Cucumbers: Assorted varieties
Head Lettuce: Assorted varieties
Jubilee Snacking Tomato Mix
Kale Mix
Onions: Candy
Peppers-Sweet: Assorted varieties
Potatoes: Kennebec
Summer Squash: Assorted varieties
Tomatoes: Assorted slicers
and perhaps one of the following: (Please see the note after “🥕 Storage & Handling Notes” below.)
Bean Mix
Eggplant: Asian
Okra: Bowling Red &/or Candle Fire
Shishito Peppers
🌿Herb It! option: Lettuce Leaf Basil, Orange Thyme, Curly Parsley
🧉Jam It! option: Peach Jam & Lime Berry Jam
🧂Spice it Up! option: Pink Celery Salt
💙 Farmer Favorite: Candy Onions
🌿 Something New to Try: Sweet Peppers
🎉 First of the Season: full-sized tomatoes for everyone!
🌡️ Notable Event: Potatoes are harvested!!
Here we are at Week 10—halfway through the Bounty Box season already! I can hardly believe it.
It’s probably no surprise by now when I say it was a busy week on the farm. The huge push was getting the potatoes harvested. We dug about 3,000 row feet of potatoes and I'll be honest - it was pretty brutal. It was 90-95° with not much breeze and even with the tractor-pulled plow, it is hard work. Every one of those potatoes is picked up by hand, usually while crawling along on our hands and knees. This year we tried pulling our harvest crates in utility sleds and it was a BIG improvement. Curious what it all looks like? Here’s a video short we made of the fun. Want to make a guess at how many pounds of potatoes we harvested this year? Click the comment button below. We’ll reveal the winner with the closest guess next week!
We also dug into the onion and shallot harvest and have made good headway there. At this point we have all of the shallots out and about 3/4 of the onions. It’s such a relief to get these out before the big rains forecast this week. Now we just have to figure out where to put them all to cure…no one wants a repeat of the Great Onion Drop of 2025!
We continue to make progress getting the fall crops planted and are caught up on the fall transplanting (for now). But more seeding is on the schedule for later this week.
We’re sending out the first of the sweet peppers and eggplants this week. Both crops really suffered with the earlier wet weather (and rabbits!) and have been slow to rally and ripen, but their time has finally come. We’ve got just enough for everyone to get a taste of pepper and the eggplants are on the “perhaps” list, but their production should pick up in the coming weeks.
A couple of crops are headed the opposite way…cucumbers and summer squashes are really struggling right now and we foresee their seasons ending sooner than later. Many of the cukes were at baby stage during the last storm and they got banged around on the trellis causing scaring on the skin. They are still good eating quality, but they look a bit ugly. Those storms, and insect pressure have affected both the squash and cucumber plants so get ready to say farewell shortly.
Tomato Season is On!
Last week you met the cherry tomatoes. This week it's time to meet the rest of the tomato family! (all except Dark Star, Granadero and Marmalade are heirlooms):
Azoycha: Lemon-yellow medium-sized fruits with sweet, yet rich flavor.
Black Krim: Medium “black” tomato with big, high acid flavor.
Cosmonaut Volkov: medium-large red slicer with a full-rich flavor
Dark Star: Dark red/purple tomato with rich, tangy flavor.
Dr. Wychee Yellow: Large orange tomato with meaty, rich tasting flavor.
Granadero: Red plum tomato with thick-walled fruit; ideal for fresh tomato sauces, salsas, and salads
Green Zebra: Small, 2 1/2” olive yellow with green stripes and a sweet zingy flavor
John Baer: meaty red heirloom slicer
Marmalade: golden-orange, Japanese tomato with a succulent, sweet/low acid flavor.
Paul Robeson: Large, brick-red fruits with dark green shoulders. Has a sweet, rich, smoky flavor.
Pantano Romanesco: A large, deep red Roman heirloom. The flesh is very rich, flavorful & juicy.
