Summer Workshops at Erda Gardens

Friends at Biodynamic CSA, Erda Gardens, are hosting some cool summer workshops. Below is their schedule.

Erda Gardens CSA members can take any of our homesteading workshops offered at Sunstone at a discount. Our regular fee is $15 the day of or $12 in advance. The discount price for Erda Gardens members is $10. See our workshop schedule at www.sunstoneherbs.com/workshops

ERDA GARDENS WORKSHOPS

• Wednesday, July1 6:00 PM PESTO- Making pesto with bountiful fresh basil. Followed by a pasta and veggie supper. Led by Penina Ballen, Pesto lover. Please RSVP by Monday, June 29, 344 – 7810.
• Saturday, July 11 1 – 3 PM The History of Food: from our Ape Ancestors to the Present. Throughout history, food revolutions include the use of fire, domestication of animals, then plants,migration, colonization, and the Industrial Revolution. We will explore our emotional, cultural.and personal experiences with food. Led by Greg Gould, foodologist. Please RSVP to 344-7810.
• Sunday, July 12, 6-8 PM Intro to Biodynamics, with our farmers Jimmy and Spiral location- Sanchez farm
• Sunday, July 19 1 – 3 PM. Intro to Permaculture with Michael Reed. Location- Blake farm
• Monday, July 20, 6- 8 PM Biodynamic Farming Series: Cosmic Rythms and working with the Calendar, led by farmers Jimmy and Spiral. Location- Blake farm
• Sunday, July 28, 10:00 AM – noon HERBS, Medicine Making with Dr. Rasa at the Blake Farm.

Garlic Harvest

Here are some photos are our first garlic harvest of the season. This is a softneck garlic variety called Inchelium Red. We purchased beautiful seed stock from Jesse Daves of Amyo Farms here in New Mexico and were rewarded with gorgeous large bulbs. Note the garlic leaves are quite brown. For braiding, it would have been better to harvest the garlic several weeks ago when there are at least four green leaves left, but life gets in the way, and the garlic is still delicious. It just won’t braid as nicely.

Next week we will start harvesting the hardneck garlic varieties from seed stock we brought from New York. We didn’t manage to save very much seed stock from last year since most of the garlic was covered with a dumptruck load of compost at the community farm where we were growing. We will keep all of our hardneck varieties for replanting this year. If you have room to plant garlic in your garden, buy your seed stock now at your local farmers’ market. Store it in a cool, dry place until late September or October (depending on your climate). Plant the individual cloves and enjoy your harvest the following June or July. Hardneck varieties are generally harvested later than the softneck. If you’re not sure which type you have, the hardneck will grow a scape with a bulbil at the top. The softneck won’t have the scape. – Jen

Jen hangs the garlic to cure under our front porch.

Eggs for Sale

Enjoy the incomparable taste of eggs grown from a backyard flock. These are no anemic store bought eggs. Our happy hens freely range with our goats, dining on grains, goat milk, bugs and weeds so their yolks are deep yellow to orange. The eggshells range in color from dark brown to pale pink. Gorgeous! $3.00 per dozen. Email us at orders@sunstoneherbs.com

Eggs for Sale