A yogurt cooler, made and shot by Mackenzie Smith Kelley.

It was very hot and humid in June 2018, and I was about 7 and a half months pregnant. My husband and I drove to Dallas so he could work as my digital tech and I could shoot the last leg of the Indian-ish cookbook with Priya, her parents Ritu and Shelly, and our food stylist Judy Kim.

We all posted up at the Krishnas for the weekend, where we would photograph the new cover option and a few stragglers that didn’t make it into the first round of recipes we shot for the book earlier in the year. One of those was Ritu’s South Indian Yogurt Cooler, a refreshing drink she would often share with her friends when they met up on the weekends for long social hikes.

Priya and I thought it would be fun to shoot the yogurt cooler by driving about 30 minutes out to the spot where they liked to hike and include Ritu with some of her friends in the shot. But, we were only there for the weekend, and shooting the cover was the priority. The Yogurt Cooler was not.

Instead of driving out for a hike at 7am, Ritu got up with me while the rest of the house was still asleep, donned her hiking gear, and blended a big batch of the icy, spicy yogurt cooler that has become a beloved staple in our home over the past few years.

I tasted that frothy mix of yogurt, cilantro, curry leaves, ginger, hot pepper, hing, a pinch of salt, and a handful of ice for the first time right before we headed down to the small stream in the Krishna’s backyard. We did our best to make it look like Ritu might be breaking for the yogurt cooler after a long hike with friends and wrapped the shot within 15 minutes, pretty quick, given our 30-45 minute average per shot with that book. I was admittedly very motivated to get back inside with a full glass of my new favorite refreshment, which I made every single day until my baby was born that August, and again on many summer days since then.

There are so many gems in Indian-ish that Ritu’s yogurt cooler hasn’t gotten a ton of attention, but I am here to tell you that it’s worth a try, especially as we move into warmer months and cilantro is still thriving.

Hing, or Aesafetida, is a flavor enhancer that Priya says makes food taste more Indian. I don't know about that, but I do know it makes food taste more delicious, and it's worth a trip to one of Austin's Indian grocers for a small jar of it. While you're there, pick up some fresh curry leaves (buy the whole plant if they are available!) I could tell you to make something else with the leftover leaves, but if you're anything like me, you'll be making the yogurt cooler often enough you won't need any inspiration for the curry leaves.

Recipe

• 1 1/2 cups full-fat plain yogurt
• 2 tablespoons fresh chopped cilantro
• 4 fresh curry leaves
• 1 teaspoon minced fresh ginger
• 1 small Indian green chile or serrano chile, chopped
• pinch of hing
• pinch of salt
• 1/4 cup ice cubes
• (I also love to add 1 small squeeze of lime and about half a teaspoon of zest for an extra boost of vitamin c and even more zing!)

Blend well until frothy, serve.

Ritu and her yogurt cooler. Photo by Mackenzie Smith Kelley, shot originally for Indian-ish.

An ode to herbs. We love to grow herbs at JBG. If you are a CSA Members, you know. When putting together your boxes, we usually put the herbs in last, and so they are likely the first vegetable to greet you when unpacking. If you’re a farmers’ market customer, you are likely used to herbal bouquets framing the cash register. While some of our other crops assume the role of an anchor vegetable, the type of thing you can build a meal around, herbs are different. They are the sparkle that can make even the most mundane plate shine. Having a fluency with fresh herbs can be a tell tale that you are a CSA Member, or at least have a relationship with someone who grows food. We shower you with these tiny, flavorful leaves year-round, and you, in turn, shower your plates, your bowls, and your platters with these fragrant plants.

A kholrabi and fennel slaw, sprinkled with all the herbs. Photo and recipe by Mackenzie Smith. :

Herbs can brighten any dish, and like a squeeze of lemon, can add freshness to even the heaviest stew. Dill, tastes like spring itself - like grass, and deviled eggs, and potato salad and pickles. Herbs can garnish, but they can also stand alone. One of my absolute favorite ways to use herbs is to roughly chop a bunch (of anything) that has been well washed and well dried, and simply add the entire mount to a bowl of lettuce. There’s no reason why your salads shouldn’t contain leaves that pack a bit more flavor.

