Simmons Organic Farm

If I own a farm someday, I would want it to be like this...

Note the ocean in the background

Squatters

Middletown, RI- There are few farms as transparent as Simmons Organic Farm. When I arrived, there had been a miscommunication and they were not expecting me, but Karla was still happy to talk with me while she packaged a new type of crumbly goat cheese she had just made. When we finished chatting, Karla let me walk around the 120-acre farm unaccompanied to take pictures. First I shot some photos of the dairy and fainting goats in the petting zoo by the parking lot. Then I made my way up the hill; my mental map looked a bit like this: Belted Galloway cows to the left, sheep at the crest of the hill, vegetables to the left just before the sheep, pigs a bit further down the hill after it crests, and chickens up the hill and to the right of the pigs. While marching up the hill, I see a mother duck and her three babies; they are not official members of the farm, but given the landscape, it is understandable why they would want to live here. The farm looks like a nature walk. On either side of the path are thick grasses and plants. There is a notable amount of butterflies fluttering around the farm, and there is a soothing chirping sound coming from the tall grasses. Once I surmounted the hill, my jaw-dropped because there was a stunning ocean view; Simmons Organic Farm is quite the spectacle. 

The history of the farm is equally as interesting as the landscape. In 1632, John Coggeshall of Essex, England arrived in Boston and shortly moved south to settle on Aquidneck Island, RI. He was allotted 400 acres and today Simmons Organic Farm is comprised of 120 of these acres. By the mid 1800s, David Coggeshall owned majority of this land and started one of the largest dairy farms in Rhode Island. His daughter Elizabeth married John L. Simmons. Their children and grandchildren maintained the farm through the early and mid twentieth century. In 1988, the grown up grandchildren Alexander Sr. and James decided to sell the farm’s development rights in order to preserve the farm for future generations. Brian and Karla, who currently run the farm, took over in 2000. They grew up together as high school sweet hearts and moved back onto the family farm while Brian’s grandparents were still working there. Over a three-year span Brian and Karla became more and more involved on the farm. One day, Brian’s grandparents gave Brian and Karla ownership of the farm, and they have been running it together ever since. 

Will faint for food

From the time that they started working on the farm, Brian and Karla knew that they wanted to make the farm certified organic. After three transition years, they became organic certified in 2004. They are very happy with this decision. Karla is aware of the growing consumer preference for local and organic produce and meat. She is glad that her farm is able to offer both of these things. Simmons Organic Farm continues to grow in success. This year they have over 300 members in their CSA; they usually have 40. Brian and Karla have also seen a recent increase in the number of visitors to their petting zoo.

There are many different operations occurring on the farm. Simmons Organic Farm raises Belted Galloway beef cows. They chose this heritage breed because the cows have a thicker mane, which allows them to stay outside year round, with the exception of blizzards. They are 100% grass fed and spend all of their time in spacious pastures. They also raise red Tamworth pigs, which are a heritage breed of pigs known for their hardiness. The pigs were in a large pen that had many trees and shady spots inside of it. The hogs and piglets were happily running around and rolling in the dirt when I saw them. Simmons Organic Farm also has pastured raised poultry and eggs. They also have a mobile poultry house. When I visited, one chicken had bravely escaped then pen, although she was hesitant to stray far from the others. For a brief minute I thought the Simmons had a small poultry flock, and then I realized that this was an optical illusion and that the chickens just had a ton of space. They also have 50 dairy goats and about 20 sheep. They donate the wool to the Rhody Warm Project and sell the meat.

This is also a biodynamic farm. The animals are used to reduce pests on the farm. Since pesticides cannot be used on organic farms, the Simmons get creative with how to keep unwanted visitors off of their plants. In the fall and early winter, the cows are moved to the vegetable plots to eat the extra produce. Chickens follow after the cows and eat the stems, stalks, and insect larvae left by the cows. This method reduces the amount of returning insects for the next year. Karla notes that they have not had many problems with pests as a result of this practice.

A new exciting product Simmons Organic Farm now offers is goat cheese! Karla has been experimenting with making goat cheese for several years. Only in 2011 did she begin selling it at markets and distributing it in the CSA. Once they determined that the goat cheese production was a feasible plan, they received a grant from the USDA Farm Service Agency to build their cheese operation. They built the structure on the farm near the famous petting zoo. They now have a large cheese making and processing vessel that enables her to make 600 containers of cheese per week. Karla has been experimenting with different types of goat cheese. Currently offered at farmers’ markets is a delicious chevre, which comes in many different flavors ranging from herbs de Provence to Chipotle. When I visited, Karla was packaging a new type cheese, a goat cheese crumble, flavored with herbs de Provence or garlic.  She also hopes to start making feta soon.  The goat cheese project has been very successful and I highly recommend buying some for yourself at the farmers’ market.

