I Heart Farms

Where I've Been Since April 8 (Part 1)

Pictured here: our neighbors' darling baby boy, Julian, who occupies a little of my time nearly every day. Because babies are church.

The short answer is that I've been working really, really hard for the "Grow a Farmer" Campaign, on an almost daily basis. The good news there is that we (the board of directors for the Friends of the UCSC Farm & Garden, and the staff and everyone affiliated with CASFS) have very nearly reached our first goal of $250K. The next goal will be to replace the funds that we took from our resources, which is not like robbing Peter to pay Paul—those funds were for general use, such as scholarships and other needs for apprentices. 

It feels FABULOUS to be in this position, especially given the severity of emotional turmoil surrounding our little grandson's broken leg. (He is fine, after nearly four months in casts, a metal boot, and being careful.) Coming up: swimming lessons for a boy!

I have had several great adventures, including turning fifty (April 30), something I had dreaded badly—turned out to be one of the best birthdays of my life. 

So here's installment #1 of "Where I've Been Since April 8."

April 13: a visit to Love Apple Farm, to meet up with the wonderful Harold McGee, who arrived seeking advice for his new garden in San Francisco. It's been three years since we had dined under redwoods on foraged food and wild boar, and it was a great visit. Cynthia chose some tomatoes especially for his climate (and palate), and he in turn autographed our "McGee" books. 

Any day that one can spend at Love Apple Farm is a blessing, a de-stressing. This was a fine day, indeed, especially because the sweet peas were tall and fragant.

On April 24, I got to do one of my favorite things in the world, which is to cook for the apprentices at the UCSC Farm. This is the annual reception, a couple of weeks after they've arrived. So many new faces, and so much great experience among them. 

I just walked around and met a few folks before heading over to the kitchen to help my darlin' friend, Forrest Cook, get things prepped. Our team (other board members and volunteers) shelled ten pounds of fava beans, peeled 11 dozen hard-boiled eggs, and made a whole lot of other stuff. 

Also got to see Brent Walker (Tennessee's loss, California's gain: he stayed after his apprenticeship last year), who came down from Oakland to make hush puppies for the party. These aren't your mother's hushpuppies: he made some with rye, and some with jalapeños and peppers...best hushpuppies I've ever had. And the only hushpuppies some people have ever had. Brent's now managing the farm for the People's Grocery in Oakland, and is loving it. (Lucky them!)

The very next day, Matthew Sutton, co-president of our board, hosted a pizza and beer fundraiser with some other former apprentices. Some hundreds of people turned out for Matthew's famous wood-fired pizza, live bluegrass, and more: the event raised over $1500 for the "Grow a Farmer" Campaign.

A little later in the week, I headed up to SFO to bring Sam Miller back to Love Apple Farm. Sam's hoping to move from England to start up a farming venture of his own—something that would make a huge number of people I know very happy. We came down coastal Highway One, stopping in Pescadero. First stop: Harley Farms Goat Dairy, where the goats were just coming in to be milked. Well, not this little kid.

There is only one place to eat in Pescadero—rather, only one place worthy of consideration—and that is Duarte's Tavern. And there is one thing that I order every time, weather permitting, and that is the combination bowl of cream of artichoke and cream of green chile soup. Served with fresh, warm bread and butter…

Sam had never had calamari, so we shared a steak sandwich and agreed that it wins Best of Show for All Breeds of Seafood Ensconced in a Perfect Roll. A little beer, a little wine, and that was Pescadero in April.

Coming up next: my birthday, some farm visits, some food-centric happenings, Big Sur, and more.

TWO QUICK ANNOUNCEMENTS

1. If you're going to be downtown Santa Cruz after the farmers market next Wednesday, June 24, see about getting a ticket to the "Grow a Farmer" Summer Soirée. Appetizers and wine, great people…all proceeds benefit the campaign. Also: the Santa Cruz Board of Supervisors will present the "Grow a Farmer" Month proclamation for the month of June. It should be a fine event, and there will be more news about our progress in raising the funds for the apprenticeship housing project.

2. Want a direct way to support a local farm? TLC Ranch (my friends and heroes) are trying to buy the house they've been renting before it gets sold out from under them. For a limited time, you can purchase egg shares at a substantial discount: visit their website for details. 

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: "I work during my leisure time, and play while I work." —me

Thanks for visiting. More soon. (And thank you, O Generous Blog Sponsor!)

