Harvest Week 21 - An Ode to Winter Squash

THIS WEEK’S HARVEST

Sunshine Kabocha Winter Squash, Lorz Softneck Garlic, Green Cabbage, Purple Majesty Potatoes, Calibra Yellow Onions, Carrots, Leeks, Romanesco, Dandelion Greens, Dazzling Blue Dino Kale, Castelfranco Chicories, Red Salanova Oakleaf Lettuce, Arugula

U-PICK

Check the u-pick board in the barn for weekly u-pick limits.

• 🎃 Jack-O-Lantern & Decorative Pumpkins | No limit | There are still a pile of nice pumpkins on the farm side of the field — help yourself if you’d like more!

• Cherry Tomatoes | Gleanings

• Frying Peppers:

  • Shishitos | Gleanings

  • Padróns | Gleanings

• Time to pickle peppers! The hot peppers will be disappearing at the first sign of frost, so now is the time to preserve the abundance! It’s a great time for pickled hot peppers and making hot sauce!

• Hot Peppers:

  • Jalapeños | No limit

  • Habanero | No limit

  • Thai Chilis | No limit | Spicy!

  • Wilson’s Vietnamese Devil Pepper | No limit

• Herbs & Edible Flowers: Herbs are winding down but some can be scrounged.

• Flowers! There are still some flowers to be had after the rains, particularly zinnias, marigolds (the solid orange ones are all the way to the north — towards Winter Sister Farm) and some late-season curios.

HARVEST NOTES

• Sunshine Kabocha Squash: One of our all-time favorite squash. Excellent for eating roasted (check out our guide to roasting from last week if you need a reminder!). Also excellent in pies, curries, soups, and baked goods (substitute for pumpkin in any recipe). Super sweet, velvety smooth texture.

• Green Cabbage: This week we’ll be bringing you some truly giant cabbage! They’re perfect for making sauerkraut (see our favorite recipe in Week 14’s newsletter), or slowly carving chunks off to eat with dinner. We’ve been loving eating stir-fried cabbage this fall, as in the recipe below, (and we’re also eyeing the Asian Pickled Cabbage recipe from the same source).

• Dandelion Greens: These succulent Italian dandelions are the perfect bitter winter green. As with chicory, they pair well with rich, sharp flavors. For a simple and delicious side dish, try sautéing with olive oil (or bacon fat), plenty of garlic and a dash of red wine vinegar. Or check out this recipe for Chickpea Pancakes with Dandelions and Caramelized Onions from a past newsletter!

SELECTING A TASTY WINTER SQUASH

POV: You approach a macro-bin of West County Winter Squash in the barn with hundreds of edible orbs. Which will you choose!?

Selecting a sweet, ripe winter squash is a little like selecting a ripe melon; you never know lies within until you take a bite, but you can take certain cues from the outside of the squash to make sure you get a sweet one.

In general, it is best to select squashes with rich color, and deep warm hues like oranges and reds. Bon bon buttercup, for example, is a dark green squash but tends to be sweetest when it has a nice deep orange spot on one side. Sunshine Kabocha, which we are distributing this week, is best when a deep orange-red. A nice golden brown-orange delicata will likely be much tastier than a paler green compadre.

We try to avoid harvesting or putting out unripe squash, but in general, avoid squash that are pale or green. Go for the warm colors!

A vine-ripened, locally grown winter squash will be delicious just roasted and appreciated unadorned. See last week’s Newsletter for our tips on roasting winter squash.

WINTER SISTER FARM CSA - SIGN-UPS NOW OPEN!

Want to keep getting abundant weekly veggies through the winter? Winter Sister Farm, located right next door, is open for signups for their 2025-2026 Winter-Spring CSA! They have a range of share options and sizes, including both free-choice and box shares, all of which include access to their u-pick herb and flower garden. Visit www.wintersisterfarm.com/csa for more details!

Meg, Henry & Riley in the cabbage patch this morning.

