June 18th, 2025
What’s in your share?
Romaine Lettuce
Salad Mix
Japanese Salad Turnips
Kohlrabi
Cilantro
Sugar Snap Peas
Romaine Lettuce - is one of my favorite crops to grow and eat. It’s gorgeous, easy to clean, and is a great crunchy addition to a salad. One thing that will differ between our salad mix and our head lettuce, is that we can’t wash each individual leaf of the head lettuce without ruining the head. We’ve dunked the heads in two sinks of water to get off any initial dirt or insects, but you may find that you need to rinse the leaves again. The easiest way to do this: 1) Cut the base (stem) off from the leaves 2) run the leaves under the faucet, (you can do this individually if you really want to be thorough), 3) let the leaves drip dry by standing them upright in a bowl or a colander, draining off the water eventually. Alternatively, a solid salad spinner is a great way to dry your lettuce, but you need to cut them first.
My favorite way to eat Japanese salad turnips: Cut turnips in half or quarters, (I like to leave a little stem and the root on for cuteness) heat a cast iron on medium-medium high and add coconut oil, olive oil, or butter with a sprinkle of salt. Place turnips cut side down once the pan is hot. Cover. Let cook for 10-15 minutes and try to resist moving them around (you want them to brown). The steam will cook the inside of the turnips while the heat will brown the outside. After 15 minutes, give them a poke with a fork. If you can easily pierce them and the bottom is crispy, they’re done. If not, continuing cooking while covered. If they’re soft but not brown, take the cover off and turn up the heat a little until they get crispy. Toss in miso or soy sauce and eat with rice or noodles or by themselves.
Kohlrabi - has a similar flavor to broccoli and the texture of a potato or an apple. Unlike a potato, kohlrabi can be eaten raw. I definitely recommend peeling your kohlrabi. Skip the veggie peeler and use a paring knife knife - it’ll go way faster. If eating raw, shred, cut into matchsticks, or into thin slices. You can also treated it like a potato and cut it into bigger chunks to roast or boil it. Our favorite way to eat it is raw, cut into thin slices with some cheese slices or dipped in hummus. This is a great resource for cutting and prepping kohlrabi! This is the only time you’ll get kohlrabi this season, so enjoy it - or be thankful its the only time you’re getting it ;)
Japanese Salad Turnips - We love “Hakurei” turnips! They have become very popular among our members because of their tenderness and sweetness, unlike a storage turnip, which has a tendency to be more dense and slightly bitter. We definitely recommend trying them raw; on a salad, sandwich, salad, or just plain. They also sauté nicely and pair well with napa cabbage, bok choy, carrots, and scallions. The greens are also delicious and nourishing! Add them to salads or stir fries.
This being our third week, I figured we’d take care of some housekeeping and talk about crop storage and how to make your veggies last as long as possible and maintain their nutritive qualities.
Most of the crops we grow have a surprisingly long shelf life. The key to preserving the life of the vegetables is all about how they are stored, starting in the field. The night before harvest, we make sure to irrigate everything that will be harvested the next morning, so that it can take up water at night. Then in the morning, we begin harvesting early, before the sun gets hot. Harvesting when the cool morning dew is still on the plants helps them stay crisp and fresh as they make their way to your table. When a vegetable is harvested, it is full of what we call “field heat”. When a plant is no longer connected to the soil, the field heat needs to be removed quickly. Immediately after harvesting, we submerge, soak, or spray the crops with our cold well water to release field heat. We then put the crates of harvested vegetables in our walk-in cooler, and return to the field to harvest everything on the list for that day.
We take a great deal of time making sure that your produce comes to you as clean as possible. This is not only to provide you with a clean and tidy box, but thoroughly cleaning each crop with very cold water helps to keep the veggies as fresh as possible. As we hand the them over to you, we wanted to provide some tips for keeping their vitality as long as possible.
Take a few minutes to look this over if you can, and if you’re ever in doubt, put your produce in a plastic bag or a glass or plastic container.
Crop Storage and Tips
This resource is an ongoing project, using mostly our own home recipes. We do take the challenge to cook seasonally seriously, so most of the recipes you will find use crops we grow, but can be adapted. Most recipes are simple; we know most folks are busy, and the commitment to CSA is enough in itself without elaborate recipes that are time-consuming.
Spicy Kimchi Slaw (sub kohlrabi for daikon radish!)
Its almost cucumber time! We tied up em last week and they are beginning to set fruit. More to come on our ongoing saga with the cucumber…
Carrots in the middle are growing nicely and will be in next week’s share.
Sugar snap peas are in full flush right now. You got a nice haul of them this week and likely will next week, before they begin to wane. Snap peas are one of the earliest snacking crops we have, but they only last for a few weeks because they don’t do well in the heat. Every year we make a trellis that they outgrow as soon as we start to harvest, so the jungle of peas is nothing new, but maybe we should get some stronger trellising equipment one of these seasons!