Indian Creek Farm

SUMMARY

Farm is open 7 days a week 8:00 to 7:00 rain or shine • Pick Honeycrisp, McIntosh, Elstar, and first Empire apples • Pick dozens of kinds of tomatoes and peppers and flowers • Enjoy fresh donuts Fri-Sun 11:00 to 6:00 • Goodies at the farm stand = apples, pears, tomatoes, peppers, ginger, corn, garlic, potatoes, honey, syrup, flowers, lemon and cider slushees • COVID rules include (1) Keep SAFE distance, (2) wear MASK in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS • BYOBags for picking produce and set them on the scale for checkout • Drive slowwwwwly on the farm • Thanks to @ginalskihollie for this week’s cover photo • Thank you for being the best farm fans in New York

FULL STORY

DEAR FARMKETEERS:  We begin this week’s Fresh Crop Sermon by contemplating a donut stack.  Let us call it The Leaning Tower of Society and/or Civilization.

Just name something that COULD go wrong with our world, and it probably already has.  Yes, ‘Creekniks, here we go together a-leaning… a-tilting… a-wobbling… a-bobbling.  To see how this movie ends, just hop right to the bottom picture.  Or scroll your way down, slowly and prayerfully, if you have a taste for small-time agricultural suspense.  For it was the great poet Rilke who counseled:  “Be patient toward all that is unsolved… and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue.  Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them.  And the point is, to live everything.  Live the questions now.  Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”  But scroll fast if you must.  Poets are not to be trusted without scrutiny.

Pick your own McIntosh apples in the Vintage Orchard.  The trees are a century old, dating back to the days when Rilke wrote his Letters to a Young Poet.  September 15 is high season for McIntosh apples – the annual Mac Attack.  We need you in full force picking til they’re gone.

Pick your own Honeycrisp apples.  This is probably the last weekend for picking these orbs of lucre and pulchritude.  “Moneycrisp,” some people call them, as these apples helped many imperiled small orchards get on financial terra firma after breeders introduced them in the 1990s.  You can also pick Elstar, a high-quality dessert apple that does great work for eating fresh, saucing, juicing, and baking.  It will keep well in storage for two to three months.  This is one of the best modern apples.  Lastly, a few of you have written to ask about Empire – the very first Empire apples are ready, while next week is their real appointed hour.

Pick your own TOMATOES & PEPPERS.  You can pick your own tomatoes now – many varieties ready and ripening.  Hard to tell you which types you will find in abundance when you arrive, depends on who got here first.  We also planted some 23 kinds of peppers, sweet and hot.  Word on the street is the hot peppers may have been picked clean for the year except jalapeños, Serranos, and habaneros.  You just have to come explore.  Note:  no eggplants for picking right now.  The lovely photo comes from @nishachittal who wrote, “I might physically be in Brooklyn but my heart is still in the finger lakes: @indiancreekfarmithaca tomatoes we picked ourselves, basil I picked off @supernatural_lake‘s giant plants before the drive home, fresh mozzarella, maldon, olive oil + balsamic vinegar…”

Get DONUTS every weekend.  Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 6:00.  Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these freshly fried toroids of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  Just whisper, “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR.”   Pictured here with Honeycrisp.

Get CIDER jugs every day.  This is the thurd week of “Orchard Ambrosia” – our 100% unpasteurized, old-fashioned, nothing-added cider.  You can get gallon and half-gallon jugs.  Freezes great.  It’s just apples and maybe a few pears, cold-pressed into juice.  Squeezed by a water balloon gadget.  It gets better each week as the apple blend becomes more varied.

Local ginger is back!  Stock up – and spice up – on this recherché commodity.   “The most precious substance in the universe is the spice… The spice extends life… expands consciousness… gives one the ability to fold space… that is, travel to any part of the universe without moving.”  Of course Sci-Fi fans know that from Dune.  But few people know that fresh ginger has been growing right here in the Finger Lakes.  Sharon and Dean of Tree Gate Farm, our friends around the corner next to Coy Glen, will try to keep us supplied for a third year.  Last year, Farm Fans hoovered up the rhizomes as fast as the farmers could deliver.  It’s great for ginger tea and myriad culinary uses.  Sharon explains how they grow it:  “The seed comes from Hawaii, arrives in March, and using a greenhouse and a lot of compost, we spend 7 months working to convince it that the Finger Lakes region is almost as wonderful a place to grow as the tropics.  Unlike what you find at the grocery store, our uncured ginger is snappy and sweet, roughly the texture of an apple or a slice of water chestnut.  And no peeling required!  Just be sure to use or freeze within a week; it’s perishable.”  Ginger now, turmeric in October!

You can cut your own FLOWERS in the field by the stand and other spots around the farm.  It’s our best flower crop ever.  The flower list has included zinnia, snapdragon, celosia, ageratum, gomphrena, scabiosa / pincushion, cornflower / bachelor buttons, dianthus / carnations, strawflower, aster, marigold, verbena, and statice.  You can also get them at the stand in bouquets – nice jars included – assembled by fruit farmers.  Thank you kindly @sanemeteriojosue for the great photo from your visit.

Please BRING YOUR OWN BAGS for picking fruits and vegetables.  In the B.C. era (Before Corona), we had gotten rid of single-use plastic bags and everyone was happily bringing their own bags or getting our reusable farm totes.  We had to make some adjustments for the early corona period, but let’s get back to that good practice:  Bring your bags for picking, set them on the scale at checkout, and we will ring you out without touching your bags.  You can also buy our totes which you might have seen around town.

Whoa, check out this locavore’s creation.  Dutch apple pie a la mode with apples from The ‘Creek and ice cream from Purity.  Thank you to @fcb002 who simply wrote, “Eat local 💕”

And then this from @withleavesofsage.  “When it’s month six of a pandemic, the first 60-something-degree day, and you’ve been binge watching British Bake Off (again), you whip together a replica of your wedding cake.  In my case, an apple spice cake with a cinnamon cream cheese frosting.  It’s three layers and made from scratch with the apples from @indiancreekfarmithaca which we picked last weekend 🍁🍎”  Thanks for the inspiration and happy cake-a-versary.

And finally, a sign of the times, a whiff of the zeitgeist.  We recently posted a gallery of 10 photos on Facebook – our weekly post telling folks what they can pick.  Among the photos was this very special peach.  Our ad got rejected by the social media giant’s artificial intelligence censors with a warning about promoting sex paraphernalia.  On a wild hunch we removed this peach – yep! – and the ad got approved.  Doesn’t THAT bode well for a fair election with no fake news?  Seems like time to WORRY.  But Farmketeers and ‘Creekniks are resilient, are we not?  We bend but we don’t break, right?  We can bend really far and strike a confident pose when we summon our yogic powers of cooperation and mutual support and… donuts?

Love to y’all.  Hope to see you at The ‘Creek.

SUMMARY

Farm is open 7 days a week 8:00 to 7:00 rain or shine • Pick Honeycrisp, McIntosh, Autumn Crisp, and Jonamac apples • Pick Seckel pears • Pick Roma tomatoes and others • Pick 23 kinds of peppers • Pick a kaleidoscope of flowers • Enjoy fresh donuts Fri-Sun 11:00 to 6:00 • Goodies at the stand = apples, pears, tomatoes, peppers, corn, garlic, potatoes, honey, syrup, flowers, lemon and cider slushees • COVID rules include (1) Keep SAFE distance, (2) wear MASK in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS • New – Please BYOBags for picking produce and set on the scale for checkout • Drive slowwwwwly on the farm • Thank you for being the kindliest ‘Creekniks in the land

FULL STORY

DEAR FARMKETEERS:  Legend tells us that when apple breeders first created Honeycrisp™, they wanted to call it MONEYCRISP.  They knew they’d created a champ that could challenge the Red Delicious™ racket – and they could just smell the grocery royalties that were going to puff up their R&D budgets on the hunt for an even more sensational next-generation juggernaut.

