GOOD HUMUS PRODUCE

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Weekly Newsletter February 28,2023

Whats in the box this week: Potatoes, Leeks, Carrots, Parsley, Oranges, Grapefruit (Oro Blanco or Ruby Red) and Red Kale.

 

This week on the farm:

Well what a sharp contrast to last weeks newsletter. Rain and cold! We still have a little snow left on the mountains from last Thursday night/Friday morning’s snow storm. It has snowed at the farm maybe 2 or 3 times in my lifetime, and each time it is so fantastically exciting. Everything dusted in white, bringing that sparkle that we see in images of New England. The snow didn’t reach our fields, but Full Belly got a couple of inches! I even saw a video of one farmer pull out a snowboard and try his luck down the snowy hills. What fun. We tried to get up to the snow, to take Zoe and Nolan to make snow angels up in our hills, but the roads were too muddy to get up, so we will have to wait for the next snow to share those memories.

I managed to tick a couple items off our mountain sized to-do list, 20 lines of red potatoes have been planted just before the rains came in, and I was able to trudge my boots thick with mud around as I set up bird netting over 3 beautiful beds of spinach. The rain since then has been steady as has the cold temperatures, and while it has made work a bit more challenging, it feels so very good to have the moisture continue-making the world feel a little more right to know we are having a rainy season.

The rain is doing an excellent job of deep hydration and replenishing of our water here in Northern California, which is the ultimate gift in these times, but the other side for your local farms is that the plants are wet and cold! Things are growing much slower than they would with 65 degrees and sun. I saw some of the people from Full Belly over the weekend, and they made the same comments. It’s slow moving in our fields! What a relief knowing that it isn’t just us waiting for the spinach to grow, we are all at the mercy of the same weather patterns J

The snow has also brought some unforeseen challenges, it took out our internet! Our provider is a local guy in esparto who runs the whole thing himself, which we love supporting and being a part of. However, when suddenly there are technical issues and muddy roads to the tower on top of the mountains, we spend way more time that we can afford without email. Claire is beginning to get a little anxious as her job relies almost completely on the internet connection, and worries about what she is missing via email.

 Be sure to send to goodhumus@gmail.com if you need to get a hold of us – the Humus@cal.net is unavailable to us at the moment.

This might be the last straw for holding onto our old email that cannot be accessed by our phones or laptops, per usual; GHP is not at the forefront of technological advancement. No internet also means Claire hasn’t searched the webs for the most scrumptious recipes for you to use this week for dinner.  As I looked at what we have in the box, I was thinking potato leek soup!!! What great weather to comfort myself with some piping hot potato-y goodness.  The carrots, well I am just hoping you are all still enjoying them since they have been in every box for a while now…But also know that we are almost through them and they won’t be back till about May, so enjoy them! Parsley too, this is likely our last harvest from the parsley which produces from about June/July until now. Well that’s all I have got for now, have a great wintery week!

Ali