Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Pirate corn!

So, here is just a quick update of what is going on out here at the farm. We currently have tomatoes turning red every day. If you like fresh tomatoes, come on down to the farmers market, Thursdays at AJ Chandler Park from 3 - 6 PM. We have a few different varieties, so you'd better try a couple of each. Also, squash is bigtime right now. A couple different types of zucchini (gold, grey, eight ball, etc.) so take a few. Now we also have canteloupe and watermelon. Our watermelon is an heirloom variety called moon and stars. It is recognized by Slow Food USA as part of their Ark of Taste collection of endangered flavors. Even when not ripe, it still tastes awesome. We have more jalapenos than you can shake a stick at, and a few bell peppers are coming back, but with this heat they may not last too long. We also have lots and lots of CNG (see last post) sweet pirate corn. Why is it pirate corn, you say? Well, that because it's a buck-an-ear! Sorry, I guess that's not worth laughing at, but with the huge demand for ethanol and all of the flooding in the midwest, corn is at a premium right now. On the bright side, we are just about the only CNG or USDA Organic corn you can buy locally. Lots of corn out here, not much of it grown using organic principles. Well, ours is, and it is delicious. Boil it, steam it, grill it or eat it raw: however you like your corn, this stuff is awesome.

Now, getting ready for fall (farmers always have to think at least 4 - 6 months ahead), we are planting our squash and pumpkins for our heirloom pumpkin patch that will be open to the public. We have 17 different varieties of pumpkin-type squash, from your standard orange to white, blue, green, stripey, bumpy, warty, thick skinned for cooking, hulless seeds for eating... you will have to just come out and see it. I can't predict the future, but my guess is that we will have a wider variety than you can find anywhere else in the valley. If you have a special request for something you'd like to see in the fall, please let us know within the next couple of weeks. Like I said before, farmers have got to think 4 - 6 months in advance, so the earlier you tell us, the better we can plan.

See you at the market!

7 comments:

KrisBo said...

i am so excited for that pumpkin patch! and save me an ear of corn, i'm gonna try to come visit this weekend. i'll even buy it from ya! pirate corn. haha.

Chad~Nicole said...

I wish I was gonna be around on Thursday because I reallly could use some of those jalepenos to make salsa with. I need to use up all of my garden tomatoes.

Mary and Skip said...

Hey BFF....

Glad you got melons going...I could never get them to ripen correctly. The side facing the sun always got mushy and the other side was hard as a rock and this would happen in ONE day!

Anyhoo...I am doing low carb diet for diabetes. I find I eat a lot of GREEN leafy veggies! Best selection is at Lee Lee Oriental Market....but sometimes they look pretty picked over.

I would love it if you would consider growing some Swiss Chard, spinach and kale this fall. I don't have any space to grow them in my back yard, anymore.

OH, have you tried growing Lacinato Kale? I did a couple of years ago..."dinosaur kale". It looks almost BLACK!

Also, my favorite tomato: "Aunt Ruby's German Green" and another called "Red Chief". Red Chief seeds I got from a friend of mine, I am not sure where she got them but both these tomatoes grow well in my back yard.

This fall I will be sticking with baby bok choy, leaf lettuces, komatsuna and arugula...smaller plants, you know, for my containers.

I am still not set up to go full bore with my veggies in my back yard...don't have enough containers! LOL!

Love, Mary L.

Mary and Skip said...

Moon and Stars Watermelon....
Awesome taste! And you can eat it all the way down to the green! :)

Unfortunately, must be a controlled substance for my B.S. issues. :(

Hope the storm that is brewing doesn't take out any of your plants! I already had an okra casualty.

Love, Mary L.

Newbie said...

hey there - Elise told me about your farm - any chance of selling some of your corn & other veggies on bountiful baskets pickup day? It's hard for me to get to the farmer's market on Thursdays.

Stephanie Shumway said...

Yay. I liked the silly joke :o) I took an organic gardening class a week ago and went straight home and planted pumpkins, acorn and butternut squash, radishes (for the kids since they pop up so quick) sunflowers (and shasta daisies and forget me nots- Megan calls them don't forget me's), canteloupe and bush beans. I love to read about all the things you're growing so I'm excited to jump on the bandwagon! We're starting a worm farm this week, too (My kids are stoked) so I just get some really great starter soil. I found a planting schedule for our area and found it useful- maybe you will too- http://ag.arizona.edu/pubs//garden/az1005.pdf
and also a page with monthly gardening tips for our area- http://ag.arizona.edu/gardening///news/calendar/index.html
Awesome stuff. Anyway, keep your shoulder to the wheel! You're doing great!

Stephanie Shumway said...

one more great site if you don't already know about it:
http://ag.arizona.edu/gardening/sitemap.html