Our potatoes (as well as other veggies) did well last week at our Yamhill County Fair!
This weekend, our family said goodbye to the Furch family — valued members of the McMinnville community who are moving away soon to rejoin family in the Northeast. If you don’t know them by name, Jason and Laurie Furch were the founding owners of Red Fox Bakery (now owned by one of the long-time employees!). They brought a fabulous artisan bakery to McMinnville and created community out of that spot for years — the smell of good bread mingling in the air with the aroma of coffee and the sound of visiting friends.
You could also say that Jason and Laurie brought our farm to McMinnville as well. We knew of this couple before we were interested in the area, since they actually started their bakery in Casey’s home town, Lincoln City, where they were friends with his parents and sister. So, when McMinnville landed on our radar as potentially The Spot Where We Should Start Our Farm, we stopped by Red Fox to meet the Furches and were immediately welcomed as old friends and were encouraged with great enthusiasm to Move Here Now And Do It! I’m not sure if this is a true memory or something that Casey and I just made up to represent the feeling of the moment, but we both remember Laurie literally jumping on a table with excitement about our farm. How could we resist?
And, so we came. And we became friends with the Furches, who were members of our CSA from day one and connected us to many of our other first year customers. Over the years, we ate countless sandwiches and drank countless cups of coffee there at Red Fox. Good times.
And, yet, they leave. Because, of course, neither life nor community are static things — and nor should they be! In a life, there is growth and change as new adventures and priorities arise, sometimes even leading us to cross-country moves. We wish them the best of their next adventure, although we will miss them very much.
From my vantage point in my 30s, I can take these Big Changes in stride, but there was a time — before we’d started on our own Putting Down Roots In One Place Adventure (i.e. “starting this here farm”) — when I looked to the future and pictured life and community both as a picture that didn’t change much. I had this idea that once we figured out what we wanted to do and where that we’d sort of coast, hanging out with the same people (our “community”) forever, doing the same things forever. Now this seems like a ridiculous notion (and fairly horrific to boot! No growth!). Even on the micro level of our farm, every year brings new adventures and growth as we expand our offerings, bring new employees onto the farm, say good-bye to old employees, and watch our children grow.
I can’t really put my finger on why, but this year in particular seems like a big year of change within the community. I’m sure things are always shifting — people move; people pass on; people have babies — but perhaps I’m more acutely aware of it this year. Many of our friends are moving even within this community, buying homes and such. And, we were sad earlier this year to say good-bye to another important family in our farm’s life: Kent and Tricia Harrop left McMinnville after a beautifully long stint as community leaders. They too were very early and enthusiastic supporters of our farm, and great role models for us as we continually ponder how to best engage in our community in loving and supportive ways.
Of course who Casey and I are within our community evolves too, even though we’re still here farming on Grand Island. Now that we’re parents as well as farmers, we’ve been more limited in how we can reach out and contribute, simply because our “extra” mental, physical and emotional resources are quite needed here on the homefront with these little ones. But, I’m always watching for opportunities to engage and grow in our connections to the people who live here and the place itself. Sometimes those opportunities are little things, such as choosing to spend quite a lot of our summer fun playing near to home, getting to know our watershed more intimately. Other opportunities have been here all along but only revealed themselves to me when I was actively looking.
For example, our little Yamhill County Fair. Why had we never participated in this event before this year? I don’t know! Perhaps because the end of July is a busy time on the farm. Perhaps because we didn’t grow up participating in fairs and weren’t quite sure how. Either way, this year was our year to begin. So, we entered a whole slew of vegetables, which took home lots of ribbons (mostly first place ribbons and a few second place too). I also entered some crafty items of my own. Certainly winning some ribbons was a fun little thrill, but the bigger joy came from feeling like we were part of the fair this year. Seeing our veggies alongside those of other gardeners in the county helped me realize how many of us live here and care about this place enough to slow down and put seeds in the ground. The fair will definitely become a staple activity of our summers from now on.
Another opportunity that has arisen in recent years is the invitation to help support other business endeavors through “crowdfunding.” This is a phenomenon that didn’t exist when we started our farm back in 2006, but I’m inspired to help others in our community make their dreams a reality, whether it’s starting a fermented food business (as Home Grown Food Products did last year), record a music album (as Val Blaha is doing right now), or financing big improvements on an awesome existing local business (as Hopsctoch Toys is doing right now — only 13 days left on their Crowd Tilt campaign! Give now!). Certainly, these are all entities that I would support anyway, but how fun to be invited to invest a little extra and help boost awesome people who are part of our wider community. For me, it’s a totally new way to engage, and I’ve grown to appreciate the opportunity and what it creates in our community.
As some of you know, long ago, before the farm, Casey and I lived for a spell in an “intentional community” in the mountains (Holden Village, a Lutheran retreat center / community). At the time that we landed there, we had romantic notions about “intentional communities,” thinking that a formal community was the answer to being connected. And certainly our time at Holden was profound on so many levels, shaping us into the adults we are today. But, we left with our hearts leaning a different direction. We wanted to find a place and a way of living that would provide us what might be better called “organic community.” This is the old fashioned sense of the word, when and where people are drawn together because of shared interests: a place where they live, schools filled with their children, work that integrates their lives, etc. We wanted a community where these bonds would overlap at many points, somewhat forcing disparate peoples into connecting.
