For the birds

Ultan Walsh took one look at my floral print rolling suitcase when picking me up at the bus stop in Belgooley last Saturday and shook his head. "This country is not made for bags like that, you know. Did you not have a backpack? Oh, you have one of those, too." Thus began the good natured teasing that would characterize the next few days.

(You'd think I'd be a better packer after the original, self-supported bikeable feast, but no.)

During my first afternoon at Gort Na Nain farm, I hand weeded asparagus beds with a local carpenter doing a weekly work share, spent the next rainy morning with a digging fork ripping up grass and prickly weeds in one of the tomato high tunnels, then chatted away the afternoon with a Romanian cook visiting from nearby Cork City as we meticulously cleared everything but the Tuscan kale and onions in another of the eight high tunnels. No pesticides or even black plastic here, which means the real deal organic farm constantly has lots to weed. Fortunately, weeding is one of my specialties.

Though he swears he doesn't have time for inexperienced help in the form of traditional WWOOFers -- I managed to talk my way into being working on the farm through connections with mutual friends -- Ultan and his partner Lucy have loads to teach. And not just about farming. During my non-weeding time, as we shared beers and meals in the gorgeous vegetarian guesthouse, I got a primer on creative cooking, the subtleties of potato varieties, local sports and politics, music, history, the troubled economy....

Most especially, I learned about birds, on the farm itself and during a stunning hike to Barry's Head before dinner on my final night there. Who knew that city pigeons actually descended from cliff-dwelling doves? Both Ultan and Lucy are avid birders. So much so that their farm's name translates to something like "Field of the Birds." (Please pardon any mistranslation there: the only thing worse than my packing skills may be my mastery of Gaelic.)

Like Eoin, Ultan hadn't planned to be a farmer. He, too, had been in a PhD program, in his case finishing a doctorate in microbiology and then deciding after a few years of being pigeonholed into grant writing that it wasn't his bag. He'd met Lucy, lured her from England to Cork, and somewhere along the line they came upon the big field that now houses a beautiful B&B and burgeoning organic farm that the two built and manage mostly on their own, complete with bird-friendly hedgerows and trees that act as both habitat and windbreaks amid the blustery landscape.

I hope to make it back to this amazing place some day...partly to see if my take on (vegetarian) chestnut sausages turns out half as good as Lucy's. Because I'm kind of obsessed with them now, and discovered her recipe is now available in one of Denis Cotter's cookbooks.

Eco-farming in Cork

I continue to be inspired by small farmers, including ones I worked with during my travels through County Cork. (Yes, I am technically on vacation, but that's hardly going to keep me from seeking out cool food producers in Ireland.) When he collected me from the bus stop in the small town of Carrigaline last Thursday, I had no idea yet what an amazingly kind person and thoughtful farmer Eoin was -- all I knew then was that he farmed about an acre of organic vegetables and had some great pics on Instagram.

Over the course of a couple of days, I worked alongside this young farmer to harvest and deliver produce for his box scheme operation -- kind of a variation on a CSA, where clients get a list of what will be available for the week and opt for whichever items strike their fancy, which that week ranged from freshly dug potatoes and carrots to all kinds of greens and alliums. Plus a few special requests from long-time customers or family friends for beets and the season's very first cherry tomatoes. (Well, the pint of sungolds I managed not to eat while digging up the nearby garlic, that is.) Next season, they may be treated to some new varieties, including an Ark of Taste lettuce that I am growing myself back home. I'm sure the heads growing here will be larger and more lush, as everything seems to be in these parts. Is it the soil? The rainfall? The gentle souls of the land stewards? My garlic and carrots pale in comparison....

As we worked and cooked up meals together -- including beet burgers, inspired by one of his customers who'd made them three times with Eoin's beets the previous week (recipe to come later) -- Eoin shared a bit of his story. Here was yet another example of someone who never expected to become a farmer, but is damn good at it. Part way through a PhD program in ecology, Eoin had become disillusioned with the research process. While finishing up a Master's degree and publishing a paper on the discovery of a rare water beetle, he stumbled upon a certification program in permaculture. He and his then girlfriend happened upon Moloney's Cottage not long afterwards, and now, less than 3 years later, he raises laying hens and vegetables enough on the 1-acre leased plot to support himself and a couple dozen customers. Like many farmers, he supplements his income, in this case with teaching at the nearby college in Kinsale. If his formal classes are as thoughtful and practical as his conversations were with me, those are some lucky students. Though I'd think local restaurants would be just as lucky if Eoin devoted himself fully to farming so he could supply a few of them. I'll be interested to see where things go...perhaps when I return for a visit in coming years.

