Valley City Farmers Market has come to an end for 2010

Last week was sadly our last week to sell at Valley City. Since it is getting colder out now all of our warm weather crops are now coming to an end. I have been picking the last of many things the past couple of days, before we get a frost and everything comes to an end.

Soon now it will be time to start my planing for next year. Although I have not started to pick out the actual varieties, I have started to think about what I would like to grown and what I probably will not be growing next year.

I will be growing most of the same cherry tomato varieties that I did this year and will probably try some new varieties also. I also plan to try many new varieties of larger slicing tomatoes. I will be growing the Striped Cavern Stuffing Tomato again and may even grow another variety of stuffing tomato such as a yellow stuffer.

As far as peppers go I will probably grow most of the same varieties as I this year plus some new ones.

I should also have a lot of beans next year since I am planning on planting almost one entire garden area with beans to add some nitrogen to the soil.

Of course I will be growing all my different colored carrots, plus I plan to have other different varieties available also.

This year we have lots of acorn and butternut squash, but next year I will be trying a bunch of different varieties of winter squash, many different colors, sizes and shapes.

These are just some of my plans for next year. When I have decided what varieties of everything I am going to grow, I will be sure to post it here and update my list on the website. I also have lots and lots of pictures and information to add to my website, and will probably start doing that very soon. I just have not had the time to update my website during the summer, but will have a lot more time during the winter (winter, that word made me cringe).

Farmers Market Season Ending

It looks like this Saturday is going to be the last market day of this year. If the weather permits I am hoping to set up our roadside stand after the market. I am also hoping to set up the roadside stand on Saturdays once Valley City Farmers Market is over. I will be sure to post here when I plan to have the stand set up so check back before stopping by. Also once the market is over I will continue to update the availability list to the right (and on our website), so if there is anything that you would be interested in, you can send me an email or give me a call, and you can pick up your produce on days other than when we have our roadside stand set up.

Since the growing season is going to be slowing down soon, planning for next year will be beginning very soon. So let us know if there is something you would like to see us grow next year. We love growing new and unusual things, and are always open to suggestions.

So let us know what you would like us to grow next year.

Fall Chores

The past few days I have been trying to get a bunch of things done for fall. Everyday I have been saving seeds for next year, from tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, and cucumbers. I still have a bunch of seeds to save yet.

Yesterday I finally got my collards, kale and leeks covered so that they will be protected from the cold weather to come. They are so beautiful I would like to have them last as long as possible. Plus I need the kale and leeks for my pumpkin stuffing on Thanksgiving. In fact I really need to cover my celery so that it will hopefully be around for Thanksgiving also.

Collards and Kale under cover.

A couple of days ago I dug up my dahlia tubers, and they are now drying a little and will probably divide them tomorrow and store them away for the winter. This year I am going to try storing them in ceder chips. Last year I just wrapped them in newspaper and put them in brown paper bags, they did ok, but I thought I would try something different this year. This is only the second year that I will be saving dahlia tubers so I am still new to dahlia saving. I was very surprised when I started to dig up my larger dahlia tubers and discovered that the dahlias that I started from seed actually formed very nice sized beautiful tubers. The ones pictured are actually the ones that I started from seed. I did not think that they would form tubers, so I learned something new.

Dahlia tubers waiting to be stored away for winter

The last picture is of my cold frame. About two weeks ago I planted a bunch of stuff in there hoping to have some lettuce, greens and other things soon. I should have planted these things sooner, but they should hopefully have a chance to mature. I really do not think the beets that I planted will have time but at least I will hopefully get some greens out from them that I can eat in salads and use as cooked greens. We will see, and hope.

All kinds of things in the cold frame (lettuce, greens, radishes, beets, and baby pak choi)

We still have lots to do before winter and before the ground freezes. Such as till some of our garden areas, and hopefully work on putting up the hoophouse that I have been talking about. I really wanted to have had it up already, but I guess, better late than ever, that is if it ever gets put up. I also need to recover our tiny hoophouse so that the snow does not break the plastic like it did last year. Since I am not using plastic for greenhouses (just the plastic from home improvement stores) it does not even last a whole year before it just starts to crumble.

Pumpkin Bread Stuffing

I was looking at Allrecipes.com for pumpkin recipes and ran across a recipe for pumpkin bread stuffing. I thought it was a really good idea, so I thought I would give it a try, and did. I think it came out really good. I do have some ideas for some changes that I will make next time, but first I will tell you how I made it this time.

Ingredients that I picked fresh for the stuffing, just before making it. Celery, Red Russian Kale, Leeks, Pumpkin Bread, and a stem of Rosemary (between Celery and Kale).

I basically used whatever ingredients that I had available to pick, that I thought would be good in the stuffing. So here it is:


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Pumpkin Bread Stuffing

4 cups pumpkin bread
1 medium size leek
3/4 cup celery
10 leaves red russian kale
8 tbls. butter
1/2 cup vegetable broth
2 eggs
1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
1 tbls. fresh rosemary
salt and pepper to taste

I think it is best to make the pumpkin bread almost a week ahead, before you make your stuffing since pumpkin bread can be kind of moist just after it is made. That way it will be a little drier before you make the stuffing.

