Podcast

In spring 2020, consumers all across the country experienced shortages of fresh and packaged foods; and for most of us, this was a first in our lives. We found ourselves staring at sparsely-stocked grocery shelves, nearly empty dairy sections, and signs warning us that we were limited to the number of poultry or beef packages we could add to our carts.

News stories told of COVID outbreaks at the very large scale meat plants, and the resultant dramatic cuts to production. We became familiar with pictures of vegetable fields being plowed under, and of farmers emptying milk tanks to the ground.

The lack of capacity in the big factories trickled down to the small-scale livestock producers because more and more consumers began searching for locally-grown beef, pork, lamb, and poultry. All that protein had to be handled at smaller-scale processors – and they quickly became swamped.

Now, we find ourselves with over-burdened processors and the need to build capacity. But can we?  A smaller-scale processing plant is an expensive enterprise to upscale, refurbish, or start-up. Are there options? What about the policies that might help this along?

In this Deep Roots Radio interview, Lauren Langworthy, Special Projects Director for the Wisconsin Farmers Union, describes the issue and the series of farmer/processor/policy maker conversations and webinars now being held to address the challenge.

The next five webinars will be held at noon, Central Time, on January 14, January 28, February 11, March 11, and April 8, 2021. They are free, register here.

I hope you enjoy this very informative interview.

Sylvia Burgos Toftness

Nancy’s response is captured in this Deep Roots Radio interview, recorded March 28, 2020. I hope you find it informative and encouraging. And don’t forget to download the eight-page resource Nancy developed in light of the pandemic: Notes on the COVID-19 VIRUS from an Herbalist’s Perspective 1

pasture herbs

I’m so grateful Nancy’s helping us navigate these rough waters. And I’m so glad her farm and business, Red Clover Herbal Apothecary Farm, is just a few miles down the road in Amery, WI. She starts, nurtures and harvests 50 types of medicinal plants on her certified organic five-acre farm. She also forages an additional 20 varieties for her broad product line. Nancy consults with customers and clients locally and from the Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area.

Nancy began exploring the world of medicinal plants over 30 years ago while living in the Ozark Mountains. When she returned to Minnesota, she studied herbalism at the Australasian College of Health Sciences; anatomy and physiology at the University of Minnesota; and earned an associate’s degree in Western Clinical Herbalism from Minneapolis Community College.

Nancy and I will chat again in three weeks to focus on the medicinal herbs growing just outside your door.

Sylvia

John Ikerd, Agricultural Economist

Recorded February 1, 2020, this chat is a quick preview to the keynote presentation Ikerd will deliver at the 31st annual Organic Farming Conference, hosted by MOSES in La Crosse, WI, February 27-29, 2020. (MOSES stands for the Midwest Organic and Sustainable Education Service.)

From a childhood on a Missouri dairy farm, Ikerd earned his undergraduate, Masters, and Ph.D. in agricultural economics at the University of Missouri. He has taught at four universities, has authored several books, and scores of papers and presentations. Among his books are Sustainable Capitalism: A Matter of Common Sense and Small Farms are Real Farms, and  Crisis and Opportunity: Sustainability in American Agriculture.

In 2014, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization had Ikerd develop the North American report for the International Year of the Family Farm. In it, he made the case for multifunctional farms that protect and renew natural ecosystems and create and nurture caring communities that provide economic livelihoods for farm families.

For more information about Ikerd, visit johnikerd.com.  To register for the Organic Farming Conference, and to learn more about MOSES, visit mosesorganic.org.

I hope you enjoy this interview.

I’ve baked my sourdough hearth loaves in covered clay pots for years, and recommend that same strategy to the many baking students that travel to my Bull Brook Keep teaching kitchen. Why? because the covered vessels provide a blast of heat and moisture-saving enclosure that yields high rises, crisp crusts and tender crumb laced with glossy holes.

That said, I’m a newbie when it comes to cooking and roasting in clay, a culinary tradition that spans a couple of thousand years (at least) and is used in nearly every country on the globe.

My first attempt was making a whole chicken.  I followed advice gleaned from a couple of cookbooks and comments on the Cooking with Clay Facebook group. It was also there that I became aware of Clay Coyote, and Minnesota pottery maker renown for its beautiful and functional clay cookware.

I hope you enjoy this Deep Roots Radio interview with Clay Coyote CEO/Owner Morgan Baum. She grew up amid the clay and firing at  Clay Coyote and is taking it into the future.

About the chicken? Well, as I said, I followed instructions pulled from old books and offered by fellow enthusiasts.

First, I soaked the bottom and lid of my terracotta roaster in a deep sink of water. After draining the pot, I placed sliced fennel bulb (another thing I don’t use much) onions and sweet peppers in the pot. I then added a couple of herbs I haven’t used much – tarragon and marjoram – and a good glug of very dry white wine. The whole chicken nestled on top of the veggies. I put on the lid and placed the pot in a cold – yes cold – oven.

I set the dial to 300F and let the oven sit there for five minutes. I then upped the oven to 450F and let her go for 1.5 hours.

