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newsleter

Dear CSA members

We are closing in on the last of the CSA for the season with only two weeks of pick up left.  This has been a great year for the farm and we have had a wonderful harvest.

The Harvest Festival

The harvest festival will be October 9 at 11 am till 2 pm.  Please come out to the farm and pick up your last CSA share, enjoy the music, cider press and bring a dish to share in the outrageous farm pot luck.  Please bring plates and silverware with you.  The Harvest Festival is such a fun event for the whole family but please leave your furry family members at home.  We love your dogs but this is not an event for dogs.  Bring bags and boxes to take your bounty home also you might gleen some food from the fields so be prepared.  We will have new peaceful belly farm tee shirts for sale and we will be taking security deposits for next years CSA.  The deposit is $100 so bring money or a check.  The farm is located on Broken Horn road.  Seaman’s Gulch Road turns into broken Horn Road just past Dry Creek Road after the main entrance of Hidden Springs.  See you there.  If you cant make it and still want to pick up your last CSA share sen us an email at info@peacefulbelly.com

Tomatoes

We are selling 10 pound boxes of tomatoes to CSA members for the great price of $17.  If you would like a 10 pound box or a few boxes we can have them waiting for you at the CSA pick up points.  Sen me an email and let me know how many you would like  at info@peacefulbelly.com  We have Romas or red tomatoes.

pepper roaster

Thats right for all of you who love their roasted chili from peaceful belly we will be firing up our roaster this weekend at market.  Come on down and get your roasted New Mexican Chili grown by us and roasted fresh at the market.  I think Idaho roasted chili may have something over their neighbors to the south.

Newsleter

July brings a new energy to the farm, with the heat we see baby melons, cucumbers, peppers and tomatoes show up on the vines.  These warm nights help these crop ripen up and all of us wait with anticipation of their bounty.

This week in your pick up you will see; chard, potatoes, cabbage, turnips, basil, onions and kohlrabi.  Kohlrabi?  This is an ancient vegetable in fact it could be one of the oldest cultivated vegetables.  You eat the big round part.  Peel the kohlrabi and then slic it up.  I eat mine raw in a salad or just as a sside with a little salt and pepper.  It tastes like a hicama.  Have fun with it.

Cooking Classes at the market  

Abby the farm chef is having cooking classes every week at the down town market.  She is taking the strange veggies and showing how to use them.  If you are having questions about some of the veggies you should come check out Abby’s “Chef at the Market” booth.  The 30th of July she will be cooking cardoons.  And you will see them is your CSA box the next week.  Free cooking classes!!! Cant beat that.

No CSA the WEEK of August 8th

Clay and I are going for a week vacation the week of August 8th.  We will not have a CSA pick up that week.  We are going to Glacier National Park with Clay’s whole family.  We have not had a summer vacation since we started Peaceful Belly, nine years ago.  Clay and his brother were both born while his parents were stationed as rangers in Glacier Park.  We thought that we better have a reunion as a whole family there.  CSA pick up will resume the next week and continue through the end of September.  The CSA  is 17 weeks long with the Harvest Festival on October 9th being the 18th pick up of squash and fall veggies.  So please put that on your calendar.

News Letter

We are back and the summers bounty is coming on strong.  This week in your CSA pick up you will get; beets, carrots, napa cabbage, shelling peas, summer squash, kale and fava beans. 

Magic Beans?

The magic beans that grew overnight into a beanstalk that reached into the clouds were very probably fava beans or, as the English call them, broad beans. Americans, however, have been slow to appreciate their enchanting powers.

The pale green beans in the big floppy pods have been a beloved early spring food on much of the planet for centuries. Favas — also known as Windsor beans, English beans, horse beans and pigeon beans — have long been diet staples in Asia, the Middle East, South America, North Africa and Europe.

These ancient beans are one of the oldest cultivated plants and among the easiest to grow. They were the onlybeans Europeans ate before they discovered America and all its legumes. They took our beans home and left us the fava, which never really caught on.

After preparing them, you begin to understand why. This is a labor-intensive process. First, you string and shuck the beans, then parboil them before removing from a waxy coating. It is something to do on a Sunday afternoon around the kitchen table or on the front porch with friends. For Americans, that’s a lot of time to spend on a bean.

A great web site about how to shell them click here

I like them shelled and then sauteed in a little butter and salt and pepper but there are many ways to eat them.  Have fun with them.

