Drowning in Cherry Tomatoes

Seems like cherry tomatoes are the first to ripen when we’re craving those big, round slicing fruits, and then they keep us busy picking all summer long. What to do with baskets of cherry tomatoes when you’ve snacked on as many as your tummy can tolerate?

I often prep winter meals at the end of summer by roasting the cherry tomatoes and freezing them. It’s such a simple task to thaw a bag of roasted tomatoes and toss them with some freshly boiled pasta, perhaps some olives, topped with grated cheese. And it’s so delicious to taste that summer goodness in the depths of winter!

Here’s how: Wash tomatoes, halve with a sharp knife and arrange on a baking sheet lined with a silicone mat or parchment baking paper. Sprinkle the tomatoes with a bit of kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, shaved fresh garlic, snipped fresh basil (also readily available this time of year) and top with a few generous squirts of extra virgin olive oil. Roast in a 400 degree oven for about an hour. The tomatoes will shrivel a bit, caramelize, and smell heavenly. Remove from the oven and allow to cool before scooping it all into a quart freezer bag.

That’s it. So simple and so delicious! Preserve this lovely fruit at the height of the season. You’ll be glad you did!

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Aronia Berries Top Pick on the Farm in August

June speaks of strawberries here in the Midwest. August speaks of aronia berries here on the farm.  Never heard of aronia berries?  Here’s the scoop:

Aronia berries, also called chokeberries, are native to North America but grown in many other countries.  They grow on a tall bush that sports beautiful white flowers in the spring.  They’re high in nutrition and antioxidants.  But don’t think you can put them on your ice cream or make a cobbler – they’re much too astringent; besides being hard and solid, like a cranberry, they leave a dry taste in your mouth.  BUT, they’re great for good health!

So how do you eat them? Here on the farm, I wash and freeze the berries in quart bags. Easy!  Then I toss a handful of frozen berries into my fruit smoothie every morning to boost nutrition: every ounce of aronia berries provides 2 grams of protein, 2 grams of fiber, 12 grams of carbohydrate, 10% of daily value vitamin C, 9% of daily manganese, and 5% of daily value Vitamin K, as well as supplying folate, and vitamins A and E.

We also make juice for jelly: In a heavy saucepan, add the berries, cover with water and boil gently until they soften or burst.  It’s similar to the way you cook cranberries.  Press the cooked berries through a food mill and add the pulp to your compost pile.  You can further clairfy the juice by filtering it through a jelly bag or tea towel (it will stain the towel!).  One of our favorite winter jellies is a crystal clear, beautifully red aronia berry-cranberrry combination.  Amazing flavor!

If you’ve tried acai bowls, why not go local and simply substitute your frozen aronia berries for acai powder or puree – you’ll get the same beautiful purple color and the flavor is similar.  Great nutrition with low calorie count. And, it’s locally grown on small farms!

Check the internet for aronia berry recipes, and stop by our store for a bag of frozen whole berries.  You’ll be glad you did!

It’s a Good Week

The sun is shining, it’s finally summer, what’s not to love?  It’s a good week.

Although some ground is still puddled with stagnant water, the excessive rain that we’ve endured since April is drying up, leaving soil cracked and hard, but nonetheless dry.  We’re grateful.  In every growing season, there’s good and less good. The heavy rains and cool spring this year provided a great asparagus crop; we’re seeing few pests so far in the potatoes, cabbage and brassicas; the onions, rhubarb, and peas are growing well, strawberries liked the chill weather, and so far, tomatoes are looking pretty good.

Our sorghum crop was planted on June 6 – we had a few days of no rain and were able to get it in the ground and it’s growing well.  We rotate crops – one of the plots planted to sorghum last year is full of bell peppers and squash this season.  Last year was tough for all our peppers and our squash was destroyed early by insects,  so we’ll be watching carefully to see if a new neighborhood is good for growth.

Crusty Italian bread, fresh from the oven.

Old Loon Farm’s store is open on Fridays only this season, and that seems to be working well for us and for the neighbors that stop in to buy eggs, frozen chicken, jams, fresh breads, cakes, syrups and whatever is seasonally ready from the garden.  Last month it was asparagus, strawberries and lettuce; this month garden peas, Swiss chard, salad greens, celery, rhubarb and various other vegetables are fresh and tasty.  Seasonal is the way to eat!

