What a Difference a Day Makes

Driving home from work on Wednesday I passed through a whiteout! Even though the ground isn't frozen, the snow covered the road and the tracks of the cars for about 10 minutes. By the time the Thursday afternoon Ambridge Farmers' Market rolled around, thankfully the temps were in the 50's and the sun was shining!

Here are some nice pictures of the market and produce in the setting sun. Look at what is still available in the way of tomatoes. Thursday was Trick-or-Treat night in Ambridge, so the crowd came early and headed home to pass out candy ......

We're Sitting on the Fence ....

Well, here they are ....... the fencesitter pumpkins at home. They'll stay up until the ram knocks them off or until the November freeze/thaw cycles start turning them mushy. Then we feed them to the sheep. Local food for local sheep!

Looking for ideas for your pumpkins? http://www.countryliving.com/30-days/pumpkin-parade-1008

There are still plenty of pumpkins, squash, and gourds at the farmers' markets. I'll be interested to see what can be found tomorrow at the Ambridge Farmers' Market. The temperature dipped today to a high of 41 degrees. Throughout the day, we had snow flurries, rain, & tiny hail stones in the air. It should be in the 50's on Thursday for the market.

How Local is Local?

Here's another story on defining "local" food. http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/2008-10-27-local-grown-farms-produce_N.htm
At a program last weekend, we learned that the PA Dept of Agriculture defines local as being produced in Pennsylvania. This was in reference to the PA Preferred program. http://www.agriculture.state.pa.us/papreferred/site/
Some "Locavores" have a tighter definition of local ...... the "100 Mile Diet", for instance. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1200783,00.html
How big is your "foodshed"? I try to write about the farms & food that are "local to me". Sometimes, as you can see from my posts, it can be a farmstand, farmers' market, or farm that I pass closeby while traveling. So that's my own version of local!

Mission Accomplished (well almost ......)

Another Sunday in October and another diversion related to the Pittsburgh Steelers. This time my return trip from State College was affected, since driving in on the Parkway East pre-game would not be a good idea! So ....... I came across the area on Rt 422 W and then dropped down to Rt 68. This gave me a chance to include a stop at Brenckle's Farms & Greenhouses as I passed by. Well, I finally completed my pumpkin shopping for the season. I added 3 large pumpkins & a group of gourds to the decorative "One Too Many" pumpkin that I had purchased at the Ambridge Farmers' Market a couple of weeks ago. The pumpkin search is over for this year. I looked all over, but I really wasn't able to find good specimens (ahem) of the heirloom varieties that I like to use. The Long Island Tan Cheese were scarce and smallish this year. The Rouge Vif d' Etampes that I found were nicked & scratched and their stems were broken. The Galeux d'Eysines were completely covered with warts & no pinkish orange was showing. I understand that they must be picked before they get too mature because the warts keep growing.

Picky, picky, picky!

The end result is that this year's display will be much more "conventional". And that's not a bad thing anyway. If you're interested in looking at or trying some of these unusual pumpkin & squash varieties check out Seed Savers Exchange http://www.seedsavers.org/ and Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds http://rareseeds.com/.

Since I use these for display through Thanksgiving, they tend to go soft, but they do not go to waste ....... they're fed to my sheep when we're finished with them! I even have an antique "long handled pumpkin cutter" that we use to break them up so that the sheep can bite into them.

How about these apple gourds? These aren't the little ones, they're 8 -12 inches around. I was impressed with the selection of pumpkins and home grown produce at Brenkle's. It's definitely worth a stop and the price on the pumpkins can't be beaten.

Running Late Tonight ......

I dashed over to the Ambridge Farmers' Market a little late tonight after work, and ended up watching folks tearing down their stalls by the time I left. You've got to hand it to these farmers ..... when you do this several times a week, you get pretty good at it. Just look at how neatly & efficiently Oak Spring Farm has their trucks packed up. Everyone has their own system depending on what they sell.

