Cherries hanging from the tree

I drove about 75 minutes out of San Francisco, over the hills and through the burbs, to pay a visit to Farmer Al and the staff at his beloved Frog Hollow Farm. I was excited. I am, after all, a fan.

Farmer Al has called Frog Hollow Farm his pride and joy for 36 years. The El Cerrito native spent time in Hawaii as a Social Studies teacher before trying his hand at farming. He started growing some basic varieties of fruit and vegetables in Hawaii and then moved back to the Bay Area and eventually set up shop in Brentwood. What started out as 150 fruit trees has now become 3500 trees on over 133 acres.

Peaches on a trees

Frog Hollow Farm is known for their "legendary" stone fruits, as their tagline says, including nine varieties of pears in the fall through January, three varieties of cherries and four kinds of apricots in May, thirteen varieties of peaches, eight kinds of nectarines, and six kinds of plums and pluots through September.

The stone fruit he and his staff grow are all certified organic and known by chefs and culinary professionals as the best you can get. Celebrity chefs like Richard Blais, Tyler Florence, and Alice Waters are avid fans. Food lovers and connoisseurs are just as loyal, which explains their popularity at Bay Area farmers markets and their Ferry Building store and café in San Francisco.

Jars of apricot preserves

Organic and sustainable aren't just words here, they're a way of life. Not a bit of the land is wasted. Smaller areas are devoted to heirloom tomato plants for their CSA program members. He’s even planted wildflowers like California poppies so he can do his part to help increase the wild bee population. They even take all their “unmarketable” fruit (those with bumps and bruises but are still perfectly delicious) and make it into their now famous conserves and preserves. When I paid a visit to the kitchen, the jars of apricot preserves on the counter were still warm. Sitting next to them were trays and trays of still unbaked apricot and cherry tarts that were going to be sold in their San Francisco Ferry Building café.

Tray of apricot and cherry tarts

So what makes their fruit so "legendary?"

According to Farmer Al, it all starts at the beginning. "We hoe all the soil by hand. We have about 20 field staff throughout the year, and more during the busy season." And his attention to detail when it comes to the care of all his plants is unwavering. "We started making our own compost out of unusable fruit and shaved trees, along with seaweed, kelp, and fish to naturally fertilize the soil."

Farmer Al has made it his life’s work to dedicate himself to quality fruit and produce. His commitment to his mission is obvious. There are no shortcuts here. That means no chemicals, no poisons. Period.

Al and Millie

While I was getting my private tour of the farm from Farmer Al and his young daughter Millie (the farm is not open to the public), he was visited by an Insurance Assessor who had obviously visited his fair share of farms in the area. The first words out of his mouth were, "I've never seen cherries as good as the ones I’ve seen here."

Farmer Al went on to say that it all had to do with how he paid attention to all his crops. He gave them "just the right amount of fertilizer. Not too much. Other places have overcompensated because of the weather this year." His continued research and years of experience have given him the tools to produce exceptional fruit.

No one is immune to Mother Nature’s wrath, though. The abundance of rain was not kind to his apricot harvest this year. He planted nine acres that were completely lost.

But the folks here have no time to dwell. Cherry season has wound down, unaffected by the unpredictable weather we’ve had. They’ve now begun their busiest time of year: peach season.

Millie with a Peach

Frog Hollow allows for their fruit to get good and ripe before picking. Most supermarket fruit is picked before it’s ripe so it can survive the long trek from farm to store and "hopefully" get riper during the journey. That doesn't jive with Farmer Al.

"Just because it's organic doesn’t mean it tastes good. Quality fruit means flavor, sweetness, juiciness."

It's that level of quality, along with their commitment to their community and loyal fans, that sets them apart.

"You can't fool people with the quality of your food. I wouldn't be doing my job it I wasn't focusing on our environment and the food we give our kids. We like to maintain a personal level of care with our fruit and our community."

And it shows.

Information:

Frog Hollow Farm
Frog Hollow Farm fruit can be found at Whole Foods Markets and various Bay Area Farmers Markets.
Their retail store and café is located at 1 Ferry Building #46 in San Francisco.
(888)779-4511
Facebook.com/FrogHollowFarm
@FrogHollowFarm

*On Saturday July 23, Frog Hollow Farm is hosting "Peaches and Tango: A Dinner in the Orchard" w/Top Chef Richard Blais and live music, benefiting The Edible Schoolyard.

Cochon 555 in New Orleans

Cochon 555's formula for success is simple: 5 chefs + 5 pigs + 5 wineries = porcine bliss. The event -- part culinary competition, part pork orgy -- was founded by Brady Lowe three years ago to help family farms responsibly raising heritage breed pigs sustain and expand their businesses while educating communities nationwide about the tasty payoff of supporting these farmers.

Roasted and Toasted

As Cochon 555 winds down its 10-city tour, I had a chance to catch the latest porktastic affair in New Orleans, where five local chefs prepared a nose-to-tail menu created from their heritage breed pig of choice.

Stephen Stryjewski (Cochon Restaurant) and Smoked Boudin with Spicy Mustard

Chef #1: Stephen Stryjewski, Cochon Restaurant (New Orleans, LA)
Pig #1: Red Wattle, Revival Meats (Texas)

This year's James Beard Best Chef of the South, Stephen Stryjewski, was a strong contender. I had lunch earlier that day at Stryjewski's Cochon Butcher, and if that divine BBQ Pork Sandwich was any indicator of what was in store, we were in for a treat.

Sorghum Pork Rinds

Cochon's smorgasbord of swine was large and plentiful. Among the dozen or so offerings was Smoked Boudin of course, one of Stryjewski's specialties. Other favorites included Open Faced Face, with farmer's cheese and white beans, Liver Cheese and Pepper Jelly on toast, Pork Rinds with Sorghum Molasses drizzled on top, and the tastiest use of pig's blood I have ever encountered, Chocolate and Chicory Blood Pudding.

