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Farewell Eggplant, Hello Orchard Fruit!
It's time. Time to be done with eggplant. Time to pull the plants and sow cover crop in their stead. Time to move on to the other bounty of fall, like the neon purple cauliflower that some of you will get this week, and the curly-headed savoy cabbages that others will get (we couldn't fit both in the tote because they're so big, so you'll get one this week and the other next week). Time to eat Hakurei turnips and kale again and squeal with delight over the arrival of the Delicatas.
That blast of heat on Sunday was something, followed by the smoky haze of wildfires reignited. It felt like summer trying to extend her desperate grip just a little longer with one last insane burst of BTUs. But next week's forecast is so comforting: rain. Rain to bring up all our cover crops and turn pastures green again and bring an end to fire season.
Cooler days and even chillier nights this week make me want to eat apples, finally. You'll see some soon in your tote. This week it's Asian Pears - a variety called Shinko that is juicy and sweet and mild.
And tangentially related to eggplant and orchard fruit, potatoes! (Belonging to the Solanaceae family like eggplant, and known in France as pomme de terre - "apples of the earth.") This week's potatoes were dug with horse power! We hitched Jack and Lily up to a potato digger for the first time and lifted a thousand pounds of potatoes out of the ground in about 3 minutes. Holy spuds! I was pretty excited because it means that we can officially get rid of our cultivating tractor! My new equine team has proven itself time and time again this season: cultivating single row crops, hilling potatoes and leeks, spreading compost, mowing cover crops, and so much more - effectively rendering the ACG tractor obsolete on our farm. Hats off to the ponies!
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