The Final Chapter: From Farmer's Market to Farmer

As the sporadic nature of my recent posts over the past few months might indicate, I have been on to other things. For this reason and many others, this will be the final post of Farmer's Market Forays. As ironic and backwards as it may be, I find that every summer I go to the market much more infrequently than I do the rest of the year. The primary reason for this is that I am trying to keep up with the produce flowing from my own backyard! It was, in fact, my love for gardening and all things farm related that led me out to Rice, Washington last week where I spent four nights and five amazing days living and working on a farm.The Quillisascut Farm School for the Domestic Arts is the official name of the program I, and 13 other students, participated in. Owned by Lora Lea and Rick Misterly, the farm is an amazing example of truly sustainable living. This buzz word, "sustainable", doesn't have much meaning when you hear it tossed around in an urban setting like Seattle. How can we truly "sustain" all of these homes, chemicals, and cars? But on the farm, the full implications of the word were apparent. On one hand, sustainable means that the people can sustain themselves by eating products procured nearly exclusively off of the farm. But it also means that the farm could continue to produce indefinitely because the land and the animals are treated with the utmost respect. Seeing this practice in place, this unique way of living and eating, is what had the biggest impact on me. But first, a few highlights from farm school.

Goats
Life at the farm seems to revolve around the goats. They provide us with milk, cheese, and meat, and, like everything at the farm, they are treated with the greatest respect. Our first morning schedule read "5:45 am: Butcher goat". Welcome to the farm, indeed. Rick had already killed the five month old billy goat, and we stood around in an eerie silence observing as he methodically and meticulously proceeded to take off its suit of skin and then remove all of the organs, etc. It was fascinating work, and not the least bit gory. After the butchered goat hung in the walk-in for a few days, we learned how to break it down into all of the various cuts of meat that you might find on your plate. Again, fascinating.

Milking was a challenge, to be sure. It's one of those things that you have to do over and over again before you get the feel of it. I was pretty disheartened at first when Lora Lea had two full buckets of milk in the time that it took me to get 1/4 of an inch at the bottom of my bucket, but I finally started to get the feel on my last goat.

Lora Lea taught us how to make four different kinds of cheese with the goats' milk: a "farmhouse" style (similar in texture to a feta), a soft chevre, ricotta, and fresh mozzarella. I absolutely loved the patience and magical science that is involved in turning milk into decadent cheese. We used the fresh mozzarella on our pizzas one night, and they also sent us home with two packages of the cheeses we had made.

Food
Life on the farm is all about food. 24-7, all of our energies are in some way going towards either the harvesting of or the production of food. And with 15 people working towards a common goal, you can be sure that we ate well! Always in use was their gorgeous stone oven. With an oven on one side and an open grill on the other side, this was used to bake bread, cook pizzas, and grill meats. The bread we baked was a true artisan type, with a pre-ferment the first night and a long slow rise the next day. Oh, for an oven like that in my backyard!

Our typical protein of chicken, goat, or lamb was always supplemented by the freshest of fresh vegetables and herbs from their garden (which we worked in on occasion). We also harvested huckleberries and learned all about the honeybees who lived in hives on their property. Citrus fruits would never grow at that latitude, so the acid of lemons was replaced by fresh verjus from their grape vines. All food preparation was led by the amazing chef Karen, who taught us endless ways to be creative with what you have in the kitchen. We were divided into "teams" and put in charge of the various meals. This kind of meal planning started with first looking into what was available, and then discussing what to do with it. This approach makes such perfect sense but is unfortunately in sharp contrast to the-start with a recipe then hunt for out of season ingredients- approach that us city dwellers often rely on. As an example of the food we ate on the farm, the lunch team that I was on put together a bread salad (to use up left over bread ends) with tomatoes, arugula, and other herbs, a fresh fava bean-white bean soup, and an apricot tart with fresh ricotta. I also ate some new things, including beef heart and goats kidney and I learned that eating on the farm is all about using everything. Speaking of, in addition to preserving food by canning (we made apricot jam), we also learned about making sausage and how to use the mysterious caul fat.

I truly felt that my experience at the Quillisascut Farm was all about getting back to "the way it used to be" or perhaps "the way it should be", depending on who you're talking to. Life is simple and unhurried on the farm. It forces you to slow down and appreciate what you already have, rather than always racing to get what you don't have. The products that come off of a farm like this are unbelievably good. So good, in fact, that it almost doesn't seem right to lump a Quillisascut chicken and a McDonald's hamburger both into the food category.

But farming and the farm life isn't for everyone. So lucky for us that those farmers are willing to travel great distances to share it with us at Farmer's Markets! And so I will continue to shop there frequently, and I will continue to harvest vegetables from my small urban plot, as I encourage you to do as well. And once I get an extra freezer, I will also be buying larger hunks of meat from farms like Quillisascut so that I don't have to rely on those silly shrink-wrapped things they sell at the grocery store. So for now, eat well, shop wisely, and enjoy what you already have. Thanks for your support!