Yes, we did!
Firstly, we would like to say a big 'Thank you!' to everyone who bought vegetables from us this year. We really appreciated getting to meet some of you for the first time, getting re-acquainted with others who bought from us last year and of course getting some extra chat time with those of you who we have known longer. A farm stand would give us face-to-face time but one of the reasons we deliver our veggies is that we enjoy spending those few minutes getting to know YOU!
This year we grew what we thought you would enjoy, the good old favourites of potatoes, beets, chard, kale, carrots, cabbages, broccoli and kohlrabi but we threw in a few twists, we grew golden beets as well as red beets and it seems they were a hit with some of you. We certainly appreciated the earthy, milder flavour of the golden beets as a change from the red ones. We grew both purple and white kohlrabi and found that many of you agreed with us and preferred the white ones. We had big beefy tomatoes as well as grape and purple Cherokee tomatoes. We learned that many of you appreciate the older heirloom varieties even if they don't look as pretty or as uniformly round!
We finally convinced nearly every one of you to try leeks and they were a big success, as we saw you all coming back and buying in bulk to freeze or dry for the winter season. The last few bunches were sold at auction and we gave the money to ICAP (Inter-lakes Community Action Partnership) who will use the money to buy fruit for the Clark Backpack program (What is the Backpack program). A big 'thank you' to everyone who made a bid and next year we will be looking for more ways to raise money for that cause. Meanwhile we are enjoying the idea of you all keeping warm in the coming months eating your potato and leek soup.
A couple of you with southern connections expressed disappointment in our not having okra, believe me, you are not alone! It was our worst year ever for okra with the cool temperatures not allowing for any germination....one lonely plant was all we got. The sweet potatoes weren't much better and it was clearly not a summer for growing southern food. Next year!
While the southern food was less than exciting we have to brag about our onions. They were huge, they were tasty and they were popular. Some of you got excited about the red salad onions, while others shuddered at the red and ordered only the Big Daddy onions. We were happy to cater to the different tastes and enjoyed hearing just what you were going to do with them. There was even one of you (and you know who you are) who regularly bought Big Daddies even though you claimed to hate onions!
A big lesson for us was that we needed more chickens and we did listen to you, we invested in more hens. I think everyone who bought veggies asked about eggs and we never had enough, so it is good to see our baby hens maturing and starting to lay. Now we need to get them through the winter so we can supply eggs to all of you next year. Hopefully they will still produce a few eggs through part of the winter.
Now it is your turn for feedback. What would you like to buy from us that perhaps we didn't grow or didn't grow in large enough volume? We heard that some of you follow a paleo diet, some of you like to start your day with blended concoctions that you swear keep you on your toes......what would you like us to grow to help those healthy diets? We have a pretty wonderful seed supplier, so if the weather and our gardening skills are up to the challenge we would like to hear from you on our Facebook page about your needs or requests.
We may be a small community but we can be a healthy community and we would like to help supply you with those veggie needs!
Again, a big 'Thank you' for supporting us with this new venture and we look forward to supplying even more of your needs next year.
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