Home Farming on a Balcony

by Jasmine McBeath of the New Mexico Action Corps

Secret Garden. Senior Garden. Gardenshare. Waffle Planting. Plantscape. Food Forest. Hanging Garden. Hoop House. Mini-farm.Earth Therapy.

There appears to be wide range of names for a home farm. I hadn't heard of the idea until I looked into planting vegetables on our patio. I was following the GROW Methodby buying locally and seasonally when I thought, what could be more local than my backyard? That's when I stumbled upon the Home Farms 2012 project. The goal is to get 2,012 home farms registered to celebrate the New Mexico Centennial. According to the project website, a home farm is “any place a person grows some of their own food, inside or out.” It’s a great way to save natural resources since there’s no shipping, and you know your food is fresh and in season.

Everyone is invited to register, from relatively large farms which offer CSAs to backyard potted herb growers. Reading the descriptions of people’s home farms revealed a great deal of diversity even in backyard plots. We planted in plastic tubs on our apartment balcony, while others’ maintain sprawling yards that yield enough fruit and vegetables to feed the neighbors. With ten beds, a hoop house and the beginnings of an orchard, one family listed their home produce as asparagus, lettuce, peas, tomatoes, potatoes, herbs, raspberries, apples, pears, fig and pomegranate. 

Another man gained the nickname, “The Farmer” for growing more than 25 varieties in his front yard, including okra, apricots, rhubarb,and tomatillos.

I smiled at the community garden called, “The Plot Thickens” and was blown away by the family that sold their second car and turned their driveway into a garden. Other inspirational stories includeMandy’s Special Farm, a long-term residence for women with autism and Shabeta’s Healing Garden that teaches intensive classes ranging from workshops to year-long courses. The City of Albuquerque Open Space Traditions Garden relies on methods from the early Pueblans and Spanish to conserve water and cultivate native seeds. There’s definitely something to learn from their water conservation techniques including using, “ollas to wick water slowly, waffle gardens to contain spread of and prevent waste of water, and cobblestone mulches which moderate soil temperature as well as prevent evaporation of soil moisture.”

I read story after story of people, from kindergarteners to senior citizens, growing to help themselves and others. And I signed on. As of last weekend, I'm a home farmer. I visited Rehm's Nursery and learned what grows well in the fall. Luckily, the workers there were helpful, since I'm new to this. If we don't count a high school science experiment on green onions in salt versus sugar conditions, it's my first time growing vegetables. Keep your fingers crossed for us!
P.S. In case you want to plant now too, consider these cool-weather veggies: kale, lettuce, spinach, chard, kohlrabi, mustard greens, collard greens, cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, radishes, beets, carrots, snow peas, spearmint and cilantro.

Yum! When's dinnertime?

The Happiest Day of the Week - Part 2!

By Susan Tamoney

 Our latest guest blogger, Susan Tamoney, is an active member of the Boston Oxfam Action Corps! In the previous post Susan discussed both why she loves her CSA, but also the challenges one faces when trying to use up all of the beautiful produce that a CSA delivers!  In this post Susan not only gives her tips from her experiences with a CSA but also some more incredible recipes to help us get the most out of our fall produce! See her part 1 post by clicking here.

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Here are my tips and advice, as well as a another recipe:

Be prepared.

A day or two before CSA pick up, work at using up the produce that you already have on hand. It helps a lot if you’re not trying to find room for all of your beautiful fresh produce in an already overcrowded fridge.

Pull together a supply of clean linen towels and plastic bags for wrapping and storing produce.

Consider investing in some tight seal glass storage containers for the produce that will be precooked or frozen. (As a matter of personal choice, I prefer glass over plastic, but certainly either will work)

Sort

As soon as you get home, sort your produce: “for immediate use”, “needs a bit of precooking prep” and “will last a while as is” worked well for me.

A friend told me about the book The Farmer’s Kitchen by Julia Shanks and Brett Grohsgal. at the beginning of the season and I found it had some really helpful and practical advice on food storage, plus there are lots of recipes:

Do some pre-cooking and freezing

Grill or pre cook for storage and later use. For me, this was probably the step that took the most discipline, but I got better at it and it was definitely the step that is the biggest help in putting together quick weeknight dinners. It works especially well with eggplant, squash and zucchini. I should say up front that I really love to cook, but in the summertime quick and easy is always best; no one wants to heat up a kitchen on a hot summer day and there are almost always other summer activities beckoning outside. In the fall, this step makes dinner way easier on a busy work and school night.

