The farm has a few box trucks that they use for deliveries to the greenmarkets and out in the fields to bring the harvested produce back to processing barn. There is a list each day of what needs to be harvested which I think is determined by what is needed for that week's CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) drops and for the greenmarkets and the farmstand. So, for instance, Rafa might say, we need 240 bunches of radishes or 20 bunches per caja (crate) or 12 cajas of radishes. Each bunch consists of six radishes that are bound by a twist tie. The radishes at the farm are such a luscious shade of pink - almost a magenta - that it immediately made me think of a great lipstick or nail polish. They are not round like what you buy in the supermarket; they are about the size of your thumb only thicker and are white at the top by the greens and then become the deep, beautiful pink color.
So everyone picks their spot along the row and fills up their crate or works with another person to fill up a crate between them. Once the crates are full, they are loaded onto the box truck and then you move to the next area that needs to be picked and start all over again. Here's what we picked during week that I was there: radishes, arugula, parsley, cilantro, tomatoes, sungold cherry tomatoes, red plum tomatoes, yellow plum tomatoes, chocolate cherry tomatoes, heirloom tomatoes, eggplants, purple kale, green kale, green beans, purple beans, golden beets, regular beets, soy beans, swiss chard, leeks, dill, mixed greens (mustard greens, baby kale, arugula and three or four other types that I don't recall). The farm also has other crops planted that weren't ready for harvesting yet.
A little bit about the process: I was a little surprised by how some of the things were harvested but many were things that I have never grown before. The soybean plants were pulled up root and all. I had never seen soybean plants and was surprised to find that soybeans grow very close to the center stalk of the plant, similar to regular beans. For some reason, I had envisioned them growing under the ground like peanuts. The leaves of kale were snapped off from the plant and twist tied together in bunches of six. The baby lettuces were also pulled up by the root and bunched together in a bunch about the diameter of a half dollar. Once they get to the processing barn, the whole caja is put in a tub of water and raised and lowered several times to get the dirt out of the leaves. Then the cajas go into a huge refrigerated section of the barn (just like in your supermarket) where they are stacked according to where they are going, i.e., CSA, greenmarket, etc.
The days during the week were much the same - get up, rush through breakfast and get out to the fields. Oh, and let's not forget something very important - especially when eating unprocessed bran per my doctor's suggestion: the morning trip to the toilet. Because it seemed that we started at the furthest reaches of the farm and worked our way back in during the day, this was a crucial thing to do prior to leaving for the fields. There is no toilet or porta-potty except at the processing barn which seems to be about 1/2 mile from the far end of the farm.
The first morning, I was hurrying as everyone had gotten up before me, and as we got out to the fields, someone asked me "do you have your harvesting knife?" Harvesting knife? What's that? Eve told me all I needed was some closed-toe shoes and maybe some gardening gloves. Sherita offered to loan me hers but it was all the way back at the farmhouse. Well, that was ok with me because guess what? I had to go to the bathroom. This was my first morning and I hadn't quite figured out that crucial stop yet.
I was awakened at 12:30 am on Monday night/Tuesday morning by headlights shining in my window. Who in the heck is here at this hour, I wondered? Well, the next morning, I found out that the boiler was fixed and we had hot water - all due to that middle of the night visitor. Yay!
The next morning, Tuesday, I got up a little later than the apprentices because I was stiff and sore from the hard work and also because of the inability (still) to take a hot shower. I headed out to the field and realized that I had left the harvesting knife back at the farmhouse so went back to get it. On my way back out to the field, I took the opportunity to use the bathroom one last time and stopped at the porta-potty. Everyone else was out picking tomatoes so I joined them in rows where the tomato vines came up almost waist high. The tomatoes are so beautiful that I wanted to take a photo with my cell phone camera and at that point, realized that I didn't have it with me. I knew that I had it when I left the farmhouse, so the only place it could be was in the porta-potty. Well, not in the porta-potty, but I figured it must have fallen out of my pocket onto the floor of the porta-potty. No big deal - I would get it when we went back in for lunch in a few hours.
About 30 minutes later, Farmer Chris (as the apprentices called the owner, Chris, to distinguish him from the apprentice, Chris) came out and asked me if I had lost my phone. I said, yes, how did you know? He had found it in the porta-potty and had called the people that I had last called to find out who the phone belonged to. He said, "I think you'd better call your mom because she sounded a little worried." So, I called my mom and asked why she was worried. She said "how would you feel if some strange man called from your daughter's phone asking if you knew who the phone belonged to?" My mom is blind, so her phone is set up to announce the caller's name, so needless to say, when she heard a guy's voice instead of mine, she was a little disturbed. Chris explained that he was the owner of a farm and told her where he had found my phone, so she relaxed a bit. She told me that I'd better call my sister because apparently, Chris had called my sister first who then called my mom and tried to convince her to call the police to find out about my whereabouts. Fortunately, mom convinced her to hold off on that. Mom suggested that in the future, I let her know the name and phone number of the place I'm going to be - just in case. Huh? Just in case of what, exactly?
Tuesday night we were invited to dinner at Eve's and Chris's. I had been warned by the apprentices not to expect much. (Eve, if you ever read this, I'm sorry if this next bit hurts your feelings, but sometimes, the truth hurts.) Sherita, Sean, Chris and I all piled into Chris's car and we drove over. Ted was meeting us there as it was just a short walk from his yurt. Jon would not be joining us because he was off on farm business somewhere else (yeah, sure!). Farmer Chris had made guacamole so we started off with the guacamole and chips while we were waiting for Eve to finish cooking. (I realized later that I really should have offered to help her - as I usually would have) We sat around the table and chatted and Forrest, Eve and Chris's son, sat down in Chris's lap and made himself comfortable. Then, Eve served the next course which she explained was broccoli rabe/leek soup which she had made based on a recipe for lentil/leek soup. She had not made enough for all of us, so I offered to share a bowl with Sherita. Broccoli rabe is one of the few vegetables that I do not care for, so I wasn't so interested in the soup. However, I'm always willing to give new things a try, so Sherita and I both dipped our spoons in at the same time and made identical faces of dismay at the taste. It was so bitter and awful, that we just pushed our bowl away and didn't eat anymore. The guys were made of sterner stuff and all finished theirs - despite Forrest's hilarious statement that the soup was terrible. Then Eve served the next course which consisted of turkey chili and sweet potato fries. Again, there really wasn't enough for everybody, but at least the sweet potato fries were really delicious. I had thought that the apprentices must be exaggerating - surely Eve's cooking couldn't be as bad as they had made it out to be - but unfortuantely, it was. Oy!
The one interesting thing we talked about at dinner was the farm dogs: Casper and Milano. They are Maremmas - bred to guard sheep in Italy - and were just gorgeous. They look very much like Golden Retrievers, but are a bit leaner and are almost white. I was very interested in how they had discovered the breed and learning more about them so we talked about them for quite a while. Apparently, they do not take very well to training as they are independent and bred to figure things out for themselves. They are very smart and stay out in the fields all night - to protect the chickens and to keep deer and other pests out of the fields. Apparently, there had been several massacres of the chickens which is ultimately why Chris and Eve decided to get the dogs. The dogs are very affectionate with people, but don't let this fool you - they are serious killers. Other pets are not safe with them and they have pretty much exterminated the rabbits and other rodents on the farm.
That's it for now....I'll try to finish up the week in the next post.
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