CHINESE SHREDDED CABBAGE STIR-FRY

From The Woks of Life

This simple stir-fry is more than the sum of its ingredients.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 tablespoons oil

• 6 oz. pork belly (pork loin, or chicken, thinly sliced) — Optional

• 5 cloves garlic (smashed and cut in half)

• 5 dried red chilies (deseeded and roughly chopped)

• 1 1/2 lb. cabbage (hand-shredded into bite sized pieces, washed, and thoroughly dried)

• 2 teaspoons Shaoxing wine

• 1 tablespoon soy sauce

• 1/2 teaspoon sugar

• 1 tablespoon water

• 1/2 teaspoon Chinese black vinegar

• 2 scallions (cut into 2-inch lengths)

instructions

In a wok over high heat, add the oil. Sear the meat until caramelized. Add the garlic and chili, turn down the heat to medium, and stir-fry for a minute, taking care not to burn the garlic.

Add the cabbage, wine, soy sauce, sugar, and water. Turn up the heat to high, cover the lid and let the cabbage cook for 1-2 minutes. Uncover the lid, and stir in the black vinegar, scallions, and salt to taste. The cabbage should be wilted, but still slightly crunchy and caramelized. Serve hot!

FARMER’S LOG

AN ODE TO WINTER SQUASH

This week on the farm we made a big push to finish clipping and boxing the last of our monster 2025 winter squash.

A few weeks ago, we penned an ode to the mighty potato. Last week we serenaded el maíz. Both are New World crops that changed the world and inspired poets. But this week we save for the fairest of them all: The beloved oldest of the three sisters — the winter squash.

She takes on infinite forms, from voluptuous to svelte; from burning red to the palest blue. She has been kindling a bashful and loyal love in humanity’s heart for over 10,000 years.

The ancestral plants of what we call squash (the species including zucchini, melons, gourds, cucumbers, pumpkins and all winter squash) are millions of years old and native to the Americas. The earliest evidence for human domestication dates back 10,000 years to southern Mexico, earlier than the domestication of corn or beans.

Word travelled fast and inspiration abounded. By 2,000 B.C., squash had became a part of life for almost every Native American culture from Southern Canada to Patagonia. (The English word “squash” comes from the Narragansett word, askutasquash, meaning fresh vegetable, and similar words can be found in the Algonquian language family.) Squash varieties were developed and cherished for everything from their protein rich and medicinal seeds to the sweet flesh and winter-hardy skins. Botanists note at least six separate domestication events occurring in the Americas.

Here at West County Community Farm, the human + squash love affair burns bright — and we’re lucky to have at our fingertips the unparalleled modern library of heirloom squash seeds to explore. Over the winter, Kayta hunkered down with a seed catalogue and a good cup of coffee and laid out a season-long love sonnet to squash: We felt the summer wind with a cool slice of Persian cucumber; we dined by candlelight over pasta with Costata Romanesca Zucchini; and once we tasted a Sarah’s Choice Cantaloupe, we could never forget.

But in the winter, our true love came — the winter squash.

We’ll have a new squash for you to get to know almost every week from now until our last CSA pickup day, December 9th. Allow us to introduce you…

Top row from L to R: Delicata, Butternut, Futsu, Bonbon Buttercup, Jester Acorn | Bottom row L to R: Honeynut, Winter Luxury Pie Pumpkin, Sunshine Kabocha, Koginut, Sweet Jade

• Sunshine Kabocha: The village beauty. A fiery-red Kabocha squash with sugar-sweet and flaky flesh. An all-time farmer favorite that can be cooked any which way. Exceptional for pumpkin pie and straight roasted eating.

• Winter Luxury Pie Pumpkin: The supreme pie pumpkin in lacy lingerie. The only pie pumpkin that can compete with a Sunshine Kabocha. We'll distribute this one around Thanksgiving with our go-to pumpkin pie recipe.

• Black Futsu: A beloved Japanese delicacy, this bite sized, mini Butternut relative has bright orange flesh with unique fruity flavor and edible skin with a gorgeous frosted look.

• Butternut: The solid, reliable, bring-’em-home-to-Daddy squash with a nutty charm.

• Bonbon Buttercup: The girl next door. Unassuming, humble, and cute as a button. BonBon Buttercup is, in farmer David’s opinion, the best squash ever. Marriage material.

• Delicata: A real heartbreaker. The sweetest. Easiest to cook, even easier to eat.

• Koginut: A very expensive date (the priciest seed of all squash), this cutie is a hybrid of kabocha and butternut and has a nutty flavor with notes of citrus and vanilla. Very popular with chefs.

