Living the Dream

This oil painting isn't really Ron's farm. I just liked it. You can find it here.

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“Hydrant's frozen”

“It won’t start”

Buck barn isolated,

Drifting snow ate our truck.

2 am, checking for newborns,

so cold eyes burn, fingers tingle

the snow crunches, but ghostly quiet.

all is well, living the dream.

Thanks and a tip of my warm, fuzzy hat to Ron Klein of Windshadow Farm & Dairy in Bangor, MI for this.  He posted it to a list I'm on and graciously gave me permission to reprint it.

Summer Saturday Mornings

Selfishly I don't want anyone to know where this road is. I want to keep it all to myself on Saturday mornings.

This summer I split a CSA with a neighbor and chose to pick it up from the farm rather than from an in-town location where it could have been dropped. Yes, the price was less because I did the pick up. But that's not why I wanted to do it.

Where I grew up it wasn't really country despite the fact that there was a dairy farm next door and cornfields across the back fence. But it was a place that was open and green and a bit wild and country-like. And for good or ill, it is in me, drawing me to like places. Where I pick up my CSA is such a place.

It is a real farm, farmed by a young couple with two children, lots of energy and even more passion and dreams. They are the future, holding my past in the palms of their hands.  They value many of the same things I was taught to value - hard work, honesty, simplicity and family. And they live out of the way, about 30 minutes from the little town where I now live.

To get there requires a drive in the country and if navigated properly, it can feel like the true middle of nowhere. Wide open spaces, lots of green, no houses and my personal favorite, dirt roads. Not dirt lanes to houses, but dirt roads that must be taken slowly to avoid or stay in the ruts that the rain and wheels create. Dirt roads that spew up dust behind the car when its dry, obliterating everything that has been passed. Dirt roads that take away that last bit of stress that had started oozing away the minute I left "civilization."

Saving money is great, but the real value of picking up my CSA is the opportunity to be in a place where I feel so much at home.

Change

From my LinkedIn feed. I didn't catch where it came from or I'd credit it. 

Yesterday's pop up poster show about sustainable agriculture and the food system (continuing today, noon to 6pm at Journeyman Distillery in Three Oaks, MI) was an interesting experience and possibly an experiment. First, there was a lot of positive feedback from guests, from the manager of the venue and from the people who took time out of their days to be "resources"and provide deeper information to people who stopped to chat and learn. Second, the conversations that took place not only exchanged information, but a type of energy flowed as well.

Like all manner of conferences, workshops, seminars, networking events, etc., although the participants may truly value the information they exchanged, the new connections they made, or the affirmation they received of their own current efforts, the most valuable thing that gets taken away is the energy. Whether invigoration and motivation of the newly interested  or re-invigoration and re-motivation of those who may have long been involved in trying to make a change, the energy is the thing.

However energy is a asset that can deplete quickly if not replenished occasionally. Of course "wins" help boost energy, but the need is greater when faced with disappointment, failure and frustration. It's easy to get focused on how big the problem is, how intransigent, how deeply rooted. So rather than let energy seep away in the face of those things, consciously choose to re-energize. Events like this show can boost your energy and ready you for continued action. Or if you are already energized, it's a place where you may inspire someone on the fence...or on the other side of it entirely. Come on down.

Lexicon of Sustainability - a story to tell

One of the images that will be on display at this weekend's Pop-Up Poster Show. Source: Lexicon of Sustainability website. 

This weekend, January 18-19 at Journeyman Distillery in Three Oaks, MI the second of four seasonal shows of Douglas Gayeton's amazing art will be on display. These images are part of a larger collection that combine images and words to tell the story of what sustainability in our food system means. I've been asked many time why I am putting these shows on. The answer is simple, to me anyway.

The project impressed me when I saw the images last summer in Goshen, IN. And being aware of many people who were interested in and doing sustainable agriculture or trying to address food issues, I thought these would be a way to possibly connect people of like interests as well as provide information to people who may not have considered some of these terms and the impacts and opportunities they represent. So I just did it. I made the contact to get the posters here and began to recruit others for spaces for shows and involvement during shows. My original idea morphed into seasonal shows which seems to be a good thing as they can potentially reach more people and keep the topic out there. I've been amazed and incredibly humbled by the support provided by people opening their venues, taking their time to be present as hosts (first show) and resources (this show) as well and the extraordinarily generous support of people providing graphic, PR and social media support. No one is getting paid. This is something that people believe in so they are involved. And this creates a really strong connection.

