How a Marketplace story captures the failure of US agricultural policy

We're big fans of Marketplace from American Public Media, and recently the show aired a story from Iowa about attempts by Iowa State to import wealthy Dutch dairy farmers that I felt nearly perfectly captured various things wrong with American agricultural policy. A summary of the story (editing mine):

Even as a millionaire, Reuling was worried about rising Dutch land prices and stricter environmental regulations. So in 2003, he and his wife became one of a handful of families to take part in the New Farm Family project. They were flown to Iowa, taken around on buses, wined and dined, even applauded when they visited prospective communities...The Reulings built a new house and a state-of-the-art milking parlor. But the project also required a minimum of 300 cows. That's about average for Iowa, but it was four times more than what the farmers had milked back home in the Netherlands. Reuling found that many animals to be a burden, especially as he realized business plans that had gotten the blessing of Iowa State were overly optimistic and didn't match what was happening in the marketplace...Two of the five families who relocated to Iowa have filed for bankruptcy, including Peter Poelma and his wife....Poelma has returned to the Netherlands after losing his life savings. Eduard Reuling says they were reassured they would have plenty of support both on and off the farm. But that help never came.

I wrote the following letter to Marketplace in response:

As a full-time farmer, I found that your story on the failed Iowa State attempt to import dairy farmers was an excellent demonstration of much that is wrong with American agricultural policy. Generations of American farm policy have followed a single overarching goal of making food cheaper at whatever cost, which cannot coexist with thriving, profitable family farms. We don't necessarily need new blood from abroad, just conditions that allow farmers of any background to recieve a decent price and income for their work.

In addition, academic and government ag programs rarely have roots in real-world economics, and are developed and run by people with comfortable government paychecks and little or nothing to lose. Few of these well-meaning folks take significant personal risk in their jobs, while transferring it all to those of us whose savings and livelihoods are on the line if their schemes or policies do not work.

The combination of idealistic interventions, overregulation, and policy choices aimed mostly at consumer rather than farmer benefit have an inevitable result: the loss of family farms, rural community, and independent agriculture that your story began by lamenting. The best way to benefit family farms and independent American agriculture is to get out of the way; reform destructive or counter-productive subsidy programs, reform overreaching regulation, stop trying to force the price of food to unsustainable lows, and make choices that allow more of food’s retail price to reach the actual farmer. The fact that successful, wealthy Dutch farmers went bankrupt producing a widely-consumed basic nutritional staple in a populated farm state tells the entire story of the worthless results of American agricultural policy.

I was contacted today by Marketplace to record a portion of that message as part of their Wednesday letters section (I don't know if it will actually be used). Either way, the story is worth reading/hearing, and considering for its various ramifications, and I wanted to post the full letter as they certainly couldn't air the whole thing.
 
On a related note, Gene Logsdon's new book Holy Shit is well worth a read (though we don't agree with all of his conclusions/recommendations) and includes a section near the end dealing with this exact issue of academics and bureaucrats hurting farms with no pain to themselves. Just like those in the Missouri Department of Agriculture who felt little pain for screwing up the scale fees at our expense, something tells me those involved at Iowa State still have their jobs, much less their houses and life savings. More than the farmers can say.

Recipe: excellent pasta/polenta topping using farm-preserved ingredients

I don't really know what to call this (a sauce? a topping?), but we've made it several times as an easy way to combine many different preserved/stored ingredients into a delicious meal.  Thick and richly flavored, we've served it both on pasta or polenta (pictured below) and it could make an excellent bruschetta as well. I'm including notes on the ingredient sources, as well, as this is almost entirely an on-farm meal drawing heavily on the diverse foods we put up for winter. This could easily be made with purchased items, but was especially pleasing as an on-farm meal. It could be made with all fresh ingredients, too, but would likely be thinner and saucier; I like the thick, lumpy texture the preserved items give it. Amounts are my best guess; farm-sourced ingredients in italics.