We’re in a bit of an herbal transition at the moment. Parsley, cilantro, and dill are still around, but soon these cooler weather crops will be replaced with the all glorious Genovese or Thai or Red Ruben basil - the herbal superstar of summer that makes a Caprese a Caprese and a pesto a pesto.

A Caprese Salad, also by Mackenzie Smith.

Here at the farm, we grow tender herbs like parsley cilantro dill and basil. These crops can be eaten in their entirety, leaves to stems, and in the case of cilantro and parsley, roots too… though we don’t harvest those at JBG. Tender herbs with their delicate and glossy chlorophyll-packed-leaves  like to be eaten sooner rather than later. Like a fresh bunch of flowers, these herbs like to be stored in a glass of water, in the fridge. You can even trim the ends to facilitate better water uptake and what we like to call refreshing. And then we’ve got the woody herbs. In this camp we have thyme, oregano, rosemary, and we’ll invite lemongrass, too, even those these tall blades almost seem to sway in a category all themselves. Woody herbs can provide flavor and depth, and a sense of place, to any dish. Regular roasted potatoes feel Italian when roasted with rosemary, and making a paste of lemongrass can transform normal-chicken to Southeast Asian chicken. All of the woody herbs from JBG dry well. Simply hang them somewhere in your kitchen. I like to just crinkle a dried bunch over my pan, until eventually only the naked stems are left.

Eat them raw, sprinkle on everything, or blitz them together and store in the freezer for another day. We love herbs, and we hope you do too. Please read on to hear about one man’s herbventure. The person, if you’re wondering, is Héctor González, Mexican at large, Abuelita Profesional, and our Social Media Manager

Part 1 of an Herbal Story, by Héctor:

PREAMBLE

My mother, Doña Licha, has a natural green thumb. I grew up surrounded by more green than I paid attention to. Isn’t it funny how these traits can be ignored, only to finally pay notice in retrospect?

Doña Licha kept so many wonderful plants alive and thriving. I recall with great warmth how she once got peaches for me and my sibling from el mercado. We were eating these duraznos in our room on the second floor of our home. My mother was there with us, eating and being playful. We needed to throw the pits to the trash but we didn’t want to walk ALL THE WAY to the bathroom. So, in our childish laziness, we threw the pits outside the window, directly into the front garden. We joked we would have a peach tree growing out soon.

My mother found those pits we threw, tended them, and made them grow SO TALL, that our peach tree grew above our two-story home. We often opened our window and stretched out our arms to grab a ripe durazno, giving it a quick rub against our clothes to remove the fuzz, to then sink into it with great gusto.

Peach and loquat trees of Hectors childhood.

I have ZERO plants in my home. I enjoy grabbing flowers at the farmers markets and bike back to my place with the bouquet shining inside my panniers. These brighten my place but these don’t require a lot of care or attention. I often marvel at other people's Instagram pages at how green and lush their places are. A silent voice in my childhood memories is ruffled.

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I love to cook. More importantly, I love to eat and try new ideas. I have the fortune of working at JBG, which makes my food exploration easier. However, I have the romantic idea that while cooking, I just take a few steps outside, grab a few herbs from somewhere, and come back to continue the process in a seamless manner. It’s a fantasy. All fantasies are based in hope. Call it pandemic brain, foolish innocence, or just plain optimism, but I felt this year would be the one where I made that happen.

Now, here are the challenges: Space: I live in an apartment without any sort of earth-filled patio, and the space is limited Sun: I get a few hours of sun in the evening Experience: I helped my mother at times when I was young and I had a garden when I lived at a house. I still have a lot to learn Budget: I don’t want to make it a big expense.

