I love Carlo's pasta for many good reasons. The first is that it tastes amazing. Why? Because of the care and attention which with Carlo farms his biodynamic grain. Because of the Semolato grind he chooses for this pasta - packing it with more minerals, vitamins and fiber that the classic white pasta. Because he follows the traditional artisan pasta making process - extruding the pasta though a bronze dye and then slow drying it.

So today I am happy to announce that we also have Carlo's Farro pasta in The Scrumptious Pantry. The classic Penne Rigate and the fun Casarecce shape. Farro medio - the variety grown by Carlo - is THE most ancient grain from the Mediterranean. It was first cultivated in 7000 BC, but then it's importance faded away with the rise of higher yielding varieties. It was actually considered a lost species before it was rediscovered in 1906 in Israel. Luckily Italians loved it and it has since established itself as a staple grain in Italy, especially in Tuscany. It is richer in vitamins, minerals and proteins than Durum Wheat and has a different gluten structure, so people that are gluten intolerant may be able to enjoy farro (depending on the seriousness of the condition). Farro has a hearty, nutty taste profile - it pairs deliciously with stronger tasting flavors, as we do in this pasta salad.

Ingredients (feeds four as main dish)

16 oz of Carlo’s Farro Penne Rigate

4 oz. prosciutto/dry cured ham, torn into pieces

4 oz. feta cheese,  crumbled

8 oz. cherry tomatoes, halved

1/2 tbsp. Roberta's Sun-dried Tomato Spread

1/3 cup walnuts, crushed

Zest of one lemon

2 tbsp. parsley, chopped

3 tbsp. Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil “Blend”

Method: (1)  Cook pasta until almost al dente, drain water, spread pasta on a baking sheet to cool down (the steam would continue to cook it in the colander or bowl). The liquid of the salad will be soaked in by the pasta, which is why you want the pasta not quite al dente, otherwise it becomes mushy. (2) Add ham, cheese, walnuts, lemon zest, Roberta's Sun-dried Tomato Spread and Cosimo's Extra Virgin Olive Oil and toss well. (3) Salt & pepper to taste  and set aside. (4) When ready to serve, add tomatoes and finely chopped parsley. (5) Correct seasoning and serve.

Updating...

+++ UPDATE: in order to help fund for the production of these products, we have launched a Kickstarter Campaign - a community driven funding tool for sustainable & creative projects. You can pledge as little as 1$ and we have mostly tasty rewards lined up for you in return. Please check out our project on Kickstarter and help spread the world. Think about what would be possible if 500 people pledged 10$. Thank you! +++

We are so excited so announce the soon to come launch of our US-farmed product line, we want to give you a sneak preview on our US farmed products! If you are following us on Facebook, you have seen the pictures we posted of our farmers, and here is what they will be bringing to The Scrumptious Pantry:

Michelle from Dietzler Farms (Elkhorn, Wisconsin) & Kevin from Happy Valley Farm (Black Earth, Wisconsin)

We used Michelle's sustainably & humanely raised beef and Kevin's organic tomatoes to make a meat sauce! There are a lot of tomato based products out there, but a high quality meat sauce that is shelf stable has been missing - until now. We researched many historic recipe books to come up with the taste profile, cause we really wanted it to reflect the culinary heritage of the Midwest. So look forward to a meat sauce inspired by the beef stew recipes we found in those historic cookbooks. And we added some bell pepper as an homage to the many Serbian & Hungarian immigrants to the Midwest. The result is a mighty tasty meat sauce that you can enjoy over pasta, rice dishes and that makes a pretty neat base for casseroles, too.

Ruth & Jacob from Fine Vine Organics (Three Lakes, Wisconsin) & Kevin from Happy Valley Farm (Black Earth, Wisconsin)

Get ready for our Cranberry Catsup! We are pretty proud of this product, because it is an absolute novelty. We found many cranberry & tomato condiment recipes in the recipe books we studied and loved the idea to have a 21st century condiment using cranberries - after all one of Wisconsin's major crops. The idea to work on a specialty Catsup was fueled by our background in wine: generally, a wine with high acidity is recommended for fatty foods, because the acidity cleanses the palate. Given our love for bacon, sausages and other fatty pork products maybe a Catsup naturally high in acidity would be a better match than the "one fits all" tomato ketchups on the market today? We can tell you, we ate a lot of bacon and sausages to find out and we can confirm, yes, our Cranberry Catsup is delightful on fries, on a bacon sandwich and also goes really well with white meat, too.

