Harvesting Eggplant & Anxiously Awaiting the First Melon Harvest

Village Farm Team,

We’re just starting to harvest the first of our eggplant! Last weekend we were only able to harvest a handful for the market but this weekend we should have a more sizable harvest. Eggplants are members of the nightshade (Solanaceae) family along with tomatoes, peppers, and potatoes. Though the most common varieties are purple, eggplants can range in color from white to green to dark purple. Though eggplant doesn’t have a pronounced flavor on its own, it easily soaks up flavors in recipes like a culinary sponge. The variety shown in the photo below is called “Beatrice”. The calyx of this variety is dark purple while the eggplant itself is a lovely shade of violet.

Our crops of melons have really been gaining some size over the past couple of weeks. We currently have one variety of watermelon planted (Crimson Sweet) and three varieties of muskmelon (Sugar Cube, Milan, & Athena). We often refer to muskmelons as “cantaloupe” in America, a name derived from the French word cantaloup which was the French derivation of the Italian town of Cantalupo. Cantalupo is a town in the Italian province of Rieti and is the reputed origin of the cantaloupe melon. We’re hoping to be able to make our first harvest of melons in the next couple of weeks!

Have you had a chance to see our sunflowers? They are currently blooming in one of our planter boxes and along the edge of our cleared beds adjacent to the Farm Club plots. We have several different varieties planted, some of which produce a single, large flower, and others that are branching varieties that will produce several flowers over an extended period of time. Of the varieties planted, they range in color from deep yellow to a dark, crimson red. Sunflowers are a great option for our pollinators and once they go to seed, they make a great snack for the native bird population. Plus, they make an incredibly beautiful addition to the farm!