June meat week is here!

Well friends, the season is certainly changing! The planting frenzy hasn’t finished and the weeds have certainly arrived! Along with the cicadas! We had fun hunting them yesterday and found 136! (Update: we stopped counting!) The chickens LOVE eating them, though I wouldn’t try them personally.

We know it’s been a long week when we sit down to write the blog and it still says “week 4 ’, well now it’s week 5 already and time for the second meat pick up! We are so thankful for our local small butchers during a time when meat shortages and price increases could be around the corner again. It is taking more planning to schedule our butcher dates now, but we are thankful for the hands that process our animals for our community.

Last week our community lost a great man, and loving husband and father of 5 small children. If you feel led to help the Parowski family please support them here. We can arrange delivery to them if anyone wants to offer meals on Thursdays.

We have some great ideas for fast easy meals lately! We’ve been doing hamburgers with chopped ramps and garlic scapes. We usually skip the bun, but not the potatoes! Yesterday I had a lot of garden work to help the farmers with so I ran some potatoes through the slicer on the food processer and layered them with some plops of butter, a few cups of milk, salt and topped with herbs and some shredded cheese. I left them in the oven at 400 for about an hour and we came in a sautéed squash and called it a really good dinner for some tired farmers! For lunch we had a nice taco pie with a salad on the side. This time of year we really need easy but satisfying food!

We will be offering cheese cake, sugar cookies, rhubarb galette and maybe more this week! The cucumbers and squash are coming on strong now and the onions and garlic are right around the corner! Even a few tomatoes are ready! Wow, this time of year is so exciting!

Now for the best news yet…..the puppies are here! We’ve been busy taking care of them. What a blessing! The children have so much fun snuggling them! They will be outside for visiting in a few weeks! We love having the “farm-ily” help socialize them!

Blessings,

The Bakers

Summer CSA start up!

The grass is back and the cows are out of their winter housing and back on pasture! They are so happy and so are we to begin our Summer CSA this week! We have a few remaining spots for our meat and veggie CSA and it begins Thursday April 29th and Saturday May 2nd 2-5 both days! (Sign up here.) You can add on a milk share, egg share, fermented share and herbal shares! We are also open those days if anyone wants to see what’s for sale in the cabin beyond what is in the CSA. We always fill shares first, but oftentimes we have extra for sale. Don’t forget our lamb is available in the store.

We look forward to the spring eating, lots of green still, but green tomatoes are on the way! We will have cucumbers before too long. Remember spring potatoes and onions must be kept in the fridge or they will sprout. We’ve been busy harvesting chickens this week, it was warm and lovely weather. It’s a fun way to have us all working together. It passes so quickly, but we are tired by the end!

Here is a tasty mustard greens (or any green will work) recipe.

Blessings,

The Bakers

Adding to the flock!

Farm baby meets the other babies!

We have been adding heritage breeds to our flock of chickens. Why? The main breed we keep is a commercial breed meant for laying large amounts of eggs over a year or two and not being super winter hardy. We love them for what they do for us, which is make a lot of eggs and eat our grass and bugs! They aren’t as pretty as the heritage breeds with fancy feathers and they don’t weigh very much so they aren’t great for eating. Though they do make nutritious soup and broth. The heritage breeds are more dual purpose, they don’t lay as many eggs, but they are heavier bodied (the breeds we chose) so they are a good all purpose chicken. The roosters are nice big birds that make a good Sunday supper! But for now they are just super cute!

This week we added some greens to the shares……beet greens! Super nutritious and full of vitamins and minerals. We enjoy these greens sautéed with some onions, also in your shares this week! Full shares have the last of the bak choi for a little while. More baby choi coming along soon! Oh and the tomatoes are planted in the greenhouse! Oh yay! We can’t wait for summer. What patience we have learned by gardening. It takes so long to care for something before you can eat it! :)

Remember this is the second to last pick up for winter CSA! Look for your invoices to be coming soon for the next season. We’ve been so busy planting we haven’t had time for the computer work! Enjoy your goodies!

Blessings,

The Farmers

The photos below were taken by Farmer Grace along the power line nearby where the fire started a few weeks ago. The slice of tree that she held in front of the camera is from a cedar tree that was on fire and got cut down to keep the sparks from spreading. I love the focus of the first one. It’s on the slice of wood and the perspective is only inches in front of her. The background, which is the bigger picture is blurry. The second picture is the opposite. Isn’t it funny how perspective changes everything? We were made in the image of God, but not all knowing like Him. We can choose which perspective to see from, but we can’t see from every angle. In troubling times it’s so helpful to rely on His knowledge and perspective and just trust Him.

Romans 12:2 - And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

April Showers bring May VEGGIES!

Soon this will all be harvested and replanted in squash, peppers, tomatoes and eggplant! Summer is in the works around here!

Available Just in Time for Easter Day Spring Farm Lamb!

Leg of Lamb, Rack of Lamb, Lamb Chops, Sausage, and Loin Roast and Lamb Bones

Reply to this email for prices and availability.