Olivia & Darro from Berkeley Olive Grove 1913 (Oroville, CA)

As you all know, we love Extra Virgin Olive Oil. We always wanted to add a domestic oil to The Scrumptious Pantry and finally found Olivia & Darro and their organic 20,000 tree olive grove on the edge of the Northern Sacramento Valley. Their oil is fruity, with a nice pungent finish, and it is super rich in anti oxidants. This one will be your new best friend when preparing salads, veggies and fish!

We will be launching our Heirloom Tomato Sauce w. Beef and the Cranberry Catsup at the FamilyFarmed Expo in Chicago, March 18 & 19. The Californian oil should be available around the same time, too.

Over the next two weeks, we will be sharing every farmer's story with you in more detail. We are so happy to have the chance to work with these amazing stewards for sustainable agriculture!

And stay tuned for more new Midwestern products in The Scrumptious Pantry, too. We have FIVE more products in the pipeline and we hope to be launching those in late summer.

Food brings families and friends together, and so do the holidays. In this spirit, I have asked Nicoletta & Fabio to share a story about Christmas in their family and what role food had in the celebration. Fabio’s father – Aldo – was so kind not only to share his memories of Christmas in the late 40s in the Italian countryside, but also one of the family’s traditional Christmas dishes: Risotto w. Chicken liver. Read on, enjoy and happy holidays!

I was growing up after the Second World War, and the predominant memory of winter is the cold. The cold was icy and crept into our house, our clothing and our bones. The only heated room was the kitchen with the wood fired oven, and some of the warmth escaped into the adjacent living room, where the family gathered, further warming the room with their bodies. The beds were icy, so mother would heat tiles in the open fire and used them to warm your beds 30 minutes before we were supposed to go to sleep.

With all the hardship we suffered through in those winters, Christmas Eve was pure magic. This was long before Christmas trees had found their way into the living rooms of Italian families. Our tradition was build around the Nativity Scene. Every family had their treasured collection of little statues and figures; every year they gathered on a bed of moss we children had collected in the woods. A piece of silver colored paper turned into a creek and pebbles and stones came together to form the cave which cows and donkeys called their home. On Christmas Eve, before going to bed, we would gently take the little Baby Jesus figure and put it to sleep in the tiny hay filled crib, guarded by Mary and Joseph. The three wise men were still positioned afar in a pool of sand and every day, they would be moved closer to the crib, until their arrival on January 6th.

Christmas morning was pure bliss! We would fly out of bed to see which gifts Baby Jesus (not Santa!) had brought. Maybe a slingshot done by Sig. Tadi - famous for his craft? Or a construction kit of metal wires, tubes, screws and beams? Or maybe even a bat to play “lipa”, an Italian version of baseball? And of course there were the precious sweets and fruits we only enjoyed once a year, at Christmas: nougat, caramels, mandarin oranges or even peanuts!

All family members would gather at the home of the grandparents for the celebration and the holiday feast. I always remember the taste of my grandmother’s special dishes: A broiled capon as “secondo”. As antipasto we would dip vegetables into warm, oily “bagna cauda” (garlic and anchovies dissolved in warm olive oil), munch on homemade salame and snack on the pickled bell peppers my grandfather was famous for. We were even allowed to have a sip of red wine, which Grandfather would strictly ration as if it were pure gold. The “primo piatto” to be enjoyed before the main dish, was a capon liver risotto. It is a simple dish, but mighty tasty and I am happy to share it with you, as it is still served at my family's Christmas table year after year.

Ciao da daddy Aldo

Grignasco, novembre 2010

Nicoletta's & Fabio's Family Christmas 2009: Nicoletta is the third from the right (holding her and Fabio's son Federico), Aldo is dressed up as Babbo Natale (Santa Claus), with his grandson Lorenzo. Far left: Fabio's Mum Fulvia, on the right Fabio's sister Leila holding baby Sofia, behind her her husband Francesco.

