Our Open Farm Sunday event was a real success. Great fun was had by all – especially the children.

Around 80 people came to visit us, nearly half of them children, not counting our own members and their families.

Many thanks to everyone who did baking, making, cooking, carving, crafting, preparing, explaining, erecting, dismantling and all the other assorted tasks necessary to get the day up and running (and down again).

Special mention should go to Jeremy Brown of St Kew Harvest, who got up at the crack of dawn to get the hog roast going. It was melt-in-the-mouth delicious!

Thanks again to Henrietta Danvers for this week’s recipe – a Good Housekeeping one that makes good use of the new potatoes in our boxes.

Serves 2

Preparation: 5 minutes
Cooking: 25 minutes

Ingredients
250g new potatoes
salt and pepper
1 small onion, chopped
125g bacon, diced
2 tbsp olive oil
125g button mushrooms
125g Cheddar cheese, grated

Method
Cook the potatoes and drain. Heat the olive oil and cook the onion and bacon, then add the mushrooms. Transfer to a gratin dish and stir in the potatoes. Season and spread the grated cheese on top. Grill until the cheese is bubbling. Serve.

For a vegetarian variation, replace the bacon with sliced leeks and add fresh herbs such as thyme and a little rosemary.

… as well as more of the mixed basil, baby carrots and other spring vegetables, all supplied by two of Camel CSA’s expert growers – Mark Norman of Bodmin and Jeremy Brown of St Kew Harvest.

* new potatoes (Mark)
* carrots (Mark)
* Swiss chard (Jeremy)
* salad bag (Jeremy)
* basil (Jeremy)

Standard boxes will also get:
* extra potatoes
* calabrese (Mark)
* spring greens (Jeremy)

* = grown to organic principles

We’re celebrating Open Farm Sunday at Camel Community Supported Agriculture AND St Kew Harvest Farm Shop in north Cornwall this Sunday 13 June 12.30 – 5pm.

This is a joint event aimed at promoting locally-grown food and produce. We’re neighbours, so come and find us behind St Kew Harvest Farm Shop beside the A39 at St Kew Highway near Wadebridge. 

Join in family fun & games, guided tours, nature quiz, vegetable box raffle.  Refreshments include a home-reared hog roast, veggie BBQ, home-made cakes, hot & cold drinks.

Camel Community Supported Agriculture is a co-operative group. We grow fresh, seasonal vegetables for our members to share through our weekly veg box scheme.

At St Kew Harvest Farm they cultivate their own fruit and vegetables without any chemicals or pesticides in the fields next to the shop. They also raise their own free-range Gloucester Old Spot pigs.

Join in the fun and games
12:30 Guided tour / lettuce planting, make bee nests & bird scarers
13:30 Tai Chi for kids / tomato toss, bull’s eye, Mr Potato Heads
14:30 Guided tour / lettuce planting, make bee nests & bird scarers
15:30 Tai Chi for kids / tomato toss, bull’s eye, Mr Potato Heads
16.30 Guided tour / lettuce planting, make bee nests & bird scarers

A simply delicious way of cooking new-season carrots from Henrietta Danvers, one of Camel CSA’s picking and packing volunteers.

Serves 6

Preparation: 10 minutes
Cooking: 15 minutes

Ingredients
750g baby carrots, tops off
2 sprigs of fresh thyme, chopped finely
Juice of half a lemon
25g butter
500ml vegetable stock

Method
Scrub the carrots and leave them whole. Bring the stock to the boil in a heavy-bottomed pan, then add the butter and lemon juice. When the butter has melted, add the whole carrots and cook for five minutes. Take out the carrots with a slotted spoon and pour some of the liquid into another container (keep for soup). Retain about 1ml of stock in the bottom of the pan and reduce it over a high heat. Pop the carrots back into the pan to coat them with the remaining liquid. Sprinkle on the chopped thyme leaves and serve.

Update 

Glad we agree on this one: Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s cookery column in the Guardian this weekend features – guess what – new-season carrot recipes.  “There’s not much that heralds the onset of summer as much as a new-season carrot – so get grating, chopping, roasting, even baking now,” he says.

We will, Hugh, we will…

There’s lots of things to see and do this Sunday beside our plot at St Kew Highway. Join in the fun and games with us and our neighbours St Kew Harvest Farm Shop on Open Farm Sunday.

Refreshments include a free-range home-reared hog roast, hot & cold drinks and home-made cake. 

Everyone welcome. See you there!