• Honeynut Butternut: A highly educated squash developed by the Cornell Vegetable Breeding Institute, this petite butternut variant is new to us this year.

• Jester Acorn: A Delicata type that looks like a fancy Acorn Squash. A good Jester can be among the sweetest of squashes.

• Sweet Jade: A real cutie — a personal-sized grey green Kabocha.

Set the table, poor the wine, and light the candles — we hope you fall in love with a winter squash this autumn!

See you in the fields,
David

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CSA BASICS

Slow on Cooper Road! Out of respect for our neighbors and the many kids and animals that live on Cooper Rd., please drive slow (20 mph)!

What time is harvest pick-up?:

• Saturday harvest pick-ups run from 9:00 am - 2:00 pm

• Tuesday harvest pick-ups will run from 1:00 pm - 6:00 pm

U-pick hours: Oriented members can come to the farm any time, 7 days a week, sunrise to sunset, to u-pick and enjoy the farm.

2025 CSA program dates: Our harvest season will run from Saturday, June 14th through Tuesday, December 9th this year.

Where is the farm? The member parking lot is located at 1720 Cooper Rd., Sebastopol, CA 95472.

Harvest Week 20 - The Season of Death

THIS WEEK’S HARVEST

Calico & Dutch Butter Flavored Popcorn Mix, Bonbon Buttercup Winter Squash, Purple Majesty Potatoes, Monastrell Red Onions, Carrots, Hakurei Japanese Salad Turnips, Leeks, Cauliflower, Green Magic Broccoli, Celery, Rainbow Chard, Castelfranco Chicories, Red Salanova Oakleaf Lettuce, Mustard Mix

U-PICK

Check the u-pick board in the barn for weekly u-pick limits.

• 🎃 Jack-O-Lantern & Decorative Pumpkins | SEASON LIMIT: 2 per share, or 1 per child for households with more than 2 children. Note: We have enough pumpkins that households that are alternating weeks can also take either 2 or 1 per child. The rain will be hard on the pumpkins, so plan to take them as soon as possible if you want them! This year we have a warty brown varietal in the mix — if you’re wanting to carve, choose the orange pumpkins, which have thinner flesh. The best pumpkins will be found on the north side of the patch (the furthest from the barn). There’s also an access point on the north end of the field if the south end is too boggy.

• Cherry Tomatoes | Gleanings

• Frying Peppers:

  • Shishitos | Gleanings

  • Padróns | Gleanings

• Hot Peppers:

  • Jalapeños | No limit

  • Habanero | No limit | (These are past the Vietnamese Devil Peppers.)

  • Thai Chilis | No limit | Spicy! Pick when red.

  • Wilson’s Vietnamese Devil Pepper | No limit

• Herbs & Edible Flowers: Herbs are winding down but some can be scrounged.

• Flowers! There are still some flowers to be had after the rains, particularly zinnias, marigolds (the solid orange ones are all the way to the north — towards Winter Sister Farm) and some late-season curios.

This year’s Calico popcorn drying down in the greenhouse. Halloween movie night!

HARVEST NOTES

• Bonbon Buttercup Winter Squash: In your farmers’ opinion, the best squash ever bred. Ultra sweet and flaky, this squash is like a dessert all on its own. Bonbon is also one of the more delicate of the winter squash we grow, and because of this, we recommend enjoying it soon, as it won’t have the long storage life of some winter squash varieties. Perfect in soups, curries, baking projects, and roasted on its own. Check out the squash primer below for some basic squash cooking tips!

• Purple Majesty Potatoes: These fancy potatoes are a beautiful purple inside and out, full of antioxidants, and particularly suited to roasting.

WINTER SISTER FARM CSA - SIGN-UPS NOW OPEN!

Want to keep getting abundant weekly veggies through the winter? Winter Sister Farm, located right next door, is open for signups for their 2025-2026 Winter-Spring CSA! They have a range of share options and sizes, including both free-choice and box shares, all of which include access to their u-pick herb and flower garden. Visit www.wintersisterfarm.com/csa for more details!

ROASTED SQUASH PRIMER

From The Kitchn

Farmer’s note: while this recipe was originally written for Kabocha, we recommend this roasting method for most of the winter squash we’ll be doling out this season.