Chocolate and Chicory Blood Pudding garnished with Bacon

Erick Loos (La Provence) and Head-to-Trotter Tasting

Chef #2: Erick Loos, La Provence -- Besh Restaurant Group, (Lacombe, LA)
Pig #2: Mangalitsa, La Provence Farm (Louisiana)

Representing the Besh Restaurant Group, Erick Loos blew us away with his creativity. He presented a mini four-course meal, showcasing a spectrum of techniques and thorough use of the animal. First up was the Pork Liver Parfait (a cool and savory concoction of liver and blood mousse, whipped lard, house-preserved peaches, and muscadine wine gelée). Admittedly, it was a little disorientating for my taste. Next came the Head to Toe Salad, composed of a terrine of the pig's head, tongue, skin, heart, tail, shanks, and trotters, topped with heirloom tomatoes and sugar cane vinaigrette. For our main, we had Slow Cooked Leg, Shoulder, and Loin served with porcini mushrooms over panisse, a chickpea fritter traditionally from the South of France. The real stunner, however, was dessert. The Porked Alaska, bacon pecan crunch ice cream and amaretto cream melting softly inside a crispy meringue, was my favorite bite of the entire evening.

Adolfo Garcia and Fried Coppa di Testa

Chef #3: Adolfo Garcia, RioMar (New Orleans, LA)
Pig #3: Ossabaw, Black Hill Ranch (Texas)

Our third hometown chef, Adolfo Garcia, put his signature Spanish and Latin American flavors into his snout-to-toe creations. Favorites included fried Coppa di Testa balls, made with rich head cheese, and a spicy, tangy Empanada garnished with pickled onions.

Bacon-spiked Tequila Shooters and Pork Liver Mousseline Cones

Chef #4: John Currence, City Grocery (Oxford, MS)
Pig #4: Berkshire, Newman Farm (Missouri)

Born and raised in New Orleans, and a recent contestant on Top Chef Masters, John Currence brought the party with his Sangrita Javelina, a shooter of tomato juice, bacon infused tequila, and bacon bits, with a rim dusted with powdered country ham and brown sugar. Also delightful were his mini cones of Pork Liver Mousseline topped with vinegar powdered chicharrones.

Mike Lata (FIG) and Fried Head Cheese over Spring Peas

Chef #5: Mike Lata, FIG (Charleston, SC)
Pig #5: Large Black, Caw Caw Creek (South Carolina)

Mike Lata traveled the furthest for this swine-off, but that didn't prevent him from bringing his A-game. Favorite bites were his Crostini of Liver Mousse and a single square inch bit of perfectly fried Pork Belly.

Team FIG and Porky Crostini

If the cornucopia of pork from these fine chefs wasn't enough to sate you, there was also massive cheese spread from St. James Cheese Company, a literal boatload of oysters, Black River Caviar, a feast of whole roasted Porcelet de Lait (young, milk-fed pig) courtesy of Naomi Pomeroy (Beast PDX) and D'Artagnan, and piles of succulent crawfish. For dessert, there were passed platters of 4505 Meats' legendary salty, sweet, chili-dusted chicharrones served fondue-style with a bowl of melted dark chocolate for your dipping pleasure. Yes, you heard right: Chocolate Dipped Chicharrones.

St. James Cheese Company, Oysters and Caviar, and Spoils of the Butcher Competition

As my blood began to turn to lardo, the only logical solution was to thin it out with a taste from the 5 wineries of the evening: Matthiasson (California), Elk Cove Vineyards (Oregon), The Scholium Project (California), McCrea Cellars (Washington), and Chase Cellars (California).

The Prince of Porc: Erick Loos (Besh Restaurant Group)

The night ended with the crowning of The Prince of Porc. By decree of the pork-loving populus, Erick Loos took home the win with the help of the Mangalitsa wooly pig he raised at La Provence's biodynamic farm.

Cochon 555 will be coming to San Francisco on 6/5, the last of this year's 10-city tour before the whole shebang culminates at the Grand Cochon, where all ten previous winners will face off at the FOOD & WINE Classic in Aspen on 6/19.

Eggs from Tara Firma Farms

Happy Easter! And where better to spend this egg-centric holiday than Petaluma, land of butter & eggs? This pretty Sonoma town is worth a drive anytime, especially now while the surrounding hills are green and the cows contented.

Start your Sunday with brunch at Della Fattoria Bakery and Cafe. If you shop at the Ferry Plaza or Marin County farmers' markets, you've probably ogled Della Fattoria's big brown loaves many a time as you try to choose that week's purchase: pumpkin-seed or polenta? Meyer lemon-rosemary (my favorite) or olive? A square Pullman loaf for slicing and toasting, or a crunchy-crusted epi to rip and dunk?

At the heart of Della Fattoria's operation is a farm and bakery, where their breads are baked in wood-fired ovens. The farm doubles as a site for outdoor, communal "ranch dinners"; there's also a small cottage available for rent by the week or by the night.

Easter brunch menu at Della Fattoria

In downtown Petaluma, Della Fattoria runs a bakery-cafe that serves breakfast and lunch 7 days a week, plus dinner on Fridays. The menu shifts a little with inspiration and the seasons, but farm eggs, local meats, and bakery products are always front and center.

Polenta, asparagus, and egg at Della Fattoria Bakery & Cafe

This Sunday, you'll find eggs bennie (eggs Benedict), of course, made with poached ranch eggs, ham, and spring asparagus under a cloak of hollandaise sauce over husky whole-grain toast. Creamy polenta comes topped 3 ways: with braised artichokes, with Italian-style meatballs, or with asparagus, a poached ranch egg, and some rosettes of proscuitto, a lovely, luxurious way to start the day. Bigger appetites might start with fruit salad bathed in brown sugar and champagne, followed by scalloped potatoes with eggs and black-pig bacon, biscuits in gravy with maple-pecan sausage and poached eggs, or a hot pressed ham-and-Gruyere sandwich.

