creekside-gardener

2015 - Harvest the Heat!

Fri, 25 Sep 2015 18:46:41 +0100

WoW! What a season. With a spring that started in late January and temperatures in the high 90's for most of the summer months, Western Washington farmers were faced with watering and cooling issues that just aren't usually part of our annual challenges. Who knew I'd be struggling to keep plants cool and wet in the PNW?!

Well, I saw many farms and gardeners take the 2015 growing season by the piping hot horns, and what a bounty it provided! We have seen success with every crop we could keep watered, and though many of our cool weather perennials and nursery stock didn't thrive in the heat, almost all of them survived with our careful nurturing in the new creekside potted plant hideout. Harvest season is busier than ever, as there are not only more options, but more of each option for preserving and marketing. I love to see the pantry shelves fill up, an altar to abundance as well as a sense of security leading into the cool, dormant winter to come.

Here at Coffee Creek, we shared in this beautiful, bountiful season with friends, family, volunteers, and WWOOFers from around the country. Between cob building projects, new hoophouse and expanded gardens, feed business, the introduction of bees and pigs, and the always exciting human dynamics, there were many valuable learning and growing opportunities. I am ever grateful for all of the presence, support, and ingenuity it took to make 2015 an amazing season of growth and expansion!

Creekside Gardener~ October 27, 2013

Sat, 26 Oct 2013 07:50:14 +0100

With harvest season upon us and autumn in full swing, I find myself reflecting on the busy days in the bountiful gardens, the long nights spent around a bonfire or preserving produce in the kitchen bus, and the challenges of living close enough to the earth under my feet to be truly affected by the changing seasons. With each passing day, the list of projects and preparations is shifting. With each change in the weather, importance and time frames are re-established and a new list is compiled.

This has been yet another season of transition here at Coffee Creek. I am glad that as the busy nature of the growing season turns toward the wood stove with a mason jar of peaches and a good book in hand, Waylon and I are the only humans in the menagerie. While more helping hands are needed at times, quiet space is also crucial to focusing attention where it is needed.

I always consider us to be holding space for community, and know that a huge part of my personal offering is in experiential education- not only to grow food, but to grow growers of food. To this end Coffee Creek has hosted many WWOOFers, travelers, and inquiring minds throughout the years. I also know that in order to offer, one must refill their cup by integrating experiences into knowledge and by resting with dreams of forward movement dancing behind one's eyelids. Soon begins my time to sit with the lessons of this season.

Though we have one more delivery in November (along with the last and largest butcher), this last week of October is a very special time in which the regular CSA deliveries and weekly farmers' markets come to an end. The season of planting and harvesting gives way to organizing and clean up- battening down the hatches for a season of cold rain and introspection. Because I so enjoy growing food for my family and yours, I know that I have put all of my energy into doing my best by our gardens and animals. Because I have put all my energy out, I know that it is time to focus energy inward and toward my son, and our relationships- toward the foundations of the life-giving energy that I have to invest each spring when it starts all over again :)

I appreciate you for your support of this tiny farm. I am thankful for our interactions with each other, and with our local economy- not just financially, but energetically. By understanding and accepting our individual offerings- be it growing a portion of your family's nourishment or investing in the supplies for a successful CSA garden- we are working together to expand each others' potential and re-establish a true meaning to the word Value. Thank you for your involvement, support, patience, understanding, and confidence. Thank you for a great season- I look forward to serving you through land stewardship in years to come, every bit as much as I look forward to this winter of rest ahead!

Creekside Gardener~ July 28, 2013

Sat, 27 Jul 2013 19:53:03 +0100

The garlic is harvested! This is a most exciting time, seeing the product of our gardens' winter work piled in the sun, ready to be hung in the Longhouse for curing. Working together in the fields on hot days pulling out the hidden bulbs, it is always a surprise to see which varieties got the biggest, which smell the strongest, and which were most prolific.

I love thinking about all the tasty dishes that will be inspired by this harvest as much as our health will improve from the amazing benefits of garlic's multifaceted magic :) Enjoy your Inchelium Red softneck in this box and look forward to tasting and experimenting with new and different varieties with your boxes to come!

