South From Alaska

We've been back from our Alaska adventure for a week and, after a morning spent picking, washing and sorting tomatoes and beans, watering in the high tunnel, making a batch of oven-roasted spaghetti sauce, I'm stealing a couple of minutes of time to update the blog before working on freezing a batch of sweet corn.
We spent nearly two weeks in the Matanuska Valley in Alaska, where son Joe, Jen and their dog Niles have been making their home this past year.

The view from Joe & Jen's front yard

This area of Alaska is know for producing giant vegetables and the borough of Palmer takes full advantage of this distinction with lots of tourist promotion. Palmer is also the site of the Alaska State Fair which opens next week for its annual run.

You can read more about it at this link. http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2014/08/20/341884706/why-vegetables-get-freakish-in-the-land-of-the-midnight-sun

Of course we visited a couple of Farmers' Markets while we were visiting in Alaska and I'll post some photos of the market in Palmer in a later post.

And speaking of Farmers' Markets, we were on hand at the Potter County Farmers' Market last week with a nice supply of tomatoes, potatoes and more. That is due in a large part to the help of Elaine and Kristen Russell, who so conscientiously tended the farm in our absence. Thank you wonderful friends!

This week we'll be setting up with the other Potter County Farmers' Market vendors on Friday afternoon. Because we have evening plans, our booth will be closing up shop by 3:30 p.m. so come early if you are looking for luscious heirloom tomatoes and more!