The room is high-ceilinged with walls the color of terra cotta and two long communal tables in the center, plus five smaller tables against the walls. Bouquets of sweet peas and ranunculus add a bright splash of color to each table, where diners share newspapers while kids gnaw on house-baked bagels. At the back is a pastry counter filled with croissants, bear claws, cookies, and tarts, plus a wall of tempting breads.

Enjoy yourself, sip that perfect cappuccino, but don't linger too long; it's time to take a scenic five-mile drive out of town, along meandering, bumpy but beautiful I Street, past horses, cows, and California poppy-studded green hills to Tara Firma Farms. If you're a farmers'-market shopper, you've probably been handed a flyer advertising their pasture-raised meat CSA program and weekend farm tours. Every weekend, from 10am-3pm, owners Craig and Tara Smith do on-the-hour walks around their property, where they're raising pigs, beef cattle, and chickens for both meat and eggs. (There's also a small market garden, three very friendly pet goats, and Roland, the farm dog.)

Craig and Tara started the farm in 2009, raising about 40 head of pasture-raised cattle who move around the farm daily, grazing on three to five acres a day. (Craig still has his day job as the owner of a large long-term-care insurance company; Tara left her job at the same company and now does much of the day-to-day farm management.) They gather about 500 eggs a day from some 700 hens, all of whom spend their days out in the fields, scratching, grazing, pecking, and laying fertile eggs of all sizes and colors. Staunch proponents of the Joel Salatin method, they practice rotational grazing for all their animals. "Everything is always on the move," said Craig, noting that adopting this system made "a huge difference" in revitalizing what had been worn-out, heavily overgrazed land.

Chicken at Tara Firma Farms

After meeting Olivia the sow and her 12 adorable, two-week-old pink-and-black piglets, we walked up to one of the chicken tractors, a shed on wheels kitted out with nesting boxes and secure predator-proof roosts for nighttime. The chickens are busy earning their keep: every straw-lined nesting box we peered into held a clutch of three or four still-warm eggs. It's prime egg-laying time right now, said Craig, as the days get longer and warmer after winter's molting season.

Olivia the sow and her piglets

Pointing out the pond stocked with fish (catfish and large-mouthed bass, for catch-and-release fishing) and encouraging everyone to come back for a hike, Craig said, "We want all our members to feel like this is their farm. We really want to help people understand where their food comes from."

About 80% of the farm's production is sold through its CSA program, which offers both meat and veggie shares; members can pick up boxes at the farm or through one of its 12 drop points between Santa Rosa and San Francisco. After the tour, visitors can browse through the small farm store, where fresh eggs and a small area of produce is on display, featuring a mixture of farm vegetables and produce from County Line, a nearby organic farm. But those in the know head straight for the freezer, where the farm's beef, chicken, and pork are packaged for sale.

As for me, I'm happy to go home with a box of souffle-ready eggs, perfect alongside some Della Fattoria toast.

---

Della Fattoria (The Cafe)
Address: Map
141 Petaluma Boulevard North
Petaluma, CA
Phone: (707) 763-0161
Hours: Mon-Thu & Sat: 6am-3pm, Fri: 6am-9pm, Sun: 9am-3pm
Twitter: @DellaFattoria
Facebook: Della Fattoria

Tara Firma Farms
Address: Map
3796 I Street, Ext
Petaluma, CA 94952
Phone: (707) 765-1202
Twitter: @TaraFirmaFarms
Facebook: Tara Firma Farms

The Writers' Block: Kristin Kimball reads a passage from The Dirty Life, her memoir about transitioning from the life of a city girl to that of a farmer. (Running Time: 12:22)

Single, thirtysomething, working as a writer in New York City, Kristin Kimball was living life as an adventure. But she was beginning to feel a sense of longing for a family and for home. When she interviewed a dynamic young farmer, her world changed. Kristin knew nothing about growing vegetables, let alone raising pigs and cattle and driving horses. But on an impulse, smitten, if not yet in love, she shed her city self and moved to five hundred acres near Lake Champlain to start a new farm with him. The Dirty Life is the captivating chronicle of their first year on Essex Farm, from the cold North Country winter through the following harvest season--complete with their wedding in the loft of the barn.

Kimball and her husband had a plan: to grow everything needed to feed a community. It was an ambitious idea, a bit romantic, and it worked. Every Friday evening, all year round, a hundred people travel to Essex Farm to pick up their weekly share of the "whole diet" -- beef, pork, chicken, milk, eggs, maple syrup, grains, flours, dried beans, herbs, fruits, and forty different vegetables -- produced by the farm. The work is done by draft horses instead of tractors, and the fertility comes from compost. Kimball's vivid descriptions of landscape, food, cooking -- and marriage -- are irresistible.

About the Author:
Kristin Kimball is a farmer and a writer living in northern New York. Prior to farming, Kimball worked as a freelance writer, writing teacher, and as an assistant to a literary agent in New York City. A graduate of Harvard University, she and her husband Mark have run Essex Farm since 2003, where they live with their two daughters.

Related Links:
• Read a Q+A with Kristin Kimball at KQED Arts by Emmanuel Hapsis
• Kristin Kimball's official site
• Facebook: The Dirty Life
• Twitter: @k_kimball
• Purchase The Dirty Life (at amazon.com)

A new report by the United Farm Workers and food service company Bon Appetit Management asserts that health and safety protections for U.S. farmworkers are inadequate and rarely enforced. On Cesar Chavez Day, Forum got an update on conditions for farmworkers in California.

