Local Food and the USDA

There is a very interesting blog that keeps abreast of the administration's interesting food initiatives and ag-policy:
http://obamafoodorama.blogspot.com/2009/09/know-your-farmer-know-your-foodknow_15.html

This post focuses on the USDA's support of local agriculture through the "Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food" initiative. Very interesting.

Inspired by Arganica door tag, Michelle Obama opens farmer's market

So Michelle Obama wants to open a farmer's market now! I heard reports that she decided to open the farmer's market when her husband found an Aragnica door tag on their porch.

Read about it in the DCist:

http://dcist.com/2009/09/michelle_obama_applies_for_farmers.php

Thoughts on Raw Milk

Hello,

Here is some information on raw milk. I will admit I am biased on the subject, if you consider having consistent experience with something, and having that experience be positive, a bias (the article selection partially reflects that). I was a member of a cow-share in Indiana, from which my housemates and I got a couple gallons a week from a local dairy farm. The taste was great, and I grew another 4 inches even though I was 25. No one else has noticed though.

What are your opinions on raw milk dairy? Should Aragnica be offering it? By the way though, whether or not we continue to offer raw milk dairy, we will be offering some great, grass-fed pasteurized milk, so hopefully all will be happy.



A Washington Post investigative piece. Read the whole thing if you have time, I think it is pretty balanced. In other words, it comes out on the favorable side...  but from initial skepticism.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/27/AR2006092700108_pf.html


An example of how studies that show explicit health benefits from raw milk are rarely taken at face value. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/05/070510093349.htm

This page speaks about the importance of a natural, grass diet for the quality of cow's milk.
http://www.raw-milk-facts.com/About_Raw_Milk.html

A lengthy summary of and argument using data on raw milk:

http://www.karlloren.com/aajonus/p15.htm



-Bert

Cherry Ridge Newsletter: They're having an open house 9/26

NEWSLETTER

FOR SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

     Seems the one-week of summer has come and gone with days now barely in the 70’s and nights chilly enough for a sweater.  This is definitely the most unusual season in all of my years here on the farm. You can certainly feel the nip of fall in the air signaling an earlier than usual winter.   Most every weed and bug has decided that this is the time to sprint to the finish, so in the absence of Jim I find that the chore lists grow faster than I can accomplish even a third of them.  This is the season when triage becomes a daily option as I have to decide what crops are nearly done and can be let go to the weeds and which ones will produce enough more to warrant putting my precious time and resources into saving them for a few more weeks.  The fall interns that have inquired about working the fall season seem to be unsettled and not committing to come to the farm yet, so I am doing it alone.  It’s also a time for planting out the fall crops that are not affected by the frost.  These plantings will take us into November and December if it doesn’t get too cold.   It’s always a gamble that we have to take as some mild falls are just wonderful for lettuce, broccoli, kohlrabi, cauliflower, carrots, beets, greens, peas and the like.  Others seasons bring cold rain, frozen nights where the crops just languish and not go to fruit.  You just never know, so goes farming.

      The last day Jim was here we dug the heirloom potato row and found that most of them are quite small, but will be just wonderful cooked whole with skins still on.  Scrub them up with a brush and running water and cook anyway you want, try basting and grilling them or even fry them cut in half or wedged in a deep fryer, yum.   This week’s fare is more of the same with red beets, just the green beans, more of the Orient Express eggplants, wonderful vine tomatoes and a herb mix with rosemary and oregano to season your little taters and eggplant.

      Saturday, September 26 will be the Cherry Ridge Organic Farm open house and picnic.   This is the first year our vegetables have gone to the DC area but even though we are about 3 hours away, I thought we would offer this opportunity to you as well as our local members, just in case some of you might be adventuresome enough to take the trip.   This is a yearly event we do for all our CSA members to see the farm, meet the farmer, share their experiences and enjoy some wonderful food and people of like mind.   We will provide some BB-Q meats that might include smoked rattlesnake and venison, wild caught fish, BB-Q-ed Polyface Chicken or Groundhog Stew and you are asked to bring your own drinks and maybe a vegetable dish, dessert or bread as a pot luck addition.  Bring the kids for fun show-and-tell of some of the unusual plants to include bananas, cotton and artichokes.  Tours of the farm start at 4:00 with dinner served around 6 (if all goes as planed.)   Please RSVP to David Beebe 540-348-5107,  and to get directions to the farm please by September 21 so I can plan the meat entrees.

      So all in all we head into fall with lots of fun events and wonderful cool weather.   I hope you enjoy your vegetables and have a good week and holiday weekend!

Gazpacho recipe, from Real People Eat Local

I found this recipe on the Real People Eat Local website, put up by a local who decided to eat exclusively loca, even grinding her own wheat, for a whole month. Here is the site: http://www.realpeopleeatlocal.com/


Robin's Gazpacho*


· Soak half of a “ficelle” from Bread Line in water and squeeze dry.

