Ordering Tomato Seeds

CREAM SAUSAGE TOMATO

This is one of our favorite tomatoes.  It is a  roma type tomato, it is cream to yellow colored.  The flesh is very meaty with a small seed cavity.  It's flavor is a little citrusy with undertones of warm sunshine.  When I take these to market and I have Glen with me I have to really keep watch over them or they disapear before they can be sold.

They are very easy to grow if your season is long enough.  We grow ours in a green-house because they mature in 90 days or so.  As you can see by the picture they  are very profilic and last long after being picked.  This is a tomato I plant every year.  

Tomato Blossom

This delicious tomato is a Cheroke Purple Heirloom.  It grows without much effort or fuss and is a moderate producer.  The taste is amazing.

Weighing in at 2 lbs!

We grow approx 50 varieties of tomatoes.  Brandy-wines,  Green Zebras, Cheroke Purple,  Great White, Amana Orange, and Thai Pink are also tomatoes we plant every year.  If you want a real treat plant Chocolate cherry tomatoes or the mini sunburst or snowberries.  My favorite company to order seeds from is Baker Creek Seeds.  Totally Tomatoes is another good source.  Remember you can save seeds year to year if you grow the heirlooms.

CSA-- Community Supported Agriculture

CRICKET SONG FARM CSA

Our mission statement:  To provide individuals with organically grown vegetables using accountable stewardship; returning to the earth more than taken, and respecting the value of an honest day's work.

Welcome to our sustainable farm.  We have been growing vegetables for our customers since 1993.  Our mission statement reflects our commitment to providing you with the best, environmentally responsible vegetables we can grow.  We are a small family farm located in the Beryl Valley of southern Utah.  You can find Purebred Nubian goats, chickens, Jacob and Shetland sheep on our farm.  Early mornings finds us milking goats to make cheese, and feeding the excess milk to our laying hens.  Wool from our sheep is hand-spun into yarn to make socks and warm gloves and hats for winter chores.  Every day is filled with the wonder of growing and providing for our needs and sharing some of our bounty with others.  Your membership in our farm gives us the opportunity to live the lifestyle we enjoy and provides you the best food your hard earned money can buy.

Following are several examples of last years Full Share deliveries

June 10,  rhubarb, apricots, cherries, broccoli, cauliflower, lettuce, sugar-snap peas, shell peas, spinach, fennel, garlic, onions, beets, herbs, aragula, honey, and herbed salt.

June 26,  pecans, carrots, beets, large head red loose leaf lettuce, mesculm mix, spinach, chard, elephant garlic, onions, aragula, wild greens lamb quarter,, dandelions,, carrots, squash, apricots, strawberries and figs.

July 10,  peas, carrots, cabbage, zucchini, yellow squash, lettuce, chard, onions,radishes  beets, shallots, tomatoes, heirloom tomatoes, hot peppers, green peppers, stir-fry, apricots, plums, strawberries, and watermelon

August 10,  string beans, yellow Cheroke wax beans, eggplant, Armenian cucumbers, english cukes, squash( 5 different kinds plus more if you wanted for canning or bread)  stir-fry, heirloom tomatoes, baby salad mix, large storage onions, golden beets, red beets, carrots, corn, potatoes, rhubarb, cantelope, canary melons, grapes, peaches and strawberries

SEPT AND OCTOBER  same of the above plus winter root crops, squash, pumpkins, potatoes, and items from  the greenhouse

I will have CSA information here soon.  We have plenty of shares available.  We provide our customers with the best vegetables WE can grow.  By growing all the vegetables ourselves  you can be assured of great quality, superior taste, just picked freshness, and absoutly NO  chemicals.  The fruit share is provided by my sister and an egg share is also available.

Swiss Chard

Swiss Chard is one of my favorite vegetables.  It is a member of the beet family.  The leaves can be eaten raw or sauted it can also  be cooked like asparagus or eaten raw.  Try filling the larger raw  stems with peanut-butter or cream cheese.  We grow chard outside and in the green-house.  I harvest chard for two years in the green-house because it is very hardy and will winter over.  After harvesting the second year I allow many plants to go to seed.  It will freely self sow.
 To serve it cooked you can cut the stalks into 1 inch pieces and cook them in boiling salted water for 5 minutes.  Then add the torn leaves and cook until tender, about 5 minutes.  Drain and serve with real butter.  Add salt and pepper and maybe even a little fresh ground nutmeg.  Or fold the chard into your favorite cream sauce.  You can also use fresh chard in a souffle, quiche or in a ring mold with creamed mushrooms in the center.

CHARD ROLLS IN TOMATOE SAUCE

1 1/2 lbs chard
1/2 loaf french bread
1 minced onion
1 minced clove garlic
1/2  cup chopped parsleyS
1 cup grated parmesan cheese
1 cup dry bread crumbs
1 tsp. salt
fresh ground pepper
1/2 tsp. dried oregano
4 eggs
1 cup tomato sauce.