Also this week on Old Loon Farm we start to welcome kids, grand kids and other relatives and friends. It’s a joy to have a full house and activities in the yard and on the lake.  It’s a good week!

 

 

It’s All About That Sweet Sweet Sorghum!

This has been a busy week here at Old Loon Farm.  Asparagus is in full growth mode, although the heavy rains we’ve had this month, coupled with the saturated soil, have made harvesting a bit of an extra chore.  We’re still working on a remodel of our summer screen porch where we gather as family during the warm months.  We’ve got some lovely salad greens, herbs, and strawberries coming to maturity in the hoop houses, along with seedlings of tomatoes, peppers, okra, onions and cucumbers. Although potatoes, radishes and garlic and doing fairly well in the garden outside, and peas, beets and carrots are beginning to push through, most beds are empty – too wet to work, too chilly to plant.  Every season is a challenge; patience with Mother Nature the necessary virtue of the farmer.  Meanwhile, our chicks are growing, layers are producing fine eggs, and we took our first batch of pastured broilers to the butcher this week; they’re safely in the freezer waiting for sales.  IN STORE FOR YOU THIS WEEK:  Fresh asparagus, free range eggs, frozen pastured broilers, sorghum and maple syrups, and fresh bakery items (Friday only).

 But today we want to talk a bit about our sweet sorghum.  Have you tried our Indiana Natural* pure cane sorghum syrup yet?  It’s a local sugar, like honey and maple syrup.  It’s pressed from the cane of the sorghum plant, evaporated at a ratio of about 7:1, and bottled.  We plant the variety Honey Drip in early June, tend it for about 100 days with hand weeding and cultivation – no pesticides.  Sorghum is drought-tolerant and will grow in marginal soils, so is quite a flexible crop.

Come harvest time, the cane is cut at ground level, the seed head at the top is chopped off (can be used as feed for the animals), and the cane is put through a chopper/press. The juice is boiled in an evaporater and turns into a beautiful amber syrup.

So what’s so great about sorghum?  It can be grown in small plots – one-quarter to one acres is a manageable plot.  Small farmers can work cooperatively to share planting, tending, harvest and transport to the processing facility; or a small press and evaporator can be set up on a small farm.  It’s a great local product to sell at farmers markets, add to gift baskets, and use at home in cooking and baking.

And best of all, unlike white sugar, sorghum has high nutritional value.  One tablespoon of sorghum provides 32 mg. calcium, 21 mg. magnesium, 210 mg. potassium (about the same as half a banana), and 12 mg phosphorus. In addition, sorghum contains iron, zinc, and B vitamins thiamine, riboflavin, niacin and B-6. (USDA National Nutrient Database Report 2017). Check the nutritional label on sugar: empty calories!

What about flavor?  Sorghum speaks of the earth – grains, sweetness, fruit.  It pairs well with apples, pears, peaches, raisins and dates.  It enhances oats, barley and other whole grains.  It brings a richness to pumpkin, sweet potatoes and winter squash.  You can dream of it with vanilla and caramel on ice cream, popcorn, and other snacks.  Anything made with buttermilk tastes even better sweetened with sorghum. Barbeque sauce, salad dressing, iced coffee, even your favorite cocktail – experiment with this versatile ingredient!

Cheers to a better diet and a more healthy YOU!

DID YOU KNOW?  Do you sweeten your yogurt with honey or jam?  Try a spoonful of sorghum! It pairs so well with plain yogurt.  Add a piece of banana or a few blueberries and you’ve got a breakfast or snack that is delicious AND nutritious!

*Indiana Natural Pure Cane Sorghum is produced by a cooperative of local small farms. Look for each farm’s name on the label. Indiana Natural also produces value-added sorghum products such as caramel corn, cakes, cookies and barbeque sauce.

 

Enough Rain, Thank you!