Choose which shape you want your squash based on how you’re planning to eat it: roasted halves — the easiest preparation — can be cut into rough slices, scooped onto plates, or used as you would canned pumpkin in any baking recipe. Roasted wedges are an elegant side dish on their own, particularly if you dress them up with interesting spices and oils (one of our favorite combinations for Bonbon or Kabocha is roasted with coconut oil and curry powder — or check out this recipe for Roasted Squash with Yoghurt, Walnuts & Spiced Green Sauce) and roasted cubes are perfect for turning into a more elaborate salad, like Ina Garten’s Roasted Squash and Arugula Salad with Warm Cider Vinaigrette.

PREPARATION

• Arrange a rack in the middle of the oven and heat the oven to 400°F.

• Using a chef’s knife, carefully trim the stem and pointy ends off 1 medium kabocha (or other squash). Arrange the squash on a cut side and cut in half. Use a spoon to scrape out the seeds and pulp.

• Option 1: Roast halves. Arrange the halves cut-side up on a rimmed baking sheet. Drizzle evenly with 1 tablespoon olive oil and use your fingertips or a pastry brush to coat the flesh. Season with 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt and 1/4 teaspoon black pepper. Roast until the squash is browned on the edges and fork or knife tender, 25 to 27 minutes.

• Option 2: Roast wedges. Cut into 1/2-inch-thick half moons. Place the pieces on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Drizzle with 1 tablespoon olive oil and season with 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt and 1/4 teaspoon black pepper. Toss to coat and arrange in a single layer. Roast until lightly browned on the bottom, about 15 minutes. Use a thin spatula to flip the squash. Roast until tender and caramelized, 10 to 12 minutes more.

• Option 3: Roast cubes. Peel the tough outer skin, then cut the flesh into 1-inch cubes. Place on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Drizzle with 1 tablespoon olive oil and season with 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt and 1/4 teaspoon black pepper. Toss to coat and arrange in a single layer. Roast until lightly browned on the bottom, about 15 minutes. Use a thin spatula to flip the squash. Roast until tender and caramelized, 10 to 12 minutes more.

FARMER’S LOG

THE SEASON OF DEATH

Rise and fall. Light and shadow. Summer and winter. Life and death. 

Halloween is an extremely important time of year on the farm. It is the season of death.

A sea of spider webs cloaked in dew.

The roots of our Halloween holiday lie in the ancient Gaelic Samhain (“summer’s end”) festival. The Gaelic were a pastoral people and the Samhain marked the transition to the dark half of the year and the time when the shepherds brought their livestock, fattened on summer mountain pastures, back down for the winter for shelter or for slaughter.

There were feasts. People opened their burial mounds (portals to the underworld) and lit cleansing bonfires. The borders between the worlds were thought to become thinner around the Samhain and supernatural spirits, and the spirits of ancestors, were thought to walk amongst the living. The spirits were to be appeased or tricked. Tables were set for friendly spirits at the Samhain dinner. People wore costumes to disguise themselves from the evil spirits and placed candles inside of carved turnips (in lieu of pumpkins) to frighten them off.

You can feel the Samhain in every nook and cranny on the farm these days. How different the farm looks now from spring’s jubilant green promise and summer’s colorful cacophony. The life cycles of the plants that showered us with riches all summer are now at an end. Their bodies hang drawn, gaunt and ghostly on their trellises or shriveled, mildewed, and desiccated in the rows, awaiting the final, furious whir of the flail mower.

This week, with our bulk harvests nearly complete, we continued the portal-tending work of the Samhain. Eric mowed in large sections of Centerfield, flailing half our winter squash, and all of our tomatoes, eggplant, and peppers into the afterlife. He then disced their bodies into the underworld where they will be consumed by worms and bugs.

At that moment the field lay empty; a bleak, deep brown maw of bare soil. An open portal.

Eric then performed the Last Rights on those fields, spreading steaming black compost and then seeding cover crop; driving processionally, rhythmically over the fields with the seeder flinging clover, ryegrass, triticale — like little prayers — into the maw. Finally, he closed the portal by kissing those seeds in with a light pass of an old tiller.

Then the rain came, and the seeds germinated. Life starts anew in those fields.

One can only marvel at the wisdom of ancient agrarian festivals, born from bone-deep relationship to the cycles of nature: How directly death was confronted.