Chicken Liver Risotto

(We adapted this recipe slightly to US cooking styles. As a capon is a rooster castrated for better taste, we prefer to suggest liver from a happy, pasture raised chicken in the spirit of humanely raised livestock)

1 cup of Nicoletta’s & Fabio’s Carnaroli Rice

3.5 cups chicken stock, hot

1 small onion, finely sliced

1 clove garlic, minced

1 Tbsp. Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil

8 oz. Chicken liver, chopped

3.5 tbsp butter

1 cup grated Parmigiano Reggiano

2 tbsp chopped parsley

Salt & pepper to taste

serves 4

Method

(1) Sautee’ the onions and garlic in Cosimo’s EVOO. (2) Add the rice, stir to coat and cook till the rice is slightly toasted. (3) Add 1 cup of hot chicken stock, stirring well over medium-low heat. (4) Once the liquid has evaporated, add the remaining chicken stock ½ cup at a time, stirring every 3-4 minutes. (5) In a separate pan, heat the butter over medium-high heat until foamy. (6) Add the chopped chicken liver and sautee’ until they are nicely browned, but still pink in the center. Be careful not to overcook! (7) When the rice is almost al dente (ca. 15 min. into the cooking process), add the liver, parmigiano, parsley and stir well. (8) Let rest with the heat turned off for ca. 4 minutes. (9) Salt & pepper to taste and serve in warmed plates.

Recommended wine pairing: Barbera d’Asti

The world has rediscovered canning. A myriad of books on canning has been published (among which I recommend “Put’em up” by Sherri Brooks Vinton, a great introduction to all things home preserving). Newspapers are running stories on canning as a cool thing to do. And I am so happy about that! Come winter, there is nothing more comforting than opening a jar of veggies or fruits put up when they were at their juicy peak. My personal favorite is the tomato, just because a jar of tomato sauce gives you so many possibilities. Right now, my pantry proudly sports a stack of jars with whole plain tomatoes (skinned – they will be a beautiful addition to a roast on a cold winter evening), one stack of plain diced tomatoes and three different sauces: one w. basil, a spicy one and one w. eggplant. I got 48 pint jars ready and a couple of larger jugs w. the whole tomatoes – I guess that should last for the long and grueling Chicago winter (and yes, we got some pickled cucumbers, peppers and beets, too).

Anyways, the best part of the whole canning thing is the happiness it brings. Not only did the canning make me happy (humming along the song “blubb-bubble-simmer” the tomatoes sang while processing them– you get the idea), but it made 40 pounds of “seconds” really happy, too.

Which is where the ugly story starts. The story about how heirloom varieties taste better, but do not necessarily look all that polished. The story about the consumer (me, us, you) so used to beautiful, shiny, perfectly round tomatoes, that we will walk by the delicious, possibly slightly cracked heirlooms not wanting to buy them. The story about wholesale buyers that will return tomatoes with the smallest “clawmarks” (see picture below) as “unsellable” to the farmer. The story about the small farmer, who worked hard at growing a superior tasting product, who now stands helplessly in front of a pile of perfectly fine tomatoes which are labeled as “seconds”. It is the story about how we can vote for organic, healthy food with our wallet and support small sustainable family farms. By buying those tomatoes for our salads, our pizzas, our BLT’s – and to put’em up for later. And just in case you are now happily contemplating how much money you can save by offering your favorite farmer to buy those seconds at a discounted price, pls. note that a small family farm that grows organic food really needs to sell their tomatoes for a minimum of 1.20$ wholesale. That means you going to the farm and loading your car up yourself with more than just a couple of pounds. When you buy your tomatoes at a Farmer’s Market, which means a six hour return trip for the farmer, the use of gas, paying the people selling at the market for the duration of the same – please think twice how much access to fair, healthy and local food is worth to you. And pay a fair price for your seconds. After all, they will make you happy. And happiness is priceless.

So snatch up a couple of pounds of the season’s last tomatoes this weekend at the Farmer’s Market, drop by your local hardware store for some canning jars and preserve that bounty!

My favorite recipe for a basic tomato sauce (makes 2 pint jars)

1 garlic clove, slightly crushed

2 tablespoons Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil “Blend”

1 chili pepper, small

0.5 lb. red onions, diced

2 lb. skinned tomatoes, diced

1 tsp fresh oregano, minced

2 tsp fine sea salt

2 tbsp lemon juice

Method: 1)  Heat crushed garlic glove in olive oil until the garlic is slightly browned. 2) Take garlic out of oil, add one small hot chilli pepper and onions. Saute' till translucent. 3) Add the tomatoes, oregano and salt. Sauce should simmer over medium heat for at least two hours to reduce. 4) Sterilize jars, add 1 tbsp lemon juice in each jar, add sauce, stir gently. 5) Clean rim of glass, close lid well and process either in a water bath or pressure canner. Be careful to inform yourself about how to ensure food safety in your home canning process! The time you will need to process your food will depend on factors such as altitude. A good resource is the National Center for Home Food Preservation.

