Cherry tomatoes and pear picking

Pictures of our table at last weeks market at Valley City.

It is pear picking time! Here at BAFarm this is how we pick our pears, no ladder required. Believe it or not I am actually afraid of heights.

Below are three of the heirloom cherry tomatoes that we currently have available in our heirloom cherry tomato mix.

IsIs Candy Heirloom Cherry Tomatoes

Black Cherry Heirloom Cherry Tomatoes

Dr. Carolyn Heirloom Cherry Tomatoes

Vegetable Pictures

Just thought I would take some pictures of some of the things we have available. Here they are:

Picture of some of the different kinds of eggplant we have available this year. We will also have some other types available, and will have to take another picture when the other kinds are ready.

Fairy Tale Eggplant
They are so cute, only about 3-4 inches long. It is a beautiful mini eggplant.

Baby Bush Zucchini

These are also a mini vegetable. They are only about 6 inches long, and barely have any seeds. They are great if you wish to add some zucchini to your meal, and do not wish to use an entire regular size zucchini.

Cherokee Purple Heirloom Tomato

We have just started picking a bunch of these, things had a late start because of all the cold weather. Some of them are a really good size.

Baby Romaine Lettuce and Butterhead Lettuce

I am planning to pull some Romaine Lettuce heads for Saturdays market.

I know it does not look like much but these are the first two purple beans that I finally got to pick today. They are so beautiful. They are also very very long, in fact they were too long to fit in a quart container, so I think I am going to have to sell these in bags instead of quarts, like I usually do. I think that these beans also have a really good taste to them also. I am very excited about them and can not wait till I have enough of these to sell, hopefully soon.

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Right now we are in the process of getting our "greens garden" ready for our fall plantings of lettuces for salad mixes. Right now it is a disaster, and we need to get it tilled and planted within the next week.

We are also in the process of making plans for a hoop house, that we are planning on making for our greens. We had some really bad problems with flea beetles and leaf minors. The hoop house would keep the greens protected from these bugs. I hope it works out, because if it does I should be able to grow some nice pak choi, since they normally get completely destroyed my flea beetles. If everything goes well with the our plans we should have lettuce and greens for spring, summer, fall and may be a lot of winter.

Valley City Farmers Market Pictures

Some Pictures of our table at Valley City Farmers Market

The Valley City Farmers Market is located in the parking lot of Liverpool Township Depot, 6615 Center Road. Pictures below are of the train which is parked at Valley City Museum, and after that is a picture of the museum, which the market is located at.

Over all view of Valley City Farmers Market.

Very very angry! NO MORE RAIN!!

It has rained 3/5 market days so far this year! Today I have been watching the radar since 3:00 AM in the morning and a very large storm has been getting closer and closer. My prediction was that it would hit around 10:00 and be over around 12:00, and it is looking more and more like I am going to be right. So it looks like no market today. That means it will have rained 4/6 markets so far this year. I am just too sick of dealing with the rain to go today. I am sick of having to sort through a bunch of soggy market stuff and I know my mom (who sells for us at Valley City) is sick of coming back soaking wet from market.

We do have a lot of vegetables ready and some of which I have already picked. I am hoping that things will clear up this weekend sometime and if they do I am hoping to set up a table at our home. I may even set up a table during the week, weather permitting of coarse, and it would be after 1:00 PM. If you would be interested in some of our vegetables this week feel free to give me a call. To see what we have available right now check out our list on the right titled: What we currently have available.

Thanks for letting me vent, and hopefully, it better not rain next week!

July- Vegetable of the Month- Collards

Before this year I have never grown collards before, nor did I ever cook with them. I decided to grow them this year since I wanted more kinds of greens that would grow will during warmer weather. Collards are most often grown by southerners because of their talerance to the southern heat. My collards are still producing really well, and hopefully will continue to do so for awhile.

Cooking:

Our favorite way to use collards is to make collard rolls, which is just like cabbage rolls except with collards. Here is our recipe that we have been using but can be changed depending on what vegetables are in season.

COLLARD ROLLS (In Crock-Pot)
Ingredients 20 collards leaves (reserve liquid from the slightly cooked leaves)

1-pound baby cut carrots (slightly cooked)

½ cup precooked rice according to package

3 Yukon golden potatoes (slightly cooked) Approximately

3 pounds ground meat (80% lean ground chuck beef) 2 cans 10-3/4 oz Campbell’s tomato soup 3 eggs

The following four ingredients are what I had available (in season) to add, you can add whatever you may have available that sounds good, instead of the following:

½ cup chopped broccoli raabs

1/8 cup chopped garlic scapes

1/8 cup chopped scallions

1/8 cup chopped beet leaves

1/8 cup BA Farm Seasoning Mix

1/3 cup breadcrumbs

1/3 cup ketchup

Cooking time in large crock pot – 6 hours on low

Prepare rice, carrots, and potatoes as above and set aside.

Trim off the thick back part of stem of the collards as you would the cabbage leaves to make cabbage rolls. Place the collard leaves in water and heat just a few minutes. Reserve 2 cups liquid from cooked leaves; to this mix add the 2 cans of tomato soup. Combine broccoli raab, garlic scapes, scallions, and beet leaves mix together and add 1/8 cup to the meat mixture, reserve remaining to be added in to liquid mixture in crock-pot at the end.