Looking ahead, there will be a Spring show and a Summer show. They too will be volunteer efforts. The question is what then? What will come out of four seasons of shows that will have occurred by the end of Summer? People can make a difference so if you come and connect with someone and have an idea, follow it. Maybe others are out there. Make connections. If you want people to work on issues, work on them yourself. Involve others. Keep trying. And as Ghandi said "Be the change you want to see."

Hope to see you this weekend!

Confused Flora

I believe in climate change. I have for a long time. Although I don't have deep technical, scientific knowledge of the issue, I don't know that I need it to see an impact close to home. The potential for radically changing the growing season. In my lifetime.

For several seasons an arrow-head type plant in my front garden has grown far too late into the season after having died out and assumed that the brief cold snap was winter and the sure-to-be brief warm snap justified popping up out of the earth again.

But today, while walking, I saw what is in the picture above. Buds on a nearly dead rose bush, on November 10th. Buds sitting side by side with massive rose hips from dead roses and spotty leaves that appear just about to give up the ghost. Clearly the plant seems pretty confused. If roses are confused it's sad. If food crops are confused, and don't fully complete their growth cycles, then what?

Pop Up Poster Show

Words and images - address the meaning of sustainability in relation to our food system.

Early last summer I learned of a national project - The Lexicon of Sustainability - which was an effort to focus on local food systems and the meaning of terms that get thrown around referring to "sustainability" and all its nuances. After seeing images on their website, then a subset of them in person in Goshen, IN, I decided that I wanted to do a show here in Southwest Michigan.

Michigan is an agricultural powerhouse, yet we, like most areas, import most of the food we eat. That makes no sense to me. Oh I understand that we are at a point where we also probably can't support our population without some level of imports (imports meaning "originating outside the state") but I do believe we can do better at sustaining ourselves with what we have nearby. Our food system has over the years morphed into something that I want to change. I believe it's time to chip away at it in a mindful way. And I believe that it is everyone's responsibility. Everybody eats.

So when the opportunity presented itself to bring posters dealing with sustainability and the food system to my little part of the world, how could I not?

Information on the show is here. I hope you will stop by and join the conversation.

True Choice

I was saddened and angered to learn something at a farmers market this past weekend. If I'm totally honest I would have to say it doesn't surprise me. But to have it occurring in my back yard is almost more than I can bear.

Around here we're pretty proud of what we grow. After all, we're "The Fruit Belt." And this time of year the joy of fresh, local peaches - particularly the Red Havens that are a favorite - is much anticipated. Of course peaches are available year round in the grocery, but they virtually never taste really good, like true, just picked fruit. They can't. They weren't tree-ripened and just picked. But that's another story.

Farmers markets are touted as places to meet the people who produce your food, to have a chat and build a relationship. To get close to your food like in the past. To get fresh peaches in season. What's there to be sad or angry about?

What made me sad and angry was that I'm told some of the very people who we've been encouraged to trust because they grow our food and who we can look at eyeball to eyeball at a market are betraying that trust. How? In this case by buying Georgia peaches and selling them in peach season in The Fruit Belt. I was told that they even peeled off the Georgia labels and stuck on Michigan ones. Huh? How did we get here? Not only misrepresenting what they were selling, but since when did growers small enough to consider the work of a farmers market worth the effort, start stickering their fruit? Is there any hope of reconnecting people who shop at farmers markets to their food sufficiently that they no longer tolerate such practices?

In a world where the food system is so interconnected that I can have virtually whatever I want, whenever I want it, it my reaction may seem unreasonable. Yet the choice that is most important to be is to be able to confidently buy local produce from local farmers. I want the truth from the people I entrust to grow my food. I stopped trusting the big food companies years ago. Please don't tell me I have to stop trusting small farmers now too...

Pumpkin cake for the current me

I love pumpkin. Growing up I couldn't get enough of if, because it seemed that the only time we had anything pumpkin was between about mid-October and Christmas. Which, by the way, is historically the season to have pumpkin unless you canned it. Commercial canning and out of area growing made year-round pumpkin even more possible. Of course now what is labeled pumpkin may actually be a winter squash mix....but I digress.