A drop in the bucket

My, my, it's been a whirlwind of a week so far. I've been so focused on catching up with friends and family here in the District that I seem to be a bit behind on blogging about the amazing sustainable food work I encountered along the final on-the-road leg of my research. (Yes, I'm riding Ollie around DC these days, maybe a mere 10 miles some days, but the bikeable feasting continues.) For those who've been patiently waiting for the skinny on Appalachia, specifically southwestern Virginia, here's the first of two posts....

Abingdon, VA provided the setting for Barbara Kingsolver's insightful Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. The book has drawn attention to local food generally, and the food scene in Abingdon/Meadowview specifically, in recent years. But before Kingsolver's book -- which, if you haven't read it, I highly recommend doing so, though if you borrow someone's copy I'd try not to take notes in pen in the margins (sorry Jeanne!) -- there was another champion for local food and local economies around these parts. A man so capable and knowledgeable and determined to fix things as to be something of a force of nature in the region. And though it took a number of attempts at contacting him before I at last managed to chase him down, my conversations with Anthony -- at the farmers' market, at a 4th of July barbecue, and finally at his organic farm -- made trip #3 over the Appalachian Mountains totally worth it. (Thank *you*, Mike, for the lift to Charlottesville, sparing me a 4th trip over those persnickety mountains.)

Now, farming is hard work. Organic farming is harder still. Running an organic farm, writing regular columns for three local newspapers, starting a sustainable business development organization, and raising a family at the same time is, well, you'd have to be Anthony Flaccavento to pull it off. (Good lord, does this man ever sleep?) He's amazing, this mover and shaker. And yet, when pressed, the hardworking, outspoken, and yet entirely personable farmer insisted that in light of the entrenched agribusiness model that our country subscribes to he feels the advances and successes that he has been a part of constitute little more than a drop in the bucket when it comes to overhauling the food system. I respectfully beg to differ.

It was from Anthony that I learned about Appalachian Sustainable Development (ASD) -- the nonprofit that he helped to start back in the late 90s to empower marginalized rural populations and foster stronger local economies. Have you ever heard of a truly ecologically sound logging company? How about a program to help tobacco farmers convert to raising organic produce or free-range chickens? (How does one convince farmers that this is a reasonable, profitable switch to begin with?) Or a means of pooling the crops from a number of small farmers to collectively sell to supermarkets in the region for a fair price? ASD has proven that these models can work. (I'm hoping that the pilot programs proposed in our country's healthcare reform legislation have similar success. We need proof-of-concept models. What's that? You're right, I guess I haven't gotten on my healthcare reform soapbox in some time. Um. Right. Back to the related matter of healthy people and economies....) Anthony's concern seems to be that the victories on the road toward healthier communities are too small, that the progress being made in little pockets here and there around the country -- and there are lots of pockets I've discovered, and likely hundreds more I'm not even aware of -- is too slow. As things stand, small organic producers simply cannot compete with the dominant economic system that favors large-scale farms and a cheaper-is-better mentality. People are quietly starting to favor more sustainable practices in individual communities, but things must also change at the policy and subsidy levels as well or we're looking at band-aids rather than long-term solutions. Well, at least that's my take away message from our conversation.

I could listen to Anthony all day. (He couldn't talk to me all day, though, since he was busy, you know, farming -- even the photo I snapped here was an action shot!) In many ways I felt like I was listening to Michael Pollan's farming twin brother. Anthony's a bit shorter and has markedly Italian features, but the points he made echo those of Pollan (and Kingsolver). Actually, he's been saying these things for much longer, walking the walk while talking the talk. As a successful working farmer and a small business developer, he's got added street cred that gains him respect from small farmers and policymakers alike. Though he relinquished the reins of ASD a little less than a year ago, Anthony still educates and advocates for more sustainable food and economic systems, and through his consulting business has begun to reach out beyond his immediate region. He's gone on to work with farmers and market developers around the country while continuing to work his plot of land in Abingdon. He may think his work a mere drop in the bucket, but I think this farmer's making the right kind of waves.

