November 29, 2011 - Morning Song Farm

December 10th is Farm Day

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Our CSA members, their friends and family are invited to a Morning Song farm day on Saturday, December 10th between 9-12. Rain cancels. As always, if you could RSVP at: donna@morningsongfarm.com so we can plan ahead for parking issues, that would be appreciated. Sometimes we have only a single participant, and sometimes the skies part and we have a deluge. It’s always nice to know ahead of time which it might be, as we are a hillside farm with limited flat spots for parking. We always figure it out, but it IS easier to know ahead of time.

Many have asked about saving their left over veggies for us; we’d love to have them— so if you’re planning on coming, start saving! If you aren’t composting yourself, we sure can use it here.

Meet our pets; llamas, goats and chickens. We’ll have llama treats here if you’d like to interact with Dreamie and Couscou, and the goats aren’t picky. Goat favorites are crunchy granola bars, saltine crackers and pretzels. Actually, they’ll eat anything, including your clothes; but we try to keep their diet in the recognizable food groups. And the chickens–remember they don’t have actual teeth– enjoy cut up soft fruit, bits of crackers, and meatless (within a day) table scraps.

Finally, if you have farm/growing questions or you’d like to offer your input this is a great time to walk the farm with the farmers and give us an opportunity to hear what you have to say.

Harvest Ticket Nov. 29-30 Page Two

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We trialed another sprout mix, (all certified organic seed: clover, alfalfa, broccoli, fenugreek, sesame and garlic chives) but goofed on the timing as this mix takes longer than last week’s trial mix. So only large shares will receive these amazing sprouts unless between today and tomorrow half our trays demonstrate miraculous growth. Barring that, our chickens will be dining on a week’s worth of amazing sprouts in a couple days.

Because we harvest on Tuesdays for San Diego/Temecula and Wednesdays for OC, we split our sprouting start days in half, with the first half ready on Tuesday and the 2nd half on Wednesday. Unfortunately only the first half will be ready at all this week. Uggr!
The good news, is that we are moving beyond radish sprouts and have sourced organic sprout seeds from a trusted provider that has some very nice mixes that I think we’ll all enjoy. We just need to get the timing down right! And of course, as it gets colder, the timing will change, but hopefully we’ll keep on top of that as well.
New this week is a clamshell of the baby Asian green, mizuna. We’ve bunched it from time to time, but never mowed a row down at the baby stage. Often quickly sauteed with a little garlic, it can also be enjoyed raw in your salad. Funny story: I had an intern plant the 40 feet or so of Mizuna, and a week later when I was out in “garden two” checking on something else, I noticed that someone had planted “radish” seed waaaay to close together. The first leaves of Mizuna look EXACTLY like a radish sprout, and even have the same mild, spicy flavor. I had told Jabin, our head farmer dude, that he’d need to plow it under, as radishes planted that closely will never bulb up, but the rains prevented him from getting to it. So this weekend I was out touring the farm, after returning from a few (much needed) days away, to discover the “radish” planting had miraculously sprouted into Mizuna. Sure enough, the tag at the end of the row was labeled “Mizuna.” I hadn’t bothered to look, because the first leaves sure did look like radish sprouts; which we grow a lot of.
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