· Place the bread and 2 pounds of ripe, flavorful tomatoes, 3-4 frying peppers (for example, yellow Hungarian peppers), 1 cucumber, 6 cloves of garlic and a reddish-purple torpedo onion in a food processor.

· Add 1 cup olive oil, salt and 5 tablespoons white wine vinegar and two tablespoons sherry vinegar.

· Whirl until mixture is silky smooth.

· Pour soup through a strainer and press with the back of a wooden spoon to extract all the liquid you can from the solids you are casting away.

· Stir in 2 cups of cold water and a bit more vinegar and salt.

· Taste and add more if it needs it.

· Chill thoroughly in the fridge.

· Garnish with finely chopped tomato, pepper and/or cucumber. Or not. Some people like to add fried bread cubes. Others like a bit of cumin. And there are those who llike diced hard-boiled eggs or finely chopped onion on top as well – but use those long red salad onions if you do.

Connie Chung and more

Arganica Intern Breaks pre-Fall Share Silence in exclusive Q&A:

Connie Chung: "Just between you and me, what will Arganica's next offering look like?"

Intern: "It will be like a really flexible CSA share. Basically, you pay for your membership, which is just delivery costs, and then you decide the 2 or 3 foods/groups that you want weekly and will get discounted, and then the whole menu is available to you weekly at prices that are basically like Whole Foods or cheaper (even though WE buy from the small producers they won't touch)... Oh, and you can skip weeks, no obligations!"

Connie: "Lets talk about these foods, what will you be offering when the Summer growing season ends?"

Intern: "For produce, first we are now offering produce a la carte, so you can get the tomatoes or anything from a list of a couple dozen items, locally, organically grown. And if you want a farm's CSA box just for the week, we will be making those available as long as they last. As it gets colder, local produce doesn't stop though, both in the earth (many of the greens), through small green house operations (tomatoes, lettuce, etc), and through canning and processing; in fact we are getting local growers to can for us right now, and are busily freezing things to make sauces and delicacies this Winter. Then don't forget that dairy, bakery items, meats, and a host of small batch prepared foods will be available year around."

Connie: "I see. So, what else can Arganica do for me? I mean, I want delivery drivers with pitch forks and straw hats, a garuantee that I will never get sick again, you know, fringe benefits..."

Intern: "Well, first there is our 'Swine Flue Free Money Back Guarantee'.... if you eat nothing but Arganica's local foods for six months, and still die from the swine flue, we will give your surviving family a credit for everything you ordered!"

Connie: "Now THAT, is value."

Intern: "But really, we compost with our member's table scraps, we are putting together a speaker series on food issues in local pubs, we will have a cheese-making workshop, there is a local-ag reading group... We look at eating healthy and local as a way of life, and we want to offer exposure to it on multiple levels."

Connie: "Well, that's about it. But one more time, I know these aren't public yet, but (leaning over) be a dear and whisper the membership price in my ear..."

Intern: (amplified) "... five...mumble... quarter ... whole year ... dinosaur eggs... discount ..."

Connie: (dabbing ear with a tissue) "Goodness, well, I hope you're filing for non-profit status. Do you need a ride home, by the way? You can't carry pitchforks on the Metro."


And how about a Ninja Turtle Farmer in every box...

Radical Roots Community Farm newsletter

Cherry Ridge weekly newsletter from farmer David Beebe

NEWSLETTER


FOR AUGUST 26, 2009


Well I'm back in the saddle again after a week on work-ation helping a friend make a summer home into a rental property. Wow, how is it that you can leave the farm for a week and come back to being behind by about three weeks? Jim, the only intern, has done a marvelous job of keeping up with the farm chores but has discovered, as I have, that one person can just barely manage the daily maintenance of the farm, much less keep up with the bugs, weeds, irrigation and all the rest. It’s a continuous responsibility seven days a week and is unfortunately very difficult to leave for even a short vacation.

This week’s bags are somewhat more of the same with more beans (purple and green), but not artichokes this time. The ‘chokes’ are coming on but did not ripen quite big enough to make this week’s fare. They have been pretty much trouble-free once planted out in the fields, but certainly took a great bit of care in the greenhouse since seeding them in December. I believe next season we will plant many more and if we have a mild winter I’m told this year’s planting might even winter over and produce again next season. It is certainly one of the few positive crops this season, and is a very unusual plant for our area, but it’s managed to produce some delicious buds for our subscribers despite the worst season weather-wise in about 30 years. You will find also this week, another vine ripe tomato or two and a bunch of the Rainbow Lights Swiss Chard that is wonderful sautéed with garlic and olive oil. To make that garlic flavor we picked a nice bunch of a rare onion called garlic chives. These can be chopped and used like garlic in any recipe. Their rich garlic flavor and chive-like onion flavor make this a great addition to so many of your dishes in summer.