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A way of life

Some folks seem destined for farming, though they may take many years and somewhat circuitous routes to get there....

As she flipped blueberry pancakes and waited for the breakfast tea to steep last weekend in her farmhouse kitchen in Sunshine, NC, Sara Jane spoke almost wistfully of her first encounters with gardening. When she was still quite young, I learned, her grandfather solicited her help for some of the work in his substantial vegetable garden in upstate New York. These early memories -- particularly their association with her grandfather, whom she still refers to as "my favorite person in the world" -- formed the seedbank from which later farming experiences would emerge. (At least that's my read on it.) Later, in high school, a friend suggested that she work on a farm in California over the summer, and she did. (In high school! See, mom and dad, you were worried about me venturing off on my own to work on farms when I'm in my 30s? What spunk!) She enjoyed the work, but it was still just a summer job. Then the Louisiana native attended college in Ohio, focusing on environmental studies and putting in some time at the newly-formed organic farm on Oberlin's campus. (Incidentally, it was here that she met her now-husband and fellow farmer, Jamie, who was studying music.) Still, food and farming weren't on her radar as a life pursuit. Then Hurricane Katrina happened and shook up everything.

With her hometown in shambles, Sara Jane began to reflect very intently on what her role in the larger scheme of things might be, how she might best be able to cultivate a better world, to help people overcome social inequities and heal an ever more polluted planet. After much deliberation she concluded that what she could do, and was determined to learn to do well, was grow healthy food. She traveled to Ireland and worked on organic farms there. She moved to Mississippi and farmed a piece of land for awhile, learning by trial and error and reading and listening to other farmers how to grow food in the small market garden she had built. She moved back to Ohio, reunited with Jamie, and took over management of Oberlin's farm. Her enthusiasm was (and still is) infectious enough to convince Jamie that they could start their own small farm. After months of searching, the couple came across the perfect 40+ acre plot of land not far from where Jamie grew up in western North Carolina and started their own biodynamic permaculture operation. And for a few days last week, they were gracious enough to let me work alongside as they harvested, cooked, and sold their wares at local farmers' markets.

It was not easy work, but aside from getting mauled by prickly blackberry bushes, the tasks were manageable and fulfilling. The shared labor and efficient (but not frantic) pace seemed natural. "You can probably lug that yourself," I recall Jamie smiling as I crouched to heft a crate of rainbow carrots to the washing station, "but it's easier if we share the load." So we did. (Not just trying to muscle through everything: what a concept!) Whether digging up carrots with Jamie, picking beans with Sara Jane, or feeding the pigs with their friend Kristen (Sara's high school friend from New Orleans who has been living and working with them for a few months), I found these young activist farmers to be open, curious, thoughtful, and joyful as they went about their daily work. Sure, it was hot, and there was much to be done, and maybe the sweet potato transplants were a few weeks behind schedule, but all the while I got the sense that they were content to be exactly where they are, doing what they are meant to be doing, their lives perfectly in tune with their beliefs. How apt that they named their place A Way of Life Farm.

It wasn't all work all the time. Mealtimes (and midday group snack breaks) offered opportunities to celebrate the farm's bounty while discussing political philosophies and agricultural policies. And on Sunday -- after morning chores, a load of laundry, and a flurry of cooking and cleaning -- a number of local farmers made their way to Sara Jane and Jamie's farm for a back porch potluck. Here was not only a mess of delicious food but a thoughtful and supportive community of growers: free-range chicken and egg farmers, organic veggie growers, pastured meat producers (including Christy and Michael and the boys from Underwood Family Farms, where I'd helped out a few days prior). As we enjoyed food and drink, and Jamie got a fire going for marshmallow roasting, conversations wandered from crop productivity to market trends to recipes. Here, I thought to myself, is the next generation of farmers. And I'm honored to have been accepted into their midst for even a brief time on my way through North Carolina.

