Fall Crop Diversity

Village Farm Team,

Thanks to the warmer weather our Lunchbox peppers are beginning to ripen to a beautiful shade of red. Lunchbox peppers are a miniature sweet pepper that can ripen to shades of red, orange, or yellow depending on the specific type. They pack all of the flavor and sweetness of a bell pepper into a small, snack-sized package. Aside from snacking on them raw, they can be sautéed, roasted, or pickled. We’ll have these in limited quantities at the veggie wagon on Saturday from 8am-12pm so make sure to get there early if you’d like to try some!

We’re finally starting to see some lovely fall diversity with our harvests. Though we’re still harvesting okra, eggplant, and peppers, we’ve also been able to start harvesting kale, mustard greens, chard, arugula, and radishes. Soon we’ll be able to add a new lettuce mix to the lineup for all of our salad lovers out there. A little further out we’ll be able to start harvesting some of our other brassicas like cabbage, broccoli, and cauliflower along with carrots and beets.

Speaking of broccoli, we spotted the first few heads forming this week! The first stage of broccoli’s growth is to form plenty of large leaves that look (and taste) similar to kale. The second stage is to form and grow the head on a thicker, central stalk. Did you know that the heads of broccoli are made up of clusters of unopened flower buds? If we were to allow broccoli to go through its life cycle without harvesting it, those green buds would eventually bloom small yellow flowers. We’ll let you know as soon as we start harvesting this cool-season favorite!