Welcome to growing year 2021, at Coburn Cove Cooperative! =)

First off, let me thank you all for being a part of our community-building, food-growing, space-and-time sharing enterprise LAST year (2020). It was a weird year that definitely now has a younger, square-peglike sibling... but you worked together with us to make the veggie, eggs and baking share from CCC possible. You rock! I think that was our fifth year so far, since starting in vacant urban lots in Chicago several years ago, that we had people sign on to help us grow food for ourselves and them by sharing in the tools, consumables and work-time expense.

Our veggie plot rolodex. Recently updated, with new 2021 contacts ;)

This year our cooperative is welcoming several new members, and also having one (maybe more; I haven't heard back from everyone I emailed several months ago) depart. I have tried to leave everyone I have NOT definitely heard a 'no, thanks' from on the distro list for the blog, but the peeps that have followed up with my email offers + payment instructions so far this year are the following: Jane Anne, Jessica, Marcel, Calder, and Kimberly. If you haven't paid yet and want to, please confirm your intent NOW with an affirmative email and either a check in the mail or a PayPal plop =)

Those rows don't tidy back up themselves, you know...

A few weeks ago we started our first batch of seedlings for the garden, and are about to move them outside to make room for another round... cross your fingers and/or pray for us that we manage to keep the frost off each successful eviction from our warm and artificially lit basement-bunker seed-starting room!

The most tedious work in the garden (absent weeding and trying to fight off pests, which is a unique blow-by-blow delight reserved for mid-summer =/) is nigh... we are hand-amending the rows with lime and topsoil presently, and will follow that with newspaper mulching (once you get to know clay, you know how much of a d@&n baby it can be about drying out) as well as traditional mulching with double-ground wood chips. These are the days when gym memberships seem a pretty dumb re-engineering of otherwise natural processes, for sure!

What's missing? Well, mulch, more mulch, weed fabric, drip hoses, protective fencing, eh... (I'm getting faint just thinking about how far we've still got, before even we start 'greening' the dag-gum thing) =P

A week or so ago we managed to plant potatoes and new onions, and are waiting to see them sprout as the first intentional greenings at the plot. Next on the list will be some experimental direct seeding with some more 'expendable' early spring crops (meaning, ones I found for a GREAT deal at AgCare on Smokey Park Hwy). And then, there is plenty of non-share-related homesteading work staring me squarely in the eye.... namely, getting the various fruit trees in our little orchard properly weeded and mulched. And then, on the horizon, transplanting the seedlings into bigger pots. And then...

...well, let me cut this short for now, and just say that things are fully into 'beginning' again on our grounds... and it feels not only good, but proper.

- Farmer(-ish) Matt and the Gang

Share #10... hope you enjoy it!

Well, what a strange share delivery, devoid of the usual fun due to not just rain but more importantly the Wedge being temporarily closed. If I could have made it out for delivery, I would have brought cold cider for all, and we could've still had a brew (and the parking lot and tables 100% to ourselves for a change!)

Sorry it took me an extra day to get this informative blog post out... here is what we put in the share:

- Potatoes (mostly kennebec but you may have gotten a red-skinned pontiac or two)
- Slicing tomatoes (main varieties are green zebra, better boy and red zebra)
- A mix of salad/cherry tomatoes as well as Mexican sour gerkins (basically, pop-a-cukes)
- Cabbage (I think its early jersey wakefield variety, but don't quote me on that)
- Pepper mix
- New Zealand spinach (really good pan-fried, btw... not sure if you've tried it yet, but its 100% sub for spinach this way)
- Kale (plants are on their way out, I'm not sure what's doing it... maybe the rain? I also know they technically don't last forever, but they sure seemed like they would, up until two weeks ago!)
- Carrot mix
- Rosemary sprig (try crushing some leaves and adding to a gin tonic w/gentle lime splash... pretty yum!)
- Rando-fun = butternut squash, eggplant or baby canteloupe

Twas kinda sad that our last share pickup had about the least hangout-y vibe of them all... and that the eggs didn't get brought (nor the local bags of dried porcini-and-friends). You can still get your eggs that you missed, and some dried porcini if you'd like, if you come to... (read below)

I will be sending out a form in the next day or so that will ask you to list some of your favorites, some things you'd have loved for us to have worked into the share (we tried a lot of things but the slowness and failure to sprout of some crops, like eggplant and corn for example, dumbfounded us)... and also any kudos or suggestions for improvement. The form will also ask you to check any days you would be willing to come out for our end-of-share, socially distanced, outdoor pizza-making celebration with (I have to brag) practically zero-food-mile toppings =P. We're hoping to get one last, quality gathering in around the food we've grown here for our friends and family, sometime either the weekend of the 22nd or the 29th =)

I'm pretty sure that we'll go up in price a little for next summer/year (as we barely even pay for supply costs, much less our time, with the current rates)... but we'll still be less than half of the typical local CSA cost. But we're also not doing this to pad our income -- more to bond with you all better, and to live more in tune with the natural world! We'd love to either have you back next year, or if you really liked this experience and want even more food to work with, we'd also love it if you graduated on to a real farm share (and kept in touch with us, about the yummy experiences you get from that)

You all are the best; look for that Google Form invite, and I'll hope to see most if not all of you in a week or two.

Your mini-farmers and friends,
Matt, Doro, Josie and Yanusz

Share #9... second-to-last, second-to-none...

