Ready to take advantage of this gorgeous weather? Start planting your spring garden!

It's time to pre-order your certified organic transplants from JBG! Pre-order now to reserve your share of spring and summer favorites, from heirloom tomatoes and basil to table grapes and more.

Orders can be placed at jbgorganic.com/transplants for pickup at any of our farmers market locations beginning on March 1st.

If you want to pick out your plants in person, visit our Transplant Sale at the Garfield Farm greenhouses, 4008 River Road, Garfield TX 78612. The Transplant Sale will be held March 5th and March 12th.

Not sure how to get started on your garden space? We're here to help!

Farmer Brenton is hosting our first ever Organic Backyard Gardening Workshop on March 12th. Sign up and get loads of insider tips on how to create a bountiful garden space for you and your family. Everything from site selection, varieties, soil health, pest management and more will be covered. Plus, workshop members receive discounts on their transplants!

Tickets are available at jbgorganic.com/workshop - hurry before space runs out!

Washing chioggia beets in the barrel washer. Photo by Scott David Gordon

We've got spring fever right now, and with a huge spring season coming along, we're hiring!

We've got some amazing opportunities available at the farm right now. If you or someone you know is interested in organic agriculture and promoting a local food economy in Austin, we want to hear from you! Check out our current available positions:

Service Technician/Grounds Maintenance

Little romaine lettuces to be planted for Spring. Photo by Scott David Gordon

Another gorgeous week at JBG! We're staying on top of our work this week, seeding for our Transplant Sale and for the fields, harvesting loads of goodies for the busy farmers markets this weekend, and starting to take on a few new spring projects like tackling our grape trellises!

Chard looking great at the market. Photo by Scott David Gordon

A young customer checks out. Photo by Scott David Gordon

JBG's awesome market staff! Photo by Scott David Gordon

JBG market customers. Photo by Scott David Gordon

Making sure we're fully stocked on spinach! Photo by Scott David Gordon

Scott makes it out for sunrise at the farm. Photo by Scott David Gordon

Photo by Scott David Gordon

Early morning in the cilantro. Photo by Scott David Gordon

Photo by Scott David Gordon

Cilantro harvest. Photo by Scott David Gordon

Cilantro gets a close-up. Photo by Scott David Gordon

Artichokes are coming soon! Photo by Scott David Gordon

We're keeping this flowering patch for a while - the bees are just loving it! Photo by Scott David Gordon

Lettuce enjoys a deep watering early in the morning. Photo by Scott David Gordon

Rows of romaine. Photo by Scott David Gordon

Kate and Katie staying busy in the greenhouse. Photo by Scott David Gordon39

by Megan Winfrey

Is there truly anything better than mac n' cheese? I'm not talking about the stuff in the blue box - I'm talking about the rich, thick, ooey gooey, topped with bread crumbs, fancy cheese type of mac. The kind you'd willingly pay $15 for. If you're like me and have to order the house mac n' cheese at every new restaurant you try, than this recipe is for you. And if you're the kind of person who thinks mac n' cheese is just for kids, then this recipe is also for you - because my baby girl devoured it. But if you're the kind of person who doesn't much care for the combination of pasta, cream, and cheese...than I am so, very sorry.

Fennel Mac N' Cheese

• 1 c. uncooked elbow noodles
• 1 fennel bulb, chopped
• 1 1/2 tbs. flour
• 1 1/2 c. milk
• pinch of black pepper
• 1 tsp. sea salt
• 1/2 tsp. nutmeg
• 5 oz. fontina cheese, shredded
• 4 tbs. parmesan cheese, shredded
• 3 tbs. breadcrumbs
• 1 tsp. paprika
• olive oil

Prepare the pasta to al dente. While the pasta cooks, heat 1 tbs. olive oil in a pan and caramelize the fennel on medium for about 10 minutes. Stir often to keep from sticking. Set aside once finished. In the same skillet, add 2 tbs. olive oil on low heat. Add the flour, stirring constantly for about 2 minutes, to make a paste. Slowly whisk in the milk until all lumps are gone. Add the black pepper, salt, and nutmeg, then turn the heat up to medium. Whisk slowly to keep the mixture from burning on the bottom until it thickens. Add the fontina and 1 tbs. of the parmesan cheese, stir until smooth. Stir in the caramelized fennel. When the macaroni is al dente, drain it and stir into the cheese sauce.

Heat 1 tbs. olive oil over medium in a skillet. Add the breadcrumbs, remaining parmesan, and paprika, toss to coat. Brown on low for a few minutes, stirring often, until the breadcrumbs turn a deep brown and become crisp.

Spoon the mac n' cheese into a small dish, top with the breadcrumbs, and serve.