You can pick Honeycrisp apples now.   They will go fast, so now is your chance.  You can also pick McIntosh, Jonamac, Autumn Crisp and other “lesser” apples.  But come strip the Honeycrisp orchard as you do every year, and assure the breeders that they have won the Game of Pomes.  After all, what could be more popular than these sweet, crisp, freckle-faced, born-in-the-USA orbs of appletude?

Maybe kittens?  And donuts?  On apple trees?  What the Honeycrisp braintrust didn’t expect was that a rinky-dink farm in a podunk hippie town was conducting secret trials on this audacious idea:  Kittendonutapple trees.  Shhh.  It’s on the D.L. til after the election.  Got to let the market jitters settle before we make a daring move on the industry titans with disruptive technology of this magnitude.

You can also pick SECKEL pears now.  There might not be a more delightful and diminutive pear.  Seckel has rock-star status among ‘Creekniks; some have reputedly camped out waiting for the Seckels to ripen.  The pears are very small and very sweet; it’s easy to eat them by the bag.  The following is excerpted from Pears of New York by the venerable U.P. Hedrick:  “The flesh is melting, juicy, perfumed and most exquisitely and delicately flavored, with the curious character of having much of its spicy, aromatic flavor in the skin, which should never be discarded in eating.”  Commence Seckeling.

Pick your own TOMATOES & PEPPERS.  You can pick your own tomatoes now – many varieties ready and ripening.  Hard to tell you which types you will find in abundance when you arrive.  But Farmer Steve is bullish on the Romas today.  You can also pick some 23 kinds of peppers.  Sweet and hot.  Same deal as tomatoes, you have to come explore.  All depends on how many pickers got here first.  Note:  no eggplants for picking right now.  Might rebound eventually.

Get DONUTS every weekend.  Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 6:00.  Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these freshly fried toroids of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  Just whisper, “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR.”   Pictured here with Honeycrisp.

Get CIDER jugs every day.  This is the second week of “Orchard Ambrosia” – our 100% unpasteurized, old-fashioned, nothing-added cider.  You can get gallon and half-gallon jugs.  Freezes great.  It’s just apples and maybe a few pears, cold-pressed into juice.  Squeezed by a water balloon gadget.

Commercial break for kittens.  Cue the music and read the script out loud in your best commercial voice:  “Everything has a purpose.  Even kittens – those mysterious creatures of the astral plane who plop out of the sky like donuts from an apple tree.  Yes, kittens, bewitching kittens, bonny and captivating kittens, teaching us to live wabi sabi, embracing our collective impurrfection… Merrrowwww.”

You can cut your own FLOWERS in the field by the stand and other spots around the farm.  It’s our best flower crop ever.  The flower list has included zinnia, snapdragon, celosia, ageratum, gomphrena, scabiosa / pincushion, cornflower / bachelor buttons, dianthus / carnations, strawflower, aster, marigold, verbena, and statice.  You can also get them at the stand in bouquets – nice jars included – assembled by fruit farmers.

Please BRING YOUR OWN BAGS for picking fruits and vegetables.  In the B.C. era (Before Corona), we had gotten rid of single-use plastic bags and everyone was happily bringing their own bags or getting our reusable farm totes.  We had to make some adjustments for the early corona period, but let’s get back to that good practice:  Bring your bags for picking, set them on the scale at checkout, and we will ring you out without touching your bags.  You can also buy our totes which you might have seen around town.  Recently saw a few in the hands of a nice Farmketeer, shopping for Honeycrisp at Wegman’s.

This just in from Northstar Public House in Ithaca:  “How do you #chooselocal?  This morning’s breakfast is brought to you by flowers, donuts, and raspberries from @indiancreekfarmithaca and coffee (cold brewed by us!) by @fortyweightcoffeeroasters.  I spy an @ithacasheepskin in the background…”  Thank you @northstarpublichouse for sourcing in the FLX region and providing open-air dining these days.

And this from Mama Said Hand Pies:  “Apple Cherry Streusel Pie.  Local apples, NYS cherries, mucho deliciousness!!”  You can find their pies at Press Bay Alley and mamasaidhandpies.com.  Thank you, @mamasaidhandpies.

Love to y’all.  Hope to see you at The ‘Creek.

FRESH CROP ALERT
SUMMARY

Farm is open 7 days a week 8:00 to 8:00 rain or shine (closing at 7:00 after Labor Day) • Pick St. Edmund’s, Jefferies, Honeycrisp apples • Pick a few pears possibly • Find the very last few peaches IF you’re especially lucky or uncommonly perseverant • Pick tomatoes of various kinds • Pick 23 kinds of peppers • Pick a kaleidoscope of flowers • Enjoy extended holiday donut hours Thursday thru Labor Day Monday 11:00 to 6:00 • Goodies at the stand = tomatoes, peppers, pears, corn, garlic, potatoes, honey, syrup, flowers, lemon and cider slushees • COVID rules include (1) Keep SAFE distance, (2) wear MASK in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS, (4) we provide picking CONTAINERS • Drive slowwwwwwly on the farm • Thank you for being kind ‘Creekniks and rational Farmketeers

FULL STORY

DEAR FARMKETEERS:  This week we dispense with our usual mumbo-jumbo and cut to the chase.  Yes, as the calendar turns to September, the harvest turns up the pace into a race and a chase – to pick the last peaches before your frenemies, to grab the shapeliest pears before they go poof, to pick every apple before it plops.  So here’s the dope.

Peaches are basically toast.  Hosed, finito, kaput.  If this exquisite freaknik double peach was a glass of kombucha, it would be down to the dregs.  Farmer Steve said don’t even mention peaches in this Fresh Crop Alert.  But we knew you’d ask so we’re cutting to the chase – most of you will not find a peach on a tree this weekend, and no peaches at the stand.  But you MIGHT chase down a few peaches in the orchard if you are especially lucky or uncommonly perseverant.  Ready go.

Bartlett pears are picking now, right as you come up the drive way.  “But I couldn’t find the pear trees…!”  Good point, by the time this Fresh Crop Alert hits newsstands, the Bartlett pears might be scarcer than deviled eggs after a church picnic.  Thank you for being such radically fervent parishioners.  Pear-ishioners.  You might have to look behind the leaves to find any.  Steve says you also might find some assorted pears in Row 19 of the Dwarf Orchard.  Ask at the stand and we’ll give you a map.

WTH?  When the Honeycrisp?  You can pick them now.  They are just starting.  They are not really ready yet, if you ask an apple farmer.  But ‘Creekniks are INSANE for Honeycrisp, and you always start picking before we announce them anyway, so you can start if you like.  Pick for color, find ones with a nice rich honeyed hue on the shoulder and in the lenticels.  Kollman here on the farm, age 8, says, “I love picking Honeycrisp early.  They are sour and sweet.”  Honeycrisps on the trees will flavor up and sugar up in the coming week, but you may pick them now since the chase is on.  Ask for a map.

In case you don’t find pears, Jefferies apples are open for u-pick.  A fabulous early apple, with a rich pear-like flavor.  Juicy, crisp yet melting.  How to avoid heartbreaking waste in apple season:  Pick an apple with 2 hands, steadying the branch or nearby apples with your non-dominant hand, then twist off your target apple with your best paw.  Don’t let an apple fall, then knock another apple below, causing a chain reaction.  Multiply that effect by thousands… and you’ve got a disconsolate apple farmer.  Please read our Farm School tutorial, How to Pick an Apple.