"Grow a Farmer" Campaign? Food Bloggers, C'mon Down!

Pictured here: Adrea Tencer, a former apprentice at the UCSC Farm & Garden's six-month residential program for training in all aspects of sustainable agriculture.

So, for six weeks beginning in mid-February, I did not take a day off. I was working on three websites: two directly related to today's BIG WONDERFUL & EXCITING NEWS post. I'm here to introduce the "Grow a Farmer" Campaign, a nationwide project to raise $250K for permanent housing for the apprentices who live on the farm during their residential program.

For forty-plus years, the apprentices have lived in tents on the periphery of the farm. Last year, they were told this is no longer an option, and UCSC began accepting bids for permanent tent cabins. One was accepted, and then costs for labor and materials went up—the result being that the bid rose by $250K. The Friends board worked on finding solutions, and in a frenzy of inspiration, the "Grow a Farmer" Campaign was conceived and born over a two-week span in January.

The response has been amazing. Newman's Own Foundation gave $50K, which is their maximum donation. The Obaboa Foundation and Olivia Boyce-Abel have created a $20K matching grant challenge (read more below).

The campaign is asking farm-loving chefs to support the cause in a couple of ways...either by hosting a benefit dinner, as Chez Panisse is doing on May 6 (among others whose number is growing daily), or by donating $10 a day for the Merry Month of May. That $300 will make a restaurant (or any business) a Partner, to be listed on the website.

Businesses like Earthbound Farm and Johnny's Selected Seeds are donors. Other business opportunities include holding "Community Day" and donating (for example) 5% of the day's sales to the campaign.

Non-profits and other organizations who can't hold events still have opportunities to participate, even by merely spreading the word via a mailing list, or making a donation. These people are Pollinators, and will be linked on the website.

There are other ways for individuals—including, hello? you former apprentices—to have fun Growing a Farmer. You can host a fundraising event—a farm tour, a house or garden party—and we'll have materials for you that will help your event succeed.

And then there are yet other creative ways to help this campaign, the most inspiring of which so far is the incredibly generous offering from Chef David Kinch and Manresa Restaurant. Concerned that a "mere" cash donation wouldn't maximize the potential to help raise the funds, the chef instead is offering up two Chef's Special Tasting dinners, with wine pairings. These dinners will be awarded to the highest donors in the Obaboa Foundation's matching grant challenge.

In the words of one of my personal heroes, Beth Benjamin, who co-founded Camp Joy Gardens, spreading the word to a local publication:

I have been involved in organic gardening, farming and seed production since 1967 due to my life-shaping apprenticeship with Alan Chadwick at the garden at the University of Santa Cruz. I worked at my own farm, Camp Joy, then with Renee Shepherd, and now am on the board of the Organic Seed Alliance. As farmers are the very base of all the fabulous food we cook at home or eat in restaurants, and the flowers that are such an important part of most of our lives, maybe this would make an interesting story, especially since the Garden and Farm is the mothership for so many of our local farmers – past, present and future. We need as many good farmers as we can get, and the training program in Santa Cruz has been training and inspiring folks all over the country and the world for over 40 years.

This is the website that was just launched for nationwide Grow A Farmer month in May – we are fundraising for permanent apprentice housing at the UCSC Farm and Garden. Living on site is an essential part of the program and the University has given us until June to raise the money to start actually building the shovel-ready project. I have been racking my brains for like minded businesses or individuals that might be able to contribute in any way. I’m sure your organization has subscribers who’ve been trained or inspired by the Farm and Garden or its offshoots, so I thought perhaps you might be one of our business contributors, or maybe write something up about our efforts. Please take a minute and look at our website, as it is a great way to explain what we are working on.  If there is someone more appropriate that I could speak to in person, please give me the contact information.

There may be a way you can help by going to a dinner or shopping at one of the participating businesses or restaurants, making a donation, or passing the publicity on to someone else or connecting us with someone who would like to be part of this exciting campaign – please go to the brand new site and see what you think!  Events will be added to the website as they are scheduled. 

So that's it, in one very large, very aromatic nutshell.

Do these apprentices a BIG favor: use Facebook, Yelp, and Twitter it up! Spread the word, spread the energy, and come on board. I'm counting on food bloggers to help here: we will arrange personal farm tours if you want to come visit. And we'll add YOUR blog to our website, both as a Pollinator and as a Blogging Partner.