It’s been a chilly and wet spring.  That could be the understatement of the year. The spring bulbs have finally flowered and the grass is growing so fast we may need to bale it.  Our sour cherry and pear trees are in blossom, as are the redbud and our beautiful magnolia, but the soil temperatures are still low and the garden is too wet to get much tilling or planting done.  Such is life: every season has its challenges. It’s a blessing to have the small hoop houses that give spring crops a boost.  Our strawberries are thriving and in bloom, and we’ve started some seedlings in Hoop #1.  They’re small, but with the chilly weather, no need to be long and leggy just yet.

We were able to take advantage of the slow spring to take a short trip to the east coast to visit family, and came home to find some nice salad greens popping up in another of our little hoop houses.  Coupled with fresh seafood that we bought and iced from the day boats just before we left Connecticut, we’ve enjoyed some delicious meals this week!  We have wonderful fresh lake pan fish here in Indiana, but fresh seafood is a great treat.

Something – we suspect a large dog – got into the chicken yard just before we returned an killed or ran off with 20 of our 30 free range laying hens.  Sigh.  Generally our little dog, Diamond, keeps theses predators away from the birds, but she wasn’t home either. We’re thankful the meat birds were penned up and didn’t get molested.  They’re nearing maturity, and we expect to have frozen broilers available in June at our store.

Our asparagus crop is coming back to life. We need a lot of good sunshine now to get it really producing. Lots of requests are coming in and we can’t keep up.  An envelope of cilantro seeds I tossed into the hoop house last winter has produced a lively crop.  Potatoes and peas are finally starting to show their leaves from our early April planting, and of course, fall-planted garlic is going strong.

This year our sorghum crop was very good, and we’re marketing this local sugar across the region.  We also had a nice production of maple syrup, and several bee colonies made it through the winter this year. That’s very sweet!  So we’re looking forward to the warmer weather, new summer honey, and fresh crops from the garden that we can share with you.  Our farm store will be open on Fridays only, but our specialty products are available through the DeCamp Gardens farm store in Albion every day.

DID YOU KNOW?  Here at Old Loon Farm, we provide a place for our lake resident neighbors to dispose of their leaves, seaweed and other plant matter.  Burning leaves, or worse, raking them into the lake, is a huge pollution problem for our air and water resources.  Composting creates new, organic-rich soil on the farm, and helps our neighbors too. We are glad to be of service, and happy that our neighbors care about our beautiful lakes.  Everyone can farm!

Happy Spring!

 

Sorghum, Fruitcakes & More. It’s What’s IN STORE for You at Old Loon Farm

Fall brings with it such rich feelings! Chilly evenings, crackling fires, falling leaves and plentiful harvest are things that we never tire of, and actually welcome after and long and hot summer!

 We’ve been busy on Old Loon Farm.  As summer began to wane in September, we harvested several plots of sorghum cane and shocked it in the field for at least a week, building up the sugar.  Then we hauled it to Heritage Acres in Middlebury where it was pressed and evaporated into a beautiful, caramel colored syrup and bottled, ready for sale.  We’re happy with this year’s product, judging it far superior to our previous crop.  We have syrup for sale in our farm store in pints and quarts.  It’s versatile and yummy – use it as you would molasses, brown rice syrup or honey – in baking, sauces, caramel corn, BBQ, or simply topping southern biscuits and pancakes.  Check out the recipe below.

Our garden is pretty much exhausted for the year.  Frost has taken whatever was left outside, although we are still getting strawberries, peppers, carrots, Swiss chard and herbs from our unheated hoop houses. A sunny day can bring the temperature in the hoop to the 80 degree mark in no time.  Our lambs are fattening up on the green grasses and the chickens seem to be enjoying finding the insects weakened by the rain and chilly fall weather.  They’re content with the change of season.

And as October ends and we begin thinking of the upcoming holidays, it’s time again to order our famous Holiday Fruitcake!  These delicious one-pound cakes are chock full of pecans, dates, dried pineapple, cherries and other dried fruits, all baked into a wonderfully sweet, rich cake that you’ll enjoy at any meal. (It seems to be a favorite breakfast treat in our family!) There’s no waxy, candied fruits, nor is there brandy in this product. The cakes stay fresh in your refrigerator for weeks, or can be frozen up to a year.  For your simple yet special dessert you’ll want to try a slice of our Holiday Fruitcake topped with whipped cream.  And these cakes are wonderful additions to your holiday gift baskets!

