Week 15:

Elliot Phillips packs this week's boxes in the washing room of 8th Street Greens.

Hello CSA folks!  Just been out floppin' irrigation lines around, rototilling bolted greens and previously rototilled beds, prepping for yet another salad planting.  Gonna plant 5 or 6 100' beds tomorrow, instead of the usual 3 or 4 beds.  Each bed gets planted with 5 or 6 rows of seeds.  Lettuce, herbs, mustards, spinach and Asian greens like bok choy.  I'm a gonna go for 2 beds of spinach tomorrow.  I'm obsessed with trying to grow spinach all season long.  It's hard, because sometimes it does well in the middle of summer with high heat, or certain patches do well but not others, so I just keep on trying, using seed, giving customers spinach semi-promises I can't keep, wasting weeding time and money, you get the point.  But farming is a bit of a science:  observation, recording, re-do after re-do of experiments, investment in different tools for trial and error.  I seem to have the strawberry thing down pretty good—getting about 3 flats a week now.  Call if you want any for a party, or to preserve.  They are definitely sweet things.

The greens are going to a wedding this week-end and we've got a special order for the farm to table dinner event at Bluebird Grain Farms in Winthrop.  It's hosted by the Washington Water Project to honor Okanogan Farms.  This Sunday at 5:00.  Proceeds from the benefit are to enhance the project's salmon-safe work with farms in Okanogan County.  It feels really good to have been contacted by a Methow caterer to provide for a Methow event.  509-881-7690 if you're curious about going.

This week's box:  4 oz of just lettuce (triple rinsed), 3 bulbs of Inchelium Red Garlic! (yes, it's small for Inchy.), and 1 bag of Thai Basil – all from 8^th Street.  Carrots, another Walla Walla onion, and a tomato from Yonder Farm.  And donut peaches from Bartella's Orchard, 3^rd year transitional (almost certified organic!), they are #2s.  The full shares get extra of the foods, plus a small bunch of chard.

Fruit option:  2 lbs peaches, 1 pint of strawberries, 2 shells blackberries (Bunny Laine).

Tomato, Mozzarella & Thai Basil Crostini

Bon Appétit   June 2011 

Makes 12 servings

Sesame oil and rice vinegar spin the caprese eastward.

Ingredients: 

12 slices seven-grain or sesame bread

1/2 garlic clove

2 cups halved cherry or grape tomatoes (or slabs of heirloom tomato from Yonder)

1 small shallot (or sweet onion), minced

1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil

1 tablespoon unseasoned rice vinegar

Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Sliced fresh mozzarella

Thai basil leaves

Preparation:  Grill bread slices and rub with garlic clove.

In a bowl, combine tomatoes, shallot, sesame oil, and rice vinegar. Season with sea salt and pepper; let sit for 15 minutes.

Put sliced fresh mozzarella on toasts. Spoon tomato mixture over mozzarella and garnish with Thai basil leaves. Season with sea salt and pepper.

Here's to Good Food!                                                                                                        ~~Shannon