Use LocalHarvest for Networking Events

If you're looking for a restaurant near you that supports local farms, start with LocalHarvest.org. Plug in your zip code, and see what pops up. Or contact us on the Grow a Farmer site: we might be able to put you in touch with former apprentices in your area who can hook you up.

If your restaurant IS going to participate, please get a free member listing at LocalHarvest and add your event to the mailing list called "Keep Me Posted." LocalHarvest's newsletter goes out every Wednesday morning to over 45,000 people, and they are the premier website in the world for their niche: guiding people to local food and eating well.

And that's the news across the nation.

Sorry to have been missing in action: this is the biggest project of my life, and by far, the best. Yes, we can!

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: "Farmers are the only indispensable people on the face of the earth." —Ambassador Li Zhaoxing

Thanks for visiting. Will you be a Cultivator?

Oooh, last treat: Check out the website I designed for my friends at TLC Ranch: they're now the largest pastured egg production operation in the country! (Sun graphic on the site by Monika Wolff.)

Happy springtime, everyone!

Thanksgiving and Thanks Receiving

I don't have a farm. I don't plant seeds, I bury them. So naturally ("nature" + "ally"), I am grateful to all of the farmers in my life. They're my heroes.

This year in particular, my appreciation has grown enormously, as I have gotten to be good friends with a handful of farmers, with whom my family have shared many beautiful dinners. These farmers and ranchers have not only supplied me with the meat and vegetables on the table, but they have shown me, through good times and bad, what it means to be a real friend.

Pictured above is Love Apple Farm, owned by my friend—more like a sister—Cynthia Sandberg. Tomorrow my family will join hers, and her crew of helpers who've traveled from around the world to work on the farm. I'll get there early to help with the turkey, which we'll cook using local herbs and shiitake mushrooms. My ex-husband and our daughter, as well as his two young sons, will be there, along with my biggest hero, Bob, who's been my partner for over seventeen years. The little grandson we having been raising for four years is out of town, but Logan is truly the center of our gratitude to a beneficent universe for his presence in our lives.

A Month of Sundays: Where I've Been

Pictured here: squashes and pumpkins at Love Apple Farm, where I've been visiting lately. There are many reasons I've not been writing—all of October, even. Foremost, I've got some steady part-time work, and second to that, we've had more visitors and socializing in the last three weeks than in the past ten years. Some other projects and interests have popped up—not the least of which has been the birth of a baby boy in the house next door, and I've been (self-)appointed Court Photographer. I'm behind in e-mails and in other areas of life.

I only have time today for three brief announcements of some events very soon, and maybe you can avail yourselves of them. And then I hope to get back in the saddle with blogging. Much is happening on the local farm scene, and most all of it is wonderful.

Making a Difference

Yet another cool thing to do with your kids and their schools. On October 18, my friends Lori and Jeff Fiorovich will host a Farm to School Day at Crystal Bay Farm in Watsonville.

Read the press release below, and see the faces of your host farmers, when Logan was just two and a half.

Harvest Festival at UCSC Farm: October 4!

Grab your kids: this weekend is the biggest event at the UCSC Farm all year 'round! I took this photo a couple of years ago, when we took Logan for the face painting, pumpkin painting, apple bobbing, and other great activities for kids. And the whole family.

The festival has expanded this year to include workshops and cooking  demonstrations among the already packed schedule of live music, apple tasting, an apple pie bake-off competition, and so much more! There are walking tours of the farm, tractor rides, and so on. And LOTS of good food to eat. $5 and under for admission to one fantastic farm event.

Highly recommended! To see the complete schedule, including the live music, visit the CASFS website here.

That's all until tomorrow. I've been under deadlines with four clients, and hope to catch a break in the action soon.

Here: a joke. "Sarah Palin is a post turtle." (I laughed, even though it's older than John McCain.)

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY, from Michael Moore: "The Rich Are Staging a Coup This Morning."

Thanks for visiting, and now get on the phone with your Congresspersons.

Fundraisers & Fun!

Next weekend is a good weekend to be in Santa Cruz: two wonderful fundraising events are taking place for farm lovers and foodies, young and old.

Saturday, September 27, between noon and sunset, Freewheelin' Farm(a little less than six miles outside of Santa Cruz, just off Highway One) is hosting its third annual Farm Art Show. I heard about the previous two from organizaer, Melinda Lundgren, and from plenty of people who attended that this event is a blast.

