NOFA

NOFA/Massachusetts sent me a big packet of information this weekend. It contains:

• Information on workshops,
• Information on the NOFA Summer Conference at my alma mater UMass Amherst (go UMass!)
• Information on various certifications you can get, and a dense newspaper The Natural Farmer.
• NOFA Massachusetts news.
• Massachusetts 2008-2009 Organic Food Guide.
• NOFA Guide to Organic Land Care.

Just, ya know, tons of stuff for anyone who wants to learn organic farming. If you join, you can get discounts on the workshops, like the Foraging for Wild Edibles one that John and I will attend in a couple weeks.

I made a veggie stew yesterday. Chicken broth, then toss in kohlrabi (stem, leaves, n' all), chard, turnips, parsnips, leftover rice, mint and basil. It came out pretty good, and it's a good way to soften the intimidating kohlrabi stem into something yummy.

I'm having trouble loading the digital photos from my camera, which is too bad. Elena made a beautiful dish of scallops with purple chive flowers on rice and garlic scapes. The purple and green really knock you out. She served it with a side of stirfried bok choy with garlic scapes. It was one of the nicest meals I've had from the farm. And, of course, honeyed strawberries for dessert.

It was hoppin'

As my normal Tuesday farm adventure was rained (and, apparently, hailed) out, I went to my weekly vegetable pick up today. The place was mobbed! It seemed that everyone skipped on Tuesday. There were little kids, "I eat all the good strawberries I find mom...", moms and dads, 20-somethings like me, and grandmas. And so the strawberry field was kind of funny. Butts in the air everyone! Picking stuff is always an adventure. I gave lots of pea-picking advice to my fellow harvesters, but they mostly got frustrated, "I don't see anything to pick." You have to look low on the vines and dig through the leaves...there's more there I swear!

The veggie haul is starting to pick up. Today I got:
- 1 bag of salad mix. I took mizuna for all of it.
- 2 heads of lettuce.
- 8 stalks of swiss chard.
- 6 Hakurei turnips.
- 1 handful of bok choy.
- 2 summer squash. I took one zucchini and one pat-a-pan squash, which is one of my favorite squashes ever with olive oil and garlic.
- 2 handfuls of garlic scapes, which are the curly-q tops to the garlic that you cut off to promote bulb growth. They taste like mild garlic, rather like chives.
- 2 kohlrabi. Kohlrabi is German for "cabbage turnip." If you've never seen one, this is the best way to describe it. Last year we failed to use the kohlrabi, but this year we have recipes.
- 1/2 pint of peas.
- 1 quart of strawberries, still going strong.
- A few sprigs of lavender.
- A few sprigs of winter savory.
- A handful of basil.

I also purchased some local honey and an herbed vinegar that the local youth from Boston make on Food Project sites. Apparently there will be 64 high school summer youth from Boston coming this week to help weed and work on the farm. It's the Food Project's Summer Interns and Summer Youth Program (SYP) that started 17 years ago. The newsletter says that it's the first job for many of them, and the first time most have been on a farm. They learn abuot food production, server food at soup kitchens, and work at the farmers market. This is yet another reason why I really like The Food Project.

The Food Project is selling tickets to a special Cirque du Soleil performance. Tickets are $100, so I fear I can't quite swing it this year after buying a condo. It sounds like good times, though. 100% of proceeds go to the Food Project programs.

Speaking of the new condo, when I got here I found that my stove just didn't quite work right. Circa approximately 1970, it was a lovely two-toned brown and had five button settings for each burner. But the settings did not all work. I bought a lovely new stove from Home Depot, in the hopes that it will encourage me to keep cooking. So far, so good. I'm going to try and tackle a savory bread pudding at some point. Maybe I'll make it with the kohlrabi!

Elena's response, "Why?"

When it rains...

So I packed up to leave work today and then saw that it was raining. Downpouring. Big puddles.

It didn't seem like a good day to go to the farm. Luckily, The Food Project lets me pick either Tuesday or Thursday to pick up my veggies. So Thursday it is.

Elena and I went to the Strawberry Fest at Wilson Farm for a little while on Saturday. We had strawberry shortcake, strawberry soup, strawberry jam, and my favorite was strawberry rhubarb crumble. I had also eaten a chocolate chip cookie I bought at the bake sale for Obama in Davis Square, so by the end of it all I needed some decent protein. We made lamb chops with yogurt and mint leaves.

