This is the week that the garden started to flex. It does that, on the heels of summer’s passing peak. This is the week that people started to make winter plans. The bracken ferns all browned. I thought about woodpiles. And corn and melons joined the tomato party and here we are.
The first half of the week was one of those deepening drought arcs. Anything not deeply rooter or irrigated became crunchy.
One day, the radar finally showed an oncoming raincloud zooming right for us. We battened hatches and stared at the rumbling western sky as the humidity spiked, the breeze died, then picked up sharply as the rumbling came nearer and those clouds darkened and began to flash.
And then we all let the rain come down on us and I think maybe we were feeling how those dry plants were feeling as that brief , beautiful deluge washed over the Farm.
It was another good week.
Inside Box 10
- Sweet Corn – sooner the sweeter. Please eat one raw, right now, where you are, with your hands and face. As one does.
- No seriously go get one.
- Cherry Tomatoes
- Tomatoes
- Cherry Bomb Peppers <spicy>
- Not Spicy Peppers – either Shisito roasting peppers, or Purple Island bell peppers, or ancho or maybe poblano
- Zucchini
- Carrots – hard fought
- Arugula Microgreens
- Thai Basil
- Cukes
- Mystery Mix Melons – if you don’t get a watermelon today, you will next week.
- Onions
- Shallots
“The fanciest of cultivated alliums. Leeks are special for sure but they got that wackado top going on… it’s hard to take them so seriously. And if you want to challenge me on this with ramps… I will ask to to reread the qualifier I included in the first sentence.
So yes. Shallots. They cast a spell over your meal. They increase the chance of you opening a bottle of white wine by 80%. You will zest your citrus and include some obscure herb in the dish like chervil. You will feel weirdly compelled to find chervil even though you don’t have a clue what it taste like. You will curse your CSA for NEVER giving to chervil even though you suspect they grow it (they do not). When you finally find it, you will chiffonade it. The shallots will shine in perfect harmony.
Also totally possible that some other member of your household will grab those “weird shaped little onions” and just slap-dash throw them into any old thing. That’s how you get haunted by the ghost of Jacque Pepin. ” – K