Those people knew.

They knew that from death comes life. They knew that death and life are only thinly separated. They knew that the rotting, decaying, destructive forces also make the road, the gateways from which life bursts forth anew in the spring. They knew that the portals, the transitions, need to be tended.

This Halloween, while you’re out there gleaning summer’s last fruits, we invite you to confront the ghoulish sight of dying plants, sagging limply, skeletal, and vacant; and the blocks of bare ground on the farm — portals now pregnant with cover crop seed. 

Because death is the doorway and on the other side are verdant spring meadows, strawberry-scented breezes, plump sugar snap peas, and bouquet after bouquet of spring flowers. 

Happy Halloween!
David

Clover, ryegrass, and triticale cover crop germinating this week in Creek Field.

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CSA BASICS

Slow on Cooper Road! Out of respect for our neighbors and the many kids and animals that live on Cooper Rd., please drive slow (20 mph)!

What time is harvest pick-up?:

• Saturday harvest pick-ups run from 9:00 am - 2:00 pm

• Tuesday harvest pick-ups will run from 1:00 pm - 6:00 pm

U-pick hours: Oriented members can come to the farm any time, 7 days a week, sunrise to sunset, to u-pick and enjoy the farm.

2025 CSA program dates: Our harvest season will run from Saturday, June 14th through Tuesday, December 9th this year.

Where is the farm? The member parking lot is located at 1720 Cooper Rd., Sebastopol, CA 95472.

Harvest Week 19 - In Praise of Maize

THIS WEEK’S HARVEST

Honey Boat Delicata Winter Squash, Jelly Potatoes, Assorted Yellow Onions, Sweet Peppers, Carrots, Kohlrabi, Mini Purple Napa Cabbage, Leeks, Cauliflower, Green Magic Broccoli, Black Magic Dino Kale, Brussel Sprout Tops, Green Salanova Butter Lettuce

U-PICK

Check the u-pick board in the barn for weekly u-pick limits.

• 🎃 Jack-O-Lantern & Decorative Pumpkins | SEASON LIMIT: 2 per share, or 1 per child for households with more than 2 children. Note: We have enough pumpkins that households that are alternating weeks can also take either 2 or 1 per child. The rain will be hard on the pumpkins, so plan to take them as soon as possible if you want them! This year we have a warty brown varietal in the mix — if you’re wanting to carve, choose the orange pumpkins, which have thinner flesh. The best pumpkins will be found on the north side of the patch (the furthest from the barn). There’s also an access point on the north end of the field if the south end is too boggy.

• Cherry Tomatoes | Gleanings

• Frying Peppers:

  • Shishitos | Gleanings

  • Padróns | Gleanings

• Hot Peppers:

  • Jalapeños | No limit

  • Habanero | No limit | (These are past the Vietnamese Devil Peppers.)

  • Thai Chilis | No limit | Spicy! Pick when red.

  • Wilson’s Vietnamese Devil Pepper | No limit

• Herbs & Edible Flowers: Herbs are winding down but some can be scrounged.

• Flowers! There are still some flowers to be had after the rains, particularly zinnias, marigolds (the solid orange ones are all the way to the north — towards Winter Sister Farm) and some late-season curios.

HARVEST NOTES

• Honey Boat Delicata Winter Squash: Delicata are a perennial favorite of ours. Versatile, and sweet, they even have edible skins. For the easiest preparation, cut in half, scoop out the seeds and roast, face down, until tender (adding a little water to your pan to keep the squash moist!). They are also delicious cut into rings or half circles, tossed with an oil of your choice (coconut is particularly scrumptious) and then roasted until caramelized. Enjoy!

FALL HARVEST POTLUCK THANK YOU

Thanks to everyone who came out on Saturday to enjoy each other’s amazing company and exceptional dishes, and to Carl Jaeger and his team of wonderful volunteers for organizing! To get a taste of one of the hits of the potluck, check out this video recipe for Leeks Braised in White Wine and Cream (recipe video here) — thanks Kaelyn for sharing!

A few snapshots from the sweet Harvest Party last Saturday. Thanks to everyone who came and to Carl Jaeger for organizing!

WINTER SISTER FARM CSA - SIGN-UPS NOW OPEN!

