Thought this article from the Times might be of interest:
Link to Original Article
October 17, 2007
Local Carrots With a Side of Red Tape
By KIM SEVERSON
THE dirt on Richard Ball’s farm in Schoharie County is 15 feet deep, rich with minerals and perfect for growing sweet carrots.
About 150 miles south, the New York City schools serve 850,000 meals a day. Some of them contain carrots. But the carrots come from other states.
So Mr. Ball and a group of people dedicated to getting local food into cafeterias had an idea: Why not feed New York City schoolchildren New York State carrots?
“I thought, here we are two and half or three hours away from the largest appetite in the country,” Mr. Ball said. “Let’s connect the dots.”
It seemed so simple. But after nearly two years of meetings, tests and negotiations, local carrots have yet to hit the lunch table. “The logistics are very complicated,” said David Berkowitz, who runs the city’s school food program. “While we have every intention of moving forward to purchase these carrots, there are no guarantees.”
The premise was an easy sell. The carrot project would help farmers who now mostly grow varieties best suited for the frozen food industry to diversify. Local carrots would be fresher, tastier and take less fuel to ship. And children might even eat more of them.
But as the carrot project supporters learned, it’s hard to change entrenched systems, whether agricultural or bureaucratic.
Around the country dozens of farm-to-school programs are trying to get local food back into the schools. In New York City, some of that work falls to the SchoolFood Plus organization.
Under its umbrella, there have been some successes. For the past two summers, most of the stone fruit in New York city schools has been local, and some of the frozen food served in cafeterias is, too.
But the advocates’ pride and joy is the small plastic bag of sliced New York apples. Since they were introduced in 2005, the school district has gone through several million bags, and public school children are eating four times as many apples as they used to, said Mr. Berkowitz.
So why not do the same thing with carrots?
Although food purists might argue that simply slicing local carrots is the best way to feed children, handling fresh carrots is too labor-intensive for a district trying to feed hundreds of thousands of children a day on a tight budget.
Individual packages make it easier for the school district to meet Department of Agriculture nutritional guidelines, assuring that the main source of funding for public school lunch continues, Mr. Berkowitz said. Also, he said, students are more likely to consume carrots if they are easy and fun to eat.
Since the district already serves more than 285,000 pounds of bagged baby carrots from other states, substituting New York carrots seemed an easy solution, said Karen Karp, a food industry consultant who was working with the school district and state agriculture officials to get more local food into schools.
She knew Jerry Dygert, an Essex County food processor, because he packages the apple slices. Together, they set out to find some local carrots that could be used in schools.
This was a surprisingly difficult step. Baby carrots are actually fully grown vegetables that are whittled down to size. Most growers in California, where the baby carrot was born almost 20 years ago, use a variety called Sugar Snax.
In New York, most of the roughly 2,000 acres devoted to carrots are planted with a different variety better suited for processing. And since an actual contract with the school district seemed a long way off, it was a rare farmer who was willing to take a chance on planting something new.
“The hardest thing for a farmer is to grow something and then discover there’s no customer for it,” said Mr. Ball.
But Mr. Ball believes it’s time to get local food back in the mouths of school children. So he took a chance and grew a small test patch of Sugar Snax.
By last fall, they were ready. Ms. Karp and Mr. Ball went to Mr. Dygert’s processing plant to see if the test carrots could be turned into babies. It was a bust. It turns out that New York soil doesn’t grow the best Sugar Snax. And grinding grown-up carrots into babies makes a lot of waste. That day, they lost about 70 percent of each carrot.
“Probably the most depressing day of my life last year was that test day,” Ms. Karp said. “The farmer had tears in his eyes.”
The solution, they decided, was to forget about baby carrots and make something shaped like a coin, which would create less waste and better suit the Nantes variety or a Nantes-Imperator cross, which grow well in New York. They added a crinkle cut, so the coins would better hold some kind of dip. Mr. Dygert’s crew came up with a bag decorated with carrots doing sit-ups.
Thus, Carrot Crunchers were born.
Back at the School Food office, Mr. Berkowitz agreed to test the Carrot Crunchers at a half-dozen schools in June. But they had to use carrots from other states because New York carrots weren’t available. Still, they were a hit.
