I know the taste of the watermelon which has been acquired by art.

Hey Lufavores,

Watermelons & Castles

The title of this week's post comes from Mark Twain, who talks about watermelons as a metaphor for life in his autobiography. No variety matches his description better than the Sweet Beauty watermelon, which many of you got a taste of last week. The Sweet Beauty is an unbelievably sweet, prize-winning variety and we've been devouring them in the office this week. You'll also find a few cool seasonal treats, including Sunrise apples (a cross between McIntosh and Golden Delicious) from our friends at Verger Biologique Maniadakis and ground cherries.

Maniadakis is one of our favorite new partners. It's a family-owned organic orchard run by Emmanuel Maniadakis. He's of Greek heritage, and loved the allure of the apple in Greek mythology. He set out to grow without using synthetic pesticides and fungicides. After a lot of research, trial, and error, he was able to use things like Kaolin clay and naturally-occurring pheromones (and also a lot of hard work) to produce incredibly delicious apples without chemicals. You can visit his orchard through the end of October if you want to check it out, harvest your very own organic apples, and explore their castle. Yep, you read that right:

(via @phillip_anna on Flickr)

(via Verger Biologique Maniadakis)

(via Robert Skinner, La Presse)

Back to the Farm

If you're on the hunt for another seasonal activity, we're also throwing our next open house on September 14th and 15th. The theme this time around is Back to School the Farm, so make sure to bring your kids and their classmates to learn about how we grow sustainably on rooftops. We'll have a biocontrol booth set up and a few other surprises, so make sure to reserve your spot now. It'll be an awesome time!

 

The bugs and the bees

The plants are steadily growing at our second farm in Laval and should be ready for harvest in just the next couple of weeks. Even now we're seeing the first strawberry tomato fruits come in, and the other 20 varieties are soon to follow. Indigo Rose is one of our favorites: it has a deep coloration and high antioxidant content; you can see some dark purple color in the plant itself. We also put in our first beehive for pollination and introduced the first ladybugs to combat harmful pests. Welcome to the team, guys! Follow the Lufa Farms greenhouse team on Facebook for the most up-to-date news.

New drop points

We're trying to open up new drop points as quickly as possible for those of you out in Laval, West Island, and South Shore. This week we're onboarding seven new drop points: Terrafolia (Dollard-des-Ormeaux), Café Bistro Monk (Ville Émard), Café Kali (Verdun), Druide & Fleurifik (Pointe Claire), CrossFit Westmount, and Crossfit Île Bizard. We're really excited to have all of them on board. If you have any suggestions for drop points in your area, drop us a line.

One of these things doesn't belong

Last but certainly not least, we wanted to thank all of you amazing Lufavores for bearing with us as we grow. This year, the community of Lufa Farms subscribers has doubled. We've been working around the clock to make sure that all of you get the best quality, most sustainable, and most delicious local treasures we can find without any errors. All of us on the team are subscribers ourselves, and we know how disappointing it can be when you planned on making your grandmother's strawberry jam but instead you receive squash as a substitute with your basket that week. (Not to diss squash jam, but we know it just isn't the same.)

(One of these things is not like the others...)

The whole Lufa Farms team and our amazing suppliers are working night and day to make this a great experience for you. If you have any problems in the meantime, don't hesitate to give us a call or send us an email and we'll do our best to make it up to you. Just to warn you: Mo might knock on your door at 1am to deliver your missing product. Sincerely–thank you all for being the best community of Lufavores we could ask for. We couldn't do this without you.

Happy September,

The Lufa Farms Team