CSA 2015 Week #1

Lettuce
Kale
Carrots
Salad turnips
Spinach
Strawberries

Special Announcements:

Welcome to the first week of the 2015 CSA season! We are so happy to be growing your vegetables for you this year, and to give you a connection to your farmer and the source of your food! There are a few housekeeping items that I need to address right away…

First, we offer this blog as a way to connect people to photos, recipes, farm events, and more. It is a great way for our CSA members and farmers market customers to see what’s happening on the farm, and we welcome all the new members to this online space! But, if you are a former CSA member and you do not want to be getting the blog, all you need to do is scroll down your email notification and hit the unsubscribe button. It is too difficult for us to try to unsubscribe you from our long list of subscribers so we thank you for your understanding that we need you to take care of this matter yourself.

Second, we wanted to make sure you know that we do rinse off the soil from your vegetables here on the farm but we ask that you wash all your vegetables and fruits when you get home to make sure they are clean for all your culinary adventures!

Third, I always like to take a picture of the CSA box at the beginning of the week to give you an idea of what you will be eating (and the vegetables are just so beautiful!). We harvest twice a week for our different drop-off locations, and sometimes as crops ripen, the boxes will differ a little from each drop-off site. If so, I will write “some sites only” to give you a heads up that you might not be getting that specific vegetable yet. But don’t worry, this is our 24th CSA season! We plant enough for everyone and keep great records of who has received the vegetables we harvest each week. You will all get a fair share of the harvest. Which leads me to my last housekeeping item…

Linda, our CSA coordinator, office manager extraordinaire will be sending weekly emails with the list of the vegetables and important information regarding your CSA shares, please read them! Thank you!

OK, now for introductions…

My name is Sara Davies and I have had the pleasure of working at Winter Green Farm in different capacities for the last 13 years. I have basically grown up on this farm. I spent my summers working on the farm starting when I was sixteen! I began picking and processing blueberries and throughout the years I have harvested on the crew, weeded, transplanted, worked in the greenhouse, at farmer’s markets, and in the office as the bookkeeper and my current position as blogger. In that time I graduated from the University of Oregon, traveled, and married a wonderful guy named Tyson who also worked on the farm for 10 years. We have two amazing daughters, Ella (4) and Genevieve (1) who are my main focus these days, filling my life with love, lessons, crazy wonderful baby/kid energy and not much sleep.

Many of you have had the pleasure of speaking with Linda Davies on the phone or at one of our farm or marketing events. She keeps the CSA in tip top shape, with her amazing organization, keen ability to multi-task, her upbeat and positive personality, and her love and passion for organic food and sustainable living. She will be the one you will talk to or email with when you contact the farm. Here is a picture of her from our farm day last weekend, showing off her beautiful arm painting done by the amazing Elizabeth from Mustache Face Painting.

Jabrila Via is a Winter Green Farm owner and has been the CSA manager since the beginning of the CSA. She is the one who coordinates everything from crop planning, seeding in the Greenhouse, transplanting in the field, harvesting, and then packing the boxes that end up in your refrigerator! She keeps track of so many details and has such a wealth of farming knowledge and experience it is amazing to watch her work her magic every harvest day! It is really a dance and a juggling act to be able to look forward and plan each box with care, and Jabrila does it so well, your vegetables are in great hands!

Here is a picture of Jabrila (on the left) with Meg and Andrea, they were washing your lettuce and spinach before I gathered them together for an obligatory group photo in the processing room…

There are six new employees on the farm crew this year, and seven returning crew members. They are a great group of people and I will share with you their stories throughout the season here on the blog so you can get a glimpse of the people who are working so hard to bring you the bounty from the farm this year.

This hot weather is making everything grow like crazy here on the farm and we can hardly keep up! Your boxes are going to quickly fill with all the delicious fresh flavors of the season. We had our farm open house and potluck last weekend and the hot weather may have been a reason why we didn’t see many of you out here. Thank you to those who braved the heat and came out to spend the afternoon with us! If you missed the day, you can always come to our harvest celebration in the fall! We had hay rides,

spectacular face painting

a game of whiffle ball baseball

Mural painting

and fun for all ages…

I will leave you with some recipe ideas for the vegetables in your box, and if you need more tips and ideas on how to process and cook your vegetables, you can look through our archived blog posts and also our box notes are available on our website and you can get there by clicking here! Thanks again for being a part of the local food movement by choosing to support our farm. We can’t wait to share the harvest with you this season!