Eating Seasonally and the 1st Tomato of the year

The notion of eating seasonally if a pretty foreign concept to most people these days. Thanks to cheap oil, misguided agricultural policies, and a population increasingly disconnected from natural cycles in general, we have access to "fresh" produce 365 days a year. By shipping in fruits and vegetables from California and Florida, Central and South America, and various places in Asia, we aren't constrained by what plants will actually grow in our climate at any given point in the year. The truth is, that your average American grocery shopper has little, if any, understanding of what is growing locally when they go to collect their weekly vittles from the nearest Try 'n Save. This is bad for a variety of reasons that range from social to environmental to gustatory.

The environmental downside to shipping perishable produce around the world in refrigerated planes and trucks should be fairly obvious. It's often stated that we burn 10 calories of hydrocarbon energy for every 1 calorie of food we eat. Even if we ignore the ecological ramifications of that figure, the impact it will have on the cost of our food as we enter a future of fossil fuel depletion isn't good. Simply put: scarce and expensive oil and natural gas will equal scarce and expensive industrially produced food. Trade agreements like NAFTA and GATT victimize farmers in Mexico and elsewhere, while subsidy programs here in America encourage the over production of corn and soybeans and shut out small, diversified family farmers.

As for your taste buds, just ask anyone who has ever eaten a fresh, ripe, heirloom tomato how it stacks up against a hothouse tomato shipped from halfway around the world in February. There is no comparison. In the words of Michael Pollan, the February tomato is a "notional tomato". It looks more or less like a tomato, but it's lacking all of the tastes, smells, and textures of a real tomato. It's a tomato with no soul. And yet we settle for it because we have shifted the responsibility for providing ourselves with food to industrial producers and grocery chains. We let them dictate what we get to eat.

Tomatoes are an easy place to start eating locally and seasonally because 1). Out of season, grocery store tomatoes suck so bad, and 2). Growing tomatoes at home is virtually idiot proof. As a result, I haven't purchased a tomato in over two years (jesus, I sound like a recovering addict). This means that from late November/early December through early July-ish, I don't eat tomatoes! I know, that sounds crazy huh? I can up a bunch of sauces and salsas and tomato preserve, but no fresh tomatoes. That's why I was so excited to see the following green, marble-sized lump on my Silvery Fir Tree tomato plant today.

It's a long way from eating, but it's a sign of what's to come, and it's out a lot earlier this year than in years before. Silvery Fir Tree is (I believe) a Russian variety that I first read about in Barbara Kingsolver's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle". They have a listed harvest time of 58 days from transplant, as opposed to 80-90 days for most other varieties. I got my seeds from Seed Saver's Exchange. I'm growing a total of 9 kinds of tomato this year, but Silvery Fir Tree was my pick for first fruit out of the box. Next year we'll try a row cover/hoop house combo, and see if we can't get them producing before June.

Would it be easier to simply go to the store and buy a few tomatoes in May? Sure, but as far as I'm concerned that's not an option. Besides, doing it yourself is too much fun.

'Burbstead Supper

As Spring gives way to Summer, the garden is beginning to produce more food, a little at a time. As I've said before, the more you get into the habit of eating out of your own backyard, the more routine it becomes. Let's take a tour of a recent supper we had, to see just how easy it can be (cue the upbeat, elevator music intro)

We begin in the garden, where the Fordhook chard and Winter Density lettuce are looking good. The Sugar Snap peas are almost done, but the Green Arrow shell peas are just coming in. *By the way, if you're looking for a good shell pea to grow, I can't recommend the Green Arrow highly enough. It's super sweet, and puts out tons of long pods that average 9-12 big peas each. Good stuff* The girls generally pump out 1 or 2 eggs a day, so we had the better part of a dozen.

Winter Density Lettuce

Detroit Red Beets and Fordhook Chard hiding in the back

The fixin's for supper

All of that was cleaned, chopped, mixed, cooked, and, with a little help from the grocery store (hey, we're not the Dervaes family or anything), became a delicious meal of beef and chard quiche, peas and carrots, and a salad. It was simple, nutritious, and 75-80% came from right outside our back door...not too shabby for a Sunday night.

It's a Madhouse!!!

Holy Crap! It's been over 3 weeks since I posted anything on here. Between the end of my school year, my boys finishing kindergarten, an out of town family get together, a painting commission...yeesh. The 'burbstead has taken as much of a backseat as the blog. The garden got weedy, the chicken run was about a week and a half behind schedule getting moved (and it began stinking worse than it should have), and the yard got so overgrown that we could have baled hay if we'd have had a tiny little baler.

So I've been trying to catch up this past week. The garden is close to where it almost should be, the grass got mowed, and the chickens got moved to a less fragrant area. With school being over (finally!), and my summer activities a little less involved than the past couple years, I'm hoping that I'll be able to get rolling on a lot of things that need attention. Let's go summer!

Also, now that I've posted a link to this site to my co-workers, I'd better be on top of my game lest I come off as an irresponsible slacker. Hi guys!

Dinner Movies

This past week I had the chance to go see a screening of the movie “Fresh” at a local brewery (Schlafly’s). It was presented by the St.Louis chapter of Slow Food International. It was described as the sequel to “Food Inc”, and I’d been wanting to see it for while. If you haven’t seen either film, I’d highly recommend both. They’re similar in the sense that they both hit the same major points: Interviews with Michael Pollan (author of “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” and “In Defense of Food”) and Joel Salatin (owner of Polyface Farms and author), unsettling hidden camera footage of CAFO’s and meat packing plants, portraits of farmers trapped in the industrial agriculture system, and breakdowns of just how unhealthy and unsustainable the American diet is. There is, however, a noted difference in the focus of each movie as well.

