Zucchini Season!

We've been seeing a lot of zucchini in the boxes lately--want a recipe for using a lot of them at a time? We make zucchini bread, of course, but here's a savory casserole that's great for brunches, or make it as a light summer dinner with salad.As I've said, I'm not a recipe person in general, and everytime I make this it's a little different, but this is the basic idea:

You have three layers--crust, cheese, and zucchini. The crust layer can be made with a tart dough, or puff pastry squares, or even canned crescent rolls for convenience. Whatever you choose, press that into the bottom of a 9x13 casserole dish.

The cheese layer is based on ricotta. I use about a cup of ricotta, and mix it with sauteed onions and garlic (from the CSA box!), garden herbs (right now we've got an abundance of sage, rosemary, some oregano and some thyme), maybe a tablespoon of dijon mustard if it's handy; add an egg if you want. (Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't--it's a heartier dish with a little egg.) Maybe add some grated cheese, maybe add some citrus zest, as you like. Spread your cheese mixture over the crust layer.

The top layer is zucchini. I usually slice up several at a time with the food processor, so I'm not sure exactly how many were used here--probably two is about right. Sliced thin, layered all across the cheese layer. The one pictured above has about a cup of cheddar and some paprika sprinkled over the zucchini, but you can also just sprinkle with a little olive oil or parmesan.

Bake about half an hour, until it looks like the crust is cooked, the egg is cooked, the cheese is melted and a little browned. Serves well warm or chilled.

The true cost of tomatoes

Don't miss Mark Bittman's opinionator column about the true cost of tomatoes.

He's writing about Florida tomatoes, not the kind that are in our CSA boxes from Irvine, CA.

A third of our [nation's] tomatoes are grown in Florida, and much of that production is concentrated around Immokalee (rhymes with “broccoli”), a town that sits near the edge of the great “river of grass,” or the Everglades, the draining of which began in the late 19th century, thus setting the stage for industrial agriculture. [snip]

The tomato fields of Immokalee are vast and surreal. An unplanted field looks like a lousy beach: the “soil,” which is white sand, contains little in the way of nutrients and won’t hold any water. To grow tomatoes there requires mind-boggling amounts of fertilizers, fungicides and pesticides (on roughly the same acreage of tomatoes, Florida uses about eight times as many chemicals as California). The tomatoes are, in effect, grown hydroponically, and the sand seems useful mostly as a medium for holding stakes in place.

Organic tomatoes require much, much fewer chemicals. As I have written before, a plant-based insect repellent, neem oil, is sometimes used. Mostly, Tanaka Farms relies on inter-planting onions to repel insects.

They also factor in a 25-30% crop loss to critters in their plans. BTW, organic farmers lose an average of 30% of their crop to critters (including insects). Conventional farmers lose 25%, despite using vast amounts of pesticides and herbicides.

Tomatoes with any color other than green are too ripe to ship, and left to rot; I’ve posted a couple of pictures I took of those on my blog. The green tomatoes are gassed — “de-greened” is the chosen euphemism — to “ripen” them; the plants themselves are often killed with an herbicide to hasten their demise and get ready for the next crop.

Those of you who have visited Tanaka Farms on CSA days know that everything that can be composted is composted on site and tilled back into the soil. Crop rotation includes lots of legumes (the beans you see in your boxes) to replenish nitrogen in the soil. The ground is never sprayed with herbicides between crops. It is simply tilled. Sometimes, volunteers from the last crop spring up amid the new.

Workers on the farm have worked alongside the Tanaka family for years, often decades. They are not treated as disposable people. Workers at TF are never sprayed with pesticides or herbicides, or sent into recently sprayed fields, because the fields are not sprayed in the first place.

Enjoy your ripe and guilt-free tomatoes this summer. Sign up online for summer CSA boxes to support Adams Middle School.

CSA Day June 11-12, 2011

Sorry about the late notice.  I just found out from the flyer in yesterday's CSA box.

This is free and open to all current CSA (you've ordered Mar-June, 2011) members.

Members will take a guided wagon ride around the farm.  You'll try some of the different vegetables and fruits grown on the farm.  After the tour, you'll pick and eat strawberries in the berry patch.

