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It's the height of the season, we've reached the pinnacle. That short but sweet time of year when we're loaded with the beautiful fruits of our summer labor- tomatoes, peppers, watermelons, and cantaloupe. It's a great time to stock up and cook it all down into sauces and salsas, and maybe preserve a bit of that sweet summer flavor to save for the colder months. Check out Ali's Super Simple Tomato Sauce Recipe.  We'll have flats of Roma tomatoes for sale at the markets this weekend: Friday 3-6pm in front of Chapman's in Fairlee, and Saturday 9-1pm at the Norwich Farmers' Market. CSA customers can order from our online store for pick up along with their weekly share. All the ingredients you need to make a delicious Salsa Verde are available right now: tomatillos, garlic, cilantro, hot peppers. It's so simple, you're going to love it! Check out the recipe here.  This is the final week of our Summer CSA Shares, but there's still much more to come! We have a few spaces open for our Fall CSA Shares. Sign up today and receive the best of our fall harvest for the next 16 weeks, until the end of December. Weekly deliveries or Half Share bi-weekly deliveries available for the fall season.  Join us on Sunday August 21st, 10-2pm. Stop by for a tour of our fields on Sunday anytime between 10-2pm. We'll also offer a tasting of some unusual vegetable varieties, and a pop-up market if you'd like to buy fresh vegetables or sauerkraut. Bring a hat and good walking shoes, and come take a tour of the farm at the height of our harvest season!
 Our tomatoes are at their peak, so it'll be a tomato party at market this weekend! Stop by our Fairlee Market in front of Chapman's Store on Friday afternoon 3-6pm or the Norwich Market from 9-1pm on Saturday. Pick up a 10 lb flat and make a batch of tomato sauce or salsa this weekend. This is a great time to do some canning!  August is a time of transitions at the farm. Most of our planting and weeding is done for the season and now we're focused on bringing the harvest in, setting our open fields to cover crops, and planning our fall projects. August is also the time when we say goodbye to some of our summer crew members. Sammy is heading back for her Junior year at Endicott College, and Lauren has made her way back to Rhode Island after graduating from VT Law School this summer. We're so grateful for all of the hard work and dedication of our amazing summer crew! Thank you Sammy & Lauren, best of luck to you both!!  Speaking of transitions... It's time to sign up for our Fall CSA Shares!! Our fall shares begin September 1st and go for 16 weeks until December 21st. Fall Shares still hold the best of the summer harvest with tomatoes, peppers, and melons extending through mid-October and fresh greens and herbs all the way until December. Check out photos of our Fall Shares and sign up on our website today!  Open Farm Day! Join us on Sunday August 21st, 10-2pm. Guided farm tours every 1/2 hour starting at 10am. Come see our vegetable farm at the height of harvest season. We'll also offer a tasting of vegetable varieties, and a pop-up market if you'd like to buy fresh vegetables or sauerkraut. Bring a hat and good walking shoes, and come take a tour of the farm! Interested in seeing more farms in the area? Check out the complete listings for Vermont Open Farm Week online.
This week we'd like to introduce Ali Price, a Root 5 Farm CSA member and local food educator. Ali provides group and private cooking lessons to folks in the Upper Valley. She's also an aspiring Health Coach and born and raised vegetable lover. This season Ali is creating a series of weekly recipes that work with the ingredients in her CSA box. Her recipes are clear and easy to read, with lots of step-by-step photos. We're excited to share these fantastic recipes with you on our website. Look for links in our weekly newsletter, or just check out Seasonal Recipes under the 'info' tab on our website.  Many people find that being a CSA member or shopping at the farmers' market and working with seasonal ingredients fosters a new approach to cooking. You can enjoy delicious meals and save time and money by adapting recipes to use what's freshly harvested and what else is on hand. Many recipes can be made successfully with substitutions or omissions, and vegetables are especially suited to this approach. When you're looking for a substitute, think about plant families. For example, main courses often call for at least one member of the onion family (scallion, onion, garlic, leek, chive, etc). Alliums can usually be substituted for each other with excellent results. Members of the diverse brassica family can often stand in for each other. Kohlrabi, for example, could fill in for broccoli or cabbage in a variety of situations, because their flavors and crunchy textures are similar.
Ali is working on a series of master recipes that use some basic staples and flexible combinations of vegetables and spices, rather than a fixed set of ingredients. Check out these delectable examples- Grilled Summer Vegetables and Simple Summer Bites.
If you want to learn more about keeping your produce fresh once you get it to your kitchen, check out the storage tips on our website. Not all vegetables should be stored in the same way. For example, did you know that the best way to keep basil fresh is in a glass of water on your counter top, not in the fridge? Or that if you take the tops off your fresh carrot, beet, and radish bunches and store the roots in a plastic bag in your fridge, they will stay crispy and keep for months? Or that tomatoes should never be stored in the refrigerator? Learn more about the ideal temperature, humidity, and expected storage time for different vegetables on our website.
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Root 5 Farm
Danielle Allen & Ben Dana 2340 US Route 5 North Fairlee, Vermont 05045 (802) 923-6339 danielle@root5farm.com ben@root5farm.com |