I did get what I wanted today - red potatoes & Winesap apples. Check out your farmers' market and orchard stands for the uncommon varieties of apples that you can't find in the supermarkets. You're hearing from someone who hasn't has a Red Delicious (<---- yes, I did that on purpose) in the house for 20 years!

Even a little pile of salad tomatoes made it home, maybe the last ones we get our hands on for the season. :~( We've had a couple of frosts in Beaver County during the last week, so most of the tomatoes have been picked.

Beaver County Fruit & Vegetable Growers Association update:

The Ambridge Market will start at 3:30pm once the time changes so that you still have time to get over while it's still light. I also understand that their last market of the season in Ambridge is the TUESDAY immediately before Thanksgiving. Perfect timing for your Thanksgiving dinner!

More on Pittsburgh area farmers' markets:

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08297/922008-34.stm

How much do we spend on food?

Here's a timely article, since everyone is concerned about their finances and savings right now. It sounds like most of us don't have a good handle on this ..... farmers' market shopper or not, there are quite a variety of responses.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2008/10/20/moneytales.DTL

They're Back!

Look what appeared at the Ambridge Farmer's Market on Thursday ..... sugar pod peas! They're back for a couple of weeks in the cool weather. I really appreciate our farmers planting a second crop of peas in the summer right when they're busiest with harvesting all of the other summer veggies.

I also grabbed a Hi-Beta Gold Spaghetti Squash ..... this will be the first time to try this variety. It's "claim to fame" is that it contains more beta-carotene than the standard spaghetti squash.

We rounded out the day with Kennebec potatoes, onions, some heirloom tomatoes, and a big bag of Golden Delicious apples that just couldn't be squeezed into the picture.

There was definitely a nip in the air and the temperature seemed to drop about 10 degrees while the market was on.

On Saturday, we were in Beaver and made a quick dash into the Beaver Farmers' Market to get some apple cider and one of the last watermelons of the season. The flowers from Ridgemont Farm looked great and a couple of bouquets sold while we were nearby ..... One of the farmers told us that he heard that the "f" word was coming ..... yes, it's time for the first FROST! He was right, we had a heavy frost overnight. Look around if you pass any farms and you may see the white floating row covers over some of the crops to extend the season. Janoski's Farm in Clinton had row covers gently billowing in the wind on Saturday when I passed by ....... they were ready.

October Sunday ... what was I thinking?

I was out and about today. It was a beautiful, sunny October afternoon and I decided to stop at a local farm market to pick out a few pumpkins. I should have known better! In addition to the great weather, it was a bye week for the Pittsburgh Steelers ......... Yes, that means that every family in Southwestern Pennsylvania went out to get their Halloween pumpkins today.

They packed the farm markets and corn mazes. They took hayrides out to the pumpkin patch. They sipped apple cider. They stirred applebutter. They staggered through the fields & parking lots loaded down with pumpkins and corn stalks. They got in my way! ;~)

I by-passed two farm market festivals where they had folks in orange t-shirts directing traffic into the parking areas. Finally, I slipped into Jodikinos Farm (between tractor ride departures to the pumpkin patch) and picked out 10 little pie pumpkins for $1 each. Then I zipped back out of the parking lot and headed for home. Whew.

Hey, the good news is that our local farmers had a great day to bring in visitors.

All about pumpkins ...... http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/pumpkins/
My pie pumpkins are going to be fence posts sitters ..... yep, they sit on fence posts along the driveway as a seasonal touch.

Still, I didn't get the unusual pumpkins/squash that I'm looking for to use as decorations. The search continues ..............

