City Commons

This week we have more conventional produce to offer.  Most items are probably self-explanatory except perhaps the cherries.  The cherries in the box are sour cherries.  While some people think they are yummy out of the box, general consensus seems to point towards cooking them.  The most common use of these cherries is in pies and jellies.  Since you have only a pint, you might find it hard to make a pie.  Try pitting them and adding some water and sugar to make a cherry syrup to pour over vanilla ice cream or pancakes with homemade whipped cream.  I have also used them in braised pork shoulder.  Brown meat, add beer, wine or water to reach halfway up meat in a dutch oven, add onions and salt and pepper and pitted sour cherries, put in 350 oven for 3 hours or so depending on size of meat chunk.  Yummy.  You could do an abbreviated version of this recipe with chops, stove top…add fresh herbs at the end.  Serve with a simple salad.

In this week’s box:

Beets

Chard

Kale

Sour Cherries

Lettuce heads

Lettuce mix

Herb Bouquets (tarragon, sage, dill, lavender)

Basil

Enjoy!!

My garden is a pretty amazing place.  It is set six blocks away from my house and tucked down a side street that dead-ends into the open lot that was once a school.  There are many wild things there, rabbits, pheasants, deer, chickweed, wild peas, dogs, my daughters.  Sometimes it is hard to make order from irregular forms that abound, a burned house across the street with scattered, half-erected beams, the grasses growing for miles, sometimes an errant rose bush or daffodils.  On Saturday, I planted scarlet salvia, a perennial that attracts hummingbirds.  My kids like it there because we picnic under the walnut tree and have a swing with a 50-foot trajectory.  Luckily, the beets that are in the box this Tuesday are not mine, the rabbits have been repeatedly eating all of their leaves and they are as small as pennies, despite having put them in the ground in April.  The savory is from Singing Tree Garden, where it grows well, almost wild, taking over half a bed with its pokey dark green leaves.  Each one of our gardens grows certain plants well, according to the preferences of the farmer, the soil and the weather.  Enjoy each of the fruits our gardens offer.

This week:

Mulberries–Fields of Plenty, Occupy Yourself, Food Field

Swiss Chard (Friday Only)–Fields of Plenty

Salad Mix–Food Field

Broccoli Greens or Kale or Radicchio (Tuesday only)–Food Field

Cherries–Food Field

Lettuce Heads–Iroquois

Tarragon–Occupy Yourself

Savory–Singing Tree

Hot Sauce–Food Field

Radishes – Fisheye Farms

Hello and welcome to the 2017 season of City Commons CSA!  This year marks our fifth season in business and we can’t wait to share our fruits, vegetables, herbs and flowers with you.  We have been extremely busy over the last several weeks, prepping beds, planting seeds and transplants and hoping for rain and bees to make our gardens grow.  Now we reap the first harvest of the year.  Spring is green.  Our gardens and your boxes prove it.

This week you’ll have plenty to create salads with:  Arugula, head lettuce, green garlic, garlic scapes, thyme, strawberries, lemon balm, radishes, salad mix, and pac choi.

Try lemon balm infused wine.

Here is a simple and delicious salad dressing recipe:

Mix 2 tablespoons tahini with 2 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar (or lemon or lime juice).  Add 2 tablespoons of soy sauce and 1/3 cup of olive oil or raw sesame oil.  Add minced green garlic (or scapes) and black pepper to taste.  Whisk, whip or otherwise stir until emulsion occurs, pour onto salad and serve.

Salad ingredient suggestions:

Salad mix, handful arugula, thyme, lemon balm, strawberries, scapes, radishes and toasted hazelnuts.  Tahini dressing from above recipe.  YUMMY!