Your bag has the last of the Vision corn, which is a bit more mature than last week’s. It might be the last of the corn for a few weeks because of the unfavorable weather which has practically ruined all the Silver Queen planted so far. The sweetness of this fabulous corn fermented right on the stalk in all the hot and wet weather last week. This is a huge loss of about 1,000 ears; ah, so goes farming. So, this time we cleaned up all the worms and shucks thinking this might work better for you in the city that you did not have to deal with the shucks, bugs and yucky stuff and as a bonus we can keep the compost-able stuff on the farm to recycle into our hopefully sustainable system. Do not despair, however. Our Sugar-Buns corn is coming in nicely and will make for a great late harvest.

Eggplants are coming at last and this week you have the Japanese variety called Oriental Express. This early variety is smaller than the typical large globe types but ‘eats’ just the same. Jim and I took the ugly, holey, ‘farmer’-ones and made up a big pan of Eggplant Parmesan last night with our own homemade spaghetti sauce and it was just wonderful.

So all in all we are getting some wonderful vegetables at this time of year with many more surprises yet to come. I hope you enjoy your vegetables and have a good week!

Raw Milk

I am doing research on milk this week, to offer to Arganica, and came accross this article on raw milk:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/27/AR2006092700108_pf.html

Give it a look and tell me what you think. I actually doubt at this point that we will offer it, but frankly, we probably would if there were not certain... barriers. Still, the milk that we will offer will come as close as possible to offering the health benefits offered by local raw milk; there are after all, grades of pasteurization, homogenization, the cow's diet, and the question of area of area of origin and freshness. I used to be a member of a raw milk cow share in Indiana. It was really good stuff. Again, if you have any comments or suggestions, hit me back.

-Bert

help wanted

Hello Aragnica,

If anyone feels like helping out with an open house happneing at results Gym on Wednesday, 5 or 6 (depnding on when you could make it) through 7:30 or 8, we would love the help. They let us set our booth and bother their members, in exchange for their members getting a little discount on the shares, works for us. The real reason I'm asking is that there are 4 locations in DC, if we could get to 2 or 3 of them, that would be great. if you are interested in volunteering, know that you will be given samples, literature, an explanation of what we're doing, and hopefully a partner (bringing a friend anyway for the company if you wish).

And there will be dinner on us as well. Either Tuesday night, or if its late and we are spread out, then later on in the next week. Email or call if you're interested: Arganica.info@gmail.com, or my number: 574-850-9822.

Take care,
-Bert

Eggplant

I know many of you are getting eggplant in your CSA shares. Here are a couple recipes coutesy of Arganica member Margaret Meinlen:

Japanese Eggplant with Nobu’s Miso

serves 4 as side dish
4 Japanese eggplants, halved lengthwise (or 1-2 large globes, cut into 1″ slices – enough for 2 pieces each person)
1/2 cup of Nobu’s miso mix, below
2 tablespoons canola oil
Preheat oven – broiler on HIGH, rack 6 inches from top
1. Brush eggplant slices with a little canola oil, place on baking sheet. Immediately put in oven and broil for 4-5 minutes, until eggplant soft and the tops are golden. Remove from oven.
2. Spoon miso mixure on the eggplant halves. Use a brush to spread the miso evenly on surface. Return to broiler. Broil 2-3 minutes until the miso is bubbly and starting to brown, about 2 minutes. But watch the oven – timing may vary based on your oven. Don’t burn the eggplant!
Garnish with thinly sliced green onions (adds great color and texture)

Roasted Eggplant w Herbs



Wipe eggplant clean and slice in half lengthwise. With the tip of a knife, score the flesh deeply in a diamond cross-hatch pattern by making two or three long cuts, cutting at a steep angle, and then rotating the eggplant to make another set of similar cuts.

Tip: Eggplant can soak up oil like a sponge, but you can reduce its ability to absorb oil by lightly salting the cut flesh and letting it drain. Press on the edges of the halves to open the cuts and sprinkle salt, 1 to 1-1/2 tsp. total for all the halves, over the surface and into the cuts. Set aside, cut side up, for 30 min.

Heat the oven to 400°F. Line a baking sheet with parchment.

Over the a plate or the sink, gently squeeze the eggplant to extract the salty juice and wipe dry with a paper towel. Brush each half thoroughly with olive oil, about 1 tsp. per half for Italian eggplant, 2 tsp. per half for globe. Arrange each half, cut side down, on top of a sprig or two of thyme and/or sage, oregano, etc. on the baking sheet. Roast for 30 min - 1 hour depending on size of eggplant(s). The eggplant will collapse and the bottoms will be a deep brown caramel color when done. Let cool before handling, 5-15 min. Gently turn the cut side up. Serve with a lemon wedge for squeezing or drizzle with vinaigrette.

Welcome

Expect this site to be a whirl wind of information on Thursday: CSA share contents, recipes, and more. For now though, you spent long enough reading that email. Get some rest.
-Bert