Slow Food Commentary

Seems that topics suited to this blog pop up at the oddest places ....... like waiting to get a haircut and finding this article in the September 15 issue of TIME magazine. Something to chew on, so to speak. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1838757,00.html

Michael Pollan is quoted in the article ..... have you read The Omnivore's Dilemma? It's the story of 4 meals, but here's a better description ....... http://www.michaelpollan.com/omnivore.php
Get it from your local library. Enough of this for a while .......... ;~)

Roadtrip Part IV - Local Flowers, Local Artists

Our first stop on the Wild Western Prince Willaim County Farm Tour was actually LynnVale Studios. http://www.lynnvale.com/ We didn't get any pictures of the cut flower garden beds since it was raining steadily when we arrived, but here are a couple of pictures of the floral design and studio area inside of the converted dairy barn. Cut flower grower Andrea (in the brown coveralls), has quite a selection of both annual and perennial beds on the farm. It's always an advantage for flower growers to have the perennials ....... some of the work maintaining them can be done outside of the busiest times planting & harvesting from the annual beds. She has a large stand of curly willow along with many other shrubs. If you're interested in the cut flower business, here's an association link to check out:

http://www.ascfg.org/.

Some other useful resources:

http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/cutflower.html

http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/woodyornamentals.html

http://www.growingformarket.com/

After we enjoyed walking through the gardens and looking at the gallery and arrangements in the barn/studio, we picked up a bunch of dried sunflowers to take home.

Roadtrip Part III - Now for the Sizzle!

A great coincidence for this local food blogger, during last weekend's visit to Virginia, was finding that a local farm tour was underway. http://www.pwcfarmtour.com/ Thanks to my indulgent family members, (!) we were able to visit 3 farms. We followed that up with wine tasting at a local winery on the way home.

Check out this great T-shirt from the Smith Family Farm! http://www.beefandhayproducer.com/home.nxg

This farm was serving lunch and taking visitors out on hay rides to see their Angus cattle herd. People were lining up to purchase beef and by Sunday, several of the cuts were sold out. We were able to pick up Porterhouse & Delmonico steaks ........ they were delicious on the grill that evening. Thanks to Smith Family Farm for hosting such a diverse crowd from the community on a rainy day! Nothing like scheduling a farm tour to bring on the rain ......... We also got a look at their pastured poultry operation and all of the equipment needed to run such a large family farm operation.

Roadtrip & Somerset Farmers' Market Part II

Part II .............
Some of the things that I just knew I could get at the Somerset County Farmers' Market - hereafter referred to as the SCFM - were Certified Organic & Certified Naturally Grown products as well as a selection of heirloom tomatoes. I purchased some really nice green (and purple) beans and purple cauliflower from my friends Ray, Kathy, & Yvonne of Providence Acres Farm. http://agmap.psu.edu/Businesses/2055 They've chosen to farm under the guidelines of the Certified Naturally Grown, Inc. organization. If you're interested in learning more about this program, check out the following link. http://www.naturallygrown.org/

Heirloom tomatoes were the fun purchase of the day, since my plan was to have a tomato tasting to complement a local dinner Sunday evening. The tomatoes came from Hi-View Gardens - just look at their beautiful displays! I took notes as Todd deferred to Sarah to give me the names of all of the tomatoes that I purchased ........ she really had a colorful variety for sale. Hi-View Gardens can also be found at the farmers' market in Wilkinsburg if you're from the Pittsburgh city area. http://www.farmersmarketalliance.com/farmers/FarmerPage.php?farmID=5 Stop in and get some tomatoes before it's too late this season. They were also among the growers featured in this recent restaurant food story.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08241/907344-34.stm

Just look at the gorgeous platter of tomatoes sliced and ready for our family tomato tasting! All of the tomatoes were great with the exception of ---- sorry Sarah :~( ------ Moonglow. It looked really nice and sliced well, but we didn't like the distinctly "different" flavor. You can see in the background of the picture that we had come from a wine tasting, but we were fresh out of words to describe Moonglow ......... afterwards, the rest of the tomatoes went into a delicious salad with green onions, shredded mozzarella, and balsamic vinaigrette dressing. Yes, this was the same meal that included the grilled Shiitake mushrooms ...........