Place in large bowl ground meat and combine the following: eggs, BA Farms Seasoning Mix, breadcrumbs, ketchup and rice. Mix together. Add the above 1/8 cup (reserve) of broccoli raabs, garlic scapes, etc. and mix.

To form collard rolls place meat mixture on the large end of leaf and roll up set each roll aside until all leaves are used. If there is left over meat, roll as a meatball. Place some carrots & potatoes on the bottom of the crock-pot. Add some liquid mixture. Then place a layer of collard rolls. Keep alternating carrots, potatoes, and liquid mixture then the collard rolls until all are used up.

May also be cooked in oven at 375 degrees for 1-1/2 hours (approximately) until done.

Health Benefits:

The following site names and describes the different health benefits of collards, such as improving bone health, and can also aid in preventing certain diseases such as heart disease and cancer. Also mentions how collards can help to prevent some vision problems, and may also help to give you more energy. Of coarse like most vegetables and greens can help with weight loss.
How Stuff Works- Collards Health Benefits

NutritionData.come- Collards

Next market- What's available

This Saturday July 4th, there will be no market at Valley City, due to the holiday. The next market at Valley City will be on Saturday July 10th. Here is what we are expecting to have available:

~Beets- Regular and Forono (longer than regular beets
~Radishes- Regular and French Breakfast
~Bagged Salad Mixes- I will post what types of mixes when it is closer to the market date
~Loose Leaf Lettuce Heads
~Head Lettuce- Should have some ready for next market
~Red Russian Kale bunches
~Collard bunches
~Sweet Basil bunches
~Red and White Scallions
~Red Cherry Tomatoes- may possibly have some ready for next market, if not we will have them soon after
~Bell Peppers- coming very soon, not sure if we will have any for next market, but will be coming soon
~Zuchinni and Summer Squash- coming very soon

Summer Greens

This year I hope to have bagged greens for salads and stir fry mixes available throughout the summer. Right now I have spinach, butterhead lettuce, baby romaine, collards, red russian kale, swiss chard, and radicchio planted. They are all suppose to be heat tolerant, so I am keeping my fingers crossed, and hoping I will have a nice selection. I also plan to plant some dinosaur kale and Tatsoi (a type of mustard green). I think I will also replant some mizuna and possibly some arugula. We will see how it goes.

So hopefully I will have salad mixes and mixed greens available all summer. I will let everyone know how all my summer greens are doing and of coarse will have to post some pictures.

Collards- July Topic of the Month

I have decided to make Collards the next Topic of the Month for July. I have really come to love both Collards and the Red Russian Kale that I grew this year. Before I grew both of them I had never used them before, and really had no idea what to do with them. But since I have read so many things about others who love them I decided to give them a try. I am assuming that everyone else also does not know what to do with them since they have not been selling well. I really want to grow them again next year so I am hoping the sales of them begin to pick up. So in an effort to let everone know about Collards, it will be the Topic of the Month.

I just thought I would mention that you can use Collards to make Collard Rolls. It is just like Cabbage Rolls but instead of using cabbage you use collards. In one way, it is actually better because the collards are not tough like the cabbage can sometimes be, when you make Cabbage Rolls. It is very good!

Pictures from the market

I just thought that I would share some pictures from our market on Saturday.

Diakon Radishes, White Scallions, French Breakfast Radishes, Looseleaf Lettuce Heads, and Garlic Scapes

Picture of some of our bagged salad mixes. Just Lettuce Mix, Spicy Salad Mix, Red Sails Leaf Lettuce, and Black Seeded Simpson Leaf Lettuce.

Red Russian Kale Bunches, Collard Bunches and Some of our potted plants we have available for sale (such as Dahlias, Tomato Plants and Fairy Tale Eggplant).

Berry Bread

We also had Berry Bread available, which was made with strawberries and mulberries, and was very good. I am hoping to be able to make some more Berry Bread for this coming weekends market. I may actually have some raspberries to add to the strawberries and mulberries. I am not sure but am thinking that next week may be the last week for the Berry Bread because the mulberries and strawberries may not be producing for the following week, but we will see. I am almost positive that I will be able to make it this weekend.

First market of the year

Valley City Farmers Market

First Market of the year

We are the first table on the right

Yesterday was our first market of the year. We had lots and lots of lettuce available, and still have lots that we did not have time to pick.

Sadly we did not have any spinach available since it decided it wanted to bolt. Sometime within the next couple of days I plan to get rid of the row of spinach that I have planted and plant some spinach that I just bought the other day that is suppose to be heat tolerant. It will be the first time I try this variety, but we shall see. Hopefully it last longer that the one I have planted now. I almost forgot that I also have some Malabar Spinach planted. This will be my first time trying this also. It is actually a vine and it suppose to love the heat, should be interesting.

I also plan to pull the last of my arugula, since some of them have just started to go to flower. I am not sure what I will put in its place yet. Maybe some more kale and collards to be picked for bagged greens during the summer.

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For next week I should for sure have more Red Russian Kale and Collards available, which I must say they both are very very beautiful.

Of coarse we will for sure have red and white scallions available.

I am thinking that I should also still have available my bagged lettuce mixes.

I should also have some beautiful full heads of leaf lettuce available.

The radishes should hopefully be ready just in time for next weeks market also.

Some of my dahlias are just beginning to bloom so I should have some of them to bring next week.

I am also hoping to get together some of my extra tomato plants.

If we get some rain this week like I believe we are suppose to things should get a growth spurt, so we may have other things available also.