Fruiting crops are coming

Good day!

We are mid-July (we all agree that it’s insane how time flies in summer, right?) and peas are officially done - we will just have a few pints at the market on Thursday. It’s now officially the beginning of show time for the fruiting crops. If you read Jessie’s post last week you know that our tomatoes have started to ripen - the very first pints of cherry tomatoes will be at the Lunenburg market this Thursday!

We also spotted our first slicers turning red, harvested a couple of eggplants and full sized beautiful peppers (still green) are now dripping from the plants. We still have to wait a bit until we can harvest those but right now, we can enjoy zucchinis! 

We have 4 x 100ft beds of zucchinis and just had our big first harvest. With those hot days, they are sizing up very quickly and we pick them 3 times/week. We could harvest them everyday but it would be too time consuming for us - some farms do though, so they have perfect consistency size wise. We find that some of our customers like them quite small (6 inches), some prefer them a bit bigger. With our harvest schedule we can offer those different options and that works well.

We also grow patty pans, a round summer squash with scalloped edges. They are very cute and as versatile as the classic long shaped zucchinis.

I must say zucchinis are not my favourite to harvest: the plants have irritating leaves and you must wear long sleeves and gloves, and very quickly you are dragging along a very heavy bin because the plants produce so much - we can harvest 3 fruits from the same plant at the time. But I absolutely love eating them so it’s all worth it :) If you are looking for inspiration, I am sharing a delicious zucchini pasta recipe that Jessie tested and approved at the end of this blog post. 

The bouquets from this week

The flower patch

Another crop that is exploding now is the flowers. We are happy we chose not to grow them in a tunnel, especially on those extremely hot days. They are a bit further from our main market garden on the farm and they actually don’t have any automated irrigation - but they are growing well.

The critical times were when we transplanted them and we managed to put them in the ground right before a good rain (in the spring, when there was still rain…) and it all worked out.

Rebecca harvests the flowers first thing in the morning and then does her magic to compose captivating bouquets (yes, you guessed right, they will be at the market on Thursday 🙂 and also in the store of course).It takes a real vision to guess which flowers will arrange well with the other ones, and build a bouquet that will be harmonious. We hope you enjoy them as much as we do.

And now, time for the zucchini recipe:

Summer pasta with zucchini (recipe by David Tanis)

Ingredients: extra-virgin olive oil; 1 small onion, finely diced; 2 pounds zucchini, sliced into ¼-inch thick pieces; Salt and pepper; 2 garlic cloves, minced; 1 ounce basil; 1 pound ziti or other dry pasta; 8 ounces ricotta, about 1 cup; Pinch of crushed red pepper; Zest of 1 lemon; 2 ounces grated Parmesan.

Recipe: In a large skillet over medium-high heat, cook the onions in 3 tablespoons olive oil until softened (5 to 8 min). Add zucchini, season generously with salt and pepper,

and continue cooking until rather soft, about 10 minutes. Turn off heat.

Meanwhile, pestle to pound garlic, basil and a little salt into a rough paste. Stir in

3 tablespoons olive oil.

Cook the pasta quite al dente. Drain and reserve 1 cup of cooking water.

Add cooked pasta to zucchini in skillet and turn heat to medium high. Add ½ cup cooking water, then the ricotta, crushed red pepper and lemon zest, stirring to distribute. Cook for 1 minute more. Mixture should look creamy. Add a little more pasta water if necessary. Add the basil paste and half the grated cheese and quickly stir to incorporate. Serve immediately.

Enjoy the rest of your week,

Raphaëlle and the Spring Tide team