2010 Photo Wrap Up

Honestly, this vegetable is the only one that looks better than it tastes. Enjoy the photo, cuz I don't think I'm growing them again.

After downloading 600+ photos from the last 5 months of 2010, I felt I had to add 17 more photos to this blog even though I've already posted the 'last' post. After selling and growing vegetables, the next two most difficult things were taking pictures of everything as 'real' farm work needed to be done, and then later posting and writing about them; the latter two at times seemed superfluous. Please enjoy.

Even if I hadn't made a dime selling vegetables this year, growing food for family, friends, and Gallupians is figuratively the pot gold at the end of the rainbow. Thank You and God Bless!

My farmers' market table, nearing the end of the season

Northern pickling cucumber harvest next to the endless beet bed

Navajo Copper Popcorn grown from seeds purchased from Native Seeds SEARCH. I've never seen this corn for sale at the Gallup Flea Market (many Hopi and Navajo flint varieties are sold there), and none of my Navajo friends have heard it, but it pops into the most platinum blond popped corn you've ever seen. The plants were about 4' tall with two ears each. Corn borer worm damage is a good sign of organic production.

3-year old Chinook Hop rhizomes flowering and ready for harvest

Celebrity tomatoes

Tomatoes, wire, t-posts, and warming water barrels with their polyester cloak of Agribon row-cover fabric pulled back for harvest. This double 60' row, produced 300 lbs. of celebrity, roma, and cherry tomatoes.

Broccoli is a budding yellow flower, and unharvested, they provide the last pollen bees can find very late into the fall. I couldn't find it in myself to pull these frost hardy plants late into October, as they buzzed with black and yellow everyday, after noon.

Basil hugging Gallup bricks. Perhaps it knows that the pesto blender is near.

Hawking veggies in the late afternoon after the last Gallup Farmers' Market, at half of the market price; neigbours and friends got them for free. Rio stood guard, literally; he had put in the house. I made $300 selling vegetables that day, and was thoroughly sunburnt. The season was over.

The rare and super tasty White King Bolete, an edible wild Porcini of the western forests. DO NOT, DO NOT collect wild mushrooms based upon these photos alone. I learned from a mycologist of several decades.

Not all food grows in gardens, some fly's wild above them. New Mexico Mourning Dove, September 2010

More tomatoes to blanch, then can. I canned half of my 300# harvest, ate or sold the rest.

A huge 'wild' radish found downstream of my gardens in a neighbors sandy garden in a 6 cu. foot wheelbarrow. It was huge, and then chicken food.

Nov 28 harvested ugly carrot line-up, pretty ones went to mom and the neighbors.

Nov 29, the last day of gardening, now I'm farming; cutting the rib from collard greens, the hardiest of all winter greens!

Gallup Farmers' Market Week 3 and Recipes

The Gallup Farmers' Market really seemed to kick into gear this week. Several more vendors were set-up (7 booths in total) selling a variety of produce, home-made crafts and beautiful clothes, and sustainable living/recycling information. But, the biggest change was the lively groups of elderly people with their $4 WIC Farmers Market checks in hand, right when the market opened! The Gallup Independent also had their reporter and photographer preparing a story about the market. I was without a camera this week at the market.

The senior WIC program; NM is far more progressive than we're given credit for!

As with each week yet this season, I sold 80% of the produce I brought in the first 20 minutes. I love the fact that most of my crop goes to appreciative people who will surely let little go to waste, but discussions with other growers and feedback from customers will prompt me to raise my prices a little in the coming weeks. Though I've said it before, I'll reiterate I don't do this for the money (the therapeutic value of growing food is priceless), it's really nice to have such a fun time trading a dozen produce-filled baskets (a full Subaru wagon worth) for spending money the rest of the week ($72 this week:)

The candy-cane stripped Chioggia Beet- an italian heirloom- 1 of 4 beet varieties i've had for sale

The Saturday morning harvest began again this week at 7:30 and I made it to the market around 8:45 (the second to last grower to arrive, I was stuck with the less desirable sunny spot at the south end of the alley). I would've arrived significantly later, as the growing size of the harvest is taking longer and longer to bring in, if it weren't for the self-less volunteer help of my friend, Jessi- now an expert at rinsing onions, shallots, and beets. Not to mention an infinitely better retail sales manager than myself. Thank you!!!

So, in all I brought 16 different varieties of herbs and produce to the market, including pickling cucumbers and medium yellow dutch shallots for the first time this season. The former selling instantly in 6, $1 bunches of 7-8 small cucs. The latter in bunches of 5 for a dollar. Also for sale was a large head of cabbage ($3), white onions (10/$1), garlic ($1), rosemary, mint, sage ($1/bunch), collard greens, yellow beets, chioggia beets, cylindria beets (2-3/$1), bulls blood beets, cocozelle zucchini (striped italian heirloom), pepo zucs (round and great for stuffing), and male zucchini flowers (4/$1).

