CSA Week 9!

Hi everyone,
Week 9 already... it's hard to believe. And July's already come and gone! The summer really flies by.
We've had pleasant weather for farming recently and most everything is doing pretty well. The only exceptions are the plants outside that really love the heat (beans, tomatoes, squash). They're producing, but not at their usual rate. But there's still plenty to give out- and the greenhouse tomatoes and eggplant are really stellar this year.

Here's what's in your bags:
Salad Mix
Eggplant
White Onion
A Tomato or two
Cherry Tomatoes
Summer Squash
Beans or Sugar Snap Peas
Mixed Basil (cinnamon, Thai, lemon, sweet and purple basils- a truly incredible aroma! they can all be used together as you would regular basil)
Arugula for some
Carrots

The eggplant is just incredible; it's really going all out, and we handed out some real beauties this week- some classic dark purple, some white, and some a gorgeous shade of purple-pink. 

  

A few words about the veggies:

• Be careful with the eggplant stems- they have little spiny thorns, and they're quite sharp!
• We have a variety of summer squash: some green zucchini, a bright, orangey-yellow zucchini, a plain yellow crookneck summer squash, and a yellow summer squash with a green bottom. You can use all of them the same way, and they have subtly different flavors.
• The tomatoes will come out to you in various stages of ripeness. The best check on how ripe they are is a good sniff (should smell nice and tomato-y when ripe) and a very gentle squeeze to see if they're still quite firm, or if they have a little "give." But remember, be gentle! Our tomatoes are not like the ones in the grocery store- these are mostly heirloom varieties that don't travel well because they can be easily bruised or squished, but they have an incredible flavor!

We dug 180 lbs of carrots this week! And they were beautiful, too- very long and straight, for the most part.

Just the other night, I tried out a recipe Sue gave me. Actually, it's more like a cooking method, and it uses the veggies you received this week. It's sort of like a ratatouille (rat-ah-too-ee, I think) but super quick and simple. And it's really really delicious. I spooned ours on top of rice, but feel free to experiment. I bet it'd be delicious on polenta, or maybe even pasta.

Lucky Moon Ratatouille
Prepare a deep roasting pan or oven-safe casserole dish by coating the bottom with olive oil.

Preheat the oven to 450, and chop up some garlic (3-4 cloves is nice). Put the garlic in the pan, and place in the oven as it's preheating. Let the garlic cook for a few minutes until golden brown, but check it so it doesn't burn.

Remove the pan from the oven, and shake some bread crumbs to coat the bottom. Toss in some chopped onion, then place a layer of eggplant, cut into 1/2 inch -1/4 inch rounds, across the bottom of the roasting pan. Drizzle with some olive oil and shake on some more bread crumbs.

Cut zucchini into rounds (about the same thickness) and layer on top of the eggplant/breadcrumbs. Repeat the olive oil and breadcrumbs. Cut thick slices of tomato and layer on top, adding some more bread crumbs on top (and maybe some cheese? Mozzarella? Parmesan?)

Bake in the oven about 45 minutes, covered, until all the layers are soft.