October is here and its time again for our annual fall farm tour and pumpkin picking. The tour is scheduled for Saturday, October 17th. It will be a sit down riding tour in a farm wagon pulled by a tractor. There is limited seating on the wagon so reservations are required. The times are 10:30; 11:30; 12:30; and 1:30. The tour lasts about an hour; we will see many of our fall crops, including different greens, turnips, radishes, kales, broccoli and cauliflowers. At the end everyone can pick a pumpkin—pie pumpkins.

Our Summer drought has ended.  After less than 2 inches of rain all July, August and into the 2nd week of September, we got 4 inches of rain in 3 days.  This was greatly needed for our fall crops, which have been planted into dry, dusty soil.  Our fall greens: Tat Soi, other Chois, Arugula, Mizuna, Spinach and others all needed some water to start growing.  Turnips- Gold, red, and white, as well as several varieties of winter radishes all had been dormant until the rains arrived.  It will be another month before we start harvesting them, but will have them into December.

Your vegetable share will be: 

Radishes
Lettuce
Mini tomatoes
Swiss chard
Okra
Beans: choice of soy, lima, and green

Flowers (last share, with makeup bouquets for those who didn't get their share in previous weeks)

Fruit: Bartlette pears, Concord grapes, Red heart plums 

Something about adding fruit to this salad brings it to a whole different level. You could easily switch the peaches for nectarines if you wanted.

Tomato, Peach & Basil Salad

Serves 2

Ingredients

2 large handfuls grape tomatoes, sliced in half lengthwise

2 fresh yellow peaches, halved and sliced

1 small bunch basil leaves

3 oz. mozzarella pearls

1-2 tsp balsamic vinegar

2 tsp olive oil

Freshly ground black pepper

Instructions