Matt takes his farming seriously.  He works at least 12 hours a days every day except Sunday.  Sunday is his family day and he walks us around the farm and shares his vision with us and the ideas he has.  We “shop the field” and decide what amazing Sunday dinner we will create from his blessed bounty.  Farming is our lifestyle.  It is how we eat, how we raise our child, how we live our lives.  To keep up with our farm, like us on Facebook.

Matt grows his food for his family, and only wants us to eat the very best.  His focus is on sustainable farming, farming that protects the environment and leaves the land fertile for next year’s crops.  He uses crop rotations and cover crops to boost the fertility of the soil.  These crops rest the soil, naturally controls  weeds, and breaks pesky bug cycles without using harmful sprays.  He also keeps bees to boost pollination.  If you walk the field in the early morning, it is amazing to watch the bees working our crops, especially our buckwheat cover crops.

Bees on the buckwheat cover crops.             Matt standing in rows of radishes.

In the second picture, Matt is standing in rows of radishes. Notice the nice mulching which reduces weeds naturally. But there is more than meets the eye! It appears to be almost flat ground but they are actually in raised beds that are almost a foot tall ! This is his take on the permaculture idea of “Hugelkultur” where plants are grown in soil but on top of piles of rotting wood. Normally a very small scale ideal, Matt has attempted to scale it up. The sunken walkways between the raised beds that normally fill with weeds and channel rain water out of our field are filled with wood chips almost a foot deep and then topped with fine mulch to cap it and hold moisture. This allows our field to capture and store rain with out erosion. Eventually they will completely decompose and be shoveled back into our growing beds to boost the organic matter and provide a natural source of nutrients to our plants.  Yes, Matt is is always studying and is always becoming a bit more  well versed in farming.   I am very proud of him.

Matt loves to grow the food, and I love to prepare it for our family.  I always give recipes, so here are two of my very favorites that impresses everyone!

Watermelon Salad                                        Sun Peach Tomato Salad

The watermelon salad impresses EVERYONE!  The secret ingredient is our honey and basil mirco greens.  I just chop up a watermelon and toss some feta and blueberries in with the mix.  I then make an easy dressing by mixing two tablespoons of honey with a tablespoon of water and then grate some ginger to taste and mix it up.  This dish is fresh, tasty, and easy!

I love cherry tomatoes, and Sun Peaches are my favorite!  I simply half the tomatoes and mozzarella balls and make an easy dressing.  I follow the same rule as they honey dressing, about 2 tablespoons of good olive oil and a table spoon of good balsamic vinegar.  I add salt and pepper to taste and a bit of crushed garlic.  Give it a shake and pour it over the tomatoes and mozzarella. When it is time to eat, I toss some basil micro greens in it and enjoy.  Basil micro greens are my true secret weapon to insure everything tastes like summer!

So, what are we bringing to market?

• Salad and Arugula
• Kale Galore
• Squash and Zucchini
• Onions
• Leeks
• Cabbage
• Radishes
• Asian Turnips
• Beets
• Green Beans
• Shishito Peppers
• Cherry Tomatoes and Hanover Tomatoes
• Honey
• Micro Greens (spicy, kale, arugula, and basil)
• Basil
• Squash
• Eggs

See you at the South of the James Farmer’s Market this Saturday!  We will be there from 8:00-12:00.  Come early to get the best treats!

We are looking for farm help.  If you know someone who would like to come and help us harvest, have them message on our Facebook page.

I am just the farmer’s wife.  My husband works endless hours producing the highest quality food I have ever eaten.  I work as a principal at the cutest little school you have ever seen with the very best teachers I have ever taught with and the sweetest students I have ever taught.  I am blessed.  The summer time for me is a time to catch my breath from the fast pace of the school year, slow my pace, and think about  what I need to put in place this upcoming year to make the next school year even better.  I do this as I help Matt harvest, as I search and create wonderful recipes to prepare our food, and as I write this blog.  Working the harvest and at market has made me a better wife, mother, teacher, and principal all because of the sense of calmness I feel as I am simply picking shishito peppers.  It is truly good for the soul.

It is hot outside and summer is ON!!!!  The squash and zucchini are on full blast.  It is my challenge to use up as many as I can in my kitchen. Last week I made Zucchini Lasagna.  I substituted zucchini ribbons for lasagna noodles.  It was awesome!  This week I made Sausage Zucchini Boats.  I topped them with our basil micro-greens.  They were to die for!  The sausage came from Black Boar Farm, their sausage is so fresh and delicious.  Our friend at Norwood Cottage Bakery was nice enough to give us a loaf of his cottage bread.  All of this, I was able to get from the South of the James Farmer’s Market.

My goal is to make even more meals our of Zucchini.  My friend posted a link to zucchini noodle recipes and I am going to make the shrimp scampi from these recipes next week.

All of the perfect vegetables of sumer are here!  We have egg plant, Hanover tomatoes, zucchini, and our onions have just finished curing!  What’s a farmer’s wife to do?