SAUCE/TOPPING

1 cup thinly sliced red/yellow onions (stored from fall; could use dried)

1 cup diced shiitake mushrooms (freshly harvested, could use dried)

3 cloves minced garlic (stored from fall)

1/2 cup minced cured ham (optional; cured from fall butchering)

1 cup dried tomatoes (stored from fall)

1/4 cup dried bell peppers (stored from fall)

1T basil (packed in olive oil & frozen from fall)

1/4 cup feta cheese (made fresh from our spring goat's milk)

1t salt (extracted from specially dug brine well...ok, just kidding)

Boil a pan of water to rehydrate any dried ingredients being used (turn off the heat and place all ingredients in the water, letting them soak for 10-15 minutes until soft). Meanwhile, saute the onions in a bit of olive oil for 10-15 minutes, until soft and sweet. Add mushrooms, garlic, and ham (if using) and saute for ~5 minutes more. Drain, chop, and add any rehydrated ingredients along with the basil & cheese. Mix well and cook for just a minute or two more to combine flavors and temperatures, then serve.

SERVING

Using this on pasta is quite easy. In the photo above, I used freshly-made polenta from fresh-ground farm corn instead, which adds a richer flavor to the dish. We generally cook our polenta (cornmeal, water, and salt) in a large pot for 30 minutes or so, then bake it in a large glass dish for another 30 minutes. You could also add this to bread for bruschetta.

For this late March meal, we balanced the main dish with a fresh spinach/sorrel salad straight from our overwintered greens, topped with a German pickled egg, one of our favorite ways to use up extra eggs. Simply hardboil a set of eggs, gently crack the shells, then steep in a brine (water boiled with salt and onion trimmings) for a few days. I find that 6-7 eggs fit nicely in a quart jar. An excellent snack or topping with lovely flavor.



Recipe: parsnip/mushroom/sweet potato shepherd's pie

I think a core skill in cooking, especially for those using fresh/seasonal/local ingredients, is learning how to adapt or invent recipes. It's more efficient, cost-effective, and interesting to learn to read between the lines of recipes in order to understand what is needed to make them work, and what is optional or adaptable.

This "recipe" is an excellent example of this process, something I adapted heavily from several cookbooks to meet what we had on hand. It was fantastic as-made, but is widely adaptable to various ingredients as long as you follow the core needs. In this case, we had just harvested a large batch of over-wintered parsnips as well as nearly a pound of fresh shiitake mushrooms (last year's logs are fruiting heavily at the moment), and wanted to feature those along with whatever else we had on hand. I don't really expect anyone to make this exact version, but it demonstrates how easily one can adapt a basic recipe to make a unique and seasonal dish without worrying about most specific ingredients. Here's roughly what we had on hand:

My final result is heavily adapted from the Shepherd's Pie recipe  (p 178) in one of our favorite obscure cookbooks, "In a Vermont Kitchen". The original calls for potatoes, onion, garlic, cheese, lamb, corn, and herbs. You'll see we changed almost everything to use what we had on hand (for example, we're out of storage potatoes but have lots of sweet potatoes left), but came out with a comparable result. We also added a biscuit topping from Moosewood New Classics (p. 292), as we usually do when making Shepherd's Pie.

One specific note: this calls for roasted garlic, which adds a lot of time to this recipe. We pre-roast whole trays of garlic at a time, then squeeze the flesh into ice cube trays and freeze. These garlic "cubes" are about the equivalent of a full head, store very well in freezer bags and can be pulled out at a moment's notice to add flavor to soups, sauces, and other recipes. I used one here to save time and bother.

Ingredients in italics were sourced from the farm.

FILLING

1 head roasted garlic

1lb sweet potatoes
4T butter
1/2lb sausage (optional; leave out or use any desired meat)

2 cups chopped parsnips

1 cup chopped onion
few T minced fresh sage, thyme, oregano
2 cups chopped shiitake mushrooms

 salt and pepper to taste

Optional: 1/2 cup grated hard cheese (I meant to use our aged cheddar and completely forgot; with the biscuit topping I didn't even notice until after we'd eaten).

BISCUIT TOPPING
2 cups flour

1/2t salt

1T baking powder
1/2t baking soda

6T melted butter

1 cup yogurt

Preheat oven to 350F.

Chop the sweet potatoes and boil until soft. Add the butter and roasted garlic, and mash until  thick and smooth, adding water or milk if needed. Layer these onto the bottom of a deep baking dish.

Meanwhile, crumble & saute the sausage, then layer on the potato mash. Saute the onions & parsnips in the sausage grease (or oil/butter if not using sausage) for 10 minutes or until reasonably tender, adding the chopped herbs in the last minute. Mix well and layer onto the sausage. Add some more butter to pan and saute mushrooms for 5 minutes or so, until they're lightly browned and have absorbed the moisture, then layer onto the onion/parsnip mix. Add grated cheese if using.

