Greens Galore

Our mild salad mix contains 3 types of baby lettuce, beet greens,
spinach, mizuna and baby kale.

Summer is now nearly upon us. Here on the farm the garden is growing and the area Farmer's Markets are in full swing again. Some of our favorite veggies to grow are a variety of different greens. We strive to have a wide selection of greens all season long. We are in an ideal location for growing greens with our higher elevation and cooler nights.

Do you know what all those different greens are and what to do with them. Greens go way beyond just lettuce and salads. They range from peppery to bitter to lemony and you can use them in everything from omelets to soups to stir-fry. Instead of just sticking to the familiar why not try something new? I always love to try something new! Here is an overview and description of some of the many types of greens there are with a few ideas of how to use each and even links to recipes for a few of them. Many of these we grow here at Simple Gifts Farm throughout the season.

Not only are greens delicious, colorful, and versatile they are among some of the healthiest foods there are.

Colorful lettuce displayed at the Farmer's Market

Lettuce- There are so many different types of lettuce, it is hard to know where to start. Of course there are the standard Romaine, Red and Green Leaf varieties. Some of my other favorites includes Red and Green Butterhead which has a smooth, tender texture, Red Oakleaf, which adds great color and variety to salads, and a unique speckled variety called Flashy Trout's Back.

A bed of spinach

Spinach- Round to oval, dark green leaves. Delicious used both as baby leaves or full size. Spinach has a mild, sweet flavor. It is one of the most well known and also versatile greens. You can't beat a spinach salad but it is also excellent in lasagna, quiche, as a pizza topping, or with garlic scapes made into pesto.

Spinach and Garlic Scape Pesto

Beet Greens- Beet greens make a colorful addition to salad mix. They are also delicious lightly sauteed with some butter or olive oil. The flavor is mild and slightly salty. My two favorite varieties for greens are Bull's Blood which has lovely deep red leaves and Early Wonder Tall Top which is fast growing with bright green leaves and red veins.

Frilly red and green mustard greens

Mustard Greens- Spicy with a horseradish type flavor, mustard greens come in a variety of colors and shapes. The traditional variety is bright green with large somewhat serrated leaves. I love the frilly bright green and deep red varieties in a salad. They add so much color and texture with a nice burst of flavor.

Mustard Green Pesto

Arugula- I love Arugula. It has a delightful peppery and nutty flavor that goes well with fruit and cheese. I think the flavor is best in autumn grown Arugula, it tends to be milder and sweeter at that time of year. I enjoy arugula mixed with other salad greens but it also makes a delicious salad on its own. Other ways I enjoy using it is in pesto or on pizza.

Arugula Pear Salad

Mizuna- An Asian green that has deeply serrated leaves and comes in both green and purple varieties. The flavor is a bit like mustard greens, but without the heat. I mostly use it in salads, but it can also be cooked in stir-fry or soup.

Collard Greens- Traditionally grown and used in the south and something I had never had until we began growing it, Collards are another delicious green. Similar in flavor and texture to kale except with smooth round leaves. It can be used in many of the same ways as kale. In the South it is also traditionally cooked with salted and smoked meats. The round leaves also make great wraps.

Swiss Chard- One of the prettiest and most colorful greens, Swiss chard has large savoyed leaves with thick stalks that range from white, yellow, pink, and red. I like to use it in soup, sauteed, steamed, or even in stir-fry. The flavor is mild, sweet, and a bit salty.

Kale and Cabbage make a nice autumn salad

Kale- Kale has been all the rage lately and with good reason. It is healthy, delicious and versatile. There are several varieties of kale to choose from. There is the standard green curly type, the flat serrated Russian types, the wrinkled dinosaur types and even a beautiful purple curly type that we have enjoyed growing. Certain types are best suited for different purposes but they can also be used interchangeably. I especially like the Red Russian as baby kale in our salad mix; it is very tender, sweet and mild at that stage. The larger curly and dinosaur types are excellent sauteed, in soups, in smoothies, or one of my favorites made into kale chips.

Kale, Potato, and Sausage Soup

Baby Bok Choy

Bok Choy- Very popular in Asian stir fries. Bok Choy grows in a vase shaped head. It has thick crunchy white or light green stalks with darker green rounded leaves. The flavor is mildly mustardy with a little sweetness.

Fresh lemony sorrel is one of the first greens in the spring

Sorrel- Sometimes called Lemon Sorrel or French Sorrel. I remember this one from when I was a little girl, my Dad had some growing in the garden. It is a perennial so it comes back in early spring every year. It was always fun to snack on it whenever we were outside. It has long slender bright green leaves. It bolts or sends of flower stalks very easily/early but it doesn't seem to affect the flavor, I just break them off and it continues to grow. The flavor is tart and lemony. It makes a nice addition to salads and also can be used with fish.

