 TURKANA FARMS, LLCGreen E-Market Bulletin August 12, 2024 Folies Campagnardes, Bouquet and photo by Michel BergerinThe Bounty Around UsHi all, Mark here.It’s an odd time to be away from the farm, just when the garden is beginning to produce in earnest and I should be busy harvesting, eating, selling and preserving. But what had become our regular, early-summer outing to visit Éric’s family and friends in Quebec shifted to a mid-August voyage this year to take advantage of the arrival in Montréal of a revived 1978 rock opera, Starmania, a magical production which proved well worth the adjustment. Thankfully, Steve was available to take charge of things in our absence.The timing also allowed us to invite Éric’s delightful friend, Michel, to see the farm and return with us in the car to Canada. Michel has played the same quasi brotherly role in Éric’s life that my friend, George, has played in mine (for 54 and 55 years, respectively). Both Michel’s visit and our trek north gave me the gift of something I sometimes sorely need: perspective.Obviously, you can’t observe the world without a perspective. Strictly speaking the word “perspective” just means a point of view, and no observation can be made without one. But in our common parlance, putting things in perspective implies that they are viewed from a distance, unclouded by our usual daily preoccupations.I’ve spent a fair amount of time of late criticizing myself for not getting enough done on the farm, for not getting out at daybreak each day, for not having organized my life to allow myself the indulgence of full-time farming and gardening. I look at the perennial gardens I’ve neglected and make numerous resolutions, promptly ignored, to devote attention to them the next day.Michel, as a new visitor, saw things rather differently. Horticulturally knowledgeable, he spent time wandering about and identifying various worthy specimens of flora amongst the intrusive invading weeds. He photographed perspectives he found attractive and gathered flowers and foliage to create a couple of spectacular bouquets, which he entitled “Phlox Revolution” and “Folies Campagnardes” (“Wild Countryside Follies”).He also spent mornings, while Eric and I were working at our desks, gathering pounds of blackberries, and during two afternoons worked with Eric to create over 40 jars of preserves. It all helped remind me that the farm, itself, does a lot of the work to provide us with bounty, and I should sometimes focus more on managing what’s there than on planting new stuff.That view was reinforced when we visited Éric’s sister Josée and her husband, Julien, a retired agronomist, in Montréal. My focus in conversation with Julien is always the production of the farm, with frequent resort to my phone for translation. Needless to say, my high school and college French was not heavy on agricultural vocabulary. But I always come away with useful tips on such matters as managing crop pests and pestilences.Julien – unlike many Québecois who seem unfamiliar with and have never tasted hot climate vegetables like okra — is familiar with fruits and vegetables that do not grow in Québec but are produced in places like lakefront Ontario that are more akin to the Hudson Valley. But I even had him stumped when I told him I was selling a good deal of purslane this year. Even though he is an adventurous eater and excellent cook who is sharply attentive to the quality of his ingredients, and even though he grew up foraging, he knew this weed neither by its English name nor its French one (“pourpier”), and did not recognize the plant when I found pictures of it online.Purslane is a succulent, in the portulaca family, and grows widely as a weed in the United States. I first ate it in Turkey, where it is called “semiz otu” and is commonly served as a mezze, its tangy leaves dressed with yoghurt, garlic, salt and lemon juice. That’s mostly how I eat it now. Mexicans, who call it “verdolaga”, eat it not only in salad but in numerous cooked recipes as well – as a soup thickener, as a braised green, or with eggs or beans or with pork. In Ecuador it is braised with tomato, garlic and jalapeno. It is reported to have numerous health benefits – high in vitamin A and omega 3 fatty acids, helping with weight loss, and a possible alternative therapy for type 2 diabetes, although those sensitive to oxalates, including people with kidney disease, should limit their consumption.I have never planted purslane, but I avoid pulling it when weeding unless it is choking out something I’ve planted, or it has finished its leafy cycle. After several years of encouraging it this way, it has grown so thick that Éric, touring Michel around the garden, described one of the beds as a purslane bed. It was the bed where I’ve made three unsuccessful attempts to establish Swiss chard this year. A purslane bed, Photo by Mark ScherzerI described for Julien how I had found a market for the purslane at $10 for a one-pound bag through the Farms 2 Tables app, where last week I got a message from someone in New York City who had bought a few bags previously asking if I could supply more than I had posted. I was concerned that the second growth in this bed had smaller leaves than the first, but I