Make the topping by mixing dry & wet ingredients separately, then quickly combining into a soft batter. Drop the batter by large spoonfuls onto the top of the layered ingredients, making a reasonable cover. Immediately place in the hot oven, uncovered, for 30 minutes. Serve with a wide spoon that can scoop out all layers at once.

Here's the final result: a rich, delicious layering of simple ingredients that work well together. No fancy flavorings or methods needed, just a bit of time and the willingness to improvise.

Assessing the farm's future: 2012 CSA?

In 2011, we will continue with the Columbia Farmers Market and local restaurants as our primary outlets for produce sales. However, with multiple years of full-time farming under our belt, we're considering whether we want to replace the farmers market component of our sales strategy with a Community Supported Agriculture model, starting in 2012. We tend to start planning well in advance, so we thought we'd seek some early feedback on this possibility. The decision will affect our plantings as early as this fall (overwintering greens and garlic, for example).

OUR CONTEXT
We chose the farmers market as our start-up sales venue because it offers a great deal of flexibility for a growing business, and it helped us smooth over mistakes and growing pains by not promising anything to anyone. We did not want to start a CSA without having production records to reassure both ourselves and potential customers that we could fulfill our end of the bargain. Selling at market allowed us to establish a reputation and work through the kinks in our farm management plans while offering the potential to continue growing through increased sales and visibility as a regular, known vendor. We still like the energy, visibility, flexibility, and community of market sales. However, with fees rising significantly, income potential a concern with flat/declining customer spending spread over ever-more vendors, bad weather a real risk to sales (the Pavilion project is going nowhere), and some other factors I don't want to get into, we want to consider other options.

OUR POTENTIAL
Converting to a CSA would have multiple benefits for us; here are some we're considering:

1) Reliable production and sales expectations. We would know before the season started what quantities of products we need, and could plan for this. Market always carries the risk that someone else will show up with lots of, say, garlic, and wipe out our sales margin within a fixed customer base. CSA is a guaranteed outlet if you can sign up the customers in the first place, and weather won't interfere with getting product to customers. This also ensures we can distribute what we grow; even the most loyal market customers (and we have many) miss weeks or make other choices at times, which is perfectly ok for them but hard on us with fresh product that has to be sold in that short time window.

2) Better use of our farm's diversity. Many of the things that set us apart from most other farms (our serious home food production & cooking skills; diversification into animals, mushrooms, fruits, timber, etc.; diverse landscape and ecological focus; and so on) do not translate easily into marketing success at a farmers market, but would become direct benefits to CSA customers. We've spent a lot of time hosting events, cultivating news coverage, and doing all sorts of the right things to gain public awareness & market customers, but it's a very inefficient process in a sales environment in which immediate price and appearance matter far more to the general public than background ethics & management methods. Rewarding CSA members with not just produce but also cooking advice/recipes, on-farm dinners, access to our trails & landscapes, educational/outdoor events, unique farm products, and so on helps target our strengths more effectively toward the people who are specifically supporting us.

3) Emphasis on direct customer relationships. As regular readers know, we take openness and free-, direct-marketing very seriously. We want people to be able to make their own decisions without intervention from regulations or legal obscurities. While market sales get us partway there, and we love our core customers who take us very seriously, we still sell mostly to folks who haven't been to our farm and don't really know how we do things. There is also an increased threat that market sales could be subject to more stringent regulation. Any CSA we run would involve many opportunities for customers to really engage with the farm and understand where and how their food is being produced, thus fulfilling our philosophy more effectively.

4) Access to new customers. Of the >100,000 people in Columbia, only a tiny fraction can or do visit the farmers market. While the market is a wonderful place for many customers, I've also heard from/of many sources for whom the market just doesn't work. Maybe they're busy Saturday mornings; maybe they get claustrophobic; maybe it's just a hassle; maybe they live on the far side of town. But at market we're fighting for a small share of the same customer base, whereas through a CSA we can draw customers from a wider segment of the population who would theoretically want fresh, local food if it was made easier to get. Developing a series of delivery nodes for CSA shares makes that possible.

