| What's Growing This Week: | |
Apricots
Carrots
Cherries
Summer Squash
Green Beans
Ruby Red Grapefruit
Garlic
Spinach (S,L)
Arugula (M)
Onions (M,L)
Cilantro (M,L)
Cherry Tomatoes (L)
Peaches (L)
Items may be substituted without notice.
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Contact Us:
| terrafirmafarm.com
csa@terrafirmafarm.com
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| CSA Rates 2011 | Boxes are charged on Monday for the week's deliveries at:
$14 Small
$24 Medium
$32 Large
For a payment of $300, get a 3% bonus. Your account balance will be $309.
For a payment of$850, get a 5% bonus. Your account will be posted as $892.00
For a payment of $1,400, get a 7% bonus. Your payment will be posted as $1,498.
Vacations are charged weekly when notice is given as a fee, no charges occur during the vacation week.
$4 Small
$8 Medium
$11 Large
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Bulk Grapefruit
Strawberries are done for the season but we still have bulk Ruby Red Grapefruit available for a few more weeks: 10 lbs. for $12. Simply go into your account and choose either a weekly subscription or a single purchase.
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Pledge of Authenticity
Terra Firma is a real farm. We grow 99% of the produce that goes into our boxes on our 220 acres of certified organic land in Winters. If we do buy produce from other farms, it's almost always from a neighboring farm and we give them full credit in the box list.
The owners of Terra Firma are involved in every aspect of making your boxes a reality: walking the fields, planting the crops, selecting and checking what goes in the boxes and finally delivering them to you. We eat the crops from our fields every day, just like you do. Thanks for supporting our efforts and enjoying the food we grow.
Paul, Pablito, & Hector
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Payments, Billing, and Changes
| Schedule vacations, change box sizes, make payments or sign up for autopay by logging in to your subscriber account at terrafirmafarm.com
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News From Terra Firma Farm
Community Supported Agriculture |
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Greetings!
It's always a tough decision to let go. All the years of time invested -- for better or for worse, all that hard work. You've spent some of the best years of your life together. Maybe you grew up together, maybe you found each other when one or both of you was older. But it's obvious that you aren't meeting each others' needs anymore.
It's time pull out the chainsaw and fire up the backhoe.
I'm talking, of course, about the relationship between a farmer and an orchard.
Deciding to the end the life of an orchard is never an easy one. It's a difficult decision both emotionally and economically. Trees don't live forever, but orchard trees (fruit and nut) will definitely outlive their productiveness if allowed to. Once this happens, you can keep pruning them, fertilizing them, and watering them thinking "next year will be better", but you're just throwing good money after bad. The opposite can happen as well, a downward cycle ensues where less and less money is made on the orchard and less is spent. In some cases, the orchard ends up abandoned.
The proper time to remove an orchard is while it is still producing, so you can use the income from the last crop to remove the trees.
Tearing out an orchard is expensive. Most farmers don't have the equipment to dig up giant tree roots and dispose of them so they must hire specialized contractors. Once the trees are gone, the ground must be made useable again -- the root holes filled in, the soil plowed, and the entire field leveled so that something else can be planted there. If you've run out of money trying to keep the orchard alive, you may not have any left to take the old one out -- much less plant a new one.
Imagine you have had a job for 20 years, and then one day you went to work and your boss told you he needed you to keep coming to work but you would have to wait 6 years to get a paycheck. This is exactly what happens when, after tearing out an orchard, you plant a new one. You have to invest years of time and money before that farmland again produces an income. Some farmers in this situation choose instead to sell the orchard to someone else with more capital.
But it's not just economics. Trees are living beings, and people develop attachments to them. To the average person, say a cyclist or commuter who has passed by an orchard reguarly for years, seeing it torn out can be depressing. So just imagine how you would feel if you or your parents -- or grandparents -- had planted and nurtured those living trees for decades and you had to make the decision to end their lives.
Most of the orchards that we farm at Terra Firma were planted decades ago by someone else, and we are not the owners. While we often have emotional attachments to these orchards, it is also very clear to us when they are costing us -- and their owners -- more than they are producing in income. This can lead to contention with the owners, who are often in denial and seeking someone to blame. Orchard Counseling is not an option.
We can't force anyone to tear out an unproductive orchard. But we can take action when we see the handwriting on the wall. For several years our old rented orchard where many of you have picnicked in the shade at Farm Day, has been in decline. In 2010 and 2011, we planted apricot trees on another piece of land to ensure that we would have an adequate supply when the old orchard gives up the ghost completely. The new trees produced their first small crop this year, and by next year, they may produce as much or more than the old orchard. By 2014, they will make all the apricots we need.
The cycle of co-dependency continues.
Thanks,
Pablito
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In Your Boxes
Just like on the calendar, this is a transition week on the farm between spring and summer. The amount of Strawberries our field is producing fell precipitously over the weekend, and all indications are that the season is mostly over. We hope you have been happy with the quality and quantity of the berries you received this year -- we thought it was a very good season.
As is often the case here, our Tomato crop is gearing up just as the berries fade away. The first tomatoes -- yellow cherries -- are in the Large boxes this week and we are reasonably certain that all size boxes will get some type of tomato next week. More summer items will also be in next week's boxes -- see the Coming Attractions below.
We did get enough Apricots this week to send a few along to everyone. As I referenced above, the old trees just aren't producing much any more. I'm sure some of you remember the abundant harvests of the past; we hope they will return in a few years once the new orchard kicks into high gear.
The Red Cloud variety of apricot is meaty and rich when eaten fresh, but really shines when it is baked in a pie or tart, or made into jam.
The Cherries in your boxes are also likely the last of the 2012 crop.
Coming Attractions next week: Watermelon! |
Recipe -- Green Beans with Ginger and Garlic
The first time I ever had green beans cooked this way was in a restaurant in New York's Chinatown where you had to wait in line for over an hour for a table. This recipe may be a no-brainer for many subscribers, but if you've never tried making it at home, it is easy and quick. And delicious.
Trim 1/2 lb. green beans and cut into 1 inch pieces. Bring salted water to a boil in a pot. Fill a second pot with cold water and place in the fridge or add ice cubes.
Boil the green beans for 4 minutes or less -- they should be bright green and still crisp but tender. Remove from the pot and drop directly into the cold water, then transfer to a colander or towel.
Mince fresh ginger to make 1 T. Mince 1 large clove of garlic.
Heat 1 T. canola or other high heat oil in a wok. Add the beans, the ginger and the garlic and cook until the garlic soft and beginning to brown. Sprinkle with salt and serve.
You can make this dish more substantial too: crumble 12 oz. firm tofu and drizzle with 1 T. soy sauce and 1 t. sesame oil. Marinate for 10 minutes, then stir fry in a wok until the liquid cooks out of the tofu and it is nicely browned.
Add the cooked tofu to the beans just before removing from heat.
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