Speaking with Karla and Brian was an absolute pleasure. They seem in touch with the current markets and aware of how unique and progressive their farm is. Karla loves working here because it always feels like she is doing something new and different on the farm. She also likes the idea of providing food for her family as well as 300 other families in the area. Karla explains that at Simmons Organic Farm, they “try to do things the right way. We try to be good stewards to our land and to our animals because they provide us lots.” Brian appreciates the farm just as much. When I met him on the hilltop, he told me about how sometimes he forgets about how lucky he is to own such a wonderful farm. But then he’ll be working, look up and see the sunset over the pastures looking onto the ocean and feel like the luckiest guy in the world. All are welcome to visit Simmons Organic Farm and petting zoo, and if you cannot make the trip down, they sell at several farmers markets and to Market Mobile so that anyone can have the joy of eating the food they produce.

This I Believe Essay

In my class Leadership Theory and Practice, one of our final assignments was to write and submit an essay to "This I Believe". I never heard back, but isn't that one of the reasons why I have a blog? To share my writing and thoughts?

I couldn't think of an appetizing compost picture,
 so here's a hen at Simmon's Organic Farm.

The Benefits of National Composting

Growing up in San Francisco, California, composting was always the norm. Just like all San Franciscans, my family put our green bins out on the curb for pick-up along side our blue and black bins. When I started college four years ago in Massachusetts, it was an adjustment to suddenly throw away food waste and paper towels that at home were composted by the city. When potentially compostable items are thrown out, they still decompose, but the nutrients from the waste are inaccessible if they are in a landfill.  It felt profligate to dispose of items that could have been composted and eventually used on farms as a natural fertilizer. It felt like an interruption to a self- sustaining cycle of growth, nourishment, and decay.

I decided to start my own compost program, modeled after San Francisco’s, which emphasizes ease for participants. Every Friday, I drive around campus and collect seventy- five individuals’ compostable items and empty the five-gallon trash bags into thirteen cubic feet composters. The paper towels and paper plates mixed with the food scraps create a balanced recipe for the compost. All of the unused nutrients left in the peels of oranges, the shells of eggs, and the weeds pulled from the garden break down into nutrient-rich soil. I stir the compost as if it was a slow cooked stew, but in this case I have to wait sixty days to enjoy the finished product instead of six hours.  At the end, there are several pounds of nutrient-rich compost that I can use to grow food or sell for a profit. The most astounding part of my job is that the entire collecting and stirring process takes one hour of my time a week.

I believe in composting on a national level. Farmers and farmland would benefit because they would have a natural source of topsoil. Our current farming practices deplete topsoil faster than it regenerates. If the United States composted on a national scale, we could possibly generate enough compost to replenish the necessary nutrient levels in the soil, avoid oligotrophic soil conditions, and the use of synthetic fertilizers. In addition, nation-wide composting would decrease our countries’ contributions to landfills and greenhouse gas emissions while creating more jobs. We have the resources and tools to compost on a national scale while increasing our nation’s food security, keeping food prices down, and decreasing our contribution to landfills and to climate change if we do so.

Field of Bacon

I made a Twitter
Follow me @fieldofbacon
I’ll post recipes, pics, books, funny retweets
If you bakin', they will come

Dzen Farms Strawberry Rhubarb Pie

Photos by Benner Boswell

It is a strange day when you find yourself with too many strawberries. I don't mean a two-pint massive container from Costco. I don't mean when you buy bland California strawberries that don't taste good enough to eat, so you have too many and too many that are going bad.

I mean 8 quarts of freshly picked strawberries from Dzen Farm in South Windsor, CT. We are talking EIGHT QUARTS of unbelievably sweet and juicy strawberries. These are the best strawberries I have ever had. It's not just my bias towards local farms either. I took a quart to my best friend's graduation party and several of her relatives agreed that they were the best strawberries ever.

Back to the point: What do you do with that many strawberries?
Answer: Make Strawberry Rhubarb Pie!


Recipe to come but here are a few starting tips:

1) Julia Child's Paté Brisée dough recipe + 2 tablespoons of sugar (in the dough) (Flour, vegetable shortening, butter, sugar, salt, ice water)
2) One quart of native strawberries (Dzen Farms)
3) 3 pieces of rhubarb, chopped
4)White Sugar
5) Brown Sugar
6) Corn Starch
7) Salt
8) 1 egg white wash (on the crust)

Photo by Benner Boswell

Native Strawberry Picking (at Work)

Photo by Eric Ballhaussen on 6/4/12

Dzen Farm Strawberry Picking

I have an internship with Red Tomato this summer. Their mission is to get local farms' produce into grocery stores. They strive to find a balance between competitive prices in grocery stores against larger farms and a a fair price for farmers. I find the organization to be really interesting because they are working in food systems and the local food movement on a regional scale. For example, right now is strawberry season. I take all of the orders from Whole Food Market in MA, RI, and CT for strawberries from Dzen Farm in South Windsor CT. This contrasts to other local food organizations I've worked for who only worked at a state level, for example, farmers markets in RI featuring growers in RI.