Recipe and photos by Christina Hurt Smith.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 bunch of Swiss chard, chopped, leaves and stems separated
• 2 c butternut squash, cubed
• Salt
• Pepper
• 2 tbsp Olive oil
• 2 shallots, sliced thinly
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tsp crushed red pepper
• 1/3 c Gruyère, shredded
• 4 oz whole milk
• 1/2 c panko breadcrumbs
• 1/4 parmesan, shredded
• Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

DIRECTIONS:

1. On a large baking sheet, combine Swiss chard stems and butternut squash, 1 tbsp olive oil, and a dash of salt and pepper. Toss to coat, arrange in a single layer and roast for 12- 14 minutes or until butternut squash is tender.
2. While the squash and chard are baking, bring a deep skillet (I prefer a cast iron) to medium-high heat and add the other tbsp of olive oil. Add garlic and shallot. Sauté for about 1 minute and then add chard leaves, about a 1/2 tsp of salt, cracked pepper, and crushed red pepper. Cook until wilted which should only take about 2-3 minutes tops.
3. Turn skillet heat to medium-low. Add in baked chard stems and butternut squash, gruyère, and milk. Stir continuously until the cheese is completely melted. If you cooked the mixture in a cast iron you can keep it in the same pan for the next step. If not, transfer the mixture to an 8in x 8in baking dish.
4. Toss panko breadcrumbs with a drizzle of olive oil and then toss in parmesan cheese. Top the chard and squash mixture with the breadcrumb mixture. Bake for 20 minutes. Mixture should be thick and bubbly. Turn oven to broil for a couple minutes to brown the crumb mixture.
5. Let cool for a few minutes and then serve! Enjoy!

Very suddenly, it seems like acres of reminders of the winter storm have vanished. We've cleaned up just about every field of dead crops, the mushy leaves mowed, pulverized, and then turned into the soil adding organic matter back into the ground. Many of these beds have already been replanted, and many more will be replanted soon. Believe it or not, there are certain areas of the farm that are still too wet to work the soil, and we're waiting until they dry out a bit more to work the beds and get new crops planted. Memories of ice and snow feel distant, and we are fully engrossed in all-things spring. This week we planted tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplant, and peppers! Our Transplant Sale is still happening every Saturday from 9 am-1 pm at our Garfield, Texas greenhouses and we are SO grateful to everyone who has visited. We re-arranged the greenhouse a bit and have made for a more streamlined shopping experience. Here is an Instagram video where we give a tour of the sale. In addition to transplants, we are also setting up a market stand at the sale so you can snag your transplants and weekly vegetables. We are really enjoying having visitors out to the farm on Saturdays, and this year's Transplant Sale has us dreaming of setting up a more permanent "market stand" at the Garfield farm because really, is there any place to get your veggies that from the farm itself? Hope you'll join us this weekend. Don some sneakers, and walk the fields! It's beautiful out there!

The green onions are looking green again! Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Green garlic - use the green and white parts of this baby-garlic for a mild, sweet, garlicy punch. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Before we are ready to get on the tractor and transplanter, we "pop" the cells trays of the baby plants. We use slender wooden dowels and gently push up through the drainage hole that is at the bottom of each plant. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Cucumbers are ready to roll. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Each plastic cell tray holds 128 plants. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Freshly planted. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Farm manager Jack is giving the thumbs up. Wheels, water, hands.... it's all working as it should. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Checkout those lines. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Harvest manager Vicente checking out the carrot progress. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Cover crop seed going in the ground. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Ada showing off an oregano transplant. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Ada and Adam checking out the herb inventory. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Views from inside the greenhouse. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Successions of tomato transplants ready to go for the transplant sale. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

The man behind the lens! We turned the camera on Scott this week, shown smiling in front of some cover crop. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Giana and Ada chatting about transplants. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Green leaf lettuce was one of the first crops we transplanted after the storm. They're sizing up nicely! Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Baby, baby bok choy. Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Krishna, Angel, and Jack in a parking lot meeting, dreaming about a new tractor.

