News from Terra Firma Farm

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

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

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

News From Terra Firma Farm

Community Supported Agriculture

Greetings!

I grew up on the East Coast, and if you've ever spent any time there -- or of course, in the South -- you're familiar with the term "it's not the heat, it's the humidity". We got a tiny taste of that weather this week in Northern California as a moist airmass moved over us, bringing clouds, thunderstorms, and sticky damp heat. It makes for a nice sunrise over the farm, but not much else good.

The majority of the most common summer vegetables and fruit grown and eaten in the U.S. are native to places with dry, warm weather -- so called "Mediterranean climates": Italy, Greece, Spain, Mexico and Peru, and the Middle East. I could list them all, but it's much easier to list the ones that enjoy humidity. Sweet Potatoes, for example, are originally from Africa. That's about it.

Our supermarkets are full of tropical fruit adapted to hot and wet areas: bananas, mangos, papayas, pineapples, etc. But most of these are extremely sensitive to cold weather, and since they are almost all trees, cannot survive winter in most parts of the U.S.. Others will not flower or make fruit in places where the length of day changes over the course of the year. The only tropical fruit species that is commonly grown in the U.S. is citrus, and even then only in a few states.

Due to their genetic propensity towards dry weather, tomatoes, melons, beans, cucumbers, zucchini as well peaches, figs, grapes, plums and apricots all share a common trait: a lack of tolerance for wet weather and high humidity. Powdery Mildew is a common fungus that is spread by heavy dew; Late Blight, Brown Rot and Fire Blight are triggered by heavy rains. In an ideal situation, most of these summer crops prefer access to water through their roots but have their leaves and fruit stay dry. Put a different way: they grow best in a dry climate with irrigation.

There is a deeply held and persistent belief among urbanites that there is something bad about farming in dry areas, and that irrigation is profoundly unnatural. This belies a profound lack of understanding of geography, agriculture and history. The best soil for farming is usually located alongside rivers, often in valleys below mountains with extensive drainages. The Hopi practiced irrigation for thousands of years sustainably. The Aztec, Maya, Egyptian, Roman and other ancient civilizations grew all their food in a dry climate using irrigation. This is why so many of the foods that we eat grow so well in California.

After one of the driest winters on record in California, we have been having an unusually humid summer in the Central Valley, owing to an abnormal weather pattern. Most summer days here proceed from sunrise to sunset without a single cloud in the sky; this year we have had numerous days where we don't see the sun until afternoon or when clouds have dotted the sky all day.

Clouds = humidity = plant diseases and we have had those in abundance this year. It's really hard to imagine trying to farm the crops we grow in someplace like Georgia, Virginia or upstate New York, where the driest days in the summer are twice as humid as anything we see.

Sure it's hot in the Central Valley. But most of the time, relief is as close as the nearest shade, or at worst, nightfall. The sun is the source of the heat, and when it goes away the temperature drops. I'll take it any time over a day like Tuesday, when you couldn't even sit under a tree without breaking a sweat. And so will the summer crops.

Thanks,

Pablito

Monster Melons

We are also having a problem with our Melons, of a different sort. It seems that ideal growing conditions during the last month have led to a high percentage of "monsters" in the field; fruits that are much larger than normal. It's not our goal to send you more melon than you can eat. But it's impossible for us to send you half a melon.

We don't weigh each melon and charge you by the pound. Instead, we just set a value for the melon and calculate the box contents accordingly. And we don't put a higher value on the melons just because they're bigger. Sooooo....I know that no one likes throwing away food, but if you don't end up finishing the melon in today's box, I wanted to make sure you know you didn't "pay extra" for it.

The best way to eat more melon is to make it easier to eat. And the best way to do that is to prep it in advance so you can snack on it at a moment's notice. Ripe melon will keep better in the fridge if it is cut up and stored in a plastic container, than it will whole (uncut).

First, make sure the melon is fully ripe. Allow the melon to warm up to room temperature, then put your nose near it and smell. If it smells aromatic and "melony", it is ripe, it should be refrigerated until cut.

If not, you should leave it to ripen another day or two. As it ripens, you will notice the rind will gradually change color. If the melon in your box is a Sharlyn (football shaped), it should be golden/yellow/light brown when ripe. If it's an Orange Honeydew (round), it should be cream colored with an orange glow on one end.

Once the melon is ready to eat, wash the rind well. Then cut the melon in half, scoop out the seeds and discard them. Cut it into long slices with a large knife, then use a paring knife to cut the flesh from the rind. You should place the cut melon directly into a clean bowl and avoid allowing it to contact any surface that the rind was touching.

When the melon has been liberated from the rind, cut it into cubes and place them in plastic containers or ziplock bags and refrigerate. Pull out when you need a quick refreshing snack.

In Your Boxes

Tomatillos are relatives of tomatoes and gooseberries that play an important role in Mexican cuisine. If you've ever had green salsa on a taco, you've eaten tomatillos. Many not ever have cooked with them. And canned ones don't count -- they simply don't compare to fresh.

Here are Terra Firma, we hope to change that. Tomatillos are a versatile, unique, and user-friendly vegetable -- maybe not as much as their more highly colored cousins, but worth getting to know. They have a distinctly different flavor than tomatoes, but they also have a different texture, especially when pureed -- silky yet light.

We grew a few of them last year, just enough to put a few in the Large boxes once or twice. This year, we expanded our production a bit, and this week we actually have enough to send out a pound in the Medium boxes.

Whatever you plan to do with your tomatillos, the first step is removing any of the papery husk that they grow inside. While you can eat the fruit raw, they are much more enjoyable when cooked -- specifically, when roasted as you would roast peppers. If you've never prepared them, I would recommend starting by making the recipe below for Green Salsa. If you already cook with them, well, you probably will have other ideas

As is often the case this time of year, the quality of our Sweet Corn took a turn for the worse in the last few weeks. We apologize if you received unusable corn -- we were trying to send the best that we could find in the field. We have given up on that crop for the summer.

Recipe: Tomatillo Salsa (Green Salsa)
This salsa is good on so many things...I drizzle it over tacos and beans, spoon it into soups, toss it on salads instead of dressing. It is tangy, silky, sweet, and refreshing all at the same time. You can make it spicy hot or not.

Remove any papery husks covering your tomatillos. Heat a cast iron skillet on the stove or grill to high heat and place 1 lb. of the fruits on it (don't use any oil) in a single layer. Use a tongs to turn the tomatillos as they blister and brown on each side -- you want them soft but intact. Transfer to a blender or food processor.

When the tomatillos are done, roast 2-3 sweet peppers on all sides, using the same pan or over open flames. Place in a bowl and allow to cool, then remove the skins and seeds. Combine the peppers with the tomatillos.

Cut 1 ripe avocado in half and remove the pit. Put half the avocado in the processor along with the juice of 1 lime, 1 C. chopped cilantro leaves, and 3 T. minced onion.

Puree the vegetables until smooth. Season with salt and more lime juice. If you want the salsa spicy, add minced jalapeno pepper to taste.