I hope to make my way back to this farm some day. Not to partake of the lavender roasted carrots or the grilled pizzas or homemade mead, but to be a part of the community of passionate, thoughtful growers once again. (And, okay, maybe partly for more of those carrots.)

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Rice field of dreams

I recently spoke with a rare breed indeed: a sustainable rice farmer in southwestern Louisiana. For those of you unfamiliar with The Deep South, it is a region known for many things, but organic farming is not among them. (A friend finishing up a degree in agriculture at LSU was lamenting earlier today that not a single stall at the Baton Rouge farmers' market offers organic produce. Not one, not in these parts.) Racial tension, fried twinkies, grits, the Blues, okay. But composting and integrated pest management? Hardly. I am bummed that I learned of the farmer and his rice operation, west of New Orleans by about a four-day bike ride, too late to visit. (If I am to make it back to DC in early July, I need to start moving north. I don't want mom and pop Vincent to start giving me a hard time about pushing my return date back... again.) But after our phone conversation I have determined that the next time I am in Louisiana -- and I do hope to make my way back to the sweet, sunny South again -- I will make it a point to spend at least a week or two learning and working (and cooking) with Kurt Unkel.

Seriously, I have come across few others as articulate and thoughtful on matters ranging from food production to agricultural policy to cooking. (Okay, maybe I am a little biased because our conversation included a recipe exchange, but I'm telling you, the driving force behind Cajun Grain is a food activist in the making, whether or not he knows it.) The anomaly of a 3rd generation southern rice grower told me about his decision to convert his fields to meet organic labeling requirements a few years ago, and while he's not sorry for the transition that produces a superior brown jasmine rice -- superior in terms of flavor and nutritional value -- he is fighting an uphill battle to scratch out a living. Ah yes, once again I come across a farmer trying to do the right thing while barely making ends meet for his family. (At just under $35 for 16 pounds of his amazing rice delivered to your door anywhere in the country, he's not a price gouger by any stretch. "Good food at a fair price" was the impression I got during our talk. I know it's delicious because I picked some up at Hollygrove Market last weekend. And I'm totally ordering a shipment when I get back to DC.) He may not make a lot of money, he chuckled as he confided, but with pastured beef and pork supplementing his organic produce and rice (third after oats and quinoa, in terms of nutrition), at least he eats well. And the smattering of grad students and interns who have come to work with him eat well, too. He has built his field and, slowly, they are coming.

Kurt believes in nurturing people and the land through responsible, sustainable growing practices. But the means to designate the way he's been doing things, I learned, is in jeopardy. It was this renegade farmer with his charming drawl and passion for homegrown tomatoes who told me about legislation that is currently up for discussion that means to define and standardize "sustainable agriculture." (If you've been following my periodic rants about inane "education standards" set by disconnected state-level administrators, you can probably guess how I feel about a checklist for "sustainability standards" set by large national interest groups like the Farm Bureau.) If it is what Kurt thinks it is -- an expensive standardizing of requirements and broadening of criteria reminiscent of the USDA's certification process for organics a few years back -- the farmer argued that the term "sustainable," which fundamentally informs his day-to-day practices and which his loyal customers support, will be rendered meaningless.

I am not a policy wonk. I just don't have the head (or the stomach) for it. But I do think there is something wrong with a system that discourages farmers from practicing *actual* sustainability (managing soil and water, minimizing chemical and fuel inputs) in favor of a labeling system that, at the very least, lets agribusiness off the hook ("oh sure, we compost some stuff and, um, use lower octane fuel for our enormous tractors") and misleads consumers ("oh, well that must mean the company has my health and the health of the planet in mind"). Ha! Heck, under such criteria, GMOs like Roundup-Ready crops might be conceivably considered "sustainable" because they cause less soil erosion from weed killing machinery traffic.

Has anyone heard about this piece of legislation?? I'll be darned if I can find accurate, timely information on it, but it hardly seems like the kind of thing the passionate food advocate and grower would just make up. From what Kurt related during our conversation, they may well get away with it, as all of the voices involved in the policy discussion represent, or have ties to, large-scale conventional agriculture. The farmer confessed that he's about ready to stop using the term "sustainable" altogether, just as farmers like Joel Salatin have abandoned "organic" certification labels for what they are calling "beyond organic" -- a shorthand for a philosophy and set of practices that prior to this latest policy debate Kurt Unkel might've termed... "sustainable."