Eggplant Prep: 

1.  Wash and dry eggplants. 
2.  Slice off the stem end and then slice the eggplant into ¼” thin slices the long way.
3.  Lay the slices in a single layer on clean towels. 
4.  Lightly salt both sides of the eggplant. 
5.  Allow them to sit for an hour or so until you see beads of water on the eggplant.
6.  Pat the slices dry.
7.  Now rub both sides of the slices with a bit of olive oil and then grill them either on an outdoor grill or on a stove top until they have some nice grill marks on them, but are still firm.
8. Allow the slices to cool on a plate.  
9. Then layer them into a storage container and keep in the fridge until ready to use later in the week.  (I've kept them for two weeks and they were still fine, just saying)

Yum!

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For another great recipe, check out Susan's Kohlrabi Chips! Also found in her previous post. For more awesome recipes, check out the Oxfam America Pinterest Site.

What are your favorite recipes? What would you bring to a GROW themed potluck? Send your recipes, stories, and meal ideas to actioncorps@oxfamamerica.org and see them posted here!

And don't forget to sign up to host your own World Food Day dinner!

The Happiest Day of the Week!

By Susan Tamoney

Our latest guest blogger, Susan Tamoney, is an active member of the Boston Oxfam Action Corps as well as a member of a local CSA! In the following series of posts, Sue will share a look at the rich variety of local options and how she has chosen to play a larger part in her own food. Below, Susan shares her tips and tricks to following the GROW Method with her CSA produce, not to mention some delicious recipes with some unlikely vegetables.

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For me, the happiest day of the week is Tuesday. This is the day that I pick up our CSA share at Land’s Sake Farm. For anyone who doesn’t know, purchasing a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) share allows small scale farmers to plan their growing season more efficiently by having shareholders pay for their entire season of produce up front, in advance of the growing season. Supporting and connecting with local farmers is one important part of Oxfam America’s GROW Method initiative in support of the GROW campaign.

But back to my happiest day of the week. It wasn’t always this way. Don’t misunderstand; it’s easy to look forward to going to the farm to pick up your CSA. The beautifully organized tables with baskets of produce spilling over their edges. The just harvested vegetables, practically crying out for their moment in the spotlight, begging to be photographed. The sunburned, enthusiastic farmers, proudly explaining what produce is in our share this week. The friendly neighbors exchanging recipes and making cooking suggestions. What’s not to love?

All of this against a backdrop of neatly tended rows of vegetables and colorful fields of flowers is pretty hard to resist. Toss in a bit of happy background noise as children, arriving with their parents, take off laughing to check out a fluffy farm rabbit and some elegant chickens clucking softly in their coop. What’s not to love?

Like many, we’ve always done a bit of backyard gardening at our house. The easy stuff: tomatoes, peas, a bit of bib lettuce, some basil. It was enough to toss together an impromptu Insalata Caprese. We’ve always sought out produce from small local farms and farmer’s markets. But this year, inspired by Oxfam and GROW, we decided that it was time to step up and commit to a CSA share all our own.
So, here’s a picture of our share for one week:

Looks like a good amount of produce for a two to four person family, right? Surprisingly, I found that there was a bit of stress involved. When I first start buying produce this way, I felt a bit overwhelmed by what I brought home in my bags, which can vary greatly for week to week. The good news is that with a bit of advance preparation and a tiny bit of practice, it was all very doable.

Be advised, if you, like me, have ever felt guilty at having to pitch into the compost (or even worse, into the trash) a head of lettuce that wilted before it made it into your salad or the zucchini that was in the back of the vegetable drawer and is now beyond salvation, even for soup, this feeling of guilt will be even worse when something from a CSA ends up in the bin. Not sure exactly why, but it definitely is. Maybe it’s picturing the sweat streaked faces of your farmers, all of whom you are on a first name basis with by the middle of the summer.

So, I decided early on in the season to make a kind of challenge of it.

The challenge:

• Use only what we get in our share, no running out to Whole Foods to buy what we might “feel” like having for dinner tonight, 
• Use everything in the share, even the things that we don’t have a clue what they are (“Oh, so that’s a kohlrabi.”), 
• If we absolutely can’t eat something, share it with friends or neighbors.