Another beauty with pear-like flavor, St. Edmund’s Russet.  Pick your own now.  St. Edmunds is covered in a smooth, velvety, pale fawn russet.  The flavor is exceptional when fully ripe.  In Apples of Uncommon Character, Rowan Jacobsen writes:  “Like vanilla pudding infused with pear essence.  Early in the season, the richness can be masked by a blast of lemony acid, but this gives way to a yellow-cake flavor.”  The texture is finely grained, crisp, and meltingly delicate.  St Edmund’s Russet is not a storage apple; eat it quick!

Get the first jugs of “Orchard Ambrosia” – our 100% unpasteurized, old-fashioned, nothing-added cider.  You can get gallon and half-gallon jugs.  Freezes great.  It’s just apples and maybe a few pears, cold-pressed into juice.

Donuts were once called olykoeks.  From the Online Etymology Dictionary:  “Small, spongy cake made of dough and fried in lard, 1809, American English, from dough + nut (n.), probably on the notion of being a small round lump (the holes came later; they are first mentioned c. 1861).  First recorded by Washington Irving, who described them as ‘balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog’s fat, and called doughnuts, or olykoeks.’  Earlier name for it was dough-boy (1680s).  Bartlett (1848) meanwhile lists doughnuts and crullers among the types of olycokes, a word he derives from Dutch olikoek, literally ‘oil-cake,’ to indicate a cake fried in lard.”  No hog’s fat here, but every weekend is donut time, and this weekend is extended.  Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, AND Labor Day Monday 11:00 to 6:00.  Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these freshly fried toroids of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  All you have to say is, “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR.”  Thanks to Farmketeer @carolinespalate for the pic.

“You have some, Da-Da.”  Some kids like sour Honeycrisp, some chomp into tomatoes.  You can pick your own tomatoes now.  Many varieties, some ready, some ripening.  Hard to tell you which types you will find in abundance when you arrive.  But Farmer Steve is bullish on the paste tomatoes right now.  Please enjoy exploring around.  Thanks for the visit from NYC, @chef_gregorymark72.

You can pick some 23 kinds of peppers now.  Sweet and hot.  Same deal as tomatoes, you have to come explore.  All depends on how many pickers got here first.  Note:  no eggplants for picking right now.  Might rebound in a week or so.

You can cut your own bouquets in the field by the stand and other spots around the farm.  It’s our best flower crop this year.  The flower list has included zinnia, snapdragon, celosia, ageratum, gomphrena, scabiosa / pincushion, cornflower / bachelor buttons, dianthus / carnations, strawflower, aster, marigold, verbena, and statice.  You can also get them at the stand in bouquets – nice jars included – assembled by fruit farmers.

If you do find peaches – or if you had “put up” peaches from your pickings in August – here are some delicacies submitted by ‘Creekniks.  First is peach matcha mille crepe cake by @jennysbreadbaby.  “Picked some fresh peaches from @indiancreekfarmithaca last weekend and had to use them!!  They were so delicious and worked well with matcha crepes and whipped peach cream! 😋  This cake also literally took like 5 hours to make because my crepe making skills aren’t that great, but glad that it worked out in the end!”

Next, peach custard pie.  Thank you @flourgrrl.  “I baked a thing.  #peachblueberrycustardpie #glutenfree Crust recipe from @bobsredmill Peaches picked at @indiancreekfarmithaca Blueberries picked at @glenhavenfarm #farmfresh.”

FInally, peach berry galette!  Thank you, @carinerfeist. “Peach Berry Galette kind of night!  We picked the peaches ourselves @indiancreekfarmithaca, and they were so juicy, sweet and flavorful!”

Love to y’all.  Hope to see you at The ‘Creek.

SUMMARY

Farm is open 7 days a week 8:00 to 8:00 rain or shine • Pick peaches • Pick Ginger Gold apples • Pick Bartlett pears • Pick tomatoes • Pick peppers • Pick flowers • Get your fresh donuts Friday, Saturday, Sunday 11:00 to 6:00 • No eggplant to pick for a while • Goodies at stand = peaches, tomatoes, peppers, apples (maybe), pears (maybe), garlic, potatoes, honey, syrup, flowers, slushees • COVID rules include (1) Keep SAFE distance, (2) wear MASK when in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS, (4) this year we provide CONTAINERS • Drive slowwwwly on the farm • Thank you for being gentle on our minds

FULL STORY

DEAR FARMKETEERS & LOYAL ‘CREEKNIKS:  May we share a few cogent notions?  Bite-sized inklings that will rouse your spirit as the summer wind tickles your petticoats?

This is a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel posing (suspiciously) as a Bergamasco Sheepdog, adapted from the work of the artist Sam Schonzeit.  To the left is a peach.  You can pick peaches now, and you ought to pick them now if that is on your pandemic bucket list.  The next 7 days will see the passing of peach season

Verily, in the fullness of time, sweater vests will again be seen on Main Street and Wall Street.  Til then, shower compassion on your fellow citizen, for the waiting is the hardest part.  Meanwhile, this public service announcement starring Farmer Steve of Yor and Sister Sarah of Yesteryear.  #badsweater #whatevenisit #1970s #crochet

Not everyone loves peach fuzz.  And that’s okay.  You don’t have to coax, badger, cajole – or legislate – people into liking peach fuzz.  Indeed the solution might be even closer at hand:  yourself.  You can let those people be.  You can witness that story and set it free.  Amen.  There are peaches at the stand.  If you don’t find any to pick, because you didn’t keep up with the Joneses (again, not the Joneses fault!), you will probably find peaches at the farm stand for another few days.

Ginger Gold is a vigorous, hardy apple tree with wide crotch angles.  Yes, in the orchard business, we talk about crotch angles unabashedly like mechanics talk about grease nipples.  The sooner you make peace with that, the faster you’ll advance your farming career.  You can pick Ginger Gold apples now.  These are greenish-yellow apples that bear a lovely, delicate blush on their sun-side. Crisp and sweet-tart, Ginger Gold is an irresistible herald of the coming harvest season.  It does not store well and is best eaten fresh – being an ideal salad apple, as the flesh does not oxidize after cutting.  How to avoid heartbreaking waste in apple season:  Pick an apple with 2 hands, steadying the branch or nearby apples with your non-dominant hand, then twist off your target apple with your best paw.  Don’t let an apple fall, then knock another apple below, causing a chain reaction.  Multiply that effect by thousands… and you’ve got a disconsolate apple farmer.  Please read our Farm School tutorial, How to Pick an Apple.

The Bartlett pear is the yardstick pear.  This heirloom was discovered as a wildling by English schoolmaster John Stair, who cultivated it in Berkshire, England.  By 1799 it had reached America, where it was grown in Roxbury, Massachussetts, under the name Williams’ bon Crétien, but in 1817 Enoch Bartlett of Dorchester was producing the pear under his own name, “Bartlett.”  In England and France, however, the pear is still known as the Williams Pear.  Under any name, the Bartlett has become the most popular pear in Europe and America, and it accounts for about 50% of all US pear production today.  You can pick Bartletts on the trees along the road at the first crest of the driveway just past the old peach orchard where the sign says “Tomatoes / Eggplant / Peppers.”  Just don’t look for a sign that says “Pears.”

Not all red octagonal traffic signs mean stop.  Some apparently mean yield.  A good yield of apple crop.

In a further perversion of national signaling standards, still other red octagonal signs don’t mean stop OR yield.  They mean, “Main road… GO here.”

Probably best to simply drive slowwwwly on the farm.  Red painted apples mean stop.  Green painted apples mean go.  A sign with 2 reds and 2 greens would mean stop, but there’s a just a little more green than red (see the leaves), so in the end it really means “Slow.”

