chardgirl

chai recipe herechai recipe here Abra: re: radicchio: our CSA membership is very diverse: some 'foodies', some chefs even. But many people with non-food passions who just want to eat healthy. They want lettuce and carrots and onions and tomatoes. Maybe they're busy so they don't read the newsletter... and they taste the red lettuce, then call us to let us know our lettuce is bitter that week! We enjoy selling radicchios at the farmers market, and we learn lots about how to prepare our vegetables from our savvy customers, folks just like YOU. cg

3 questions = not too many at all. The goats are slaughtered when the chef/cook in question prefers it. ie: the folks from Michoacan like them larger for birria, at least a year old. I don't know why, possibly this is an economical way to feed folks and they have plenty of ranchland back home to get the goats to this size. We're told that in Italy it's a treat to have young, milk-fed kid. One possibility for this is that when a small farm with not so much land has little boy goats they don't have room to keep them: the brothers can start breeding their sisters as young as 3 months (yes, 12 weeks old!) so you'd have to have a special pen to keep them separate... we castrate ours into 'wethers'. When we have too many wethers and a chef friend from SF wants the treat of young kid for their own holiday gathering or something, we'll do that. Yes, our kids(humanoid kind) have attachment issues. They each have their own goats, (girls only!) and they are constantly reminded to not name the little boys that won't be with us for long. We feel it's teaching them where their food is coming from, even if they don't eat goat, we aren't vegan. Right now we are just starting the new 'crop' of cute cute cute baby goats. We have about 5 'new' moms: and 4 of them are GREAT moms. One needs to be turned into CPS (child protective services): her name is Towel and she will NOT let her baby nurse. So Towel will be slaughtered sometime in the next year because the goat CPS are too busy to visit us. The kids aren't happy about that, but there's not room on the ranch for rotten mamas. Meantime, Manny and Mr. Chardgirl have to catch Towel and hold her down while her baby (boy) swigs as much as he can. One week later he's already much skinnier than his cousins, but he's determined to survive his rotten mama! Yes, Rancho Gordo and I both sell in San Francisco on the embarcadero, photos will be forthcoming on Saturday. Ah yes, Me and Farming. I fell into it via marriage. I was born and raised in Venice (that's the CA version, not the Veneto version), as was my father. My mom is also LA born and bred. I hated all the driving, so moved away at 18... went to college etc, then found myself living in central CA, teaching 3rd grade and then 1st grade, then I was married to an organic farmer. I continued to teach until the babies came. I love being self employed, and I love fresh produce, and I love the farmers market. the 6 day weeks, the muddy harvests (not me personally, I do all the office stuff), the ridiculously low pay, that's at times hard to swallow, but I figure I can go out and get a 'real' job when the kiddos are gone, right? There are market-scale farmers who make a decent living money-wise... But we are often distracted by our kids, we don't have a trust fund pillow (I'm not whining here, really, just reporting), and we don't own the land we grow the majority of our crops on. I'm off to the paperwork piles, I'll check in again before the sojourn to Monterey.... cg

Hmm... by the time I was 10, I was fixing fence (digging post-holes is pretty good exercise). How's the goat fence? ← Yes, the kids are active on the farm: hauling hay to the goats, carrying totes to and fro, playing with the baby goats, and helping make fences. We only started homeschooling a little less than a year ago, before that they were at school most of the time, and while their friends chose handball/soccer during outside times, both of my kids chose fantasy play (sitting) with friends under the tree! We're already making progress just having them at home... and they each have their own garden: 10 year old has his potato garden, that kept him busy this summer! and now 8 year old has her carrot garden. I like the idea of making them dig post holes, we do have great fences since many neighbors have dogs.... and we also have lots of coyotes round these parts. cg

He might actually. My husband HATES beets but he actually likes roasted chioggias in a salad. Another friend of mine who hates beets asked me to order him a bunch from my farmer after having a salad of them at our house. My favorite early winter salad is roasted chioggia beets, mezuna, goat cheese and marcona almonds, with a lemon, olive oil and sumac dressing. It's the easiest thing but I'm constantly asked for the recipe. I have a couple of bleeding heart radishes in the fridge that I need to use up. Probably some asian slaw or something. I also have a monster tatsoi . It's really tough to get back to the supermarket once our farmer's markets shut down. I like to make a celeriac remoulade using yogurt instead of mayo -- very nice and refreshing. By the way, in Lebanon they eat raw goat's liver like sashimi. They cut it into 1/2 inch cubes, and eat it with pita, dipped in salt and middle eastern pepper mix. With arak. For breakfast. (It's actually very good!) ← I make a similar roasted beet salad and it often converts 'beet haters' into "I still don't like beets but I like this salad' people. With the red-meat daikon (yet another name for watermelon radishes ) I also make a slaw. and I slice them up for a potato-chip replacement product, and today I'm going to try to make a soup out of them: only because we have so many it's my duty to figure out how to use them! For the slaw: I like to slice them up on my Benriner mandolin for nice even strips. stay tuned for my soup project... Raw Goats Liver... I admit I'm unlikely to try this: but I will definitely put the crew and guests and husband to the challenge. I don't care for liver in any form (no, not even stuffing or fois grois, spelling!? I don't speak French at all, just Spanish!) cg