5) Improved efficiency. We think that a CSA would be more time efficient and would result in more efficient use of the produce. Saturday Market takes a significant chunk of time out of our week. Even if we delivered each share door-to-door, it would probably take less time than the 8-10 hours that market day eats up (plus the extra packaging and container washing needs from retailing at market). And at market, there is no guarantee that we can sell all of what we produce; there's nearly guaranteed waste. In a CSA model, we can plan for consistent production while rewarding members with extra product if desired. Also, a CSA allows us to do the marketing work of finding customers in the winter and early spring when there are fewer overall demands on our time, meaning that we can focus more intensely on the actual production during the active growing season.

MAKING THE DECISION
We haven't made any decisions, and are certainly remaining a market farm in 2011. We do know that it's an either/or decision for us. It really would not be cost- or time-effective to attempt to do both market and CSA at the same time, especially considering the ever-increasing market fees (though we certainly intend to continue restaurant sales). This is a major topic that we're exploring in our own heads, and want to put it out there for feedback from customers and readers. What do you think? What models do you prefer? Do you see pros or cons to us taking either path that we haven't thought of? We would greatly value your feedback, either as comments or emails to contactus@cherthollowfarm.com

Earthquake notes

Stepping off the farm soapbox for a minute, I'm going to don my ex-geologist hat for a few observations on the horrific earthquake/tsunami situation unfolding in Japan:

1) This was not an "unimaginable" event, as so many in the media are claiming. Generations of geologists and scientifically educated laymen have known perfectly well where most seismic and tsunami hazards exist. They do their best to inform decision-making at the political and economic level, with some success. Japan is one of the most prepared countries in the world, and despite the horror, it shows. Sometimes you just can't prepare enough; there's a cost-benefit analysis that goes into all decisions. For example, seismic tsunamis are possible along the Atlantic coast, too, but at a low enough risk not to justify investing in the spectacularly expensive mitigation strategies that would be necessary. If it happens, the hindsighters will scream, but no one can pre-justify the expense on a rational level.


As another example, Japan has put tons of money into building some tsunami walls in what are considered the highest-risk areas. This wasn't one of them, but that doesn't make them wrong. No country has the resources to attempt 100% prevention/mitigation, so you choose the best solution you have and hope for the best. That didn't happen this time; we don't always have control. But it was plenty "imaginable" to anyone who has taken a well-taught earth science course.

2) Big earthquakes happen regularly. This very useful USGS page demonstrates that magnitude 8+ quakes have occured on average a little less than once a year since the record begins in 1902, with rarely more than a couple of years between 8+ events. Most of them happen in remote or unpopulated places, as one would expect given the actual density of human population as spread across the entire globe (including oceans). Every now and then one hits where there are lots of people, and that's when we pay attention. That's the reality of statistical chance, not something unusual or unimaginable. This is why most Pacific Rim countries have invested in a network of earthquake/tsunami sensors and warning systems, which performed very effectively in tracking and monitoring this event as it spread, and made sure the effects on further coasts were minimal. The Pacific NW coast is strung with tsunami warning signs, sirens, and evacuation plans. Most residents know what to do in the event those go off (whether they actually do it is their problem, as it their choice to live and build in a risky area). It doesn't do much good when the event happens a few minutes off-shore, but the system is there for a reason.

3) Subduction zone earthquakes are not, repeat NOT, related to human-induced climate change (I'm talking to you, Grist). That whole climate change debate has gotten to the point where both sides look silly for claiming that either everything, or nothing, is evidence of climate change. Yes, a significant rise in sea level will make a given event more damaging. And, yes, climate (especially precipitation) may influence tectonics on broad spatial scales and long time scales. But subduction zone earthquakes and the tsunamis they generate are about the last place that such an effect would be seen. Activists, please don't use such bad examples to undercut any chance you had at seeming rational and educated.

4) Media are even dumber than I realized. I was forced to watch CNN in a waiting room Friday morning, and was appalled (even with my low expectations) by how utterly uneducated and alarmist the talking heads were. Even their so-called on-staff scientist was spouting claims that were not only wrong, but flatly contradicted by statements already available from reputable sources (for example, that huge waves were sweeping toward the American coast when NOAA had already issued its forecast earlier that the effects on the Pacific NW would be noticeable but not widely damaging). I haven't watched TV news in at least 7 years, and I don't seem to be missing anything.