Want to keep getting abundant weekly veggies through the winter? Winter Sister Farm, located right next door, is open for signups for their 2025-2026 Winter-Spring CSA! They have a range of share options and sizes, including both free-choice and box shares, all of which include access to their u-pick herb and flower garden. Visit www.wintersisterfarm.com/csa for more details!

ginger-peanut warm kale salad

Recipe by Hetty McKinnon — from Anna Jones

“With this recipe, Hetty manages to tread that elusive line between something tasting so delicious that you can’t stop eating it and making you feel so good after eating that you crave it all the time.

Hetty says herself, ‘This salad comes with a warning: eat at your own risk, as it is very addictive. The combination of kale, tofu and ginger-accented peanut sauce is unexpectedly irresistible.’

Duration: 30 mins

Serves: 4-6

Ingredients

• 4 heaped tablespoons smooth peanut butter

• 2 tablespoons tahini

• 2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil

• 2.5cm piece of ginger, peeled and grated

• 2 cloves of garlic, peeled and grated

• 3 teaspoons tamari or soy sauce

• 2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar

• 1 tablespoon runny honey or maple syrup

• 2 bunches of kale (320g), stalks removed and leaves roughly torn

• 200g (1 cup) quinoa, rinsed

• 500ml (2 cups) vegetable stock or water

• 300g extra-firm tofu, sliced thinly

• extra virgin olive oil

• 1 red onion, peeled and thinly sliced

• 1 cup unsalted peanuts, roasted and roughly chopped

• a handful of coriander leaves

  INSTRUCTIONS

Make the ginger–peanut sauce:

Place a medium saucepan on a low heat and add 4 heaped tablespoons smooth peanut butter, 2 tablespoons tahini, 2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil, a 2.5cm piece of ginger, peeled and grated, 2 peeled and grated cloves of garlic, 3 teaspoons tamari or soy sauce, 2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar and 1 tablespoon honey or maple syrup, along with 1 cup water. Cook until the peanut butter and tahini have melted, stirring until the sauce is smooth and creamy. If the sauce ‘freezes’ or is too thick, add more water, a tablespoon at a time, until it’s smooth and the consistency of thickened cream. Taste and season with sea salt and black pepper.

Fold the kale into the sauce:

Fold 320g de-stalked and roughly torn kale leaves into the hot peanut sauce. The heat from the sauce will wilt and cook the kale. Set this aside.

Cook the quinoa:

Put 200g rinsed quinoa and 500ml vegetable stock or water (if using water, season it with 1 teaspoon of sea salt) into a large pot. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat, cover and cook for 15–18 minutes, until all the liquid has been absorbed and the quinoa is translucent and you can see the twirly grain. Turn off the heat and set aside, uncovered, while you prepare the rest of the salad.

Fry the tofu:

Put 300g extra-firm tofu on a chopping board and season well with sea salt and black pepper. Heat a large non-stick frying pan on medium–high, and when it’s hot, drizzle with 1–2 tablespoons olive oil. Working in batches, place the tofu in the pan and fry for 2–3 minutes on each side until lightly golden. When all the tofu is cooked, allow it to cool, then slice it into 5mm-thick strips.

Cook the onion:

Rinse and dry the tofu pan and place it back on a medium heat. Drizzle more olive oil into the frying pan, add 1 peeled and thinly sliced red onion and cook for 12–15 minutes, stirring occasionally, until it is softened and sweet.

Finish the salad:

Combine the peanut-kale mixture with the quinoa, tofu and onion. Transfer to a large serving plate and top with 1 cup roasted and chopped peanuts and a handful of coriander leaves.

FARMER’S LOG

IN PRAISE OF Maiz

This week we’ll be racing to get ahead of another oncoming storm — this one set to arrive next Friday. This Sunday we’ll attempt to harvest our towering popcorn and flour corn crop out of Mystery Field.

In honor of the upcoming harvest, we wanted this newsletter to be a song of praise to maize…

Humanity is bound to no other plant more than corn. Since it’s domestication in Southern Mexico some 10,000 years ago, maize has become the staff of life for human civilization as we know it.

We can testify to it’s power as farmers.

