Amarosia Organic Garden

The farm season begins and ends with garlic. It is the last major thing we plant in the fall and the first major thing we harvest outside in the spring.

Garlic is planted at around the same time that you plant tulips, daffodils etc and managed in a very similar way.

Holes are made, in our case using an ingenious device designed by Dave it makes 4 evenly spaced holes (6 inches apart) and marks the spot where the next row of holes should be placed (6 inches in front). It looks like a 4 pronged rake and works by a pair of people each taking a handle and pressing down on the cross bar with their foot at regular intervals. This repetitive stepping action has earned it, its pet name, the ‘Stairmaster 2008′.

Serge and Noriko work the ‘Stairmaster 2008′

Evenly spaced holes in raised beds.

You can also use a bulb drill attachment (available from Veseys) or a ‘dibber’ and make the holes one by one. The advantage of the ’stairmaster’ is not just that it makes 4 holes at a time (and spaces them evenly) but also that it does so from a standing position. It is hard on the thighs, but easy on the back.

After that the garlic bulbs are separated into cloves and the cloves are placed individually into the holes, pointy end up, then topped off with some compost.

Noriko, separating the bulbs

Rowena and Noriko planting the cloves (late October)

The prevent the garlic being ‘heaved’ out of the ground during the freeze thaw processes during the winter, we top the beds off with a layer of mulch. This can be almost anything organic, but bear in mind that anything that is loose can blow away, but anything that bonds together can form a thick mat that the garlic cannot penetrate in the spring.

In our case we put a layer of chopped leaves which do wonderful things for the soil, but are not very good at staying put, and then roll out a layer of straw on top to hold everything in place.

Dave prepares a round bale of straw ready to roll it on top of the chopped leaves (to the left)

Rowena rolls out a giant ‘toilet paper roll’ of straw

Meeka tries to help!

The benefit of using the round bales is that they are quite easy to roll out, though of course they don’t produce perfect layers and there is a lot of stopping and starting. When using the small square bales, you can either choose to pull of layers and place them onto the garlic like tiles, or to fluff them up. Fluffing the straw allows the garlic to grow through it, but also allows it to be caught by the wind and blow away. Last year we applied ’tiles’ of straw and then fluffed it in the spring when the garlic began to emerge.

In addition to preventing frost heave the mulch also prevents weeds and keeps moisture in the soil allowing the garlic to grow to a good size. Also, when the garlic is harvested, the straw (leaves etc) can be tilled in providing lots of organic matter to the soil.

In the spring you should have beds of what resembles large leeks, which can be harvested at this early stage and eaten in soups and stews as you would a leek. The flavour is garlicy but mild.

A little later ‘hard neck’ garlic will send up stems which are initially curly and tender. These can, and should, be harvested at any stage before they straighten out and produce a swollen bud. These stems or ’scapes’ are delcious made into pesto or added to soups, stirfries, or anywhere you use spring onions.

It is important to be sure that you have removed all of them because for as long as the plant is putting energy into growing a flower head it is not putting energy into the bulb. Leaving the scapes on will result in much smalled bulb size.

garlic scapes ready to harvest

Garlic scape, past its best, it should be removed anyway

Bunches of scapes. Remove the flower bud tip which can be chewy

By late summer the garlic bulbs are ready to harvest. They will start to look yellowed when the plant is no longer growing. When you are not expecting rain for a few days, carefully pull the stems and place the plants to dry on top of the mulch. Rotate after a day to allow the other side to dry too and avoid piling the garlic up or the bulbs at the bottom will not dry out.

Bring the bulbs in and dry on wire racks or hang in bunches in a dark, dry, airy location for a few weeks, or until you are ready to eat them.

At this time of year most fields are looking brown after the farmers have tilled in all of the crop residues. Then over the winter the soil freezes, breaks down into a fine dust and is blown away by the chill winds.

At Amarosia our farm still looks green! We plan to hold onto our soil thank you:-)

Fall rye after the peas and beans

White clover inbetween the cabbages

Oats and crimson clover as a summer cover crop

 Spring; Carrots and Spinach

Early Summer; seeding buckwheat

Mid Summer; buckwheat matures

Late fall; head lettuce, radiccho, chicory and nappa cabbage

Otherwise known as Jerusalem Artichokes, we don’t use this name because they are neither from Jerusalem nor artichokes! Sunchokes are related to sunflowers and have tall stems with tiny yellow sunflowers which bloom in late October. The ‘Jerusalem’ part of the common name is a mis-understanding of the word ‘Girasol’ which means sunflower in Spanish and Italian.

By early November the plants have died back and it is time to dig around beneath them for their sweet tasting tubers. They can be sliced thinly and eaten raw, stir fried (they taste like water chestnuts) or cooked with potatoes, butter and black pepper to make a delicious cream soup.