...for the price and the love that goes into it, at least! =)

Mixed peppers, basil, salad and slicing tomatoes, he gets, chard, carrots, a spilt of 'moon and star's watermelon (and, a baby canteloupe if your slice was significantly smaller than the others), and... our own potatoes. You'll think I'm BSing, but these potatoes will be soooo yummy! Reminder: don't toss your best greens if they look good. instead, slice them finely (slaw or addition to salad), OR a little less finely and fry up (perhaps with your chard?).

Also, an idea for using the flower heads on your basil stalks, that works well for us: steep them in a nice olive oil for anywhere from a couple days to up to a week (ideally, in a sealed container, out of the sun), and then pour the resulting, herbed oil into ice cube trays, make frozen cubes, and throw into any batch of noodles (first-pass or refried) for a burst of great basil flavor!

Finally, today beef share ppl got the VERY LAST of my grillable cuts, from our two steer. Sob, sob, sniffle, sniffle... please do me a favor, and send me a picture of you enyoying your first bites of these flavor-monsters... so I can at least live vicariously through you! =)

Looking forward to the last share, and to the socially-distanced pizza-making 'picnic-on-the-farm that we will announce (and then do) some weekend soon thereafter.

Y'all are the best!

- M

Basket #8 -- fun and abundance!

Sorry, I thought this posted earlier, but I just saw that it did not. Tomatoes, and lots of them. Make sure you rinse the tomato leaf dust off the little ones! Also, a few fun new things:

Cabbage -- this is our first year doing these well; please let me know what you end up making out of it, be it slaw, goulash, gowumpki, whatever... it should be sweet

Teenage (as opposed to baby, or full-grown) carrots -- a colorful mixture of three different varieties, colored white, yellow and orange

Staghorn sumac seed sprigs -- soak in 16-32 oz of water for two days, then strain off the resulting yellowish-orange liquid, add sugar to taste and enjoy over ice on a hot day -- it's an old native American recipe for lemonade!

Variety bonus -- we didn't have enough of each, so you got a random one of the following ootions: cucumber, eggplant, pattipan squash, or baby cantaloupe

Hope you're enjoying the bounty, let us know of you have any questions, or if you arrive at any particularly lovely creations with this fresh and local food pallette!

Share #7... missed ya'll !

Tomatoes galore, everyone.

We have a couple of exceptional-type things to mention: 1) basil somehow suffered from being kept partially in water prior to sharebasket-building... this was an experiment that I thought would give crisper  leaves for leaf-based nom-noms, and which has helped some (kale and chard) but seems to have offended others (basil)... so I tried to give anyone with the strange, wilted-black (usually happens if you store too cold) basil leaves a few extra snippings. 2) We didn't have enough huge zucchini for everyone to get a whole one, so we sliced them in half.

Outside of that, we've got: cherry and slicing tomatoes, Mexican guerkens (like tiny, slightly sour cucumbers), bell as well as serrano/Belgian peppers (sweet to mildly spicy), cucumber, zucchini, New Zealand spinach, kale, beets, and chard. Plenty to get yourself in trouble with!

For byperlocal beef add-on peeps, there was an option of top round or shoulder roast cuts, all weighing in over 3lbs (2lbs min. every two weeks is what we promised)... I think basket #9 will have about 1lb of sirloin steaks, for all members, as a great way to end the celebration of our two veal rescue boys on a high note!

Please send me any fun recipes you discover, along the way to getting the very most out of your basket this week :)

best,
Matt

Share #6 -- fruits starting to come ;)

Nothing new in this week's share that you wouldn't recognize -- although we did grow what are probably the nicest broccoli heads ever. At least, for us... growing good broccoli has been a long time coming!

Peaches are from our trees, no pesticides... so just slice it up before serving, in case there are any spots to cut out. :)

Tomatoes are just starting to come in, and one of your specimens might need further ripening. No worry, they already have more sugar than most picked-when-green store bought tomatoes, they just need to soften. Just place in a paper bag with bananas (best) or old apples (better) to accelerate their coloration and softening!

Mexican sour gehrkins (tiny cucumbers that Doro thinks are cute, but I kinda do not) are also in the tomato containers in each basket. Just eat like little cucumber bites.

Lots of kale right now, extra-curly... I dare you to dip in batter, and deep fry ;)

See you in two Saturdays (on the 25th)
farmer Matt

Basket #5, you lovelies!

Hey ya'll,

Good stuff in the basket these days, here ya go:

Mountain mint -- Very menthol-y, with a hint of the oregano oils... find a way to yum it. Mixed drink? Mediterranean lentils with yogurt and crisped onions?

Swiss chard -- all kinds of uses... you don't know you betta ask somebody!

Mixed salad greens -- exactly as stated

Zucchini and pickling cucumbers -- If you got a huge zuke, only one or two pickles for you... otherwise, a handful of pickles and a medium-sized zuke

Red Russian kale --  share your recipes with this good stuff, if you find surprising ones... we tend to just roast it with oil and salt :)

Green beans -- Self-explanatory

'UFO' aka Pattypan squash -- these roast amazingly, building some umami almost comparable to mushroom (soup, etc.)

New Zealand spinach -- experiment... not a true spinach, more of an edible succulent... a slightly tang flavor. Let me know if you find a special recipe for it

Genovese basil -- we prayed and prayed we'd be able to get this out with red tomatoes, but they just started flowering and we can't wait any longer! If the flavor on the flowers is too strong, let them steep in a ramekin of olive oil, and just have flavored olive oil to use later (sandwiches, etc.)

Beef share people are getting either stew meat cubes, or cubed steak this week.

As always, it is an extreme pleasure to grow food for your family!

Matt