Tomatoes have a last name, Nightshade.  Pretty great last name.  They are in the Nightshade family with peppers and eggplants.  You can pick your own tomatoes and peppers now.  Many varieties, some ready, some ripening.  Hard to tell you which types you will find in abundance when you arrive.  But Farmer Steve is bullish on the paste tomatoes right now.  Please enjoy exploring around.

More news from the Nightshade family:  no eggplants for u-picking right now, could be a couple weeks, or maybe next year.  A few obsessed folks picked hundreds of baby eggplants despite our pleas to let the babes fatten up.  But we’re not bitter at all.  No sirree, everything’s cool in the eggplant department.  Nothing to worry about on this TINY BABY EGGPLANT SPECIALTY FARM.  Breatheeee.

A word of encouragement from Farmketeer @flxbubbles who posted this on Instagram:  “If you’re looking to pick flowers in the local area, @indiancreekfarmithaca is the place to go!”  Yes, you can cut your own bouquets in the field by the stand and other spots around the farm.  The flower list has included zinnia, snapdragon, celosia, ageratum, gomphrena, scabiosa/pincushion, cornflower/bachelor buttons, dianthus/carnations, strawflower, aster, marigold, verbena, and statice.  You can also get them at the stand in bouquets (nice jars included) assembled by fruit farmers giving self-care as they heal from the eggplant pillage.

Donuts were once called olykoeks.  From the Online Etymology Dictionary:  “Small, spongy cake made of dough and fried in lard, 1809, American English, from dough + nut (n.), probably on the notion of being a small round lump (the holes came later; they are first mentioned c. 1861).  First recorded by Washington Irving, who described them as ‘balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog’s fat, and called doughnuts, or olykoeks.’  Earlier name for it was dough-boy (1680s).  Bartlett (1848) meanwhile lists doughnuts and crullers among the types of olycokes, a word he derives from Dutch olikoek, literally ‘oil-cake,’ to indicate a cake fried in lard.”  Every weekend is donut time.  Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 6:00.  Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these freshly fried toroids of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR.”  No hog’s fat here.

And now a special recipe submitted by our ‘Creeknik of the Weeknik, Carine R. Feist, MPH Nutritional Educator, @carinerfeist.  Anyone who cooks this dish and sends us a photo will get automatic ‘Creeknik of the Weeknik next week.  As long as the photo isn’t shot with a potato, as they say.

Barley Risotto with Grilled Fairytale Eggplant, Cherry Tomatoes, and Fresh Corn

Produce from Indian Creek Farm, Ithaca NY

This dish is a wonderful celebration of the August bounty in New York.  After visiting Indian Creek Farm, we were thrilled to prepare a dinner using the spectacular harvest available at this time of year with quarts of fragrant juicy tomatoes of several varieties, colors and sizes, and we even picked super sweet peaches that will be used in a peach, blueberry galette dessert later this week.  This is our favorite time of year as nothing beats fresh tomatoes, corn and other summer vegetables.  I’m sure that you’ll agree!

Risotto:

• 2 cups of vegetable broth, bring to a boil
• 1 cup water, bring to a boil
• 11⁄2 cups barley, einkorn wheat or farro (your choice)
• 1 to 2 cups of oat milk (or half and half if you prefer dairy)
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 1⁄2 cup parmesan cheese (optional)

Simmer barley or other grain of your choice in the broth/water mixture in a covered pot over medium heat for approximately 1⁄2 hour. Add the oat milk in 1⁄2 cup increments until creamy as desired. Remove from heat; it will thicken slightly off the heat. Add parmesan cheese, if desired.

Fresh seasonal summer vegetable topping:

• 1 pint of mini fairytale eggplants. Trim off the stem and slice in half. (Our container had 16 small eggplants.)
• Vinaigrette dressing – 2 T. reduced balsamic vinegar or fig vinegar, if available.
• 2 T. Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 1 pint Supersweet cherry tomatoes, washed and sliced in half. (The orange variety is our favorite!) 2 ears of corn, grilled with kernels sliced off the cobs
• 10 basil leaves, washed, dried and sliced just before serving (chiffonade style)

Marinate the sliced fairytale eggplants for 1 minute in the vinaigrette, stirring periodically.

Remove the eggplants from the marinade (reserving the remaining marinade).  Grill the eggplant halves on both sides (about 20-30 minutes) until softened and grill marks develop.  Use a grill pan for this or use a grilling mat on your outdoor grill.  (They will lose most of their lovely purple color, but they will be so delicious and the other colors of the completed dish will make for a gorgeous dish!).

Meanwhile, grill two ears of corn and then slice the kernels off the cob.  Set aside.  Slice the tomatoes in half and set aside also.

After the eggplant is cooked thoroughly (but not so mushy that its falling apart!), add it back to the bowl with the remaining marinade.  Add in the tomato halves and fold gently with a spatula or large spoon, so as not to break up the eggplant.  Just before serving, add in the corn kernels with one stir of the spoon.  (Add the corn at this point to keep its lovely yellow-white color.)  Gently pour the vegetable mixture over the top of the risotto.  Place the shredded basil on top of the mixture and bit of salt and a grind of fresh pepper.

Love to y’all.  Hope to see you at The ‘Creek.

SUMMARY

Farm is open 7 days a week 8:00 to 8:00 rain or shine • Pick corn • Pick Zestar apples • Pick pears (maybe?) • Pick tomatoes • Pick peppers • Pick flowers • Fresh donuts Friday, Saturday, Sunday 11:00 to 6:00 • No eggplant to pick for a while • No peaches to pick this weekend • Goodies at stand = peaches, apples, tomatoes, peppers, garlic, potatoes, honey, syrup, pottery, flowers, slushees • COVID protocols include (1) Keep SAFE distance, (2) wear MASK in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS, (4) we provide CONTAINERS • Drive slowwwwly on the farm • Thank you for being kind and gentle locavores

FULL STORY

DEAR FARMKETEERS:  Everyone is looking for new tools right now, improvising in this extraordinary crisis.  Scratching and scrabbling, trial-and-erroring, ad lib-ing and ad hoc-ing.  Farmers are pretty good at that.  Professional contrivers and devisers and MacGyvers.

New this year:  pick your own corn-on-the-cob.  Everyone needs a few cobs in their pandemic toolkit.  Serve it at homeschool to sweeten up algebra “class” on the back porch.  Slather if you must, but even better without butter.  No salt required.  Fresh off the stalk.  50¢ an ear.

Pick Zestar apples! Most of you won’t feel the apple-picking spirit til September, but these are worthy early apples.  Very pretty, round, rosy red apples.  The flesh is juicy and crisp, with a sprightly zest (hence the name) that sweetens with caramel sugars.  They store well for six to eight weeks, and are firm enough to please most bakers.  Advanced apple data:  Zestar comes from the breeding program at the University of Minnesota.  It is a cross of State Fair and MN 1691 (Conell Red x Goodland), and it was released in 1999.  “Zestar!” is the trademark name; the cultivar itself is called Minnewashta.  How to avoid heartbreaking waste in apple season:  Pick with 2 hands, steadying the branch and/or nearby apples with your non-dominant hand, then twist off your target apple with your best paw.  Don’t let an apple fall, then knock another apple below, causing a chain reaction.  Multiply that effect by thousands of pickers… and you got a defeated apple farmer.  Please read our Farm School tutorial, How to Pick an Apple.

Pick your own pears – maybe.  There were some Flemish Beauty and others around when we looked.  They all could be picked by the time you get here!  Just ask at the stand and we will try to direct you to what’s ripe and ready.

Peaches are NOT picking!  You all performed an exemplary orchard bumrush last week – totally wiping out the first wave.  Stay tuned for possible future waves.  We will announce if we spy another round of ripening.

But just to get schooled up for a possible next round… a public service announcement starring Farmer Steve (way back when) and Sister Sarah.  #badsweater #whatevenisit #1970s #crochet

There are peaches at the stand :-)  You’ve been tearing through them and we will try to stay stocked for another week.

