We’ve dug the last parsnips and sown the first seeds

Camel Community Supported Agriculture’s volunteers have harvested the last of the parsnips for the weekly vegetable boxes.

Now we’ve dug up all the Jerusalem artichokes as well, there’s only some frost-bitten Swiss chard remaining out of what we grew last year.

At the same time we’ve planted the first of this season’s seeds in growing modules - spring onions, lettuce, onions and parsley.

Seasonal local food recipe No 73: Parsnips baked with Cornish Yarg cheese

Nigel Slater (sorry, it’s him again!) describes this as a ‘shallow cake along the lines of a pan haggerty, made with thin slices of root layered with grated cheese and herbs’ (Tender Volume I). He suggests using Cornish Yarg cheese – the one coated with stinging nettle leaves.

Serves 2 as a main, with winter salad as a side

Preparation: about an hour, including cooking

Ingredients
a large onion
75g butter
2 large parsnips
leaves from 3 or 4 sprigs of thyme
100g cheese – Cornish Yarg or Gruyere
100ml vegetable stock

Method
Set the oven at 200C/Gas 6. Peel the onion and cut into paper-thin rings. Melt half the butter in a shallow ovenproof pan and gently fry the onion till soft and translucent. Stop before it colours.

Peel the parsnips and slice in fine discs – ‘so thin you can almost read through them’. Tip the onion out of the pan, place a layer or two of parsnips in it, brush with more melted butter and scatter over salt, pepper, some of the thyme and a little of the cheese. Do this twice more, ending with cheese. Pour over the stock.

Cover with lightly buttered greaseproof paper or foil, then place on a high shelf in the oven and bake for 25 to 30 minutes. Remove the paper and test the parsnips with a sharp knife; it should glide in effortlessly. Return to the oven, uncovered, for about ten minutes to brown. Serve straight from the pan.

Come and get stuck into our veg plot

Make the most of this lovely spring weather.  Come and share in the push to get our vegetables in the ground.  There’s lots to do.

We need plenty of people at our volunteer growing session this Sunday 11 April to prepare some more beds and spread compost.  There’s also celery and broad beans to plant out as well as beetroot and parsnip seeds to sow.

Please join us between 10am and 1pm on Sunday.  You’ll find us on the plot behind St Kew Harvest Farm Shop.  If you can, bring tools – hoes, spades, forks, trowels, rakes, wheelbarrows. 

Help us to get veg growing again

It’s time to get growing again

Help us to get veg growing again

The next volunteer growing session is on Sunday 11 April.  We’ve decided to give everyone a rest this Easter Sunday.

We do need all the help we can get to plant veg at this time of year so please consider coming along for a couple of hours next Sunday between 10am and 12 noon.  

You’ll be made very welcome.  We can guarantee you unlimited fresh air, plenty of exercise and some friendly company… PLUS you’ll come away feeling you’ve achieved something worthwhile.

Expert grower Mark Norman says:

“A small gang of us created a new growing bed, spread compost, and sowed lettuce and beetroot Detroit last week.  But we really could have done with some extra assistance. 

On Sunday 11 April there’ll be broad beans and celery to plant out, and more beetroot plus parsnip to sow.  Also compost to spread and additional growing beds to prepare.  Please bring tools – hoes, spades, forks, trowels, rakes, wheelbarrows…”

Freshly-dug parsnips in the veg boxes

All the boxes this week will contain:

potatoes (Burlerrow Farm, St Mabyn)
savoy cabbage (Rest Harrow Farm, Trebetherick)
onions (Rest Harrow Farm)
leeks (Rest Harrow Farm)
carrots (Rest Harrow Farm)
* parsnips (Camel CSA)

The standard boxes will have larger quantities of some of the above plus:
* jerusalem artichokes (Camel CSA)
* braising greens (Jeremy Brown)
small cauliflower (Rest Harrow Farm)

* = grown to organic principles

We’ve passed another milestone

Our picking and packing team prepared a total of 30 seasonal veg boxes for our members this week – an all-time record.  Plus the box we’re offering in a prize draw at the St Mabyn Pre-School Valentine Brunch.

A further milestone was reached.  For the first time, all the contents of the boxes were bought in from other growers.

The fact that we’re buying in such a high proportion of the weekly vegetable box contents at this time of year may seem like an admission of defeat.  But this is far from the case.

In the UK, community supported agriculture comes in many different shapes and sizes.  There’s no “right” or “wrong” way of doing it.

As a not-for-profit organisation we rely totally at present on the goodwill of our members, who make up our volunteer workforce.  This will change as we expand and if we are successful in our funding bids to the Lottery and the Local Action Group.

As we’re working on less than two acres, we’re not in a position to grow large-scale main crops which need constant rotation like potatoes and winter brassicas.  Instead we are concentrating on “high-value” seasonal crops which would be either too expensive to buy in or do not travel well.

Benefits

As a CSA, we’re committed to building up partnerships between farmers and the local community, enabling farmers to sell direct to the public, and providing other mutual benefits.  So that’s why we’re happy to include varying proportions of vegetables in our boxes from small-scale, local growers.

The Camel CSA approach is very much community-led.  It’s organised democratically. Every member has a say in how our project is run.