For $5, get a basket; you'll be able to pick and take home some of our yummy strawberries.

Please visit www.CSADAY.com to register for either Sat. or Sun.  Please register for times between 9:30 AM-2:00 PM.  Tours leave every half hour.  The tour is approx. 1 hr and 15 min.

Also, please note if you wish to purchase future CSA boxes for July, please go to www.tanakafarms.com, click on CSA Program and register as a new subscriber.  We are ending our relationship with Farm2table Connect at the end of June and switching over to a different order placing system, Farmigo.  If you have any questions or concerns, please contact us at CSA@tanakafarms.com. 

We hope to see you this weekend!
The Tanaka Family

Afterschool Strawberry Specials

Farmer Tanaka passes this on:

Strawberries are sweet right now and we have an abundance of them so we are having a U-Pick Special!!!

When: 3pm Everyday Monday June 6th- Friday June10th
Don't be late, wagon will be leaving promptly at 3pm

No Reservations are needed. Please arrive at least 15minutes early.

Where: Tanaka Farms
5380 3/4 University Dr
Irvine, ca 92612

Cost: $5 per person ages 2 and under free
Includes: Wagon ride to Strawberry Patch and 1 one pound basket of strawberries to take home. You may purchase additional baskets for $5 each.

Thank you and see you at the farm,

The Tanaka Family

CSA Changes

Starting in July 2011, Tanaka Farms will charge $3/box for delivery.  The good news is that, at the same time, the 10-box minimum order required for delivery to a site also goes away.  As a bonus, June 2011 will have no minimum and no delivery fee.

Farmers have been hit hard by rising commodity prices, especially for gas.  The cost of delivery has pushed the Tanaka Farms CSA program back into the red.  After much thought, the Tanaka family has decided to hold the prices of the boxes steady, but charge for delivery.

If you have been sitting on the fence due to uncertainty, I will extend the June sign-up deadline until Monday, June 6.  Get it into the Adams PTSA mailbox at the school by 7:45 AM or Neighborhood Grinds by 8:00 AM on June 6, and you can still have a box June 9 or 23.  Download the June form here.

Beginning in July, we will shift to online ordering.  I will write a separate post as soon as that is set up for the Adams MS group.

Our group will be migrating to TF's online ordering system
through farmigo.com in July.

http://www.tanakafarms.com/CSA.html
http://csa.farmigo.com/join/tanakafarms/2011

Eileen, the TF CSA coordinator, will be setting up our group soon and I will forward the registration info as soon as I receive it.

All accounts are set up on a recurring basis so subscribers have 6 choices.

1. indefinite hold
2. short-term vacation hold with an end date
3. S box weekly
4. S box biweekly
5. L box weekly
6. L box biweekly

You can change your account setting at any time, as often as you like. The only caveat is that the setting 4 days before our delivery day is the one that is honored.  We get deliveries on Thursday, so the setting you have on Sunday holds for that week.

Your credit card will be charged the day of delivery, usually in the early evening.

Farmigo will automatically generate email reminders to everyone who has signed up for a box that week.

What is vegan sugar?

My daughter asked me why we buy the two pound bag of organic vegan sugar that costs the same as a five pound bag of regular sugar. What makes sugar vegan?

She was too small to remember, but we took a vacation to Australia in 2003. On the shuttle through Queensland, we drove past many sugar cane fields. A blur of a fast-moving animal caught my eye as it crossed the road and ran into the sugar cane.

I asked the driver what kind of animal lives in the cane. He replied that quite a few animals live in the cane fields.

Then we passed some cane that had been cut by a mechanical harvester.

"What happens to the animals when the cane is cut?"

"They become animal by-catch."

I told him that I just went off sugar.

Then he said that there were more reasons to go off sugar. He told us about all the chemicals that are sprayed on the sugar cane. Then the cane is cut, crushed, and the juices collected--chemicals, animal by-catch and all*.

Vegan sugar is made from hand-cut sugar cane, which gives the animals a chance to get away.