Pick your own tomatoes and peppers.  Many varieties, some ready, some ripening.  Hard to tell you which types you will find in abundance when you arrive.  Please enjoy exploring around.  Generally the hot peppers won’t be red yet.

No eggplants for u-picking right now, could be a few weeks!  They are tied up in traffic with all the students flowing into town.  (Actually, a few folks picked hundreds of baby eggplants despite our pleas.  Let’s hope mask-wearing pleas are met with better compliance as town fills up again!)  You should be able to find eggplant at the farm stand.

Look what our roving customer-columnist posted this week.  Thank you @samanthanfountain for sourcing from so many local growers.

Something to do with tomatoes:  Stuff them.  Not nearly as Instagrammatic as Samantha’s creations.  But tasty.

Flowers:  Cut your own bouquets in the field by the stand, and other spots around the farm.  Flowers include zinnia, snapdragon, celosia, ageratum, gomphrena, scabiosa/pincushion, cornflower/bachelor buttons, dianthus/carnations, strawflower, aster, marigold, verbena, and statice.  You can also get them at the stand in bouquets (nice jars included) assembled by fruit farmers.

Every weekend is donut time.  Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 6:00 – expanded from 5:00!  Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these freshly fried toroids of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR.”

Thank you to whoever left us a full box of apple juice in the orchard grass.  Just what we needed!  Good news is Steve thinks we will have the first jugs of Orchard Ambrosia – naturally sweet, cold-pressed, and unpasteurized – on Labor Day weekend.  Fingers crossed

Love to y’all.  Hope to see you at The ‘Creek.

SUMMARY

Farm is open 7 days a week 8:00 to 8:00 rain or shine • Pick peaches • Pick flowers • Pick sweet peppers • Pick hot peppers • Pick cherry tomatoes • Pick first other tomatoes • Pick Williams Pride apples • Fresh donuts Friday, Saturday, Sunday 11:00 to 5:00 • Stuff at stand = tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, garlic, cucumbers, potatoes, PA peaches, honey, syrup, pottery, flowers, slushees • COVID protocols include (1) Keep SAFE distance, (2) wear MASK in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS, (4) we provide CONTAINERS • Drive slowwwly on the farm • Thank you for not picking baby eggplants and not climbing on peach trees • Thank you for being kind

FULL STORY

DEAR FARMKETEERS:  If your back-to-school spirit is shaky, don’t worry.  Farm School will be held remotely this year.  Hooray!  You can lie back in your hammock and tune into lessons each week in these Fresh Crop Alerts.  First lesson:  Latin.  Here we go.  Uni means “one,” and corn means “horn.”  Thus unicorn means:  “one horn.”

Meanwhile copia means “plenty,” as in copious.  So cornucopia means “horn of plenty,” from the Classical Latin.  But words slip and slide over the eons.  Nowadays, in Modern Latin – the language of the agricultural classes – the meaning of corn has shifted ever so slightly from “horn” to “hen.”

And what’s THAT we hear?!  Is it the Hen of Plenty?!  Why yes it is!  Sounding in the hills above Ithaca!  Archie is smashing the keys in a bombastic rendition of the official theme song of Indian Creek Farm, trumpeting the dawn of picking season proper and a pretty decent local harvest.  (Psychedelic daydream:  Imagine a jazz band braying on their horns of plenty.  Fruit flying higgledy-piggledy and ‘Creekniks dancing like donut peaches kaschnockered on apple wine.)

Yes, Farm Fans, it’s THAT time.  The one day every year when we let the barnyard beasts host an open mic on the family heirloom instruments.  This year it coincides with the announcement that William’s Pride apples are ready to pick.  On your walk to Row 10 in the Dwarf Orchard you can debate whether it is properly Williams’, William’s, or Williams.  The internet has not decided.  When you get to Row 10, you can pick your first apples of the year.  These are RED apples, which seems to be what everyone has been holding out for.  The Yellow Transparent and Yellow Pristine apples that kicked off the season were received with precisely the indifference that those poor varieties have come to expect perennially.  Sigh.  Meanwhile there are only a few trees of Williams Pride, so they might get stripped fast, but they are the tip of the spear for apple season.  Despite big losses in the peach crop, we should be headed for an abundant apple season over the coming 10 weeks.  Note:  In Row 10, sandwiched between William’s Pride and Pristine, are Sansa apples.  Sansa are not ready yet.

How to avoid heartbreaking waste in apple season:  Pick with 2 hands, steadying the branch and/or nearby apples with your non-dominant hand, then twist off your target apple with your best paw.  Don’t let an apple fall, then knock another apple below, causing a chain reaction.  Multiply that effect by thousands of pickers… and you got a defeated apple farmer.  Please read our Farm School tutorial, How to Pick an Apple.

Peaches are picking.  We enter week 2.5 of peach season with a half-decent crop to be picked – after losing half the crop to spring frost.  However, fans of “donut” peaches will be shocked and dismayed:  The donut peaches were almost froze out totally.  We had a 10% donut crop so you probably won’t find any of those sweet fat little frisbee fruits.

How to avoid heartbreaking waste in peach season:  Don’t squeeze peaches on the tree.  Exhibit A is a cold, hard thumbprint.  Straight up peach abuse.  Somebody was testing ripeness.  They found out it was ripe.  They left it on the tree.  It takes an experienced eye to judge ripeness in a peach by looking.  Best thing to do is:  Ask us which rows are ready.  Pick those peaches.  Take them home even if they feel a little firm.  In 2 days you’ll have a perfect peach.  Stick them in a brown bag to expedite.  Up to you whether you squeeze a peach after it’s yours.  None of our business.  In the peach orchard, please do not climb, shake, or pull on peach trees.  We already hauled out a broken tree.  Peach trees are more delicate than apple trees.  By hanging off a trunk and toppling it over, you could deprive future you (and future you’s frenemies) of 10 years of juicy, succulent, locally grown peaches.  Per tree.

Sweet and hot peppers for u-pick and boxed at the stand.  Many varieties, all ready or ripening.  Hard to tell you which types you will find in abundance when you arrive.  Please enjoy exploring around.  Generally the hots won’t be red yet.

Are tomatoes picking?  “Yes.  That’s a soft yes,” says Farmer Steve.  People have been finding tons of cherry tomatoes, while the bigger varieties are just filling in.  So make a pass through the tomato patch on your visit, and stay tuned for what Steve says will be a huge crop over the coming weeks.

Summer sweet corn is an OMGawdsend.  Eat it right outta the pot or right offa the stalk cavekid style.  Zero butter and even less salt than that.  (But try Old Bay Seasoning!)

Another idea for “putting up” peppers from a recent  ‘Creeknik of the Weeknik.  Enterprising locavore @samanthanfountain posted this DIY hot sauce using jalapeños and Serranos from Indian Creek, and garlic from Here We Are Farm, our neighbors round the corner in Perry City.  Love to see a young person sourcing from so many local farms.

And this one with beets!  Samantha mentions habaneros which will be heating up soon – along with so many other varieties that ripen and redden through August and September.

Flowers:  Cut your own bouquets in the field by the farm stand.  Current flowers include zinnia, snapdragon, celosia, ageratum, gomphrena, scabiosa/pincushion, cornflower/bachelor buttons, dianthus/carnations, strawflower, aster, marigold, verbena, and statice.  You can also get them at the stand in bouquets (nice jars included) assembled by fruit farmers between Latin lessons.

Every weekend is donut time.  Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 5:00.  Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these freshly fried toroids of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR.”

