​Good morning members,

It's March and wow am I glad. I must say I'm a bit over Winter and feeling a bit stir crazy. The signs of Springs are here though - daffodils, crocus, bud break on trees, robins becoming more active, and longer days. In case anyone has felt like all of sudden they are seeing lots of robins and wondering where they go during the Winter (calling all nature nerds) - they don't actually migrate in our neck of the woods. In Winter, robins form nomadic flocks (at least within the US where Winters are not too extreme) which can consist of thousands of birds. Usually these flocks appear where food is plentiful and as Spring rolls around, they split up. They reappear in our yards and it can feel like they have returned when really they are just switching from being non territorial in the Winter to aggressively defending their territory ahead of breeding in the Spring. and now you know. :)

​Good morning members,

This email is a little later than usual because this weekend Bailey, Cal and I were at the Oregon State University Small Farm Conference! It's an annual conference attended by over 700 small farmers and others in agriculture (seed producers, non-profits, market managers, aspiring farmers, food system educators, home gardeners, government agencies, etc.). The conference is a full day and there are three sessions each of which has numerous classes to choose from. I left the conference yesterday afternoon feeling inspired, which is a good thing during this time of year - February is a hard month for farmers! Not only do we have the opportunity to learn about a wide range of topics but we also get to be surrounded by hundreds of folks who all care deeply about small-scale agriculture. One of the sessions that inspired me the most was about how several agriculture based non-profits are interacting with the Oregon legislature and what they are fighting for. It was just a reminder of how much our voice matters, to continue to engage in local politics, and how complex some issues are. I urge you, dear members, to look into and support organizations like Friends of Family Farmers, 1000 Friends of Oregon, Farmers Market Fund, and Oregon Organic Coalition. They are fighting for things like protecting our state's farmland from ever expanding urban growth boundaries, to increase access to fresh produce for those on SNAP, and stepping up regulations on conventional agriculture and confined animal feeding operations (CAFO's) which are huge polluters. I must say that I have been a bit detached lately from what is going on in our state in regards to agriculture but after this class, my passion for these sorts of topics has been reignited. True progress is systemic changes to our local government and these organizations are doing the real work.

​This past Tuesday, which was incredibly Spring-like (I was down to a t-shirt), we were able to pull plastic onto one of our high tunnels. It was quite the feat with only three of us, but we got it done! The very next day, the winds picked up again while we were securing the plastic with what are called batten straps (they go over the plastic and are secured to either side of the tunnel). By Saturday morning, half of those batten straps were broken! The tunnel as of last night still has its plastic but gosh, it's a little nerve wracking! We increased the number of batten straps from 3 to 10, cut off wind at the doors and under the sides, and really thought we have learned several lessons from the past storm so we wouldn't lose plastic again. Fingers crossed that it makes it through this wind which starts to die down on Tuesday. Our hope is to plant some early spring greens into this tunnel so that we can return to the farmers market earlier than last year.

Hey Members, 

Hi Members, 

​I made a run out to the farm Monday because it's really hard to be away from it for three weeks and it felt like the tundra (or so what I imagine it to feel like). During the past week, there were gusts up to 80mph with sustained winds in the 30's. Temperatures dropped to around 10 degrees and did not get above 40 for almost a week. That's what I consider to be a serious deep freeze. The farm looked fine when I left on Monday afternoon and I felt ok about things. But then the ice came, along with more cold wind and temperatures. When Stephen and I returned to the farm Thursday, everything was under a sheet of ice and things did not look so great. We lost plastic on one of our high tunnels - thankfully not the one with our late Winter greens. When we checked in on our Winter squash and potatoes in our shipping container, we discovered they were all frozen. ALL of them. Mother nature can be brutal.

We created this handy reference guide for you to turn to for inspiration on how to utilize some of the produce that may find its way into your homes throughout a season as a CSA member with Wild Roots Farm. Bookmark this reference to return to as the harvest season evolves. What are your favorite recipes to make with your CSA share? We would love to hear from you! (click "read more" to view the full guide!)

My grandpa came to America from Teggiano, a small town just South of Naples in Italy when he was just a boy, around 12 years old. He eventually married my grandma who was a Polish immigrant. They lived in the Canarsie borough of Brooklyn, alongside other Italian and Jewish immigrants. They were fortunate enough to have a house with a nice size backyard where they kept chickens, a huge fig tree (possibly one brought from Italy), grapes and of course vegetables. My grandma instilled a strong love of gardening in most of her seven children. My dad and all his sisters still keep vegetable gardens at home where they always grow what I consider the Italian must haves – basil, tomatoes, peppers, and squash. Part of my love of gardening came from my grandma Mary, whom I was named after. She passed on shortly before I was born and my parents adopted me.

