Fresh from Wellspring Charitable Gardens - July 10, 2025

Fresh Today… Heirloom Slicing

& Cherry Tomatoes, Eggplant, Summer Squash, Cucumbers, Lettuce, Carrots, Garlic, Green Onions, Red or Yellow Onions, Basil, Lavender, Apricots, Plums & White Peaches

Using your Produce… by Julie Moreno

Many years ago now, I heard a chef speak about how he would grill vegetables and then marinate them after cooking, so that the flavor soaks in before serving. And after having many experiences with grease flare ups from my oiled squash it makes perfect sense to me. You do need to start with a clean hot grill before placing your vegetables on the heat, but this has worked wonders for me. This Grilled Squash Salad takes advantage of this method. Charred strips of squash are cooled, diced, and marinated in a simple dressing of olive oil, lemon juice, salt, and pepper. Cherry tomatoes and fragrant basil are added just before serving, to keep their flavors fresh. Enjoy this as a light side dish for dinner or with a slice of cheese and sourdough bread for lunch.

 Grilled Squash Salad

with Tomatoes, Lemon and Basil

3-4 pieces squash, cut into thick strips

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1 teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon pepper

1 cup cherry tomatoes, cut in half

3-4 tablespoons chopped basil

* Grill the squash on a hot grill until lightly charred on each side. Remove from the grill and let cool for 5-10 minutes. Dice the cooked squash and drizzle with the oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper. Stir the squash and let it sit for 15 minutes. Add in the tomatoes and basil then serve.

Caprese Salad

I love a recipe where its picture is worth a thousand directions! What can be simpler and more satisfying than Caprese salad? Slice and layer ripe tomatoes and fresh mozzarella, interlace fresh basil, drizzle with extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar of Modena, and finish with sprinkles of flaky sea salt and fresh ground pepper. Done and delicious! You may also enjoy a savory variant of this traditional Italian salad that substitutes smoked provolone cheese for the fresh mozzarella. Either way, you will be serving a culinary masterpiece worthy of a picture.

Tomato Salsa…

All summer I will make salsa with our tomatoes, peppers, and onions. This simple Pico de Gallo is an easy recipe to master. You can adjust the heat by using mild or spicy peppers.

Pico de Gallo

3 large tomatoes, diced small

½ cup red or white onion, finely diced

1-2 hot peppers, finely diced

1 clove garlic, minced

3-4 tbsp. cilantro, coarsely chopped

1 tbsp. lemon or lime juice

½ tsp. salt

½ tsp. fresh ground black pepper

* Combine all ingredients and let sit for 15-20 minutes before serving, if possible.

Metaphors of Soil and Soul… 

The Uncomfortable Way to Comfort 

Cindi J Martin

My mom was one of nine children born to sharecroppers working Santa Rosa farms during the 1920’s and 30’s. Those Depression years were inexpressibly hard for her, so our venture into farming called forth unspeakably sore memories of her poverty, deprivation, and shame. Still casting dark shadows in her mind today are painful memories of her dad slaughtering, then butchering, beloved rabbits and chickens to feed his large family. Like many of her generation, she was told to simply get over the hurt and just move on.

Few families in modern urban and suburban landscapes now grow vegetables or raise livestock for food, let alone slaughter and butcher animals to feed the family. The act is abhorrent. Ironically, our children are entertained by untold hours of staged dramas depicting wanton violence and brutal deaths, but they are shielded from the reality of viewing the lifeless body of a loved one or beloved pet. In so doing, we withhold a natural occasion to impart an essential emotional and relational skill: healthy grieving of painful loss. Encounters with death acquaint children with landscapes of sorrow that are native to life. In farming, we traverse this familiar terrain often. We process disappointment, loss, death, and deferred hope throughout the growing seasons and the life/death cycles of our garden plants and livestock. Certainly, children and sometimes adults need support to embrace, rather than avoid or deny, the intense and disturbing feelings natural to grief.

Years back I first faced a hideous but common farm reality. Marauding raccoons had savaged our Wellspring chickens late one night, slaughtering 21 of our 25 laying hens. Going to gather eggs from “the ladies” the next morning, I stumbled through blood-stained feathers, torn wings, twisted legs, and headless corpses scattered outside the coop and over the nearby fields. Horrified, I fell headlong into grieving – expressing shock, denial, anger, sadness, and guilt (aka “what if’s”). Looking back, I am grateful for my garden friends who let me – uncensored - express the raw feelings that described the raw carnage that had broken my heart. They didn’t try to talk me through the sorrow or cheer me out of it. They embraced me in it, joining my pain with their tears and hearing the expressed horror of my loss without judgment or rebuke.  That is grieving – working through the loss despite the pain.

We adults may think children or other adults morbid for wanting to know details about the death of a loved one, but that is precisely what is needed to work through the pain of grief. It’s counterintuitive, but acknowledging, expressing, and embracing the broken heart heals it. We get stuck in grief not by focusing on it for a time, but by denying or avoiding it.  We are told in Psalm 23 that the path to comfort leads “through the Valley of the Shadow of Death” - not around it, over it, or under it, but through it with the LORD. Jesus confirms the way: “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”