It’s hot for a ball of somnolent fluff.  Genetically, Zorro has the hardware for long days of mountain work in the Pyrenees.  Culturally, his software has been hacked by the hippy ethos of Ithaca.  A dogologist might describe this hybrid creation as an alpine canine bong hit, Canus alpinus bongus.  He has an infinitude of engrossing if dubious ideologies to ponder in daytime dreamland.  Try not to wake him when you go wandering in the orchards.

Love to y’all.  Hope to see you at The ‘Creek.

– SUMMARY –

Farm is open 7 days a week 8:00 to 8:00 rain or shine • Pick first few peaches (just a few – see below, maniacs!) • Pick flowers • Pick sweet peppers • Pick first hot peppers • Pick first few cherry tomatoes • Pick Pristine apples • Pick the one beefsteak tomato • Fresh donuts Friday, Saturday, Sunday 11:00 to 5:00 • Stuff at stand = cherry tomatoes, sweet peppers, hot peppers, eggplant, garlic, cukes, PA peaches, honey, syrup, pottery, flowers, slushees • COVID protocols include (1) Keep SAFE distance, (2) wear MASK in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS, (4) we provide CONTAINERS • Drive slowwwly on the farm • Thank you for NOT picking baby eggplants and NOT climbing on peach trees • Thank you for supporting small farms

– FULL STORY –

DEAR FARMKETEERS, Bob Dylan said:  “Tomorrow is a long time.”  But these days, yesterday seems like forever ago.  The past year has been chock full of time dilators – things that make foggy memories out of other things that weren’t so long ago.  Impeachment was only a few months back; seems like a year.  Peach harvest was only a year ago; seems like a dream.  So you could be forgiven for thinking that peaches are just an idea – not fuzzy droolworthy fruits of the material world.

But here they are in the flesh, primping for showtime, with help from fashionista eggplants.  Peaches will debut this weekend.  There will be a FEW peaches ready for u-pick in the upper block.  It was not clear how to share this news with you, since the mere mention of the p-word could incite a bumrush on an orchard that is still plum with unripe peaches – not prudent in any year, let alone in a pandemic with pent-up u-pick appetites and nerves frayed by uncertainty.  Given the thousands of readers, there is a high chance that by the time you read this email, early birds will have picked the ripe peaches clean.  We saw 40% crop loss to spring frost, 90% loss of the donut peaches.  Yet we do see peaches on the trees.

So please come out and enjoy the farm – it is the beginning of the August harvest bonanza – and see if you find peaches.  If not, do not worry.  We have planted the peaches in more or less orderly rows that ripen in succession, and we will alert you each week to new waves.  (Pro tip:  Come on weekdays BEFORE the newsletter hits inboxes.)  Also you will find PA peaches at the farm stand which might salve the crestfallen picker who finds none on the tree.  Finally, look around:  There is a nice big vegetable field this year, first apples to pick, abundant flowers, and of course donuts.  All good, and more to come, so please be of good cheer even if you don’t find peaches this week.

Instead of rummaging through random peach rows, ask at the stand and we’ll Sharpie a map.  Also remember that we cannot keep up with the HUNDREDS of messages that flow in through Facebook and email.  We will not respond in time to your well-meaning messages like, “Will there be peaches to pick in an hour?  Will there be peaches to pick at noon tomorrow when I bring my kids?  Will we find enough peaches to pick for a party of 7 on August 23 and what varieties are they and what do they cost and are they freestone?”  You just have to come out here.  The ‘Creek is not on Instacart and there is no way to preview the real-time inventory remotely.  When you come, please do not climb, shake, or pull on peach trees.  We already hauled out one broken tree, before picking has even really started.  Peach trees are more delicate than apple trees.  By hanging off a trunk and toppling it over, you could deprive future you (and future you’s frenemies) of 10 years of juicy, succulent, locally grown peaches.  Per tree.

Pick peppers and tomatoes and (mature) eggplants.  You will find sweet bell peppers, Italian fryers, nassaus, and the like, plus the first wave of jalapeños and Serranos and other hots.  The hots are still green, of course, but you can pick now.  You can pick the first cherry tomatoes.  Farmer Steve says there is “one beefsteak” that’s ready.  So really it’s just the cherry tomatoes right now, with a whole field of other varieties coming.  You can pick eggplants, but – and this comes right from the top, meaning Farmer Steve – please do NOT pick baby eggplants.  Let them size up.  Pick them a week or two later.  Pictured here is a lovely haul from @samanthanfountain who was ‘Creeknik of the Weeknik two weeks ago, and she kinda just won again.  Come on, Farmketeers, up your game before she wins a trio.  Look at what she made and Instagrammed below… and that ain’t the half of it…

Lactofermented salsa verde.  Includes roasted jalapeños from The ‘Creek, fermented tomatillos (West Haven Farm), fermented onions and garlic (Here We Are Farm), fermented garlic scapes and other ingredients from Ithaca Farmer’s Market.  We slapped the #LOCAVORE tag on there.

Lactofermented hot sauce.  Includes habaneros, Fresno chilis, other peppers from The ‘Creek, and onions and garlic from Here We Are Farm and Ithaca Farmer’ Market.  #DIY!

Salsa and hot sauce in squeezy bottles – with LABELS! That is some next-level foodistry, Samantha!  Thank you.

Flowers:  Cut your own bouquets in the field by the farm stand.  Current flowers include zinnia, snapdragon, celosia, ageratum, gomphrena, scabiosa/pincushion, cornflower/bachelor buttons, dianthus/carnations, strawflower, aster, marigold, verbena, and statice.  You can also get them at the stand in bouquets (jars included), designed by fruit farmers in the increasingly rare dull moment.

Git Ya Gar Gar!  You can get Garlic Greg’s garlic at the stand, as bulbs or beautiful braids.  Braids include about a dozen big bulbs and are doped with herby botanicky things.

The new meaning of Donut time.  In news from outside the farm bubble, the former King of Spain – who previously ‘retired’ amid personal scandals – has now fled his country under investigations into financial scandals, with the New York Times reporting that Juan Carlos said that his “decision to leave amid multiple inquiries was taken ‘with the same eagerness to serve Spain that inspired my reign.’”  Umm, say again?  Absconding with the same zeal that you cheated the public before?!  Good one!  Sounds like DONUT TIME!  Yes, Farmketeers, we dedicate this week’s donut plug to Former King Juan Carlos of España.  Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 5:00.  Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these freshly fried toroids of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR,” is all you need to say.  Tune in next week to find out which honorable public servant will take home the DONUT TIME AWARD.  Nominations can include any bad-faith bozo worldwide.

25 years ago Sunday, this hard-working artist drifted into the hereafter.  What a long strange trip it’s been.  Some people have since seen The Madonna in the Northern Lights.  Others have seen their ancestors’ faces in raviolis.  We have seen Jerry in Zorro.  A pretty good impression, don’t you think?

Love to y’all.  Hope to see you at The ‘Creek.

– SUMMARY –

Farm is open 7 days a week 8:00 to 8:00 rain or shine • Pick last few raspberries now • Pick flowers • Pick sweet peppers • Pick first jalapenõ and Serrano peppers • Pick Pristine apples • Pick Yellow Transparent apples • Fresh donuts Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 5:00 • Stuff at the stand = garlic, shallots, cukes, peppers, eggplant, PA peaches, honey, syrup, pottery, flowers, slushees • COVID protocols include (1) Keep SAFE distance, (2) wear MASK in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS, (4) we provide CONTAINERS for picking • Drive slowwwly on the farm • Thank you for supporting small farms

– FULL STORY –

DEAR FARMKETEERS:  If you could have it your way, how would you make a buck in this life?  Or make your mark?  Or make the grade?

