Buying the Farm: Reinvesting in the Roots of Good Food

Another neighbor breaks and trains horses for a living and, having grown up in the neighborhood, helps us find the best hay we can buy. One of the highest-caliber organic vegetable and herb farms in our tri-state region, Rock Spring Farm, is five miles from my house and run by my friends, Chris and Kim. Another friend—formerly a veterinarian—supplies a large percentage of the eggs used by our local liberal arts college. Meanwhile, I'm in my second year of direct-marketing grass-finished beef (did you know ruminants didn't naturally evolve to eat grain?), humanely-raised veal (suckled on the cow), and pastured pork (who'da thunk that pigs would enjoy rooting and ranging AND grow up to be tasty and well-marbled sans confinement?).

On a more regional scale, the Upper Midwest Organic Farming Conference, hosted a mere 45 minutes from my own gardens and pastures, is quickly galvanizing the future of regional food production.

My husband and I are now about six months from organic certification, and we've qualified for at least two cost-share programs to help us invest in our most important assets—our land and systems for its sustainable management. We drink the raw milk our two dairy cows produce and make our own yogurt and butter. We also trade out meat and eggs for most of our veggies, fruit, and herbs. It's a satisfying system that I'm proud of each time we sit down at the table—and each time I ship a box of beautiful, succulent, healthy meats to a family willing to get to know us and understand why we do what we do.

Is farming risky? Yes. Bucking the commodity system, advocating for enterprise diversification, and direct-marketing at living (and unsubsidized!) wages threatens daily to sap unhealthy amounts of our energy. It also strains our marriage as we learn to work together, burning both ends of the candle night after night.

But the rewards are tangible and many. Farming has forced me to really think—with more focus than I ever applied in a classroom—about what's valuable in life and how I can contribute to the future of good, real foods my grandparents would recognize (thanks, Michael Pollan, for the illustration). Food is getting closer to the heart of my cultural identity, and its kinship with heath, economics, politics, etc...frankly scares and fascinates me.