Before the farmers could start planting the right carrots and Mr. Dygert could invest in new equipment to cut the carrots into coins, Mr. Berkowitz had to figure out how to battle a bureaucracy that seems tilted away from local food.
“It’s not a question of just saying I believe in local products and I’ll buy them next week,” he said.
The district buys food from four approved distributors, who are required by federal and local laws to seek out the least expensive product that will meet its specifications. School districts that spend federal money on food cannot give preferential treatment to local products, although a provision in the 2007 Farm Bill being debated in Congress might change that.
With the apple slices, a deft hand with the specification-writing solved the problem. The district ordered Empire apples sliced in a way that matched Mr. Dygert’s product. Since few other processors are making the bagged apples and Mr. Dygert’s price is the best, the distributors who supply the district are able to fill the order with his product.
Carrots are trickier in part because there is still no agreement on which kind of New York carrot is the best one to use. And although New York produces enough apples to keep the district supplied all year, carrots are a different matter. They can be stored for several months, but the district needs a year-round supply.
The specifications would have to be written in such a way that carrots from other states could be substituted when the local supply ran low. And they would have to cost no more than the district is already paying for carrots.
So everyone waited. And waited. The school year started, and still no carrots.
But the moment is close. Earlier this month, the price was set and the distributors were cleared to buy the carrots. A new batch of Mr. Ball’s carrots are in storage and the rest are ready to be harvested. He has about 20 tons in all.
Mr. Dygert said yesterday that as soon as he gets an order from the district, he will have to ship the carrots to Michigan or Vermont to be cut and shipped back to him for bagging. Until he is sure he will have enough business from the schools, he didn’t want to invest in special coin-cutting equipment.
So maybe, just maybe, New York school children will be eating local carrots by the end of the month.
“It’s like herding cats, but if we don’t start talking about it’s never going to happen,” said Mr. Ball, who hopes to persuade other carrot growers to take a risk and plant some carrots for the schools next spring.
“We spent the last 40 years getting out of the local food business so I figure it’s going to take a few years to turn that around.”
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
Collected Notes from Windflower Farm 10/2/2007
Notes from Windflower Farm - #13
It has been very dry here. I’ve said that dry years are better than wet ones, but this one has started to wear on me: the corn is “strappy,” lettuces have bolted, celeriac and leeks have stagnated, and hillsides are turning brown. Vegetable fields require an inch and a half of rainfall every week. Except for a brief shower that took place during our open house on the farm, accompanied by a spectacular electrical storm that was perhaps the weekend highlight for our friends from the city, it had not rained here in ages. The last appreciable rainfall took place so long ago that I cannot remember exactly when. Rainfall in summer is typically a localized phenomenon, and our frustration has only mounted as we have watched several storms travel across the southern horizon. Farmers not more than ten miles from here have told us that it’s rained regularly where they are. Finally, to our tremendous relief, it rained here last night and most of today. I cheer because there are crops on our farm—including the late squash and fall spinach and salad greens out back—that the irrigation guns can’t reach, and an all-day rain was needed for them to make a good crop. I cheer because we can take time off from hauling pipes, and because, softened by the rain, we can now prepare land for our fall garlic planting and for establishing cover crops.
Notes from Windflower Farm - #14
It didn’t freeze last night, but we were prepared—the threat of frost was all the talk among weather forecasters and farmers here. Temperatures during September have been nine degrees below normal, and it seemed as though an early frost might take place. South of here, at a friend’s farm near Great Barrington, MA, there was a light frost, but he said it did little damage. Although 75 miles to our south, it turns out they typically experience their first frost of the season a full week before we do because of their mountains. On average, September 29th is when we experience our first frost. We are located on a fairly high plateau, and because the coldest air slinks along valley bottoms, we often escape the area’s first light frosts. But we spent a part of the weekend covering crops anyway. By placing 30 X 400’ sheets of Typar directly over the tops of crops like peppers and basil and lettuces that cannot handle freezing temperatures, we can provide them with four or five degrees of protection. The covers will also help some late-planted greens and squashes mature more quickly. Still, a killing frost that even Typar cannot protect against will likely come in the next few weeks.