Host: Scott Shafer

Original broadcast aired on Thu, Mar 31, 2011 -- 9:00 AM

Guests:
• Juan Santiago, president of the Central Valley Youth Association and former farmworker
• Barry Bedwell, president of the California Grape and Tree Fruit League
• Don Villarejo, founder and director emeritus of the California Institute for Rural Studies
• Erik Nicholson, national vice president of United Farm Workers
  Twitter: @UFWupdates Facebook: UFW
• Maisie Greenawalt, vice president of the Bon Appetit Management Company
  Twitter: @bamco Facebook: Bon Appétit
• Manuel Cunha, president of the Nisei Farmers League

Related article:
Grist: Startling new report shines light on farm labor conditions—and they ain’t good by Tom Philpott

The Perennial Plate is an online weekly documentary series dedicated to socially responsible and adventurous eating. The episodes follow the culinary, agricultural and hunting explorations of chef and activist, Daniel Klein. Season One took place over a calendar year in Minnesota where every Monday for 52 weeks, Daniel and cameragirl Mirra Fine released short films about good food. In Season Two, they will be traveling across America, taking the viewer on a journey to appreciate and understand where good food comes from and how to enjoy it.

Bay Area Bites asked Daniel about Season Two's Real Food Road Trip -- the mission, the project, the plan for the Bay Area and how people can participate.

Daniel Klein and Mirra Fine jump for joy in front of the vehicle that will take them on the Real Food Road Trip. Photo: Tim Klein

BAB: What is the mission of you trip? How does a road trip around the country fit in with your project? What do you expect to accomplish? Why did you choose the specific destinations you plan to explore?

Daniel: The mission of our trip is to explore and promote what good food is in this country. What “good food” or “real food” means is, of course, up for question. And we don’t pretend to know. This trip is about engaging and learning with the people who are passionate about their food.

The first phase of The Perennial Plate was about Minnesota. It was extremely local and/or regional. There is fantastic stuff happening here, much like the rest of the country. We couldn’t move on and just do a year in Iowa, so we decided to take on the whole country and show glimpses of these places in all their similarities and differences. It also just seemed like the logical next step for the show.

We expect to learn a lot. What I film is generally something I want to learn about, so we just bring the viewers along on that same educational and entertaining journey. Beyond learning, we hope to meet (and entertain) a lot of people, and develop a project that is a real celebration of all that goes into food (animals, the earth, water, money, politics, humans, love).

The destinations on our map are not set in stone. We want this journey to be guided by the people who submit ideas, or have stories to tell. We drew a map of places we wanted to visit, but it will surely change and develop.

Real Food Road Trip Map. Illustration: Mirra Fine

BAB: After a year documenting local Minnesota food + farming what kinds of local stories will you seek from specific regions? Are you going to try to capture the essence of the local cuisine? Or are you just looking for compelling stories?

Daniel: There are some regions where we really want to focus on the food that makes that place famous, but other places we’ll avoid the obvious choices. The truth of the matter is we don’t know yet. In the first few days of announcing the project, we received hundreds of story ideas, we are still sorting through them.

We are looking for compelling stories most of all. But each episode will vary. One week may just cover “Iowa” and have several short stories about food in that state. Another week could be a more in depth look at just one fisherman in Louisiana. We don’t like to repeat a format each week, and we think that changing things up keeps people coming back. One thing that will stay constant is that each week will keep moving, we’ve only got 6 months to cross the country.

BAB: When do you anticipate being in the Bay Area? What types of stories are you looking for to capture the food culture of the Bay Area? Do you have anything lined up yet? How can people submit their stories?

Daniel: We expect to be in the Bay Area in late June, early July. I am really excited about the Bay Area, but also a little nervous. There are so many stories there, it seems like everyone and there brother is involved with food in some way. So we could do something on just how prevalent and awesome good food is. We have been in touch with a number of folks in the Bay Area, but nothing is confirmed yet. On our website we also got hundreds of stories from across the US, many were from the Bay Area. We are still accepting ideas on our site, please: Tell Us Your Local Food Story.

Mirra Filming with second camera. Photo: Chuck Peterson

BAB: I am curious about your production process -- how will you produce segments while on the road? What kind of setup do you have?

Daniel: Working from the road is going to be a challenge, however after filming and editing 52 videos, we are relatively proficient in the process. Our setup will include a laptop, many hard drives, 2 cameras (one HD video camera and one DSLR camera that will be used to film occasionally but more often to capture pictures for our blog and the post-trip cookbook).

Our plan is to always be a week ahead of our videos, so its pretty real time. We are leaving on May 9th and we will release our first video on the 16th. We will film an episode every week as well as extra footage that may not make it into the series, but could appear in a film or mini-series version of the project.

BAB: I hear that Mirra, your vegetarian girlfriend and videographer will be blogging to document your journey in addition to shooting the segments. You say she will provide a vegetarian perspective to the experience -- what does that mean? Why do you want to include this POV?

Daniel and Mirra working together at a Harvest Dinner. Photo: Stephanie Watts

Daniel: Mirra will be blogging. She’s always been a part of the project, though very behind the scenes. But she is a funny writer with a very different POV from my own (when it comes to food). We say she will bring a vegetarian perspective, but really she will just bring her own thoughts to the project, they just happen to be vegetarian. That means when I am excited about some meat, or discussing the morality of killing an animal, she may have something different to say. It won’t all be serious of course, I expect her to make fun of me often.

The show is very much about connecting people to their food and making them think about it. We are learning and don’t know the answers, so by having two very different food perspectives, we are playing to that concept of dialogue and reason. Also, the first episode turned Mirra into a vegetarian -- it may do the same to others -- and that’s ok. The more folks are conscious about what they eat, the better.

Bread Pudding + Pumpkin Soup and Harvest Dinner Menu. Photos: Stephanie Watts

BAB: You also talk about doing events while on the road that people can get involved in. Can you clarify the details for people that might be interested?

Daniel: There are two types of events: harvest dinner and screening. We are working on a 30 minute version of the Minnesota series that we will be showing across the country (along with a Q&A). These screenings can be in at a restaurant, farm, home, theatre... wherever there is space and the appropriate equipment for screening as well as a reasonable size crowd (20+)

For the dinners, we will be cook (and film) and promote the dinner. The host is expected to organize the location, kitchen, money (for food) as well as bring together the guests. The event can be a fundraiser for an organization, a farm or The Perennial Plate. Events must have at least 20 people.