We've been buying organic vegan sugar ever since. The cost is revenue-neutral because I was looking for an excuse to cut down on our family's sugar intake anyway.

* In theory, the animal blood and guts are removed in the sugar refining steps. Our family does not eat vegan, but we didn't like the idea of "regular" sugar after we learned how it is made.

Walk the farm to help Japanese farmers

Looking for another opportunity to help?

Farmer Glenn Tanaka is an active volunteer with the Orange Coast Optimist (youth) club.  The kids were deeply affected by the earthquake in Japan and the plight of farmers that lost their crops due to the tsunami and radioactive contamination (or the perception of contamination).

They wanted to raise money to help those farmers and they will be hosting a special Walk the Farm fundraiser on June 18, 2011 at Tanaka Farms. 

Your $20 donation to "Walk the Farm" includes:

- Scenic view as you "Walk the Farm"
- Bottled water
- Sampling of fruits and vegetables from around the farm
- Shaved ice
- Hot Dog/Hamburger lunch
- The knowledge that you are helping a community to rebuild their farms

- T-shirts are available for $10 and can be ordered when registering.

Normally, the cookout tour costs $24/20 (adults/kids).  On this occasion, the cost is a mere $20.  Moreover, it is 100% tax-deductible because 100% of the proceeds will go to the OCO club, a 503(c) non-profit organization, which will funnel the money to Japanese farmers.

Become a gleaner

Image of Jean François Millet's painting, the Gleaners, courtesy of USC.

Gleaning is the practice of salvaging food after the commercial harvesters are done.  For instance, my high school biology class took a field trip to a vineyard to glean grapes left on the vine after the mechanical harvesting was done.  We used the grapes to ferment some wine for our microbiology unit.  In Millet's day, peasants used to glean to stave off starvation.

Today, farmer Glenn Tanaka donates his leftover harvest to the food banks fun by South County Outreach and Families Forward in Irvine.  Together, they provide fresh produce to up to 350 families in need.

Do you want to help farmer Glenn help hungry families?  Sign up to glean on a Monday or Wednesday afternoon this summer.  This is a great way to teach your kids where their food comes from, and to be mindful of others who may not otherwise have access to clean and healthy food.

Find out more about gleaning at Tanaka Farms.  Up to 25 helpers are needed for

• Wednesday, June 1, 3:30 pm
• Monday, June 6, 3:30 pm
• Wednesday, June 8, 3:30 pm
• Monday, June 13, 3:30 pm
• Wednesday, June 15, 3:30 pm  

RSVP to Glenn@TanakaFarms.com

Where the money goes

I would like to thank all of the participants in the Adams CSA program.  The money raised by your participation in the program helps us fill in school funding gaps.  My daughter was a beneficiary of this largess last week.

Adams Middle School is a Title 1 school.  40% of Adams students are considered high-risk either because of their parents' educational background or because of their family income. 

[Many people are surprised that there are pockets of need, even within the Beach Cities.  But Adams is special because their students of all backgrounds statistically outperform other kids that come from similar backgrounds.  In contrast, other middle schools with higher mean test scores in the Beach Cities underperform relative to their economic peers.]

The school drama club is putting on Beauty and the Beast this May*.  The drama teacher wanted to take the kids to the Pantages to see a professional production.  The district policy is to not let money be a barrier to a quality education for all students.  But there was no way the school district could come up with the $4,000 for the entire drama club to go.

We found a way to make it happen.

We got a discounted group rate from the Pantages box office.  The PTSA paid for the rental of a school bus to transport the students.  Most parents paid $47 (vs the $60 box office list price).  Kids from families that couldn't afford $47 (and could substantiate financial need) were given a 50% subsidy from the school's educational enrichment fund. 

Everyone who wanted to go was able to go.  The kids had a great time.

Thanks all around.

* Contact me if you are interested in getting tickets to the Adams' performance of Beauty and the Beast.  Or if you want to help with the costumes or sets.  ;-)

Do you Recipe View?

Google Recipe View debuted this week. I typed in Golden Beets and found a recipe for Farfalle with Golden Beets, Beet Greens, and Pine Nuts. It was so delish, I ate seconds.