Weekly Recipe: Let's talk about all of them

This week's clip: a few suggestions for preparing what's in your veggie bags.

Farm Journal Update

May 25: I'm keeping a farm journal for my readers this year that my late, dear grandma Stella would have identified as being "full of BS". I really miss her.

May 26: My soil is deficient in boron, so I went down to IGA to buy some Borax, a mined salt that, in addition to killing ants and washing your clothes, will help my sunflowers, those boron hogs, grow tall and strong.  Owner Harry was at the register and asked me if I was going fishing. "???" I said. He explained that fishermen use Borax as a binding agent for fish roe so that the latter will stay on their hooks as bait. I realize that a local Grocer like Harry has a hard time matching prices with the big boxes, but where else are you able to get ninja fishing advice along with your jujubes? Certainly not at Superstore. 

May 27: I tossed and turned in bed last night, feeling guilty about the presumptions I made in yesterday's journal entry. So I phoned Galen Weston to ask him how to hook a decent-sized trout, but all he did was go on and on about his Decadent-brand ice cream sandwiches. In the end I had to hang up on him. I'm going to sleep like a baby tonight. But not that baby Carrick. I hear tell he doesn't sleep well at all. Welcome to the world buddy!

May 31: A lesson in extremes today. Down in Penticton to deliver the year's first weekly veggie bag to my subscribers, I visited one new customer and was whisked inside to be thanked and introduced to every member of the family, including Jet, who will be five in fourteen sleeps. He invited me to the party. Ego soaring, I proceeded to the next recipient, an eighty-five year old whose daughter had purchased her a veggie subscription for Christmas. Evidently it was a suprise. "What? I've got too many veggies already! I throw them out!" I've never had a customer accept their veggie bag so begrudgingly. I liked her, though. Farmers tend to get put on a pedestal. This lady will keep me humble. And I like a challenge.

June 1: I split my pants crotch-to-knee while lunging for a pop fly during a softball game today. This is journal-worthy only because of my lengthy pants-splitting story from a couple weeks back. My thighs are like Andy from The Shawshank Redemption, only less successful. 

June 2: Farming is awesome because you can be in on a conference call for a board meeting of some non-profit you're involved with, and the topic is bylaw changes and you just want to stick your head in the oven, and then Joe calls you on the other line to tell you he needs help baling hay, and when it's hay-baling time and there's thunderheads on the horizon, you don't mess around man, and so you get back on the other line and say "I have to go. There's hay to be baled." And you race out the door, and you feel like Batman. And so you ask Joe to call you Batman, and he says "I'm not doing that. Pick up a rake." But it's still way more fun than that conference call. And you can still refer to Joe as  Commissioner Gordon when he's out of earshot. 

Recent photos from the farm

Above: Jordan and Nicole thresh some Rattlesnake beans harvested last year. Finally. I bought a used walk-in cooler for the farm! This will be great. But don't tell Vanessa how I abused her truck to get it here. A shot of our Friday evening market stall. And some haying shots...we hayed this week, almost successfully. We had about 4/5 of the bales off the field before the sky let loose with angry raindrops. Dagnabbit! Ian took some of these photos but wants you to know it was with his iphone camera, not his fancy ones.

Weekly Recipe: BBQ that Kale!

The farm's apprentice this year, Ryan McNichol, is a chef by training, and for this week's recipe--first of the CSA season!--he tells you how Kale can be BBQ'd for your delight. Audio clip below. Thanks Ryan! By the way, Ryan is going to be demonstrating this recipe during our Friday evening 5-7pm farmgate market this week. Come check it out!

This is Ryan. He's nice. He just bought a motorbike, which is why he looks so happy.

Recent Farm Photos

A few recent photos. All but one are taken by Ian, a friend and professional photographer who has been helping us out on the farm. We'll be featuring lots of his photos on the Farm Photography page of this website.

The Weather Had Other Plans

Today I set up my camera to take photos at intervals in order to show you a tomato bed being planted, but instead it caught a storm rolling in. The last photo was taken about 30 seconds before the hail let loose and we scrambled the heck out of the garden. Had I not been concerned about my camera you'd be seeing a lot more of the storm.

