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By deepening our connection to the food system, we  can further connect with each other and the world around us.

Meet the Crew: Bramble and Zelda

2/26/2020

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Names: Bramble and Zelda

Titles: Benevolent Overlords, Official Greens and Herbs Taste Testers

Favorite Foods: cabbage, Brussels Sprouts, kale, collards, dandelion greens, mint, basil, parsley, lemon balm, celery...

Zelda and Bramble have shared our home since March 2016. They had been abandoned in a grocery store parking lot in Watkins Glen, NY, during a February rainstorm. Fortunately, a Good Samaritan brought the duo to Farm Sanctuary, where Abbie was a caregiver. Bramble’s and Zelda’s strong and distinct personalities, friendliness despite their rough history, and mutual devotion were clear, and we knew right away that they would be moving in with us! They have enriched our lives beyond description and we are so grateful for our wonderful little friends! It has been fun getting to know their individual quirks, their inquisitive and communicative nature, and the roles they fulfill in each others’ lives. When they take over the world, Zelda will be the mad scientist and safecracker, while Bramble will ask nicely, wiggle his luxurious cheeks, and get exactly what he wants!

Zelda and Bramble now live in their own room in our house, a palace that Kevin customized based on their interests, complete with a window perch/jungle gym, interactive peg board walls, and a private deck with a bunny door so they can come and go as they please. They love tearing in and out of their room, watching the sun rise and set from their deck, sitting in the window and overlooking their domain, and requesting dandelion offerings from passing subjects.
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Official Greens and Herbs Taste Testers hard at work! Bramble (left) and Zelda (right)
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Learning and Growing

10/24/2019

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Things are trucking along here at Dandelion Ridge Farm, settling into the autumn rhythm. We don’t have to water so much these days (thank goodness!), and are doing our best to keep cold sensitive plants like ginger warm enough. Greens like kale, collards, romaine, and dandelions are thrilled with the cooler weather, though—summer heat is not their friend! We hope to keep greens and herbs going throughout the winter.

We will have very limited quantities of tarragon, lemon thyme, and marjoram this week. These plants are young and not producing much yet, but I think we can manage a small harvest. Tarragon can be a challenge to get established, but its licorice-y flavor adds so much to a dish. Lemon thyme has a fun, citrusy brightness against thyme’s savory background. And marjoram has similarities to oregano, but is more subtle, sweet, and nuanced. Stop by our farmers’ market booth on Saturday to try some!

Today, I went to a workshop at one of the University of Kentucky’s Horticultural Research Farms about agricultural high tunnels. We got our tunnel this spring, and while it has been wonderful to grow in a more protected and controlled space, it is definitely an adjustment, with its own tricks and challenges. We always benefit from these educational opportunities and I certainly learned a lot from the experts today!

Kevin’s presentation at the Hudson Valley VegFest in Kingston, NY this past weekend was a hit! He spoke about our journey into farming, from harvesting and weeding in his parents’ subsistence garden as a kid to learning about more sustainable practices as an adult; from our meager first harvests from our raised bed garden in Asheville, NC six years ago to this year’s harvest of 4,300 pounds and growing! Kevin discussed the array of problems with the current corporate food system and the need for each of us to do what we can to break with the industrial model and engage more fully with the food that sustains us.

In the kitchen, I’ve been playing around with different ways to preserve ginger, including dehydrating both the roots and the stalks and leaves. I’m also working on an intense Ginger Marmalade made with apple cider, so stay tuned for that! I think it will be a great addition to a holiday menu!
Update: Try it in this Sweet Potato Hash with Ginger Marmalade for a perfect holiday side dish!
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Cold Weather, Dried Herbs, and Getting Involved

10/16/2019

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I hope you are staying warm in this cold snap! Our ginger and sensitive herbs are bundled up under blankets or tucked in the greenhouse as needed. This guy is enjoying the tropical environment among the ginger foliage, too!

Now that autumn definitely seems to be here, the kale and collards we planted for the fall are coming on and we will have our first small harvest this week! We will also have dandelion greens and romaine in the next few weeks.

We have another exciting new offering: upon popular request, we are now offering a very limited supply of Dandelion Ridge Farm dried herbs and pepper flakes! We carefully dry the best of what we grow for your enjoyment year-round. We’re offering epazote, thyme, sage, oregano, and rosemary, as well as ground jalapeño peppers and crushed habanero flakes for you heat-lovers out there!

We’re staying active with events this week, too! Kevin is on his way to New York’s Hudson Valley to present at the Hudson Valley VegFest, where he will hopefully inspire folks to move along the continuum from passive consumers to active food producers, whether it be starting a farm, learning to cook, or growing a few herbs on a kitchen windowsill.

