A Taste of Farm to Table

(^ hahaha pun intended...)


It's only the my third day of work, but I am proud to say that I am already living the farm to table lifestyle! We've accomplished so much in the garden just in two days too!

Good morning, garden. :)

Yesterday, Maggie, various interns, and I spent the whole morning digging potatoes. The sun shone down on our backs as we searched for purple, gold, red, and tan potatoes, filtering through the raw umber colored soil like we were digging for colorful gemstones.  We sorted the perfect ones in one bin, and the half-eaten-by-the-gopher-but-still-good ones in another bin. We even chatted and laughed along the way. After washing them, and letting them dry, Maggie and I weighed them this morning, and I now know why my muscles are so sore...Turns out, in 3 hours, from 3 rows of potato plants, we harvested around 300 POUNDS of potatoes!! Looks like we'll be set on potatoes for a while...and we even have 6 more row that aren't ready yet!

Gemstones!

That's not even all! There were even more in those washtubs!

Last night was also my night to cook dinner for the whole group. I was paired with Amelia and her visiting Tico boyfriend (turns out there will be 3 of us girls with boyfriends living in/from Costa Rica!), and I'd like to think we did really well for only three sets of hands. We were even able to clean up BEFORE we ate because we had finished in time!

Now here's the exciting part....wanna hear what we made?! Well first, Amelia was in charge of the lentils dish, which she also made a sauce for, so I cannot really speak for that dish. However, my dishes were so literally farm to table, it makes me even more excited to learn more about my job. First, I made a salad. Ingredients included sungold cherry tomatoes (the ones I harvested Monday and are pictured in my blog), pears Amelia picked from our orchard on her way to the kitchen, mixed greens I harvested from the garden on my way to the kitchen, walnuts, Parmesan cheese, and a vinaigrette I made from blackberry honey and balsamic vinegar.

Then, I also made Vegetable Tian. The potatoes were the ones I had dug that morning, the tomatoes/zucchini/squash had been picked the day before, and I grabbed the eggplant and onions on my way up to the kitchen. We also used thyme and garlic from our garden, so the only things in the dish that WEREN'T from our garden were olive oil, salt, pepper, and Parmesan cheese. Pretty good, I'd say, and everyone else said so too.

(P.S. if you ever want any farm to table recipes, please message me on Facebook or comment on this blog! I am happy to share! All of our recipes must come gluten free, vegetarian, and/or vegan too, so everyone can be included!)

This morning was the first morning I was not in the garden until lunch. Just like any other religion, Quakers worship too, so we have worship and community meeting time blocked off on Wednesday mornings. This is really our only time during the week that everyone is together at the same time, other than meals. It sounds like worship time is just a gathering of silence, but this morning, as an intro, we were guided through a group meditation that took us through some Quaker steps to worship or something....Not quite sure. Basically, we meditate and reflect upon ourselves and how we can overcome challenges or negativity to become the best version of ourselves. That's the best way I can think of it. 

However, my meditative state was quickly ruined once community meeting started. This group time is when members of our community can introduce new ideas, bring up issues they may have, or generally just share joy or concerns. It's also a time for announcements and school policy stuff. It got a little heavy, but thankfully (oops?), Maggie and I had to skip out to the garden to pick our CSA boxes. CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture, so basically, we put together produce boxes for members of our community that want a share in the garden - it's the same idea behind BarkBox and BirchBox and all those trendy sample boxes (except ours is nutritious, healthy, and clearly as fresh as it can get!). Today's box included tomatoes, kale, arugula, mixed greens, shallots, fennel bulbs, cauliflower, potatoes, and raspberries. YUM! I enjoyed harvesting and packing these boxes with the freshest produce you can find, and again, I felt truly farm to table. 

They're not ripe yet, but these are Pink Bumblebee Cherry Tomatoes. I picked some beautiful red and pink striped ripe ones for our CSA box today!

Raspberry HEAVEN.  

Today I learned that I really enjoy being in the garden. I like that I get to be outside all day in the beautiful weather (ask me again when I'm freezing in January...), and I feel like I'm doing something that makes even the smallest difference. I haven't even gotten to have class with the students yet (that's tomorrow!), so I hope that is also just as rewarding. At night, I am a good kind of tired - it feels good to work hard and be productive, and "work" hours fly by. Lastly, it's also nice to be able to eat as many perfect raspberries as you pick. ;)