After leaving home decades ago I found that pumpkin wasn't just for that tiny window and so started collecting pumpkin recipes. One of my favorites was a pumpkin cake that had orange juice and orange zest in it. It was heavenly and I made it often, even adapting it various ways. Time passes and for whatever reason, that recipe was replaced by others. But when invited to a dinner last evening, I decided it was a perfect time to bring that wonderful pumpkin cake as a dessert. So I dug out the recipe and rolled up my sleeves yesterday morning to make the cake.

HORRORS! I read the recipe and it called for a stick of butter in the cake AND a stick of butter for the frosting! Had I really eaten that? Yes I had, and loved every minute of if. Today though, I don't eat so much fat (or try not to) for various reasons. And I don't even try to fool myself into thinking I can do it occasionally. Of course I can, but I don't want to. So what to do?

My solution was to leave the butter in the frosting since I didn't have a good idea of what might substitute (sorry - fat free creme cheese doesn't do it). That left the batter. Often I've used apple sauce to replace a fat in baking. So this time I used some recently canned pear sauce (just like apple sauce only I think a milder flavor) and wondered what would happen. Yes, it's risky to try new things when you are bringing a dish to a dinner, but why not get feedback from people who you know enjoy and know food? So I dove in and made the recipe with the substitution.

At dinner I didn't say what had changed in the recipe, only let people know there had been a change and asking for their thoughts. Seriously, there were moans of "yum" "ooohh, this is so good" and the like. I actually thought they were putting me on so I tasted it. It was good - very moist and delicate and 50% less fat than the original recipe. I learned that I can use pear sauce just as well as apple sauce and not risk so much at all. And since I made the pear sauce with pears from a nearby friend, I knew it didn't have gobs of sugar or anything else in it either.

I've shared the recipe on the Recipes page of this blog. I apologize in advance because I don't know where the original one came from. But with this adaptation, I guess it becomes mine :-)

A good glass of wine...

A friend, Greta Hurst of Tabula Rasa Gallery in Baroda, recently attended the 5^th Annual Southwest Michigan Wine Evaluation at Lake Michigan College, Mendel Center in Benton Harbor. It was a serious, day-long event where Michigan wineries brought their wines to be blind tasted by 40 winemakers, chefs, restaurateurs, grape growers, wine enthusiasts, AND three highly trained sommeliers. Michigan wines have a reputation for being too sweet for serious oenophiles who historically have tended to dismiss them. They may need to rethink that.

Participants tasted 59 different wines grouped into ten varietals: Pinot Gris, Chardonnay, Gewurztraminer, Pinot Noir, Riesling, Merlot, Syrah, Cabernet Franc, Bordeaux Blend and Cabernet Sauvignon. Each category included at least one wine from outside the region as the benchmark for that particular varietal.

The goal:

• to unemotionally evaluate local wines against a benchmark and provide consistent feedback to winemakers as they work to raise the bar on Michigan wine.

Bottom line? Tasters unanimously chose Michigan wines over benchmark wines every time.

I expect this was a lovely way to spend a day and appreciate learning of it from Greta. Hats off to Southwest Michigan’s wine country!

What happens when....

In Skyping with a former professor of mine turned friend and mentor we talked about the things I'm interested in and working on to make changes to the food system. He didn't ask, but the changes I'd like to see are not most likely very different from those of many other people:

1. I'd like to know where my food comes from and how it was grown/produced.
2. I'd like to have real choices in all types of food, not be limited to eating GMOs, foods that have additives etc. 
3. I'd like to be able to buy most things without having them travel hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of miles to get to me. 
4. I'd like to be able to buy fresh as much of the year as reasonable and have regional food processing done (like the time when every town or area had a brewery, which is happening again....) so that I could support local growers year round. 
5. I'd like to have more of the price I pay for food go to the people who raised/produced it and less to the intermediaries, packaging companies, shippers and marketers.
6. I'd like to see healthy, fresh, sustainably raised/produced food available to everyone at a fair price. 

 Tall order, yes. And he raised some questions. Specifically:

1. What happens when the activism to get these things may hit declining returns relative to the effort to get them done?
2. What might be the countervailing activities that don't get put into action until the threat to the existing system takes a harder form?
3. And, what may be some unintended consequences of successfully changing the food system?