Notes from Windflower Farm - #15
The transition from summer to fall crops is underway here. As tomatoes, summer squashes and peppers complete their decline, fall greens, winter squashes, parsnips, and late broccoli will begin to arrive in your shares. We started harvesting potatoes last week. Last year, we dug all our potatoes by hand—two acres of them—with a middle-buster plow, two pitch forks, and a small but determined harvest crew. I vowed that I’d find the parts necessary for restoring our John Deere Model #25 potato digger during the winter. It possesses two side-by-side digging chains, each made of 132 pieces of 27-inch chain, and two now-obsolete drive mechanisms. The year before, a chain link had busted, shooting all 132 links from one side into the air, sidelining the machine for the season. Thanks to the internet, I found the parts I needed on an old digger sitting in a hedgerow in Michigan. Freshly reassembled and lubricated, I pulled my digger out of the barn last week. The first pass across the field was uneventful. Little red potatoes rose up out of the soil, traveled along the digging chains, hopping and bouncing along with large rocks and weeds, while soil particles and small stones fell through the chains back to the ground. The potatoes then slipped off the back end of the digger in a wide, neat row on top of the bed, waiting for the harvest crew to pick them up and place them into totes. The Model #25 was an engineering marvel back in 1958, and is a significant step above our middle buster and pitchforks.
On the second pass, a rock lodged between the frame and chains, bending several links before grinding the machine to a halt and stalling the tractor. I managed to free the rock with help from a long, steel pry bar, and was soon rolling again. At some point during the third pass, one of two large drive chains fell off the digger, but, because it didn’t affect the functioning of the machine, I tucked it into my tool box and kept going. By now, the harvest crew had begun picking the potatoes off the ground, and yields appeared good. The next three passes were trouble-free, and we had managed to squirrel away a four-week supply of potatoes. Midway through the last trip across the field, I noticed smoke coming from a universal joint and then, with a crack and a snap, the joint burst, the shaft went flying, and the digging chains stopped moving. With four weeks before I need to dig potatoes again, I should be able to find replacement parts. With any luck, this year’s harvest crew will never have to learn what it’s like to dig a 300’ bed of potatoes with a pitchfork.
Notes from Windflower Farm - #16
Our boys are vegetarians, or, more accurately, lacto-vegetarians. Although Jan and I occasionally eat meat, they adhere to a diet based on vegetables, fruits, grains, yogurt and cheeses. We are sometimes concerned that they don’t get all the vitamins and minerals they need, but, because they are so fond of dairy products and eat great quantities of beans, they probably do fine. And they are beginning to like greens, with kale appearing to become a favorite. That’s good news for us, because kale is a healthy food of the highest kind. Even cooked it’s high in protein and fiber, vitamins A and C, iron and calcium, and a host of other vitamins and minerals. In fact, you’d be hard pressed to find a healthier vegetable. You'll find kale in your shares this week, along with arugula and lettuce.
It has been very dry here. I’ve said that dry years are better than wet ones, but this one has started to wear on me: the corn is “strappy,” lettuces have bolted, celeriac and leeks have stagnated, and hillsides are turning brown. Vegetable fields require an inch and a half of rainfall every week. Except for a brief shower that took place during our open house on the farm, accompanied by a spectacular electrical storm that was perhaps the weekend highlight for our friends from the city, it had not rained here in ages. The last appreciable rainfall took place so long ago that I cannot remember exactly when. Rainfall in summer is typically a localized phenomenon, and our frustration has only mounted as we have watched several storms travel across the southern horizon. Farmers not more than ten miles from here have told us that it’s rained regularly where they are. Finally, to our tremendous relief, it rained here last night and most of today. I cheer because there are crops on our farm—including the late squash and fall spinach and salad greens out back—that the irrigation guns can’t reach, and an all-day rain was needed for them to make a good crop. I cheer because we can take time off from hauling pipes, and because, softened by the rain, we can now prepare land for our fall garlic planting and for establishing cover crops.
