excerpts from an urban farm

Today I bring you just a few pictures from around the farm(s) in Chicago.  Farming in an urban environment is a unique challenge but also an inspiring and creative endeavor.  From composted restaurant scraps to rooftop bee keeping, there is a world of opportunity in the city, which makes pieces of vacant land less of an eyesore and more of a blank slate of farming potential.

Steam rising from our hot compost pile - it still amazes me to feel how hot it gets (150 degrees!).  The mural in the background was painted in collaboration with local youth around themes of food, farming and food security.

Raised beds and a hoop house on a gray day.

Rainy day farming at Grant Park.

I didn't expect to be driving around a 12 passenger van this young in life but I guess 'plant mom' precedes 'soccer mom.'

The harvest knife is sharp.

 Rooftop bees!

I got to help 'catch' this swarm as my first bee keeping experience.  It was amazing and a little bit scary.  Bees are just so cool.

Seriously full hive.  Again - a little scary and a lot amazing.

city farming

Hello friends!

Working full-time has a way of really rearranging priorities in life ... and when that full-time work is farming the priorities lean more towards showering and sleeping (and of course spending every minute at home with that handsome man of mine!).  The good news for you, though, is that I now have a more portable camera with which to bits of my world with you.  Let's start in Chicago ...

This is the Iron Street Farm, located on an abandoned industrial site.  In the back you can see one of our 6 hoop houses which are mostly growing greens and seedlings right now.  It's hard to make out, but on the right of the picture there is also a big brown pile - that's compost!  ... and actually the pile is much bigger now (some people use machines to build big piles.  not here.  lots of wheelbarrows and pitchforks!).

This is Feona, or FeFe (Iron street cat ...).  I don't really love cats but she has decided that she should follow me around for parts of the day.  On this day it was problematic since she kept walking on the bed I was working on.  Up until this Sunday, the only animals on the farm were Feona, Jimmy Cat, and a parrot named Thunder.  But!!!  After a workshop weekend up at our headquarters in Milwaukee we brought back fish for our aquaponics system!!!!!!!  This is so exciting.  I even dreamed about taking care of these fish.

Here are the fish being gently introduced to their new home.  I promise more pictures of the actual system in the future.  These little guys are perch and we have about 15 of them in the tank right now.  We've had the system built and running for them for a long time now just waiting for their arrival and now they're here!!   And now we have to try not to kill them ... Speaking of which, I'm responsible for them this morning so I'd better go get ready.  Happy Wednesday!

dirt

For the past few days I've been out in Grant Park planting our 'Art on the Farm' installation.  At the moment, we've got chard, lettuce, runaway fennel, some beets and carrots, runaway mint and catnip and plenty of weeds.  The work is part planting, part attacking aforementioned weeds.

Working outside will quickly open your eyes to the subtleties of weather... Friday it poured off and on ... another day is was sunny but the wind was so cold so I think I got sun and wind burn ... yesterday it was hotter than I anticipated ... today looks sunny but who knows what it will hold.  I did enough bending yesterday to get a sunburn on my lower back.  Yeah.  What?!  Apparently my long undershirt didn't do it's job.

One perk of working out at Grant Park is that we're right in the middle of the Loop, which means some friends can come visit me!  The benefit of this to you is that my friends can carry cameras (in the form of iPhones).  And so I bring you actual proof that I do something like farming via Instagram.

the new life

On Tuesday I began my adventure with Growing Power in Chicago (the link will bring you to the page of the farm I work at).  But I don't have much to report from the farm front because we spent the week getting ready for the Flower and Garden Show that opens this weekend at Navy Pier.

Expo shows always amaze me because of the sheer size of them.  Last year, I went with Grady to an expo that his company was holding that included maybe 20 full-size trucks, buses and military vehicles just hanging out in this giant room ... they didn't even look big compared to the size of the space.  The expo we were setting up was on an even bigger scale than that and involved tons and tons (probably literally) of sand and dirt.

Every exhibit in the landscaping side of the show was - well - a reconstructed landscape.  I spent most of the week shoveling sand and dirt, burying potted plants in said dirt, spreading wood chips and sod and other such things to get our installation ready.  While it wasn't exactly farming, it involved enough bending and digging in the dirt to make me feel sore and dirty in the exact same ways.

Next week I look forward to some actual work on the farm and I was given some small hope that I will be taught {urban} beekeeping!  I'm probably most excited about that ... bees keeping on the roof ... so awesome. 

I'm still trying to think of a way to get some pictures to this space.  I really can't see myself bringing my expensive, fancy camera with me for the day because I'm afraid it will get broken and I don't have a fancy phone with a fancy camera, so that won't work either.  We'll see.  In the mean time, if you're desperate for some visuals, you can go to their website to get an idea of what's going on.  I may not be back here until next weekend but maybe I won't be so tired this next week!  Here's to hoping anyway ...

Happy weekend!

dinner from a chef

After my most recent trip to the library, I came home with the usual pile of books that can be sorted into 'Food Books' and 'Baby Books.'  {Just to head-off anticipated questions, we're not trying to "start a family" right now ... although of course we are a family even without children but I think you get the meaning I'm getting at, no?}.

On the top of my 'Food Books' pile, was a little audio version of In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan.  I am probably one of the few who is very enthused with the local, clean food movement who has not read the book that preceded this one, The Omnivore's Dilemma.  While I plan to pick it up in the future, I also know plenty of the wrong that he writes about and am already convinced it's not a good thing. 

