Fresh from Wellspring Charitable Gardens this Week - June 19, 2025

Fresh Today… Potatoes, Eggplant, Radishes, Green Beans, Summer Squash, Zucchini, Cucumbers, Mini Romaine Lettuce, Beets, Carrots, Garlic, Red & Green Onions, Dill, Basil, Apricots & Cherries

Using your Produce… by Julie Moreno

A simple way to use 4-5 pieces of summer squash is by making noodles. Any of the varieties can be mixed for a colorful meal or side dish. You can use a spiralizer if you have one, but a vegetable peeler, mandolin or a box grater will also work to create thin shredded pieces. Or practice your knife skills and just slice it thin and then slice your slices into strips. If your pieces are thick just cook them a little longer and less for thin slices. There is no need to cook the noodles separately.

Zucchini Noodles

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced

4-5 summer squash, shredded,

     spiralized or shaved

½ teaspoon salt

½ cup chopped tomatoes or halved

     cherry tomatoes

¼ cup shredded Parmesan cheese

¼ cup torn fresh basil leaves

¼ teaspoon freshly ground black

     pepper

* Heat the oil in a large, high-sided skillet over medium heat. Add garlic to the pan, stir and cook quickly until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the shredded zucchini and sauté for 3-7 minutes, depending on the thickness of the squash. The squash should be soft. Stir in the tomatoes and salt, cooking for 1-2 minutes more. Remove from the heat and stir in the cheese, basil and fresh ground pepper. Taste and add more salt if desired.

A Not-So-Classic Classic BLT

Summer arrives tomorrow, June 20, so today we present the first ripe tomatoes from the garden. That means it’s time to celebrate summer’s arrival with a delicious BLT Fest! Cindi's mother told her how to cook bacon using a waffle iron. Rather than simply laying the bacon side by side on grandma's vintage Sunbeam waffle maker, Cindi interlaced the strips, closed the lid, heated the cast iron grates, and cooked a crispy lattice of bacon. She then cut the lattice into four equal squares that fit perfectly on her fresh baked sandwich bread. You might try her crafty twist on the classic BLT sandwich. She also calls hers a BLT – Bacon Lattice and Tomato!

Make your own dressing…

Making your own dressing is a simple upgrade for your salad. You can mix the dressing for just one salad in your mixing bowl, or double or triple the dressing ingredients and keep the extra in the fridge for the next day. This salad uses all the traditional veggies, with a lemon-garlic dressing.

Green Salad with Lemon Vinaigrette 

1 tablespoon lemon juice          

2 tablespoons olive oil               

1 clove garlic, minced                 

½ teaspoon salt                            

5-6 cups lettuce, washed and chopped                                 

3 radishes, sliced

1 carrot, shredded

1 cucumber, sliced

1 tomato chopped

¼ cup crumbled feta cheese 

Salt and freshly ground pepper

* Combine lemon juice, olive oil, minced garlic and salt, whisking together in a large bowl.  Add in the remaining ingredients and toss gently to coat everything with the dressing.  Adjust the seasoning with salt and fresh ground pepper if needed.  Eat right away. 

Metaphors of Soil and Soul…

A Pain in the Thin

Cindi J Martin 

Tree limbs this time of year bow down with dense clusters of green, hard stone fruit that must be thinned if we are to have an abundant harvest. The practice is called cleaning in John’s Gospel. Despite how healthy cleaning sounded, when I began our gardening venture, I brought my trusted friend John to the ranch to relieve my anxiety about knocking down promising fruit. It seemed a waste, until he explained the risks of not cleaning – broken limbs and distressed trees, undersized and diseased fruit.

Intellectually I understood the practice, but a familiar pain unsettled my heart when he said to discard enough fruit so those remaining were a fist apart.  “That much!” I winced in disbelief. Uncertain and wavering, I needed his encouragement to release my hold – my control - and his reassurance that the practice would, in time, bear fruit.  Fear and doubt lingered, but as directed, I clenched my fist and thinned, knocking young fruit to the ground below.  After a few years of training with Farmer John and seeing its fruit, my confidence in the practice of thinning has grown. 

Faith in God and His Word grows in a comparable way – by trust and practice.  People of great faith often speak of fear and doubt coexisting with faith.  They say they built confidence in God by enduring the tension between belief and unbelief one experience at a time. Emily Dickenson wrote, “We both believe, and disbelieve a hundred times an hour, which keeps Believing nimble.”  She uses the present participle form of the verb believe - Believing - to show faith can be active and present even though fear or doubt are felt. Recall the desperate father who cried out to Jesus to deliver his demon possessed son; he pleaded, “I do believe, help my unbelief.” The LORD works through and despite this obvious tension. 

Thinning makes room for fruit to mature.  If the fruit of our effort is small, tasteless, or diseased, perhaps we are not thinning the excess we have crowded onto our limbs.  Trying to shoulder too much can hinder growth, break our limbs, and diminish our yields. Painful as it is, dropping promising fruit to the ground so what remains can mature and ripen requires enormous, yet nimble, faith – a faith that goes out on a limb.