To host an event, please Submit Your Idea.

BAB: Is the Perennial Plate slated to become a documentary film? A TV series?

Daniel: We plan on turning the 6 months of filming into a documentary film or mini-series. Although we are releasing a video every week, we will be filming other content that will make this next phase possible.

BAB: How have you funded your project for the past year? How do you plan to fund your upcoming Real Food Road Trip?

Daniel: Last year was funded out of pocket as well as through crowd funding and hosting harvest dinners. For Season 2 we are raising $20K on Kickstarter (Please Donate!) and also looking for sponsors. It's a lot cheaper to drive around Minnesota than to drive cross-country. We want the viewership to both guide the trip as well as help pay for it.

BAB: What do you hope people will learn from The Perennial Plate?

Daniel: I hope people are entertained and through that entertainment, become more engaged with what they eat. Even if they go in a different direction than I would, if they are thinking and making a choice about it, that is positive.

BAB: How has your project affected the way you view food? View life?

Daniel: The project has made me more open minded about food. I don’t think there is one answer, and when you meet with people who have different points of view, but a similar passion for making good food available, you realize that this process has many paths.

The project has made me look differently at filmmaking and storytelling. I focus more on the person and less on the project, looking for moments of humanity rather than a clear explanation.

The Perennial Plate | Twitter | Facebook | Foursquare

Happy spring! The vernal equinox, daylight savings time, and the Jewish holiday of Purim may all be upon us, but brrrr! With umbrella-destroying winds, tornado watches along the coast, and socks-drenching rain, it's feeling much more like winter than balmy spring. Oh well--remember all those sunbathing days we got back in January?

Like most of us, bees prefer to stay inside where it's warm and dry on days like this, snuggling together in a big bee-ball to keep themselves, and especially their queen, nice and toasty. But for humans, the show must go on, and so CUESA's honey celebration at the San Francisco Ferry Plaza Farmers' Market on Saturday, March 19th went on even in the teeth of blowing rain. Once a month from February through November, CUESA will be hosting a celebration for a different fruit, vegetable, or product, featuring tastings, ask the farmer (or producer) sessions, and a variety of cooking demonstrations by local chefs and cookbook authors. Last month was citrus; this month, for the first time, was honey.

First up behind the counter was Margo True, food editor of Sunset magazine and the author (along with her staff) of Sunset's latest book, The One-Block Feast. The book, which comes out next week, came out of a series of homesteading projects undertaken by Sunset over the last couple of years. "We wanted to get back to the Lane brothers' original vision for Sunset, which was as a laboratory for Western living," said True. With a spacious garden, room for bees and chickens, the ability to get a "milk share" from a cow living at a nearby farm, and lots of kitchen room for testing, True and her team set out to see if they could make or source everything--even flour and sea salt--from as close to the magazine's Menlo Park campus as possible. The results were sometimes spectacular, sometimes frustrating, but all of it got incorporated into the book. True tried to be as honest as possible, promising that they "definitely wrote about what bombed," too.

However, on this gray morning, True was here to show off two recipes that promise big payback for not too much effort. A custard-based honey ice cream, made with honey from the magazine's own hives, had a suave, salted-caramel edge, thanks to a drizzle of honey on top and a sprinkle of sea salt. It's more lusciously creamy than sweet, but the honey flavor still comes through. Even though it was hardly ice cream weather, the crowd snapped up every sample and scraped the cups clean.

Next came strawberry jam, made of nothing more than ripe early-season berries, honey, and a dash of lemon juice. Rather than cook it on the stovetop, where the direct heat could scorch the mixture, True spread out her chunky berry puree in a thin layer on a baking sheet, then revealed her secret: a long, gentle bake in a slow oven, which would gently condense it down while preserving the berries' ripe flavor. Spread on slices of Acme bread, the finished jam did taste remarkably fresh, with a soft consistency somewhere between jam and compote, perfect for a yogurt parfait topped with granola and a handful of fresh berries.

When I was researching my own book about honey a decade ago, Helene Marshall and her husband, beekeeper Spencer Marshall of Marshall's Farm Honey, took me around their bee house, let me scoop a fingerful of eucalyptus honey straight out of the comb, and even let their bees model for photographs. Now, ten years later, Helene is still talking up the beauty of bees and the importance of local honey (and local pollinators), and finally, people are ready to hear what she has to say. Speaking about the recent resurgence of interest in backyard beekeeping, she said, "The biggest, best, and most important thing to come out of this is that people have respect for bees and beekeepers now, and a real appreciation of honey. People realize that we need those bees!"

Helene Marshall of Marshall's Farm Honey, offering samples of Fairmont Hotel

In front of the audience with J.W. Foster, executive chef of San Francisco's Fairmont Hotel, Helene talked about their latest project, putting hives on the Fairmont's roof. "I'm San Francisco born and raised, went to my junior and senior proms at the Fairmont, so it feels like our bees are going home. They can hitch a ride on a cable car...it's so San Francisco, I love it!" On warm days, the bees like to nip up to the penthouse level to sip from the fountains, getting a free look at that $15,000-a-night view.

So far, the Fairmont is hosting four hives, all very healthy. Last week's harvest yielded 60 pounds of honey, with a light, floral-herbal taste and an early-spring hint of eucalyptus. "This honey was harvested last week, extracted a couple of days ago and bottled this morning," said Helene.

Marshall's Farm Fairmont Hotel honey

With a lot of fresh honey at his disposal, Foster and his kitchen staff are experimenting to see what they can use it for. Their latest creation is an unctuous duck-egg aioli with olive oil, garlic, rosemary, and a touch of honey, used to dress chopped raw beef tartare with stovetop-smoked onions and cress salad on walnut crostini.

Ice cream, beef tartare...finally, the last chef, Brandon Jew of Bar Agricole, promised something hot, a hot toddy made with brandy, chartreuse, honey from Alan Hawkins' apiaries, bitters, and lemon peel. He made some mostarda, too, his spin on Bologna's favorite tart-sweet relish, a late-winter version made from brandied, spiced raisins mixed with a honey-based Seville orange marmalade, and served over a slice of pork pate. A few sips, and hey, was that a ray of sunshine coming down?