More details on the "how to" of the canning process can also be found here.

I have been thinking about this for a while now. You remember, like six weeks ago? New decade, big thing, Person’s of the year and the decade all around. Internet people, business people, politicians. Even wine person of the decade. No food person – at least I did not come across one.

Who are the people that left a significant mark on our food culture in the past ten years?

The TV/Celebrity Chef? We certainly had a lot more of chefs on TV, talking about food, preparing food, showing the average viewer how to cook up a storm or broil a simple roast. Anthony Bourdain traveled around the world, and the couch potato traveled with him. Gordon Ramsey had short-tempered outbursts on TV screens on both sides of the Atlantic. Yep, they were everywhere, but rather than taking the inspiration to their home kitchens, viewers settled in their sofas, watching Celebrity Chefs as you watched the Gladiators in the Roman circus. Only that in Roman time the snack food served was certainly better than the chips, dips, and drinks coming with today’s TV evenings. If anything, these Celebrity Chef’s provided great entertainment, but their impact on revitalizing our food culture is very questionable to me. So, out goes the Celebrity Chef.

And in steps – a first Lady and her garden. How can someone become a food person of a decade if she was only in the public eye for eleven months of it, you ask? Well, if you can win the noble peace price after nine months, why not food person of the decade after eleven? The public stunt of an organic garden in the White House was certainly a masterpiece to get food on the political agenda. But only creating a forum is not yet enough for winning this noble title, cause as all things politics it is easy to announce a vision and much more difficult to pull it through. Especially in this complex system of big industries, lobbyists and political deals. I surely hope we will see Michelle Obama involved in education and actions towards better food supply for years to come, so maybe in 2020?

So how about all those bloggers and writers that cooked their heart out for a year and taking us along on their journey: eating locally, growing their own food, grilling the roadkill as a Sunday roast: Barbara Kingsolver (“Animal, Vegetable, Miracle”), Alisa Smith & J.B. MacKinnon (“Plenty”), Gary Paul Nabhan (“Coming home to eat”). Certainly admirable projects they pulled off and great learnings involved for bystanders looking on. These projects were fueled by a lot of effort, but although I admire them and personally have had great take-aways from their books, I wonder if their accounts have not scared the biggest part of the population. If you do not happen to be a writer by profession, with the current day job of writing a book about your experience, spending a day driving through the countryside looking for locally grown wheat does not sound very feasible to most of us. Which might result in de-motivation rather than the revolutionary spirit of “we can change our food culture”. In light of this doubt, the blogging localvore is not receiving this decade’s award, although I acknowledge that their efforts might have an important impact when discussing and shaping the supply-side of REAL FOOD FROM REAL PEOPLE. But that will have to be evaluated in 2020.

Another spokesperson for real food is journalist Michael Pollan. With his books he has been going full circle. He clearly analyzed the problems we are facing when it comes to food production and presents them in a way everyone can understand. Not only has been an advocate for changes in the way we produce our food, he has stimulated consumers to make fast changes to how they were eating, giving them easy and simple indications to follow. His last book “Food Rules” is certainly a great tool for the consumer needing some guidance and a driver for changes in our food culture. All these achievements make him almost the Food Person of the Decade.

The Food Person of the Decade in my opinion is the family farmer. Whose sheer existence and daily struggle tended the fertile ground on which all other ideas can now grow. It is the family farmer that has not given in to big agribusiness, that stood tall on his land and defended real food. Without them manning the fortress of real agriculture over the last decades - and especially the last one if we consider all the developments like GMO etc – no White House garden would have been possible. Michael Pollan would not have had no one to write about, and the blogging localvores would have starved a couple of weeks into their projects.

The Food Person of the Decade is the family farmer: the Barbaras & Fabios, Carlos, Martys & Krises, the Veras and Vickis, just to name a few. Their hard work, their sweat, their risk taking, their crop planning, them in their fields and on their pastures for 18 hours a day, 7 days a week, on Sundays, holidays, birthdays – they are what keeps our society alive. It is the family farmer that brings taste to our kitchens, in restaurants and homes. It is the family farmer that does the magic of awakening tastebuds. I am grateful that I am so lucky to call some of them my friends and be inspired by them.

