Farm News – September 24, 2015

Hi Folks, so autumn has officially arrived, and the nights are getting quite chilly out here in the hills of Northwest New Jersey. The long term forecast for the Northeast is for warmer than average temps through the fall, so hopefully we won’t have a frost until late October. This is a great time of year for veggies since we can still enjoy some of the summer crops, and the fall cool weather vegetables are beginning to come in as well.

We have begun cutting a lot of broccoli and believe there will be enough for all groups this week. We have been in a rotation with cauliflower these past few weeks, so if you have not received any recently you may this time around. We are still trying to glean some tomatoes from our declining plantings and waiting for a late planting to ripen. Peppers and eggplant should be abundant for a few more weeks. We also have lima beans this week in addition to the string beans.

A word of warning about the broccoli – the cabbage family has 2 caterpillar pests and they become more abundant in the fall. We have sprayed Dipel (bacillus thuringensis) to control them, and we will try to be vigilant about removing any we see during bunching and packing. They are a light green color and so are very well camouflaged and tend to hide down inside the heads of broccoli. Inspect your broccoli carefully before cooking or preparing.

We have some nice fennel currently, but not enough for all, so we will be offering it as a choice with some herbs: chives, mint, and basil. For greens it will be a 3 way choice between arugula, tatsoi, and broccoli raab. In the root vegetable category it will be a choice between radishes and beets.

The share for this week will be: Lettuce, string beans, eggplant, peppers, broccoli, choice of beets or radishes, leeks, choice of arugula, tatsoi or broccoli raab, lima beans, potatoes and choice of fennel or an herb.

The fruit share for this week will be: Gala apples and nectarines.

Enjoy! Farmer John