Recipes reprinted by permission from The One-Block Feast.

Recipe: Strawberry Oven Jam

Summary: Making strawberry jam without sugar or commercial pectin is challenging. Honey tends to burn over high heat, resulting in a bitter jam, while a slow-cooker yields a jam that is too liquidy. Stephanie Dean, Sunset’s kitchen test manager, kept at it and finally arrived at this easy method, which produces a not-too-sweet, fresh-tasting jam with a nice, spreadable consistency.

Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 2 hours 30 min
Total time: 2 hour 45 min
Yield: about 1 cup

Ingredients

• 2 pints strawberries, hulled
• 2 tablespoons honey, plus more to taste (optional)
• 1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 200°F. Combine the strawberries, honey, and lemon juice in a food processor and pulse 20 to 30 times to chop the berries, stopping to scrape
   down the sides of the work bowl as needed. Be careful you don’t puree the berries.
2. Spread the strawberry mixture in a thin, even layer on a rimmed baking sheet. Bake, scraping up and stirring with a flat, wide metal spatula every hour and then
   respreading into an even layer, until the jam is as thick as you like, 2 to 3 hours. It will continue to thicken slightly as it cools.
3. Let cool, then transfer to an airtight container. Stir in more honey before serving if you want a sweeter jam.
4. Note: The jam will keep in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 1 week or in the freezer for up to 3 months.

Recipe: Honey Ice Cream

Summary: We were knocked out by the intensely floral, seductive flavor of our honey in this simple, lovely ice cream, created by Sunset's recipe editor Amy Machnak.

Prep time: 5 min
Cook time: 15 min
Total time: 6 hrs 20 min (includes 6 hours freezing time)
Yield: 4 cups

Ingredients

• 2 cups heavy cream
• 1 1/2 cups whole milk
• 4 large egg yolks
• About 1 cup honey
• Pinch of fine sea salt, plus more for finishing
• Ice cubes

Instructions

1. Pour the cream and milk into a medium saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Right before it comes to a simmer, in a medium heatproof bowl, whisk
   together the egg yolks, 3/4 cup of the honey, and the salt.
2. Immediately pour the cream and milk slowly into the yolk mixture while whisking constantly. Return the mixture to the pan and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly and adjusting the heat to prevent the mixture from boiling, until it begins to thicken, about 8 minutes.
3. Fill a large bowl with ice cubes and water, and nest a medium bowl in the ice water. Strain the custard mixture through a fine-mesh strainer into the medium bowl. Let cool completely, stirring occasionally and replacing the ice if needed.
4. Freeze in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s directions. Transfer to an airtight container and freeze until firm, at least 6 hours or up to 2 weeks.
5. To serve, scoop ice cream into bowls. Drizzle with more honey and top with a sprinkle of salt.

A little over a year and a half ago, I moved from New York City back to Minnesota -- the state where I was born (but only lived in until I was four years old). Upon my return, I had hoped to open my own restaurant, educating Midwesterners about good, local and creative food. I quickly came to realize that no educating was needed... except on my end. Taking stock of my skills and offerings, I decided to shift directions and combine my passions into one project. I've been making documentary films and cooking for the last six years, why not bring them together? Thus, The Perennial Plate was born.

For this new endeavor, I gave myself the challenge of creating a short documentary every week for a year about sustainable and adventurous food in Minnesota. The videos would be posted online for free, funding would come from the viewership and I would learn a lot about my home state. Forty-six episodes later, the project has been an inspiring and life changing experience. I've gained friends in the form of farmers, chefs, hunters and foragers and a new found appreciation for all of the work and love that goes into the food we eat.

I'll be heading through the Bay Area this summer to film, but before you get your own local video, I wanted to share a two-part episode that I made a couple weeks back in my home state. To view the whole series, visit theperennialplate.com

A warning to the squeamish viewer. These videos are about rabbits -- not just how cute they are, but how to raise them, how to kill them and how to eat them.

I visited Marshall Farm: a very small family operation that just started its first year of commercial rabbit farming. They are trying to popularize this climate-friendly protein option. As the only rabbit farm in Minnesota, most of their rabbits go to restaurants in the Twin Cities that feature local ingredients and charge a pretty penny.

Will rabbit break out of the fine dining mold and into the mainstream? With its white fur and Easter bunny association, maybe not. Because the rabbits aren't raised by the thousands, it also isn't the cheapest meat, and perhaps that's how it should stay -- as something special to be enjoyed from time to time.

WARNING: Includes graphic footage of a rabbit being slaughtered

At Marshall Farm we killed two bunnies. Scott Marshall butchered the first, and I did the second. From this bounty, I created a terrine. This elegant meatloaf is an easy crowd-pleaser, and a good way to make the most of every bit of the rabbit. Here's the recipe:

Rabbit Terrine Recipe

For this terrine I used rabbit as well as some pork fat, and some pork rillette that I had previously made. The rillette isn't necessary. I wouldn't make it just for this terrine, but if you want to give it a try, follow the example from Wrightfood.

Equipment:
Meat Grinder (eg KitchenAid with food grinder attachment)
Terrine mold or loaf pan

Ingredients:

2 rabbits de-boned
3/4 lb pork fat (or 1/3 of the quantity of rabbit)
2 cups pork rillette
1 egg
1 egg yolk
3 slices rye bread without crusts
1/2 cup of whole milk
2 rabbit livers (kidneys and hearts as well)
2 tablespoons of fresh thyme
1 Thai chili, seeds removed
2 tablespoons salt (to taste)
1 cup of dried cranberries
The addition of 2 tablespoons of a liqueur or fortified wine adds depth. I didn't have anything local, so I opted out
Canola oil to coat inside of terrine mold

Cut the rabbit and pork fat into pieces that will fit into your meat grinder. Combine the rabbit, pork, salt, and spice in a bowl. Mix and refrigerate for 2 hours (or more). Separately, put your meat grinder attachment in the freezer (for at least 1 hour).