good morning all... my breakfast is green tea this morning. I'm saving room for the lunch in Monterey: daughter and I will be lunching at Stokes Restaurant: the chef loves our produce and his mom is a San Francisco frequent market shopper. She would call him after Saturday market and say "Brandon, these are the most beautiful beets/chard/insert other vegetables here" and he would call us and beg us to deliver, so we do: only to his restaurant and one other friend's house where she runs many dinner parties. Ruthcooks: we grow our row crops on 34 leased acres in Hollister, CA. It's about 30 miles east of our home ranch. I know this doesn't sound ideal... Mr. Chardgirl and I live on our 20 acre home ranch in Watsonville, CA: it's pleasantly hilly, with LOTS of yummy poison oak for the goats, and about a total of 5 or less farmable acres. BUT we have very little water here at our home ranch. If we're irrigating the rosemary rows (by drip irrigation only!) I can't do laundry that day.... So we leave the 34 acres of GREAT farmland in Hollister from some very cool landlords... and there's a wonderful ag well out there too. Most of our employees live closer to the field. I'm leaving off photos of my cup of green tea, but promise plenty of photos tonight of the days adventures and tonight's cooking class.... cg

Hello, ME TOO. My daughter is 8 and my son is 10 (I'm currently 'blogging' for more info on my darlings) and they both have little bellies the doctor says we should watch. Thanks to all who have posted to this thread. in our house there's no tv at all: but we do have a dvd player so they watch 1-2 movies on the weekend, that's it. But both kids prefer drawing & reading. I'm not a Judy Jock, but try to model fitness and drag them out to something active everyday. I wish it wasn't dragging! also in our house we try to cook with them, let them make cookies once in a while and try to stay away from all high fructose corn syrup. (has anyone read the stuff Michael Pollan has written about the stuff? It's as though he's a science fiction writer....) I stopped the juice thing when they were toddlers because my son wouldn't stop drinking it. Now we occasionally do orange juice, especially if I can get them to help squeeze it! Just like you: I only talk about being healthy, I leave off talking my own weightloss efforts around the kids, and I hope for the best. keep up the good work! cg

Chai I love chai, and one winter I spent time tweaking the recipe to the place I liked it most. It's got plenty of cardamom (feel free to add a bit more), plenty of black pepper (add more or less or leave out, depending on your tastes) and ginger! I've since learned that one can add LOTS more FRESH ginger to give a great kick. 8 c water 1/4 c sugar, or less sucanat or honey, or to taste 2 T cardamom seedlets, smashed a little (much cheaper at health food stores....) 1 T dried ginger, smashed a little OR 3" knob of fresh ginger, cut into a few pieces 1/2 tsp vanilla 1 T dried orange peel, or 2 strips fresh orange zest 2 T black peppercorns, smashed a little 1 T cinnamon chips OR 2 1/2 inch sticks cinnamon 10 whole cloves 2 star anise, optional (well, any of this is optional!) 2 T or so of black tea, decaf or full strength, or 'red tea' Boil everything together except the tea for 15-20 minutes. Remove from heat and add the tea and let steep for 5-6 minutes. You can then chill this concentrate and combine with milk hot or cold, I use half of this chai mixture with half milk. Soy milk works well if you don't have the cow kind around.... Keywords: Vegetarian, Non-Alcoholic Beverage ( RG1511 )

Good night for now. One of my favorite nightcaps is above: a pot of fresh mint tisane or fresh mint tea. I'll answer more questions tomorrow. We need to get to bed early since half of us need to get up at 3am to start the restaurant deliveries and 25% of us should get up soon after then to catch up on paperwork while the youngest 25% gets her charm sleep. cg