Endive, Escarole, Radicchio- I am going to lump these three all together. They are all in the chicory family and all have at least a somewhat bitter flavor. I have not had as much success growing these greens and personally do not care for the bitterness.

Our spicy salad mix contains 3 types of lettuce, arugula,
3 types of mustard greens, and wrinkled crinkled cress

Cress- These delightful peppery greens are common in Northern Europe. They are used in soups, salads, sandwiches, and garnishes. The flavor reminds me of Nasturtium; both spicy and sweet. I like to grow Wrinkled Crinkled Cress. It has small frilly leaves and grows quickly.

Homemade Popsicles

I can remember my Mom making my sister and I popsicles when we were young. They were always a fun, refreshing treat in the summertime. My boys love them now as I carry on the tradition. They are so easy to make at home, cheaper than buying them, and you can control what ingredients go into them. All you need is a little plastic popsicle mold (I found mine at the thrift store for $0.50),your kitchen freezer and a little imagination. You can really make them out of so many different things; yogurt/kefir and fruit smoothies, 100% fruit juice, homemade lemonade, homemade chocolate milk, use your imagination... Today my boys are having lemonade popsicles. These do have sugar in them, if you would rather avoid added sugar then the fruit juice ones or smoothie ones would work better.

  Lemonade Popsicles

1/2 cup lemon juice
1/3 cup organic sugar
1 quart water

 Mix all ingredients well. Pour into pospicle molds. Freeze for several hours or I find that over night works best. To remove from molds run briefly under warm water. Give them to your kids and send them outdoors to eat them, they will be messy! Have you ever made popsicles? What fun varieties have you tried?

Growing Within Our Climate

 

Late Spring Snow, April 27, 2014

Yesterday I posted a photo of the snow we woke up to in the morning. The reality is we live in cold area. Our little mountain valley is up at 2700 feet elevation and the particular spot our farm is located is a frost pocket. We get late frosts and early frosts every year. Sometimes we have late snow, one year we had a frost every month.

When we first started farming there were a couple other market farmers in our region and they were both growing pretty much everything; from corn to melons to cabbage. So that is what we tried as well. Some of the crops were always a fight for us to get at all, others were hard to get as early as the other farmers. But we sure tried, it was like a competition to see who could bring the first zucchini or cucumber to market. It became discouraging and frustrating to be fighting our climate all the time.

Garlic is one crop that does very well for us.

Over the last several years of farming we have learned a lot and have adapted what we do to fit our climate. We have learned which crops are not worth growing at all in our location, which ones are worth giving extra protection to and which ones do especially well for us.

While at first our cooler season seemed like a disadvantage it has turned out that if we work within it, it can actually be an advantage. Greens and lettuce do exceptionally well in our cooler summers. Potatoes don't mind it a little on the cool side and we can grow beautiful garlic and onions. We now focus on the things that grow really well for us and don't                                                struggle so much with the others.

Hoophouses and row covers are two ways we extend our season

We have found that most warm weather summer crops like green beans, cucumbers, squash and zucchini do just fine for us as well but generally don't come on as early as other areas of the county. We like to grow one hoophouse of zucchini and cucumbers to get them earlier and that seems worthwhile at this point. But other than that we don't rush to have the earliest crops, that way we can plant a little later and not have to worry as much about the weather. We do use row cover fabric on most crops as a boost for the first couple weeks or until they start blooming. We also grow tomatoes and peppers exclusively in a hoophouse because they do so much better in there. Although this year I am cutting way back on the tomatoes and am growing mostly cherry tomatoes. I have had a hard time getting nice large  tomatoes without splitting.

There are a couple of vegetables that we don't even grow at all because they like heat too much  and the chance of ripening them at all here is slim. They also take up too much space in a hoophouse to be worth growing in there. The two main ones are corn and melons.

It is actually really fun to learn and adapt to growing within our climate, learning what does well and focusing on that. The reality is that a late snow or late frosts do not hurt us or set us back very much at all, because we have learned to work within our climate.  

I would encourage any vegetable farmer just starting out to take into account their climate and make the best of it by doing what works well there. Don't feel like you have to do what everyone else is doing. Be open minded and adaptable to new ideas and plans. And don't forget to enjoy the journey along the way.