My actual biological DNA is mostly French/German and tiny bit British and Dutch. Even though my parents tried to bring some of that culture into my life, I feel little connection to any of those places. As an adoptee, finding a connection to your roots can be a struggle. My mom is Puerto Rican and Mexican/Indigenous while my dad is Polish/Italian – both are first generation Americans but I was brought up as pretty traditional American. As my mom always told me though, I’m all of the things jumbled together. Claiming my parents’ cultural heritage as my shared experience, I at times feel like an impostor – that I HAVE to state that I was adopted. Statements like “My mom is Mexican, but I’m white because I was adopted.” and “My dad is Italian, but I’m not because I was adopted.” Honestly, sometimes it’s exhausting and I’m left feeling lonely and so disconnected from everyone. I feel my deepest connections though to the Mexican and Italian culture. Although I didn’t grow up particularly immersed in either of these cultures like my parents, they were always there in the background. Homemade chorizo, capirotada, a love of dancing, and all things corn from my mom’s side. A deep love of garlic, spaghetti, feasting, and hand gestures from my dad’s side. Both sides come with a lot of passion, deep traditions, and a love of life.

One vegetable that that is part of the cultural heritage is the cucuzza. My grandma used to grow it in her backyard when my dad was a kid. I will never know for sure why my grandma grew cucuzza, but I guess that it was for my grandfather to make him feel at home in a new country. Maybe one of her Italian neighbors gave her some seed. It doesn’t really matter though so much now. That information has been lost in our family along with the culinary tradition of how to prepare the cucuzza. This charming squash is still in the hearts of my dad and his sister. My Aunt Jo loves to grow beautiful vegetables and enter them into the local and state fairs. She always saves seed and passes them along to my dad and her other friends. A few years ago, she handed my dad an envelope of cucuzza seed she’d saved and convinced my dad to try growing some. It was more seed than he needed, so he gave me some and told me that my grandma used to grow it. Well how could I not try it then?

Cucuzza, or snake gourd, has been cultivated throughout the Mediterranean region and has a long culinary history in southern Italy and Sicily. The cucuzza (Lagernaria siceraria) is an Italian calabash type squash and a member of the Cucurbit family. Botanically, it’s a type of gourd, though it’s most commonly used similar to summer squash. In Italy, it also goes by Zucca, suzza melon, cucuzzi, and Googootz (pronounced goo-GOOTZ) in slang. There is a well-known Sicilian proverb – “however you cook it, it’s still just a squash”. It’s so much better than zucchini though! It has a really nice firm texture that holds up to cooking well, stores longer, and is easier to harvest. The cucuzza grows long (over 12 feet) but should be picked young when they are around 12 to 18 inches long. They have pale green skin and white flesh. As they mature, their skin hardens and they can be stored similar to a winter squash. They do need to be trellised and are avid climbers and can make a gorgeous green “fence”.

As Lane of the Culinary Breeding Network recently said, the Italian side always takes over everything. I feel that this is very true in my life – it’s the culture I feel the most connected to. After traveling in Italy twice, how could one not fall in love with it all - the food, the way of life? Everyone in the countryside there has a garden. Each dish is so regional and deeply steeped in tradition. This past year, we grew out a couple beds of cucuzza on the farm. Each time I walked by the walls of climbing tendrils, with glowing white flowers that open at night (and are pollinated by moths), I felt transported with a sense of connection to something ancient. We organized a Zoom cooking class for our CSA members with Zisolhouse, a small farm in Sicily that Brian and I actually visited in 2019 thanks to a recommendation from Lane. It’s in the Southeast corner of Sicily just a little south of Noto. The little organic family farm was created in the 70’s and planted out in citrus and olives. It was abandoned for a generation, but Fabio and his partner Annarelle have brought it back from the grips of wild blackberries. It’s now a REAL agriturismo where one can stay, learn about citrus and wild oranges, olive oil, and enjoy a real Sicilian meal. Each member who paid for the class received all the ingredients for the recipe from our farm, which was for a very traditional stew that included some of the smaller, younger tendrils of the plants called “tenerumi” in Italian. I bought the class for my dad for his birthday and he loved it! He loved it so much that he made the dish like 4 times in a row. It was a great way for us to connect as a family to his mother, who I never had the chance to meet, around food. He also talked with his Vietnamese neighbor about the cucuzza and he learned how they grow a similar squash they call bầu rắn. They shared their recipes for this squash.

Food is the one things we all need. I truly believe that as Anim Steel says “Food can be a vehicle for social change. It brings people together in a way that very few other activities can." As I connect to my community through farming, growing some of the crops that my grandparents grew in their homeland can make that connection more deeply rooted and authentic. My generation seems to be searching deeply for those forgotten traditions that our ancestors left behind to “fit in” to Western culture. Even though at times I can feel like an impostor claiming any ties to Italian culture, it is how I want to relate to the world and my community. I want to slow down, enjoy what grows regionally, cook seasonal meals, and embrace the vegetables that were passed up for convenience of transport. The cucuzza will now be a part of our farm’s story and a link to our families roots.

Intrigued? Want to grow some yourself? Adaptive seeds based in Oregon has them cause they are such a cool plant!
Thanks for reading - Farmer Mary