One of the best things about this week's market was hearing of how customers had prepared my produce from previous weeks. Here are some of the more memorable (i'll write them down in the future) recipes I heard:

Strawberry, watermelon salad topped with my mint

Zucchini flowers stuffed with braised mutton and rice

Zucchini flowers stuffed with crumbled goat cheese, battered, and fried like a chile relleno

Zucchini squash (large) stuffed with its chopped self, onions, cheese, and bread crumbs

Chioggia beet salad with goat cheese, walnuts, and balsamic vinegar

Mint leaves frozen individually in ice-cubes for a pretty aperitif garnish

The Gallup Farmers' Market runs each Saturday morning from 8:30-10:30 in the downtown walkway between Aztec and Coal street. The market manager is Carole Palmer and vendor booths are $5/day.

Gallup Farmers' Market 2010 Week 2

The 7/17/10 harvest

I'm no farmer. I was reminded of that realization Saturday morning, when once again, I was sleeping my soundest when I should have been up and about in the cool dawn air picking spinach or something of the sort. Instead, it was 7:30 when I finally dragged myself from the covers; 1 hour to harvest and get to the market that opens at 8:30.

Me harvesting (out of frame), Rio scanning for fox/rabbit

Harvesting the produce that wilts the least first, I started with a wheel barrow load of 140 immature white onions (10/$1) topped with the a couple dozen mixed beets (striped Chiogga and classic bulls blood), some already 4" around. The onions went quickly into a water bath to loosen the dirt from the roots and the beets got a cursory rinse.

Citrusy lobed leaves of the nutritious weed Purslane amongst the cucumbers

Next, I grabbed the pruning shears and a large basket for the zucchini and male squash blossoms. Since I'm only harvesting the fast-growing zucs once a week, several of the cute little baby fruit from Tuesday had already grown into foot-long monsters! Yet most were in the preferred 6-9" range. Combining the striped cocozelle with the round pale green pepo zucs, I brought a 20 lb. basket to the market. The edible male flowers I cut (4/$1) buzzed with bees long after I filled a small basket with the 6" golden trumpets.

Collard Greens

Rosemary, sage, mint, and spearmint filled the next small basket. 8 am. Yellow dutch shallots growing in too shady of a bed were pulled next (most of my shallots are elsewhere and triple the size; harvest starts next week) and rinsed. The green leaves imitating a luxurious scallion.

The last three baskets were filled with collard greens, the last of frilly lettuce heads, and the native 'weed' purslane. The latter being a relatively novel addition to salads with a citrusy crunch.

First cabbage head to be harvested

Finally, fearing the cabbage worms may leave me with nothing but swiss cheese like cabbage if I waited too long, I cut the 2" wide stem of a green cabbage and carried the whole plant to my harvest staging area. It measured nearly 4' across with a nice 10" head (I think I got $3 for it). Filling the entire Subaru with baskets of food I was out the door at 8:25! Even without taking up the generous offer of a harvest assistant yet-- a 55 minute harvest! I forgot the garlic at home though.(

Work in Beauty CSA's nice handwriting (and produce)

The market was again full of the early customers when I arrived at 8:45. In addition to the regular Work in Beauty CSA distribution table and myself, this was the first week of the season for market-regulars, Serendipity Farm from Vanderwagon.

Serendipity Farm's early-season table

Most customers from last year would remember farmer Pete Douglass's produce and amazing woodcrafts; real wood toys from only $10!!! Pete also had flyers/maps inviting people to visit their farm in Vanderwagon; what a great chance for kids to see where/how food is grown and beat the Saturday morning rush for their fresh produce. I'll visit him and his wife soon and post a story. Handmade native jewelry was also for sale that morning.

Bull's Blood beets and their greens

Market manager Carole Palmer was out of town and many regulars attended the bee workshop in Ramah, so the morning felt a little less busy than the previous week. Though the number of customers was up from the first week, and with a larger harvest, I made $65 selling out of everything but the purslane by 10:30.

... STILL watching the hills; the best fox dog ever!

The fee to sell crafts or produce is $5/day or $15/season, and as summer crops ripen, more and more backyard growers will come out each weekend. Hopefully, the number of customers will also grow each week. Contrast the low prices at our farmer's market with the squabbles and insane fees the LA Times described at southern California farmers' markets in this article.

Farmers' Market Season is Here!

