taking pumpkins down

The most homegrown thing on the table this Thanksgiving was pie, and though it was lovely, I’m not sure I want to have that life experience again.

The main trouble was that the pumpkins were just awful in the garden this summer. Maybe it’s that we’re city folk at the 48th parallel, with postage-stamp backyards and 24/7 shade. But they hogged all the warmth and sunlight, blocked access to the back steps and killed about half the grass, leaving behind a cold season mud pit. Much coddling was required to produce just three little sugar pumpkins, and even then powdery mildew brought down the vines in late September, the fruits dark green and speckled, not a blush of orange in evidence.

A blasting indoor radiator turned the eldest of them orange by Halloween. The Biscuit notched this as a major victory. The two remaining ones continued their ripening at a glacial pace. We finally roasted them yesterday morning, and I wish I could tell you it was an epiphany. For sure, we had fun running our fingers through pumpkin guts. We counted seeds until we got to twenty and lost interest. But truth be told, roasting and pureeing pumpkins was just one more thing to do on a long Thanksgiving prep list. It’s hard to want to go through all that again.

(Just in case, though, here’s what I learned: the more orange they get, the sweeter they taste. We followed Lane Morgan’s infallible instructions for pumpkin pie in the Winter Harvest Cookbook. )

the usda reports on local foods

In the USDA’s first-ever market report about the local foods economy in the U.S., the story that emerges is of two distinct farming cultures. Small farms, defined as those generating $50 grand or less in gross yearly sales, account for the vast majority of farms selling local fruits and vegetables, mostly to the actual consumer. Yet — no surprise here — a few much larger farms took in half of all dollars spent on local food, to the tune of $2.7 billion, through more traditional distribution channels.

Especially striking was how much time small-farm farmers devote to selling, as compared to the bigger guys. And yet these small-farm folks bring in an average of just $7800 per farm per year — and they don’t tend to work off farm, to boot. What that means is they take home less dough than just about anybody else in America including the unemployed.

This is worrying if you like eating locally. You wonder how many farmers will eventually decide they require more than sub-poverty level wages, no matter how obsessed and passionate they are about growing good things to feed people.

It’s also cause for soul-searching as a consumer. I know it’s heresy to suggest as much, but are farmers markets really the best way to ensure a strong future for local foods if they generate little income for farmers? Can retail markets evolve so that local foods are increasingly available, while paying small farmers a living wage? Will consumers continue to buy local produce if there isn’t a face and story to accompany it? Do the smallest craft farms deserve special support, or is the bigger-is-better model simply more sustainable?

What do you think?

raw … kale?

The story starts with a fistful of cavolo nero leaves. Time was tight. There was no game plan to speak of, and cheesy ziti bubbled and browned in the oven. But who was ready to embrace winter — by which I mean stewed kale on the side? Not here. The snappy decision was raw kale salad. We’d declined to try it a few years back, when it was all the rage.

And well! I’m late to this party, but let me tell you this stuff is actually delicious. I love the salad’s slight crunch and green freshness; the lemon juice softens the kale ribbons just enough to blunt its raw edge. Should you require further proof of concept, consider that my husband, a skeptic through and through, packed the remnants for lunch today.

Recipe: Tuscan Kale Salad

1 bunch Tuscan kale, aka black kale, dinosaur kale, cavolo nero (see photo above) / 2 tbls lemon juice / 3 tbls olive oil / 1 small clove garlic, minced finely / 3 tbls Parmesan cheese / scant ¼ tsp salt / crushed red pepper to taste / ¼ cup breadcrumbs, toasted

Strip stems from kale and slice into ½-inch ribbons. Mix together lemon juice, oil, garlic, cheese, salt, and red pepper, then toss thoroughly with kale until all strands are dressed. Toss again with breadcrumbs and let sit for 5 minutes before serving. Feeds 4 as a side. Adapted from Melissa Clark.

turning into a pumpkin

Fifteen days left for these guys to put on some serious orange. My money is on indoor heating to beat nature this time of season. Any pumpkin-ripening tips — especially chants, spells, or strange brews — would be welcome.

Small farm snapshot

One of the great things about living in a small farming town is that I really do get to know the people who produce food locally.

Vangie Alexander runs Tranquility Heights Farm, a small-scale poultry and dairy just outside Palmer. She sells eggs in area specialty stores, provides raw milk to those with shares in her condo cow, and works in a local doctor’s office (the same office where we take our kids in fact). And after talking to her about her operation I knew to search out Red Star hens for our backyard coop — they are impressive layers.

(I shot this video as part of a project for the Alaska Farmland Trust, with funding support from the State of Alaska Division of Agriculture).

The official end of the season

A pair of rampaging moose put an exclamation point on the end of our 2011 growing season this morning.

Moose absolutely love brassicas, and these two made a meal out of our remaining cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, and pea plants. The loss of the sprouts is the hardest to take — they’re very frost tolerant and most of the plants were still in the ground — though we were able to salvage parts of three plants.

Our gardening friends in Anchorage suggested we surround the garden with cheap pinwheels to avoid moosepocolypse. Next year.

Putting up broccoli

The first frost has yet to put an emphatic end to southcentral Alaska’s growing season but things are definitely winding down. We’ve got a long haul until fresh local produce returns (June!) so preserving some of the summer’s harvest is an absolute necessity.

So despite the fabulous weather today I’ll spend at least a few hours inside blanching and freezing broccoli and cauliflower. It’s a simple process, and so very worth it when the days are short and cold.

We freeze our broccoli in 1 gallon bags, which is just perfect for making broccoli soup.

Freezing broccoli:
Cut the crowns into pieces (I chop mine fairly small since they’ll be going into soup), then blanch the broccoli for a minute before dropping it immediately into an ice-water bath. Pat dry the florets, spread them on wax paper-lined cookie sheets and freeze. You can bag up the broccoli once it’s frozen (the two-step process keeps everything from freezing together).

I’m sure it would preserve better if you used a vacuum packer but our broccoli doesn’t stay in the freezer long enough to make it worth the extra effort.

Too pretty to eat (almost)

Romanesco cauliflower from Alaska's Glacier Valley Farm.

Romanesco cauliflower is one of my very favorite crops — it looks like something from the pages of Dr. Seuss and the spirals expressed by the florets follow the Fibonacci sequence.

Salmon burgers, a surprise kid favorite

Sockeye salmon from Alaska's Fish Creek.

This summer we’ve really been going after the fish — via setnet, dipnet, and rod-and-reel — and as a result we’ve started to exhaust our recipes for fresh salmon. My ran across Kristin Dixon’s recipe for salmon burgers as part of my day job for Alaska Dispatch and rather freely adapted it based on what I had in the kitchen. It was a huge hit with my girls.

Fresh sockeye salmon burgers

1 fillet of fresh salmon, skinned and deboned (I remove the pinbones with a pair of pilers) / 1 egg / Worcestershire sauce to taste / Salt and pepper to taste

Cut half the fillet into 1/8″ cubes and puree the other half in a food processor. Combine the salmon and mix it with the beaten egg, Worcestershire sauce, salt and pepper. Form the mixture into patties and cook on the grill or skillet. Kirstin adds a few different ingredients — there are plenty of possibilities — but I wanted to see the reaction without onions first.

Make sure you grease your skillet or grill — I’ve found that it’s sometimes a challenge to flip the patties.

Seedlings in the ground

As the days in Alaska head toward the maximum the farms in Southcentral are busily getting greenhouse seedlings planted in their fields.