Beets. They can feel divisive, at times. For the farm, they’re a wonderful storage crop that is relatively easy to grow. They have a long growing season and do well in spring, winter, and fall. We consider these sweet and starchy roots a wonderful staple that can work their way into dishes both sweet and savory. They’re dense, and like a potato, can serve as a meal’s foundation, an anchor vegetable to which herbs, sauces, and cheese are sprinkled. But we’re farmers, and we were born to love each and every one of our vegetables, equally. We adore beets, but know that some of you are experiencing a case of beet-fatigue. We hope this week’s blog post will help solve your woes, and that the beets bouncing around the bottom of your CSA box will delight you.



VARIETIES & COLOR

Beets are in a group of plants commonly referred to as the “goosefoot” family. They share this distinction with crops like chard, amaranth, spinach, and even quinoa, and are nicknamed as such because the leaves are said to resemble goose feet. You be the judge. Here at JBG, we grow three types of beets: red beets, golden beets, and the candy cane striped Chioga beets. Deep scarlet red beets get their rich hues from very special pigments, called betalains, which are unlike the color-causing molecules in most plants. Evolutionarily, these pigments are different from what makes a tomato or bell pepper red, and leave scientists scratching their heads as to why, exactly, beets are so richly red. Fun fact: check the label on red food products like tomato paste, jams, jellies, and even strawberry ice cream. Most of these commercially-produced products rely on beet’s betalains to achieve a dark red or pink hue.

A 365 day project of unique panorama photos by Austin photographer Scott David Gordon

Another interesting feature of beets are the rings which you can see when slicing through the bulb. The darkest rings are the vascular tissue of the beets - structures called xylem and phloem. Xylem is responsible for transporting water and nutrients from the soil into the beet, and phloem is responsible for carrying sugars from the leaves. The lighter rings visible in beets are simply storage tissues, and in the case of beets, they’re storing lots of sugar. Beets are one of the sweetest vegetables around, and there is even a type of beet called a sugar beet that is grown specifically to produce sugar. In fact, over half of the world’s refined sugar is made from beets!

NUTRITION

When beets were first domesticated, the leaves were consumed for food, and the roots as medicine. Which makes sense, because beetroots are just zinging with nutrition. Beetroots have an impressive amount of vitamins and minerals. A single serving of beets contains a healthy dose (2 grams) of fiber as well as Vitamin C, B6, Folate, Magnesium, Potassium, Phosphorous, Manganese, and Iron. Nutrition experts claim beets can help reduce blood pressure, improve athletic performance, fight inflammation, improve digestive health, support brain health, and so much more. 

RECIPES

Beets are often described as “earthy” tasting which can be attributed to a compound called geosmin (which means “dirt smell”). For some, this dirt-taste is a delicasey. For others, it can be off-putting. In her article “The Beet Goes On”, botanist Katherine Preston, PhD, poses a good question: “There are many scents and flavors that attract or repel, depending on their context. Parmesan cheese smells like vomit, white pepper smells like wet dog, and expensive Italian truffles smell like feet. Geosmin flavor in water or wine is off-putting because it indicates contamination (harmless as it may be), but we love it after a gentle rain because it belongs there. Beet lovers welcome geosmin as a normal flavor component of beets. Do beet haters, by contrast, attribute it to something unhealthy?”

Below are some recipes, both in and out of the box, to help you adore your beets.



Beet Hummus:  Beets can make a wonderful anchor to an entire meal, but they can also be foundational as a snack. Enter: beet hummus. There are a dozen ways to blitz roasted beets and make the vegetable into a dippable, spreadable snack. Optional ingredients include things like yogurt, tahini, chickpeas, and herbs.

Beet Chips:  Since we’re on the snack train, why not make chips out of your beets, and then use these as vessels for regular-hummus? Or dip beet chips in beet-hummus if you’re looking for full immersion.



Beet Kvas:

Beet Kvas is an easy-to make fermented beet beverage. This salty, sour, and sweet beverage is perfect on its own, taken as a post-workout shot, mixed into a cocktail, or even stirred with sparkling water. If you’re looking for a quick, no-frills recipe to use those beets, look no further.

Beet Ketchup  A bounty of beets can be preserved in the form of ketchup - a perfectly dippy alternative to tomato-ketchup, there to tide you over as you anxiously await the summer fruit.