Freewheelin' Farm is the subject of adoration with locals: they run a CSA with 40 shares, bicycling the six miles into town to deliver their produce. I'd written about it after a stop on the Eco Farm bus tour a couple of years ago.

Amy, Darryl, and Kirstin work the farm together, and they run a great show—figuratively and literally. Check out the details on the flyer: organic brew, wine tasting, wood-fired pizza, kids' table, and more. All for a $5-$10 donation, and there is also art for sale. Great stuff!

The next day, a high-end culinary event is taking place in honor of The Vanilla Queen, my friend, Patricia Rain. Read on for "A Culinary Event Fit for a Queen!" It should be wonderful.

Just Another Beautiful Day on the Farm

Monday found me up at the UCSC Farm, meeting with the board of directors for the Friends of the UCSC Farm & Garden. I arrived early so I could walk around. The weather was unusual: a little chilly and autumny, with a layer of high fog. I'm not ready to let go of summer, and found myself a little melancholy.

That dissipated quickly as I walked around and saw the apprentices, hard at work, but none so busy they couldn't take a moment to tell me a little of this and that about the farm.

I decided today to make a new photo album that will be exclusively devoted to the UCSC Farm & Garden, since it's so important to me, and so unique.

You can see the new album here: All UCSC Farm & Garden.

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Upcoming 2008 Events

      

SEPTEMBER 2008

Fall Plant Sale
Friday, September 12, 12 noon - 6 pm & Saturday, September 13, 10 am - 2 pm
Barn Theater Parking Lot, corner of Bay and High Streets, UCSC

Fall is a wonderful time to plant vegetable crops that will   extend your gardening seson and to give perennials a good head start   for next spring's blossoms. The region's best-suited varieties of   organically grown winter vegetables and landscape plants will be   available. Proceeds support the Apprenticeship program. Friends'   members receive 10% off all purchases. Call 459-3240 for more   information, or email jonitann@ucsc.edu.

Harvest Festival and "Food for Thought" Forum at the   Farm

 Saturday, October 4, 11 am - 5 pm
  UCSC Farm

Save the date now! You don’t want to miss our annual Farm   celebration, as we host our biggest "open house" of the year, including   our second "Food for Thought" forum on local food issues. Great music,   food,   apple tasting, an apple pie bake-off,   garden talks, hay rides, kids’ events, tours, displays by local   farmers, chefs, and community groups make this a great event for adults   and kids. Free for Friends’ members and kids 12 and under; $5 for   non-members. Call 831.459-3240 for more information or to volunteer for   this wonderful community event.

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THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: "A citizen of America will cross the ocean to fight for democracy, but won't cross the street to vote in a national election." — Bill Vaughan

Thanks for visiting.

The Heisman Chicken Awards, & Farm Visit with a Baby

Sorry I have not been around as much as I would like: I've had paying work deadlines, and tending to business. And one week without a car.

TLC RANCH VISIT ON LABOR DAY WEEKEND

Yes, I am SO GLAD I did not attend the Slow Food event last weekend. We celebrated slow food without having to pony up to Carlo Petrini. [Edit: please read this post about Slow Food Nation's "Come to the Table." I was crying before I even got to the end.]

Last Sunday was fantastic. Rebecca Thistlethwaite and Jim Dunlop at TLC Ranch had invited some friends out to celebrate a real slow food event, and that included a tour of the ranch with Jim. That's him, hamming it up (so to speak) with a chicken who'd gotten out of the fence.

Since my car was out of commission (more on that in a bit: it brought a blessing), I got a ride with Guillermo and Amber Payet, of LocalHarvest.org. If you read my blog, you know they're dear friends, and I had the utter joy of sitting in the back seat with little baby Joaquin, eleven weeks old. I was in heaven, of course.

Berries and Babies and the Dirty Girl Family

This is the world's quickest post, since I'm overdue with one…things are busier than ever, and the housing crisis for the apprentices at the UCSC Farm is eating up some of my unfree time, so to speak.

But I did get out on Monday to visit one of my friend's new farms. Joe Schirmer, a graduate of UCSC and of the CASFS (UCSC Farm & Garden) program, has had the good fortune to find two new farms to add onto his existing acreage. The farm I visited on Monday is the same spot I visited a few years ago, when it was covered in Vanessa Bogenholm's strawberries. Happily, Joe's still growing those—three kinds, including the wondrous Albions that are my favorite, ever—but he's diversified so much that I was bowled over.