From a small, armored, long-storing kernel springs forth a plant (a grass) with vigor unmatched. In a week or so it out-competes any weed — reaching for the sun with almost hallucinatory speed. In the blink of an eye, maize creates a complete, shady canopy, soaking up every ray of sun with palm thick spears. After reaching full height, it enters it’s most beautiful phase, a month of wind tossed sex. The pollen, bursting from caramel brown tassels atop the plant, feeds thousands of pollinators and rains down on the silks below. Each silk, if pollinated, becomes a kernel. And from just one kernel, up to 800 kernels can grow on the cob — multiplicities of nourishment.

The poets are best suited to praising a plant this powerful.

First, we’ll hear from our dear friend and former CSA members, Rebecca Harris, who wrote this poem in 2019 after walking through the corn field. Second, we’ll hear from the master of odes, Pablo Neruda.

(Notice that both poets happen to mention the sea, laughter, the color blue, and children — both undoubtedly tapping into a collective unconscious in their praise of Mother Maize.)

* * * * *

The Symphony of Harvest
by Rebecca Harris

I go down to the
Corn stalks just to listen
To them.
The way you might go
To hear the ocean.
Or bear a child to share
Laughter.
Here in a world that feels
Like a desert,
I hear rain in this
Corn-
Hear voices-
Melted with sunlight,
Made soft and strong-
Such a wild way-
The corn dances,
As strange
As lions
Dancing,
Or finding a melody in the
Dirt,
Or light in a cave.
Here,
They reach so tall,
They are browning,
Golden and green-
The farthest cousin from
The sea-
Yet I hear them murmur
The same words.
And I am bathed
In music.

Weeks later,
I heard that children were stamping
On the corn
After harvest,
Finally allowed to run tender and
Wild through and over the stalks.
I imagine they blew through them like
Wind colored with blue,
Dragging the sky behind them.
Blue corn sits in baskets
Like fallen arrows
Waiting to dance.

Now,
I see the corn stalks and as I
Let go of the sea wind that it
Brought into my hair
I am filled with children and their
Games
And the memory in my body
Joining them,
As beautifully as the corn and I
Make music.

* * * * *

Ode to Maize
by Pablo Neruda

America, from a grain
of maize you grew
to crown
with spacious lands
the ocean foam.

A grain of maize was your geography.
From the grain
a green lance rose,
was covered with gold,
to grace the heights
of Peru with its yellow tassels.

But, poet, let
history rest in its shroud;
praise with your lyre
the grain in its granaries:
sing to the simple maize in
the kitchen.

First, a fine beard
fluttered in the field
above the tender teeth
of the young ear.
Then the husks parted
and fruitfulness burst its veils
of pale papyrus
that grains of laughter
might fall upon the earth.
To the stone,
in your journey,
you returned.
Not to the terrible stone,
the bloody
triangle of Mexican death,
but to the grinding stone
sacred
stone of your kitchens.
There, milk and matter,
strength-giving, nutritious
cornmeal pulp,
you were worked and patted
by the wondrous hands
of dark-skinned women.

Wherever you fall, maize,
whether into the
splendid pot of porridge, or among
country beans, you light up
the meal and lend it
your virginal flavor.

Oh, to bite into
the steaming ear beside the sea
of distant song and deepest waltz.
To boil you
as your aroma
spreads through
blue sierras.

But is there
no end
to your treasure?
In chalky, barren lands
bordered
by the sea, along
the rocky Chilean coast,
at times
only your radiance
reaches the empty
table of the miner.

Your light, your cornmeal,
your hope
pervades America’s solitudes,
and to hunger
your lances
are enemy legions.

Within your husks,
like gentle kernels,
our sober provincial
children’s hearts were
nurtured,
until life began
to shuck us from the ear.

---

CSA BASICS

Slow on Cooper Road! Out of respect for our neighbors and the many kids and animals that live on Cooper Rd., please drive slow (20 mph)!

What time is harvest pick-up?:

• Saturday harvest pick-ups run from 9:00 am - 2:00 pm

• Tuesday harvest pick-ups will run from 1:00 pm - 6:00 pm

U-pick hours: Oriented members can come to the farm any time, 7 days a week, sunrise to sunset, to u-pick and enjoy the farm.

2025 CSA program dates: Our harvest season will run from Saturday, June 14th through Tuesday, December 9th this year.

Where is the farm? The member parking lot is located at 1720 Cooper Rd., Sebastopol, CA 95472.