Cook chard.  drain and squeeze dry.  Chop. Soak french bread in hot water and squeeze dry.  Saute onions and garlic in 2 tb. oil until limp.  Put chard, bread, onion, and garlic in a food processor and grind until fine.  Mix with the parsley, bread crumbs, salt, pepper and oregano.  Add 1/2 cup parmesan cheese.  Stir in eggs.  Chill mixture for several hours.  Shape mixture into sausage like links with you hands which have been floured. Chill links.   

Bring a large pan of salted water to a boil.  Drop in links, a few at a time.   Cook until they rise to the surface and are firm.  Remove and place in a greased baking dish.  Surround with tomato sauce.  Sprinkle with 1/2 cup parmesan cheese.  Cook 35 mins 350 degrees.

EGGS IN A NEST
Saute chard until limp.   Place chard in a greased 8x8 baking dish.  Make 4 nests in drop an egg into each nest.  Sprinkle with parmesan cheese and seasonings of choice.  Bake until eggs are done to your likeness.

Jacob Sheep

We purchased our Jacob Sheep in 1996.  I am a hand spinner and weaver, and was always intrigued with the Jacob Sheep.  As a spinner you have a large variety of yarn you can spin from the sheep's fleeces.   Black, brown, lavender, white, plied 1 strand white 1 strand colored, or while carding just card all colors together for a variegated yarn.  The crimp count is about average, meaning the yarn is not itchy nor is it real soft like Merino.  It makes great mittens, hats and socks.  When my kids were little I knitted them tube socks from the wool.  The socks repelled the farm dirt and didn't wear out very easily.  

                                  Hand Spun, Home Made,Tube Socks

Size 8 knitting needle cast on multiples of 2 long enough to go around the calf circumference. For the stretchy cuff, Knit 2 plural 2 ribbing for 2 inches.  Knit right side, plural wrong until desired leg and foot length.  Decrease 2 every row for toes, until 6 stitches remain on needle.  Cut yarn leaving about 1 yard in length, draw yarn through  remaining stitches and tie off.  Use remaining yarn to sew seam. Hand wash in cold water.
    HINT: I would make them larger than needed and felt them by putting them in a pan of hat water and a tablespoon of dish soap.  Agitate for several minutes and then rinse in cold water.  Repeat this process until you achieve the desired results.  After the socks are felted they can be washed in the regular wash.

  Thank you for stopping by.  You are kindly welcome to sign in as a follower in the right hand column.  By following our blog you show us your support, and  please encourage those around you to by food locally grown using organic methods.

Home Page:

cricketsongfarm.blogspot.com

Cricket Song Farm established 1993

    

  Cricket Song Farm is a sustainable, non-certified organic farm in southern Utah.  We have been growing vegetables for Farmer's Markets and our CSA customers since 1993.

I grew up conventional farming.  Long days and night spent watering hundreds and hundreds of acres of crops.  I gained a respect for the land at an early age.  I knew I wanted a farm of my own, but it would be a small sustainable farm where I planted the seeds by hand,  hand milked the goats morning and night and gathered the freshly laid eggs.  I would nourish the soil with nutrients and compost produced on the farm instead of chemicals and fertilizers, and when I harvested it would be by hand for someone I knew personally.

Shortly after we were married, my husband bought me (us) our little farm..........76 acres, beautiful sunsets and room for the kids to roam.  We had been previously renting a small 2 acre farm so we moved our herd of Purebred Nubian Dairy Goats, chickens, other miscellaneous farm animals, and our 5 children (the youngest was 3 weeks old) to our little farm.  We lived in a tent and immediately began the process of  feeding the soil and growing vegetables for our customers.

 Why did we choose the name Cricket Song Farm?  When we purchased our farm it had been neglected for years.  The soil was depleted, there weren't any worms or soil microbes to be found.  As we applied manure, compost and sustainable, organic practices the soil came to life teaming with worms and bugs, both good and bad.  The grasshoppers, flea beetles and crickets began eating our crops.  I was grateful our farm was becoming what we were working so hard to create.  As I listened to the crops grow, the bugs happily munching the spinach and to the crickets singing their serenade nightly,  I named the farm Cricket Song Farm because............well, the crickets at least sang for their supper!

Now after many years and the children all grown and gone, we still farm several acres, participate in several Farmer's Markets and have a limited amount of CSA customers.  We have had a happy life living close to nature, raising the food we eat and sharing it with those around us.  Stop by and see us at the market and say "Hello",  just look for the ole "FarmHer" with the long brown (and a little grey) braid, a funny farmer's hat and a retro apron.

photo on the cover on St, George Health and Wellness Magazine used with permission

Pictured above is my booth at a local market

we grow all our own vegetables

many other vendors gather produce from several growers to bring to market,

some vendors truck produce in from California and Nevada,

you can be assured we only provide vegetable grown by us using our high standards!

I love this picture of my beautiful daughter holding a bunch of radishes. Notice the peeling fingernail polish worn off by work.  She is truly a little farm "GIRL".

 Our veges are picked and delivered to market within just a few hours
(we begin harvesting at 4:00 a.m. to ensure freshness)

Thanks for allowing us to grow you the freshest, healthiest, nutrient dense, and tastiest food available.

Follow along for information about what markets we will be attending.

cricketsongfarm.blogspot.com

Thanks for stopping by.