The result? Every piece of that chicken was moist. The skin was crisp. The veggies were delicious. I was sold!

Since then, I’ve dived into making beans in clay, and to poaching eggs in savory sauces. It makes such sense: great ingredients cooked in pots shaped from the earth.

Sylvia

Just 15 minutues from our farm, Bull Brook Keep, my husband Dave and I became fans with the first jingle of their front door. We stepped into a place where the espresso machine was busy, lunches were freshly made, and live music was captured by the tall tin ceilings and burnished wooden floors. We’ve become regulars for the excellent coffee, delicious meals, and growing sense of community rooted in friendly faces, local music and commitments to local foods and friendships.

Saturday morning jam session

Quinn Wrenholt and Liana Bratton at Jewelltown Roastery

JewelltownRoastery1 (tap for video of a recent session)

I hope you enjoy this Deep Roots Radio interview with Quinn Wrenholt and Liana Bratton, and make a point of visiting Jewelltown Roastery.

Sylvia

Expertly organized by the nonprofit Midwest Organic & Sustainable Education Services (MOSES), it attracts about 3,000 farmers and ranchers, researchers and policy makers, film makers, authors and chefs, vendors and advocates from the Midwest, across the country, and around the world. They brave the icy winds and occasional blizzards of deep winter to learn and advance sustainable farming practices, processing, and marketing. Why? For the health of the land and water, livestock and crops, and people.

Chang Tianle & Sylvia Burgos Toftness

I’ve attended this conference for several years, and now serve on its board of directors – an amazing privilege. This year, I had a pleasure to meet Chang Tianle, organizer/director of the Beijing Farmers Market, was well as a writer for Foodthink.

Although China is in the news every day, I know very little about it, or it’s capital city of Beijing. This Deep Roots Radio podcast provides some quick facts about the Peoples Republic of China. In the interview, Chang describes how the farmers market started, and how it’s growing despite struggles to compete with large corporations.

I hope you enjoy this interview.

Sylvia

It was July – hot and sticky. And there were dozens of us from all across the Midwest gathered to learn about how to save heirloom seeds. Those more practiced came with seeds to share: seeds they’d grown out in their home gardens or farms. Seeds that they’d been entrusted with by a grandmother or aunt, an older neighboring farmer or a good friend.

That campout shifted my thinking about seeds completely because I learned that saving seeds isn’t only about growing food, it’s about perpetuating a cuisine, a culture, tradition, and food independence. I also learned that seed saving is amazingly political. I heard from people who’d traveled halfway around the world to let us know that there are gardeners and farmers who risk prison by saving seeds that have adapted to their side of the mountain, their climate and their culture.

Today, SSE is used by over 13,000 members around the globe, and works to grow out and preserve 20,000 varieties. Lots more people know about and participate in seed saving the world over, but the threat to open-pollinated seeds is as great, if not greater because of the consolidation of seed companies.

Connecting the dots between what we eat and how it’s grown

Fortunately, there are alternative seed sources, several of them featured in a Seeds Savers Exchange online exhibit called The Rise of Heirloom Seeds. In this Deep Roots Radio podcast, co-host Dave Corbett and I chat with SSE seed historians Sara Straate and Kelly Loud about this web project.

Sylvia

Katie Sterns, You Betcha! Box

Lots of businesses boast of a triple bottom line, but it’s a rare enterprise that can show results. Witness the You Betcha! Box, a new Minnesota-grown business that not only aggregates and promotes state-based small food businesses, but delivers great-tasting product while advocating for sustainability and contributing to local nonprofit-causes.

I hope you enjoy this Deep Roots Radio chat with You Betcha! Box founder and CEO Katie Sterns. It’s amazing what collaboration for good can do.

Sylvia Burgos Toftness

Oyster mushrooms growing in logs

But then there are the invisible farms – the ones that grow under cover and so slowly they seem still – the mushroom farms.

So still, in fact, that Jeremy McAdams launched his enterprise on a residential lot in the middle of Minneapolis!

In this Deep Roots Radio interview, co-host Dave Corbett and I chat with Jeremy McAdams owner/operator of Northwood Mushrooms in Clayton, Wisconsin. (Also marketing as Cherry Tree House Mushrooms) Why grow mushrooms in logs of wood? Why not plastic bags of compost and chips? And why certified organic?

I hope you enjoy this conversation. It brings mushroom farming into the light!

Sylvia Burgos Toftness

In this day and age of smartphone selfies and Instagram immediacy, Geenen uses large 5-inch by 5-inch exposures taken through old bellows-camera technology. His approach and  equipment requires a deep understanding light, photo exposure, depth of field, exposure, composition, image development, and a great deal of patience and planning. It is anything but point-and-shoot.

I hope you enjoy this Deep Roots Radio chat with Geenen. His exhibit, called Continuum of Will, is on display from Dec. 7, 2018 to February 1, 2019 in the Farm Table Foundation gallery space in downtown Amery, Wisconsin. This exhibit is free and open to the public.

Brooks Geenen and his exhibit, Farm Table Foundation, Amery, WI

For a sampling of Geenen’s work, visit his website, www.brooksgeenen.com.