Yes, we send out an availability to the restaurants, usually with a little note like: "chef's Challenge this week: how much cardoon can you use??" etc. We do our CSA with another farm and we average about 900 members. But since we're two farms doing it, I only claim 450! How do we decide what goes in the box? Sister Wife (the other farm's CEO, child schlepper, bookeeper, and farmwife) and I are the beta CSA members: what we like goes in the box, within reason. I've made a rule about radicchio: "Only once a decade, please" because of the negative phone calls we get. Folks like fruit and corn and tomatoes and sweet carrots... We do our best to make a well rounded box. We've not missed a box or newsletter since starting 8 years ago... Farmer Boys make their planting schedules months in advance. Before starting the CSA we did many farmers markets so producing many varied, consumer friendly interesting variety crops was already old hand for him.

I'll be in Pacific Grove tomorrow! and I'll try your celeriac recipe this week, I wonder if I could use pears instead?? That's what I have around right now. Stay tuned, we're having 'cardoon class' tomorrow night. cg

yes, correct on both counts. I also miss gardening: now that we have a farm I don't garden! We do have lovely vegetables all the time though, I enjoy that...

We sell to many certain restaurants, all our favorites. The restaurants in SF that we sell to meet certain criteria: they pay on time (a must for a small farm like ours: we don't have day jobs or trust funds, this is it!), they are excited about how fresh our stuff is, and their willing to work directly with the farm. It takes a bit more work for chefs to make 2-10 calls than the one easy (but more expensive, usually) call to a produce broker. We don't sell to produce brokers at all. OK, Mr. Chardgirl finally broke that solid rule last month when his watermelon radish crop came off beautifully: we simply have WAY WAY too many and they are gorgeous. So our friends at Greenleaf took pity and bought as many as they thought they could possibly sell. Otherwise, I'm the broker and the farmwife! I send a fax and email twice a week, then I take the orders, then I print them up, then our crew (mentioned in a previous post) put the orders together, then Mr Chardgirl and son make the deliveries. We've been looking for a driver for a while but that's tall order these days.... I do the one farmers market at least 75% of the time, and friends help out with that occasional Saturday off my body and life crave... This Saturday I'll be there with my ladybug apron on!

Yes, we have plenty of chioggia beets right now: you can mandolin or grate them into a green salad or on their own: try using johnnybird's favorite salad dressing and add green onions and some toasted walnuts. OR the other great way for any beet including the pink and white striped chioggias is: roast them after quartering and tossing with oil and salt in a medium oven for 45 or so minutes. YUM. you can eat these hot or cool and make a salad out of them. Yes, we use the library lots and lots. My kids (human) are also enrolled in a public school 'independent study' school where they have their own library (no late fines!) and a few art/pe/science/ writing classes a week as well. it's the best of both worlds for us.

Ok, I finally took a look at recipe gullet. I hope it's easier than it seems to add, I'll pm snowangel tomorrow or even call her and in the meantime: My granola recipe is very simple: 4 cups of oats (or seven grain or similar cereal) 1 cup oat bran (or wheat germ or?) 2T ground flax seed (optional) 1 Cup more or less of toasted walnut or other nut pieces 2-3 teaspoons of cinnamon pinch or more of salt dried fruit: raisins, cranberries, blueberries, chopped apples or apricots... mix all of the above together then 1/4 Cup honey heated in a small pan with: 1/4 cup (or less) of oil: any will do: mild olive oil, safflower, butter, etc. then pour this hot mixture over the dried mixture (above) and then eat as is or toast it some in a mild (325? degree) oven for a few minutes. I like mine fairly toasted, I have a friend who likes hers more 'raw' tasting. I think I need to get to know Recipe Gullet....

This is tonight's dinner. It was a "hurry put on the table we've got invoicing to do and the kids are hungry what's in the fridge let's try to be vaguely healthy" kind of a dinner. Once we were sitting down there was peace since tonight there was something for everyone: lots of vegetables for me, a cheese plate and tofu in shoyu for kids and olives and escarole salad for Mr. CG. Starting with the big wooden bowl: escarole salad with grated scarlet turnips (raw, surprisingly mild) dressed with feta and ev olive oil and meyer lemon and S& P. Then clockwise from there: Smoked salmon (my son LIKES it, and it's not white, we're getting somewhere...), cooked turnip greens with garlic (give me my greens, I love dark cooked greens.), tofu in soy sauce, cheese plate with a small piece of 'amadeus' (picked up at Whole Foods while visiting relatives in the southland), an Andante fresh goat cheese, and a domestic edam I picked up at the store. Bleudauvergne's blog with her cheese plates inspired me! I'll do better after market this next weekend. And the last bowl: watermelon radishes: very mild, crunchy, and gorgeous. BUT my camera is acting up, I'm using my older digital, I'll try to fix the programing of the better, newer one tonight before our family splits up and visits two different Bay Areas. (the boys to SF Bay area, the girls to the Monterey Bay.) I'll continue answering questions after I get my invoicing for the restaurant route done... cg