Redfield Beauty: 3”– 4” flat pink fruits with excellent, full flavor.
Rutgers: large, red with excellent flavor for fresh eating or canning
White Queen: Medium-sized, smooth white-skinned tomato with sweet, juicy flesh, low acid.
Wisconsin 55: A flavorful medium-sized variety that is juicy, firm and ideal for slicing, cooking, and salads
A final reminder about the little member bonus we announced last week. When we order our cases of spice jars for our Seasonal Seasonings, they always come with 2 packages of spice jar labels. They are quite comprehensive collections. If anyone would like to update their spice jars or just play around with a bunch of “spicy” stickers, we’d be happy to share them with you. Just click the comment button below and let me know you’d like a package of them and we’ll bring them along with your Box next week.
As we mentioned in our earlier emails, this year we’re celebrating not only our 20th Bounty Box season, but also the people who made it possible: YOU.
Each week we’re drawing a name from our membership list to receive a surprise from the farm. It might be one of our favorite kitchen tools, a product from the BGF Pantry, a product from one of our favorite local makers, or another fun farm-inspired treat.
This week’s winner is: Sandy T.!
Sandy’s gift is one of our favorite eco-friendly kitchen items - a package of reusable cotton kitchen towels from Hand-Me-Down Talents in Indianola. We LOVE these for wrapping around leafy greens before storing them in a plastic bag. They’re also a great way to reduce paper towel use in the kitchen.
Congratulations, Sandy! We appreciate you!
And good luck to everyone in next week’s drawing. There’s lots more fun to come!
Twenty years ago, during our first Bounty Box season, we only grew lettuce during the spring, fall and winter as it is a cool-weather plant. It took years of trial and error, but today summer lettuce has become one of those little victories that reminds us how much we've learned over the past twenty seasons.
If you’ve ever wondered why we grow so many different tomatoes, this week is your answer. Every variety brings something unique to the table—different colors, shapes, textures, sweetness, acidity, and rich tomato flavor. Some are perfect for sandwiches, others shine in salads, while a few are destined for sauces or fresh salsa.
This week’s mix includes heirlooms alongside a few modern varieties, each chosen because it earns its place in the field. Don’t worry if they aren’t perfectly round or grocery-store smooth. Some of the funniest-looking tomatoes are often the ones with the biggest flavor.
💡 Pro Tip: Store tomatoes at room temperature, never in the refrigerator, until they’re fully ripe (or cut). Cold temperatures dull both flavor and texture. If you can’t use them right away, refrigerate them only after they’re fully ripe, then bring them back to room temperature before eating.
🍽️ Simple Recipe: Tomato, Basil & Candy Onion Salad
Slice tomatoes and sweet onions, scatter with torn basil leaves, drizzle with olive oil, season generously with salt and pepper, and finish with a splash of balsamic vinegar if you’d like. Sometimes the simplest recipes are the best.
🍽️ Bonus Recipe: Roasted Tomatoes with Thyme and Feta
This is one of those weeks when less really is more.
When tomatoes are fresh from the field, there is one meal on constant replay at our house. We make a big pot of pasta (penne rigate is our favorite), then set out bowls of chopped tomatoes, sweet onions, chopped greens, fresh basil, feta or Parmesan cheese, garlic-infused olive oil, and balsamic vinegar. Sometimes we add cooked Graziano sausage, too. Everyone builds their own bowl with whatever sounds good that day.
The best part? It’s just as delicious reheated the next day for lunch.
Save the elaborate recipes for January. August tomatoes deserve the spotlight all by themselves.
Here’s our downloadable one-page guide to storing all things produce!
This section contains the crop-specific storage information, handling suggestions, and preparation tips for everything in this week’s box.
CHERRY TOMATOES: Store cherry tomatoes at room temperature, out of direct sunlight, until fully ripe for the best flavor and texture. Once ripe, they can be refrigerated if needed to extend their life by a few days, but allow them to come back to room temperature before eating for the fullest flavor. Wash just before using.
