After a hectic day at work, I was excited to come home to our CSA share. We got a long message from the farm today that made me feel bad about what the farmers are dealing with this summer, in addition to the extreme heat. Also, we learned that heirloom tomatoes should be picked ripe, which means they’ll often be soft and split. That’s a hard thing for me to reconcile because it makes me feel like I’ll have to eat them right away, but now I understand why so many of the tomatoes are in that particular state.
This week our share contents included:
Mini Bell Peppers – 5 each
Watermelon – 2 small or 1 large
Tomatoes – 4 lbs
Cabbage – 1/2 head
Squash – 2 1/3 lbs
Mixed Greens – 3/4 lb
Ruby chard, heirloom tomatoes, watermelon, cabbage, squash, mini bell peppers in front
The mini bell peppers are super cute, and I think we might just eat these whole since they’re basically bite sized. The watermelons were pretty small so Josh picked out one of the larger ones, which is just enough for 2 people to share. We have lots of heirloom tomatoes now, some of which are really soft and some which are slightly firmer. I foresee lots of caprese salads in our future, which is just fine by me. For the mixed greens, Josh got swiss chard with huge leaves and thick ruby red stems. Gorgeous!
Our fruit share is starting to overwhelm us but James just sent us a delicious-looking peach pie recipe that will help me get through our rapidly ripening peach bounty. This week our fruit share contents included:
Italian Plums – 2 lbs
Peaches – 3 lbs
Nectarines – 2 2/5 lbs
Peaches, Italian plums, nectarines
I have absolutely no complaints about the fruit this week. The peaches are large, ripe, and picture perfect. It took lots of willpower not to dig in before I snapped my photos!
In addition, today is Market Day for our CSA. That means in addition to our regular shares, we had the opportunity to order some extra goodies, such as cheese, yogurt, eggs, organic meats, spices, and more. When Josh and I first decided to purchase a CSA share, we debated whether to get an additional egg or dairy share but decided that we wouldn’t use up those items fast enough. Market Day gives us the opportunity to try out some of these item on a one-off basis (you pay per item you choose). We put in our order a few weeks ago and today we received our goods.
This is what we decided to order from Market Day:
Organic Eggs – 1 dozen
Yogurt – 5 containers (6 oz each)
Cheese – 2 packages (8 oz each)
Honey – 16 oz organic wildflower
Organic eggs, assorted yogurt, horseradish cheddar, wildflower honey, garlic and dill cheddar
For the yogurt, there were four different flavors available, so Josh picked out one of each – blackberry, orange, strawberry, and he doubled up on raspberry. For the cheese, he picked horseradish and garlic/dill flavored cheddars (other options included mild cheddar and smoked cheddar). We’re excited to see if organic eggs taste different from regular supermarket eggs, since we debated for a while whether to get a half dozen weekly egg share. If we like these eggs enough, maybe next year we’ll go for the weekly option. Yes, we love our CSA enough that we’re already thinking about next year!
Tags: Cabbage, Cheese, Eggs, Honey, Nectarines, Peaches, Peppers, Plums, Squash, Swiss Chard, Tomatoes, Watermelon, Yogurt