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Update to the Farm Journal

May 7: Semi-monthly self-reminders: askance is how my readers may want to look at these farm journal entries, which is the format I'm using to speak to them this year. I grew bored with the old format and thought this might spice things up in the headroom.

May 8: Attended a valley-wide Chamber of Commerce event with winemaker, friend, and Mazda enthusiast Tyler Harlton of TH Wines. Wore a new pair of slim-cut, navy pants for the occasion. Enroute, remarked to Tyler that I couldn't figure out why I don't wear slim-cut pants more often because "I make these look good." Tyler stopped for a wine delivery in Kelowna. By the time he returned I had split my pants down the inner thigh, crotch-to-almost-knee. Insisted to Tyler I could hobnob while standing just so to avoid showing off my alabaster skin. Tyler balked at the suggestion just before realizing he happened to have an extra pair of pants in the canopy of his truck. The lovely folks at Discover Wines allowed me to change in their bathroom, and off I went to the Chamber event, apparently concerned about an impending flood. Tyler is a bit shorter than me, turns out. I still think showing off a little thigh would have been the lesser transgression. 

Happy Farm, USA

May 10: Second farmers' market in Penticton. Already questions about whether any of my veggies are genetically engineered (AKA GMO) are rolling in. I always reply with the same primer: 1. Certified organic farmers like me are forbidden from using GMO seeds, period. 2. This is a more or less a moot point at the farmers' market, where the only possible veggie you could find that could have come from GMO seeds is sweet corn, for which it is unlikely any valley farmer is using GMO seeds to grow. This doesn't stop veggie vendors from erecting signs that say 'GMO Free', which is a bit like an apple juice advertised as 'Fat Free'. 3. Where meat and eggs are concerned, if the producer is not certified organic, it is highly likely the feed used for the animals has GMO soy, corn, or canola in it, since just about all conventional (ie., non-organic) livestock feed contains those products.

May 11: Addendum to last entry: I should add(endum) that, while I am not allowed to, and don't use GMO seeds, I am among a minority of organic farmers who believes that the GMO foods approved for commercial use are safe to eat. I don't usually mention this to my colleagues and customers because I don't enjoy conflict and awkwardness. Read: I'm a coward.

May 12: Woke up to find more cucumber seeds rooted out of their seed trays, insides scooped out like yogurt by an enthusiastic modern woman in a Danon commercial. Mice have been stymieing my efforts to grow cucurbits this year. I've got a few traps set now, with cucumber and squash seeds as bait. Let's hope Mickey returns, hung-over, for some hair of the dog.

May 15:  Attended a meeting of the Peachland Fall Fair organizing committee last week. If my prose appears suddenly more illustrious, it's because I write with a new title: Jordan Marr, Fall Fair Trophy-Master. Ever noticed how a title's magnificence is often inversely proportional to its job description? I am to haul 50 trophies back and forth from the engraver, and hand them up to the stage one-by-one during the event. If the Fall Fair committee were composed of Archie Comics characters, I'd be Moose. Incidentally, I hope readers plan to enter something in the fall fair this year. It's really fun.

May 18: The start of the Homestead Farm Veggie Box program draws near. If you're in the program and haven't received an update from me, I apologize. It has been just crazy up here on the farm. But I'm still thinking of you all; today I stood on my deck and blew you a kiss on the wind to reassure you of your place in my head and heart. Unfortunately, Joe, co-owner of the farm and an old-school, less sentimental type of farmer, saw what I was doing and blew some armpit farts on the wind at the same time. So, be careful which messages you accept from the breeze. 

May 19: Mickey returned and met his end. I've got a pretty incredible photo of him caught in the trap on my website's blog. Warning for the faint-hearted: it features a dead mouse. 

Recent Farm Photos

In this slideshow: the first tomatoes went out this week! On brand new trellising! Thanks to those who are making stuff happen here...Gillian, my brother Alex, Ryan, Ian, Joe, Jess, and my mom, who came out and cooked for the freezer all weekend so I can feed the farm crew more efficiently. Also: dandilion.

