Well, that's all, folks! This is the last CSA box of 2016. And so the sun has set on another lovely growing season. Thank you for being wonderful, adventurous customers and delightful dinner guests. We had a ball picking, packing, cooking and eating with you and we are very much looking forward to doing it next year!

Planning for the final box of the season is tricky. We always have a few things in mind that we'd love to have at the end - some of which end up being ready, and some that don't make it - and we always have a few surprises. This year, the biggest surprise is tomatoes! We've still got 'em, which is unusual for a Box 10. We had a frost last night, but we put a few brandywine tomatoes in the hoop house with the peppers, so we've still got some in the box for you. Some aren't totally ripe, so just leave them on your counter - not in the fridge! - until they soften up. Most things are still going gangbusters, and greens are ate their best flavor of the season. Here's what's in the box:

Tomato - Heirloom Brandywine!

Peppers - We didn't succeed in getting you many red bell peppers - they just didn't ripen up in these cool summer! But there are a lot of tasty peppers in here.  The hot ones are yellow and long, short and green and tiny and red :)

Tatsoi - Like Bok Choy but smaller and more tender. Over the years we've gotten lots of negative feedback on bok choy. So we thought we'd go with the smaller, more tender version and see how that went over. You can use these leaves chopped in salads - use the crunchy stems, too - or cook whole leaves in stirfry or float in soup. The little middle leaves are especially wonderful in a broth-y pho-ish soup.

Radishes - Lots of very cool radishes in the box this week. You've got loose in the box some pretty Misato Rose, Beauty Heart and French Breakfast Radishes. Serve them sliced on a veggie plate with dip, because they've all got dramatic colors inside and out. We've also included 2 White Icicle radishes with their lovely sweet greens. Please do eat the greens - they are very nutritious and taste sauteed or included in a soup. The radishes can be sliced and lightly sauteed in butter, or grated into kimchi and relishes.

Kale - Sweeter every day as the weather cools.

Sweet Potatoes - Yum! Just in time for cool nights. Bake and eat with a little butter, cube and roast in the oven, or boil and mash into curry soup. Great paired with coconut milk!

Red Cabbage - These mini heads are unbelievably sweet. Grate for a slaw or braise with shredded apples in apple cider.

Minuet Mini Napa Cabbage - Wonderful for fresh eating, as in a salad or Asian-flavored slaw, but also great cooked. I like these tender little leaves instead of a bun for burgers, meatballs,  and larb-influenced meat/rice mixes.

Red Onions

Potatoes - Great for fluffy mashed dishes or wonderful in hash browns.
 
Garlic - Robust flavor.

Enjoy!!!!!!!! And thanks a million for your support of our little farm! Look for an end-of-season survey in your inbox soon!

Well, that's all, folks! This is the last box CSA box of 2016. And so it is time to celebrate another successful garden year and the final harvests of the season. JOIN US! Next Sunday, October 11, from 2 til 10pm, is our annual Warm and Wooly Fall Farm Festival. We'll have tractor-pulled hayride farm tours, mini-donkey cart rides and s'mores on the campfire all day long! We'll have woolcrafts -spinning and felting - from 4 to 5:30pm, a Champagne Tour of the Bed and Breakfast at 5pm, a giant potluck dinner at 6pm, and live bluegrass music with MooGrass at 6:30pm.  We'll also have goods for sale from neighbor farms - bread, granola, honey, jams, salsas and more! Bring friends, family, layers to wear, comfy shoes for walking and a potluck dish or drink to share. Circle M will be providing meat from the homestead and probably a pumpkin dessert or two. There will be local beer, mint lemonade and whatever else you contribute!

Planning for the final box of the year is tricky. We always have a few things in mind that we'd love to have at the end - some of which end up being ready, and some that don't make it - and we always have a few surprises. This year, the biggest surprise is tomatoes! We've still got 'em, which is unusual for a Box 10. But we've had no frosts yet, even though we've been close, and so the tomato vines are still producing away.  Most things are still going gangbusters, so your box is actually a box and a bag this week - we just couldn't fit everything in and we wanted to make sure you got a full share of the farm's bounty! So come prepared to carry a lot. Here's what's in the box:

Tomatoes - Heirloom Brandywines and tasty little cherries of every color, size, and shape.

Arugula -  We planted a greens mix for fall so you could have salad, but the mix included arugula, and it grew so fast and furious that it crowded out the rest of the mix. We won't be buying that mix again! But the arugula is tasty and spicy and wonderful. I'd recommend chopping and cooking it to have with eggs or pasta. Or on top of pizza!

Swiss Chard - Tender fresh leaves, just like in spring. Yum! Try in a gratin.

Broccoli - These tiny heads are side shoots from our summer planted broccoli and new heads from our fall planting.

Eggplant - Most are very young and tender. These are sweet enough to just saute with your tomatoes and peppers.

Peppers - We didn't succeed in getting you any red bell peppers - they just didn't ripen up in these cool summer! But there are a lot of tasty peppers in here. We've bagged all the hot ones with your tomatillos - like a salsa kit! The rest are all sweet - the tiny flame-shaped ones are paprika peppers and they have an amazing fresh taste. Use like any other sweet pepper.

Tomatillos - Roast whole and then send through the food processor with garlic, onions, peppers and vinegar for terrific salsa verde.

Herb Bag - We had a lot of herbs ready this week and we wanted to get you a lot, since we wouldn't have another chance. The bag, from the top down, includes baby celery, rosemary, sage, oregano and lemon balm.