Also beef bulk boxes are available again.

This is a quick update to remind you that tomorrow is April 1st! No fools around here! It’s meat week! Thursday 2-5 and Saturday 2-5, remember your veggies won’t be bagged this week either, but they will be available during the meat pick up times “market” style. So we look forward to seeing you and catching up! We hope your spring is going great and that you are enjoying good health, remember to eat your greens ;) OH and don’t forget to eat some LIVER! But that’s a health lesson for another day!

We have been out in the rain planting potatoes, trying to beat the rain! We didn’t quite get them all in before the rain was coming down too hard. The rest of the potatoes will have to go in another day. We had a great lunch to come in to after the hard work in the rain. We enjoyed cheeseburger pie and sweet potato wedges and salad. Yum!

Now the Baker girls are getting going on the cheesecakes, breads and cookies for sale tomorrow and Saturday. We like to have a treat once in awhile to keep things exciting!

I do have a great sweet potato tip for you (from our dear “Aunt Beverly”) : If you freeze your sweet potatoes before you bake them (works only for baking a whole one), they have the most amazing texture once baked. It’s like mashed potatoes. That is because freezing breaks down the cell walls, so you want to bake them straight from the freezer, otherwise they will turn mushy and not nice! It takes about 2 hours to freeze a potato, then bake as normal.

Blessings,

The Baker Team

What do greens tell us?

Sometimes no news is good news and sometimes it isn’t! I can’t say we’ve been quiet over here from good or bad, BUT it has been lively! We’ve had two forest fires at the camp next to us, which caused power outages. During milking time and with all the baby chicks and the incubator needing heat, that made for some interesting extra work. Thankfully there were no buildings lost and no one hurt. There have been so many vegetables to plant we can’t seem to stay on top of it, but that is just the time of year! We had a wild time helping some other farmers load some wild cows (nice we aren’t the only ones that have wild animals occasionally). The butcher dates are so hard to come by we are doing the best we can to plan for it. Anyway, all that is not to complain, we love our work and enjoy it even though we are beginning to feel some extra burden with the current happenings. We are grateful for the animals and seeds and all the people we rely on to do what we do! On to the good stuff:

Well, it is a little later than St. Patrick’s day, but happy late one anyway! It’s greens week for sure around here! We are celebrating the warm weather by eating lots of greens! Actually what happens when the weather changes is that the greens that have been slowing growing all winter long in the greenhouse suddenly wake up and take off! It’s like watching a little person gingerly try and walk, only to wake one day and start running. Or hearing them babble and realize they are telling big stories! But when that happens with greens, they want to bolt. That means send up flowers to make seeds. The longer days tell them it’s time to reproduce or die! So when that happens it’s time to stock up and eat lots of greens! We’ve been using the napa cabbage for stir fry, salad and soups (just not on hot days like this one)!

So if you need helping with your veggie ID this week:
You got cliantro, napa cabbage, collards, kale, lettuce, mustard greens and potatoes for good measure! When I saw those shares getting put together and felt how heavy they were, I was amazed at how healthy everyone will be after they eat this weeks bounty! I believe that God makes the things we need grow when we need them. Spring greens are great for detoxing and also contain lots of vit. c and K, two things we need to boost our immune system after a long winter! The greens are also great for bone strength, which we all need. Also we tend to eat heavier foods in the winter and the spring greens help flush our systems.

So, if you need helping encouraging your children or other not so enthusiastic loved ones that they need greens…..just make them taste great! We love our go to salad dressing: 1 part honey or maple syrup, 1 part vinegar, 2 parts olive oil and shake. Or to make it creamy just add a handful of walnuts and process in the food processor. So yum and and so easy, most of these greens can be eaten raw, but you can also stir fry them with a nice peanut sauce and rice and stew cubes and there is a simple dinner or lunch! When using the tougher greens like cabbage or collards I like my trusty recipe of sautéing in butter or lard, and some salt, pepper and raw avc.

Many Blessings! Your busy farmers!

PS Don’t forget the April meat week is coming up! NEXT Thursday and Saturday!

Spring is here, don't miss out on all the fun......

There are so many exciting things to report about, where do we begin?

Well first we are opening sign ups for Summer CSA which will begin April 29th and May 1st. The last day of this CSA season will be April 15th and 17th, then the farmers get a week to catch our breath and get things in order. If you are a current member we will automatically renew your membership and invoice you based on your current selections. Please let us know by the 10th of March if you wish to make changes or give your spot to someone else. We are super excited to get back to business with fresh air and doing market style every week. It’s been a long winter and we look forward to seeing more of you!

Meat pick up is this week and we have a surprise for you!!! The butcher we were taking our lambs to had an opening for pigs so guess what?? We have link sausage again! Oh yum! Stock up for breaking out the grill soon! OK, I might be getting ahead of the season, but I think grilling days are not too far off. The lamb will be for sale in the cabin for everyone and the new pork sausages will be for CSA members only.