Chocolate Beet Cupcakes  Just trust us. You’ll never look back.



Beet Salad  There are endless options that play off the classic combination of roasted beets, a tangy cheese, good olive oil and herbs. This version includes citrus. Additions like fennel, onions, herbs, nuts, and cooked grains are all wonderful ways to build a salad around roasted beets.

All Rights Reserved

Fried Beets  This recipe is really a story about a fried-beet-failure, but the story includes links to actual fried beet recipes. Breaded and fried beets + creamy dip = heavily snack even for the most skeptical consumer.

For more beet recipes, checkout our recipe archive.  And don’t forget about the leaves!

Baked Carrot Cake Oatmeal. Photo by The Migoni Kitchen.

Author: The Migoni Kitchen

Carrots are so versatile we often forget that they are great for sweet AND savory dishes. With spring around the corner, we thought what better way to use carrots than in carrot cake! But wanting to keep things on the lighter side, we opted to create some carrot cake flavored oats for a healthy and delicious breakfast. Baking the oatmeal gives a slightly different texture that we loved. Perfect for a Saturday morning breakfast.

Serves 2 people

Carrot-oatmeal mise en place. Photo by The Migoni Kitchen.

 

Ingredients:

• 2 medium carrots, grated
• ¼ cup dried cranberries
• ¼ cup crushed walnuts
• ¼ cup shaved coconut
• ½ cup steel cut oats
• 1 scoop protein powder of choice (optional)
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 egg
• 3 tablespoons maple syrup
• ⅔ cup vanilla almond milk
• ½ teaspoon cinnamon
• ¼ teaspoon dried ginger

Instructions:

• Preheat the oven to 350F
• Whisk together the milk, egg, and maple syrup in a large bowl.
• Add in the remaining dry ingredients and stir to combine.
• Pour into a small casserole dish (we used one that’s 7x4.5 in) or a loaf pan (reduce cook time to 25-30 minutes).
• Bake for 30-35 minutes or until liquid has absorbed and oats are tender.

The perfect bite. Photo by The Migoni Kitchen.

Happy Friday!

A few quick housekeeping notes before we dive into this week's post. CSA Members: we have had closed citrus orders until further notice. If you already ordered citrus, we will be honoring those orders, but we are unable to offer additional orders. Like JBG, G&S Groves (where we source the citrus from) is reeling from the recent effects of the winter storm, and their availability of fruit has significantly decreased. Second note for the week: Some of you may have noticed that the online transplant sale is closed. If you already placed an order, it will be delivered to market as planned! If you missed the online ordering, just come on out to the sale and get the full-farm experience! And now onto the post!

Last weekend’s transplant sale was such a success, and we’re so excited for another Saturday of sunshine, community, and lots of eager gardeners. Spring fever is a real thing, and we’ve got it. Do you? The sale is happening on Saturdays from 9 am-1pm at our Garfield, Texas greenhouses: 4008 River Road, 78612. Mask up, and come to the farm!



Many of you have been asking about the varieties of plants we’ll have at our spring transplant sale. There are many! In fact, we seeded over 100 different vegetables marked specifically for our transplant sale. This includes all the summer favorites like different varieties of slicing tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, and paste tomatoes - perfect for making sauce or canning. On the pepper front, there are a plethora of sweet varieties and a bounty of hot ones… as well as plenty of peppers packing medium spice and lots of flavor. There are other summer stalwarts like melons, cucumbers, squash, and eggplant, as well as endless aisles of herbs - both annual and perennial. If you scroll to the bottom of this page we’ve published a pretty long list of specific varieties that we planted for this year. *This list, however, is just to give you an idea of the types of plants we have - we may sell out of a specific variety, and won’t necessarily be able to keep the page updated… so don’t hold us to it! But! The good thing about our sale is that we truly have a bounty of options. If you had your heart set on growing big, juicy, slicing tomatoes this summer, we’ve got several options for you. We planted over 31 different varieties of tomatoes alone... and that was us practicing restraint! You see, there are many varieties that are near and dear to our farmer-hearts, but that isn’t necessarily suitable for commercial production. In some senses, we live vicariously through your interesting, colorful, and dynamic summer gardens. If you’ve ever flipped through a seed catalog, you know how dazzling the hundreds of pages of thousands of vegetables can be. Lucky for you, Brenton and other farmers at JBG have years of combined experience in variety selection, and we promise you we’re only selling plants we think are well-suited for life in Central Texas.