They are great for diabetics and the weight conscious because they are very low calorie and contain inulin instead of sugar. They do have an amusing side effect, similar to that of beans however, so are best not eaten the day before an important interview!

This year we decided not to sell any because we want to expand on our patch for next year. David has been busy digging up the few plants behind the greenhouse and replanting them so that we can enjoy them next fall. Most plants we ‘rotate’ around the farm to break disease and pest cycles, but Sunchokes have neither and will come back year after year even when you are sure that you have removed every single root (you haven’t!) so are best left in the same spot, far away from your other veggies!

For over 18 months our horseradish plants have looked like this.

The plants look like huge ‘dock’ plants and the leaves, which emerge early in the spring, are hot and spicy. I finally plucked up courage to dig up one of these monster beasts last week and found myself wrestling with an octopus! The roots spread out underneath the walkways, sending wood chips flying as I struggled to tear the plant loose. No matter which direction I tugged, the roots held firm. I ended up dismembering the plant with the spade releasing the odor of wasabi with each blow, and then went back to tackle each root individually.

Here is the resulting beasty minus a few limbs that refused to budge.

Horseradish is incredibly pungent when first sliced and its vapours can make your eyes sting and your nose run, but the oils quickly dissipate. This means that if you want to experience the maximum heat of a good horseradish sauce you need to grate it only when you mean to eat it. Keep the root stored in a plastic bag in the fridge in the mean time.

When you are in the mood for a tasty sauce, try grating it directly into a bowl of vinegar with salt for a simply hot dressing for roasted meat, or mix with mayonnaise for a delicious seafood sauce.

Remember to eat it promptly for maximum heat, or leave to stand for a little while if the initial bite causes the top of your head to fly off!

Well, we are sighing with relief that we managed to reach the end of the season without running out of vegetables (though the squash did get counted and recounting many times to make sure that we did not sell too many by mistake). We had hoped to have some nappa cabbage and arugula in the final boxes but things grow extra slowly at this time of year so they were not quite ready.

The large boxes contained 9 of the following and the small boxes contained 5

• Napoli Carrots
• Heirloom Kale
• Horseradish
• Hakurei Turnips
• Dumpling Squash
• Parsley
• Head Lettuce
• Leeks
• Spinach

Thank you all so much for your support throughout the growing season!

We will be taking a few moments to breathe and review the year with its successes (tomatoes, early garlic, salad kale, cucumbers, summer squash, squash, melons, ground cherries and sugar snaps) and its challenges  (potatoes, broccoli, cabbage, peppers, onions, orach, late garlic, daikon) in order to decide what 2009 will bring.

Thanks again and we wish you all a short and not overly chilly winter!

There are no short cuts to producing, safe, healthy, nutritious food. If the food is cheap, someone, somewhere is doing something that you would rather they didn’t. It could be

• spraying the food with pesticides to reduce labour costs
• adding ‘filler’ to the product in the form of genetically modified waste products such as corn starch
• using poorly paid migrant labour
• adding toxic chemicals to baby milk and animal feed to make them appear to be more nutritious

As if we didn’t already have enough positive reasons to buy local, sustainably grown food, China keeps providing us with even more negative reasons.

“Chinese Melamine Scandal Widens” 

My last few days looked something like this

Friday: Pick for the market all day then plant garlic until late in the evening

Saturday: Get up at 4am to go to the Dieppe Market. Spend the day there then return to pack for two days away inspecting organic farms in Nova Scotia.

Sunday: Get up at 5am and leave for Nova Scotia with Noriko (who I dropped off  in SpringHill) and do two inspections, including one that lasts 7 hours.

Monday: Get up at 6am to do three more inspections. Get horribly lost in the woods in the pouring rain on the way to the first farm and nearly get the car stuck in a bog. See a bald eagle which (almost) makes up for the stress! Finish final inspection at 7pm and drive back to New Brunswick.

Tuesday: Get up at 6am and pick for the farm share program. Work in the pouring rain all day then take off for a board meeting of the Greater Moncton Immigration Committee which finishes at 8pm.

Wednesday: Get up at 6am feeling decidedly shaky. Prepare for the farm share program, then plant more garlic for the rest of the day) managing to squeeze in a little bit of blogging at lunch time.

Thursday:??? Crawl into a hole and refuse to come out?!

This week large baskets contain 8 items and small boxes contain 5

1. Baby leeks

2. herbs

3. dumpling squash

4. Rainbow carrots

5. Red Russian Kale

6. Heirloom tomatoes

7. Broccoli

8. Shredded cabbage

9. Napoli Carrots

Farm Share boxes (picked and packed in the pouring rain!) contain 5 or 8 of the following

1. Buttercup squash

2. Asian Greens

3. Bulls Blood beet purples

4. Shiso

5. Heirloom tomatoes

6. Rainbow carrots

7. Ground cherries

8. Spring onions