On Sunday, I took the Greek-spiced lamb sausage and cooked it with chard, turnip greens, an onion, beans, and spices in a mango simmer sauce. While simmering, I made paneer with a recipe that popped up in my iGoogle. It is one of the easiest new things I've tried in a long time, and a lot of fun because you get to watch milk curdle, and then you play with cheesecloth. It came out great with my sausage creation.

For the paneer, I used Shaw Farm milk for the first time. They are a local company that people seem to rave about, and yes, the milk tastes wonderful. They don't seem to like the idea of raw milk, and neither does my nutritionist sister. I still have to try it.

Elena and I made a bacon minestrone soup, which we adapted from a recipe from The Bacon Show. Minestrone is great, because once you have the beans and pasta, you can just keep throwing in all the veggies you have left from the farm. Chard, turnip tops, zucchini, and leeks instead of onions. I think that bacon and leeks make a wonderful broth. The soup ended with a bunch of fresh basil and mint from the farm.

I am so looking forward to my next meat share from Chestnut Farms. I only have the two beef rib Delmonico steaks left, in part because I am the worst at cooking steak. I seem to be much better at meting out the meat than the veggies.

Too many strawberries?

I just cut up most of the 2 quarts of strawberries I got at the farm this week. Mixed half with local honey I bought at The Food Project. Honey gives the strawberries a tangy kick. And at lunch today a coworker reminded me that eating local honey can also stave off local pollen allergies. Good stuff.

The other half I froze for smoothies later on. I also made a ground beef curry with Chestnut Farms beef and bok choy from The Food Project.

I have a couple farmer's markets I want to visit soon. Medford has what looks like a modest market, and I'll be able to get Where Pigs Fly bread there. I don't really eat much bread, but since I've discovered buttered toast with turnip slices, I've had to keep some around. The market blog is here: http://medfordsquaremarket.blogspot.com/. They are open Thursdays from 1 P.m. to 7 P.M. in Medford Square. It looks like they try to be a little more than just a farmer's market, and they include weekly family activities starting this season.

Arlington also has a market, and I know that Chestnut Farms attends. They told me that you can get fish there, so I have to check it out. They are open on Wednesday from 1 P.M. to 6:30 P.M. in the Russell Commons parking lot on Rt. 60, just east of Mass Ave. I'm also looking for local yogurt and cheese. And raw milk, but I guess that's illegal. Let me know if you have a cow. I just want to try it.

The commonwealth of Massachusetts runs a great, but not exhaustive, listing of farmer's markets in all counties: http://www.mass.gov/agr/massgrown/farmers_markets.htm. There seems to be a dearth of markets in the Shrewsbury / Grafton /...boroughs area. What's up with that?

Tomorrow Elena and I are going to Strawberry Fest 2008 at Wilson Farms. I hear tell that we get free strawberry shortcake. Can't miss that! (If you don't want to miss it, details here: http://www.wilsonfarm.com/what.html.)

Go green!

So, if you're gonna choose between green zucchini and yellow summer squash on the eve of a Celtics/Lakers game, go with the zucchini. I did, and look what happens.

Today's farm share from The Food Project:
- 1 summer squash (I chose zucchini)
- 1 head of lettuce
- 1/3 bag of salad mix (it's mizuna time!)
- 1 bunch of chard (lots of colors: yellow, orange, green, bright pink/red)
- 2 handfuls of bok choy
- 6 hakurei turnips
- 1/2 pint of snow peas
- 2 quarts (!) of strawberries

The strawberries are plentiful. You could go find your own spot on the field, squat and just gather a quart. These are not your normal strawberries. One thing you have to learn is that the farm share is not the grocery store. So the strawberries might be small and shaped all kindsa ways, but they are also more intensely flavored. Some are sweeter, some just taste more strawberry.

I have to buckle down this week and really start cooking. I've been eating out a lot. When I was a little kid, we went out maybe twice per year for special occassions. It seems like nowadays, you eat out for special occassions twice a week. Birthdays, classes finished, project finished, it's a rainy day...the excuses are endless. I have to get my condo in better shape (moved in a month ago and still have some boxes) and then I'll have to have people over for dinner instead. And eat chard. We'll see if I can sell that one! The Food Project printed a recipe for a chard pie and another for chard with raisins and olives. Interesting.