I love farro. Ever since living in Tuscany, farro is my preferred grain. In summer, we eat it cooked & cold with veggies and greens in salads. In winter, it is the base of warming stews and soups. And I love the earthy, hearty taste of farro cookies and cakes. Now, as days become shorter and the temperature drops (yes, even in Tuscany), there is nothing more scrumptious than the nutty-sweet taste of a farro cookie and a mug of hot coffee.
So I was flabbergasted just now, while doing research on farro for the introduction of Giovanna and Niccolina’s new Christmas cookie (which the Chicago Tribune rated “tasty to boot”, by the way), to find out that farro was considered a “health food” in the US. You do not know what you are missing!

Farro is spelt. Although there is a fair amount of debate out there if the Tuscan farro is really spelt or emmer (very close cousins), I can say to the best of my knowledge that farro is spelt. Farro is the mother of all wheat. It originated in Palestine in the bronze ages, it was found in the pyramids in Egypt and fed the Roman legions building their empire. And it has been a staple in Tuscan cooking and baking forever. I guess it is fair to say that farro is a very “stubborn” plant. It needs little and can thrive in harsh ecological conditions. Which is why it was so established as a staple crop in many areas of the world. It was even grown in the US, where it is said to have been introduced in the 1890s. But as agriculture advanced, high-yielding varieties were bred (also, high-volume commercial baking operations wanted varieties rich in gluten) and mankind learned to manipulate the land with a mix of fertilizers, herbicides, fungicides and other gadgets of modern agriculture. Those new varieties spread like wildfire and farro was replaced. Some areas, such as Tuscany, would not let go of their farro and continued farming this grain, which is as Tuscan as Chianti wine.
Luckily with a growing interest in more natural farming and more wholesome eating, farro is now experiencing a renaissance also elsewhere. For one, given its nature, farro requires less fertilizer than other wheat varieties, and is hence a natural crop for organic farming, although it will yield less than bread wheat (which explains while it is more expensive).
But it also has more protein than wheat and thanks to its tough husk, freshness and nutrients are maintained better than in other grains. So, I guess these factors make farro a “health food”. Well, then so be it! Eat healthy, live happy, enjoy your farro, and try this recipe for farro & raspberry jam cookies recently posted on Lucullian Delights (a very inspiring Italian themed foodblog) http://www.luculliandelights.com/2009/11/farro-and-raspberry-jam-cookies.html

If you do not feel like baking yourself, enjoy Giovanna’s and Niccolina’s handmade Spelt & Figs Cantuccione. You can enjoy it slice by slice just like that, or toast the slices a second time to make the classic Tuscan “Cantuccini” – biscotti as they are usually called in the US. Available online at www.piazzaitalianmarket.com/store

Quoting TODAY'S CHICAGO TRIBUNE

"Seeing the smiles of those who crafted your ..food...on the label makes the experience exponentially more CHARMING. And The Scrumptious Pantry's Cantuccione (Tuscan fig cookie) is TASTY TO BOOT..."

We obviously could not agree more with this feedback, but I have to say we are delighted to see that Giovanna's & Niccolina's dedication to quality and hard work in their tiny bakery finds such an important forum!

The Cantuccione is a cookie loaf, basically. When baking biscotti (bi = twice, cotti = cooked, hence cooked twice), the cookies is first baked in a long loaf - the Cantuccione - before it is then sliced and the slices toasted again for biscotti. This is the Cantuccione after the first baking: you can enjoy it as it is, slice by slice, or make your own biscotti!

From spelt flour and the best dried figs these two talented artisans could procure comes a Christmas treat that also makes a great stocking stuffer!

ORDER YOUR CANTUCCIONE NOW ONLINE

Comparing Carlo’s pasta to another artisan Italian pasta widely available in the US during a comparative tasting last week, one taster had comment, which I want to share with you today: “you can really see the wheat”, she said.

I always put a standard pasta next to Carlo’s pasta when doing tastings and in store demos, just because the texture looks different, the color is richer – the pasta looks more alive to me. But I never came up with these simple words. Yes, you can see the wheat!

So today, as Carlo and his staff are shelling this year’s grain harvest (which by the way was great in quality but not really satisfactory in quantity due to the heavy rains in early spring and the dessert like temperatures in summer. Side note: it amazes me how what is celebrated as the perfect climate by one crop farmer can be deadly for the other. In this case, the weather conditions were absolutely perfect for the vines, a notion not shared by Carlo and fellow grain farmers…), let me talk pasta.

