Pear Cake - dense cake filled with chunks of pear, topped with tangy cranberry jam and slathered with yogurt frosting
 
Inspiration from: https://www.cookiedoughandovenmitt.com
 
Ingredients:
Pear Cake
1 cup butter room temperature
1 3/4 cups granulated sugar
2 tsp. vanilla extract
3 large eggs
2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
3/4 cup buttermilk or full-fat yogurt
1/2 cup 100% pear or cranberry juice
3 large bosc pears diced
 
Jam: 
-2 cups cranberry juice
-1/4 cup granulated sugar
-3 large bosc pears, diced
 
Frosting:
2 cups full fat yogurt (Siggi's is my preference)
1/2-3/4 powdered sugar (to taste)
 
InstructionsPear Cake

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Spray 2 8-inch round pans with non-stick cooking spray. Dust the pans with 2 T. all-purpose flour. Tap out any excess flour. This will help keep the cake from sticking. Set aside.
2. Peel, core, and dice 3 large pears. Set aside while making cake batter.
3. In a large mixing bowl, add in the butter and sugar. Mix until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.
4. Add in the vanilla extract and each egg one at a time until incorporated. Scrape down the sides after each egg.
5. In a separate bowl, add in the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir to combine.
6. Measure out buttermilk and pear juice.
7. Alternately add the flour and buttermilk/pear juice always starting and ending with the flour. I did 3 parts flour and 2 parts buttermilk. Scrape down the sides and mix to combine.
8. Stir the diced pears into the batter until they're incorporated.
9. Pour the batter into the prepared round pans. Spread evenly out. I used bake-even strips to try to keep the cakes level as they baked.
10. Place into the preheated oven and let bake for 55 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean or with moist crumbs.
11. Let the cakes cool for about 20 minutes. Turn the cakes out onto a wire rack and cool completely.

Jam Filling

1. In a small saucepan, add in the sugar, cranberry juice, and diced pears. Turn on heat to medium and let it come up to a simmer. Simmer for 20 minutes.
2. Remove from heat and let cool. 

Yogurt Frosting

1. In a large mixing bowl, add in the yogurt and powdered sugar. Turn mixer on high and beat until creamy.

Assemble

1. Add the first layer of pear cake to a cake plate.
2. Add the cranberry jam to the cake. Make sure the jam is evenly spread and make sure to leave a 1" buffer around the edges to prevent the jam from spilling over
3. Add the second cake layer. 
4. Add a heap of frosting to the top of the cake. Spread it out evenly and push the excess off the sides. Work the frosting down the sides of the cake. Grab extra frosting when needed. Keep the frosting thin on the sides. 

 

​Happy Friday folks,
 
Winter is waning!  We’re thinking about our spring (working) break. We have this weekend and two more in March, then we close markets at Chevy Chase and Sheridan. (Dupont continues to the end of March.).
 
People ask me: “why, oh why do you do this to us every year?  Why do you abandon us and force us to go back to the supermarket?” 
 
Well we’re sorry, but we need to stop marketing so we can focus exclusively on spring planting. It’s such a demanding process, working with the fickle weather, trying to keep on schedule with all the succession plantings of about 40 different crops. If we miss one, just one!, that could mean no lettuce or no beans some day when you come looking for them in June or July.
 
So we aren’t really taking a break and running off to Fort Lauderdale or someplace (well, except for one of us, who is very old and halfway retired and loves Key West).
 
No, all (but one) of us will be slaving away at the farm so that YOU, precious customer, can have your beans and lettuce EVERY week.
 
Anyway, don’t panic. We will return for our 47th (!) season in May (Dupont) or June (Sheridan) with all those delicious June crops, like strawberries, snap peas, asparagus, etc. As for Chevy Chase, we will return no later than June 1, and possibly a bit earlier if crops justify. We’ll let you know. Watch this website, OR put your email address on our list, (clipboard at market this week) and we’ll contact you.
 
Last week I promised to tell you about this new source we have for local organic produce, to supplement our own. It’s a marketing cooperative called Lancaster Farm Fresh, consisting of 40 or 50 organic vegetable growers like us, located near Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
 
Our own marketing cooperative, Tuscarora Organic Growers, was founded about 15 years earlier, in 1988, and we actually helped the Lancaster group get started, using many of the same principles and methods that we had learned.
 
So this means that for the next three markets we’ll have beautiful, organic carrots, cabbage, kale and onions, etc., even though our own crops of these are sold out.
 
See you at market.
 
Jim

SHEPHERD'S PIE​   

Here is a recipe submitted by our farm manager, which she made this past week with great success!  Simple and delicious!  A great way to use up leftover mashed potatoes.  And if made in an oven proof skillet, you have a one pan meal! 

Saute onions and quartered mushrooms (crimini or white) for a few minutes, but you want them to be a little firm. Salt to taste.  Cover with mashed potatoes or mashed butternut squash or a combination of both.  Sprinkle with shredded cheese and bake until golden brown.