Also IN STORE for you at the Farm:  Broiler chickens (frozen), fresh eggs, granola, jams and jellies.  ORDER AHEAD:  fresh breads; made-from-scratch angel food cakes in vanilla, chocolate and lemon.  You can reach us by email, oldloonfarm@gmail.com.

Enjoy the Fall and Fall’s seasonal foods!

Sorghum Oven Caramel Corn

15-20 cups popped corn

2 c peanuts (optional)

2 c brown sugar

1 c butter

1/2 c sorghum syrup

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/8 tsp cream of tartar

Pop corn and place into a large bowl, removing seeds. Preheat oven to 250 degrees.

Combine brown sugar, butter, sorghum and salt in a large, heavy pan.  Boil about 5 minutes over medium heat, stirring.  Remove from heat and stir in vanilla, baking soda and cream of tartar. Mixture will foam and become light.  Pour over popped corn and mix well to coat all pieces.  Transfer to a shallow pan and bake for 1 hour, stirring every 15 minutes.  Cool and store in an airtight container.  (From Sorghum Treasures II, National Sweet Sorghum Producers and Processors Association.)

 

A Memorable Summer

This summer has all but passed us by.  Busy hands make time fly, and that pretty much sums up what has happened here on Old Loon Farm.  We’ve been through planting, harvest, preserving and back to planting again.  It’s almost Labor Day.  Fall is right around the corner.

Travel plans prompted our decision not to participate in the farmers market, CSA, or on-farm sales this year, and instead concentrate on wholesaling our excess produce and preserving as much of our harvest as possible. A trip to Hawaii in April kept us  from starting most of our own plants from seed this year; others crops we direct seeded later in the Spring.  And a two-week trip to the East Coast during early July meant that we missed some harvest and returned home to find weeds taking over our gardens and fields.  August brought family visitors to the farm for several weeks.  (Our grandkids all grew an inch during that time enjoying the delicious, fresh farm food!)  All part of this year’s growing season, and we wouldn’t trade this summer for the world!

As Fall approaches, we are busy canning tomatoes, pickles, peaches, and grape juice and making jam. We’re cultivating our asparagus beds, and harvesting blackberries and  everbearing strawberries.  Apples and pears (ugly because we don’t spray with pesticides) are in the cooler waiting to be made into cider.  We’ve planted spinach, romaine, mesclun, carrots, radish, beets, arugula and butter lettuce for our Fall garden.

We’re also watching our sweet sorghum form seed heads and move toward maturity.  It looks good at this point, and we’re planning harvest by end of September. A group of student interns from Merry Lea  helped us thin and measure our crop last month, as we track growth and success of this new crop.  October 12 is the Family Festival and sorghum processing demonstration at the Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center of Goshen College in Wolf Lake.

Our hayfield has been cut and baled twice this summer, but now is quite soggy, like most fields in our area. Three sandhill cranes were spotted fishing in its shallows yesterday, and Canada geese stopped by this week as well.  Recent rainfalls  rivaled the spring in amount and intensity; our lakes are at high-water mark and we’re mowing yards weekly.  It’s lush and green here in northern Indiana!

Have a wonderful Labor Day holiday!

Looking forward to a Memorable Weekend

It’s the traditional start to Summer in the Midwest – Memorial Day Weekend – and it’s right around the corner.  Established to remember those American heros who died in war, it is also the first big holiday weekend of the season, even though by the calendar Summer doesn’t officially start until mid-June.  Those of us of a certain age remember  schools closing for the summer before Memorial Day and reopening after Labor Day, so summer vacation was really bookended by those two holidays, with Independence Day on July 4 marking the mid-point.  Even if the temperatures don’t cooperate, in our minds, it’s Summer and we welcome it with open arms.

Garlic scapes

It’s been a cool and uneven Spring, very wet here in our area. Lots of our fields and garden patches are still too wet to be planted, while others that have been seeded, are struggling to get started. It’s the nature of farming that there are seasonal differences and most crops get in the ground, grow, and mature sooner or later.  It is what it is.