My baby Italian cocozelle with flowers on the way to the market

The Ramah Farmer's Market started several weeks ago, and Gallup's Farmers' Market began this past Saturday, July 10th. The market in Ramah is the larger of the two with 1-2 dozen craft and produce vendors, and very active group of volunteers. It's easy to keep up with the numerous events and resources in the Ramah area by reading their bi-monthly newsletter, The Ramah Farmers' Beet. At the height of the harvest season in August, the RFM attracts 350+ visitors/day. My favorite items from there are Windy Ridge goat cheese (look for the lovely Jesse Lee Grey sitting on the south side of the horseshoe with two nondescript coolers behind her table) and the Nolo bait (organic grasshopper-cide) for only $3/pound!!! It runs from 10-1 pm, next to Backwoods Pizza on Ramah's west-end. I'll take pictures next time I head south.

The early shoppers equally splitting up the carrot harvest

In comparison, Gallup's Farmers' Market is no slouch. Sure, it's not as big yet, but each year it is growing and last year's market days had an impressive variety of produce, baked goods, crafts, and information booths. This year's season started on July 10 and will continue through September, I think. A nice addition to the market this year is the Work in Beauty, CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) booth where they'll be distributing CSA shares and selling extra produce.

Cynthia of The Coffee House bought half of that day's garlic

After sleeping fitfully all night in anticipation of the first market day, I awoke around 7 ready to start harvesting, only to see that it was raining. On my list of items to harvest where radishes, large green onions, carrots, purslane, spinach, collard greens, baby zuchinni, male squash flowers, mint, rosemary, and the garlic was already pulled.

Top to bottom: Baby finger, Danvers, Scarlet Nantes

The onions, carrots, and radishes took some time to wash and tie into bundles and so I left home at 8:45 without any purslane, spinach or collard greens in tow:( [Blog editing note: I just saw a Lance Armstrong RadioShack ad that said it's not cool for guys over 30 to use emoticons. WTF, and when did he get so awesome?]

Carole Palmer (market manger) and the sold-out table of Sunrise School for Ecological Living, Fort Defiance, AZ

I'm not sure whether the market officially opens at 8:30 or 9, but when I arrived there was already 2 booths set up and already sold out of their onions. Within 10 minutes I had sold all the garlic and carrots. Get there early! Though, Mrs. Butler generally shows up later (usually 10 ish) with a huge variety of produce (this week she had eggs, turnips, cole-crop starts, and woven baskets benefiting the market). Paul and Mary-loo of the Sunrise School had radishes, greens, pepper transplants, and onions grown by students at their school in Arizona.

The CSA crew in a rare moment of chilling

Here are the prices I settled on: garlic ($1/head); onions (10/$1); carrots in a bunch(5/$1); mixed radishes (10/$1); mint ($1/bunch); baby zucchini and squash flowers (4/$1). By 10:20, I had sold everything and made the most rewarding $45 ever! Of course, it's not about the money; best of all I met many great new people and old friends in that shady walkway downtown. In theme, the best over-head saying of the day was, "I don't spell 'profit' with an f."

The Butlers stand

In all, the first market day of year in Gallup went well. The quantity and variety of produce available will expand greatly over the next month as warm season vegetables come into season. Carole Palmer mentioned the WIC food assistance program will be up and running in a few weeks attracting many low-income and elderly customers to the market. And hopefully some of the usual growers and vendors from the Vanderwagon area will return to the Gallup Farmers' Market, opting for Ramah this week. I'll have a steady supply of onions, shallots, and garlic at my stand each week, in addition to the rotating menagerie of warm season crops coming into season.

Gallup Farmers' Market

August 29th Gallup Farmers' Market

Get there early!  I rode down to the Gallup Farmers' Market shortly after The Splendid Table ended this morning. Earlier than I usually get down there. And good thing; many of the greens were sold out before the market even opened at 8:30!

An $8 bag of local groceries

 

Nestled in the morning shade of the downtown walkway on Coal St., a half-dozen growers were set-up when I rolled in at 8:15. A line had already formed at the Serendipity Farms (Pinehaven)table, and the last of the mixed lettuce was being rationed out, so I decided to start at the Work-in-Beauty CSA table. They had great looking swiss chard and bountiful large zuccs. I bought a bunch of chard with 4 of the 32 quarters I brought with me today.  Next to them were the Vanderwagon couple selling sourdough, white, and honey-oat loaves; all baked using home-milled flour from our local breadbasket region of Cortez, CO. I bought a $4 loaf of the sourdough and was excited to hear that they have found a local source of wheat from Ramah. They also sell really neat planters made from recycled car tires. Finally, I joined the line for Serendipity's produce, with an eye on their fat carrots and beets; both crops fell to grasshoppers in my garden this year. The salad greens were long gone ($4/gal. bag), but they still had a couple bunches of beets, carrots, turnips, and chard remaining when I passed over my final quarters. Two more people in line behind me indicated that the Douglass's would be sold-out before 9 am. Get there early!

This August 3rd Gallup Independent article has general information on the regional farmers' markets and some of Brian Leddy's great photos.