Worth some thought and some conversation....

Back to the future

Last year about this time I wrote a series on the Simple, Good and Tasty site (www.simplegoodandtasty.com) about 21st Century farming. It was about my belief that we were experiencing a renaissance in farming, particularly small scale farming. I see it happening, but, then again, just because I see it, doesn't mean its a national trend.

Recently Slow Food USA's newsletter carried an article from USA Today that said exactly the same thing. I am so pleased to be right :-). It is a hopeful sign that there is a re-focusing on the farming lifestyle. Perhaps we are going back to a work ethic of a prior time, now with the benefit of technology that our ancestors didn't have. A work ethic and a sense of place and pride. A connection to the earth and a respect. I do hope it's not too much to ask. And hope it's not too late....

Long-term thinking; act now!

Below is a request for support that was sent to a list I'm on. It speaks to something very important to all of us. I encourage you to get involved; what we eat depends on it.

Hey folks,

I’m writing to ask you all to support a new piece of legislation to support beginning farmers for the next 5 years. Though not “directly” an organic issue, beginning farmers are twice as likely to be certified organic, and many very small beginning farmers fall under the $5000 threshold, meaning they are organic but exempt from certification (but not from following the rules) under the NOP.

In any case, 70% of US farmland is expected to change hands within the next 20 years, and we need a new “crop” of environmentally and socially conscious farmers to take their place. We (myself, as a representative of Michigan Organic Food and Farm Alliance, and other organizations who are part of the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition) have worked hard to craft a piece of legislation that promotes beginning farmers, and allows access to federal programs for those wishing to start diversified organic operations, instead of favoring 5th generation conventional corn farmers or CAFO’s.

But WE NEED YOU TO CALL Your SENATORS and your Congresspeople. Especially important will be calls to Senator STABENOW’S office. You can leave a message at her DC office by calling  202-224-4822, or call and speak with (or leave a message for) her State Ag. Liaison, Kali Fox in her Lansing office at 517-203-1760, or e-mail her atkali_fox@stabenow.senate.gov. 

Sample Message: I’m calling to urge Senator Stabenow to co-sponsor the Beginning Farmer and Rancher Opportunity Act of 2011. This legislation is being introduced in the House and Senate next week.  It will help new farmers get started in agriculture.  It’s a jobs creator and a cost effective smart investment.  Can I count on Senator Stabenow to be a co-sponsor?

To learn more about the bill you can see the post at www.beginningfarmers.org HERE:http://www.beginningfarmers.org/beginning-farmer-opportunity-act-ask-your-legislators-to-co-sponsor-today/

Please call today or Monday!

Thanks Much,
Taylor Reid
MOFFA Policy Committee
Www.beginningfarmers.org

Sharing news from RegionalFoodSolutions.com

The information below is from an email I received from Patty Cantrell at Michigan's RegionalFoodSolutions.com organization. Hopefully it's a step in the right direction for Michigan and its residents....

Governor Draws Health, Wellness Lessons from MI Good Food Charter

In an address last Thursday, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder shared his ideas for improving health and wellness in the state. In developing a number of his recommendations, he drew on the Michigan Good Food Charter, a policy platform for leveraging the power of Michigan food and farming to improve public health, grow jobs, build social equity, and protect the environment.

Highlights from Gov. Snyder’s plan include:

• Working with schools to increase physical activity and health education and to adopt healthier nutrition standards.
• Improving access to healthy, local foods in partnership with food manufacturers and food retailers.
• Strengthening the farm-to-school network in Michigan.

The governor did not drill down, in many cases, to specific needs spelled out in the Charter, such as building farms' capacity to supply more local foods to schools. Yet the top-level direction he provided was clear: Make the healthy food connection with Michigan agriculture, and make it work for the state’s economy and communities.

Keith Creagh, director of the Michigan Department of Agriculture, told Lansing’s Channel 6 news it’s all about access to healthy foods.

“One of the programs that we'll spend more time, energy and effort on is something called Local Food Hubs, and that's marrying businesses and consumers and farmers to make sure you have that integration of systems to supply food locally," said Creagh.