Mango, pineapple, peach green tea is paired with the last of the apricots for your quart of kombucha. It was just bottled on Saturday, so you may be interested in letting it sit (out of direct sun) on your counter for day or two to complete a double fermentation, where the flavors will truly meld and the effervescence will come through.

Enjoy the heat of summer, now paired with cooler and longer evenings. As the season shifts toward harvest time, I truly enjoy the lower temperatures at night for canning or relaxing after a long day in the garden or at market. Busy times are important to balance with enjoyment and relaxation. While that can be challenging (for me especially!), I find the productivity of this time of year to be a great inspiration for taking it easy when the opportunity is present :)

Creekside Gardener~ July 14, 2013

Sat, 13 Jul 2013 19:36:16 +0100

There is nothing quite like a summer day in the garden- dogs laying in the shade after chasing butterflies with Waylon, the sun on my back as I weed gardens in preparation of the next planting. Watering the plants, myself, and and the nearest person who is least suspecting it...!

Now that the rains have subsided, the plants are shining with the sun. Dark green potato leaves are shading cool and colorful tubers; spiny, curling leaves hide little yellow flowers that are quickly developing into cucumbers; pumpkin plants vine out and out, absorbing all the summer sunshine Washington has to offer. Of course, the weeds and grasses appreciate the warmth at least as much as the vegetables and berries do, so the balance of mowing and harvesting is yet to be reached.

No matter how our hours are spent, I truly appreciate the tangible success of time spent with the land. To see our progress at the end of each day and to watch projects as they take shape fulfills us in a similar way that a warm tomato off the vine does. Thankfully, the work season is longer than the tomato season here in Washington, so there is much fulfillment to be had, even as we patiently await a more diversified harvest :)

Creekside Gardener- May 26, 2013

Thu, 23 May 2013 17:15:11 +0100

Good Morning!

It is chilly and drizzling for butcher day. I started out by taking the puppy, Luna, for a bike ride and making breakfast for the crew, who will emerge from their warm homes at the sounding of the Kitchen Bus bell. We always know there is something good to eat when chiming echos across the field and forest of Coffee Creek!

Our next delivery is this Sunday, the 26th of May. Please be sure to refer to the schedule of dates, times, and locations in the first CSG which is archived on the Creekside Gardener page of our website, along with CSGs from years past. There are many great recipes and silly stories throughout the pages.

This is how you can make the breakfast that Kate and Chaliese are eating now (I am fasting, and have been cooking non-stop for 4 days, as I tend to do) :

Cast Iron Quiche
8 inch cast iron pan
2 tbs butter melted in cast iron
"Bread Crumbs" (read on...)
Drizzle of canola oil
1/2 cup leeks, chopped
1 cup chard, kale, spinach, collard or your favorite hardy green, chopped
5 eggs ...or 3 chicken eggs, one bantam egg and a duck egg, if you happen to have a menagerie :)
1/4 cup goat (or other) milk
1 tsp baking soda
salt, herbs and spices to your liking
Soft or crumbly goat cheese

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place 2 tbs butter in cast iron pan and melt in preheating oven.

Saute leeks in a drizzle of canola oil in a small pan on medium heat.

Crumble the last of that bag of potato chips with those whole wheat crackers that are almost stale (cut up tortillas, crusty bread cut up into inch squares, et c...) to cover the bottom of your warm, buttery skillet about a half inch deep.

Cover bread crumbs evenly with chopped greens, then with sauteed leeks.

Whip eggs, milk, soda and whatever seasoning you choose (today I used salt, garlic powder, cayenne powder, and a dash of Worcestershire sauce) until light and bubbly. Pour evenly over pan, then top with goat cheese.

Bake for 25 minutes, until the edges are golden and the middle is set. Serve hot! YUMMY!

Please choose two of the following plants to be delivered with your share this weekend:
Buttercup winter squash
Red Burgundy Okra
Clemon's Son Okra
Little Bells sweet pepper
Pablo Ancho mild pepper
Jalapeno hot pepper
Napolean sweet/mild pepper
Aunt Molly's ground cherry
Aubergine Eggplant

SPECIAL PRICES ON ALL PLANTS!!

