Bamboo shoots

    We've been cooking and eating our bamboo shoots for years and really like them and very much recommend them.  They're really a treat to us, especially at this time of year when there aren't many fresh vegetables coming out of the garden besides greens.  We use them in more or less traditional Asian-type stir-fries together with vegetables and/or meat, but we've also enjoyed them with fried eggs for breakfast or simply as a side dish sauteed in butter, also sometimes in soup.  Most of you have probably eaten bamboo shoots in Chinese food, but we've enjoyed fresh bamboo shoots so much more than canned bamboo shoots or however restaurant shoots are preserved.  Even after boiling they remain firm, almost crunchy, very roughly like a carrot that's been sauteed without being boiled.  So the texture is very nice together with softer vegetables or with meat.  The taste is comparable to fairly mild starchy foods like rice or Irish potatoes or bread, and it somewhat fills the role of a starch for us, even though they're nutritionally closer to asparagus (which is also a shoot vegetable.)  If any of you are eating anything like the keto diet, which seems to be popular recently, you might especially appreciate a vegetable that can substitute well for actual starchy vegetables.  Because the taste is fairly mild bamboo shoots are often used together with stronger flavored vegetables and sauces, but we've definitely enjoyed them in very simple ways, too, like just sauteeing in butter.

  Although we've been eating and enjoying bamboo shoots for years, we're still experimenting and figuring out whether it's better to soak the shoots in water before boiling and how long is best to boil them, so we don't feel ready to advise others on those details.  For that you can probably find better recommendations online from people with more knowledge and years of eating bamboo shoots than we have.  As we understand it, bamboo shoots (at least of the species we have) shouldn't be eaten raw but should definitely be boiled as at least a first step.  If you have any experience doing anything with fresh bamboo shoots (from harvesting to cooking to preserving for later consumption), we'd love to hear about experience and recommendations.  One thing we haven't seen online but that seems to be working very well for us is to cut the shoot in half lengthwise as the first processing step.  That seems to make it a lot easier to separate the outer leaves and remove the shoot inside.

  The shoots we're harvesting now are from a species called moso.  We've read that moso provides about 80% of the bamboo shoots eaten in China, and if you've had Chinese food in America, it's probably the species of bamboo you've already eaten.  We'll have shoots from another type called vivax that shoots later this month and into May.  There's a small but noticeable difference in taste.  Our family is basically undecided on which we like better.  Try them both!  They're both about the same size.  A single shoot can weigh up to around 2 pounds before processing, but the shoot is inside a leafy, shuck-like portion that isn't edible, and similar to asparagus, we discard the lower portion of the actual shoot because it's tougher and more fibrous than the top portion.  So there's a large amount of what you'll get that you won't eat.  If you're going to use the shoots as just a small part of a stir-fry with lots of other vegetables you might use as little as half of a shoot per portion, but if you want the bamboo shoots as a larger part of a meal you might want more like one or two shoots per person.  We haven't weighed and calculated an average shoot weight yet, but we're guessing it will be around 1-1/2 pounds per shoot, so if you're ordering under 3 pounds we'd recommend ordering by the shoot, but for larger orders feel free to order by the pound or by the shoot count.  As vegetables go bamboo shoots seem to have a relatively short storage life (which is probably why most Americans have never seen a fresh edible bamboo shoot in a store or anywhere else), so we'd recommend boiling them very soon, after which point it seems like they'll keep fine for a few days in the fridge until you stir-fry them or do whatever else you're going to do with them.

Georgia Collards

 

Goat Milk Soap and Plain Tallow Soap

 

Desiccant packs

 

Quart clam shells

 

Plain Tallow Soap

 

2025 CSA PLAN

  We're taking sign-ups for the 2025 Vegetable CSA now.  

  If you'd like to join the CSA for the first time, please make plans to come to the farm.  We require new members to visit the farm so we can talk more about the CSA, so we can show you how we're farming, and so you can try out the drive.

THE CSA PLAN

   2025 will be our 21st year offering CSA shares.  A CSA is a partnership with a local farm that provides you a weekly share of produce items and helps make it possible for us to grow a radically homegrown alternative to supermarket-style food/agriculture defined by big corporations, chemicals, genetically modified crops... (For more information about how we farm see what we wrote here and other things on this blog.) 

  The CSA plan consists of 23 weekly shares each with a value of $23 spread out over an approximately 6 month season (from, depending on the weather, roughly early or mid- May and continuing through approximately early November, minus possibly a week sometime during the year that we'll need to take a bye week on our end, leaving 3 bye weeks for you.) 

  The cost of the CSA for returning CSA members is $529 (23 weeks times $23.00/week), but for first-time members our beginning offer is a half season share for $253 for 11 weekly shares (covering the first 12 weeks of the season with one bye week and renewable for the second half) so that new members can try out the CSA without needing to commit to the full season.

WHAT'S INCLUDED IN CSA SHARES

  A standard share contains a full assortment of several dozen different seasonal fresh vegetables (tomatoes, sweet potatoes, cucumbers, peas, beans, lettuce, okra...), shitake mushrooms, all from open-pollinated seed and grown without chemical pesticides or fertilizers.  Here is a link to photos of sample CSA shares.  

