August Creek Farm

blog

  • Home
  • Our Story
  • Turkeys
  • Farm Store
  • Blog
  • CSA
  • Contact Us

7/2/2016

Freezing Swiss Chard & Kale

10 Comments

Read Now
 
Whether from your garden or your CSA, summer can leave us with a bounty of fresh greens that we dearly miss in the wintertime. Luckily for us, putting up your Swiss chard and kale only takes a few minutes and will leave your taste buds oh so thankful this winter.

Prep

Make sure your Swiss chard and kale are rinsed clean.  For kale, remove the stems.
Picture

Blanching

Bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil. Blanch your Swiss chard for 3 minutes. Blanch kale for 2 minutes. Swiss chard stains the water red, so if you want to share water baths, be sure to blanch your kale first.
Picture

Rinsing

Rinse your greens under cold water. I use a colander. Turn the greens over with your hand or a spoon to make sure all the greens are hit with the cold water. This stops the cooking process.

Your kale will be bright green from the cooking process. Any off colored leaves should be removed at this point and not kept for storage.
Picture

Packing

Allow your greens to drain, and give them a slight squeeze as you pack them into your freezer bags. Remove as much air as possible before you seal your bags, and label them with what you're freezing and the year.
Picture
Now you're ready to put your greens in the freezer!
Picture

Share

10 Comments

6/12/2015

Zucchini and the Start of Summer

1 Comment

Read Now
 
Summer has very nearly arrived. Life on the farm tends to get really hectic in the spring-time, and I often find myself wondering what month it is. Two weeks ago we had such mild weather that I began reminiscing about apple cider, mums and pumpkins, wondering what kind of winter lay ahead of us. I had to snap myself out of it, realizing it was only Week 1 of the CSA, not Week 19 or 20. Then the hot weather hit and I thought, "Man, it's awful warm for October." That is, until I saw this:

Picture
To you or anyone else, those look like little yellow gherkins. But for me? Forget the corn waist-high in the fields, lush soybeans or wheat just weeks from harvest. To me, summer starts with zucchini. Apple cider and mums will have to wait while I enjoy the plethora of delectable goodies that about to grace my dinner plate, supper plate and snack plate. Hey- there really doesn't even have to be a plate, I'll eat it. Zucchini are just the beginning of summer. I am already finding tiny prickly cucumbers eager to soak up lots of rain and find their way happily into my CSA member shares before long.

Okay, okay. I'm probably getting a little ahead of myself. Our broccoli are quickly on their way to maturing and we still have a couple more harvests of snow and sugar snap peas before they are done for the season. I know it's still spring. But as a new farmer, I'm beginning to accept the change of the seasons by something as simple as a zucchini blossom.

Share

1 Comment

4/25/2015

The Path That Lead Home

0 Comments

Read Now
 
    Some people have asked, "Have you always wanted to farm?" Well... Yes, and no. Like many people from a farming background, I can honestly say I grew up wanting to farm. If you're a farm kid like me, you will probably find the whole idea incredibly romantic. Here in Central Illinois, growing up on a farm probably means riding with Dad or Grandpa in a combine at harvest, taking them snacks and supper in the field, and doing your best to help load those 50 pound seed bags in the spring. I learned how to drive a tractor in high school, and helped my dad with cultivating.
    "It's a cultivator, Andrea, not a plow," he correctly me. "Nobody uses moldboard plows anymore, they're bad for the soil."
    My family has farmed for generations. Like a lot of other families in the area, our ancestors came over from Germany and started farming as soon as they arrived. My great-great-great Grandpa broke the ground out of sod, and said it was full of snakes. I guess as an environmentalist, I should be a little bummed about all this Prairie turning into Farmland, but it's hard to scorn the work that put food on the table all my life. When my dad made the tough decision to get out of farming I was crushed. At the time, I was only in middle school but thought that one day I could be farming too. I guess I took it hard for about a week, as any pre-teen girl would do, and moved on. I didn't hold a grudge against my dad (How could I?) and was lucky enough to land in a major that I loved at University. I thought I had found my niche in life. Like most people though, my path was not laid out straight ahead of me. Surprisingly, a Bachelor's in Environmental Science does not exactly result in an immediate career when you graduate during an economic recession.
    My post-college crooked, rocky and at times seemingly dead-end path eventually led me to a job as a Horticulture Technician in the Sunshine State. Every day I rode past my friends immaculate vegetable garden. He started his own tomatoes from seed (Whoa, you can do that!?), trellised his crazy warm-climate malibar spinach, and grew crops in colors I didn't know existed. My grandma has kept a garden all her life, but I had no idea such colors and variety existed for vegetables. The best part of my friend's garden? We tasted it. I bit into the purple mustard greens and was shocked at their radish-like heat. We grabbed a couple leaves of romaine to add crunch on our sandwiches at lunch, and we made faces when we ate a leaf of the slimy malibar spinach.
    "This tomato is an heirloom called Cherokee Purple," Scott told me. You're telling me tomatoes can have history?
    I was hooked.
    Today, I love my job. I am so glad I didn't land that perfect job with state or incredible internship with the government. I'm also thankful for all the little jobs I had, the ones I really didn't enjoy, that collectively built the skill set I needed to start my own business and serve my customers. Farming for me isn't really a job, or even a career. It's my life.

Share

0 Comments
Forward>>
Details

    About the Farmer

    Andrea is a 5th generation Illinois farmer and owner/operator of August Creek Farm.

    Archives

    February 2018
    August 2017
    March 2017
    January 2017
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2015
    April 2015

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly
  • Home
  • Our Story
  • Turkeys
  • Farm Store
  • Blog
  • CSA
  • Contact Us