Cut pumpkin bread into cubes and let dry overnight, may have to bake in oven at 250 degrees to make sure bread is dry enough.
Melt butter in a pan over medium heat. Add celery, leeks, and kale, cook till tender.
Mix in rosemary, salt, pepper, and pumpkin pie spice. Fold in bread cubes. Add eggs and then vegetable broth.
Transfer to buttered baking dish. Bake for 35 minutes covered with foil, at 375 degrees.

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Once again I thought this came out really good the way I made it but here is what I am going to do differently the next time I make it.

• Will make it next time with at least 6 cups pumpkin bread instead of 4 cups
• May use 2 leeks instead of 1
• Will use a little less kale, maybe 8 leaves instead of 10
• If I make a bigger batch I am sure that I will probably have to add more vegetable broth also.
  
• Instead of drying the bread overnight and then putting it in the over to make sure it is dry enough, I will toast it in the toaster oven first and if I need too I will put it in the oven for the rest of the time.
• Since I will make a bigger batch next time I will probably be able to bake for 40 minutes covered and 10 minutes uncovered, which is what the recipe I found said to do.

I will definitely have to play around with this recipe for awhile till it is perfect. Anyway, I am sure I will be making this for Thanksgiving, for sure.

What's Available- Saturday October 17th

There are only two more markets left! We have not gone to market for the past couple of weeks. But we will be attending tomorrow's market! I had planned on baking a lot, but so far have not made as much as I had hoped to. I did not get any pies made so far, and since it is so late, I do not believe I will have time to do so. Hopefully next week I will get a lot more made. It is sooo hard to believe the end of this years market is almost here. Any how here is a list of the what we plan to have available. I wish it was bigger, but for this year it will just have to do. Next year our list should be a lot larger at this time of the year.

• Collards
• Red Russian Kale
• Leeks
• Yukon Gold Potatoes
• Golden Delicious Apples
• Red Delicious Apples
• Jona Gold Apples
• Pumpkin Bread
• Pumpkin Apple Streusel Bread
  

Pumpkin Picking Time!

My mom showing off some of our pumpkins.

She thinks she is allowed to drive the tractor, but she isn't.

Sadly I do not think we are going to be selling any of our pumpkins, we just don't really have enough. We will probably keep them, and have lots of pumpkins to carve for Halloween. But we do have a bunch of pie pumpkins that I will be using to make pumpkin breads and pies. I will probably start baking my pumpkin breads and pies for Valley City Farmers Market, not this Saturday but the following Saturday.

We tried lots of different kinds of pumpkins this year, like white pumpkins, blue pumpkins (we only got one of these, not sure why we didn't get anymore, I know the plants came up ok, oh well), and Knucklehead Pumpkins which did really well for us we got more of these than anything else. The only thing that was disappointing about the knuckleheads is, they are suppose to have a lot of bumps on them, and most did not have as many as I had expected, they were still pretty neat though.

I wish we would have thinned out the plants a little or would not have planted them so close together. I think we would have ended up with a lot more pumpkins if we would have done so, oh well, next year.

Our Plans for Fall

Sadly were not able to get any of our fall greens and lettuces planted, but there is a reason for that. We are planning on building a hoop house in the location where we plant our greens. Yes we had to sacrifice planting our fall crops but it will all be worth it in the long run. We will not only be able to start our greens earlier, but it will also protect our crops from bugs. Which should make it possible to grow things that were either impossible to grow (pak choi and mustard greens) or very hard to grow (arugula, beets, radishes, and a lot of other greens) before.

I am very excited about our plans and can not wait to get started with them.

We are still hoping to sell at the Valley City Farmers Market, hopefully till the end. The following is what we plan to have available after a frost stops us from harvesting anymore warm weather crops.

• Pumpkin Pie
• Pumpkin Bread
• Pumpkin Seeds
• Apple Bread
• Apple Pie
• Pecan Pie
• Collards
• Kale
• Leeks
• Yukon Gold Potatoes
• Corn Stalks
• and possibly some other things

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This year has been a really big challenge, the temperature for much of the season has been much cooler than normal. Making it difficult for crops such as eggplant, okra and caused most crops to be harvested much later in the season than normal.

We have also had issues with bugs that we never had before. We have always had trouble with flea beetles but this year was the worst yet, posing a problem for eggplant, radishes and our spicy greens. We also had major problems with beets and spinach which was something we never had a problem with before, leaf minors. In the past we were always able to pull beets with beautiful tops with hardly any problems, but this year was very different.

Another problem that we had this year was with rodents. Never before have we had our bean plants just cut off from the ground by rodents. The monsters also whipped out our beets overnight.

Considering how difficult of a year it was I am also very grateful for what we were able to harvest and the support of all our wonderful customers. Even though the year is not yet over, I can feel it coming to an end, since many of our warm weather crops are ending and the weather is getting cooler. So I just wanted to say thanks, to everyone.