Hazelnuts

One of my goals here on the farm is to eventually grow many different types of edible fruits, berries, and nuts. I don't know if we will ever be selling any, but I like the idea of having a diversity of things growing for our family and to share with friends. Imagine my excitement when I ran into a neighbor a couple weeks back who knew of someone locally who had hazelnut bushes for sale! Of course I called them right away. So this last Saturday we went down to pick them up. I got two very nice large bushes plus several smaller ones. The man we bought them from was very knowledgeable and friendly. He said they should be planted 8-10 feet apart and grow to about 16 feet tall. He recommended having 6-8 bushes for best pollination. He also said that they do not do well with grass growing around them. This morning we dug our holes and dug out the grass around them. We decided to plant them along the yard fence as a kind of hedge. We added a little bit of composted chicken manure fertilizer and planted the bushes. David and Matthew had a great time digging in the dirt, throwing the fertilizer around them and watering them. It was a great family project. By the time we were done though Matthew had accidentally been sprayed with the hose and was having a meltdown and they both boys getting hungry and tired. So we went in and had some lunch, then it was nap time for the boys.

Getting ready to plant on of the larger bushes.

David working on digging the hole bigger.

The last hazelnut bush in the back of the pickup.

The boys had a great time "helping"

Starting to bud

Digging in the dirt

Two little boys in two holes

David watering the hazelnuts after they are planted

Frugal Friday: Farmgirl Fashion: Cute Mud Boots

As a farmer/farmer's wife I spend  a lot of time outdoors, in the dirt and mud. It can be easy to just wear grungy old work clothes all the time and to start feeling not so cute. I like fun, cute things and so I get tired of that sometimes. One thing I have always thought would be fun is a pair of cute mud boots. I have had the same pair of old, plain black, slightly too big thrift store mud boots for the past four years. They were finally starting to wear out and crack so I started looking for new ones. But being the frugal farm wife that I am I didn't go down to the store and just buy a pair of cute boots, after all they cost around $30. No, I kept my eyes open at thrift stores, figuring I would probably end up with a decent, practical pair that fit. I was excited when I found found this pair of cute polka dot ones (did I mention that I love polka dots?) for about $5! Now I may be covered in mud when I'm out working on the farm, but at least my feet feel cute!

Red Pepper Flakes

Last summer I had an abundance of hot peppers! I love having an abundance of fresh things from the garden. Sometimes it can feel like we are not selling enough of something that we have lots of, but in the end it is usually nice to have the extra. I do not like to let anything go to waste and very little does. When we have extra produce I either use it or store it for ourselves, give it to friends, donate it to the food bank and sometimes compost it or feed it to our chickens.

In this case I ended up drying lots of hot peppers. All different types; Jalapeno, Serrano, Hungarian Wax, Fish, Habanero, Cayenne and probably a few I've forgotten. I used a couple different methods to dry them. One way that is fun and also makes a pretty decoration, is to take a needle and thread and string the peppers on that and hang them somewhere to dry. I also did quite a few of them in the food dehydrator. I just spread them out on the trays and turned it on. I think I may have poked holes through the skin with a knife, but can't remember for sure. They took a few days to get completely dry. Then I stored them in jars or paper bags. 

They are great for throwing into chili, soup, or stir-fry to add a little extra kick. But I had a lot of them and sure wasn't using them very fast. So I decided to turn some of them into red pepper flakes. The thinner skinned varieties like Cayenne or Hungarian Wax work the best for this but I used several of the others too. I did mine by hand in several batches with my mortar and pestle. It was fun, I have more time for projects like this in the winter. If I was more in a hurry I would have just used my food processor and I think that would have worked just fine, too. Now you know one idea for using up an excess of hot peppers. Another great way to use them is in a delicious roasted pepper hot sauce. I will be posting the recipe for that at some point, too.

Making red pepper flakes

Mortar and Pestle

A Lovely Jar of Red Pepper Flakes

Growing Good Transplants From Seed

Something that we have learned over the last few years is that healthy, sturdy transplants make a huge difference in the success of your garden. When we first started out our plant starts were not much to be proud of. They were usually tall and spindly and many of them didn't survive being transplanted to the garden. It was discouraging to say the least. Another area that has been a challenge, especially as we grew more and  more transplants each year has been keeping track of varieties, start dates, etc. Over the past few years we have slowly developed systems and learned the best methods for growing healthy transplants from seed. We still keep learning new tricks every year, as well as make mistakes every year.

When we first started farming five years ago we had little experience, no infrastructure, and not much money. But we jumped right in and did what we could, learning as we went along. We didn't really have a great place to start plants at the beginning, so we ended up growing them next to every window in the house. After a couple springs of having flats of plants on every available flat surface in the house, we knew we had to come up with a new plan. It got to the point where we had plants on the table, the counters, the washer and dryer, and extra folding tables. So last year we added a small addition which is half greenhouse to the back of the house and bought 4 sturdy metal shelves that hold 24 flats each. It has made a huge difference. We still outgrew the shelves last year and had to set up folding tables, but at least they weren't in the house anymore. We do still start our earliest plants especially peppers and tomatoes on a set of shelves in the house to make sure they stay warm enough.