In the end, the rice farmer and I agreed that labels are on their way to becoming meaningless, that the only way to truly know what's in your food is to shake the hand of the farmer who grows it. (Or at least talk with him on the phone. Or, of course, grow it yourself.) I look forward to a continuing dialog on the matter of sustainability certification as it develops. In the meantime, it warms my little heart that there are farmers like Kurt out there in rural Louisiana growing good food and educating those willing to listen, and amid the changing agricultural climate continuing to do things [insert replacement term for "sustainably" here]....

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Organic, schmorganic

I feel as though I've been deliberately avoiding a confrontation with the hot topic of GMOs (genetically modified organisms -- for our purposes, GM food crops) for some time now. The truth is that I'm still trying to work out where I stand. There are compelling arguments on both sides, frankly, but I read something earlier today that got me all hot and bothered enough to try and gather my thoughts on the matter.

Some GMO proponents argue for the potential to develop food crops that have a higher nutritional value. This is key in areas where malnutrition can be deadly (the humanitarian argument). There is also the possibility of developing hardier varieties that are resistant to, say, frost or pests or drought; maybe they will require less chemical fertilizers or pesticides (the productivity argument). There are some good points, and thoughtful crop scientists and farmers and researchers working toward these very goals.

On the other hand, anti-GMO folks argue against the use of untested products (the unknown long-term repercussions argument), or harbor an inherent distrust of the big companies running the show (the corporate greed argument), or believe that scientists shouldn't be meddling with nature (the frankenstein argument, or what I heard someone at the Community Food Security Conference I went to back in Des Moines refer to as the "God Move Over" argument -- this last one's a bit too anti-science for my taste).

I'm sure I've inadvertently missed arguments on both sides, and for that I look to you, readers, to help me out here. I'm not anti-GMO, categorically: consider the humanitarian and productivity arguments. There's a lot of possibility for good. But at present, the way things seem to be heading, I can't help but find myself anxious about GM food crops. They've been out on the market for years now, often in the form of the ubiquitous (and popularly maligned yet still consumed in mass quantities) high fructose corn syrup. And yet the long-term effects of GM foods have not been tested nearly as long or thoroughly as, say, vaccines or many prescription drugs before flooding the U.S. market. (Ever wonder why the European Union refuses to produce or purchase GM foods? Are they all just overly paranoid?)

Also, I just don't trust the folks running things: groups like Monsanto, Pioneer, and Syngenta are *profit-driven* above all else. Making money is not inherently a bad thing so long as it does not obliterate any sense of ethics. From what I can discern, Monsanto sells GM seeds at home and abroad that are comparatively inexpensive so as to undersell most other seed producers, their GM seeds are sterile (so farmers can't save seed to plant the following year) and are designed to only to respond to specific pesticides (that, guess what, are only sold by Monsanto), and there are hundreds of cases where the company has tried to strong arm farmers who refuse to buy their seed or who speak out against them. (Shoot, am I on their watch list now? Nah, probably not. My guess is they're not interested in a food-loving cyclist and her raw milk yoghurt recipe.) Don't believe me? Put "The Future of Food" on your Netflix list -- the presentation might be a bit tedious in places, but many of the points raised are good ones.

Regardless of which side of the issue I might some day find myself, one thing is certain: GM crops should not qualify as "organic." And yet, I learned from my friends over at Food Democracy Now, this is exactly what will happen if Monsanto (boo, hiss) pushes a pending piece of legislation through the USDA to certify their genetically modified alfalfa as organic. What's next, organically certified GM tomatoes? It's a slippery slope in a system where the qualifications for "organic" products continue to lose credibility. (Seriously, you should see all of the "natural" ingredients, preservatives, and products are considered "organic" these days. At least the "no lab-manufactured chemical applications" and "no genetic modification" criteria retain some integrity thus far.)

I can hear you asking, "What can I do?" Well, here's a start: add your voice to the group protesting Monsanto's push to certify its GM alfalfa as organic. Here's where to find more info:
http://fdn.actionkit.com/go/111?akid=88.84907.E3xKTt&t=6. The deadline for comments is later today: March 3.

