farm to (s)table
for whatever reason—hmm, I dunno, maybe it’s the one hundred degree farenheit temperature—but, for whatever reason, our walk in refrigerator keeps cycling itself off for a much needed breather. good for it, bad for produce.
trust the spirit
for whatever reason—hmm, I dunno, maybe it’s the one hundred degree farenheit temperature—but, for whatever reason, our walk in refrigerator keeps cycling itself off for a much needed breather. good for it, bad for produce.
two amazing things happened today at the backyard moon. first, we were attacked by a mob of city dwelling, country itching "landless, wannabe farmers". crop mob atlanta, an all volunteer production, travels to local sustainable farms and lends a hand in whatever ways are needed. as they explain on their website, farmers are not only an aging population, but a dissapearing one. in the age of gps plantings and oil powered harvesters, less people are needed. but in our world, where hand meets seed and soil, community is paramount. and that is exactly what they provided us with today.
When I first moved down here, it was originally because of a hot lead from brent the butcher, partner behind brooklyn’s the meat hook. he had said a guy he used to work with at marlow and sons had moved down to athens, georgia--and with a kind off odd smile (which I now can understand)--he said, “and they’re doing a lot of cool stuff.” the odd smile no doubt referring the tentacle like, farm fueled behemoth that is our farm's family—two nationally known and talked about restaurants, a local coffee roaster and coffee bar, both a vegetable and meat csa for the local community, and a regional network of small scale, sustainable, and humane meat producers. from the first time i heard about it, i knew i needed to know more...
this is as close as we come to some real deal, yee-haw, cowboy antics. a three hundred yard cow move, bringing the herd home to welcome the new arrivals. we are taking advantage of this moment of integration—new steers—to accomplish a couple other things on the list. one, we are sending them from one side of the farm, all the way to the opposite end of the pasture—grass they haven’t grazed in many months. secondly, we are providing the herd with an exercise on running everyone to home base. never a bad thing to master.
cnn just released a full story to accompany the tv clip they released earlier this week, and the article is featured on eatocracy.cnn right now.
it includes a pretty thorough description of my apprenticeship, and the circumstances of our move from ny to ga, as well as all the details of the ins-n-outs involved between getting animals from the farm to the bun.
i’ve become increasingly more paranoid about what the animals do during a rain storm. let’s face it, we all stay inside, and they’re all together, conspiring willy nilly about who knows what.
exhibit, a: look at those beady eyes: