The Box
Spring CSA Week 3

The box is not even here, but Farmer Vicki does such a great job making it hard for me to wait for tomorrow, I thought I'd share her report on Week 3.

Quote Farmer Vicki:

This week's boxes contain French Breakfast radishes. Traditionally, they are the radishes used for making breakfast sandwiches. They are long and slender, tender and relatively mild. Don't waste the leaves - they make an excellent addition to your juicing, in a smoothy, in a greens recipie or in a salad. Greens are high in nutritive value - far more so than the radish itself. We also have salad turnips (red ones and white ones). They are both young tender turnips, designed for eating raw, although they can be steamed, stir fried, or cooked the same as a traditional turnip. Again, don't miss out on the delectable greens.

Another treat for the week is bekana. It looks like a lettuce, with more of a thin "greens" type leaf texture. It is considered a Chinese non-heading cabbage (brassica group). Several different veggies fall in this catagory, but with a great deal of variance between them. This veggie I eat raw most often, altho it can be handled like a green, juiced, steamed, braised, sauteed. I enjoy greens with rice and/or beans (pinto, etc.). I season by steaming the rice in a veggie broth with onions, celery and garlic (optional). I wash and chop the greens and add for the last couple of minutes so they remain a bit firm. To include beans, precook the beans and add to the rice mixture. Steam together for several minutes before adding the greens. This green is particularly good in a stir fry. Just add it to your favorite recipie. Please share your greens recipies as many folks struggle with how to use them.

Some folks have raab in their boxes and some have boc choi. If you are planning a stir fry, include the boc choi or raab in your box. The whole plants are edible. Boc choi is a wonderful Chinese veggie with lots of possibilities. I use it raw in salads at times, but most often in stir fry. It can be used in place of celery in a soup recipie. The flavor is light, fresh and mild, with almost a hint of cabbage, but uniquely its own flavor. Raab is wonderful lightly steamed with butter and salt, or add it to another dish (such as the stir fry).

I do appologize as we forgot to tag the bekana, the raab and the boc choi bags. Bekana is light green and looks a bit like lettuce. Raab is darker green and has stems with buds and/or flowers. The boc choi is a clump of stalks with broad leaves at the top with lighter colored stalks. A few of the turnips were ready and I placed them in boxes at random. They are either red or white and round.

You will find I like growing greens, oriental veggies, lettuces and salad crops. Of everything I grow these are my favorites. I have been known to grow 30 varieties of lettuce in a single year, but usually stick to 8-9 types. I've settled on the one's that do best for me in each season.

We are trying to plant crops outside and the rain is holding us up. The field was a solid lake on Sunday night. If we try to go out there it will suck us right up. I have learned the hard way to stay out of the field when it is this wet. That sand will grab a boot and hold it tight. It takes Hercules' strength to pull up out of that goop. When the field dries we will have to run to get out there and get it done before more rain settles in on us (Thursday, I believe). I want to sing "Rain, rain go away," but after our lack of rain last year I hesitate. One year after 3 or 4 weeks with no rain, to be silly, I went out and did a rain dance. Coincidentally, it began raining and it rained and rained and rained. I felt as if we should begin to build an ark. It rained until the fields were flooded and we were unable to get into them for over 2 weeks. The weeds prospered, the crops rotted and I was dismayed, to say the least. Since then I never, ever attempt to wish for something other than what we get. So, perhaps on Wednesday we can get into the field again.