June 11th, 2025
What’s in your share?
Salad Mix
Endive
Radishes
Komatsuna
Arugula
Sugar Snap Peas
Endive - is sometimes called “Frisee”, but the variety we grow is actually endive. That said, searching for “frisee” recipes maybe be more precise than “endive”, because you may find recipes for “Belgian Endive” instead. Endive may not be familiar but it’s one of the most nutritious crops we grow. The cool thing about endive is that it can be lightly cooked, which sweetens and softens the bitter leaves. The white, inner leaves are the sweetest and most delicate, because they’re protected from the elements, while the outer leaves are stronger in taste and texture. If the taste is too strong for you, we definitely recommend either cooking it down with some honey or maple syrup or eating it in a salad mixed with the sweet romaine and tossed in a creamy dressing, like a Caesar Salad. I also washed these really throughly, but because of the nature of the frizzy leaves, they will likely need another rinse. This is where the salad spinner comes in handy. This is the only time you’ll get endive from us this season - be it a good thing or a bad thing ;)
Dinner from last week: roasted choy and broccolini, salad with rads, hummus with kalamata olives, baked feta with last year’s sun-dried tomatoes and onions and fresh herbs from this season and some pitas to schmear it all on.
Simple, but fancy-looking. We honestly love eating and cooking, and it’s a huge inspiration for why we started farming. It’s not a lucrative line of work; farmworkers are some of the lowest paid workers across the globe and often are not able to enjoy the fruits of their labor. We are extremely privileged to be able to take the time to enjoy our food and are working (mostly Sam) with other organizations in the state to make farming a more just and “sustainable” way of life.
Komatsuna - you also got it last week, but its green season so get em while they last! Stir fries, omelets, cooked or raw - these greens are super nourishing and don’t get enough attention in the produce world.
Arugula - has been tough for us to plan for an early spring harvest for the past couple years. It matures 30 days from being seeded, and because the leaves are so tender and susceptible to flea beetle damage, it needs to be covered at all times, which increases growth speed. Usually it goes to seed, or “bolts” before the first harvest, making it unmarketable. But this time, we held off on planting, and while the leaves are pretty big anyways, they have not gone to seed and are the perfect supplement to a salad. The leaves are mature, not “baby” arugula. Because of their size and how we wash and bag our cut greens, putting them into bags would have bent and bruised the stems and leaves, creating a soggy mess in a plastic bag, which nobody wants. So we opted to harvest them into cute little bunches. They have been dunked in water for an initial cleaning, but a little rinse never hurts. When you are ready to eat them, simply use a kitchen knife to cut the stems from the leaves just above the twist tie, and you’ll have some awesome arugula to add to your salad mix.
Radishes - Love em or hate em, they are always the first root crop of the spring. Radishes are a great crunchy addition to a spring salad, but are also delicious roasted. Halved or quartered, tossed in oil and soy sauce, roasted radishes may change your mind about their taste.
recipes to try
Tomatoes are growing fast! We had our first week with the new crew of workshares this past Thursday and immediately put them on most technical field job: pruning and trellising tomatoes. It can be a hard task to wrap your brain around, but everyone got the hang of it and we got all 600 tomato plants pruned and trellised in 4 hours :) So lucky to have such a sweet crew - we’re gonna crush this year!