By Ali
With all the abundance recently, and hot crop harvest inching closer, I have been feeling especially inspired to get more creative in the kitchen. I owe a lot to farming for healing my relationship to food. The curse of centering so much of your life around understanding nutrition, health, and its function within the human body is that I am easily pulled into restrictive and rigid ways of centering it in my life.
Being able to interact with my food through farming has changed the way I relate to it. I am getting closer and closer to no longer seeing food purely as micro and macronutrients, something to fear, or something to be studied and analyzed, but as something living, relational, and a way of exchanging with the earth.
My salads have been bringing me a lot of joy recently, with bright crisp radishes, cucumbers, fennel, and herbs of all sorts. The beauty and vibrancy of the crops make my heart feel so big. Most Thursday afternoons, two of us farmers cook a big meal for the whole crew an hour before our usual lunch time. I really love being able to collaborate, care for each other, and enjoy the fruits of our labor. I feel so privileged to be able to eat in a way that truly reflects my environment.
Open Field Farm 2026 | The "ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW" guide for members
Upcoming Event: Potluck Friday 6/12 at 6 pm
CSA Barn Hours:
Summer hours: 2:30-6:30 pm
Pick List:
Eggs
Nicola Yellow and Fingerling potatoes
Pink Beauty Radishes
Hakurei Turnips
Dragon Fennel
Parade Scallions
Alto Leeks
Cocozelle and Dark Star Summer Squash
Rhubarb Red Chard
Madeley and Dazzling Blue Kale
Champion Collards
Regiment Spinach
Lettuce
Basil, Cilantro, Dill, and Parsley
Strawberries
Whole Dried Hot Peppers
Herbal Tea Blends
Pick your own flowers and herbs
Filigreen Farm Blueberries for sale
Beef Bone Broth (Made by Olla Products)
Apollo Olive Oil
Revolution Bread available
Open Field Farm Swag!
4-Ingredient Naturally Carbonated Strawberry Soda by Anne-Marie Bonneau
Ingredients
1 cup sweet strawberries, cut into small 1/2-inch pieces
½ cup sugar, granulated, sucanat, rapadura or coconut sugar
4 cups water
2 tablespoons lemon juice
Instructions
Stir water and sugar together in a jar with a capacity of at least six cups. The sugar will dissolve fairly quickly. Add the strawberries to the jar. Stir. Close the lid on the jar or cover with a cloth secured tightly with a string or rubber band.
Stir the contents daily.
After about five days, depending on your kitchen environment, the drink will start to bubble. Continue to allow it to ferment and taste it daily. During hot summer weather, I let the drink in this post ferment in the jar for eight or nine days. Warm weather speeds up the fermentation. Cold weather slows it down.
When you like the flavor, strain your drink through a sieve placed over a large measuring cup or a bowl. Set these berries aside. Stir the lemon juice into the drink. Use a funnel to fill clean, flip-top bottles, leaving at least 2 inches of headspace. Set the bottles aside for 2 days or longer, ideally in a box in a cool garage or cupboard to contain potential explosions. The longer the drink ferments, the more sugar the microbes will eat and the less sweet the soda will taste.
ALWAYS BURP YOUR BOTTLES! In other words, open the bottles just enough to release some of the carbon dioxide building up inside. You want your drink carbonated but not explosive. Burp the bottles at least every couple of days or every day if you live in a hot, humid area.
If, when attempting to burp your bottle, the drink begins to gush out, burp it more frequently as it continues to ferment or move it to the refrigerator where it will calm down. If you’re new to fermentation, you may want to burp your bottles outside in case they start to gush out and make a big mess.
If, after burping your bottle, only a small hiss of carbon dioxide escapes, burp your bottles less frequently. You don’t want so much carbon dioxide to escape that the drink becomes flat. Because strawberries tend to create lots of carbonation, you likely won’t have this problem.
When you’re ready to drink your soda, move the bottles to the refrigerator to chill for a few hours before serving. Your drink will continue to ferment in the refrigerator but more slowly. Over time, it will become less sweet. If you won’t drink it for a couple of weeks, burp the refrigerated bottles.
Optional, Highly Recommended Step:
After you strain the strawberries, you can make a smaller batch of this. The still-sweet strawberries, now teeming with those fast-reproducing bacteria and yeast, will ferment this next batch quickly and it will likely begin to bubble within a day or so. However, because the strawberries have gone through one infusion, they will render a weaker tasting drink. Make this batch more concentrated. Combine ¼ cup sugar and 2 cups of water with the reserved strawberries. Proceed as with the first infusion. My second batch has less fizz but it still tastes very good.