5) Natural events aren't always predictable, but they are "expectable". So while we're all justifiably horrified at the unfolding events in Japan, let's take a deep breath and accept that this kind of event happens and is going to continue to happen no matter what we do, on a geologically active planet with ever-more people concentrating with ever-more infrastructure to be destroyed by random but expectable events. And for local readers, keep in mind that St. Louis is on the edge of one of the highest seismic-risk areas in the lower 48, the New Madrid fault zone. It may not happen through our grandchildrens' lifetimes, but no one should be surprised if it does.

Hail: not what we needed

It's been absurdly wet for three years. Looking at Columbia weather records since the late 1890 (and our own data), the past three years are the first such period on record in which annual rainfall has been over 50" for three consecutive years. In fact, annual rainfall in this area has only gone above 50"  ten times in that entire period. Three of them were, you guessed it, the last three years. Enough, already.

So this is what we got this afternoon (make sure to turn on the volume):

That's pea-size hail, all of it, covering the ground, with some dime-size mixed in. And just under an inch of rain in a short period of time (over an inch if you include the moisture now melting out from the hail layer). From a science/weather nut perspective, quite fun to watch, one of the most intense storms we've had here. From a not wanting to live and work in a sea of mud perspective, not so much.


Here's the hail building up in a nice pile where several roof angles converge:

Here's a closeup of the little buggers: 

Naturally this event shredded some of the greenery off our cedars. This resulted in a really neat phenomenon; when we stepped outside as the hail and rain slackened off, the entire air was rich with cedar perfume, like stepping into a massive potpourri bag. Really neat experience, especially combined with a thick mist/fog rising off the ground and whipping away in the strong west wind trailing the storm.

And this is our stream, a few hours later. We've seen it this high before, and it goes back down quickly, but still an impressive response to an impressive storm. The rest of the farm is, of course, a sea of mud and slowly draining water. Yuck.

It was fun while it happened, but the aftermath is rather frustrating. At least we didn't have any crops out other than some overwintering spinach, collards, and a few other things. We'll see if there's any real damage tomorrow. Could have been worse, though, as the same system spawned multiple tornadoes and damaging winds as it swept past St. Louis.

Bird list & other natural events, February 2011

Below is a complete list of birds observed and/or heard within our farm's ecosystem for February 2011. Birds in italics were observed or heard only in flight over the farm, but not otherwise interacting with it.

Woodcocks are displaying their mating flights for the next few weeks; this is an amazing sight & sound if you've never observed it before, though it's very hard to describe. They like brushy habitats and a few have used our pastures every spring for the last few years. We might be able to host a listening session or two at dusk on nice days, for interested friends of the farm.

32 species:

NEW IN FEBRUARY
Snow Geese (thousands in migration)
Turkey Vulture
Killdeer
Bald Eagle
Great Blue Heron
American Woodcock (mating display first observed 2/28)
Belted Kingfisher
Fox Sparrow
House Finch
American Goldfinch


ALSO PRESENT
Canada Goose
Ducks  (unidentified)
Red-tailed Hawk
Red-shouldered Hawk
Barred Owl
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Pileated Woodpecker
Blue Jay
American Crow
Tufted Titmouse
Black-capped Chickadee
White-breasted Nuthatch
Carolina Wren
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Eastern Bluebird
American Robin
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Northern Cardinal
Song Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco

MISSING FROM LAST MONTH
Hermit Thrush
Mourning Dove

OTHER NATURAL EVENTS
Spring Peepers began calling on 2/17, and we saw the first bat of the year that same evening. Western Chorus frogs began a day later.

Kidding!



   Our domestic population went up by three this morning, as Garlic produced three healthy doe kids right at dawn. We missed the actual kidding by about half an hour, getting out to the barn just after the last one was born. All three are healthy and happy so far:





These are just what we'd hoped for, female all-dairy-breed kids that we can raise for the year and select the best one or two to continue building the herd long-term. The two whiter ones are almost identical, while my favorite is the black one: 



 With three kids and two teats, it will be interesting to see if sharing works or if one ends up as a runt. They eventually figure out how to nurse on their own, but it doesn't hurt to give them a hand figuring out which part to suck on:  

These are a serious time sink, but part of the joy of spring is watching the arrival of new life. These are the first goats born on-farm that we have the potential to keep (we've had nothing but males for the last few years), and so we're extra attached to them already.

 

There are more to come, as Frankie has another week or two to go. We won't be keeping any of hers, as her genetics aren't as good as Garlic's, but hers will still be a welcome addition to this year's herd and this winter's food supply.