What we’ve found is that organic community can be slow to understand and find, but it is a rich gift. An evolving one, but all that change brings the growth that is life.
Of course, seeking community is why we started our farm’s Community Support Agriculture program right away. To connect people with food and farms — what could be more powerful or fun! To be honest, now that we’re in our ninth season, I have moments when I think of our CSAs purely as a “marketing model” (that’s language that gets used a lot in ag extension circles to describe CSA programs). I think I can take for granted the profundity of what we’ve grown from this farm. Back when it was just a dream and an early reality, it bowled me over with its beauty — people eating from our farm! People joining friends to eat! Us becoming friends with our customers! No longer even being able to see those boundaries! An integrated life and business! That’s what I saw then as our goal, and when I pause and savor our life, I see it now. As with most aspects of our daily lives, beauty can blend into background, but those pause moments of gratitude can bring it back into focus. Because, wow, what an amazing community surrounds and supports this farm. Really, truly, we live a profoundly connected daily existence.
When we lived at Holden Village, we had weekly “community” meetings. They were important for connecting and resolving conflicts and working through all the other things that might happen more “organically” (and slowly) in an organic community such as we live in now. Every week, when all the business had been worked through (including always sharing joys and gratitudes!), the meeting leaders would close with the same words: “Thanks for being in community.” That phrase has been on my lips a lot lately, and I’ve even said it to Casey regularly in place of my usual “thanks.” He laughs at the shared reference to our past, but I mean it. I am grateful to him, for being my partner in this venture, and I grateful to all of you, for all the ways you have supported us and asked us to support you over the years. Those interwoven dependencies building beauty and joy out of daily existence. Indeed: Thank you for being in community!
And, enjoy this week’s vegetables!
Your farmers, Katie & Casey Kulla
P.S. One last round of shout-outs for the evening … did you know that there are two new restaurants here in McMinnville? Jesse Kincheloe recently opened Valley Commissary, which serves lunch and caters for local events. They also purchase veggies from our farm! And cooking up a storm at The Diner is Kyle Chriestenson, a talented chef we’ve worked with at various restaurants over the last few years. Our family stopped by The Diner for dinner this weekend (using our fair winnings!) and enjoyed our meal very much! Check out both these great new places for eating! (Um, does this community do food well, or what? Local writer Emily Grosvenor documents that fact nicely in this recent article! Read it!)
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CSA Farm Dinner on Saturday, August 16! And, speaking of community, it’s time for us to build some as we break bread together as a farm community. Hopefully folks put the farm dinner on your calendar when we first announced it months ago. In the intervening period of time, plans have changed slightly. It will still happen out here on the farm on Saturday, August 16. The food will still undoubtedly be delicious. But, our awesome caterers are moving away. Yes, last year’s amazing sit-down farm dinner was prepared with love and skill and enthusiasm by Jason and Laurie Furch, who are on their way out of town. When we heard the news, we pondered other options but found ourselves really feeling like they were a big part of the energy behind last year’s event. For now, rather than trying to recreate it from scratch we’ve decide to fall back on our favorite standby plan: A FARM POTLUCK! Our family will prepare lots of good food (a summer stew, salad, and other goodies), and we invite you to join us for fellowship and feasting. If you’d like to go on farmer-led a tour of the farm, arrive at 4 pm. We will begin the potluck dinner at 5 pm. Please bring a dish of food to share as well as plate and utensils for your family. We hope you can join us!!!! I’ll include directions to the farm in next week’s newsletter!
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Meet this week’s vegetables:
- Chehalis apples — In the continued theme of “Everything Is Early This Year,” our family spent some time this weekend picking our Bartlett pears and Chehalis apples. Um, so early? Anyhow, the apples are delicious — the first really good apples of the season (we enjoyed some earlier apples last month, but honestly those first apples are only good because they’re the first apples!). Enjoy these delights!
- Cucumbers — Ahem, these are BLUE RIBBON cucumbers, folks. Yep, they won 1st place at the fair!
- Yellow romano beans — These beautiful beans can be prepared in any of the ways you would traditional green beans: eaten raw, roasted, added to cooked dishes, pickled, etc. We’ve always been suckers for their pale yellow glow.
- Beets
- Potatoes — BLUE RIBBON potatoes!
- Summer squash & zucchini — And, yes, our zucchini and summer squash both won blue ribbons as well! There was actually quite a bit of competition in this category, so we are feeling proud of our zucchini! And, if you’ve wondered, the pale green summer squash that we produce so much of is called “Magda.” It is wonderfully prolific (which is why we farmers love it) and also delicious (which is why we home cooks love it). I reach for it more than the green zucchini; most often to roast but also for making Squash-a-Ganouj!
- Onions