Also, this week at CSA the Baker girls have fired up the bakery and will be offering cheese cake by the slice and bread and maybe more! There are also new “farm'-ily” members to meet……they will be a surprise, but here is a hint: They are furry and so sweet! The first batch of broiler chicks has arrived and all 400 are settled in nicely to their brooder. Tommy has about 15 lambs and a few more to come. Spring is certainly underway here.

If you are looking for the perfect breakfast recipe a “farm-ily” member found this one for us, who doesn’t love a great sausage gravy?!? We have been adding the totsoi to smoothies lately and I forget how great I feel with greens first thing in the morning. I’ve been needing the extra boost they give me with all the added work of springtime projects! Now I just need to remember to get some liver out and really boost by energy with some liver and onions. Our bodies need different things in different seasons and winter always makes me need some extra iron.

The ginger has arrived, the onion and potato seed stock is on the way, wow, things are moving at a fast pace. Nature isn’t waiting for us so we’d better get moving! I can’t wait to see the first spring grass turning green. The plants are all inside still, but soon the big garden will be full of life and food again. For now the greenhouses are stocked and keeping us happy and busy.

We will also have Benjamin the bottle lamb at CSA from 2-5 both days to greet you! We look forward to seeing you soon!

Farm store is open to any and all today from 2-5 and Saturday from 2-5 this week!

Blessings,

The Farmers

February already! Meat pick up and fun recipe ideas!

So many new babies!

Meat pick up is Thursday Feb. 4th and Saturday Feb. 6th 2-5 each day. Remember veggie pick up is that time as well. We will have lots of goodies to choose from for CSA this month. (Delivery folks will be the same time 2-6pm.) You will get to meet Benjamin the bottle lamb! Bottle lamb is a name we use for lambs who have lost or been rejected by their mother and need to be bottle fed by us. In this case, Benjamin lost his mother so we feed him lamb replacement milk. Sometimes when a sheep has 3 lambs she rejects one of them. We have only had one set of triplets this year and their mom is doing great with all 3.

We are enjoying the snow so much, we hope you have had a nice time sledding or building snowmen like we did. We have been enjoying some nice soups lately and lots of cookies and bread! We have started a sour dough starter and have enjoyed baking with it. We have tried crackers, muffins and cake! We will begin some breads now that our starter is mature.

We have also made some new dishes this winter. We love our instant pot sesame chicken and rice, but this week we tried Lo Mein. We just sautéed cabbage (which Johnny accidently pronounces garbage instead of cabbage), mushrooms, onions and ground beef, then add some cooked noodles and sesame oil, ginger, honey, soy sauce and pepper to taste. YUM! We don’t use pasta often, but it made a great quick meal that everyone loved.

We made this fried bread recipe with the parsley last week for a great quick snack before evening milking. We did one batch with olives, but not everyone loved those! We have also been making fun slaws with cabbage, radishes and onions. We hope you have been enjoying the winter flavors! We will be trying these yummy steak bites that a farmily member recommended tomorrow for a quick dinner after CSA.

Looking forward to seeing everyone!

Blessings,

The Bakers

Enjoying the new year! Plus special announcement.

We hope you are enjoying the sunshine and looking forward to some snow maybe next week! We have been quite busy over here with the little ones. Human and animals! The winter is when we get lots of book work done and get caught up on school work and research. Plus farm projects! We started seeding peppers this week though and that usually makes me realize spring will be here before I am ready!

Last weeks veggies had a mix up! We accidently didn’t put carrots in the Thursday shares, so sorry! We will have them in this weeks bags instead. We hope you enjoyed the black spanish radishes last week for a fun change of root. The greens are still coming along and should return in abundance soon. Right now they are maturing very slowly. This week we will have Scallions, Chard, Parsley, Onions, Crimini Mushrooms, and Butternut Squash. Enjoy!

Would you like to stock up on dry goods and soup bones for broth?

We are going to be placing a bulk order of some things we don’t grow. If you would like to add on to our order you can let us know what you would like by Friday the 22nd. All of these items are organic and they are in 25 pound bags (unless otherwise noted). There will be a $10 ordering fee and shipping will be 4% of what your order total is. To order simply reply to this email and we will confirm what you order within 3 days. There may be other organic items so if there is something you are looking for just ask. We will be offering:

• Rolled Oats $32.81

• Long Grain Brown Rice $39.82

• White Basmati Rice $80.94

• Soft White Wheat {berries} $36.50

• Chief Hard Red Wheat {berries} $50.90

• Hard Red Spring Wheat {berries} $26.84

• Hard Red Winter Wheat {berries} $46.44

• Black Beans $50.82

• Garbanzo Beans $54.96

• Kidney Beans $77.45

• Sprouted spelt flour 5# bag $18.46

• Sucanat 5# bag $19.77

  Soup bones and chicken feet will be on sale until mid Feb. or while supplies last: Small bags are $2 per pound and large bulk bags of approx 30 lbs are $1.50/lb. (Available anytime.)We will be receiving the dry goods order sometime the first week of February and will notify you when it’s available for pick up here at the farm store.

  Have a blessed week!

  The Bakers