The Homestead Organic Snake

It's not unusual to find snakes on the farm, but this was the biggest one I've seen in the Okanagan. Sorry for the lack of perspective and the crappy camera.

Recent Photos

Photo One: After a few weeks of feeling overwhelmed, the cavalry arrived. This year's crew: Ryan and Ian. They arrived within a few days of each other and have been whipping things back into shape. In this one they're weeding the hell out of some beds of greeens. 
Photo two: Tyler Harlton of TH Wines puts his Homestead Produce on the street to play with his phone. "It's okay," he said. "I've got a good immune system."

Photo three: Humble beginnings for our new Friday Night Farmgate Market. 5-7 pm every Friday until October. Hope to see you there.

Update: The Homestead Organic Journal

April 23: Semi-monthly self-reminders: I'm keeping a somewhat truthful farmer journal for my readers this year. I need to gather up all that irrigation hose I left lying outside the nursery. Someone's going to trip on it.

April 24: Baked cookies for Torbin, a departing visitor from Germany who was doing some house-sitting on the property and ended up helping me with a big fencing job. Stepping out of my soiled work pants, decided there was no need to throw on another pair while baking, given I'd just have to change back to work pants in twenty minutes. Regretted that decision ten minutes later when Jennay, farmer-owner of Paynter's Fruit Stand, stopped by to drop off the carrot seeder she'd borrowed and looked through the window to find a hirsute, heavy-set guy mixing cookie dough in his underpants, Pearl Jam blaring on the speakers.

Same: Headed up to a local condo complex to give a talk on organic farming. One of my favourite speaking gigs so far. They fed and wined me first, and clearly they've been reading my articles, because they chose to give me a bag of candy as a thank you (much better, if less salutary, than what I received for speaking to folks at the Central Okanagan Association of Dental Professionals, who gave me a toothbrush and some of those loopy things for flossing behind one's retainer). It went so well, in fact, that they invited me to join their group--The Ladies of Eagle's View. It called to mind my three brothers' previous proclamation that I'm the sister they never had. I politely declined the invitation.

April 25: While fencing in the new garden, found my beloved hammer, Fat Bob, half buried in the soil. I'd long given it up for lost. If I can find the time this week I'll write a Haiku to celebrate its return.

Same: The first ever Homestead Friday Night Farmgate Market at the top of our driveway. Well attended. Its hippie-dippie vibe was converted to more of a tailgate one when a customer and his friend pulled in to grab some veggies after a day of golf and hauled out a case of beer. I wasn't complaining. We'll be doing these markets every Friday, 5-7pm, until October, he writes in his farm journal.

April 26: There you were! Dirt-sheathed
                Your shaft now half-composted
                 I missed you, Fat Bob.

April 28: Nearly tripped on the irrigation hose outside the nursery. I really do need to get it out of there.

April 29: There are long workdays when so much stuff comes out of my hair in the shower that it begins to feel like I'm in a Warner Bros. cartoon, and I half expect an Acme Anvil or a fish skeleton to suddenly pop out of there. That hasn't happened yet but I did find a tick today. I smushed him.

May 2: Was rushing out of the nursery with a tray of onion seedlings in my hands when I tripped on the pile of irrigation hose. Tray went flying. It landed face down; I landed tits up in the rhubarb patch. I really need to move that hose.

May 5: Those with risk tolerance could plant their beans and corn now. We're not out of frost season yet but by the time they germinate they'll likely be okay. The risk averse should wait 7-10 more days to plant. 

Update for Veggie Box Subscribers

Garden is growing well, folks; as planned, we're looking at a late-May start. You'll get a week's notice. I've included an image below, because that's what gets eyeballs on blogposts, folks.

Jordan dreams of fresh carrots almost every night. 

The Chef has arrived.

First cabbage planting of the season is in, thanks in large part to this guy, our 2014 apprentice. Welcome to the farm, Ryan.

Cooking With: Pac Choi

If you're getting veggies from The Homestead in April or May, chances are you'll get some pac choi. In this clip Chef Rob Cordonier of Hillside Winery & Bistro makes a couple of suggestion for its preparation in the kitchen.