WHATS IN YOUR BOX THIS WEEK AND HOW TO USE IT

FRESH CANDY ONIONS (red and white) - Store in the refrigerator crisper drawer for up to one week. You can peel off layers that become dry or slimy if used after one week. $4

NEW POTATOES - Keep in a cool, dry place away from light, like a dark corner of the kitchen or in a cabinet. Also keep well ventilated. Do not store in a plastic bag but you can store in a basket or paper bag. $5 (1.75 Pounds)

TOMATOES- The best way to keep summer tomatoes fresh and full of flavor, store them on the kitchen counter at room temperature and turn them shoulders-down. 60 to 65° is an ideal temperature for storing and we recommend placing your tomatoes out of direct sunlight. 1.25lb $5

ZUCCHINI/SUMMER SQUASH - Storing zucchini in the fridge is a quick and simple way to keep zucchini fresh. Keep the zucchini whole until you're prepared to use it, avoid washing zucchini prior to storage. 3 x $1 $3

GARLIC - Store on your counter in a cool, dry place with indirect sunlight. Will store for months this way. $2.50

FAILURE TO LAUNCH CARROTS - Store carrots in the refrigerator in a plastic bag or container. They can store for several weeks and sometimes even months $5

GREEN BEANS - Green beans can store in the bag in your crisper drawer for up to 5-7 days $6 - 1 pound

VEGGIE OF THE WEEK

ZUCCHINI

This is one of our staple summer vegetables that is versatile in use and deserves more credit than it is given. In normal summers there seems to be a plethora of zucchini and it can get sort of a bad rap as the gift you can’t get rid of. It seems like every neighbor and grandma can produce loads of zucchini and they like to drop it at every doorstep in the county. Those zucchinis are normally over-sized and limited to its uses.

Zucchini can be added to a sweet bread, quiche, muffins, used as a replacement for lasagna noodles, spaghetti noodles, breaded and friend, or sauteed. I prefer the smaller, younger zucchini due to the high-water content, which is about 95%, the smaller one’s fry and sauté better. I do like the medium size ones for replacement lasagna or for stuffed boats The occasional ones that hide and get overlooked until they are huge, for zucchini muffins or bread.

This week I am giving everyone 2 small zucchini/Summer Squash and 1 larger medium size zucchini. You can try these boats even with medium size zucchini or shred and use it in breads, relish, for zoodles etc.

Stuffed Zucchini Boats Recipe - Love and Lemons - this is great for those medium sized zucchini. This is a vegetarian recipe but, you could sub in taco meat and then stuff with all of the taco fixings such as salsa, sour cream, lettuce, cheese and more. YUM!

Stuffed Zucchini Boats - Dinner at the Zoo - this one is full of marinara, Italian sausage, bread crumps, mozzarella! Makes me hungry just typing those ingredients out!

Best Sautéed Zucchini Recipe - How To Make Sautéed Zucchini (delish.com) - this is an easy recipe to throw together on a busy night. When zucchini is in season this is a go to. I love to use a well seasoned cast iron pan to make this! I don’t normally add onion because I have semi-picky kids but, you can!

Double Chocolate Zucchini Bread - Sally's Baking Addiction (sallysbakingaddiction.com) - DON”T FORGET DESSERT! Sally’s Baking Addiction is my go-to for desserts!

A few others to try:

Garlic Herb Tortelloni — Triple H Family Farms, LLC - I actually made this tonight and it was yummy! Uses zucchini and slice up some of your tomatoes.

Week 10

Welcome to Week 10! We hope you enjoyed your box last week and made good use of all the fresh items we included. First, I’d like to mention that Matt is still doing well, and we genuinely appreciate all of you that have asked about him following his surgery.

This week, our focus has been on harvesting potatoes and onions. We doubled our potato crop this year, which makes harvest a bit more challenging this past week — but we were up for it! We’re preparing for a significant planting of winter squash, which we hope to get into the ground this week which we will harvest in the fall and early winter. To do this, we will be busy prepping beds, moving silage tarps, adding soil amendments and laying plastic mulch where needed.

Additionally, Matt and I had a lucky moment: we successfully caught a bee swarm! While spraying fence lines, we noticed a small swarm that we believe originated from a hive we had in a smaller box that had become too crowded. Our youngest son was with us when we captured the bees, and he was thrilled to watch as his mom and dad, wearing full bee suits, gently sweeping the swarm into a new hive.

We are hopeful to extract honey within the next two weeks from our established hive and look forward to adding some fresh honey to our market table.

We hope everyone had a fun and memorable Fourth of July! Hopefully, some of the items from your CSA box were able to be used during your celebration.

IF ALL ELSE FAILS

If your week has been crazy and you haven’t had time to do a thing with items in your bag, focus on these tasks:

You can freeze onions. I love to chop them up and store in portions of zip lock bags. Perfect for winter soups, stews and etc. After freezing, the texture changes somewhat and they are softer so not great for fresh eating.
Freezing tomatoes is the easiest way to keep ripe tomatoes until you're ready to use them. You don't have to peel them first—in fact, the act of freezing them itself makes the tomatoes very easy to peel and you can freeze as many or as few at a time as you like. Visit this link for directions on how to do this, How to Preserve Tomatoes to Enjoy All Year
Garlic can store on your counter without issue. You can also pop it it in the fridge if you prefer.
Greens such as carrot tops or other veggie scraps can be saved and used for homemade vegetable broth. Try this recipe: How to Make Vegetable Broth Using Saved Kitchen Scraps ~ Homestead and Chill
Carrots will store well in your crisper drawer with their tops off.
Zucchini can be shredded and frozen if you are unable to use it this week. How to Freeze Shredded Zucchini | Cooking School | Food Network

NEXT WEEK’S POSSIBILITY’S

Your bag next week will include 6-7 of the following depending on availability and if it’s ready to harvest.

Carrots
Herbs
Tomatoes
Fresh large candy onions
Fresh red candy onions
Cherry Tomatoes
Cucumber
Fairytale Eggplant
Potatoes
Green Onions
Heirloom tomatoes (planning on this!)
Zucchini
Summer Squash
Eggplant
Green Beans

Wishing you a fantastic week ahead, see you next week!

Summer CSA Newsletter: Week 10