Foraging for wild edibles

I'm planning to join the Massachusetts chapter of the Northeast Organic Farming Association (NOFA) www.nofamass.org. (For my friends and family in New Hampshire, their chapter is at http://www.nofanh.org/.)

I picked up their 2008-2009 Organic Food Guide at Chestnut Farms last week. It has a map that shows different organic farms and where to shop, and includes listings for CSAs, farm stands, and farmer's markets. I had no idea there was so much activity, and I think it's just of farms associated with the magazine. I wasn't able to find The Food Project in there.

The main reason that I am joining is that I wanted to take my brother to Belchertown, my old stomping ground, for a workshop Foraging for Wild Edibles. Now, don't all sign up, because I haven't signed up yet and I want there to be space! Russ Cohen runs this workshop and shows us two dozen of the 150 species of wild edibles in MA. You can read a Boston Globe article about Cohen: For this nature lover, the time is ripe for something wild. I've heard it's a great experience.

An aside

Celtics won! Dreams revived. Eat your greens, everyone.

Wilson Farms and dinner

After work today I went to Wilson Farms to do a little gift hunting. Right now I have the Celtics game on, and I'm trying to avoid watching it because it's too depressing. (C'mon guys, bring back those childhood memories!)

Wilson's Farm (www.wilsonfarm.com) is in Lexington, MA, and sells vegetables and fruit from their farm, but also imports veggies from all over. They also sell beautiful plants and shrubs, as well as pots, fertilizers, seeds, bulbs, and whatever for your garden. All at high-end prices. As far as I can tell, not everything is organic. The farm has been around since 1884, and I just missed a farm tour today! Oh well. It looks like they are every other Thursday from 6:30-8 PM. They have a strawberry fest coming up June 21 & 22 from 10:30 AM to 4:30 PM. It should be good times.

While I was at Wilson's, they were selling asparagus for $1 a bunch. My farm doesn't grow asparagus (no idea why!) so of course I grabbed a bunch. I had to go to Trader Joe's to pick up some heavy cream, because my sister and I have a problem. We somehow had three and a half dozen eggs at the beginning of the month. She bought some, I bought some from the meat farm, and it's just hard to consume that many eggs. The solution? Asparagus frittata.

I took a recipe from Wilson's, and Elena and I teamed up and it came out great. We used up six eggs too and have plenty frittata for breakfast.

I should clarify that the turnips from the farm are hakurei turnips. They are small white turnips with edible greens, crisp with a touch of radish flavor. The farm suggested that we cook less, and that a nice snack would be radishes or the turnips sliced on buttered toast. We tried it out, and it was fantastic, especially with our eggy, cheesy frittata.

It turns out, and I knew this, that I am terrible at cooking meat. It's probably my mom's Irish/English influence. (Hi Mom! Mom makes really good cookies, I can tell you that.) I horribly overcooked a ham steak, so I had to make bean soup with it the next day. I tried cooking a hamburger for only three minutes a side, though, and it came out wonderfully. I had turnip sliced on top and lots of lettuce. The farm meat is very lean, so you have to add veggies and oil to make it work, and cook for 30% less time. It's counter intuitive. But man, when you do it right, so much better.

I think I'm going to have too much food this summer, so I'm hoping I can discipline myself to freeze more. I am trying to buy less and waste less.

Strawberries!

Last week's veggie share was a bit disappointing due to the cold, dry weather. But then it rained for two days and has been in the mid to high nineties. The reward? Strawberries!

Last year I didn't get a strawberry until July. I remember that when my siblings and I were little, we played a game called SimFarm. Part of the game was selling our crop on the futures market before it was released. You could make a killing if you sold your crop of oranges for $30,000, because by harvest time it was only worth $12,000. Unfortunately, the game let you sell it that high almost every time, so it was pretty easy to upgrade your farmhouse to have a swimming pool.

The point is that in commodities futures, you never know quite how everything is going to work out. What's terrible for lettuce is apparently great for strawberries. My love for strawberries is about 300 times that of my love for lettuce.