My bosses at Red Tomato thought Eric, the other intern, and I should visit Dzen Farm so we could see the product we were selling. So on Monday, we got to spend the whole work day on a strawberry farm. It's pretty far away so between the transportation, the tour, the strawberry picking, and the diner stop, it really did take up a whole day. I thought you all may enjoy these photos that Eric took.

Oh! And most importantly, if you are in the RI, MA, CT area, stop by any Whole Foods Market and pick up your quart of delicious, native strawberries from Dzen Farm under the Red Tomato (Plainville, MA) signs.

25 acres of strawberries... miam! (Photo by Eric Ballhaussen on 6/4/12)

Just in case you wanted proof that they are edible (Photo by Eric Ballhaussen on 6/4/12)

Jewel strawberries. An up close shot of what Eric and I ate (Photo by Eric Ballhaussen on 6/4/12)

Meatball Recipe

As some of you may know, I lived in the ECCO house, environmentally conscious and community oriented house, for my last two years of college. In the spring semester of 2012, Alex and Teddy decided to try out the Paleo diet. The boys bought a huge freezer. It was so huge that you could probably fit two humans in it! Then they bought 1/4 of a cow from Wheel-View Farm to eat for the semester. Since they were unable to finish the cow between the two of them, and Benner and I were the only two staying in the area for the summer, they gave us the rest of the beef.  WOHOO! Well, my new mission is to slowly work through this beef, mostly ground beef mind you, by the end of the summer. I've already cheated by giving some of it to other friends and co-workers, but yeah, it's still a ton of beef.

For this meatball recipe, you can really use any type of ground meat you want. When I'm home, I usually go through my parents freezer and take all the weird quantities of frozen meat (one pork chop here, a ground beef package there, etc), grind it up, and use that. This summer, we're have 100% beef meatballs because, well that's the meat we have!

These meatballs can be sauteed or baked: see directions below.





Ingredients:

2 pounds of ground beef (Wheel-View Farm)
3/4 wine (red or white, again use what you have open)
1/2 cup Pecorino Romano cheese, grated
2 slices of thick, stale bread, ground up in a food processor
1/2 cup parsley, washed and chopped in a food processor (Dzen Farm)
3 large garlic cloves, chopped in a food processor
1 egg yolk (Casey Farm)
1/4 non fat milk (Organic Valley)
Salt and pepper to taste


Directions:

1) PREHEAT OVEN TO 380F.

2) Pour the wine over the beef and mix together. Let sit for 10 minutes.

3) In a separate bowl, mix together pecorino, bread, parsley, and garlic. This mixture should create two cups.

4) Add the cheese, bread, and herb mix to the beef. Add in the egg yolk, milk, a dash of salt and pepper to taste. Mix as little as possible. Stop mixing the second everything looks evenly dispersed.

5) TO BAKE: Grease a baking pan or cookie sheet with olive oil. Begin making small meatballs, about 1 inch in diameter. Place the meatballs on the baking sheet so that none of the meatballs are touching. Cook for 15 minutes. Cut one open to make sure it's not pink inside. If it's not pink, then it's done. When finished place them on a paper bag or paper towel to absorb the excess oil.

6) TO COOK WITH OIL: Heat 1 inch of cooking oil (light olive oil or vegetable oil) in a sautée pan. Put your hand over the pan (don't touch it, duh); if you can feel the heat, add the meatballs to the pan so that they are not touching. Cook for five minutes. Turn over each meatball so that it cooks evenly through. Cook for another three minutes. Cut one open and make sure there is no pink on the inside. When finished place them on a paper bag or paper towel to absorb the excess oil.

7) Serve with pasta and your favorite tomato sauce recipe. I'll upload my mom's one day.

Advice on sautéing vs. baking: When I first started making meatballs, I always cooked them in oil. I thought it would give the exterior a better looking texture. However, sautéing meatballs takes a long time because you usually have to do them in batches. If you are impatient like me, you can also make the mistake of trying to turn them over before they're ready, and then they can fall apart, which is a mess. They also are much oily-er, which you'll see on the paper bag.

This time I baked them and, honestly, they had the same flavor as when I sautéed them. Baking them also kept their structure in tact more. The meatballs were definitely less oily. While they didn't have as nice of "perfectly browned exterior", by the time they were covered in sauce, I did not notice the difference. It was also nice to walk away from them and get the pasta cooking/ do some dishes instead of constantly tending to the meatballs in the oil.

Winner: Bake