  Normally we pack CSA shares with an assortment of whatever we think is at its best each week with maximum variety from week to week.  But we also offer the option to marginally customize your share, depending on what we have available.

  Every Saturday, we'll send out an e-mail with a list of most of the items we expect to harvest for the coming pick-up day.  If you see anything on the e-mail list that you'd especially like included in your share, just e-mail us what you would like by our Monday deadline.

   If we're not able to meet requests we'll substitute other items so that in any case you should receive a full $23 share.

  If we expect to have more demand for an item than we'll be able to accommodate, we'll typically not list that item and instead include such limited items in the shares of members whose requests were minimal enough to leave us room to include those things, so not everything that goes into CSA shares will be on the e-mail list and available for requests.

  

LOGISTICS

  Shares are picked up on Tuesdays (anytime that afternoon or evening but not before 2:00.)  In response to the Saturday e-mail, you'll need to let us know by noon on Monday if you would like a share that week or if you are taking a bye week.  You'll also let us know what time to set your share out for you.  A little before the time you tell us, we'll set a paper bag with your name on it out on the pick-up table.  If you don't see us outside and would like to talk to us about anything, just honk your horn.

  

WHAT IF YOU'RE OUT OF TOWN OR CAN'T COME TO THE PICK-UP ONE WEEK? WHAT ABOUT EXTRA WEEKS?

  Our CSA season should run 26 weeks, so full season members should have 3 bye weeks. If you're out of town or want to skip getting a share one week for any other reason, just let us know that you're taking a bye week by the order deadline, 12pm Monday.  If you use up your 23 pre-paid shares before the end of the CSA season (by not using all your bye weeks over the course of the season), you can pay $23/week for the remaining weeks.  If you take more than 3 bye weeks (or more than 1 bye week if you bought a half season membership), you will forfeit the extra pre-paid shares, but you can always give your share away to a friend.  Just let us know to whom you're giving your share that week and have that person e-mail us before the order deadline just like a regular CSA member would.

HOW TO PROCEED IF YOU'RE INTERESTED IN JOINING THE CSA

  If you have more questions about our CSA, please send us an e-mail or call us (704-546-5074) or make plans to visit the farm.

  Any of our customers is welcome to come for a farm visit/tour, but we require a farm visit of new CSA members.  This gives you a chance to better understand what our farm is all about, what your partnership with us is about, and what it means for what you'll be receiving in your CSA shares. It also helps us better explain the logistics of our system to first time CSA members and to answer any questions you have.

PAYMENT

  For new members purchasing half season shares we ask for a $100 non-refundable deposit to hold your spot (or you can pay the $253 in full).  The remainder of the $253 is due when you pick up your first share.  

  For returning members purchasing full season shares we normally ask for a $100 non-refundable deposit to hold your spot (or you can pay the $529 in full).  The remainder of the $529 is due when you pick up your first share.  

EATING LOCAL: SCHEDULING PRESERVED FRUIT CONSUMPTION

 

  It's that time of year when we realize the freezer is still packed with food and more food will be coming from the gardens and orchard soon.  We are thankful that we've come through the winter with plenty but we also realize that we'd better use some things up.  Frozen strawberries are good but attempting to eat a bunch of them right before this year's crop ripens takes the joy out of eating frozen strawberries.  While we don't mind keeping canned goods for more than a year, we do try to eat up the frozen fruits and vegetables within a year.

  This year we're trying something new to make sure we clean out the freezer and use up some of the older canned fruit: we're scheduling what preserved fruit to eat each day.  To accomplish this, we first took an inventory of all the remaining frozen fruit and of the canned and dehydrated fruit that we still have from 2023 or before.  Then we took an extra calendar and assigned fruit to particular days, evenly dispersing each fruit over the period until we will have that fruit fresh again.  The strawberries, for example, typically start producing in early May, so we assigned days at regular intervals between now and then for when we will eat frozen strawberries.  The schedule also includes frozen blueberries, peaches, kaki and American persimmon pulp, pawpaw, and mulberries, along with canned peaches, apple sauce, Kieffer pear sauce, canned pear halves, and dried apples (that we use almost exclusively in baked goods) and dried Asian pears (for snacking).  It comes out to a little over one package or jar of fruit a day, plus some dried fruits (figs, jujubes, dried kaki persimmons...) we intentionally left out of the schedule and kiwis, the only fresh fruit we have left this time of year.  We often enjoy fruit with breakfast or with yogurt as a snack later in the day.

  Though planning it out took some time, we're finding it is saving work overall and is eliminating the potential for things getting forgotten.  Every night, Hattie simply looks at the calendar and brings in the assigned fruit for the next day.  If it is frozen fruit, it goes in a bowl in the fridge to thaw.  If it is a canned good, it is left on the counter.  There is no more trying to quickly thaw some frozen fruit in front of a fan first thing in the morning to have it with breakfast.  There is no trying to think of what fruit we haven't had in a while and pulling it out.  There is no overabundance of one kind of fruit right before the season is about to start.  The plan lets us simply enjoy last year's bounty, one fruit after another.

