Wonderful Weeds

Stringing the words “wonderful” and “weeds” together in the same sentence will get you strange looks in agricultural circles. And frankly, we spend too much time and money around here trying to get rid of them. Still, weeds play a vital role in the health of the farm, springing up to cover bare soil, pulling nutrients up from far below ground.

The wonder of weeds is really that they set the stage for something else to come along and replace them; most of them only thrive where the soil has been disturbed, and different soils will spawn different kinds of weeds. In the greenhouses, where the soils have been intensively augmented with compost, the weeds are predominantly pigweed and lambsquarters, typical indicators of high fertility. Adjacent fields still sport plenty of buttonweed (that’s the one you see alongside all of the corn fields where the herbicides have just missed), but we are seeing more and more pigweed and lambsquarters as we loosen and enrich those soils. Looking at the differences in root structures can provide some insight into the unique suitability of each weed to its situation: buttonweed just goes straight down, looking for minerals that are absent in the topsoil; pigweed also has a substantial taproot, but puts more effort into sending roots throughout the top layer of soil, using what’s there.

We generally try to deal a deathblow to weeds before they get up to size, but we don’t panic if a few get ahead of us, as long as they do not negatively impact the crop. We figure that the weeds are just doing their job, and we can make good use of them by mowing and tilling them into the soil.

My favorite weeds are the perennials, like quackgrass and thistles. Although they are hard to control, I am continually amazed at their ability to survive and thrive through the worst we can throw at them. Both spread by sending roots under ground to a new location. Thistles go deep, typically ten to twelve inches, before spreading laterally. The roots are often spindly and weak; where they stop growing laterally and head for the surface, the shoots snap easily off from the main root where the plant stores its energy. (The trick to pulling thistles with your bare hands is to know that the thorns don’t grow in darkness—just move a little soil aside and grasp the roots.) Quackgrass spreads more shallowly, but I have seen the roots grow right through carrots and potatoes if left unchecked. On one occasion, I pulled up a single rhizome that was over six feet long! Now there’s a weed that knows how to move.

Goings on on the Farm

Omigoodness we got a lot of sunshine this week, and the soil has been dry enough to work and we’ve seeded crops and cover crops and mowed the farm so that it looks nice again and we’ve had a pleasant time of working outside in this remarkable weather!

Chris attended a food safety seminar on Tuesday that provided suggestions that will get us a long ways towards achieving a food safety certification from the USDA. We already follow best practices; we just need to upgrade our monitoring and documentation, something that will take some significant time and energy.

We are still running a little shorthanded, but we are coming back from that a little. One of the hazards of running a small farm – or any small business – is that having even one person out sick can present some real challenges.

We started onion and shallot harvest in earnest this week, and anticipate getting another big crop of carrots out of the ground (and out of the weeds. Yuck.) and hoeing the perennial herbs before the weekend rolls around.

In This Week's Box

When you get your box home this week, take the beets greens off of the beets. Both go in bags in the crisper drawer, as do the carrots and the zucchini. The fresh onions should go in the crisper drawer, but they don’t need a bag. Garlic gets a dry, cool spot (easier this week than last!), and the tomatoes go out on the counter.

Round Red Greenhouse Tomatoes

Sungold Cherry Tomatoes

Golden Zucchini

Green Top Beets - The earthy flavor of beets comes from the same chemical compound that soil organisms secrete to make the characteristic smell of freshly-tilled soil. If you are reluctant to try beets because of some leftover trepidation resulting from canned and boiled conventional beets from you childhood, then please try our beets. The best simple preparation is to bake them in a covered baking dish at 425 for about an hour. The beet greens have a pleasant flavor, different than spinach but close enough that they will work in most spinach recipes.

Basil – Again, keep this warmer than the rest of your produce by double-wrapping it, or putting it in the door, or both. A member of the mint family, basil seems to have originated in India, although some evidence seems to indicate that it originated in China. Throughout the world, it has a range of symbolism, from a symbol of mourning in Greece to a symbol of engagement in Romania. A good Hindu goes to rest with a leaf on his breast as a passport to paradise.

Carrots – Still loving our carrots this year.

Fresh Red Onions – By next week, we should be into our more regular storage onions. In the meantime, enjoy the fresh reds for their mild flavor and juicy texture.

Garlic

One of several other items: salad mix, purple broccoli, or red peppers. We didn’t have enough of any of these for all of the boxes this week, so we have used them up by spreading them around.

Recipes You Can Use

Classic Beet Greens

1 bunch of beet greens
1 tbsp olive oil, or a little more
1 garlic clove, pressed or minced
Freshly ground pepper
Fresh lemon juice

Heat the oil over medium heat in a medium-sized skillet. Add the garlic and stir until the garlic is fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add the beet greens and stir for two minutes or so, until they have begun to wilt. Remove from heat, cover, and allow to sit for several minutes to steam themselves. Serve immediately with a light drizzle of fresh lemon juice to taste.

Beet and Carrot Salad

1 pound carrots, grated
1 pound beets, grated
¼ cup finely chopped red onions
¼ cup basil leaves, chopped
1 tbsp white wine vinegar
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp stoneground mustard
½ tsp salt

Combine the carrots, beets, onions, and basil in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together the remaining ingredients. Toss with the vegetables, and chill for one hour for flavors to develop.

Basil Pesto

Pesto can come a lot of different ways. Leave out the nuts, or change the nuts. A little more olive oil helps it cling to pasta, a little less makes it more spreadable.

3 cloves garlic
1/3 cup olive oil
1/3 cup Parmesan
1 Tbsp Lemon Juice
1/3 cup almonds or pine nuts
salt and pepper to taste

Place basil, garlic, nuts, and lemon juice in a food processor; with the processor running, drizzle in the olive oil. After you have a smooth paste, transfer to a bowl, stir in the Parmesan, and add salt and pepper to taste. For a real treat, try pesto made with a mortar and pestle—it’s a totally different experience!