Note to self: remember to NOT wear heels to the farm. There's nothing like clomping around a strawberry patch in heels on a hot summer's day.

The haul this week:
- 1 head of lettuce
- 1/2 a bag of spinach
- 6 turnips with greens
- 2 radishes with greens
- 1/2 a pint of peas (pick your own)
- 1 pint of strawberries (pick your own)
- 1 bunch of dill
- 1 bunch of mint

The summery scent of freshly picked strawberries, dill, and mint wafted over me as I sat in Rt. 2 traffic on the way home.

Liz and John's trip to Chestnut Farms

On Sunday, my brother John and I trekked out to Hardwick, MA for the semi-annual open house at Chestnut Farms. I called the day "Meet Your Meat."

Despite being a steamy summer day, we had a great time. My brother told me a few times that he was jealous of the family's nine-year-old, Sam, because he got to live on a farm and work with animals. I knew John had visited a farm when he was younger and really enjoyed it. He gets along great with the animals, except when he decides to chase chickens around for a half hour.

I didn't think he'd catch the mean black chicken, and yet...

The chickens don't want to be caught. In fact, between John and a couple of three-year-old kids, all six chickens escaped. I felt kinda bad about this and let the farmers know, but they said, oh don't worry about it. Chickens go home once it gets dark. Kind of like carrier pigeons.

Here's me with a red-headed chicken:

The chickens we caught are meat chickens, but the ones that lay eggs live in a school bus that has a plank out to a yard. Caroline, their daughter who is going to Smith in the fall, pointed out the "laying an egg" sound. "It's a pretty distinctive sound." And it seemed to be going on pretty constantly in the bus. Eggs everywhere.

Piggies! There was a couple from Somerville there asking a lot of questions. One question was, "Does that pig taste different than that pig?" I was sort of taken aback by that one, but I had to remember, yes, these pigs will be my food in a few months. The answer is that the flavor of the meat depends on the feed, not the breed.

Kim said that they brought a bunch of pregnant sheep to the barn in the hopes that they would lamb the week before the open house. And they all obliged. I thought this little guy was cute. The sheep were pretty hot and breathed heavily. They'll be sheared in a week or so.

Me with a lamb (so soft).

John with a lamb. There was also a goat, "Lizzy, why can't I have a goat?"

I asked Kim if they had sheepdogs or llamas. She said they tried llamas but it didn't work. They got out. Their neighbors were "from the city" and had spent $5,000 on their landscaping, and the llamas went over and ate it all. You would think this would be a disaster. Kim said they tried for days to chase down the llamas, and apologized to the neighbors. When they couldn't catch the animals, she told the neighbors that they'd have them shot instead. The neighbors wouldn't hear of it. They built a place for the llamas on their land and co-adopted them, and they are just fine without their landscaping. Too funny. I love western MA.

Be a local hero! Buy locally grown!

I need to post some thoughts on going local at some point. For example, how do I replace coconut milk in my cooking? And avocadoes? Important questions...

Allandale Farm

I went to the graduation party of one of my math buddies on Friday. It was good times. Besides a tour of the beautiful grounds and endless maze of a house, and firing off a potato cannon, there was amazing food. As it turns out, they found a farm that would cater their party. Billed as "Boston's last working farm," Allandale farms is located in Brookline and has been around for 250 years.

http://www.allandalefarm.com/

The food was simple, which you can do with great ingredients. They had quartered radishes with an herb dip, and the radishes seemed to magically have only the good part of the radish taste, without any of the bitterness. One of the first things I grew when I was a kid was a row of radishes. They grow to harvest in 21 days, great for impatient children, but then you pick them and they have this bitter taste. I ate them anyway, because I grew them. I can't tell if this farm used a better brand of seeds, or watered and fed them better than I did when I was 7.

At the party, a friend of mine stared at his salad in disbelief. It was pretty much just lettuce and dressing, but the lettuce was crisp, sweet, amazing. He asked if that was what lettuce really tasted like. I said, yep, that's why I have a farm share. My food tastes a lot better. The lettuce last spring was better than this year because we had more rain, but it's still better than the grocery store.