Without further adieu, here are 5 of our favorite vegetables we think you should grow this spring:

1. Lunchbox Pepper: Part of the joy of a backyard garden is being able to pluck a fruit, right off a plant, and eat it. Lunchbox peppers, and their indubitable snackability, fit this profile. They are sweet and crunchy, with loads of beta-carotene. Plants tend to give high yields. If planting in a windy location, consider staking with a tomato cage to prevent the stems from breaking. This plant is perfect for a large, 18-inch pot, as well!

2. Cherokee Purple: It’s our favorite heirloom tomato, plain and simple. Originating from Tenessee, this variety is thought to have been passed down from Native Americans of the Cherokee tribe. The ripe fruit is a beautiful dark dusty pink, with a deep, rich-red interior. The flavor is rich with an unmatched sweetness, perfect for salads or a BLT.

3. Eureka Pickling Cucumber: Uniform, crip fruits that are very green from the earliest stages which makes this cucumber great for pickling when they are 2-5 inches long. Or, you let these fruits grow to maturity (about 7 inches) for an incredible slicing cucumber. We like Eurekas because they’re easy to grow and virtually trouble-free; they’re incredibly disease resistant. These cukes would be happy to climb a trellis or fence for easy harvest and vertical appeal.

Serranos are the red and green peppers pictured in columns two and 4. If you're looking for a little less heat, try a poblano (green pepper pictured) and if you want the full-shebang, go for a habanero (orange).

4. Serrano Hot Pepper: If you’re not a fan of spice, maybe skip this recommendation, but if you fancy yourself a hot zing to most dishes, the serrano is for you. Serranos are easy to grow in Texas, and can offer high yields of dark green, finger-sized glossy fruits. Leave the fruit on the vine for a red pepper, if you’d like. Serranos are perfect for all-season enjoyment, and the plants can be very prolific. To boot, the fruit has a long shelf life, making this an ideal plant to save your harvest, and then make a hot sauce, salsa, or fermented pepper mash. They are easy to harvest, and have less sprawl than other peppers, making them more efficient for use in a garden space.

5. Genovese Basil: No summer garden is complete with basil. Genovese is the classic variety, with delicate smooth leaves and a punchy aroma. Basil loves hot weather and does well in a pot, or nestled between tomato plants as a companion. Harvest a few leaves as you needed, or harvest a bunch for a batch of pesto. When grown into maturity, a basil plant will become delightfully bushy, providing an herbal component to meals throughout the summer. And as the summer looms to a close, basil flower will be a wonderful gift for friendly pollinators… or a wonderful sprinkle for a bowl of sliced tomatoes.

A bunch of Genovese basil.

Other resources: We will be selling farm-grade organic compost at our sale, but if you’re needing mulch, native perennials, flowers, or just some outdoor inspiration we suggest you pay a visit to The Natural Gardener, Tillery Street Plant Co., or The Great Outdoors. If you’re interested in upping your tool-game this season, we recently got a glimpse of our neighbor, Farmshare Austin’s, new hand tools from Easy Digging ... perfect for small-scale farming or committed backyard gardening. If you’re brand new to gardening and feel like you need some support, there are local services like Austin Edible Gardens that can help you plant, plan, and maintain your space. The Wildflower Center usually hosts wonderful classes, and if that doesn’t work for you, Youtube is your friend. Sun, soil, water, and some time. These are all it takes to grow vegetables, and we hope you’ll take the plunge. The rewards are plenty!

Ennie, meenie, miney, mo. You can't really go wrong with any of the varieties in our greenhouse. We planted them all, just for you!