Category: CSA

Delivery #2, Week of June 2, 2025

The News from Windflower Farm

Hello from all of us at a still-wet Windflower Farm!

What’s in the vegetable share?

  • ‘Tropicana’ lettuce (green leaf) or red leaf lettuce
  • ‘Red Russian’ kale
  • ‘Prize’ bok choy
  • ‘Crunchy King’ radishes
  • Baby bunched red or yellow onions
  • Potted ‘Prospera Red’ basil 
  • News from the farm

On Friday of last week, in one spectacular day, three of our staff planted ‘Panisse’ and ‘Tropicana’ lettuce, ‘Red Russian’ kale, ‘Giant of Italy’ parsley and ‘Prospera’ basil, some 15,000 plants in all. And two more stellar employees, along with my son Nate, planted sweet potatoes, another 8,000 plants, or slips as they are called, making for a Windflower Farm one-day planting record. And then it rained, with nearly 3” falling before it was over.

There is much to be said for farming on high ground, and it is more than just the view. Our fields are usually quick to dry out. Still, runoff from a neighbor’s fields, which are even higher than ours, flowed between newly mulched beds of eggplants and chiles, producing nearly enough whitewater to kayak. Friends of ours who farm on both sides of the Tomhannock Creek had over 3” of rain and now cannot cross the ford to tend their crops on the far side of the creek. Weather, that fickle managing partner of our farm, has been particularly out of step with the plans we lesser partners have made for this season.

Next week, we expect to send purple kohlrabi, arugula, lettuce, kale, a mustard mix, radishes, and onions. Next to come from our fields will be cucumbers, squashes, garlic scapes and broccolini, but not until the weather becomes more of a team player.

Best wishes, Ted

Delivery #1, Week of May 26, 2025

The News From Windflower Farm

Hello from all of us at Windflower Farm! Thank you for being with us for the 2025 growing season. Your first shares of the season will be delivered this week.

What’s in the vegetable share?

  • ‘Coastal Star’ Romaine lettuce
  • ‘Red Russian’ kale
  • ‘Fordhook’ Swiss chard
  • ‘Astro’ arugula (a small bunch)
  • Baby bunched Dutch shallots
  • Potted purple or green basil
  • Egg shares start this week.
  • Fruit shares will start in a week or two.

News from the farm

Let’s begin by acknowledging that it’s been a miserable spring. I can hardly remember when I last felt the sunshine or was outside in temperatures warmer than 60-something. Yesterday’s high was 59 degrees, and it is the warmest it’s been in a week. I’m still wearing my thermals! Rainfall so far this May has been 5 inches above normal. The average brightness and solar radiation for the month of May has been just 2/3 of normal. It has been a spring unlike anything we’ve experienced.

These cool, wet and generally bleak conditions have presented us with challenges, but we are feeling optimistic. We have done much over the years to mitigate the effects of foul weather on our production. This year, we have deployed every manner of season-extending paraphernalia, from greenhouse plastics and floating row covers to soil-warming black plastic and woven fabric mulches to encourage our crops. And we use a permanent raised bed system to help achieve earliness.

The field season got underway on Earth Day this year and our first delivery will take place on Rachel Carson’s birthday. In those five weeks, we have planted tomatoes in two large greenhouses and 11 smaller greenhouses (which we call caterpillars). We have planted cucumbers in one large greenhouse, one caterpillar and three 375’ long low tunnels. We have planted peppers in seven caterpillars, lettuces in two caterpillars, kale in two more, and zucchinis in three 375′ low tunnels. And we have planted numerous beds of greens and early root crops in the field and covered them with floating row covers.

All of this is to say that, despite the cold and gray, the start to this season will appear very much like that of any other year – it’s a time for salads. We are happy to be getting started and hope you enjoy your first share.  

Best regards, Ted and the Windflower Team

PS: Windflower Farm hats are once again available for purchase:  If you are interested in a hat, please use this link to order:Windflower Farm Hat Order Form. We will send your hat to your site later this season. 

Distribution #3, January 11, 2025

Winter News from Windflower Farm

Happy New Year from all of us at Windflower Farm! Your third and final box of the winter season will arrive this Saturday.