“Food Inc” is primarily a scathing indictment of our modern food system. It spends the bulk of the film exploring the nutritional, environmental, and ethical shortcomings of how we get our daily sustenance. Monsanto’s role in promoting GMO’s and monopolizing of the seed industry is condemned (something that has provoked a rather vehement response from Monsanto). There’s a heart-breaking scene involving a woman who became a food safety advocate to congress after the death of her son due to tainted meat. Over all, it’s a pretty bleak picture. Salatin’s Polyface Farm and the corporate organic dairy Stonyfield Farms (which is owned by Dannon corporation) are held up as two examples of how things can be improved, but the thrust of the movie is more heavily on what’s wrong with the system.

“Fresh” starts off with a condensed version of much of the material that is covered in “Food Inc”, but it then shifts to highlighting examples of people who are working to change the system. Polyface Farm is again featured, and rightfully so. Salatin has positioned himself as one of the chief spokespeople for small-scale, diversified, ecologically sensitive agriculture. He’s developed a fantastic system, and his passion for what he does is clearly evident when he speaks about his farm. The Ozark Mountain Pork Cooperative, a collection of small-scale pork producers in Missouri and The Hen House Grocery Stores in Kansas City are also featured. The highlight, for me though, was Will Allen’s Growing Power organization in Milwaukee, WI.

Will Allen is a former professional basketball player who began Growing Power in the early 90’s on 3 acres in urban Milwaukee. Since then, it has grown into a network of city farms that cultivate something like 100 acres in Milwaukee, and they’re expanding into Chicago. Will is putting together an organization that grows food, teaches skills, and builds communities. While I don’t think that there is one, right solution to the problems that we are facing, Growing Power is certainly on the right track.

As I said, I enjoyed both films. Neither one really presented me with much new information. I had already read books by Pollan and Salatin. I was familiar with the local food movement. Mostly it was neat to see an issue I was interested in and passionate about presented in an engaging and entertaining format. However, if the only people who see these films are those who are already committed to changing the status quo, then not much is going to change. We need to use movies like these to introduce our friends and family members to this very important issue. In that respect, I think “Fresh” might be more effective at persuading otherwise uninterested people. “Food Inc” is full of good information, much of it likely shocking to folks who haven’t given their food much thought. However, I think “Fresh” does a better job of showing the problem, and then giving lots of inspiring examples of alternative systems (and without alternatives, you’re just bitching into the wind).

So go get some snacks that you grew yourself, invite some friends over, and watch something that will spark more thoughtful conversation than 90% of what comes out of Hollywood these days. It might just be the start of a meaningful change in your community.

'Burbstead Breakfast

Eating fresh, local food can seem like a hassle if you're not used to doing it. Convenience is the primary focus of most Americans' eating habits. We're not used to thinking about where our food comes from, and most people don't really care so long as it's easy to fix. If your cooking routine is typically placing a frozen meal in either the oven or microwave and walking off, fixing food from scratch can look like a real pain in the ass. "Wait you want me to grow the food myself? Forget about it! "

The funny thing about eating locally is, once you get started, it keeps getting easier. Or rather, you adopt new habits; so that what was once going out of your way is now the new normal. You think about your food choices more than you used to, but you begin doing it unconsciously. It's a process that you're never finished with, but it's enjoyable and worthwhile...and each step makes the next one easier to take. My breakfast this morning is a good example. Without trying, I made a meal that (excluding the ingredients for the bread) came entirely from the 'Burbstead: fresh eggs, homemade bread, and tomato preserve from last year's garden. Fresh, local, and as Mr.Food used to say, "Oooh it's so good!"

'Burbstead Breakfast

Harvesting..finally

I thought that I had gotten an early start on planting this year, but it doesn't seem like it's translated into much by way of early eating. I finally harvested some radishes this past week, Cherry Belle's and French Breakfast. I had a bed of Winter Density Lettuce that looked pretty nice, and a nasty thunder storm with spotty hail tore it up pretty good.

A pretty bunch of French Breakfast radishes

My Sugar Snap Peas are climbing their trellises nicely. If they're played out by time the Kentucky Wonder Pole Beans are up and running, I might repurpose them there. Tomatoes and Eggplants are in the ground underneath cold frames or low tunnels. That's a solid 2 1/2 weeks earlier than last year. If I can get those two working together ala Eliot Coleman, I'm going to shoot for a full month early next year. The weather has been pretty soggy for the past weekend, and the rest of the week looks like more of the same. I might try starting Cukes and Squash indoors this year, as opposed to direct seeding them. We'll see how that goes.

Home made Peas Trellis. I think it looks nicer than the chicken wire I've used in the past.

Mending Fence pt.2

The new fence from our front yard. All of the white slats were salvaged from the original fence.

Way back in March, I undertook what I anticipated to be a weekend-sized job: replacing the worn out and collapsing fence on the South side of our back yard. The actual demolition only took a couple of hours. The rebuilding, on the other hand, took a bit longer. As per usual, conflicting schedules caused the process to stop and start multiple times. It proceeded very slowly. I finally finished building it within the past week or so. It still needs to be painted white, and I'll have to play with the grade at the gate so that it opens smoothly; but other than that I'm pretty happy with it. Pushing it forward to the front edge of our house has added about 30'x23' of space to our back yard.

Right now it's a great space for the kids and chickens to rummage, and will hopefully have raised beds going around the edges in the near future. Down the line, I'd like to put a trellis or arbor over the gate and some fruiting bushes on the front side of it. For now, though, I need to dig up some exterior paint and let the twins get their inner Tom Sawyer on. At the current rate of progress, that'll happen sometime at the end of summer. We'll see...

Inside the fence, I've got eight 2'x3' pop-up raised beds that are going to be filled and planted .