Would you open a for-profit theology practice on Capitol Hill – advising your clients on abstruse matters of the spirit?  Would you sell handmade greeting cards to old ladies at analog craft fairs in a digital world?  Would you become valedictorian of your massage school class?  These are all good options!  But for us farmers, our lot is to be sellers of fruit.  Purveyors of produce.  Hustling green peppers and hawking Red Delicious.  A struggle at times, to be sure; but, also a kind of Goldilocks existence – neither the noblest profession, nor the meanest.

Speaking of meanest, thank you for being the nicest.  It is really nice when all our nice customers are so nice.  It is hard enough trying to wrangle a peach crop without a bunch of meany-heads exercising their innocent narcism on our farm crew.  U-pick is a kind of therapy, indeed, but please do consult a specialist if you feel really out of balance.

Or speak truth to flower.  This is as fine a time as any in history to ask, “What am I meant to be doing?  What is my gift?  How can I do right and feel right?”  While Crown Princess Ivanka has counseled Americans to “find something new,” we say speak truth to flower.  Tell a zinnia or snapdragon your deepest truth – they are good listeners – and listen for their quiet counsel.  It worked for Adrianna.  One of our favorite former Farkmeteers left us for nursing school and graduated this spring… just in time to be a front-line responder in the covid crisis.  Good luck and be well!

Yes, you can cut your own bouquets in the field by the farm stand.  Current flowers include zinnia, snapdragon, celosia, ageratum, gomphrena, scabiosa/pincushion, cornflower/bachelor buttons, dianthus/carnations, strawflower, aster, marigold, verbena, and statice.  You can also get them at the stand in bouquets, designed by fruit farmers in the rare dull moment.  Thank you to @chlorothrill for picking and sharing.

You can scrounge for the last raspberry stragglers.  Don’t make a special trip just for the berries.  The summer crop is pretty well picked over.  Look what @the_vet_epicure made with her haul:  “Raspberries from @indiancreekfarmithaca went into this delicious raspberry frangipane tart by @1wanderer.  The layer of raspberry jam under the almond filling really made the dish (a trick we learned from #greatbritishbakingshow).”  Thanks, Vet!

Not to be outdone in the raspberry department, behold these beauties by @dolcedelightithaca: “Local fruit makes the best pastries 😋 peach raspberry galettes for dessert any one?”  Whoa.

Get your garlic.  You can find Indian Creek garlic and shallots at the stand.  Also Garlic Greg is making these beautiful braids, each includes about a dozen big bulbs plus flowers and herby botanicky things.

Pick sweet peppers and first hot peppers.  You will find sweet bell peppers, Italian fryers, nassaus, and the like, plus the first wave of jalapeños and Serranos.  The hots are still green, of course, but you can pick now.  (Note, please refrain from picking eggplant for a week or so.  You did a very throrough job picking the first wave – so thorough that we need to let the patch recover, and let the baby eggplants size up nice.)

Come pick Pristine apples.  They are the first real apple-ish apples of the year.  Lovely lemon-yellow orbs of fruitological blushitude.  Descendants of the venerable McIntosh and Golden Delicious varieties.  Perfect for eating fresh, saucing, and cooking.  Easy to pick in Row 10 of the Dwarf Orchard.  Easy as pie.  Tart, crisp, juicy, and firm.  And isn’t that blush prettier than a store-bought doll?  (True apple experts – and aspiring foodies – will also pick the Yellow Transparents, a.k.a. “salt apples” that we introduced last week.  Find those in the Vintage Orchard near the shack near the raspberries just off the road where it turns at the pear trees after the old peaches just past the stone wall that’s buried in the weeds… Oh just ask at the stand when you get here.  We have maps and sharpies.)

The moment you’ve all been waiting for is not here yet.   And, no, we don’t mean a coordinated national response to the greatest calamity in generations.  (Though that has not arrived yet, either.)  We mean peach picking:  It is not time yet.  We do have PA peaches at the stand for the same price as U-pick.  So that’s something.  But we can’t turn you loose in the peach orchards yet because they aren’t quite ready.  Truth be told, some lucky visitors have picked the odd tree here and there in the old peach orchard because the peaches were dropping.  And we had a 40% loss to frost overall.  Plus a 90% loss of the donut peaches.  But we do promise to announce peach picking in a Fresh Crop Alert when it’s time.  And while you probably won’t pick a donut peach this year, you can pick a donut.

What time is donut time?  Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot 3 days a week this year.  You can get them Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 5:00.  Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these freshly fried toroids of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR,” is all you need to say.  You can also get lemon slushees every day at the donut-slushee window.  It’s a real hole in the wall.  Like, we cut a hole in the wall and stuck Nick the Donut Kid in it with his robot friend.

Love to y’all.  Hope to see you at The ‘Creek.

– SUMMARY –

Farm is open 7 days a week 8:00 to 8:00 rain or shine • Pick garlic now • Pick shallots now • Pick raspberries now • Pick flowers now • Pick first sweet peppers & eggplant now • Pick “salt apples” a.k.a. Yellow Transparent apples now • Fresh donuts Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 5:00 • Stuff at the stand = cucumbers, peppers, eggplant, honey, syrup, pottery, flowers, slushees • COVID protocols include (1) Keep SAFE distance, (2) wear MASK in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS, (4) we provide CONTAINERS for picking til further notice • Drive slowwwly on the farm • Thank you for supporting small farms (and being kind)

– FULL STORY –

DEAR FARMKETEERS:  Do not be troubled, for when the world has gone mad, sad, bad, or even plaid – still there is garlic.  Garlic to have and garlic to hold.  Garlic for your loves, garlic for your loaves.  Yes, this week, we recognize two worthy ‘Creekniks of the ‘Weeknik, who by their gentle example have counseled us that when the world has gone barmy – GARLIC.  Garlic for your mind.  Garlic just in time.

Pick your own garlic now.  This is the final week.  Early next week, Garlic Greg will harvest any remaining bulbs to store in his secret apocalypse root cellar.  Meanwhile this photo, and the cover photo above, and the next three below, come from our first ‘Creeknik of the ‘Weeknik @samanthanfountain, who not only picked and put up, but also Instagrammed her haul with the effortless panache of a champion locavore digital native.

Lo, behold, cloves.  Cloves of garlic.  Plumply bulbed together.  Samantha’s story said, “Massive clove of garlic from the harvest today.  Only four of these make up one big fist.”  The fist of justice!  The fist of power!  The fist of kindness!  Please note the nomenclature:  cloves make a bulb, bulbs make a fist, and they are all priced by the head.  Cloves, bulbs, fists, heads.  But no dustups or donnybrooks on the farm!  Please and thank you!  Nonviolent agriculture!  Amen!  U-pick pricing = $2/head (1 to 9 heads), $1.50/head (10-49), $1.25/head (50-100), and $1/head (100+).  Pull yours ASAP.

And now a jar of avant-garlic foodism by Samantha:  “Excited to ferment some garlic honey giant cloves from @indiancreekfarmithaca in a dark molasses-like raw buckwheat honey from Waid’s Honey @ithacafarmersmarket.”  Booyah.

Don’t stop at garlic – you need shallots to sweeten and balance.  Garlic Greg says you harvest shallots just like garlic, but pay like flowers:  shallots are $6/handful.  Big hands, big savings.  Studious foodies will study the anatomy of shallots.

On the fruit side of the The ‘Creek, you can still pick raspberries.  Best crop ever and people have been finding lots.  It is starting to feel like last chance for the summer berry crop, especially if the weekend is busy.  Please come get yours, the autumn crop is smaller.  Lovely photos, Samantha.  Thank you.

Our Co-‘Creeknik of the ‘Weeknik models exemplary form seen among the most perspicacious and perseverant pickers:  Look under the raspberry leaves to find booty missed by the masses.  No tantrums if you don’t see any berries on first inspection.  A teachable moment for your youngsters.  And after all that learning, catnaps are permitted.

