July is always a very busy month, when seemingly everything is ready to harvest. Plus there’s the heat. Last week and the week before have included many long, hot days.
It’s not sticky, tired, drudgery; there is so much beauty, so much deliciousness, and a great group of people who generally are in good spirits. Here’s a short list of some things making us happy over the last week:
Funny faces on produce! All year long, there’s funny looking produce, from carrots with legs, to eggplants with noses. I always get a kick out of these fun fruits and vegetables, and clearly am not the only one. CSA member Charlotte sent the photo of the melon with the face and someone added eyes and smiles to some tomatoes in the office, pictured up top.
We don’t just love tomatoes with faces, we love all the tomatoes, especially Andrew, who can frequently be found sorting tomatoes. If you love tomatoes and want more than what’s in your box, bulk tomatoes are available: boxes of heirlooms, early girls, and Romas, plus baskets of cherry tomatoes (three per order). All are in the CSA Member Store to add to any pickup, or you can send us an email.
Cooler weather! It’ll heat back up by the end of the week, but we’ve been enjoying the brief break from triple-digit heat.
Cockscomb, also called brain flower! This variety of celosia gets its name from its resemblance to brains or rooster heads. In addition to the normal sized, we also grow a variety called Indiana Giant, which can grow to four or five feet tall! We grow some really beautiful colors, and the shape is always SO cool, so we’re excited to share them with you and are making them the CSA flower of the week. The smaller ones, pictured on the right, not the jumbo ones in the photo on the left.
We finally got a new order of the cardboard boats that we use for tomatoes and a few other things last Friday. They’d been backordered for weeks! That’s why we’d switched to bagging tomatoes. It’s not our first choice, but without our preferred packaging materials, we had to improvise.
Lastly, some really lovely notes from CSA members sharing how much they’re enjoying the summer bounty. Thanks for letting us know!
Elaine Swiedler, CSA Manager
