Weir River Farm Blog 8/9

Happy Tuesday Trustees members!  The last succession of trays has been seeded for the season - a momentous and bittersweet occasion.  We just have to hope that in two to three weeks when this spinach and lettuce is ready to be transplanted, the ground has soaked up some rain water.  The summer has been very overcast and even stormy, but its important to remember it still isn't raining, and our water deficit is growing bigger and bigger.  Keep this in mind if the CSA share or farm stand is looking a little dire ; this is the worst summer (weather wise) in my three years working on the farm, and more experienced farmers than me are saying the same. Luckily, our little plot on the top of Turkey Hill is less than a quarter the size of our previous operation, meaning I've been able to 'draw blood from a stone' in a sense, and use what little water we have to keep our plants alive and producing. 

Speaking of the farm stand, I'll be set up tomorrow, 10-12, during story time hours. I'll have some fresh onions, beans, squash, and possibly a few more surprises. Please stop by to say hi and grab some locally grown organic produce.

Your share this week from Chestnut Hill farm will include:

Beets

Squash

Tomatoes

Scallions

Kale

Lettuce

Potatoes

Here's Des with some lovely recipes:

Recipe of the Week:
The beans are about as perfect as you can get right now....I can't even get them back to the house. I eat them standing in the field...marvelling at the velvet skin, the crunch and the sweet sweet beany taste. I fully admit that the dragon beans are my absolute favorite, but the Green Jade come a close second in my heart. If and when they make it all the way back to the house- I like to toss them with garlic powder, olive oil and salt and roast them until they are carmelized and crispy and then drizzle a little balsamic on them. So good. But. They are other ways to eat them.
I recently looked at a bunch of recipes from Real Simple and one seemed perfectly yumtastic....especially since it involved a fairly simple sauteeing of beans in a little butter/olive oil and drizzling some Mustard Viniagrette and adding sliced toasted almonds. Yeah. That sounds amazing. I love Appalachian Naturals Wildflower Honey Mustard Dressing- it's got old world real mustard and local to the Pioneer Valley honey (right around the corner from my parent's house) and is always the perfect consistency. I use it just as often to make Mustard BBQ chicken as I do to dress up a salad. In any case, there are a bunch of other green beany delicious recipes on the same site, if you like to cook your beans in the first place.