How we store vegetables through Winter
People ask us all the time how we store fresh-looking, beautiful vegetables for months and months into winter. While there's a lot that goes into growing and prepping veggies for long-term storage, maintaining the right temperatures and humidity are the most important. Our storage building was built for this purpose!
Climate control
We maintain two basic sets of conditions: cold/damp and warm/dry. The root veggies like carrots, beets, and parsnips, as well as the cabbages and kales all appreciate cold/damp storage conditions. We climate control this half of the building at 32 degrees F and 95-98% relative humidity throughout the winter. Winter squash, pumpkins, onions, and garlic prefer drier conditions around 65% relative humidity. We maintain this space at 50 degrees F while the squash and pumpkins last and lower the temp to around 40 F after that. We mostly control conditions with fans, coolers, and heaters on thermostats and humidifiers or dehumidifiers on humidistats.
The building
Our storage building is designed to be both functional and energy-efficient. We built it in 2021 with help from a Farm Service Agency loan and built into the hillside to use the earth as a temperature buffer. The building is well-insulated and sealed to protect our precious cargo from the harsh winter conditions outside, and it gives us space to process and package veggies during the winter. Think of it as a modern root cellar!
Containers
We use containers to both consolidate and organize all the different vegetables and varieties we grow and store. For things we have a lot of, such as orange carrots, we use bulk super-sacks made of woven polypropylene. Each one can hold 800-1,000 lb. of veggies when full! For our specialty varieties, we use smaller plastic totes. Inside both the sacks and the totes, we line the bottoms of containers with burlap and peat moss to soak up excess moisture.