They also had a beautiful pasta with quartered steamed potatoes and herbs. You've never had a potato melt in your mouth like this...you don't even need butter. And there was a simple pea soup, steamed asparagus, and a quiche-like item.

At the end there was rhubarb crumble. Simple, sweet, again showcasing just the good part of the rhubarb without any of the bad.

I wonder if they are tax-exempt. I know that my friend's wife is considering raising cattle on their land to cut down on the taxes. I can imagine that would be one way to keep a 100-acre farm going. (I can't find it on their website, but I asked one of the caterers about the acreage.)

The farm has a retail store, but they also sell to Whole Foods. I need to check if there's a way to see the source of vegetables at Whole Foods. Their actual retail store is here:
259 Allandale Road
Brookline, MA 02467
and open 9-6 on weekends.

June 4 meat share

I picked up my first meat share on Wednesday in Arlington, MA. I had no idea what to expect, thinking that my 10-pound share would probably include four pieces of meat that I'd have to divvy up. It wasn't like that at all! There were lots of little packages, almost like it was designed for one or two people. It included:
- 2 packages that each had two hamburger patties.
- 2 packages of ground meat.
- 3 breakfast sausage.
- 3 lamb sausage.
- 1 large ham steak.
- 1 London broil steak.
- 2 beef rib Delmonico steaks.

I was surprised that there wasn't any chicken in the share, but I know that this is the start of chicken season so we might not get any for a month or two. I committed to six months, and the ten pounds cost $70. I also bought two dozen eggs at $4 per dozen. Kim, the farmer, said that you can leave the eggs out on the counter for up to 10 days and they taste better. She also said that the USDA might disagree with that method, and that eggs last up to a month in the refrigerator.

I put the London broil into my meat and parsnip crockpot. Elena took hers out at 6am and said it was wonderful, but when I took my serving out at 8am the steak was too tough. Organic, grain-fed meat is much leaner than conventional meat, so you should take about 30% off of cooking time. I told Kim that I am Irish and can't cook meat, and she said, "Don't boil it!" And look what I go and do.

June 3 vegetable share

I talked to the farmer at The Food Project, and she said this spring was cold and dry "which isn't good for growing anything!" Last June was warm and rainy, so I was a little surprised at the first share this year. I picked up:
- 2 heads of lettuce (different varieties)
- 5 parsnips (which had been in the ground all winter)
- mint
- sage

Elena and I have been making lettuce salads all week, with sweet vadalia onion dressing. I have no idea what to do with sage.

Oddly enough, Elena and I both had dreams about parsnips the day after the share. Shaped like a carrot, parsnips have a slightly sweet flavor to them and taste great steamed or in soup. I made a meat and parsnip stew when I got my meat share.

It rained for two days this week, and we're in the middle of 3 days of 90-degree weather, so my hopes are up for my veggies in future weeks.

Hooray for CSAs!

The title of my blog, "An overcrowded chicken farm produce fewer eggs" is a Chinese proverb that I thought fit the idea of the CSA. If you treat your animals and your vegetables well, you can more out of the land.

Farm shares are not for people who like planning meals. Some weeks you'll have enough lettuce for a rabbit farm, and other weeks you'll wonder how you'll consume five pounds of tomatoes. Experiment! And watch Iron Chef like it's your job.

Last year was the first year I participated in community supported agriculture (CSA). Each week, I'd go to The Food Project http://www.thefoodproject.org/ in Lincoln, MA to collect a share of whatever they harvested each week. I share my share with my sister Elena.

This year I also found a meat share that distributes in my area. Based in Hardwick, MA, Chestnut Farms http://www.chestnutfarms.org/ sends their truck to different towns in Massachusetts once per month. You pick up a cooler full of meat, and they also offer eggs "these were all laid yesterday" for purchase.

This blog will include what I received in my weekly vegetable share and my monthly meat share. I'll post successful recipes, articles about CSAs, and may veer into farming news or farmer's markets every now and then.

I always wanted to live on a farm, and even took a course in organic farming when I was at UMass Amherst. I grew tomatoes and peppers and peas at my parents' house, but now I live in a condo in city. CSAs seem to fill that need for seeing things grow, picking tomatoes, and chatting with other people who care about where their food comes from.

Drop me a line if you have any questions or information you would like me to post.