3"- 4" ANNUALS ARE 4 FOR $10!!
Regularly $3 each
tomatoes: stupice, gold nugget, brandywine, pomme d'ammore, as well as all the plants listed above
6 PACKS ARE 5 FOR $10!!
Regularly $2.75
red Russian kale, purple and white Vienna kohl rabi, Waltham broccoli, Umpqua broccoli, Georgia southern collards
FLAT OF WHITE VIENNA KOHL RABI FOR $15!!!
That is eight 6 packs!

Well, it is time to start our "Thanks, but no thanks" rain dancing again. I am thankful for the soft ground while we dug post holes to replace the first section of our poultry fencing. And our new gates make access to our birds and compost so much smoother. But with all the new area cleared, I feel myself hankering for warm, moist (not soaked!) soil to transplant our next round of plants in. I am excited to build new gardens as we fill in all the existing beds which are (mostly) freed from weeds and chicken scratching. Even weeding is fun in the sun!

This has, no doubt, been a lovely spring so far. I look forward to the days growing ever longer, to the cool nights after hot days, and to a bountiful harvest from the land that loves Washington's manic spring time weather even more than I do.

Welcome to the Creekside Gardener! May 12, 2013

Thu, 23 May 2013 15:02:49 +0100

Greetings! and Welcome to the Coffee Creek Community & Gardens 2013 CSA

Deliveries begin this Sunday, the 12th of May! We are excited to bring you plant starts for your garden, fresh produce and goodies from our gardens, happy chicken eggs and organic, pasture-raised chicken this season.

Please choose one 6-pack of brassicas: red Russian kale, purple and white Vienna kohl rabi, Waltham broccoli, Umpqua broccoli, Georgia southern collards
AND one tomato plant: stupice, gold nugget, brandywine, pomme d'ammore.

Extras of all plants are available at $3 each! Just let me know and I will drop them along with your share.

Planting tips: No more frost this year, yippee! You can transplant these hardened starts now. Plant tomato and brassica starts DEEP- all the way up to the lowest leaves. Tomatoes can even be laid down in a trench, as they will right themselves in no time. Water thoroughly after transplanting. Sing songs in your garden often :)

Head start on the next delivery, May 26th choose any two plants, ready for your garden:
Winter squash- Burgess buttercup, spooky pumpkin, blue hubbard, delicata, Waltham butternut
Okra
Many peppers- sweet and hot, I will let you know all the different varieties as soon as I have them all transplanted :)
Eggplant

Deliveries will be made:
North Tacoma by 10am
Seattle (Georgetown) by noon
Olympia by 5pm
If you are serving as a drop point, please expect me up to an hour earlier
Deliveries will occur on the 2nd and 4th Sunday of each month. Please mark your calendars with the following dates:

May 12 and 26

June 9 and 23

July 14 and 28

August 11 and 25

September 8 and 22

October 13 and 27

November 24 (one delivery in November, the Sunday before Thanksgiving. Don't forget to place your turkey deposit!)

Pick up your share at one of the following locations:

Coffee Creek Community & Gardens- 716 West Carson

south Tacoma- 1020 60th St

north Tacoma- 1121 N Harmon St

Georgetown- 842 S Orcas St
Olympia East Side Co-op on Pacific Ave

Please contact us immediately if you have not set up which drop point you would like to utilize, or if one of these works better than the one you chose.

We have extra eggs! Please send a good text receiving number if you would like to know before deliveries if extra are available. Spread that word to your neighbors, friends, and family, too! Networking is a great gift!

Our egg prices have increased with the commencement of our CSA deliveries: $6.50 in Olympia and Tacoma, and $7 in Seattle, to account for delivery costs. You scored yours for the set price of $6 per dozen by purchasing a share...good thinking, you!

We are currently organizing our volunteer and work party schedule for the season, and will email you all the details soon. Keep an eye out for the ways and days to get involved.

We appreciate your choice to go tiny! We are a very small operation. We may well be too small to call an "operation" :) Your support, involvement, and encouragement means so much to us! Thank you for giving us the opportunity to provide your family a portion of your food this season. We look forward to being your farmers!