This photo is a little dark, but it's some of the leftover harvest from today: name those vegetables! cg

Hi Nathan! Where shall we go for lunch this week? I'm open to suggestions... You think you're jesting, you should see my vegetable crispers, it's disgraceful. So many good intentions turn into rotting stuff. and my kids get to take it all out to the compost. They dream of living in the suburbs where there's LOTS less compost to 'take out'! And sidewalks for their scooters.... Yes, plans for eating out this week include: Wed: Mr. Chardgirl and 10 year old will do the restaurant route in SF with the better digital camera ( the suave long-haired cutie zeroing in on the dessert girls hoping for a treat while the papa drags the 25# bags of beets and celery root in the back door....): we will post their photos on Wed evening. Chardgirl (me) and darling 8 year old sister will deliver to one restaurant in Monterey, CA and then EAT there and report back here with those photos. We're also going to the aquarium (the monterey bay one, it's incredible) but I won't likely post many if any photos of that sojourn... Then on Saturday daughter and I will do the market: it's the SF Ferry Plaza market on the Embarcadero: we've been doing that market since it started in 199_? I don't remember! Since before kids at least, I know that much. I will post photos of Rancho Gordo and other friends at the market. Maybe daughter and I will even get away for a moment to eat a cookie or drink tea and we'll post on those too. Then Sunday is the highlight: the Goat Roast! stay tuned, I'm off to tour de fridge, I promise to post photos and answer more questions later. So far this is much fun! cg

I'm back from mom schleping. I'm about to make dinner, but I'll make an effort to answer all questions by the time I retire for the eveing! My kids are Son = 10 years old, he's been in the 'all white food' phase since his sister was born, that's since Feb. 1997. Sigh. Since we've started homeschooling he's getting a *little* better. He loves fancy cheeses and cheese plates, and he helps Mr. Chardgirl on our restaurant route 1 or 2 times a week and each time they try a new fancy pants pizza place in SF (we sell to many). Neither Son nor his 8 year old sister will come anywhere near to eating our goats, but neither of them is a vegetarian. Yes, we want them to learn about where meat comes from. They both like goat cheese, that I buy or trade for at market since the idea of the chains to milking twice a day gives me the HEEBIES. No thanks. Our kids do make their own breakfasts and lunch, and they love 'cooking class' where we cook something new with them during the week. I'm hoping for advice from all of YOU: My son loves rice, is interested in shrimp and salmon (esp. smoked) and he likes nori. He's PASSIONATE about all things Japanese, not just the beloved manga and anime but also the history, language and food. Well, some of the food.... What shall we cook this week with that boy?? Please advise, thanks. Tonight's dinner is the 4:30 mystery/tour de fridge. They (Mr. Chardgirl, and Manny and Lourdes) are packing for the restaurants, so I'll go out in a moment and see what was over harvested. ("Don't touch that kale, we're oversold as it is!" "How about escarole, _________ ordered 12 heads but I called in 12 dozen..." These our our usual Tuesday late afternoon conversations. So far the photos haven't impacted kids yet, we'll see how they feel in a week...

yes, tonight I plan to get to know recipe gullet and I'll attempt to post granola and chai recipes... then I'll search for cardoon and celeriac recipes! cg

What DONT we grow? We don't grow asparagus or mangoes or ginger. We grow many many vegetables seasonally, we grow many varieties one can't get in the supermarkets. IE chioggia beets, 5 kinds of radicchio, purple plum radishes, watermelon radishes (my favorite), erbette chard, and so on. One of our 'signature' crops is broccoli di cicco, a sprouting broccoli that's sweet but is sometimes confused with rapini, which we also grow. Also: turnips, arugula, parsley, marjoram, oregano, rosemary, pumpkins, peppers and chiles, leeks, cipollines, potatoes, kale, chard, fennel, escarole, dandelion greens, cauliflower, 3 colors of carrots right now, borage leaves, and wild arugula. That's what we have THIS WEEK. We do all the summer stuff in summer: san marzano tomatoes, many kinds of eggplants, etc etc. We only sell to 1 farmers market, one large CSA (the veggie box thing), and to restaurants in San Francisco. More on that later too. Now I'm truly out the door... cg for photos nearly all taken by Mr. Chardgirl of our vegetables...

