Somehow it’s September already. August seemed to evaporate in the heat and the haze and just like that there’s a change of season here at Hutchins. And despite the extreme weirdness of this current moment, we hear echoes of the more “normal” rhythms of a typical season- some of our crew members returned to college (as they do), our high school crew members’ schedules change this week, and the urgency of bringing in the fall crops, like potatoes, winter squash and storage cabbage, becomes more acute as the days wane and sharpen. Just like every other year.
While the calendar says September, the weatherman still keeps sending us an occasional summer day, but the light slants differently, the air feels drier, and the margins of the day slowly close in, the expanding nights still a-riot with life. This time of year brings forth the best that New England has to offer: our crop variety and abundance are on the increase and the gamut of both summer and fall produce is on display in all its glory. Summer crops like tomatoes, eggplant, and peppers are still coming on, with the late summer/early fall veggies like winter squash, potatoes, turnips, and winter radishes beginning to make appearances, accompanied by the season-long stalwarts like lettuce, kale, arugula and chard.
Because of Covid-19, the annual Ag Day market in downtown Concord will not be happening – instead, Concord’s Agriculture Committee will host the 15th annual Ag Day as Concord Ag Week this year! Fun agricultural events and specials will be going on at farms all around town. Please see www.concordagday.com for more information. The Ag Committee is also hosting a raffle associated with Ag Week: Post a fun photo of yourself at a Concord farm during the week of September 8 -12, 2020 on Instagram and tag @farmsofconcord to enter to win a farm bounty basket! (You can also email your photo to melissa@barrettsmillfarm.com to enter without an Instagram account.)
During Ag Week here at Hutchins we will be awarding the 100th customer of each day with a prize of a giant storage Kossak kohlrabi – they’re wonderful conversation pieces, keep for ages (which gives you a lot of time to figure out what to do with them), and are guaranteed to sate even the most ravenous kohlrabi enthusiast.
And in lieu of a traditional tour, on Saturday September 12th Liza will be attempting to host an all day virtual tour of what goes on all day at Hutchins Farm on Instagram stories – please check out @hutchins_farm to follow along throughout the day depicting “A day in the life of Hutchins” – we hope to also be able to put the slideshow together in a video in the week afterwards so everyone without an Instagram account can view it – please check out our website for an eventual link!
We hope to see you soon (and get excited about those storage kohlrabi!)
-Brian Cramer, Liza Bemis, and the Hutchins Farm Team
Photo: Behold! The Kossak Kohlrabi!
Photo: Cold front coming through the end of August