Winter Farming and Cooking
It's been cold this week (appropriate for winter), which is not a major problem for farm stuff but it does make things more complicated. There's not much heated indoor space at the farm since our barn is open and un-insulated. We have "coolers" which are small insulated spaces for storing veg, and we have one greenhouse with a heater that we use for starting seeds in the early spring (the spinach is grown in other, un-heated greenhouses). The greenhouse is a good space to work in since sunlight does most of the warming anyway, but that means moving the veggies from the coolers to the greenhouse and back again for overnight storage. In addition, the box truck that we use for Boston deliveries is insulated and has a heater, but it's small and uses a lot more energy to heat for longer periods. So getting everything harvested, washed, packed, sorted, and stored mostly involves a lot of moving things and shuffling crates back and forth, dealing with frozen water taps and hoses, etc. And that's not to mention snow!
Local winter vegetables are inevitably less varied than in the summer, especially the deeper into the season we get. But there are endless ways to prepare and combine the same raw materials, especially when you have recipes for inspiration. Of course the internet has lots of great recipes and ideas for CSA veggies, but my experience has been that often the formatting is not great and there are pop-up ads and flashy banners around every corner. So I include recipes and ideas in these emails, and our website has lots of recipes on it, searchable by vegetable. My favorite way to find recipes, though, is still in books (on paper!). Last winter I asked people to send me their go-to faves for local veggies:
Perfectly Good Food by Irene Li and Margaret Li
Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison
Season by Nik Sharma
Zaitoun by Yasmin Kahn
Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat by Samin Nosrat
Six Seasons and Grains for Every Season by Joshua McFadden
Nothing Fancy by Alison Roman
Falastin by Sami Tamimi and Tara Wigley
Ramen by Makiko Sano
Ottelenghi Test Kitchen (there are also many other great Ottolenghi cookbooks)
The Art of Simple Food (I and II) by Alice Waters are classics!
Ditto for any of the Moosewood cookbooks
So stay warm indoors and get cooking!