Meanwhile, soak the bread in the milk and alcohol. Whisk the eggs until combined.

Remove the grinder from the freezer, and grind the salted-meat mixture as well as the soaked the bread. Add the whisked egg to the ground meat, lightly mix together, and then put the combined forcemeat through the grinder again.

Lightly poach or saute a spoonful of your forcemeat and taste for balanced seasoning. Adjust accordingly.

Lightly cover the inside of your terrine mold with canola oil, then press plastic wrap into the mold with plenty extra hanging over to cover the terrine at a later point.

Pour the cranberries into the bottom of the mold, distributing equally. Follow that with a layer of the forcemeat. If you are just using rabbit loins, place them in the center of the terrine and then fill the rest of the mold up with the remaining force meat. If you have the rillette: flatten the rillette onto plastic wrap, place the rabbit loins in the center and then roll the rillette around the loins, making as tight a cylinder as possible. Lay this tube (without the plastic) in the mold and cover with force meat, making sure some is on the sides as well. Use the excess plastic wrap to cover the forcemeat.

Cover the terrine with tinfoil, crimping at the edges to make a lid.
Fill a pan with hot water and set the mold in the water. Cook the terrine in the oven at 300 for an hour to an hour and a half or until the interior temperature reads 150 degrees.

Uncover the terrine and let sit out for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes create a press that can equally distribute weight onto the terrine (another terrine mold works best). Put the terrine in the fridge with weights on top and let it sit overnight.

I served the terrine with a green tomato vinaigrette and micro greens, but it can be served with anything a little sweet and sour. Pickles, mustard, and jams are all great options along with some crusty bread.

The Perennial Plate
Twitter: @perennialplate
Facebook: Perennial Plate

Where's the beef? These days, as numerous workshops at the recent EcoFarm Conference revealed, it's on the farm—right alongside the sheep, the chickens, the ducks, and the goats.

From a farming perspective, biodiversity used to mean replacing typical fenceline-to-fenceline monocropping (which you can still still see down in the Central Valley: huge tracts of dirt planted with nothing but straight lines of strawberries or lettuce) with a more photogenic mix of pollinator-feeding flowers, orchards, hedgerows, and assorted vegetables in colorful profusion, all working in sync to make the farm a happier habitat for beneficial bugs, predators, and people.

Now, however, more and more small farms (and vineyards) are getting livestock into the mix. Whether they're providing milk, eggs, meat, or labor, animals and poultry are taking their place again alongside the tractor and the compost pile as integral parts of the contemporary, sustainable organic farm.

The 2011 conference had a much more concentrated interest in horns and hoofs than in years past. At least half a dozen workshops focused on animal issues, ranging from "Ecosystem Services in Livestock Production" and "Cattle and Carbon: Rangeland Conservation & Climate Protection" to "Healthy Herds, Healthy Markets: Raising Heritage Breed Livestock and Poultry" and "Building a Local Meat Supply Chain."

Putting the proof onto the plate was Marin Sun Farms, our own local grass-fed meat company, whose in-kind sponsorship of the conference put excellent local chicken, bacon, and lamb onto the menu of Asilomar's dining room throughout the conference (which made, for the omnivores among us, a welcome alternative to the usual beans, kale, and quinoa).

Why have animals on a farm? Well, as one of the owners of Full Belly Farm pointed out, a productive, diversely-planted organic farm produces a lot of surplus food. Restaurants, retailers, CSA and farmers' market customers all want the good stuff. They'll pay for it, but it has to look and taste the best. And if you're not bathing your produce in pesticides to keep it the boring, munching, scarring bugs at bay, well, you're going to end up culling a whole lot of not-so-pretty, overripe or undersized stuff along the way.

Some of it feeds your family and your workers. Some of it can feed your compost. But if you want to turn oversize zucchini and beat-up tomatoes into usable, high-quality protein (not to mention plenty of fertilizer), well, nothing beats feeding it to pigs, goats, or chickens.

Backyard goats and chickens enjoying some sweet and crunchy discards from Star Route Farm

It's all part of the closed-loop system advocated by Rudolf Steiner, the Austrian polymath who mixed biology and soil science with folk wisdom and time-tested peasant farming practices, codifying it into what we now call biodynamics. Stripped of its more arcane spiritual elements, it's more or less the same down-to-earth, interconnected system advocated by Joel Salatin, the nattily dressed farmer/author of Virginia's Polyface Farm, who gave an impassioned speech last month in Point Reyes Station. Drawing from his latest book, The Sheer Ecstasy of Being a Lunatic Farmer, Salatin turned the hay-lined Toby's Feed Barn into a tent revival for smart pasturing practices and mixed-use farms. Real pork, he insisted, wasn't a "white meat;" instead, if the pig's been raised right, rooting around, living out its full pig-attude, its meat should be iron-rich and consequently rosy pink.

Joel Salatin. Photo by Stephane von Stephane

Even wineries are getting in on the act: at Robert Sinskey, in Napa, part of the vineyards' biodynamic practice involves grazing down the weeds with sweet-faced Romney sheep, whose wool is sold alongside the wine in the tasting room.

But, as much as we might hope to be going back to a more natural practice with grass-fed meat and pastured eggs, few consumers are ready to think of steak and omelets as exclusively seasonal products, dictated by water, daylight, and temperatures just as much as asparagus or raspberries. If you have backyard chickens, you know that laying slows down dramatically as the days get shorter. Grass-fed cows have to be managed according to the ecosystems of their particular pastures.