These are kohlrabi. I’ve already removed the leaves. Aren’t they a beautiful color? They transform into beautiful chips with a purpled ruffled edge, very Prada!

The great news is that we did it! And not only that but I can say with complete honesty that we have never eaten better than we did this summer. We had some truly amazing meals, and they were all simple and delicious and healthy and VERY easy to prepare. It took a bit of experimentation and “tweeking”, but by end of the season, I’d finally got it down. Supporting lots of parts of the GROW Method in the process and eating some amazingly delicious food. Now that REALLY makes me happy!

Kohlrabi Chip Recipe:

1. Wash and dry one or two kohlrabi. 
2. Thinly slice them into discs using a mandolin (careful of your fingers!). 
3.  Put the slices into a bowl and toss them lightly with a little olive oil, just to coat. 
4.  Place them in a single layer on parchment (very important) covered cookie sheets and bake in a 425F oven for about 5 minutes. You should keep an eye on them. Keep them in longer if you like them crispier.

I made these a lot this summer because they are great to serve as a little nibble before dinner or on the side with an entrée and because everyone loved them. So, I hit on a sweet and salty version that I liked even better:

1. After tossing the kohlrabi slices with olive oil, sprinkle them with some coarse salt, some ground cinnamon and a bit of granulated sugar. 
2.  Keep a close eye on them while they’re in the oven, they can burn quickly with the added bit of sugar.

Hope you like these as much as we all did! Kohlrabi got the prize in our house for “Vegetable That We Never Would Have Tried Without A CSA” and now it’s a hands down favorite!

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Susan introduced us to what her CSA looks like and what her challenges were in using up all of her delicious produce!  Next she'll reveal her best tips and tricks for getting the most out of a CSA!  And of course more great recipes!

Have your own tips and tricks? What about favorite recipes for our lesser - known veggies? Email them in to actioncorps@oxfamamerica.org!

A Look at Juribidá, Colombia

Carolina Garcia, a Oxfam Action Corps leaders in Boston, Massachusetts and FAST Program Assistant at Oxfam America, recently returned from a trip to Juribidá, Colombia. Read on for Carolina's fascinating experiences and insights, beautiful photos, and inspiring GROW Method take-aways.

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This summer, I had the privilege to visit Juribidá, a small town in the wonderful Colombian Pacific Ocean where, in almost every garden and backyard, one can find raised beds with herbs and vegetables for personal consumption.

In spite of the many problems this entire region faces -mainly government neglect-, towns like Juribidá have managed to subsist almost entirely on their own resources for centuries: catching their own fish and growing basic produce like plantains, onions, peppers, etc. Unfortunately, the commercial fishing industry has proven to be disastrous for them, as it has nearly depleted their waters of many of the species that used to inhabit them.

But this post is about positively inspiring us to GROW our own food, locally and seasonally, and to support those who do it at a small scale, so here it goes.

That's a drill!

By Carolina Garcia, Boston Oxfam Action Corps

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What did you see this summer that inspired you to GROW? Whether in your backyard or across the globe, let us know how what new experiences you've had this summer! Send them to actioncorps@oxfamamerica.org.

Des Moines Urges - Decrease Your "Foodprint"!

Down in the dumps about American food waste? So are the Iowa Action Corps volunteers and the Natural Resources Defense Council. A new report demonstrates exactly where this waste is all coming from - and just how much good could be done by wasting less. Read this great post urging you to waste less and go GROW by the Iowa Action Corps!

It shouldn't come as a huge surprise. You wander into the kitchen, open the refrigerator door, and there they are: moldy strawberries, wilting lettuce, and an array of weeks-old leftovers that you either forgot about or were too busy to eat. "Oh yeah! I WAS going to eat that..."

Let's face the ugly truth: As Americans, we're quite wasteful. A new report from the Natural Resources Defense Council  (Motto: "The Earth's Best Defense") puts a stunning number on the wastefulness, too...40%. But they don't stop there. Their report examines every stage from Farm to Fork to Landfill and all those steps in between to provide a truly comprehensive look at where the inefficiencies exist in our food system that result in such a mind-blowing number.