Carlo’s pasta is made with a richer form of flour, the so called “semolato”, rather than the “semolina” which is the typical white flour. To explain the difference, let me remind you the composition of a grain kernel (from the outside to the inside)

- the protective skin is called the husk (or hull)
- then comes a layer of bran, which mainly contains fibers
- next is the endosperm, divided into two layers, of which the outer one contains proteins, fats, minerals, vitamins and enzymes. The inner part of the endosperm (which is ca. 80-85% of the kernel) is composed of starch and gluten, a protein.
- protected by all these layers is the germ, the living cell of the kernel, and it contains antioxidants, vitamins E and B, minerals and proteins.

The classic white flour (“semolina”) is milled to separate the inner layer of the endosperm from all the other components, using only 60-64% of the actual kernel and loosing many of the positive properties of bran and germ in the process.
The semolato Carlo uses for his pasta is the result of stone-milling the grain and significant amounts of the bran, the germ and the outer layers of the endosperm.

The results are more complex taste profile of the pasta, which is easier to digest, contains more nutrients and shows off the wheat in the pasta itself! It is NOT a whole wheat pasta though, because it does not contain ALL the kernel. Speaking among us, we use the term “semi-integrale”, which could be translated into “partly whole wheat”. In any case wholesome, especially as Carlo follows strict organic agricultural procedures on his farm and also respects organic regulations during the actual production of the pasta: it is dried at low temperatures in order to maintain the proteins, vitamins and amino acids, which are heat sensitive.

Having said all that, how about a nice plate of pasta with porcini mushrooms, while they are still in season (for four people)

1 box of Carlo’s Durum Wheat Pasta Farfalle Shape
½ stick butter
Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil
2 garlic cloves
2 cups sliced porcini mushrooms (make sure the gills are white and not yellowish-greenish, which is an indicator that they are old!)
½ cup white wine
¼ cup chopped parsley
freshly grated parmesan cheese
salt & pepper

Melt half of the butter in a saucepan with a dash of olive oil, at low temperature add the slightly crushed garlic cloves to extract their aroma. Add the mushrooms, but be careful not to fry them! Add salt, pepper and white wine. Let simmer for a couple of minutes.
Cook the pasta in a separate pot (contrary to popular belief you do not need to put oil in the water, nor should you rinse the pasta with cold water. The latter would wash away the starch that is needed to have the sauce stick better to the pasta), when al dente drain, take garlic cloves out of the sauce, add the pasta, stir and let sit for one minute, adding the remaining butter and the parsley. Serve with freshly grated parmesan cheese to your liking.

Picture yourself in the Tuscan countryside. With a glass of wine in your hand. On the terrace of a small farmhouse surrounded by vineyards, you take in the beautiful countryside, the vines standing in perfect formation, just like disciplined miniature soldiers (of the peaceful kind). Your gaze wanders over the rolling hills, you watch people harvesting grapes, happily bringing the fruit in the cellar. You hear children laughing loudly, as they play hide and seek in the vineyards, their hiding places being told by their dogs which are curiously running back and forth. What a happy scenery! Then you glance at one of the old olive trees mightily lining the estate

**Screetch **

And that is when all happiness comes to an abrupt hold. Because what you see are shriveled somethings, shadows of what the olives should be like at this time of year. Weak and tired they struggle to hold onto the branches that should nourish them, feed them water, make them grow until their green skin seems to be bursting from the juice that has build up inside.

Not so. This summer of 2009 was hot. Too hot. And dry. Too dry. And it is not only the olive trees suffering. After all, these are the strongest and most independently minded plants around. Peppers have been practically burned up before they ever had a chance to grow. Eggplants dried up on the vine. Berries never reached maturation. Water is life. And without water, we are in serious trouble.
Why no irrigation you might ask? Well, yes, irrigation would solve a pressing situation in a year like 2009 has been. But what are the long term impacts of irrigating? Of lowering the levels of the ground water? Because irrigation always also means pumping water out of their safe wells. None of the water used for irrigation ever finds its way back into the depth of the soil.

What is worrying us farmers here that there are no “normal” years anymore. Seasons have merged or plainly disappeared. There are no weather patterns to count on anymore. It is, as if we had completely lost touch with nature. And nature is our vocation, our life, not just what feed us (and you).

I surely have no answer, I surely do not know where to start to resolve this problem. So if you were expecting a solution from this post, I am sorry to disappoint you. But maybe this post is increasing awareness among all those of you who live in environments that lack the intense daily contact with nature. And maybe one of you has an idea, the solution, our salvation?