We were also pleased to be part of a World Food Day celebration at Community Action Council’s Wilburn Center in northeast Lexington on Wednesday. Community members got to watch food demos, taste dishes from diverse cuisines, and take home fresh vegetables, including Dandelion Ridge Farm sweet potatoes.
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Sunny Lemon Balm

8/29/2019

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Last week, I shared a little bit about our mint varieties. Now I’d like to tell you about another of my favorite herbs: lemon balm! It is a member of the family Lamiaceae, as are mint, basil, and many other aromatic herbs. Its flowers attract a plethora of butterflies, bees, and other pollinators. It has a wonderful bright but soft lemony scent and flavor that shines in many of the same ways mint does, in both sweet and savory dishes. You can really use lemon balm anywhere you might use lemon; its flavor is just more subtle, herbaceous, and delicate.

We love infusing water with lemon balm—as with mint, just crunch up a bunch of it in a pitcher of water and keep it in the fridge, replenishing the water as needed. You can also dry it and use it to make tea. It is delicious in a salad dressing, or just chopped and added to a salad. Summer squash sautéed with minced fresh lemon balm, chives, and maybe a little dill makes a fantastic quick side dish, or add some chickpeas for a complete lunch! And it is amazing with fruits or in sweets, like these addictive lemon balm cookies!
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Demolition Week and Mint Madness

8/21/2019

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It’s demolition week here at Dandelion Ridge Farm!

We’ve taken down our tomatillo, tomato, pepper, basil, parsley, and edible flower plants in the high tunnel to prepare for tilling and fall planting. It’s bittersweet to raze the veritable jungle that has been growing and producing abundantly. But the plants are now winding down and it’s time to move on to the tunnel’s next phase: extending our growing season into the fall and winter. It looks so empty in there now! Here is a “before, during, and after” montage of our work!
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Now that we don’t have all the tomatoes, tomatillos, and green beans to harvest, this seems like a good time to talk about herbs! Folks often ask us what to do with the different types of mint we grow. We grow a classic spearmint, good in savory dishes like salad dressings or this delicious fresh pea soup. It is also tasty with berries and other sweets.  We also grow Kentucky Colonel Mint, a versatile type of spearmint with large leaves, classically used in mint juleps and mojitos. It can be used interchangeably with standard spearmint.

Chocolate mint is a type of peppermint with an amazing soft chocolaty aroma and flavor. We use it to make a wonderful infused water: just lightly crush a handful of the herbs to release the oils, then place in a pitcher of water in the fridge. We refill our pitcher with water multiple times over several days before we have to replace the mint. It’s the perfect way to quench your thirst on a hot day! Chocolate mint is exceptional in desserts, as you might imagine! Stay tuned for some recipes on that front!

Mountain Mint is actually not a member of the mint family, but is a close relative that has minty flavor, but also some spicy undertones that some people compare to oregano. I find it to be best in savory dishes like tabbouleh. Or use it fresh or dried to make a tea.

Butterflies love mint as much as we do! (How many can you find?)
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Food Share, Chow Chow, and Celery

6/19/2019

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What a wet week! The garden—and everything else—is saturated with rain, weeds and insects are out in full force, and it’s a challenge to even get out into the garden to get anything done in the mud. We’re very thankful for the protection of our agricultural high tunnel over our tomatoes, tomatillos, and some herbs, but could use a dome over the whole farm!

But weather aside, it’s been a good week! We were happy to contribute to the Franklin County Farmers’ Market’s first monthly South Frankfort Food Share program of the season. The Food Share is a cooperative buying program that allows people to buy a box of assorted vegetables on a sliding scale based on their income. In addition to food access, the program seeks to educate participants on how to use fresh vegetables that may be new to them, and to build community. Dandelion Ridge Farm was proud to contribute parsley and collards to this month’s variety of veggies. The next food share will be July 16; you can sign up for a share starting July 3 if you’re interested.

We’re also bringing some new items to market this week! We’re harvesting our first heads of red cabbage and first bunches of celery this week! The cabbage is a variety called Integro, with a beautiful pearlescent color and succulent, sweet leaves, and it is featured, along with green tomatoes, in our new Lizzie’s Chow Chow relish! This chow chow recipe was passed down from Kevin’s maternal great grandmother, Elizabeth Jenkins, an active subsistence farmer and food preservationist in rural east Texas. Her cooking skills—and the dishes she fed her loved ones--are family legends, and we’re excited to share her chow chow with you! We love it best over a big bowl of black eyed peas and cornbread for an extra dollop of luck and deliciousness!

I used to think of celery in the same category as onions and garlic; they add flavor and crunch to dishes, but other than raw celery sticks with a dip, I didn’t really think of them as a vegetable in their own right. I would buy a bunch of celery for a recipe, then only use a few stalks and the rest would sit in fridge until it got limp. But this year, I’ve gotten into roasting celery and eating it as a side dish, and this has totally changed my relationship with what is now one of my favorite vegetables! I don’t typically follow a recipe when roasting celery, but here is basically what I do. The flavors of thyme, tarragon, and fennel complement the celery really well. I hope you’ll try it and fall in love with celery like I did! Find the recipe for Roasted Celery and Fennel here.
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