Now on to the basics of how we organize our seeds and plant records and how we grow our transplants. We start the year off deciding how much of each crop we want to grow and ordering our seeds. When the seeds arrive they first get entered into a spreadsheet on the computer with the name of the variety, the quantity, and where we bought it from. Next the seed packets get stored in shoebox size plastic tubs. I use rubberbands to keep the varieties together, for example all the broccoli, or lettuce, or tomatoes together. Then they go into the boxes in alphabetical order by crop and the boxes are marked with the letters they contain.

Our seed organizing system

I like to have a plan to make sure I get everything started on time so I created another spreadsheet with a date for each week and how many flats of each crop I want to start that week. Of course that is based on how many beds of each crop that we decided on earlier. Then I know how many flats I need Andrew to make for me each week and how much space they will take up in our grow room. Andrew usually makes the flats and I usually plant them. This year I stuck my planting schedule on the refrigerator, that way I will see it and remember to do it! 

We start all our plants in soil blocks that we make with a soil block tool. It compresses the soil mix into 1.5 inch cubes with an indentation on the top for the seed. Each flat holds about 75 soil blocks. We have found this to be a very efficient and economical way to go. We also make our own soil mix, it is cheaper and works better for us. Here is our recipe.For making soil blocks it needs to be very wet, but it also works well in cell packs or pots.

7 1/2 gallons peat
1/2 cup lime (mix with peat)
5 gallons perlite
5 gallons compost 
1 cup blood meal
1 cup phosphate rock
1 cup greensand
Mix well

Flats full of soil blocks

 One seed (two if it is older seed, then thin to one plant) gets planted in each indentation. I do not even cover my seeds. I used to cover them lightly with soil, then I started just gently pressing them in with the end of a pencil, now I just put the seeds in and it works fine. As I plant each flat I place a small sticker with a number on it at one end. This number gets noted on my flat planting record sheet. I keep track of each flats number, crop, variety, date planted and I am supposed to record germination rates and dates but usually forget. This year we have also been taking stickers and putting them on the side of the flats with the name of the varieties. We always plant in even rows so that it is more straightforward. The stickers that we use are the leftover edges from our labels for our lip balm, scrubs, etc.

The flat number

The flat planting record sheet

Keeping records

The varieties marked on the side

After the flats are planted they go on one of the shelves. The early ones start off indoors on a shelf behind the wood stove. We have found that some of the most important factors to growing good starts are warmth, moisture and light. Warmth and moisture are especially important while the seeds are germinating. We check the flats often to make sure they are not drying out at all. Being behind the wood stove keeps them nice and warm but can also dry them out quickly if we are not careful. If you keep your seeds moist and warm they will usually germinate quickly and at a good rate. For a few crops like peppers, tomatoes, and basil we also use a heat mat underneath the flats to keep them consistently warm if the fire is out or something. 

We watch carefully for the first little sprouts to appear. As soon as they do light becomes very important and we move them to a shelf that has fluorescent lights above it. When we first started out we depended solely on sunlight from the windows, but it just wasn't enough and that was the biggest reason for spindly, weak plants. But at the time we didn't spend any money unless we had to so we made due. Thankfully as we have done a little bit better we were able to afford some lights. We have found that it works best to have 2 sets of lights on each shelf, but it does work to have only one if next to a sunny window. Even the plants that are out in the greenhouse addition do better with some supplemental light. 

We start all of our own transplants from seed at this point. In the past we bought onion sets but it is hard to find organic ones(which we are required to use) at all, let alone reasonably priced ones, so we have been starting those ourselves as well. Most crops spend about 4-6 weeks in the soil block and then get transplanted directly to the garden. These include lettuce, broccoli, cabbage, kale, cucumbers, and squash. Some crops spend 4-6 weeks in the soil blocks and then get potted into 4" pots. These are mainly tomatoes, peppers, and basil. The onions and leeks are done a little differently. They are scattered into a flat that is full of soil mix and grown in there until they are ready to separate out and transplant to the garden. 

Well that is the overview of how we start and grow our transplants. Of course there is a lot more I could get into about each crop, how much to water etc., but the main things are keeping your plants moist enough and warm enough and having good lighting. Those three things have made a huge difference in the success of our transplants. If you have any more questions or if I forgot anything please ask!

The flats on the shelf. The bottom shelf without lights hasn't come up yet,
the shelves above have two lights each.

Pepper seedlings

Onions, basil, and tomatoes, in the addition.
 The shelf with the tomatoes has one light on it.

Tomatoes after being potted up into 4" pots

Basil under lights

This is an example of the difference good light makes.
This flat was grown on a shelf that had one light
down the center. You can see that the lettuce in the middle of the flat is
much darker green and lusher. The lettuce on either side looks a little
pale and sickly in comparison. I actually ended up throwing
 out some of the lettuce on the left side because it was so bad.