Youth Farm: Cold Nights and Winter Shares

On the farm. We have certainly had some hard freezes. Most crops that are not covered, recovered and covered again with floating row cover (otherwise known as remay) have died back for the year.  As a northern grower its easy to admire plants like brussel sprouts and cabbages, kale, carrots, and beets that keep trucking through several frosts – and sometimes taste sweeter. Of course these plants have their limitations, and after record lows last weekend, they are ready to come out of the ground – right in time for the Youth Farm’s first year with a Winter CSA share.

Winter Shares. This year the Youth Farm has added 10 Winter CSA shares.  The share is meant to be a manageable amount of food for families who want to store some food to eat locally well into the winter.  Winter share holders will take home approximately 100 lbs. of veggies to process for the winter, including winters squash, leeks, spinach, shallots, onions, cabbage, beets, carrots, potatoes, pie pumpkins, spinach, kale, salad mix, garlic and kohlrabi — as always there will be a few surprises, but that is the gist of the winter share.

Much of the big poundage of the share can be stored outside of the refrigerator in places like closets or basements, or even in your kitchen, but many of the other veggies do best in the refrigerator.  If you are planning to put up veggies for the winter, now is the time to clear out the fridge in preparation! I will be posting more crop specific storage info next week.

We look forward to seeing and meeting all our winter share folks!

If you would like more information about the Youth Farm and our goings-on, please check us out at www.gardencityharvest.org and www.Youthhomes.com, and check out more blog posts!