Creekside Gardener- November 14, 2012

Wed, 14 Nov 2012 08:07:39 +0100

Aloha! Thank you for sharing in our harvest this year!

Turkeys and CSA shares are available for pick up (Coffee Creek, afternoon) or delivery (Tacoma, morning) on Monday, the 19th. The Matrix Coffeehouse is not open on Mondays, so all Lewis County shares shall be picked up at Coffee Creek after 3pm. Turkeys are fresh, never frozen, and can be refrigerated or brined until ready to prepare on Thursday! Even if you plan to freeze your turkey for later days, we recommend that you refrigerate for a few days first. This gives the meat a chance to rest, and the flavor really develops. We do this with all of our freshly butchered meats, and are super happy with the flavor and juice factors.

We have a few large birds and a lot of smaller turkeys. It is hard to estimate the hanging weight off the top, but I think many will be in the 8 to 15 pound range, with a fee in the twenties. The heritage breeds cost $8 per pound and domestic breeds are $5 per pound, all at a $40 minimum. Most birds are heritage breeds that required a much longer season than the domestics. We will send a complete listing of available birds, weights, and prices as soon as the butcher is finished on Saturday. Please respond with your desired bird and we will match you up as best we can. Full payment is due when you receive your turkey.

We will also have 10 chickens available at $5 per pound. This is a good time to put a few birds in your freezer for the winter- our next butcher won't be until late spring, so stock up! Organ meat is available at $5 per pound, and feet at $.50 a piece. Chicken feet make great broth and/or dog snacks as they are very high in collagen and elastin. I will gladly share my new gravy recipe with any aspiring organ-eaters. It is my favorite way to work them into our diet, so far! Organs and necks come with your turkey, and feet are available upon request. Please place your orders for chickens now.

This will be the last CSA delivery/pick up date for the 2012 season. Boxes of produce, preserves, kombucha and eggs will be available to each shareholder. Thank you so much for your participation in our Community Supported Homestead! It has been such a pleasure and challenge to serve you this season, and we truly appreciate the opportunity to provide your family with a portion of your nutrition each year.

We appreciate your interest and support! Thank you for lessening the demand for factory meat by choosing our locally- and lovingly-raised chickens and turkeys this season. Where love is evolution, everyday living is the revolution. You are important and your choices matter. Thank you for taking a conscious approach to nourishment and celebration.

Be well, and live in light!

Creekside Gardener~ August 8, 2012

Tue, 07 Aug 2012 22:29:08 +0100

With community comes much communication, and with much communication comes much personal and spiritual development as well as a state of joyous exhaustion. This year has been unlike any before it, and as our community has formed, morphed, grown, shrunk, and cartwheeled through the seasons, the fruits of our labor -both physical and emotional- have sweetened and become increasingly abundant.

My hopes are that our returning shareholders are as pleased with the quantities of produce, and larger sized chickens as I am, and that our new shareholders are content with a different kind of CSA program from others they may have experienced. We are all busily expanding our gardens and greenhouse production while raising more birds for eggs, meat, and livestock sales than ever before. In addition to our farming lives, we are continuously encouraging ourselves and each other to reach deeper and create stronger bonds as a community -a family that works, eats, plans, and lives together...in harmony with each other and with nature.

We are so blessed to share in this experience with you, our customers, and are humbled by the opportunity to serve your family, sharing food that we work so hard to nurture (sometimes coax!) into existence. With each success (and each failure) in the gardens, we are learning and growing, as a community, as individuals, as farmers and as homesteaders. We encourage your feedback, your praise, and your criticism so that we may continue to improve our offerings and services!

Thank you all for helping to create another season of bounty and abundance at Coffee Creek Community & Gardens!

Creekside Gardener September 7, 2011

Wed, 07 Sep 2011 09:06:18 +0100

What a whirlwind this season has become! From the excitement of a growing community to the expansion of our living spaces, we are fueling ourselves on fresh veggies and utilizing the sunny days to the best of our abilities. Coffee Creek Community welcomed Shane Keller and Joe Smith to the farming family and is pleased to have celebrated by exercising our creativity in the building of a hot running water station and a kitchen bus (in the works). We have also broken ground on the first of our forest homes and built a tree house, well...because we wanted to. Be sure to check out our Facebook page for recent photos and updates on projects and community life.