CUCUMBERS: Store unwashed cucumbers wrapped in a cotton towel in a sealed plastic bag in the vegetable crisper bin for about a week. Keep cucumbers tucked far away from tomatoes, apples, and citrus—these give off ethylene gas that accelerates cucumber deterioration. You can do a lot of fancy things to the skin of a cucumber, but when it is young, fresh (and unwaxed), it really only needs to be thoroughly washed. However, if the skin seems tough or bitter you can remove it; if the seeds are bulky, slice the cucumber lengthwise and scoop them out.
EGGPLANT: Store eggplant at cool room temperature if you'll use it within a day or two. For longer storage, refrigerate it in the crisper drawer and use within 5–7 days. Wash just before using. Eggplant tastes best when cooked soon after harvest and doesn't need to be peeled unless the skin is unusually tough.
All of your GREENS will keep best if stored in a plastic bag, with the top folded over and placed in the produce drawer of your refrigerator. We find the longest storage is achieved by having a layer of cotton or paper towel between the greens and the plastic. If leaves become limp, retrim the ends and a quick soak in cold water will often restore their crispness.
OKRA: Store unwashed okra dry in a paper towel or cloth-lined plastic bag in the vegetable drawer of your refrigerator. Use within 3–5 days for the best quality. Wash only just before cooking, and avoid sealing damp pods in plastic, as excess moisture will cause them to spoil quickly. Young, tender pods can be sliced whole, while larger pods are often best for stews or gumbo.
ONIONS: These onions have been partially cured, so they'll keep longer than fresh onions but aren't ready for long-term storage quite yet. Store them in a cool, dry, well-ventilated place out of direct sunlight for up to several weeks. If your kitchen is especially warm, you can refrigerate them to extend their life. Their sweet, mild flavor makes them wonderful for sandwiches, salads, grilling, roasting, and fresh salsas.
SHISHITO PEPPERS: Keep in a loosely closed bag in the crisper drawer and use within a week. To prepare, toss whole peppers in a hot skillet with a little oil until blistered, then sprinkle with salt.
SUMMER SQUASH/ZUCCHINI: Refrigerate unwashed zucchini and summer squash for up to a week and a half in a perforated plastic bag or in a sealed plastic container lined with a kitchen towel. These do not need to be peeled to use, just slice them up and go!
SWEET PEPPERS: Store unwashed peppers in the vegetable drawer of your refrigerator for up to two weeks. They are delicious raw, grilled, roasted, or sautéed, and there's no need to peel them. If you won't use them right away, peppers also freeze beautifully—just slice, remove the seeds, and freeze.
** NOTE: You will notice over the course of the season that some box contents listed above say “Perhaps one of the following...” These are items that we can’t harvest in sufficient quantities for the whole CSA to receive at one time. We do track who gets what and we will do our best to ensure that everyone eventually receives each item. On some items this may take several weeks, so please be patient.
Need extra produce this week?
Our VegEmail program makes it easy to order additional vegetables, pantry items, flowers, eggs, cheese, baked goods, and more from Blue Gate Farm and our partner producers.
Place your order here by Thursday at noon and pick up Saturday at:
SingleSpeed Brewing (Downtown Des Moines)
Grand Theater (Knoxville)
It’s one more way we’re helping make local food easy.
You’ve seen our photos—now we’d love to see yours.
Share pictures of your Bounty Box haul, your favorite recipe, your 20th Delight gift, your garden-inspired dinner, or even your kids (or pets!) helping unpack the box. Email, text, or post them in the Blue Gate Farm Community group.
We’ll feature member photos throughout the season.
Facebook: Blue Gate Farm
Community Group: Blue Gate Farm Community
Instagram: @bluegatefarmfresh
Questions? Just hit reply or click the comment button below
Thank you for being part of the farm this season. We’re so glad you’re here!
Best from the farm,
— Jill and Sean & the whole BGF Crew
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