Granted we are at the end of our growing season here on the farm and most of the crops have come to the end of their life cycle. But we still have some crops that need to be put up for the winter in our farmhouse pantry. Cabbage, carrots and waxy greens are very much a part of what,s is still hanging on the field and it just so happens to be the main ingredients for Kimchi. There are several folks that may have never heard of Kimchi…and up until last year Kimchi wasn’t something I myself wasn’t familiar with. Our farm friends bought out a batch they had made for me to try and I loved it! Last winter I made my first batch and even though I toned it down and really decided to make it to my own taste it was wonderful. Kimchi is a traditional fermented Korean dish that is made much like kraut but adds a twist by also using other vegetables and spices that hold up during the fermenting process. Growing up on a farm I remember my mother and grandmother making kraut for the root cellar as well as other fermented vegetables such as pickled corn and even green beans. Handed down for generation to generation preserving methods that after the age of the refrigerator came along some how tended to get lost. But for many the art and health benefits of fermenting vegetables are too important to be forgotten. Not to mention they are delicious!
Asian Cabbage
December 2nd. we are hosting a free workshop on making Kimchi here at the farm. I am excited about showing you my method of how I make my recipe for this wonderful side-dish as well as discuss all the variations and ways in which you can make Kimchi your very own. There is no limit to the creative process of persevering the harvest. I hope you can join us next Saturday morning…learn something new and something useful that can be handed down generation to generation. I think it is so important to keep these skills alive and renewed….you never know when you may need them again.
Preserving The Harvest Workshop~ Kimchi
Saturday December 2nd. 10:30 am
The Farmhouse Kitchen ~Madison Creek Farms
Fun, Free and always Unconventional!
Here we are in the early part of November and a couple of good frosts and 1 freeze under our belt and we still have some beds of greens that keep hanging on. That I love. Of course my son Lucca is pretty sick of seeing greens every night for dinner. I have been freezing bags of turnips, mustard greens and spinach for the past few days. This is so simple to do and come the dark, cold days of winter it is nice to pull out a bag of greens from the garden from the freezer. You just need to wash your fresh greens and put them into boiling water for a couple of minutes or until they turn bright green…this may in some case take less then 2 minutes. Once they have turned color remove them from the boiling water and put them into a bowl of ice water to stop them from cooking. Once they have cooled squeeze the water out of them and place them into a plastic freezer bag. That’s it! So easy and you will be happy you took a few minutes of your day to do this while the greens are in season and readily available.
This is a study of dirt time…I mean getting down there in it… smelling…looking at it…feeling of it through your fingers and then testing the dirt…the dirt will tell you what it needs and believe me it will need plenty of fresh compost and other minerals as well. I think of it like I do when I create a new food recipe…it takes trial and error to get the mixture right and some experience in the kitchen helps a great deal. We have a lot of fall varieties of vegetables coming up now with the cooler air and rain bring new life to the farm. So happy to see some of my favorites back out there growing. Kale, Lettuces and radishes are coming on and looking wonderful. We also have some beets, and carrots that should show up in the CSA baskets late October. Mustard greens and Arugula are really pretty right now coming up through the ground. I can’t wait to start harvesting those. Now…I need to get back to the to-do-list..I think I have spent enough time putting it off this morning:)
With the farm’s market being closed right now to the public due to the lack of rain and this heatwave it has made it easier around here to harvest the produce that is producing..and believe me there is plenty out there in the field that is still giving its all. The last couple of weekends we have had our fall CSA shareholders pickups and that has been great…for I can only put up so much. We had a few shareholders out of town or unable to pickup last weekend and this is what was left over after the pickups were over. I did take a couple of bags full over to my neighbors…and my sister Patsy went home with a bag of vegetables…although she calls me later and asked …now what is this green leafy stuff and what do I do with such & such? I try my best not to slap that girl…I have sent home bags of all this stuff with her before…I bet she tossed it and went for a hamburger instead.
Welcome to The Female Farmer! Life on a 38 acre organic farm...it's not always banjo's and butterflies out here on the farm, People!
The season to count my blessings
During the hustling seasons of Spring through Fall here on the farm it is hard to slow down long enough to catch your breath let alone count your blessings…but now that the field is sleeping and the days are shorten by hours I find myself doing just that. Being thankful for the little things that come with living and working here on the farm….the people and the lifestyle that happens here. Granted I am not a holiday ho..ho..ho person by any means..I do enjoy the spirit of it all,just not the shopping. I do not enjoy the whole shopping thing…
I am starting the first batch of seeds this week going into their planting trays for early spring crops. These will be the first plantings in Febuary. The CSA will open for signups mid January so keep an eye out for that. I guess I will get back to wrapping up these gifts for Christmas is just around the corner. Mark and I wish you all a Merry Christman and our best wishes for the New year.