Chives - Great with the russets!

Radishes - Lots of very cool radishes in the box this week. You've got loose in the box some pretty Misato Rose, Beauty Heart and French Breakfast Radishes. Serve them sliced on a veggie plate with dip, because they've all got dramatic colors inside and out. We've also included 3 White Icicle radishes with their lovely sweet greens. Please do eat the greens - they are very nutritious and taste sauteed or included in a soup. The radishes can be sliced and lightly sauteed in butter, or grated into kimchi and relishes.

Kale - Sweeter every day as the weather cools.

Sweet Potatoes - Yum! Just in time for cool nights. Bake and eat with a little butter, cube and roast in the oven, or boil and mash into curry soup. Great paired with coconut milk!

Red Cabbage - These mini heads are unbelievably sweet. Grate for a slaw or braise with shredded apples in apple cider.

Onions - Flat cippollinis are terrific cut in half and roasted. Reds are sweet and crisp.

Kohlrabi - Terrific sliced, grated into slaw or eaten like an apple. But also wonderful cooked and mashed up with your potatoes. Add a little cabbage flavor anywhere!

Russet Potatoes - Great for fluffy mashed dishes or wonderful in hash browns. Pretty much an all-around delicious tuber!
 
Garlic - Robust flavor.

Enjoy!!!!!!!! And thanks a million for your support of our little farm!

Well, it's officially here, and it even feels like it. In fact, we fired up the woodstove for the first time of the season this morning - Happy Fall! This is always my favorite time of the year, and not just because I will finally be done picking tomatoes sometime soon:) The smell of smoke, the colors of leaves, the sweetness of cole crops - all of it is delightful and delicious to me.  And so it is time to celebrate another successful garden year and the final harvests of the season. JOIN US! Next Sunday, October 11, from 2 til 10pm, is our annual Warm and Wooly Fall Farm Festival. We'll have farm tours, tractor ride and s'mores on the campfire all day long! We'll have woolcrafts -spinning and felting - from 4 to 5:30pm, a Champagne Tour of the Bed and Breakfast at 5pm, a giant potluck dinner at 6pm, and live bluegrass music with MooGrass at 6:30pm.  We'll also have goods for sale from neighbor farms - bread, granola, honey, jams, salsas and more!

Bring friends, family, layers to wear, comfy shoes for walking and a potluck dish or drink to share. Circle M will be providing meat from the homestead and probably a pumpkin dessert or two.

Speaking of pumpkins, you'll notice you have none in this week's box. Nor will you have one next week, which is our last box of the year. Sorry! We had a disease problem which is as yet unidentified - apparently this has been quite common all over WI, according to NPR - and all of our pumpkins and hard squash have been rotting in storage. We are roasting up a storm to try and salvage some before they rot - and hopefully you'll get your share in the form of dessert at the farm festival:)

Luckily, there are a lot of things that are still going gangbusters out there in the gardens. Tonight our forecast is 40 degrees - which could mean a frost in our little valley - so we've brought in lots of tender things that might perish. So enjoy these last tomatoes and eggplants! Here's what's in the box:

Basil - We had bug problems in our first planting of basil, and so planted a second round in the hoop house, on the other side of the property from the original rows. The bonus is that now we've shut the sides and ends and we'll have basil til the end of the season!

Tomatoes -  The flavor changes as the weather cools off, and you'll likely notice that. You'll also notice that Brandywines have really taken off at the end of the season. These are the perfect slicers to put on burgers or make BLTs. You've got endive and arugula leaves you can use, but I recommend Swiss Chard leaves and make BLC's!

Eggplant - Nice tender skins, small fruits. These are great to slice and roast, as we did for the base of our Deconstructed Moussaka  at the last field-to-table dinner, which was a blast, by the way! See the menu here.

Peppers - We grew peppers in our hoop this year, which has been great for yields, but we still don't really have many red ones for you! So chilly in this little valley...

Arugula- Yum!

Endive- And yum again! We combined the arugula and endive for our Duck and Cherry Salad dish at the field-to-table dinner last weekend, and it was hugely popular. Rarely do we get so many glowing comments about the salad course! We slightly heated the fat from the roasted duck and then gently massaged it into the salad greens with a little salt. Then we topped with a bit of pulled duck and some dried cherries chopped with balsamic vinegar. Great combo.

Aronia Berries - Second time in the box for these. We are so lucky to have a partnership with our neighbors at Barham Gardens to bring these to you again. Have fun experimenting. We cooked ours down mashed in a little water, strained the juice out and added enough sugar to make a thin syrup that we added to seltzer water to make the refreshing Aronia Fizz at the field-to-table dinner.

Herb Bouquets: Parsley, Lovage, Baby Celery, Rosemary - All of these are terrific in hearty winter soups, or combined with the russet potatoes.

Herb Bags: Lemon Balm and Oregano

Radishes - I love fall because we get to bring some favorite spring crops back. French Breakfast radishes are even more sweet and crisp in the fall. Enjoy!

Mustard - This lovely bunch of tender serrated leaves is a mild version of mustard. Use torn or cut in a salad, or cook in a soup or stir-fry. Great with all Asian flavors.

Collards - We thought we'd have these for you earlier in the season, but it probably works out best that you get them when it's cool outside. Use with bacon or smoked ham hocks and cook slow and low in the meat stock.

Swiss Chard - Tender and delicious.

Cipollini Onions - Sweet and crisp and delicious!

Russet Potatoes - Great for baking, mashing, boiling - whatever you like!