I realized I made that granola with my daughter but I only ate about 3 tablespoons of it, so I had an early lunch: the ingredients for the lunch... name those vegetables! Ok, I didn't have any couscous after all, none in the cupboard. So I improvised with a bit of smoked salmon and left the grains out altogether. The celery root is mandolined then cooked up with garlic and pepper and served with feta cheese. The cup has my homemade chai with milk. I don't drink coffee at all: I'm a 100% tea kid, my whole life. Mr. Chardgirl, and my parents, and his parents, and my sister-in-law, and I think all my friends everywhere are ALL coffee drinkers, but not me. I demanded a taste from my father at age 4 and he poured some black, no sugar or milk into my kiddie tupperware cup (1969) and it tasted FOUL. I've never looked back. I'll try to post my chai recipe later tonight after the mom phase of my day fades a bit. I'm off with to art lessons, park visits with skates, well, no, it's raining. We'll find something to do. A walk in the rain at the least. cg

This is a young boer goat, I think he's 75%. Well, he was. We aren't vegetarians, we keep the girls so they can make more goats and when the kids are 4-8 months old they are slaughtered and eaten. I don't take part in that at all, Mr. Chardgirl and the crew do this for parties and what not here at our home ranch.

Whew! The restaurants are ordered, the field is called, and I don't leave to pick up (human) kids for another hour. Yes, I"ll make my order by PM in a day or three. What would the best beans be for what Michoacanos living in CA be? Thanks for reminding me to make my order ahead! (disclosure: Rancho Gordo is my farmers market buddy: we both sell at the same market...) We have a few kinds of goats: Boer goats which around here are primarily known as meat goats... (see photo below); we have a few "Spanish" goats which I think are mostly mutts; we also have a few nubians which around here are dairy goats. We DONT milk them: no time! We got them from a neighbor who wanted her small goat herd to go to a home where they would live out their lives and not become instant tacos. Mr. Chard Girl (he's the goat person in the family, I just pet the babies) assured her they were safe here. We do slaughter and eat our meat goats, and gift them to our employees who are from goat ranches in Oaxaca and Michoacan in Mexico. Our goats are not for making money: we have them for four reasons: 1) to clear the substantial forests of poison oak on our ranch 2) to teach our kids about raising animals 3) for our vegetable customers to have a chance to visit the babies a couple of times a year 4) Mr. Chardgirl has been a full time market vegetable farmer in one guise or another for over 20 years (25? 27?) and he's enjoying his new venture in goats! I'm going to post the photos in another post for boring egullet image log in reasons... stay tuned for more goat photos. Yes, we're busy, but so are lots of folks. It's now late late November, our 36 week CSA season is done, and "all" I have in my life is twice a week restaurant deliveries (I make the orders, do the invoicing etc), 1 farmers market a week (that's on Saturday, I'll take photos of my buddies and their offerings there!) and then the tiny job of homeschooling our two mini humans. Our kids are in fact nearly as tall as me: they are 8 and 10 years old, and I hope to involve them in cooking this week at least a couple of times if not more! Another highlight for the week: HOW TO COOK CARDOON? That's one vegetable I'm not sure WHAT to do with! So sometime this week our friend Martin has promised to visit and make a cardoon/potato gratin with us. Photos and recipe are promised, of course. For lunch today we'll all be out and about so I'm making a chilled salad of broccoli romanesco and celery root and couscous. My busy life will make most (any?) attempts and gorgeous plating non existant. You all, we all, can visit the last blog for beautiful plating! Photos on their way....

Good Morning. It's raining. I'll get right to the photos! All Breakfasts Served this morning: As plans for (human)meals for the next few days come up, I'll let you in on them. One special highlight of the week will be Sunday: we're having a true Mexican/Michoacan goat roast in our yard with one of our goats. Don Miguel, a trained butcher/Birria cooker from Michoacan will cook for some of our food-industry friends from the SF Bay area. I promise many photos. More about me later, the restaurants are calling, I've got to call the field with the orders, I'll be back in an hour or so. cg

Add me to the (lurking) Bleudauvergne Fan Club. The photos and the writing together... When is the cookbook coming out?? My son is a new (10 year old) fan of Cheese Plates, now he's ready to depart for France. Thanks for the inspiration in making our own cheese courses here near our home, across the world from your gorgeous plates. cg