Even as we launch our boat and mow grass twice a week, we continue to harvest asparagus and fresh salad greens for sale at the farm.  Baking has taken a back seat while planting and other spring chores get our attention.  Our garlic has begun to sprout its seed shoots  (garlic scapes – edible and lovely in salads and vinegars), radishes are ready, and rhubarb is prolific.  We’re hopeful for some good strawberries this year to pair with all that rhubarb! Herbs are prolific, including mint, thyme, oregano and chives, ingredients to enliven our salad dressings and meat rubs and seasonings for the grill.

Fingerling potatoes, onions and sweet potatoes are in the ground in our upper field.  Sorghum planting will start next week as we turn the corner to June.

As you begin to gear up for summer relaxation and fun, don’t forget to eat fresh, drink lots of water, apply your sunscreen, and stay safe.

 

 

 

Asparagus Season

Yup, it’s here again!  Asparagus season. The local harvest has started.  Sure, you can buy asparagus at the grocery store in the middle of winter, but it comes to you from halfway around the world.  Now is the season for the world’s finest – LOCAL, HOME-GROWN asparagus.  Does anything else shout spring quite so eloquently?

This weekend our little community around Loon Lake gathers for the neighborhood garage sale, a kick-off to spring as necessary as putting the piers in.  We’re participating with a few pieces, but mostly with food – breads, cookies, honey, sorghum, maple syrup, asparagus and spring vegetables.  The greens have been terrific so far this spring!

The other midwestern spring treat we eagerly await is just starting to produce:  rhubarb.  Rhubarb, also known as “pie plant,” looks and acts like a fruit, but it’s a vegetable that’s packed with vitamins, minerals and dietary fiber. As kids, we had permission to pick from our neighbor’s rhubarb patch.  We tore off the deep green leaves and started chomping on it raw, sometimes adding a sprinkle of salt.  Pucker up!!  Rhubarb makes the most wonderful pies and jams, too!  Mix with strawberries or go it alone, you just can’t beat it!

Here’s my mother-in-law’s (Grace Loomis) recipe for rhubarb custard pie, one of my very favorites:

1 unbaked 9″ pie crust

1 1/2 cups sugar

3 Tbls. flour

1/8 tsp ground nutmeg and 1/8 tsp ground cinnamon

1 Tbls. butter

2 eggs, beaten well

3 cups rhubarb, cut into 1/2″ pieces

Blend dry ingredients.  Add egg and mix well.  Place rhubarb in unbaked pie shell and pour egg mixture over rhubarb, smoothing to cover.  Bake at 450 degrees for 10 minutes; turn heat down to 350 degrees and bake another 50 minutes until center is set.

Enjoy this lovely spring weather!

 

Hello, Spring!

Of course we had to talk with all the farmer/vendors at the markets!

After a long and cold winter, and plenty of travel around the country to rejuvenate us, we’re back at home working on the farm. We’ve visited farm markets in Kentucky, South Carolina, Washington DC, Connecticut, and Hawaii, always looking for the freshest and most delicious foods.  We’ve not been disappointed!

 

This year, we will not be vending at the Saturday farmers market in Columbia City, but will have our products at our Farm Store on N Brown Road, near Loon Lake.  Stop by to see what’s IN STORE for you.

Our hoop houses are well into production, with fresh salad greens and some herbs already being harvested.  Carrots and onions are well into early growth. We’re beginning to plant outside beds, with beets, carrots, onion, garlic, fingerling potatoes,

The hoop on the left is filled with strawberry plants. They’re already blossoming! Can’t wait for those first luscious fruit smoothies!

spinach and other produce already in the ground.  Chuck reports new growth on our asparagus, figuring in another few weeks we will begin early harvest.  Rhubarb is coming up and the berry bushes are beginning to show buds.  Spring is just a wonderful time of the year here.

Meanwhile, we have a good supply of “local sugar” since we worked hard last fall and winter.  We have our own, pure honey, sweet sorghum syrup, and maple syrup, all locally produced.  Freshly made granola, including our new buckwheat and oats variety, as well as jams and jellies are also on our shelves.

And we are partnering with Wise Farms LLC to produce yummy sorghum caramel corn.  Find it here at the Farm Store, and at the Posy Patch on May 11 & 12.

Have a sweet spring and enjoy every minute!