  While we need to work on the logistics of the food calendar some more, like figuring out when to start assigning days (probably when the last of a crop is preserved), I'm thinking of doing the same method for the preserved vegetables and maybe even meat.  I've never been a menu planner.  Eating fresh from the farm during the growing season requires a flexibility that I've gotten used to - salads when lettuce is abundant, tomato sandwiches when the tomatoes are ripe and plentiful, goat cheese stuffed peppers when the goat's are in milk and the peppers are turning color.  But during these winter months, when we're eating heavily from our winter stores, scheduling our consumption seems like the answer to enjoying the bounty of the previous season while getting us ready to enjoy the bounty to come.

Roasted sweet potato drink

 

  Did you know you can drink your sweet potatoes, too?  With a bit of processing, sweet potatoes can be made into a tasty locally grown hot drink.
  While any size sweet potato can be used, we use the very smallest ones that we might otherwise just consider goat food.
  First, we scrub and wash the potatoes really well.  There is no need to peel them, but we make sure they're clean.
  Next, we grate them by putting them through the grater on our food processor.
  Then we dehydrate them.  To make it worthwhile to run the dehydrator we often do large batches at a time.  We dry them until they are fully dry and brittle.
  Then we spread them thin on a cookie sheet and roast in the oven.  How long to roast depends on preference.  You can go for a light roast, a dark roast, or not roast them at all.  Just don't burn them.
  We then store the dehydrated pieces sealed in quart jars.
  To brew the roasted sweet potato drink, we boil water in a small pot.  We very coarsely grind the sweet potatoes pieces in our coffee grinder or use a mortar and pestle.  We add about 1 tablespoon per pint of boiled water and let steep about 5 minutes.  Then we strain it through a small mesh sieve and it is ready to drink.  We especially enjoy it with cream and honey.

  

Dried turmeric powder

 

Garlic granules

 Simply add this dehydrated garlic to anything that will cook for awhile or grind into garlic powder.

Photo tour of the farm

  Most of these photos are old photos already on our blog, but they're all here together for a broader look at our farm.

Corn made into hominy, ground, pressed, and cooked on the griddle into tortillas.

Cracking black walnuts

Our favorite summer pea variety.  Our original seed source was Eric's great uncle in Harnett County.

A sampling of different summer pea varieties we grow.

In the background are our first attempt at storing hay in old-fashioned haystacks and our little corn crib.

Moveable shade for the goats made out of bamboo.

 

 

One of our (Nora's) first aged goats milk cheeses.  We were very happy with it.

Leaf mold to be used for potting mix once finished

One of our farm visitors helping us hang up onions to dry.

Our now 16 and 18 year olds milking the cow.

One of our farm visitors milking the cow.

Skimming milk to make butter.

Butter

Cheese press

A quick hive inspection on a warm winter day.

Making candles with our beeswax.

Pawpaws

Hardy kiwis (smaller, smooth skinned/not fuzzy, delicious)

Kaki X American persimmon tree

Kaki persimmon

Threshing black beans

Winnowing black beans

A photo from soon after we planted our first apple trees, well over 10 years ago.

Jersey steaks

Making hardwood charcoal in our outdoor water stove

Just some of the seeds we saved one year.

Onion seed

Onion seed after threshing

Nursery bed prepared for planting onion seed in the late fall.  We set onion plants out in the garden the following spring.

Mama hen

The first litter of piglets born on our farm

A neighbor friend helping us scald and butcher a hog

Cold frame

Young goat roasted with spring onions, butter and garlic, asparagus, fried grit cakes and lettuce salad.

 

The seed cleaner we use mostly for cleaning (sifting, scalping, and winnowing the remaining chaff and weed seeds out of) our wheat.

Our favorite salad - dried figs, goat cheese,  and lightly toasted pecans.

Fresh wild-harvested winter oyster mushrooms

A weekly CSA share

Cultivated shitake mushrooms

Frying sweet potato chips

Persimmons from a wild tree on our farm

Persimmon pulp

Canned and dried food

Digging a trench to lay a drain tile through the middle of the garden beside our house.

Saving seeds from the tomato variety we grow more of than any other, an extra meaty variety.

Tortillas with a mix of different varieties of dried peas (similar to black-eyed peas), with canned pork, goat cheese, with fresh cilantro and onions, roasted red peppers from the freezer, fresh Swiss chard on the side, cow's milk to drink...

 

Bamboo shoots

Getting ready to install the water stove and making an extra large split bamboo basket for storing acorns.

Bedding the different varieties of sweet potatoes we grow

Harvesting potatoes

Sampling sweet potatoes.  Sweet potatoes are one of our favorite crops to grow and to eat.

With some protection on the coldest winter nights we're able to grow outstanding quality citrus with hardly any other trouble.

The inside of our pea sheller, which we use for dry peas and beans

Fermenting peppers for hot sauce

Reunion with former WWOOF farm stay visitors

Harvesting peanuts

Splitting basket splints from white oak

Harvesting tulip-poplar bark for siding