Across the street from my apartment is the Old Town Alexandria Farmers’ Market. It has a storied history, beginning with its founding in 1753. When we
A tiny stand built from slatted crates opened recently and the owners displayed arugula that was so tender and delicious, I thought I was in Italy. Little breakfast radishes that had a French accent, and an unbelievable selection of microgreens in the summer and winter that we buy weekly to make salads. There is a person in my household, who will easily pick up that second pork chop, but can usually manage to eat only a mouthful of salad. The greens from San Giovanni’s Farm stand have made him a changed man. ( A big plus is that they have small bouquets of flowers seasonally, which will last a week.) and I’ve heard our Kitchen Detail editor wax rhapsodic about some teensy turnips she bought at the stand and sautéed.
Their growing and harvesting techniques are pretty much done by hand (with some simple machinery). I learned that they use a no-till philosophy, which actually reduces considerably soil erosion from wind and water. No-Till can also diminish demand for fuel and labor and improve the overall health and structure of the soil while repressing weeds, retaining sufficient moisture, and building organic matter in the soil . If you are in the area, you may want to organize a visit to this little garden that could.
Although so much of farming in the US has chosen the bright shiny object route, much to our detriment I believe, some interesting statistics should encourage
One person full-time can hand handle 1 acre of intensive production – and more often it is two people who share the work. This type of farming is suitable to a wide variety of crops, particularly what are called High Dollar Crops: salad mixes, heirloom tomatoes, and cut flowers, for example. These market gardens not only sell in local farmers’ markets, but also to restaurants and through the the CSA movement.
The one-acre ideal goes back to the Middle Ages, when it was the amount of land that could be ploughed in one day with a yoke of oxen (usually a rectangle measuring “four rods by one furlong” or 4, 840 square yards.) And in the 21st century this plot of land can yield $60,000 -$129,00 for mixed vegetables or more, if salad mixes, herbs and cut flowers are grown. As the bulk of expenses is seeds, plants, and supplies (not pesticides, chemical fertilizers, and other Monsanto addictions) and no additional labor, the margin is usually 50% or over.
Check out Lynn Brczinski’s book for a motherlode of information on this little-known agricultural insurgency:
After owning one of the best cooking stores in the US for 47 years, Nancy Pollard writes a blog about food in all its aspects – recipes, film, books, travel, superior sources and food related issues.
Che Si Mangia?* One of my hobbies is cooking. The other is eating. I probably…
Leaving McCormick When I stumbled onto the history of Vanilla and the debt that is…
Gelato Concerns One of the things I found to fret about when we moved to…
I am a sucker for farmers markets. When we were first married and rented part…
Ham Histories Since I now reside in one of the reigning ham regions of the…
A Different Party Wars have unintended consequences, as anyone who reads Heather Cox Richardson obsessively…