All this week’s boxes will have:
*baby carrots (Mark Norman)
*lettuce (Camel CSA / Jeremy Brown, St Kew Harvest)
*new potatoes (St Kew Harvest)
*chard (St Kew Harvest)
Cornish strawberries (Celtic Produce)

Standard boxes will also contain:
*bag of spicy greens (St Kew Harvest)
*mixed basil – Sweet Genovese, purple, Thai, cinnamon and lemon varieties (St Kew Harvest)
*extra potatoes and *extra chard

* = grown to organic principles

Veg box regulars probably noticed that last week’s bag of mixed basil contained an unexpected cornucopia of flavours – quite a shock to the tastebuds!

There are many different varieties of basil and Jeremy Brown of St Kew Harvest is growing a selection.  Some can also be distinguished by their thinner leaves.

Sweet Genovese is similar to the basil we’re all familiar with.  Purple basil, which is also fat-leaved, has a deeper flavour and a richer colour.

Lemon or “hoary” basil is delicious in a green salad. Cinnamon basil is from Mexico. Thai basil, used in oriental cooking, has a distinctive liquorice taste.

Come and see what we do to promote local food this Sunday 13 June.  Join us in lots of food-related fun and games – including a hog roast – on our site at St Kew Highway.

Camel Community Supported Agriculture members are holding this Open Farm Sunday event jointly with our neighbours Jeremy and Antonina Brown who run St Kew Harvest Farm Shop & Tea Rooms.

We rent our two acres of land from the Brown family and Jeremy is one of Camel CSA’s three expert growers.

Do come along any time between 12.30 and 5pm.  You’ll find us behind St Kew Harvest Farm Shop beside the A39 at St Kew Highway near Wadebridge.

There’ll be family activities, guided tours, nature quiz and vegetable box raffle.  Delicious refreshments include a St Kew Harvest free-range hog roast, veggie barbeque, home-made cakes plus hot and cold drinks.

Join in the fun & games
12:30 Guided tour / lettuce planting, make bee nests & bird scarers
13:30 Tai Chi for kids / tomato toss, bull’s eye, Mr Potato Heads
14:30 Guided tour / lettuce planting, make bee nests & bird scarers
15:30 Tai Chi for kids / tomato toss, bull’s eye, Mr Potato Heads
16.30 Guided tour / lettuce planting, make bee nests & bird scarers

This is a perfect creamy pasta dish that uses some of the fresh basil we have in the veg boxes this week.  It comes from the first River Cafe Cook Book Easy, whose authors are the late-lamented Rose Gray and her fellow River Cafe founder Ruth Rogers. 

Serves 4

Preparation: 10 minutes
Cooking: 30 minutes

Ingredients
350g dried egg tagliatelle
100g pancetta
500g cooked borlotti beans (or tinned)
1 red onion
2 garlic cloves,
1 x 400g tin of peeled plum tomatoes, drained
3 tbs double cream
3 tbs torn basil leaves
50g Parmesan, freshly grated
extra-virgin olive oil

Method
Peel and chop the onion and the garlic.  Cut the pancetta into 1cm pieces.  Rinse the beans if tinned.

Heat 2 tbs of olive oil in a thick-bottomed pan. Add the onion and cook until soft, then add the garlic and pancetta and cook until the pancetta is translucent. This should take about 10 minutes. Add the tomatoes, chopping them up to make a sauce, and cook for a further 10 minutes.

Season, then stir in the borlotti beans and cream. Cook for 5-10 minutes, until the sauce is thick. Add the basil and 2 tbs of olive oil. Cook the tagliatelle in boiling salted water until al dente. Drain, retaining 3-4 tbs of the pasta water. Add the tagliatelle to the beans, adding the retained pasta water if the sauce is too thick. Toss together, drizzle with olive oil and serve with the Parmesan.

The delicious smell of new season basil is wafting around the veg boxes.  We’ve got a wonderful selection of spring vegetables this week, which suggests we’re almost over the “hungry gap“.

All the box contents – except for the last of the Cornish asparagus crop – come from two of Camel CSA’s three expert growers, Jeremy Brown of St Kew Harvest and Mark Norman in Bodmin.

Small and standard boxes have: –
*new potatoes (Mark Norman)
*mixed basil (St Kew Harvest)
*radish (St Kew Harvest)
*rocket (St Kew Harvest)
*lettuce (St Kew Harvest)
asparagus (Lower Croan, Sladesbridge)

Standard boxes also have: –
*extra potatoes (Mark Norman)
*beetroot (Mark Norman)
*green onions (Mark Norman)
*green garlic (St Kew Harvest)

* = grown to organic principles

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