Sorry for the late notice on this one. I've been biking all day -- 70 miles! -- and just had a chance to read through the material and become indignant. Now, time for sleep....

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A berry nice place to work

When one thinks of a farm owner, one generally thinks of a powerful man (or woman) pitted against any individual or group that might lobby for better wages, benefits, and working conditions for those doing the labor. I've taught Steinbeck; I've read a bit about Cesar Chavez. Farm laborers have a long history of powerlessness and disenfranchisement. They have more often than not been treated as replaceable cogs in a larger, profit-driven machine. This is simply not the case at Swanton Berry Farm, the country's first production scale certified organic berry farm. Don't let the name fool you: they don't just grow berries. But then, this is no ordinary berry farm.

Amid sporadic rainstorms on Sunday afternoon, I spied a welcoming "Jam Tasting ->" sign along Highway 1 and ducked into the Swanton Berry farmstand to see about picking up something to go with my jar of peanut butter and 2-day-old bread. I was soon distracted by other, more appealing gustatory options. (I did eventually purchase a jar of olalliberry-strawberry jam for a later sandwich.) I was also fortunate to have an opportunity to learn about the innovative farm from Barrett and Forrest. Over a slice of velvety pumpkin pie and a steaming cup of fair trade java -- I felt a small degree of pressure to have the berry cobbler, it being a berry farm and all, but Swanton grows pumpkins, too, and I stand by my scrumptious, whipped cream laden choice -- Barrett gave me a rundown on the history of the farm and its progressive owner, Jim Cochran.

Started back in the 80s with a modest berry crop, the farm's 2 original managers -- Jim and Mark -- rented a few small farm plots and began to experiment with organic methods. Success was slow but steady as they refined their methods, paying attention not only to their growing market but the land as well. They discovered, for example, that strawberries planted in areas where broccoli (and other brassicas, to a lesser degree) had been grown the cycle before were significantly less vulnerable to the common but pernicious verticillium wilt, the bane of berries in the region. At the time, few folks were interested in organic methods, so no formal research was conducted. Years later, a small group of researchers at UC Santa Cruz heard about the brassica-verticillium theory and did a little research.... Today the broccoli-strawberry crop rotation is fairly well accepted as an organic management practice -- John even mentioned it during one of the activities on yesterday afternoon's tour of the UCSC student farm. (More details on UCSC's Agroecology Center and the amazing Life Lab program to come in a later post.) Swanton's willingness to do things differently extends beyond crop rotations, however.

As we chopped brussels sprouts (and then feasted on creamy brussels sprout soup with Forrest who invited me to stay for a delicious, impromptu lunch), I learned that Swanton Berry was the first farm in the state to *invite* the AFL-CIO to meet with its workers back in the 90s. For over a decade, farm workers have had the option of signing a union contract. Working here, employees enjoy regular pay raises, diversified work tasks, a modest housing option, vacation time, and other benefits virtually unheard of in the farm world. It's also the first agricultural small business that I've ever heard of to offer its employees stock options. (Now, don't get all worked up -- this stock is in addition to regular pay, not in place of it, which is important in an industry more prone than others to extreme fluctuation.) The Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP, for short) allows farm workers to put money toward retirement, kind of like a 401(k). At least that is my very basic understanding of it. (Having worked in an office for more than 3 years with a gaggle of innovative financiers in a former job one would think I'd have a firmer grasp of finance and investment matters, but alas, I don't.)

Swanton Berry Farm has a lot going for it, but the most important difference I sense here is the value placed on the workers. The business strives to make itself a good place to work, where folks want to return each year. It's not perfect, but it's heads and shoulders above most of the competition.

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The mad farmer's garden

Ollie and I arrived on the doorstep of The Mad Farmer's Garden in Coal Valley, IL in the midst of a torrential rainstorm last Thursday. (Have I mentioned the less-than-perfect weather yet? Oh. Yes. I believe I have. It was like the famous storm in King Lear, but maybe with less people losing their minds. Actually....) From what I know of the Wendell Berry collection of poems from whence the organic farm takes its name -- a sequence of diatribes and manifestos that critique society's destruction of land and community -- the weather was somehow fitting. The farm's very existence rails against modern, conventional practices. The property is owned by Ian's great uncle and run by Ian with the help of a small, tight-knit group of friends, with practices that stubbornly recall a simpler, less industrialized time. The goats are milked by hand twice daily. Seeds are saved. Food is grown without fertilizers or pesticides or hormones. They grow things not only to sell but to support themselves. They compost. This, while being surrounded on all sides by giant, GM operations and manure spreaders.