Make ratatouille with baked havarti cheese!  It is truly my favorite summer dish and so healthy.  It is definitely on the Black Creek Farm menu next week!

If you would like to keep up with our farm, like us on Facebook.  I post all week!

Summer is on and so is the harvest!  So, what’s coming to market this week?

• Salad and Arugula
• Swiss Chard
• Kale Galore
• Squash and Zucchini
• Onions
• Fennel
• Leeks
• Cabbage
• Radishes
• Purple and Orange Carrots (the purples sell out fast)
• Beets
• Green Beans
• Shishito Peppers
• Cherry Tomatoes and Hanover Tomatoes
• Honey
• Micro Greens (spicy, kale, arugula, and basil)
• Basil
• Squash
• Eggs

See you at market this Saturday!  We will be there from 8:00-12:00.  Come early to get the best treats!

We are looking for farm help.  If you know someone who would like to come and help us harvest, let us know.  We are also looking for someone to work market with us.  We pay and/or do a farm share.  It is up to you.  If you know someone who would like to help us, have them message on our Facebook page.

I absolutely LOVE basil!  The smell is so wonderful, if I could buy it as perfume I would!  I love basil so much, when I get home from market, whatever is left, I make in to pesto immediately.  In fact last Saturday, I made myself a big batch and froze it to enjoy all winter!

Making pesto is so easy and takes only a few minutes.  All you need is:

During the week, I love to take afternoon walks and check on the status of the farm. During my walks, I always seem to find something amazing and I happily snap a picture and post it on Facebook.  I am so amazed at how much work Matt gets done all by himself!  During the season, he is out working at 6:30 in the morning and finally settles back in to the house around 6 for dinner, with Sage and I and then back out to work until 9:00.  He gets it all done and I am so proud of what he does. The fact that our child understands where his food comes from and the importance of sustainable farming is priceless to me.  Another bonus, he is the only kid I know that eats his vegetables!  If you would like to track the progress of our farm, like our Facebook Black Creek Farm page.  I just put it together Monday and am real excited about how it is forming up.

As many of you have figured out, I LOVE to cook!  I especially love to cook Matt’s food!  I swear, I wasn’t a good cook until I married a farmer!  His delicious, fresh food makes it so darn easy!  I have always read about people who were substituting zucchini noodles for pasta noodles.  I was always intrigued to try it out.  I did Monday night, and I have to say it was one of my top favorite recipes.  One of my favorite recipe bloggers is Skinny Taste, and I remembered she had a recipe so I popped over to her blog and found this delicious recipe for zucchini lasagne!   Of course, I can never follow a recipe exactly, so I also added some of Matt’s delicious arugula (I got the idea from my friend, Dana who told me she threw in spinach).  I also had some fresh pesto that I just made Saturday after market and I tossed about a tablespoon of that in with the ricotta cheese mixture.  It was pure perfection!

Many of our customers at market are addicted to our Shishito Peppers!  They are finally coming in full force and will be coming to market this Saturday!

This season they are better than ever!  They are big and plump, crisp and delicious.  If you aren’t familiar with these treats, you will love them.  It is so quick and easy to prepare them.  I just take a pan and toss in about a tablespoon of olive oil, turn up the heat and blister then in the pan (throw them right on in, no need to cut them up).  I then toss some sea salt on them and give them a lemon squeeze and eat them up.  I use the stem as my fork!  You can do the same thing on a grill.  It doesn’t get any easier (or tastier) than that! You can also roast them.  Some folks will toss sesame seeds with them, that is awesome as well.

Another new thing coming to market is old fashioned GREEN BEANS!  On my afternoon walk, I picked one right off the plant.  They are so sweet raw.  I can’t wait to serve them up for dinner!

There is no sense in serving boring steamed green beans when they are this fresh!  I love to serve them with various vinaigrettes.  If you are a bacon lover, you will love Green Beans with Bacon Vinaggrette!  It is so easy and the bacon gives it a nice smoked flavor!  Matt grows a ton of garlic, so I put it in everything.  I absolutely love this Garlicky Green Beans with Pine Nuts recipe.  Casselmonte Farm is one of our favorite farms and we love to trade with them.  They grow the best mushrooms!  They are right across from us at market.  Since we have green beans, Green Beans with Mushrooms and Crispy Onion Rings will be on our menu!  These recipes call for frozen green beans….don’t listen to them, fresh is best!

Summer is on and so is the harvest!  So, what’s coming to market this week?

• Salad and Arugula
• Swiss Chard
• Kale Galore
• Squash
• Onions
• Fennel
• Leeks
• Cabbage
• Purple and Orange Carrots (the purples sell out fast)
• Beets (chioggia and yummy golden)
• Green Beans
• Shishito Peppers
• Honey
• Micro Greens (spicy, kale, arugula, and basil)
• Basil
• Squash
• Eggs

See you at market this Saturday!  We will be there from 8:00-12:00.  Come early to get the best treats!