Notes from Windflower Farm - #14
It didn’t freeze last night, but we were prepared—the threat of frost was all the talk among weather forecasters and farmers here. Temperatures during September have been nine degrees below normal, and it seemed as though an early frost might take place. South of here, at a friend’s farm near Great Barrington, MA, there was a light frost, but he said it did little damage. Although 75 miles to our south, it turns out they typically experience their first frost of the season a full week before we do because of their mountains. On average, September 29th is when we experience our first frost. We are located on a fairly high plateau, and because the coldest air slinks along valley bottoms, we often escape the area’s first light frosts. But we spent a part of the weekend covering crops anyway. By placing 30 X 400’ sheets of Typar directly over the tops of crops like peppers and basil and lettuces that cannot handle freezing temperatures, we can provide them with four or five degrees of protection. The covers will also help some late-planted greens and squashes mature more quickly. Still, a killing frost that even Typar cannot protect against will likely come in the next few weeks.
Notes from Windflower Farm - #15
The transition from summer to fall crops is underway here. As tomatoes, summer squashes and peppers complete their decline, fall greens, winter squashes, parsnips, and late broccoli will begin to arrive in your shares. We started harvesting potatoes last week. Last year, we dug all our potatoes by hand—two acres of them—with a middle-buster plow, two pitch forks, and a small but determined harvest crew. I vowed that I’d find the parts necessary for restoring our John Deere Model #25 potato digger during the winter. It possesses two side-by-side digging chains, each made of 132 pieces of 27-inch chain, and two now-obsolete drive mechanisms. The year before, a chain link had busted, shooting all 132 links from one side into the air, sidelining the machine for the season. Thanks to the internet, I found the parts I needed on an old digger sitting in a hedgerow in Michigan. Freshly reassembled and lubricated, I pulled my digger out of the barn last week. The first pass across the field was uneventful. Little red potatoes rose up out of the soil, traveled along the digging chains, hopping and bouncing along with large rocks and weeds, while soil particles and small stones fell through the chains back to the ground. The potatoes then slipped off the back end of the digger in a wide, neat row on top of the bed, waiting for the harvest crew to pick them up and place them into totes. The Model #25 was an engineering marvel back in 1958, and is a significant step above our middle buster and pitchforks.
On the second pass, a rock lodged between the frame and chains, bending several links before grinding the machine to a halt and stalling the tractor. I managed to free the rock with help from a long, steel pry bar, and was soon rolling again. At some point during the third pass, one of two large drive chains fell off the digger, but, because it didn’t affect the functioning of the machine, I tucked it into my tool box and kept going. By now, the harvest crew had begun picking the potatoes off the ground, and yields appeared good. The next three passes were trouble-free, and we had managed to squirrel away a four-week supply of potatoes. Midway through the last trip across the field, I noticed smoke coming from a universal joint and then, with a crack and a snap, the joint burst, the shaft went flying, and the digging chains stopped moving. With four weeks before I need to dig potatoes again, I should be able to find replacement parts. With any luck, this year’s harvest crew will never have to learn what it’s like to dig a 300’ bed of potatoes with a pitchfork.
Notes from Windflower Farm - #16
Our boys are vegetarians, or, more accurately, lacto-vegetarians. Although Jan and I occasionally eat meat, they adhere to a diet based on vegetables, fruits, grains, yogurt and cheeses. We are sometimes concerned that they don’t get all the vitamins and minerals they need, but, because they are so fond of dairy products and eat great quantities of beans, they probably do fine. And they are beginning to like greens, with kale appearing to become a favorite. That’s good news for us, because kale is a healthy food of the highest kind. Even cooked it’s high in protein and fiber, vitamins A and C, iron and calcium, and a host of other vitamins and minerals. In fact, you’d be hard pressed to find a healthier vegetable. You'll find kale in your shares this week, along with arugula and lettuce.
From the NYT: Organic, and Tastier: The Rat’s Nose Knows
October 3, 2007
The Curious Cook
By Harold McGee
IN any controversy it can be helpful to consider the views of disinterested parties. So, on the subject of agricultural policy and practice, it’s worth noting that an unimpeachably neutral group has joined the ranks of those who prefer organic foods over foods produced with the help of synthetic chemicals. That group is 40 Swiss rats.
A team of Swiss and Austrian scientists recently concluded a 21-year study of organic wheat production. As an “integrative method” for assessing quality, they gave lab animals a choice of biscuits made from organic or conventional wheat. The rats ate significantly more of the former. The authors call this result remarkable, because they found the two wheats to be very similar in chemical composition and baking performance.
