We hope you enjoyed the tomato bounty last week!  Local heirloom tomatoes are a true luxury, we're lucky to have a farmer like Michael Borek in South Florida.  He says this season he's getting one of the best crops he's ever seen so expect to see more of his fruits often for the remainder of the CSA.  This week we are including his heirloom cherry tomatoes.  This week's share also includes some of French Farms first beets with really nice beet tops which are totally edible so please try to use them.  Beet tops are pretty much swiss chard; beets and chard are in the same family except that one was developed for it's root and the other for it's leaf. 

Among many other beautiful produce in the share this week, we're including a pretty rare tropical fruit from LNB Groves.  First of all, if you aren't familiar with LNB Groves please check out their website or their instagram.  They are a sweet family run organic fruit farm in the Redlands; they grow the most amazing variety and selection of tropical fruit; they are a true gem in our agricultural community.  We"ll be enjoying their canistel this week and hopefully other fruit in the weeks to come.  Canistel aka "eggfruit" is kind of strange, but definitely good if you catch it at the perfect moment of ripeness.  When you give it a squeeze it should be a bit soft like a ripe avocado.  The skin must be peeled because it contains a white sap that irritates the mouth, bit it's very thin like the skin of a pear and it's very easy to peel with a paring knife.  The flesh inside is a magnificent orange color an has a texture similar to baked potato, but tastes more like baked sweet potato.  It's typically eaten raw although it can be used to make a pumpkin pie substituting all or some of the cooked pumpkin with raw canistel.  LNB Groves set up a fruit smoothie booth at the Pinecrest Farmers Market every Sunday and when canistel is in season they love to use it in smoothies for it's rich and creamy consistency.  Since it's most likely new to most of you, here's a useful link to get educated about canistel and also a link to a local food blogger that made canistel flan and it looks super easy and super delicious.

Ok so finally, here's a list of the contents of this week's CSA shares:

Small Shares:
French breakfast radishes from Verde Farm
Beets from French Farm
Cherry tomatoes from Michael Borek
Eggplant from Verde Farm
Choice of bunched greens from French and Verde Farm
Lettuce from Worden Farm
Canistel fruit from LNB Groves

Large Shares:
French breakfast radishes from Verde Farm
Beets from French Farm
Cherry tomatoes from Michael Borek
Eggplant from Verde Farm
Choice of bunched greens from French and Verde Farm
Lettuce from Worden Farm
Canistel fruit from LNB Groves
Hon tsai tai from our friends
Yellow and green beans from our fields
Extra canistel