One of the things I have been doing as I roam about the country learning about food is, in a sense, peeking into different variations on sustainable lifestyles, trying them on, seeing which elements fit. Trying on places and ideas and communities. Kind of like shoes. What feels right? What's missing? Is this uncomfortable? Will I get blisters? (Another metaphor, yes. I'm talking work shoes here, but I suppose some of you are thinking about dancing shoes. Those shouldn't give you blisters, either.)

I had heard about the Coal Valley homestead farm from my friend, Hannah, who had, along with her (and now also my) friend Lindsey, built a raft and traveled down the Mississippi River to learn about sustainable farming in 2008. Talk about spunky: these were my kind of people!

Hannah, Lindsey, Ian, and Andrew welcomed me into their midst from the start. They invited me to join in with the farm chores, the market, the cooking (yes!), and frankly answered whatever questions I ventured -- from how each came to the farm to how to use the indoor composting latrine. The two couples share a vision of self-sufficiency, communal living, and innovation that informs their daily lives. It's not perfect yet, with personalities still at odds sometimes and different ideas on how and when to do things, but they're making it: they produce the majority of food for themselves, generate very little waste, are revitalizing the land, and are developing a loyal customer base through the Davenport farmers' market (less so with shops so far). Each season, there are new projects, experiments, and techniques that the young farmers undertake -- companion planting, seed saving, greenhouse construction, trying out new heirloom varieties -- based on the interests and needs of the group. These are undertaken with a spirit of joy and curiosity and, finally, the desire to make things a little bit better. Who could ask for more? Wendell would be proud.


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"Why am I doing this?"

I've been talking with a lot of farmers these days. Mostly (I think) I've been doing a lot of listening. Except when topics like cooking, science fiction, or domestic healthcare policy (not to be confused with science fiction) come up, I like to let conversations drift and see where the farmers take them. One thing that has come up many times is a farmer wondering how -- and sometimes even if -- his or her work matters in the grand scheme of things. I mean, can a sustainably grown tomato change the world? "Why am I doing this?" This very point came up a few days ago when I stopped in for a spell at J. Faulkner Farm in Portville, NY, just ahead of storm number two (of three) that afternoon.

It was an unanticipated stop, for the most part. I'd been chatting with Elaine the postmistress (in I believe it was Bolivar, NY) as I bought yet another sheet of postcard stamps -- I may be single-handedly keeping the US Postal Service in business these days -- and she suggested that since I would be passing through Portville later that afternoon I might stop and chat with a man named James about his organic farm -- a pesticide-free oasis amid the surrounding farms with happy chemical trigger fingers. So I did.

Michael Pollan has Joel Salatin; I have J. Faulkner. A rare balance of patience and caution with enthusiasm and curiosity became evident pretty quickly as James showed me about. The farm is run by the thoughtful but softspoken farmer and his mother and boasts an amazing diversity for such a small area (4 acres, I think he said): at least 5 varieties of heirloom corn, rows of leeks, tomatoes, tomatillos, peppers, squash, carrots, lettuces, blueberries, beets, potatoes, broccoli, and several other crops he is tinkering with, all grown from seed. Oats, clover, and rye cover the other fields, enriching the soil and keeping them ready for planting if the farm expands one day. In spite of the two farmers markets he sells at locally, James admitted that the operation itself wasn't enough to support the family, that his wife had a regular job. And yet he feels compelled to grow things, and grow them the *right* way, enrich the soil, give people an option to buy good, local produce.

