Your organic farm in the Eastern Townships
This week we write our ode to the turnip, a sadly under-appreciated vegetable. The ones we’re harvesting now are delicious – with a turnip-y sharpness that balances out the plump sweetness they’ve developed thanks to the cooler (and wetter) weather we’ve been having. Like our other spring crucifers, our previous crop of turnips suffered the…
The weather has been playing tricks on us. After two (almost consecutive) frosts last week, we saw balmy temperatures again early this week – just enough for our veggies to recover from the brief cold spell. At this time of year, every sunny day counts, particularly if there are two or three in a row.…
Fall struck hard and fast last weekend, in the guise of two chilly nights with near-zero (Celsius) temperatures. We worked hard to harvest the last winter squash and to cover our basil. Most other vegetables, be they brassicas (cabbage, broccoli, kohlrabi) or umbellifers (carrots), thrive in cold weather – sweetening as the temperature drops. As…
The change in the fields is notable: the tomatoes, eggplants and peppers have arrived. This holy vegetable trinity gives everything a new look and feel. From here on in, your baskets will have fewer leafy greens and will weigh more. They are the ultimate trio, vegetables for our favourite summer vegetable dish, ratatouille. Their presence…
It seems all we have been doing in our spare time for the past month is staking and suckering tomatoes. Tomato chores rank pretty high on the tedium spectrum of vegetable farming – close runner-ups to weeding carrots (by far the most tedious of all vegetable chores). But, as we keep telling ourselves, it’s worth…
Given an early Spring and recent warm days, our plants are growing like gangbusters. This morning, as we were staking tomatoes, I started thinking that this might be a record year, agriculturally speaking, at least. Take our tomatoes, for example: June is not yet over and they are already laden with fruit. I am so…
The stress level on the farm has just gone up a few notches. The nonchalance of early May has been replaced by a sense of urgency as we have to plant, and fast, before the next rains. Coming days will be spent binge planting eggplants, peppers, corn, zucchini and cucumbers. Two weeks from now, we’ll…
From one year to the next, change is the only constant, or so it seems. Rewind to May last year: we were experiencing diluvian downpours, waiting for the rain to stop long enough to be able to transplant our first seedlings to the fields. This year’s weather is only marginally better – showers instead of…
Here we go again. Broccoli is getting a bum rap, and American consumers are going to pay. Reacting to the current debate on President Obama’s health care bill (‘Obamacare’), certain politicians and Supreme Court justices are turning broccoli into an ideological scapegoat. “The government can’t force us to eat broccoli,” they’ve said in rebuttal to…
The first fall frost welcomed us in the fields this morning. You know there is no turning back to summer once frost has hit, even if, as they are forecasting this Thanksgiving weekend, it is followed by a balmy Indian summer spell. While some vegetables resist, and even relish, frost (brocoli, jerusalem artichokes and lettuce,…