In fact, the rats were better at telling the difference between organic and conventional foods than many humans have been. In the handful of carefully designed taste-offs reported in the last few years, people were often unable to identify the organic foods, and often didn’t prefer them.
This is puzzling, since organic produce generally does pack more antioxidants and other potentially healthful — and potentially flavorful — phytochemicals than conventional produce. Just last July, Professor Alyson Mitchell and colleagues at the University of California, Davis summarized 10 years of data from tomatoes grown in carefully controlled organic and conventional systems. The antioxidant contents varied from year to year, but were consistently higher in the organic tomatoes.
What do phytochemicals have to do with flavor? Phytochemicals are chemicals created by plants, and especially those that have effects on other creatures. Plants make many of them to defend themselves against microbes and insects: to make themselves unpalatable, counterattack the invaders and limit the damage they cause. Most of the aromas of vegetables, herbs and spices come from defensive chemicals. They may smell pleasant to us, but the plants make them to repel their mortal enemies.
Why should organic produce have higher phytochemical levels? The current theory is that because plants in organic production are unprotected by pesticides and fungicides, they are more stressed by insects and disease microbes than conventional crops, and have to work harder to protect themselves. So it makes sense that organic produce would have more intense flavors. For some reason, taste tests haven’t consistently found this to be the case.
This puzzle remains unsolved. But a few pieces have come together to reveal a simple way of getting more flavor into some kinds of produce no matter how or where it’s grown. And that includes backyards and windowsills.
Plants sense and respond to any kind of attack by means of chemical signals. Cells in the attacked area first detect telltale molecules from the invader. Then they respond by releasing warning molecules that trigger the rest of the plant — and even neighboring plants — to start producing chemical defenses. Biologists discovered many years ago that they could induce the plant’s defensive response without any live insect or fungus. All they had to do was supply the initial chemical signals — the invader molecules or the plant’s warning chemicals.
At Clemson University, Dr. Hyun-Jin Kim and Professor Feng Chen recently exploited this fact to intensify the flavor of basil plants. They induced a defensive response in the plants by exposing them to a material derived from chitin, a long chainlike molecule that funguses use to reinforce their cell walls. Insects and crustaceans also build their hard exoskeletons out of chitin. The chitin from crab and shrimp waste is processed industrially to make a shortened form called chitosan, and this is what the Clemson food scientists used.
They soaked basil seeds for 30 minutes in a chitosan solution, then soaked the roots again when they transferred the seedlings to larger pots. After 45 days, they compared the chemical composition of leaves from treated and untreated plants. They found that at the optimum chitosan concentration, the antioxidant activity in treated plants was greater by more than three times. The overall production of aroma compounds was up by nearly 50 percent, and the levels of clove-like and flowery components doubled.
Chitosan is readily available as a dietary supplement that supposedly encourages weight loss. When I asked Professor Chen by e-mail if chitosan capsules from the health food store dissolved in water would work as well as his lab-grade chemical, he replied, “I would guess they will have the same or similar effect.” He added, “I would like to encourage master gardeners to try them for fresh aromas.”
A few years ago I gave up my big garden for a few pots of dwarf citrus and herbs. I’m currently pseudostressing a pot of basil and cilantro seedlings, hoping for freshly intensified flavors that won’t require a rodent’s nose to appreciate.
The Curious Cook
By Harold McGee
IN any controversy it can be helpful to consider the views of disinterested parties. So, on the subject of agricultural policy and practice, it’s worth noting that an unimpeachably neutral group has joined the ranks of those who prefer organic foods over foods produced with the help of synthetic chemicals. That group is 40 Swiss rats.
A team of Swiss and Austrian scientists recently concluded a 21-year study of organic wheat production. As an “integrative method” for assessing quality, they gave lab animals a choice of biscuits made from organic or conventional wheat. The rats ate significantly more of the former. The authors call this result remarkable, because they found the two wheats to be very similar in chemical composition and baking performance.
In fact, the rats were better at telling the difference between organic and conventional foods than many humans have been. In the handful of carefully designed taste-offs reported in the last few years, people were often unable to identify the organic foods, and often didn’t prefer them.