He quietly lamented the slow acceptance of his work. "People ask me why they should pay two dollars for a head of organic lettuce at the farmers market when they can get regular lettuce at the supermarket for a dollar fifty. Then they walk away. But I keep bringing it and slowly more people are buying it." He's thinking about a larger spinach crop, for sale rather than just personal consumption since a friend mentioned his wife had stopped eating supermarket greens after a series of national e. coli contamination scares. He's trying out a few longberry bushes to see how they fare in the area. Longberries, he'd heard, have an even higher concentration of beneficial antioxidants than blueberries and they're pretty hardy in colder climates. (Maybe they'll be the new pomegranate or acai berry craze in a few years.) Slowly, slowly he tests out new crops, new varieties, new ideas. He grows everything organically, but hasn't been certified, at least not yet. Instead, he told me, his produce is "certified naturally grown" -- an honor-system-based designation which has farmers (rather than some USDA employee) periodically checking up on each other's farming practices. Pretty cool, and in my humble opinion much more true to the spirit of local, organic farming in its purest form.

Ollie and I headed out soon after the storm subsided, bound for Allegany State Park. James insisted that I take a tomato and a bell pepper -- "You don't even need to cook 'em. Oh, but I wish it were a better season for tomatoes!" -- and conceded that I didn't really have space for a few squash. I tell you, after storm number three blew through about two hours later, I couldn't resist nibbling on the perfectly red, tantalizingly juicy tomato. Did I say nibble? It was amazing: I devoured it right there on the sidewalk in front of god and everybody. It may be a drop in the bucket, but I'll bet if more folks tasted tomatoes like that they won't deign to put one of the round, supermarket tomato-shaped imposters to their lips. Keep doing what you're doing, J. Faulkner, we'll catch on. A tomato may yet change the world.


Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Do the right thing

I've been having a lot of opportunities to feed some of my favorite people lately, at least a few each week: wine dinners, soup dinners, impromptu dinners, the occasional weekend brunch. (These are above and beyond the weekly dinners with my buddy Mitch, who not only lets me take over his kitchen but also has a working TV and doesn't make fun of me too much when I urge my favorite characters in Lost not to listen to Ben! He's not to be trusted! Oh. Sorry about that, I get excited.) I have been making an effort to experiment with as much local, seasonal, organic produce as I can these days. I feel proud to be supporting local producers, but beyond that I love the challenge: my days are filled with roasting beets, sauteeing sunchokes, inventing new ways to incorporate potatoes into, well, whatever I can (there are so many potatoes, in fact, that I have sometimes secretly snuck them into friends' handbags and backpacks), baking apples, braising rainbow chard, and figuring out what to do with things I had never cooked before, like rutabaga (I like roasting these with honey). It's like Iron Chef... without the fabulous cookware... or competition. (I win.)

A few of my recent dinner guests have apologized nervously, sometimes sheepishly, for having brought something that was not local/seasonal/organic (let's just call it "LSO" -- I'm feeling silly typing it out every time). It's prompted a number of interesting conversations, along with apologies from my side for giving the impression that any friend gracing my table with their presence -- or some food or beverage that they have been kind enough to contribute -- would be unwelcome. Goodness!

As much as possible, I have been trying to stay as close to LSO* as I can in my own cooking. It's not always possible. I mean, if I happen to have a bottle of good Armenian cognac around, I should use it, right? (It was a gift and I discovered that it is great to flambe with. I'd like to dispel any images of me guzzling it.) I also have a soft spot for lemons in my water. Sure, I buy lemon juice, but it's not the same. And I drink a lot of water, so I generally buy lemons by the bag. I make concessions. French wine, say, or coffee, coconut milk, almonds. When I deviate from my LSO model, I make the decision to do so deliberately, and I'm okay with that. (Incidentally, my cousin Sonia mentioned that she'd heard somewhere that, environmentally speaking, a bottle of French wine often has a smaller carbon footprint than a California one, since French wine is shipped rather than flown. I should look into this, though, and see if it might be the case for my favorite South American vintages as well. I love California wines, too. And Italian ones. And... well, I don't want to give the wrong impression so I will stop talking about wine here.)

I think the trick is something that I hear most often in the context of my yoga class: mindfulness. Basically, it means being aware of our thoughts and actions. Making the best choice for ourselves at the time, being gentle and forgiving with ourselves when our choice isn't ideal. Like when I need fresh lemons in my water. I'm not moving to Florida. (I do try to buy organic when I can, at least.)

*See how catchy it is? You read it first here, folks. Someone call the OED!