling of your vegetables. https://bittmanproject.com/winter-csas/
Wishing you and yours a healthy and happy holiday season, Ted, Jan, Nate, Andrea and Jason
Central Brooklyn CSA 