This is puzzling, since organic produce generally does pack more antioxidants and other potentially healthful — and potentially flavorful — phytochemicals than conventional produce. Just last July, Professor Alyson Mitchell and colleagues at the University of California, Davis summarized 10 years of data from tomatoes grown in carefully controlled organic and conventional systems. The antioxidant contents varied from year to year, but were consistently higher in the organic tomatoes.
What do phytochemicals have to do with flavor? Phytochemicals are chemicals created by plants, and especially those that have effects on other creatures. Plants make many of them to defend themselves against microbes and insects: to make themselves unpalatable, counterattack the invaders and limit the damage they cause. Most of the aromas of vegetables, herbs and spices come from defensive chemicals. They may smell pleasant to us, but the plants make them to repel their mortal enemies.
Why should organic produce have higher phytochemical levels? The current theory is that because plants in organic production are unprotected by pesticides and fungicides, they are more stressed by insects and disease microbes than conventional crops, and have to work harder to protect themselves. So it makes sense that organic produce would have more intense flavors. For some reason, taste tests haven’t consistently found this to be the case.
This puzzle remains unsolved. But a few pieces have come together to reveal a simple way of getting more flavor into some kinds of produce no matter how or where it’s grown. And that includes backyards and windowsills.
Plants sense and respond to any kind of attack by means of chemical signals. Cells in the attacked area first detect telltale molecules from the invader. Then they respond by releasing warning molecules that trigger the rest of the plant — and even neighboring plants — to start producing chemical defenses. Biologists discovered many years ago that they could induce the plant’s defensive response without any live insect or fungus. All they had to do was supply the initial chemical signals — the invader molecules or the plant’s warning chemicals.
At Clemson University, Dr. Hyun-Jin Kim and Professor Feng Chen recently exploited this fact to intensify the flavor of basil plants. They induced a defensive response in the plants by exposing them to a material derived from chitin, a long chainlike molecule that funguses use to reinforce their cell walls. Insects and crustaceans also build their hard exoskeletons out of chitin. The chitin from crab and shrimp waste is processed industrially to make a shortened form called chitosan, and this is what the Clemson food scientists used.
They soaked basil seeds for 30 minutes in a chitosan solution, then soaked the roots again when they transferred the seedlings to larger pots. After 45 days, they compared the chemical composition of leaves from treated and untreated plants. They found that at the optimum chitosan concentration, the antioxidant activity in treated plants was greater by more than three times. The overall production of aroma compounds was up by nearly 50 percent, and the levels of clove-like and flowery components doubled.
Chitosan is readily available as a dietary supplement that supposedly encourages weight loss. When I asked Professor Chen by e-mail if chitosan capsules from the health food store dissolved in water would work as well as his lab-grade chemical, he replied, “I would guess they will have the same or similar effect.” He added, “I would like to encourage master gardeners to try them for fresh aromas.”
A few years ago I gave up my big garden for a few pots of dwarf citrus and herbs. I’m currently pseudostressing a pot of basil and cilantro seedlings, hoping for freshly intensified flavors that won’t require a rodent’s nose to appreciate.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
A few photos from Windflower Openhouse
What a great time. I wish I could include photos of the UNBELIEVABLE lightning storm we were treated to Saturday night. But here is what I did manage to snap off.
Thanks again are due to Ted, Jan and the whole gang up there for growing all our yummy veggies & gorgeous flowers. Hosts with the mosts!
Callie Janoff
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Carpool to the farm?
My girlfriend and I are looking to carpool to the farm for the weekend of August 25. Here's the catch: we don't have a car. So by carpooling, we mean that we need a ride. In exchange we'd be more than happy to cover gas expenses, etc. associated with the trip. Or perhaps we can come to another arrangement.
If anyone is planning on going up there and will have room for two in their car (we're both small people), we'd greatly appreciate it.
Please let me know. Thanks,
Dan Berger
amirrorcrackd@gmail.com
If anyone is planning on going up there and will have room for two in their car (we're both small people), we'd greatly appreciate it.