Now, you might think that mega-farms or corporations are to blame for the majority of the 40%. Yes, they are responsible for a share of it...but it's actually us - the individuals and families making food purchases who contribute the largest share of food waste. Yuk! In fact, if 15% of the food waste was recovered and put on the table for hungry families, we could feed 25 million people! That makes a huge difference considering here in the U.S., 1 in 6 people are food insecure.

So, it only makes sense that Oxfam's GROW Method is the next logical step in the process. One of the key components is reducing food waste so that we, as individuals, can make a difference. Between the Pinterest page and Facebook app, you can learn (and contribute!) new ways of thinking about your food and how to lower your "foodprint".

For a one-pager version of the NRDC report highlights, click here.

The average American household throws 
out 20 pounds of food per person per month!

For the complete NRDC 25+ page report "Wasted", click here.

MY PLEDGE: MEATLESS MONDAYS

Jasmine McBeath from the New Mexico Action Corps has made a promise to cut down on her meat intake for Meatless Mondays! Take a look at her post below to see why Jasmine decided to go meatless on Monday - and you won't believe what a difference it can make!

To see what else is up in New Mexico, check out their blog: http://newmexico.oxfamactioncorps.org

What have you done to implement the GROW Method? Have you tried meatless Mondays? Have any vegetarian specialties to share? Let us know at actioncorps@oxfamamerica.org!

I have to admit that I only recently considered the changes I could make to my diet that would affect others. Although I grew up in a conscientious, environment-oriented family, we were more concerned with saving water than food. In fact, my boyfriend still refers to me as "The Water Nazi" for turning off the facet while he's midway through brushing his teeth or shaving.

But when I read about "Meatless Mondays", something stuck. I had learned about Oxfam's GROW Campaign from my training, and this plan provided a simple, concrete way to support the "eat less meat" objective. 

The phrase has been around for almost 100 years (originally a WWI slogan to ration food), but I didn’t know about “Meatless Mondays” until a recent backlash from ranchers about the content of a USDA newsletter. This flurry of articles made me dig a little deeper, and realize that the campaign has reached a lot of people. According to a report by the American Meat Institute, nearly 20% of households participate. 

Chefs are on board; schools, hospitals, and even whole towns have implemented meat-free Mondays. 80,000 children attending Baltimore City Public Schools made the switch. University of California Santa Cruz and Carnegie Mellon students enjoy Meatless Mondays at their dining halls. The Cobblestone Café at John Hopkins Hospital offers only vegetarian options on Mondays. Bigger still, San Francisco and Washington D.C. have passed city-wide resolutions. And in 2011, Aspen became the first “Meatless Monday Community” with over 30 restaurants and organizations participating.

If you're like many of my friends, you're probably asking, "What difference does it make?" The answer is: a lot.  A family of four that trades in their steak dinner for lentils once a week saves 12.5 Olympic-size swimming pools of water per year. Moreover,“if everybody in America did that, that would be the equivalent of taking 20 million midsize sedans off the road,” food advocate Michael Pollan commented on Oprah. Water, land, fertilizer, oil. These are all things we don’t often consider when eating meat. Maybe you knew that livestock farming accounts for almost 20% of greenhouse gases, but did you know it also represents 8% of water use worldwide?

                   

 What it Takes to Make a Quarter-Pounder

Source: J.L. Capper, Journal of Animal Science, December, 2011.

Credit: Producers: Eliza Barclay, Jessica Stoller-Conrad 

Designer: Kevin Uhrmacher/NPR

The drain on resources gives rise to other problems. According to Oxfam press officer Ben Grossman-Cohen, "If we don't reduce our environmental footprints as we increase production, poor people, particularly women, will be the first to suffer. Eating less meat is a simple way to reduce the pressure on global resources and help ensure that everyone has enough to eat." Oxfam's GROW campaign goes a long way toward feeding a world population estimated to grow to nine billion by 2050. 

Now, I realize there are many people that go way beyond the once-a-week pledge. There are vegans and vegetarians, and others like a former roommate of mine that ate veggie burgers every other day just because they were simple to prepare and tasted good. However, we all do what we can, and that means "Meatless Mondays” for me. This plan assures I eat less meat by making it a priority at least once a week. I've conned my boyfriend into joining in also. As a big meat-eater, it’s a significant sacrifice for him, but I’m confident I can cook up some great vegetarian meals. I’ll keep you updated on how it’s going, and post some fun recipes so you can join in too.

By Jasmine McBeath