Full text of Governor Snyder’s address on Michigan health and wellness is available here: http://www.michigan.gov/snyder/0,4668,7-277--262254--,00.html

Farm Subsidy Myths

Farms subsidies are good things, right? They help farmers and we all need to eat so we should continue to provide subsidies, right?

No. Not really.

Click here, to read about farm subsidy myths busted.

Three cheers for Michigan's farm to school advocates!

On the heels of the last post about silly laws preventing people from growing their own veggies, comes great news for farm-to-school advocates and children's health. The recent story of how only two states, Michigan and Florida, received special assistance is a credit to the hard work of many. The next step? Finding a way to continue to provide that supply between October and April. More hoop houses anyone?

USDA picks Michigan for food program - Laura Misjak, Lansing State Journal

http://www.lansingstatejournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/201107120400/NEWS01/107120307

Michigan is one of two states chosen by the United States Department of Agriculture to participate in a pilot program that will make it easier for locally grown food to end up in school cafeterias.

Officials are expected to announce the program today, with Michigan and Florida schools able to purchase the locally grown food in 2012, Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Kathleen Merrigan said in a Monday interview with the State Journal.

"It's really about making bureaucracy work better by using existing entitlement dollars and increasing the flexibility of how those entitlement dollars can be used," Merrigan said.

School districts will be able to use the USDA funds they receive to purchase locally grown food.

The effort is expected to increase nutritional value in school lunches, boost the state's agricultural economy and give students the opportunity to see where their food comes from, Merrigan said.

The pilot program has great potential to positively impact Michigan's economy, said U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Lansing.

"I think Michigan particularly will benefit because we grow just about everything we need here," she said. "Our schools are very eager to be able to purchase from their local community because they can get apples, cherries, blueberries, celery, and everything from local farmers."

Local growers will have to be on an authorized list of vendors through the USDA, Merrigan said, and details on how to get on that list will be released in coming weeks.

Michigan was chosen because of a high interest in farm-to-school programs, along with the wide variety of locally grown fruits and vegetables.

The state's agricultural diversity is second only to California's, officials said.

Diane Connors, a food and farming senior policy specialist with the Michigan Land Use Institute, said the program will provide more flexibility for food service directors to serve Michigan-grown foods.

"It's fantastic to get more flexibility with USDA funds for schools in Michigan to purchase produce from local farmer and to get healthy foods to kids in school," she said. "It's also good to build local food economies in Michigan where farming is such an important part of our economy."

Edible Michiana

Good news food lovers! We are about to have our own magazine devoted to food! Long in coming, perhaps, given that Michigan is the state that taught California how to grow produce. But, nonetheless, the magazine, Edible Michiana is about to launch here in the heartland. The premiere issue will be available July 1 and quarterly after that. In my opinion it is long overdue and welcome. While the awareness is growing about the area I live in as a wonderful agricultural area, there is still too much farmland being lost to development. This is an area that is worth visiting precisely because of what ISN'T here. It's not quite lost to chains, water parks and mega stuff. Not yet, but it's still possible that this fertile, beautiful contributor to our tables could be. Let's hope not.

Look for Edible Michiana and see what's here...

Michigan - the other agricultural state

Unless you are from around here (the mid-midwest) I suspect that the idea of Michigan being an agricultural state doesn't come to mind as quickly as the images of snow, auto industry or, perhaps, Motown sound. But agricultural it has long been and still is.

In a three-day series of articles I briefly profile the state's farming heritage, talk with three couples committed to the more rural life, growing and using local ingredients, and look at the future of small scale agriculture on the SimpleGoodandTasty website starting Tuesday, February 15. It was great fun to write and I hope you enjoy reading it!

The Migrant Project

A friend forwarded a blog post to me yesterday that had in it - almost hidden away - a link to an exhibit in California about migrant workers. This is a group of people who are not often in most people's consciousness, yet they are a key link between the food in the ground and the food on the table.

Michigan used to have a large migrant worker population, but over the years that declined as the nature of growing food in Michigan changed. I suspect the crops that workers worked on have disappeared, been automated or other changes have occurred, resulting in far fewer individuals and families making the annual trip to Michigan to care for and harvest the most important thing we grow - food.

While the exhibit relates to workers half a continent away, I suspect that the story has relevance here as well. Take a look at The Migrant Project - it may change the way you look at food...