Flower shares and wine shares start this week.  The fruit shares are still a few weeks ways….we hope soon I cant wait for one of Eagle Creeks Peaches.

cooking classes

Hey CSA members remember that we offer cooking classes on the farm.  Chef Abby has been doing them all June with greens and the CSA members that have been attending are raving about what they are learning.  The July classes are about peas and fava beans.  These classes are great because they give you wonderful knowledge about how to use all these amazing veggies in your CSA pick ups.  Here is a link

Newsletter

Perhaps summer is finally here!!!  The hot crops like our favorite tomatoes and peppers will love it but the peas will not.   Peas, how we all love peas.  This year Clay planted so many peas.  That is great for you and bad or our farm crew.  You will see snap peas, snow peas and shelling peas in your pick ups for the next few weeks.  Remember snap peas and snow peas you can eat the whole pea but shelling peas you can only eat the little pea inside the pod.  Shelling peas are a bit of work but oh so worth it.  

     in you pick up this week you will have these funny little things called garlic scapes.  They are the flowering necks of the garlic and a real treat.  Their texture is like a green bean with a light garlic flavor.  I love t just saute them up and add to pasta.  Here are some other ideas; Chop them up into one inch pieces and saute witha little olive oil until soft then add them and your favorite hard shredded cheese to some pasta with a little salt and pepper.  They are also wonderful in eggs or on a pizza or in a stir fry. There are so many fun recipes on the Internet for these strange little treats.  Have fun!

    Flower and wine shares begin the week of July 11th.  If you have a flower or wine share look for them starting that week.  Fruit share should start around the same time, the apricots are ripening up.  It is not too late to sign up for a fruit share or a wine or flower share just click here for the fruit share or click herefor the wine and fruit.   You will be sorry if you don’t. 

   Remember that we will not have a CSA pick up the week of July 4th.  In the past we have so many people not pick up their share that week that we have decided to give us that week to catch up on weeding.  We will resume pick ups the week after. Please mark that on your calendar.

We hope you are enjoying the spring bounty and you are having fun with boc choy.  This is the time to eat your green.  Thanks so much for choosing us to grow your food.

Newsletter for first pick up

Let the food begin.  Welcome to the bounty, you are in for an amazing season.  Clay has gone a little crazy with the amount of food he has planted this year and you will reap the bounty.  I think having a new baby kicked in his protective instinct and he wanted to have as much food as possible.   We are so excite to bring you all these fresh veggies.  In the first few weeks you will receive; salad mix, arugula, boc choy, radishes, boc choy, mustard greens, spinach, pea shoots, kale, turnips, and broccoli Rabb.  Every pick up gets a little different variety but all the pick up spots will see these veggies in the first 3 weeks.  It is so important for you to eat your greens and we will help you out with this in the spring. 

So what do you do with all these things?  I have included some recipes so have fun and remember, stir fry, stir fry stir fry!

Arugula- can be eaten raw in a salad or you can lightly wilt it in a pasta or make a pesto with it.  I  love to saute a little garil in some butter or olive oil and toss it over a nice pasta.  I put in the arugula  and let the warm pasta wilt it just a little then I top it off with a nice hard cheese like manchego or asiago and a little salt.  Easy and so good!  Try this if you think it is too bitter for your salad. 

ARUGULA PESTO SAUCE eat with artichokes, noodles, toast, carrot sticks…

3 cups packed arugula (about 3/4 pound), washed well and spun dry 1/3 cup pine nuts, toasted golden and cooled 1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 large garlic clove, chopped 3 tablespoons olive oil 1/4 cup hot water plus additional if desired In a food processor pulse together all ingredients except oil and water until arugula is chopped fine. With motor running add oil in a stream, blending mixture until smooth. Sauce may be made up to this point 1 week ahead and chilled, its surface covered with plastic wrap. Bring sauce to room temperature to continue. Stir in 1/4 cup hot water plus additional for thinner consistency if desired.

RAPINI: also called raab, broccoli rabe, cime de rape, rape and brocoletti. It’s a form of turnip green. Blanched Rapini (Broccoli Raab)
adapted from Cook’s Illustrated

Using a salad spinner makes easy work of drying the cooled blanched rapini.

1 pound rapini (broccoli rabe), washed, cut into 1-inch pieces
2 teaspoons salt

Bring 3 quarts water to boil in large saucepan. Stir in rapinigreens and salt and cook until wilted and tender, about 2 1/2 minutes. Drain and set aside. Cool empty saucepan by rinsing under cold running water. Fill cooled saucepan with cold water and submerge greens to stop the cooking process. Drain again; squeeze well to dry and proceed with one of the following recipes.