The core management group is responsible for all the main decisions.  Under the guidance of our three volunteer expert growers, it works out what to grow, how we grow it, what goes in the boxes, what we charge our members and who should supply us. 

All our own onions and shallots – in store since last summer – have been used up at long last.  The remaining parsnips, artichokes and carrots are again well and truly frozen into the ground.

So the carrots, curly kale, onions, purple sprouting broccoli, swede and Brussels sprouts (complete with sprout top!) in this week’s boxes come from Richard Hore at Rest Harrow Farm, Trebetherick.  

Richard and his family, who cultivate 30 acres close to the relatively mild climes of the Camel estuary, have done us proud this winter.

The winter salad bag was supplied by Jeremy Brown, one of Camel CSA’s expert growers.  It contains a selection of baby leaves such as pak choi, watercress, mustard, rocket and spinach from his polytunnels behind St Kew Harvest Farm Shop at St Kew Highway.

The potatoes were grown by Colin and James Mutton of Burlerrow Farm, St Mabyn.

Mud, mud… glorious Cornish mud

So much for the first signs of spring.  When the north wind blows in North Cornwall it strikes with a vengeance.

Camel Community Supported Agriculture’s picking and packing team discovered this today as they battled against the elements to get this week’s veg boxes ready for our members.

First the root vegetables – the parsnips, Jerusalem artichokes and carrots – had to be dug up in the teeth of the gale. 

Then they had to be washed clean of the mud that enveloped them.  By hand. Outdoors. At the edge of the field. 

Try that in freezing conditions!

The adverse weather meant yet again the eagerly-anticipated purple sprouting broccoli wasn’t available from our suppliers. 

Mushrooms were also a little short, so we had to raid our own patch for cabbages. Jeremy Brown provided mustard greens.

In spite of these setbacks, the volunteer team remained very upbeat.  Special thanks to picking and packing supremo Trish and to Robert, Penny, Jennifer, Henrietta, Mike S, Gillian and Charlotte.

First signs of spring in North Cornwall

What a relief to see snowdrops emerging in the woods between St Mabyn and St Kew Highway.

The ground is far too cold and saturated with melted ice and snow for us to start work yet on Camel Community Supported Agriculture’s vegetable plot.

Once the earth warms up in late February / early March our volunteer growing team can begin preparing the ground, spreading compost and planting seed into cells to go in the polytunnel. 

In the meantime we’re continuing to harvest our own parsnips, Jerusalem artichokes and carrots as well as the remaining onions and shallots in store.  The rest of the weekly veg box contents are being sourced locally from growers in the immediate area.

It’s (s)no(w) problem!

Congratulations to our intrepid picking and packing team who braved the wintry conditions to prepare Camel CSA’s first vegetable boxes of 2010.

Only the onions in the boxes came from Camel CSA’s own share of the harvest.  Our dwindling crops of parsnips, carrots, Jerusalem artichokes and last of the beetroot are well and truly frozen into the ground.

We’re grateful to local supplier Richard Hore of Rest Harrow Farm, Trebetherick for providing such a variety of green vegetables – leeks, curly kale and savoy cabbage as well as carrots.  And to our expert grower Jeremy Brown who collected the potatoes from Burlerrow Farm in icebound St Mabyn.

We put together a total of 23 boxes for our members to pick up. Fortunately our site is next to the A39 “Atlantic Highway” which has been kept relatively clear from ice and snow.

Local food

The fact that we could provide fresh vegetables this week goes to show how important it is to be able to source food locally. 

Supply chains across the country may be interrupted by the big freeze, but we’ve been able to keep our veg box scheme going – with just a little help from our friends in north Cornwall.

As Making Local Food Work said this week in its response to the Government’s widely-reported new national food strategy: “Communities must be engaged in the future of food.”

Many thanks to picking & packing supremo Trish, who fetched the veg from Trebetherick, and to the team – Cathy, Charlotte, Mike H, Mike S, Penny and Robert.

And enjoy our heartwarming seasonal soup! Recipe No 26 – Leek soup with parmesan

Seasonal recipe No 21 – Root vegetable stew

This really tasty recipe comes from Riverford Organic Vegetables. It works just as well without the turnips – just add a bit more of the other roots.

Preparation Time: 20 minutes
Cooking Time: 1 hour

Serves: 4

Ingredients
2 large onions, chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
250g puy lentils, rinsed
3 tbsp oil
2 tsp coriander seeds
2 tsp cumin seeds
250g carrots, peeled and cut into 2cm chunks
250g turnips, peeled and chopped
250g swede, peeled and chopped
250g parsnips, peeled and chopped
900ml vegetable stock
1 x 400g tinned chopped tomatoes
salt and pepper

Method
Saute the onion in hot oil with the crushed garlic, until the onion is transparent.

Meanwhile, put the coriander and cumin seeds into a small pan and dry fry for a few minutes, stiring occasionally. Crush with a pestle and mortar. Add the seeds to the onion mixture and cook, stirring for 2 minutes. Add the root vegetables to the onion mixture and cook for a few minutes. Add the lentils and stir well to mix. Pour in the stock and chopped tomatoes. Season with salt and pepper.

Cover and simmer gently for 40 minutes (or cook in a medium oven) until the vegetables are tender and the lentils are soft.