sent her a picture of and she said she’d take whatever I could supply. It struck me in telling the story that, although it is laborious to harvest, I was making more money from the purslane in that bed than I would have from the Swiss chard I had intended there.True, purslane grows from seed annually. But it self-seeds. It functions in that sense like rhubarb, asparagus, sorrel, mint and horseradish. Once established, these crops do a great deal of the work for you. The perspective I gained from Michel was confirmed: take advantage of the bounty around you. Phlox Revolution, Bouquet and photo by Michel BergevinWHAT’S AVAILABLE THIS WEEKWhile we’re in Canada Steve will fulfill egg orders. Vegetable / berry orders resume on Sunday, August 18In the red meat department, frozen lamb:Butterflied legs of lamb $16/lbRib or Loin chops (packs of 2) $14/lb Small racks of lamb $14/lb Riblets (breast of lamb) $8/lbOther cuts imminently arriving.In the not so red meat department, frozen heritage breed turkeys, raised on organic grain, see below, $12/lbIn the yellow and white palette: Eggs: $6/dozen, plentifulVeggies:cucumbers, 50 cents each Sorrel $2/bag Horseradish: $4/lb Mint $1 a bunch Spearmint $1 a bunch Tomatoes $3/lb – so far Rose de Beirne and Brandywine are ripening Zucchini: $1.00/lb Okra: $5/lb, limited quantities right now Purslane: $10 / 1 lb. bag – luscious large leaves for Turkish semiz otu salad, price based on the pain to pickBerries etc.:Blackberries, luscious, now in the prime of the season $6/pintRESERVE THIS YEAR’S TURKEYBecause you asked for it. A turkey regular reminded me that it’s past time to ask you to reserve your heritage breed turkey for this year’s Thanksgiving. Reservation form below.For those of you who can’t wait for Thanksgiving, we still have 6 birds from last year in the freezer, ranging from 12 to 15 lbs. Fed on organic feed, pastured all day once they got big enough to go out, $12 lb. Great birds!TURKEY RESERVATION FORM 2024 TURKANA FARMS, LLC 110 Lasher Ave Germantown, NY 12526 farm@turkanafarms.com 917-544-6464 Name__________________________ e-mail__________________________________ Address________________________________________ Phone__________________ Please check here if you would like to receive email offerings in season:______________HERITAGE BREED TURKEYS: This year we are raising Bourbon Reds and Blue Slates, which will range from 7 to 18 lbs. Fed on organic feed, pastured all day once they get big enough to go out, protected on perching bars all night. We are hoping to slaughter the Sunday or Monday before Thanksgiving and deliver fresh, not frozen, in Lower Manhattan, at points along the Taconic Parkway, or at the farm. $12 lb plus $5 off premises pick up fee. Can’t guarantee the fresh slaughtered part this year, but we’ve got a lead on someone who will do it. Otherwise frozen. Note: These sell out early.Number desired: ___________ Approx. weight ________ Pick up place: ___at the farm; ___Lower Manhattan___a point along the Taconic Parkway Please send a deposit of $40 per bird to hold your reservation to Turkana Farms, 110 Lasher Ave., Germantown, NY, 12526. Make check out to Turkana Farms, LLC.(Yes this luddite farm still uses checks). The balance due will be paid at the time of the pick up.  FARM PICKUPS:Email us your order at farm@turkanafarms.com, and let us know when you’d like to pick up your order. It will be put out for you on the side screened porch of the farmhouse (110 Lasher Ave., Germantown) in a bag. You can leave cash or a check in the now famous pineapple on the porch table. Because I’m now here full time, we’re abandoning regular pick-up times. Let us know when you want your order any day between 10 and 5, and unless there are unusual circumstances we’ll be able to ready it to your convenience. If you have questions, don’t hesitate to call or text at 917-544-6464 or email. HEAR OUR SHOWIf you’d enjoy hearing these bulletins out loud instead of reading them, we broadcast them on Robin Hood Radio, the nation’s smallest NPR station. You can find it on FM 91.9, AM 1020, WBSL-FM 91.7 “The Voice of Berkshire School” or streaming on the web at www.robinhoodradio.com, where podcasts of past broadcasts are also available under the title AgriCulture in the “On Demand” section. FM 91.7 “The Voice of Berkshire School”can be heard from just south of Pittsfield to the CT border. You can hear the station on WHDD FM 91.9 from Ashley Falls, MA down through the Cornwalls and in NY from just south of Hillsdale down to Dover Plains. You can hear the station on AM1020 from Stockbridge, MA to Kent and from Poughkeepsie to Pawling to Kent, Goshen, Torrington, Norfolk, and Ashley. Recently added for those in the Route 22 corridor from Ancram down to Pawling is FM frequency 97.5 And of course you can listen in our own neighborhood of Southwestern Columbia and Northwestern Dutchess County, where it is being broadcast from Annandale on Hudson, 88.1 FM. FOLLOW USThe bulletins may also now be found in written form on line as well, at the Germantown, NY, portal ofhttp://imby.com/germantown/userblogs/agriculture-turkana-farms/ ©2024 Turkana Farms, LLC | 110 Lasher Avenue, Germantown, NY 12526 |
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