Rapini with garlic and red pepper flakes

2 T extra virgin olive oil
3 medium garlic cloves
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 recipe blanched rapini greens (above)

Heat oil, garlic and red pepper flakes in medium skillet over medium heat until garlic begins to sizzle, about 3 to 4 minutes. Increase heat to medium high, add blanched rapini greens, and cook, stirring to coat with oil, until heated through, about 1 minute. Season to taste with salt, serve immediately.

Rapini with Sun Dried Tomatoes and Pine Nuts

Follow recipe for Rapini with Garlic and Red Pepper Flakes, adding 1/4 cup oil-packed sun-dried tomatoes, cut into thin strips, along with garlic and red pepper flakes. Add 3 Tablespoons toasted pine nuts to skillet along with rapini greens.

Pea shoots check out this web site it is all about pea shoots, click here

Turnips Tips

adapted from “From Asparagus to Zucchini”

*Eat turnips raw. Slice or thickly julienne and add to vegetable platter or eat alone with or without dip.
*Grate raw into salads.
*Bake turnips alone for 30-45 minutes at 350 degrees, basted with oil, or bake along with other seasonal roots.
*Cook turnips with roasting meats.
*Mash or scallop turnips, just like you would potatoes.
* Dice turnips into soups or stews, and julienne into stir fries.

My favorite way to cook turnips is to saute them with a little oil until they are soft.  I add garlic or cumin.  Turnips seem to  

Newsletter End of April

She has arrived!!!   The Farms new baby was born April 23.  Clay and I are so proud to welcome our new little girl Tilly to the farm.  I knew the whole time I was pregnant that it was a boy…surprise!!!!   Tilly comes at the highest of spring for us on the farm but we are all adjusting great.  Her big sister Daisy is in heaven and she has already won over her pap’s heart.  A new little baby is such a joy to have and she has all ready been spending time on the farm.

Remember that the tomato plant sale starts this weekend and runs for the next three week ends in a row.  This year we have so much more then just tomatoes.  We are growing peppers, eggplants, cucumbers, melon….come by and check it out.  Click here for more information and directions to the farm.

Csa starts in about a month and we are so excited to pull veggies out of the ground for you.  We are trying some new things this year so look forward to a few suprises now and then.  Take care and I will send a new letter next week.

April News Letter (Time to Give)

  Many of our CSA members know the Peaceful Belly is more then just a farm but some of you may not.  Let me explain…Our mission statement is that all people in the Treasure Valley have acsess to  fresh local organic food from a local farm.  We believe that small family farms that feed their community are so important in creating a healthy community.  Peaceful Belly provides food, education and we donate, time, food, plants and knowledge into our community in so many ways.  

   This year Peaceful Belly is working closley with the Idaho Food Bank and every Tuesday we are having a team of volunteers come out to the farm and harvest food just for the food bank.  We are also helping out the Boys and Girls club with their summer feeding program.  Everyday in the summer the Boys and Girls Club of Boise feed lunch to over 200 children who other wise would not have lunch.  We are providing them with fresh veggies so that the children many have a healthier meal.  We are also donating all the plant starts to their new children’s garden.   Peaceful Belly also donated 1000 of pounds of food to the refugee communities, soup kitchens and women and children shelters.  We donate plants and veggie starts to community garden, refugee gardens and educational garden like BUGS.  Some of our reasons behind this come from the source of why we farm.  “We farm because we want to help our community have a healthier enviornment and people.  When people eat fresh food that is raised by caring hand great change is possible.”

  Small farms were once the back bone of all communities.  They helped feed and educate about food and they provided security to communities.  Big farms today have no control where their food goes, after is is harvest big trucks come and take it away.  Most farmers do not feed their own communities.  This needs to change.  Farmers need to be able to raise food for people that the know and that know them.  Seems simply  but it is far from.  It means people have to start eating and shopping differently.  Many of you have made the choice to support Peaceful Belly, we ask you to find other to support our farm or farms like our.  Please ask your friend and family to join a CSA or shop at farmers markets.  Small farms that sell directly to their community can play a huge role in creating a healthier community and a much better place to live.

About The Fruit share and tips for your home fruit trees

We do not have an orchard at Peaceful Belly farm but our CSA member can buy a fruit share from Eagle Creek Orchard.  Rob and Linda raise their fruit organically and with great care to detail.  The fruit from their orchard is amazing and is true summer time.  Make sure you sign up for their fruit CSA by clicking here

Here is a freindly Blog about taking care of your home fruit trees and what to do written by them, you can also link to the blog by clicking here