Sweet Local Farm

Our friend and soon to be farm mate Michael Crigler is a very talented artist. He was asked to design a special pop art My Little Pony for Hasbro. You can buy one here.

He even designed the packaging:

I bought one as a Christmas gift for my little niece, Bella.

The leaves are just starting to change in our neck of the woods. This is the view from our kitchen table. The cute rooster tablecloth was a gift from my friend Kym. She spotted it at a market in Portugal and had to buy it for our kitchen. Thanks Kym!

Early morning on the farm has been quite eerie lately. The whole neighborhood falls under a blanket of mist. I am not the best morning person so I haven’t gone outside to photograph it yet.

Martha Stewart blogged about her misty farm. Check out her beautiful photos.

Many different kinds of crops must be planted in the fall for next years harvest. These crops tend to be grown from roots or tubers instead of from seed and also tend to be expensive. I was planning to order some hardneck garlic from Seed Savers Exchange but most of it was sold out.

I found very affordable hard neck garlic for sale at a farmers market in Allston, MA. The farmer said she grows all of her garlic from her own bulbs, so I bought as much as I could. You can read Megan’s account of us planting garlic on her blog.

I also just planted jerusalem artichokes or sunchokes. I found that these tubers were also very expensive to buy online. I found them at Russo’s in Watertown, MA.

We got a sweet cast iron skillet for our wedding. The beauty of this heavy piece of cookware is that it can go from burner to oven. I had read about depression era skillet cakes that used other fruit, including peaches, but since I am up to my ears in pears (still), I decided to try with that.

For the “cake” part, I used this amazing vegan recipe from post punk kitchen for cornbread. It is dense and moist, and I happened to have some local cornmeal on hand.

Start by peeling your pears:

Then slice them thinly:

Heat up 3 tablespoons of “butter” and a quarter cup of sugar in the skillet:

Line up your pears so they cover the bottom of the skillet and let them cook on medium heat for 10 minutes:

Start scooping your batter on top of the pears and use a spatula to spread it evenly:

Throw it in a preheated oven for 30 minutes:

This is what it looks like done in the skillet:

To flip your cake, let it cool for a few minutes then put a big plate face down on the skillet and flip:

This cake is perfect for a healthy dessert or a hearty breakfast:

On Sunday we visited the Randall’s Farm Corn Maze. There were four acres of 8ft high corn. In the maze there were 10 riddles to be solved. We enjoyed the hay ride out to the maze.

Sonny loved the tractor:

Megan in the maze:

Luke chillin on the hay ride:

Karen in the corn:

Tara and Sonny:

It has been an amazing month. We got married, saw many friends and family, and have been busy workin on the farm. In farm news, our hens are laying! Other than my chicken’s eggs I am vegan, so I haven’t eaten an egg in a long time.

Here are our beautiful brown eggs:

My first egg breakfast:

Our garden is feeding us:

Luke picked baby squash, zucchini, and squash blossoms:

We diced herbs and mixed them with vegan cream cheese:

Luke carefully stuffed each bossom:

Here are the blossoms all stuffed:

We battered them in a mixture of flour and beer and deep fried them:

They stayed warm in the oven:

Fried Zucchini Flower:

We ate fried squash blossoms in Sicily. They are such a seasonal treat. The filling made them so rich and flavorful. If you have a garden, try to make this!

(there is more to it than these handsome guys partying)

If you have pictures from the wedding, please leave us a link comment and we will add them to this post! Here are some of our snapshots.

Thanks to all our friends and family for such a memorable day.

PICTURES: Rebekka’s Photos, Sarah’s photos Caitlin’s Photos

and stressed, and broke. That’s right, it is wedding time.

(photo by Jared Leeds)

Just a few more days till we tie the knot in front of our family and friends in Rhode Island. Lucky for us we have some volunteers to watch the farm while we are away. Can’t wait to post pictures!

(photo by Jared Leeds)