What you’ll get this month

  • Purple and ‘Toscano’ kale and spinach from our winter greenhouses
  • Sweet potatoes, Russet potatoes and a purple potato variety
  • A butternut squash (from friends at Denison Farm)
  • A bagful of yellow onions and ‘Rosa di Milano’ onions
  • Carrots, beets and celeriac in another bag
  • A jar of jelly made by our friend Deb using her own organically grown berries
  • And a bag of (mostly) ‘Ruby Frost’ apples from the Borden Farm

Special note: Please take home the winter share’s cardboard box and recycle it. Thank you!

News from the farm

We took the final harvest of the season today from our unheated high tunnel #3, and without much sunshine, it was cold. We were a team of five, so the workload was not heavy, but we were all happy when we were finished and we could head to the warmth of the barn. The greens were not only inside a greenhouse, but they were hooped and covered by two layers of a row cover made from spun polypropylene that looks like a painter’s ground cloth. Uncovering the greens on this frigid day, it was gratifying to see the healthy beds of dark green and purple kale and bright green spinach. There are few pests in winter greens. Still, the kale suffered a little from the cold; although it is good now, you should probably use it up within the week. The spinach will keep longer.

On this final harvest day of the season, we received our first box of seeds for next season. These came from High Mowing Seeds, a small New England purveyor of organically produced seeds for Northern growers. As a certified organic grower, Windflower Farm is required (and would choose anyway) to buy organically grown seeds. One of the many benefits of this requirement is that there is now a cottage industry in small scale seed production. Nate took a course in seed saving last winter, and we have been saving seeds of a few favorites. Now there are opportunities for small scale farms to generate additional sales by growing seed crops to sell to organic seed purveyors – a little seed side hustle. High Mowing was featured in the excellent book, The Town That Food Saved, by Ben Hewitt. The town, Hardwick, Vermont, was by coincidence where I first learned to farm many years ago.

And that’s a wrap. Thanks very much for being with us during these first several weeks of winter. Take good care. You’ll hear from us soon regarding the 2025 season.

Best wishes, Ted and the team

Distribution #2, December 14, 2024

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

Winter Share Distribution No. 1 November 16, 2024

The News from Windflower Farm

Things to remember: Please arrive on time. Winter distributions for Central Brooklyn CSA  are at 1251 Dean St. from 4:30 to 6:00

What’s in the share?

  • Lettuce
  • Red Russian kale or Purple Russian kale
  • Mixed mustard greens
  • Broccoli (check for caterpillars, rinse where necessary)
  • Carrots
  • Russet potatoes
  • Sweet potatoes
  • Butternut squash
  • Red and yellow onions
  • Borden Farm apples and
  • Borden Farm apple cider

Your vegetables, fruit and cider are in a large cardboard box that you can keep. The box is heavy! We recommend a wagon, cart, or a friend to help you carry it home. 

Next month’s share will include beets, carrots, kohlrabi, spinach, kale, potatoes, sweet potatoes, buttercup and butternut squashes, apples from the Borden Farm, and Harry’s honey.

Please remember to pick up your eggs, maple, and grains if you’ve ordered them.

A note about grains: Kristoffer from Hickory Wind Farm here- thanks indeed to everyone who signed up for grain shares, we’re glad of your support and to have had a good harvest to offer. Your November distribution includes bags of both Turkey Red Flour (Item 1) and Medina Flour (Item 2), please ensure you get one of each as you pick up. The bag of Medina should be sufficient to make two large sets of very nice pie crusts, if you have a wish to make some for Thanksgiving. A recipe for crusts and apple pie is now included on our website: 

https://hickorywindfarm.net/pages/recipes. You can also find our suggested Turkey Red bread recipe on that page. Thanks! – Kristoffer

What’s new on the farm?

I’m writing on Thursday morning. The landscape outside my front window has the look of Mid-November: the leaves are gone and a frost covers the lawn. We’ve delayed the harvest until 10:00 this morning because overnight temperatures were well below freezing. Greens that are harvested while still frozen will turn to mush afterwards while those that are allowed to thaw prior to harvesting will be fine. We’ll start with kale in the greenhouse which, while unheated, is still warmer than the outside. We’ll then head to the field for the lettuce and mustard mix that are still growing under floating row covers. It will likely be our final field harvest of the season and there is a festive feeling to the day.

Best wishes, Ted, Jan and Nate