The summer sun has graced us at long last, and the gardens (and gardeners) are basking in the glory that warm days bring. Bright red tomatoes hang heavily on the vines and summer squash are finding their way into every meal, farmers' market stand and CSA box. We even have a couple orange pumpkins already! It is rare to be able to leave pumpkins on the plant until the stem dries (when you are supposed to harvest) in Western Washington, but I think the extra care given by starting them in the greenhouse really payed off, as there are surely some fine pies in our future.

Unfortunately, our chickens are not quite as excited about the 90 degree weather as we are, and egg production has dropped some over the last week. Please enjoy your smaller share of eggs and be thankful (we are!) of our hens' daily labors. Just last night we introduced our spring pullets to the laying flock and are hoping to bypass the fall drop off by supplementing light and a little extra feed as the days grow shorter, but only time will tell what autumn will bring. We appreciate your patience!

You will notice some Michihili cabbage and bok choi in your boxes today. Already our fall gardens are bringing on the goods and, once again, are surpassing the summer gardens in dependability, if nothing else! Do consider growing an early spring, late fall and winter garden next year if you are not now: these are the greatest of growing times in our unique and sometimes unpredictable climate zone. I am seriously considering planting another patch of shelling peas to see if we can bring in one more harvest before freezing weather comes on.

Chickens are in the cooler for all recipients this week, so be sure to pick your bird up in a timely manner. They are delivered frozen at 10 a.m. and should be kept frozen unless they are to be thawed completely and cooked within a couple days. We have been enjoying our chickens in stir fries with garlic, crookneck squash bok choi and fresh basil over rice or quinoa.

Happy Wednesday!

Creekside Gardener No. 6, July 20, 2011

Wed, 20 Jul 2011 06:09:05 +0100

Late last winter I began to dream of July. While I was not envisioning woolen shirts and slug hunting as much as, say, summer squash and peaches, this is Washington. I should know better. But if July won't warm me up now, at least it did in February! Some crops really enjoy the cooler, wetter days, and for these plants I am ever thankful. Alas the slugs are every bit as eager to enjoy them, so we continue the food fight to the death with our mollusk forest friends. Thank goodness for ducks. While they are not yet prowling the gardens for slugs on their own, they are very helpful in, ahem, disposing of the the slimy buggers.

The mild temperatures and high humidity are also great for starting up our fall plants in the greenhouse, and the little seedlings are emerging everyday! This is your chance to get your plant order in early, providing the option of mixed six-packs instead of receiving a single crop in each. Take a look at the varieties I have and place your order before the end of the month to receive TWO custom six-packs for your fall gardening pleasure. The current plant list will be on the "Goods and Talents" page (look up!) by the end of the week, so shoot me an email, and remember: two six packs= 12 plants for your home garden. You are welcome to order extras for $2.50 per pack of six. This is also a great time to transplant leeks and seed beans, peas and carrots for a late season crop, just in time for winter preparations!

We stayed up way too late on Monday night just to bring you this preserved taste of June! Homemade strawberry jam, fresh out of the garden with just a touch of organic sugar is sure to brighten up a pb&j or your breakfast toast. It is also great on vanilla ice cream or yogurt! Fresh apricots are from Calhoun Family Farms in Wapato, Washington, and the ones that don't make it into your boxes this week are going right into the next batch of preserves to keep us warm this winter.

Fresh Spanish Roja Garlic was pulled out of the garden last night, and is not dried like most of the garlic you encounter. The sharp spicy cloves should be enjoyed soon, as they won't last as long as the ones we are curing for later. Roasted garlic spread on crusty bread is a super special treat:

Peel outer layers of garlic off, but leave the cloves wrapped and attached to head.
Cut off the top 1/4 inch of the whole head, exposing the cloves inside.
Drizzle with olive oil, wrap in foil, and bake at 400 for 35 minutes.
YUM.

Have a great Wednesday!