CSA Box Contents Week of Feb 15th

Katie drives the tractor for the transplanting crew. Photo by Scott David Gordon

From the Farmer's Perspective

I'm an all or nothing kind of guy - perhaps my best and perhaps my worst trait.  As I get older (and hopefully wiser), I'm slowly learning that things are not always as black and white as I like to see them, and it's helping me become a better farmer - there's a lot to be said for the middle path! In October 2014, we committed to reducing the our use of plastics at JBG. Our biggest use at the time was plastic mulch in the fields, so naturally, we decided to cut that out. I chose to go all in on this project, stopping our use of plastic mulch cold-turkey, and we learned a lot in the subsequent year. JBG hired a full time weeding crew to tend to our bare soils, and we worked as hard as we could to keep up the farm's productivity.

Hand-weeding is a tough task, and we've done a lot of it this year! Photo by Scott David Gordon

My staff warned me that jumping in two feet first was a risky move, but I convinced them to push though. I'm incredibly proud of the work we've accomplished since then.  Without plastic, we've been battling waist high weeds with all of our efforts - and some serious man (and woman) hand labor.  As we are crop planning this year, however, we are re-evaluating our use of plastic mulch. I'm starting to see the more subtle pieces of our farm puzzle, and learning that things are not as black and white as I'd like them to be. This year, we have decided to use plastic mulch in a much more limited capacity, in order to deliver our customers the high quality produce they expect from JBG. For each and every crop, we are weighing the pros and cons of using this technology and making decisions as to where it is appropriate.

Plastic mulches have a lot of benefits in the agricultural world. They keep soil temperatures higher at night, which is very important for lots of our summer crops. We weren't happy with the quality of our peppers and tomatoes last summer, which was due in part to day-night temperature fluctuations. Plastics also drastically reduce weeds and prevent water, soil, and nutrient runoff - this is one lesson we learned the hard way with heavy rain events last year. For shallow rooted crops that do poorly with weed pressure, like our onions, the use of plastic mulch will save us thousands of gallons of precious water and hundreds of hours of hand weeding.

Onions are one crop that we will try again with plastic this year. Photo by Scott David Gordon

And the plastic does wonders for our soil's microbial life.  It suppresses weeds, saving us many tractor passes over the soil and reducing compaction in the fields. Additionally, the dark and moist environment under the mulch, especially in our hot Texas summers, is the ideal environment for beneficial soil microbes. Without the mulch, the top layer of soil dries out and this biology is forced deeper and deeper to find a suitable home. High microbial activity in our upper soil layers has an additional, maybe less obvious benefit: like you and me, these microorganisms breathe oxygen and excrete carbon dioxide. The carbon dioxide produced under the mulch seeps out through the holes punched for crops, bathing our plants in individual little clouds of carbon dioxide.  Along with giving our plants a nice big CO2 boost (like an oxygen bar for humans), we are reducing our greenhouse gas emissions by ensuring that our crops turn this carbon dioxide into oxygen instead of letting it escape into the atmosphere.

Newly planted brassicas. Photo by Scott David Gordon

So, it's time for me to stop seeing the world in black and white and start looking at the bigger, more complex picture. Yes, I want to reduce our use of non-renewable materials and am committed to keeping our use of plastic mulch to a minimum at JBG. We are exploring other alternatives to plastic, including strip tillage and natural mulches like hay.  But, we also have to take into account valuable resources like water and topsoil, which plastic undoubtedly helps to conserve.  Add in there our labor costs and workloads for the farm crew, which directly affect pricing for our customers as well. Have I mentioned it's not as straightforward as I originally thought? Plastic is still plastic, no matter how you spin it, but with so many things to take into consideration, there is no single right answer. Our hope is to find the best compromise in order to make the best decisions for our farm, our community, and our planet.

For more of the farmer’s perspective, follow Brenton on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram @farmerbrenton.

Farmshare Austin is a local non-profit accelerating organic farming knowledge to scale food access in Central Texas. They need to sell just 28 more tickets to their screening in order to make the event a reality - we hope to see you there!

On Thursday March 3rd, join our friends from Farmshare Austin for a screening of Consumed, to be hosted at Regal Metropolitan 14.  Proceeds from the event will go to Farmshare to kick off their annual Amplify Austin campaign, so they need your support!

Consumed is a dramatic thriller that tells the complex story of genetically modified food. The story is anchored by a working-class, single mother on a hunt to uncover the cause of her son's mysterious illness. Interwoven are the stories of an organic farmer, the CEO of a biotechnology corporation, two scientists on the verge of a major discovery, and an ex-cop caught in the middle of it all.

Get your tickets today: http://gathr.us/screening/14128