Please let me know. Thanks,
Dan Berger
amirrorcrackd@gmail.com
Sunday, August 12, 2007
News from Windflower Farm, August 11, 2007
The Farmall we use for cultivating was manufactured in about the year that I was born, so, of course, I hesitate to call it old, but in tractor years it certainly isn’t young. Although it’s difficult to find parts for it among local equipment dealers, they are readily available from on-line vintage tractor enthusiasts. I found the tractor at a nearby farm auction and bought it for $2,300. It was the first tractor I’d ever purchased. It turns out it was owned by a man who has a barn filled with dozens of small, vintage Farmalls that he restores. This one didn’t make the cut, and was returned to the field.
The tractor had been acting up recently, and it was foolish of me to ask one of the field crew to use it to hill potatoes. I’m still learning about management, but I know that we won’t get all the work done if I’m the only person operating our equipment. Always a temperamental tractor—the clutch requires an especially gentle touch—I could hear the stalling and restarting from the next field over, but I was sticking to my guns. I need my field crew to become more highly functioning.
As a farmer I am a manager of resources—soil, water, plants, all kinds of equipment, and, most importantly, people. It follows that if we surround ourselves with equipment that lightens our labors, we must empower our employees to be able to operate it. This is Management 101, I suppose, and yet I am reluctant to let folks use my machinery. The twenty year old boys who work here like nothing more than to drive tractors, but they usually do so with less care than I’d like. Although one result is that the Farmall now needs it’s starter rebuilt, another result is that someone else on the farm now knows how to hill potatoes and will, I think, be more gentle on my tractor if given another chance to use it. Now, if I can get the old John Deere potato digger working properly, we’ll dig some new, red potatoes...
Loads of cucumbers this week. You might try “refrigerator pickles,” or cucumber soup. Below is a recipe for Gazpacho. Also in your share is a lettuce mix. We call ours a teenage salad mix—it’s not the fancy baby stuff, but it’s still youthful and tender. Later in the season we’ll attempt to add some zip to our salad greens with adolescent mizuna, tatsoi, baby kale and arugula, but these are currently under siege by flea beetles. Also in your shares are sweet corn or beans, tomatoes, red beets, and more.
Have a great week,
Ted
The tractor had been acting up recently, and it was foolish of me to ask one of the field crew to use it to hill potatoes. I’m still learning about management, but I know that we won’t get all the work done if I’m the only person operating our equipment. Always a temperamental tractor—the clutch requires an especially gentle touch—I could hear the stalling and restarting from the next field over, but I was sticking to my guns. I need my field crew to become more highly functioning.
As a farmer I am a manager of resources—soil, water, plants, all kinds of equipment, and, most importantly, people. It follows that if we surround ourselves with equipment that lightens our labors, we must empower our employees to be able to operate it. This is Management 101, I suppose, and yet I am reluctant to let folks use my machinery. The twenty year old boys who work here like nothing more than to drive tractors, but they usually do so with less care than I’d like. Although one result is that the Farmall now needs it’s starter rebuilt, another result is that someone else on the farm now knows how to hill potatoes and will, I think, be more gentle on my tractor if given another chance to use it. Now, if I can get the old John Deere potato digger working properly, we’ll dig some new, red potatoes...
Loads of cucumbers this week. You might try “refrigerator pickles,” or cucumber soup. Below is a recipe for Gazpacho. Also in your share is a lettuce mix. We call ours a teenage salad mix—it’s not the fancy baby stuff, but it’s still youthful and tender. Later in the season we’ll attempt to add some zip to our salad greens with adolescent mizuna, tatsoi, baby kale and arugula, but these are currently under siege by flea beetles. Also in your shares are sweet corn or beans, tomatoes, red beets, and more.
Have a great week,
Ted
Saturday, August 11, 2007
Tomato Watermelon Salad
This was a big fad last summer. There were lots of recipes floating around that combined tomato and watermelon. I was hooked - it's one of my favorite salads now.
6 cups of cubed seedless watermelon
6 cups of chopped tomato (use whatever variety you like)
1-2 red onions, chopped
Toss ingredients together, then dress with olive oil and red wine vinegar.
Delicious!
6 cups of cubed seedless watermelon
6 cups of chopped tomato (use whatever variety you like)
1-2 red onions, chopped
Toss ingredients together, then dress with olive oil and red wine vinegar.
Delicious!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)