How did she earn ‘Creeknik status?  By harvesting 107 heads of fresh garlic!  Bravo and thank you for sharing.

Still time to pick flowers?  Yes, you can cut your own bouquets in the field by the farm stand.  Current flowers include zinnia, snapdragon, celosia, ageratum, gomphrena, scabiosa/pincushion, cornflower/bachelor buttons, dianthus/carnations, strawflower, aster, marigold, verbena, and statice.  You can also get them at the stand in bouquets (jars included), designed by fruit farmers in the rare dull moment.

What time is donut time?  Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot 3 days a week this year.  You can get them Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 5:00.  Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these freshly fried toroids of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR,” is all you need to say.  You can also get lemon slushees every day at the donut-slushee window.  It’s a square hole in the barn wall.  (Peaches not ready to pick yet.)

Are peaches ready to pick yet?  Not yet.  Hold your pants on.  A couple weeks.  Maybe even less.  Maybe a week.  It’s a long time to hold your pants on.  So we promise to announce in a Fresh Crop Alert as soon as we know.  Unless we have an emergency need to post it on Facebook for some reason of complex agricultural timing.  Heads up — only about 60% of the crop seems to have survived the spring frost.  Therefore competition will be vigorous.  We don’t want to have ration the peaches.  So be nice.  No brannigans or brouhahas!  No scraps or slobberknockers!  WE’RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER.  Meanwhile there are Pennsylvania peaches at the farm stand.  To hold you over.  They taste pretty much the same to be really honest.  And there are some nice people in PA.  It’s okay to start on those.

Pick your own eggplant.  The ripening of these first Nightshades ALMOST pushed us to jump the gun and sound the Horn of Plenty, a.k.a., the cornucopia.  But it wouldn’t be right til peaches and maybe tomatoes are on the scene.

Pick your own sweet green peppers.  If you find one in the field wearing a squash flower on its head, RUN!  Definitely not cool.  That would mean entropy is decreasing, a most unnatural state of affairs – far worse than a runaway climate.

Saved the best for last.  Nothing creates a community orchard bumrush like Yellow Transparent apples – time to pick now!  Your Siberian friends REALLY LIKE these apples.  The Yellow Transparent apple is a cold-hardy variety imported in the 1800s from Putinlandia before it was officially called that.  It ripens in July for the short northern season.  To cut the acidity, people in the olden days added salt (take note, foodies!) and called them salt apples.  We call them Old Yellers.  They are way better than Honeycrisp.  They make a CREAMY apple sauce, first chance of the year.  Good stuff to be thankful for.  Please come pick these apples.  They are dropping as we speak.  Drop.  Drop.  Hurry.

Happy 10th anniversary to this photo.  Yes, our Hangry Hippo made her debut on July 23, 2010.  A decade later, social media fans are still trying to figure out her true nature.  “Hairless munching guinea pig?” asked one user recently.  “I had to double take,” said another.

Love to y’all.  Hope to see you at The ‘Creek.

– SUMMARY –

Farm is open 7 days a week 9:00 to 6:00 rain or shine • Pick raspberries now • Pick garlic now • Pick shallots now • Pick flowers now  • Strawberries are kaput • Fresh donuts Friday, Saturday & Sunday 11:00 to 5:00 • Goodies at the stand = cukes, blueberries, honey, syrup, pottery, flowers, slushees • COVID protocols include (1) Keep SAFE social distance, (2) wear your MASK in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS, (4) We provide CONTAINERS for picking til further notice • Drive slowwwly on the farm • Please see our updated dog policy below • Thank you for supporting small farms • Thank you for not being willfully irresponsible about reasonable advice from epidemiologists

– FULL STORY –

LOYAL FARMKETEERS:  Every question, no matter how puzzling, has an answer.  Are Congresspeople vertebrates?  Who was the first human to blork a squinkle?  Why did the chicken cross the chicken?  Yes, Gentle ‘Creekniks, even these abiding perplexities have answers.  But we must not reveal them til after the election.  TOO RISKY!  So we will take up a few easies from your inquiries.

Can I pick raspberries now?  Yes you can.  Thank you for asking.  Enterprising berryists, like @peanutbutterandjuliette, have been picking for a couple weeks, but the patches still seem plentiful.  Nights (and days) of warmth (and sun) have brought new waves of berries to a pickable state.  What you find when you get here depends.  Who got here before you?  How much did the birds eat?  As usual one question begets a whole family of questions.  (Linguistic parthenogenesis?!)

Can I make a mixed berry pastry with princess power?  Depends – are you a @pastry_power_princess?

Can I pick garlic now?  Each year, when you see this picture of Garlic Greg channeling the Garlic Goddess, it means time to pick your own.  There won’t be a 4th Annual Garlic Harvest Party this year – TOO RISKY! – but you can come pick now.  Greg says it’s the best crop ever.  Fourth time’s the charm.

What kinds of garlic can I pick?  Garlic Greg says there are the hard-neck varieties Continental and German Red, and a soft-necked variety.  U-pick pricing is by the head:  $2/head (1 to 9 heads), $1.50/head (10-49), $1.25/head (50-100), and $1/head (100+).  So you just do a headcount of vampires in your life, multiply by 3 heads per head, and stock up accordingly.

Can I also pick my own shallots for the first time ever at Indian Creek?  Yes!  Garlic Greg says you harvest them just like U-pick garlic, but pay like U-pick flowers:  to wit, shallots are $6/handful.  Yet another moment in life when Bigfoot-sized hands will save you a few ducats.  What is a shallot anyway?

Can I pick bouquets of flowers?  Yes, you can cut your own flowers in the field by the farm stand.  Current flowers include zinnia, snapdragon, celosia, ageratum, gomphrena, scabiosa/pincushion, cornflower/bachelor buttons, dianthus/carnations, strawflower, aster, marigold, verbena, and statice.  You can also get them at the stand in bouquets.

What time is donut time?  Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot three days a week this year.  You can get them Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 5:00.  Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these fresh fried rings of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR,” is all you need to say.  You can also get lemon slushees every day at the combination donut-slushee window. (Tomatoes not ready yet.)

Can I bring my dogs?  Only kinda sorta.  Please consider our new dog policy, honed over many years of experience and revised for 2020.  We love dogs, but we do not encourage visitors to bring dogs these days.  If you must bring your dog, please:

1. Keep your dog on a LEASH and attended at all times,
2. CLEAN up right away and take the waste with you,
3. Keep your dog out of the crop FIELDS; orchards only.

Remember, there are often lots of people and vehicles around.  Not everybody is comfortable with dogs – no matter how cute or friendly your dog is.  And, nobody (farmer or visitor) wants to step in waste as they wander.  Meanwhile, our dogs live here on the farm and mostly lounge around anymore.  If they ramble up to you or bark, don’t worry, they will not chase you away.  Just ignore them if you are unsure.  Thank you.

Can I drive as fast as I want on the farm?  Yes, if by “as fast as I want” you mean really slowww.  It’s the right thing to do.  Like masks and no giant indoor exercise parties.

May I wear my wask when in close quarters such as the checkout line and donut line?  Please.  Do.

Do you have a colorful, somewhat helpful, somewhat confusing, locally printed 8-page saddle-stitched brochure with maps and picking tips and rules and regulations that I can pick up at the farm stand and/or download in PDF form for viewing on my mobile as I wander the farm? Yes please!

Are peaches ready to pick now?  Nowt yet.  Hang tight.  A couple weeks.  We will announce in a Fresh Crop Alert.  About 60% of the crop seems to have survived the spring frost.  Competition will be vigorous.  Be nice.  Meanwhile there are Pennsylvania peaches at the farm stand.  To hold you over.

Love to y’all.  Hope to see you at The ‘Creek.