In this Week's Box

When this box gets home, put the peppers in the crisper drawer; they don’t need a bag. Melons go in the fridge, but they probably won’t fit in the crisper; again, no bag necessary. You don’t want to refrigerate melons for more than a couple of days. Tomatoes go on the counter or on the windowsill to finish ripening; open up the clamshell of Sungolds. Basil wants to stay warm, so maybe you’ll want to double-bag that. Yellow Onions go in a cool, dry place.

Sweet Red Peppers – The red sweet peppers have finally come into their own, so we are pleased to have a good number in this week’s boxes. Red peppers are fully ripe green peppers; while physiologically mature, green peppers haven’t finished the ripening process that makes fruits so much more attractive. Of course, that ripening comes at some risk to the grower, increasing the opportunities for decay, sunscald, and insect damage, but along with modest risk comes great rewards. As peppers ripen, not only do they taste better and look prettier, but they’re better for you; a ripe pepper has ten times the vitamin A and almost twice the vitamin C as a green pepper.

Jalapeno Peppers – These are the small green ones. We grow a variety with modest heat and very good flavor.

Melons – Hey, we’ve got melons! We lost a key melon variety on our farm three years ago when the hybrid seed was pulled from the market. Ever since then, I’ve been a really lousy melon farmer. But this year, we’ve got some melons. Almost everybody got a cantaloupe in their box this week; we had to substitute a small watermelon in a few of the boxes. (The watermelons are not performing so well, and I don’t expect to have enough to do much with putting them in the shares. Sorry.)

Paste and Saladette Tomatoes – After some experimentation with shelf life, I am feeling more comfortable putting these spotty but tasty tomatoes in the boxes this week. I’ve held some very spotty tomatoes on my windowsill for the better part of six days now, but I would still recommend using these on the sooner side of later.

Round Red Tomatoes – Still mostly coming from the greenhouses. As the days shorten, production will continue to decline on both the round reds and the Sungolds; we have definitely passed the peak of harvest on both of those now.

Sungold Cherry Tomatoes – Most boxes got these, but not everybody.

Yellow Onions – more fully cured this week than last, which won’t affect the flavor at all but will allow you to store them longer. Again, cool and dry are the keys to long shelf life for onions.

Purple Kale – Use this just like green kale. Purple means it should have some more antioxidants in it. Plus, it looks neat.

Basil – again, keep the basil warm. Very dirty this week, due to the heavy rains on Tuesday. Sorry about that. Basil can go bad pretty quickly once it’s washed, in my experience, so we chose to bag it and deliver it dirty. Give a quick rinse and pat or spin dry before using.