This is a basic recipe that you can add any leftover vegetables that you may have. ​

Hi folks,
 
Sorry about skipping my blog last week. Too much going on at our annual, three-day conference of the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture, our great, 28-year-old, state-wide organization of organic and environmentalist farmers.
 
As always, for all those years, it was a really well-organized, high-quality event , very effective at inspiring, educating and bringing together nearly two thousand farmers and others from Penn State and the PA Department of Agriculture.
 
It’s a great way for us tree-hugger farmers to get those academics and bureaucrats to listen to OUR concerns about better ways to farm while protecting the environment.
 
We from New Morning Farm are always enthusiastic participants, and we were this year. (The farm covers costs for all crew members to attend, and considers it work time, for payroll purposes).
 
New Morning Farm had a couple of very cool displays in the “Farm Innovations” section, and our stalwart farm manager, Jenni Glenister, sat in for Jim, presenting workshops on organic corn production and also cover cropping.
 
So even though you didn’t hear from me or see me at market, I wasn’t slacking off or wasting time!
 
We’ll be at all markets this weekend (let’s hope it doesn’t snow, but even if it does...) with some new produce items from a new source near us in PA that I’ll tell you about next week.
 
Ok, you’re waiting for the secret word, for your incredible 5% discount. So here it is: “farmers conference”.
 
See you there (at market, not at conference).
 
Jim. ​

Happy winter, folks!
 
We’re all a little chilly these days. We haven’t gone below zero yet at the farm, but close, and the furnace is sucking up lots of logs.
 
It’s conference time in PA for us farmers. We always send the crew to the annual meetings of both the Pennsylvania Vegetable Growers Association and The Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture. Lots of educational workshops, opportunities for networking, and displays of equipment and other useful products. These events really help inspire us and give us ideas and information for doing our job better.
 
I’ve been pretty active in both organizations for decades, serving on committees and boards and giving many presentations at workshops. I’m kind of retiring from all that now, and I’m proud to say that my younger, experienced crew members are taking over for me. Jenni Glenister, who’s been with us for ten seasons and has been farm manager for the last three, has really stepped up at the conferences, already having done several presentations, including two this year. Our 45 years of experience at organic vegetable production means we have a lot to offer younger farmers, and we enjoy doing it.
 
The organization we consider the most important is the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture. Back in 1991, together with about 15 other people, I helped to found this now-great, state-wide group. We are mostly farmers, not all certified organic, but all environmentally concerned. With about three thousand members (the annual conference attracts close to 2000),  PASA is really effective at influencing state ag policy and really good at educating farmers and the public about environmentally benign farming practices. Look it up on the internet!  It’s a great institution, and interesting to read about.
 
We’ll be at all markets this weekend, with plenty of our delicious winter vegetables, fresh homemade baked goods, eggs, etc. And it’s going to be sunny and MUCH warmer!  Mmmm!  See you then.
 
Jim ​

​Honey and Rosemary Sweet Potatoes
Recipe By:Coco
"Baked until chewy on the outside and soft on the inside, these are a perfect balance of salty and sweet. The rosemary makes them addictive."
​
Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/4 cup honey
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh rosemary

• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 3 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cut in 1-inch cubes

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.   Line a baking sheet with foil or parchment paper.
2. Mix the olive oil, honey, rosemary, salt, and black pepper together in a large bowl, and stir the sweet potato cubes in the mixture to coat. Remove sweet potato cubes with a slotted spoon and arrange in a single layer on the prepared baking sheet.
3. Bake in the preheated oven until tender, about 45 minutes. Turn oven heat up to 450 degrees F  and bake until browned, another 15 minutes.

​8/24/18
Schools are starting, Labor Day is next week, I know that it feels like 
summer is over.  The farm season has it's own rhythm, and in fact each farm will have it's own seasons.  Here at New Morning Farm it is still summer.  So how do we measure summer? We're still planting, watering, weeding, and harvesting all the summer crops: tomatoes, summer squash, cucumbers, beans, and sweet corn.  We've still got peaches, plums, nectarines, and cantaloupe melons to enjoy from our neighbors.  Our summer market, Tuesday, is just gearing up for it's biggest markets.

At the same time, we see the shift towards fall, though it's not here 
yet.  We're transplanting the last of the fall brassicas, lettuce, and 
other field greens.  The potato and winter squash harvests are done and they are curing for storage.  This week, we're harvesting the big carrot planting for the year.  As we squeeze these milestones into our regular work schedule, we can start to say, "That's done for the year."  It's a relief for sure.

Other signs of the shifting season include the later sunrise, and the 
quiet dawn, no more dawn chorus from the birds.  The geese are overhead every morning for their training flights, and the insects chirping whirring and buzzing has replaced the tree and marsh frogs.

At market this week, look for fresh harvested orange carrots! We're 
really pleased so far with the harvest, and the flavor is all carrot 
with none of the bitterness you sometimes get from the supermarket.  The cooler and cloudy days has meant trouble for many crops, but the lettuce is doing great. We'll have the full selection this week from butterheads to romaine. 

Hope to see you there, Jennifer