Rearing animals on grass takes time, and as talk with numerous small farmers and ranchers at the conference proved, no one small farm or ranch can provide a year-round supply of freshly slaughtered meat. The answer? Co-ops and partnerships. As the workshop "Are CSAs Sustainable?" proved, a single farm limited by acreage, climate, and resources can't always produce enough variety to keep customers coming back for a box year-round. Your cool, moist, ocean-fogged farm might produce spectacular greens and kales—but what happens in July, when "greens fatigue" sets in and your members are longing for peaches and tomatoes? You can preach the virtues of chard; scrape up another loan, lease another parcel of land and increase your payroll; or partner with an inland neighbor already dripping in stone fruit and create a box that shares the wealth.

Niman Ranch does this on a large scale; Marin Sun Farms, Straus Family Creamery, and North Coast Meats on a smaller one. Partnering with other ranches helps produce a steady supply, while selling meat through a CSA, like the one described by Tyler Dawley of Barbarosa Ranchers in Red Bluff, insures not only a pre-sold market for the animals, but a chance to familiarize customers with cuts beyond the usual chops and tenderloins.

Cooperatives can also help with the biggest snag in the local-meat supply chain: getting access to a small-scale slaughterhouse, then finding a way through governmental wrapping and packing regulations scaled for the likes of Tyson Foods.

As State Director Dr. Glenda Humiston of USDA Rural Development pointed out, one of the top requests her office gets from rural communities (right after broadband) is access to small-scale slaughterhouses, particularly mobile ones that can move from community to community. Throughout the workshops, farmers with pigs, goats, sheep, and cattle on their land got up to beg for solutions, giving details of sudden shut-downs at nearby slaughterhouses (some affiliated with local ag-training universities) or wrapping/packing facilities.

No one, even the most carnivorous among us, likes to think too hard about how their main course went from animal to ingredient. But with meat moving out of the supermarket and into the farmers' market, thoughtful consumers have more and more chances to find out how their dinner lived, and to put their food dollars towards supporting land-healthy, humane practices.

For more background on the challenges of creating a local meat supply chain, read the report Where's the Local Beef? by Food and Water Watch.

The price of Pixie tangerines. Contamination dangers for organic dairies from GMO alfalfa. The safety of tractor tweeting. Veterans transitioning into farming, pastoralism and grassland management, the cave paintings of Lascaux and sustainable meat production, the future of CSAs, hot heritage breeds and much, much more.

Such were just a fraction of the topics buzzing through the first day of the 31st annual EcoFarm Conference. It's Davos for organic farmers, where hundreds of forward-thinking, change-making ranchers, farmers, wholesalers, seed-company founders, and advocates for sustainable agriculture and food justice converge for 3 days of workshops, presentations, meals, and talk--lots and lots of talk, spilling over through panel discussions, cheese tastings, workshops, lunch lines, morning yoga and evening movies.

There's so much to discuss, after all, here at the forefront of the sustainable-ag revolution, where muddy boots and sun-creased foreheads tell the stories of decades spent cajoling balky tractors, hauling irrigation pipe, praying for rain or praying for sun, battling aphids in the Brussels sprouts and codling moth in the apples, and not least of all, convincing skeptical customers to try a purple carrot or a white beet.

And for once, Mother Nature has given her servants a gift: unheard-of sunny skies and summery, beach-basking temperatures, instead of the EcoFarm tradition of fierce winds, blustery rain, and January gloom. For once, the farmers who trekked in from the snowy reaches of northern Vermont or upstate New York are getting a real California vacation.

On Wednesday night, capping a day of "Farms with Barns" pre-conference events about sustainable animal husbandry, Nicolette Hahn Niman, author of Righteous Porkchop, advocated fiercely for a return to pre-CAFO systems of ranching. Armed with then-and-now photos and armfuls of statistics, she made a passionate case for the environmental benefits of raising (and eating) animals fed exclusively on pasture, the way she and her husband, Bill Niman (founder of Niman Ranch, although he's no longer associated with the brand), do in the green and pleasant land of West Marin.

It's hard not to get platonic crushes on favorite farmers when you shop the Bay Area's farmers' markets, or at least to see them as rock stars of the vegetable world. And here they all are: white-haired David Little, Marin's king of dry-farmed potatoes; smiling Dru Rivers and Judith Redmond of Full Belly Farm, Jim Cochran of Swanton Berry, Tim Mueller and Trini Campbell of Riverdog Farm, Albert Straus of Straus Family Creamery, and numerous others.

And more and more, they're getting the word out about their farms, their concerns, and their lives on and off the tractor through the same social-media outlets the rest of us use for cute-kitty videos and complaints/brags about kids and jobs. In a workshop about Social Media for Farmers, Greg Massa, a 4th generation organic rice, almond, and grain farmer for Massa Organics along the Sacramento River, admitted to tweeting from his tractor. (Although, as he pointed out, "If you've ever seen one, you know there's not a whole lot in a rice field you can hit.")

As a smaller-scale farmer carving out a niche, Massa found that as his company grew, he had to find a way to maintain the farm's personal connection to customers, once he was no longer able to be the face of the farm at every farmers' market. The answer? Facebook and Twitter. Customers (and fans) can find out what will (and won't) be at his market stands each week, including his newest item, whole-wheat tortillas made from farm-grown wheat. (He also raises a couple hundred ducks in the fields, selling them as meat for a short time in the fall.) They can also share in the trials and delights of the farm, whether it's a rice-loaded truck stuck in the mud or a chicken laying an egg in the pickup's cupholder.

After several years of ignoring social media, this year's conference was tweeting with a vengeance (#EFC11). Naturally, this made Farm City author (and proud typewriter-using Luddite) Novella Carpenter say, in a later panel about Women Writers & Farmers, "I hate Facebook, I hate all that crap. I could pet a goat or I could stare at a computer--fuck that!" She did admit to using Twitter for spur-of-the-moment commerce, like the frequent sidewalk farmstands she throws together in Oakland.

"Everything I do is illegal, basically, so I use it for that." It's part of the benefit of being a best-selling author, she pointed out. "The book took me 3 years to write, so I probably made about 10 cents an hour. But I can sell chard like crazy."

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