Enter: In Defense of Food.  This book was intended to be a follow-up to the Dilemma and offer some ideas of where we should go from the point of "lots of bad things are happening in the industrial food world."  Let me just say that I got this audio book simply to entertain me while I was knitting furiously and instead I listened intently and vowed multiple times during the listening to change my lifestyle and tell the whole world!  {When ideas strike me as true I get rather passionate :-)}.



I would beg you to please read this book (traveling for Christmas?  Take it with you!).  I'll try not to make it out to be the most awesome thing ever, but he draws many aspects of food and culture into his writing that I think strike at the core of what needs to change and why and he does so without sounding too much like a crazy "you must eat local, organic and not to is sinful" kind of person.  If you want to hear him give a sort of short summary of the book, watch this video.

All this to say, I became much more highly motivated to make good, real food and enjoy, even savor it!  Thankfully I had checked out another book to help in such a quest: Harvest to Heat.

The pictures are gorgeous - the stories of chefs and farmers are enchanting - the titles of the recipes make your mouth water {they are written by famous chefs, after all} - the foreword is written by Alice Waters.

My highly motivated, Saturday-morning-fresh self picked many of our meals for this week from this book - including last night's supper of "Sweet Potato Gnocchi with Braised Plums and Crumbly Blue Cheese."

Hours after commencing, we enjoyed the product of our (rather significant) labor.  A dish that could have been served  - albeit, not made by me - in some fancy locavore restaurant!    Delicious?  That wouldn't be the exact word I'd choose - an interesting taste experience - would be more like it.

More importantly, it was a meal that reminded me that it is worth it to spend hours cooking from scratch, using foods that are full of nourishment for both body and spirit.  I am by no means a gourmand, but I do enjoy putting effort into something that I can be proud of and that my little two person family can take pleasure in.

What have you been cooking these days?  Any delicious ideas to share?

{this moment}

Good-bye for the season, farm days.

 

A Friday ritual. A single photo capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember ~ SouleMama.

on the book stack

Today, I don't have a book stack for you.  Instead, I'm sharing a rather short documentary which I found on the Joy of Farming blog. 

This film considers what the future of farming may be and how we will continue to feed all of the people on this planet.  It's a very big challenge and one that ultimately concerns each one of us who must eat to live.  The film isn't too long and it was made by the BBC and filmed in the UK so it includes some beautiful landscapes.  Please do grab a cup of tea (and some knitting, if you're so inclined) and consider some of the possibilities presented here!

{this is part 1 of 5 so you can get a taste then follow the link to YouTube to watch the rest, or watch it in its entirety here}

farm days

I've posted before about my little time working on an organic farm (here) but I feel the need to post once again.  Montalbano Farms finished their last CSA deliviery 2 weeks ago but they allow members to miss up to 2 weeks during the summer and make it up at the end of the season, so we've been harvesting and packing shares (although many fewer than regular season) until last week.  The weather has been surprisingly good and there has been plenty of cool weather crops to fill the boxes.  This time of year is just so beautiful that I just had to take more pictures.  The green, red, orange, yellow and blue all mixing in nature is truly breathtaking.


Crates and crates of fresh-picked lettuce ...

Herbs under the autumn sky ...

 

It's amazing how God works all of these complementary colors into His creation - just look at these gorgeous peppers!

Kale still standing tall ...

One of my favorite things on the farm these days (and while we're at it, my least favorite thing is cleaning scallions) is picking chard.  These massive leaves are so gorgeous I feel like I would love to eat them, although eating chard is not actually quite as fun as looking at it, in my opinion.  I have no idea about the history of this plant, but I like to imagine that this is what dinosaurs must have eaten.  One leaf is sometimes twice the size of my head and they look like something from another time.  You don't find these kind of colors in nature often outside of the rain forest.

(hmmn.  upside down?)

Work will continue on the farm until Thanksgiving.  We'll see how many more days I'll go out - I don't have warm enough clothes to handle much cold outdoor work.

weekend

It was a full and wonderful weekend!

:: We enjoyed the last of the fresh summer tomatoes.

:: Spent a day working out on the farm.  The sky, the sun, the trees, the fields - it was all just perfect.

:: Ate lots of delicious food in celebration of my good friend's marriage.  I love that chocolate and celebrations generally go together.  Yum.

:: Watched this adorable baby (and another not pictured) running around all weekend.  So cute and such a handful!  Way to go, moms, you're rock stars.

:: Loved and celebrated this friend as she became a wife.

:: Talked with old friends not seen in a while and made some new ones.

:: Started some more Christmas knitting.  I'm making progress!  And I chose thick yarns to speed the process along.

:: Looking at the state of our house after this weekend and building motivation for some serious cleaning.

:: So thankful for the fullness, joy and beauty in this life.

down on the farm

Every Friday this summer I head an hour west of here to work on a farm.  Montalbano Farms.  These days I feel as though I'm pulling the sun behind me as I go, watching it lift the morning haze away from the miles and miles of corn fields.  Normally I'm not super enthusiastic about corn fields but on these mornings, they are quite beautiful.  The sky gets bigger and the earth gets greener and my breaths just a little bit deeper as I near the farm.

The farm itself is situated right in the middle of a corn field - from the road you'd never know that there was an organic vegetable farm back there somewhere [corn is really tall, for those who may not know].  The farm is also a work in progress, and by that I mean that this is only their second year as a farm and their first year on this piece of land.  "They" are Rob and Christina, farmers soon to be married.

At the moment, it's not much of a "farmy" farm.  There's no wooden barn, no cow with a milking shed, no really old equipment sitting around rusting, there's not even a house much less a rocking chair on the porch.  Just two big, blue barn structures, a camper and a port-a-potty.  But there are vegetables.  Plenty of vegetables to go out and pick and wash and sort and box.