This Week on the Farm 9/30
The weather has been absolutely gorgeous the past few days. Nice clear blue skies and warm weather remind us why we love the fall weather. The mosquitos have died off for the most part, and now the only insects causing problems are flies. I have several wicked bites that are itchy and red, but I seem to be the only one they are attacking. Tyler says that is because I am just sweeter than he is.
Nights are cooling off rapidly, which means chance of frost. Sunday night we covered our greens for the first time. Our covers for the lettuce, arugula, chard, and bok choi seem to be working well, but so far we haven’t had a hard frost. A harder frost is projected for this Saturday, so this will probably be the last week for peppers and tomatoes since they are frost sensitive.
We spent Monday harvesting pie pumpkins, jack o‘lantern pumpkins and gourds. We pulled them from the field because they can get damaged by frosts. We have them piled underneath the pine trees on the eastern side of the field. We can cover them with a tarp to trap the heat at night close to the ground.
Tuesday Tyler and I installed more hoops over the greens to hold the covers above the plants when we cover them at night. We also harvested the rest of the onions to get them in and protected from the frost. I pulled some of our celosia flowers that were done blooming and looking really pathetic and planted crocus and tulip bulbs for next spring.
Wednesday we spent the morning working on cleaning up the fields and pulling any diseased plants from the garden. Hopefully on Friday we will have time to plant the cover crop in these areas to help prevent erosion this winter and spring.
The winter rye is coming up well in the areas where we planted it last week. We hope that it grows a lot this week and is well established before we get a killing frost.
On a non-farm note, we provided butternut squash, potatoes, carrots, and lettuce to the farm dinner at Taliesin co-catered by Monty’s Blue Plate Diner chef Matt Pace. We were told the dinner was a success. To see a review of the dinner click here. Needless to say, Tyler and I were super pumped to read about our produce.
We would like to thank Lapacek’s Orchard for the opportunity to provide apples to our customers and we hope to offer apples on order again next year! Apple season is still going strong so if you missed out on ordering through us, the local orchards (including Lapacek’s) can help you out.
The following recipe was sent to us by BOG member Joan Wittrock. Enjoy!
Pumpkin Chips
1 lb fresh pumpkin, peeled and seeded
Peanut oil
Salt (optional)
Cut pumpkin into very thin slices with a vegetable peeler. Pour oil to a depth of 1-2 inches into a Dutch oven; heat to 375°. Fry pumpkin slices, in batches, about 3 minutes or until crisp. Drain; sprinkle with salt, if desired.
(From Southern Living, OCTOBER 1998)