Ostara

Happy Ostara (a bit late) to all. I hope everyone had a nice Spring celebration. Things have been busy here and as they settled down I found myself dealing with a bit of depression again. Ah well, life goes on! We managed to do a few Ostara activities. We made little nest treats for a sweet activity. An outdoor egg hunt turned out to be a disaster (two children in tears, baskets blowing away) but what do we expect with 27 degree weather and flurries in April? Spring made a brief appearance but appears to be feeling a bit shy! Our Ostara treats came from Sweet Earth Chocolates this year. I highly reccomend them! Their customer service was great, shipping was exceptionally fast, and the goods are GOOD! We tried all of the different "eggs" (mint crunch, peanut butter crunch, dark and milk chocolate, and the bunnies. Their chocolate is fair trade and organic, and they have a number of vegan options. Be sure to check them out the next time you're in the market for sweets. (I see they have Mother's Day specials on their website today!) They made a lovely basket, joined by a small amount of precious Surf Sweets Organic Jelly Beans. Bird's Ostara cardigan got finished in a nick of time. Luckily I'd made my own shawl last year, so no worries there. I hope Spring is showing it's face wherever you are this week. Happy Ostara!

Hanna's Dream

My regular readers will know that I do my best to reign in my love of kids clothes. That's true, but I know a great source for sustainable, stylish kids clothes when I see one! I've had the chance to work with the owner of Hanna's Dream a bit this year. (Within my budget, I promise!) She is a real delight and has a great site. Hanna's Dream has everything from baby clothes to blankets to toys to adult clothing. Much of what they carry is hard-to-find European brands. There are lots of lovely natural organic color grown cotton pieces, but there are also fun and funky pieces as well. Their prices are very competitive and they're often offering great deals such as free-shipping or a percent off a certain brand, in addition to a daily special. Right now the site is offering 20% off all of their Lapsaky line for kids. They even offer used clothing occasionally. How cool is that? Take a look! I'll be adding a permanent link if you want to check back in the future.

A Tale of Two Cabbages

I've been meaning for some time now to write about the vilification of Whole Foods, and how thoroughly I reject that vilification. The Omnivore's Dilemma is a very valuable book that explores food issues well in some areas, however I took great issue with Michael Pollan's characterization of Whole Foods and it's role in the Industrial Organic world. (As an aside, I don't necessarily have a problem with Industrial Organic, but that's not the point right now.) Pollan cited the lack of local organic produce, and chose extremes like out-of-season organic asparagus from South America to illustrate his point. As it turns out, Pollan didn't even bother to contact Whole Foods about his book. Pollan claims that he was trying to take a purely consumer perspective, and didn't want to get too journalistic about it. If this is so, then it was terribly shortsighted. (See Whole Foods CEO John Mackey's letter to Pollan, and follow their exchange, here.)

Pollan had obviously never been to my Whole Foods. If he had, he might have been impressed. Generally there are at least a few dozen varieties of local organic produce being offered. The number of local selections is advertised daily, and it's often more--I've seen it as high as the 70s. When we worked on a small organic farm southwest of Milwaukee, we learned that the CSA sold excess produce to the Whole Foods. We were very impressed, since they are a relatively small operation. Our Whole Foods carries a number of items from Tipi Produce, a farm just about 20 miles away, and I've seen one of the farm owners at the WFM dock, unloading their truck himself. Apparently not all Whole Foods are this good about stocking local produce, and I suppose it depends on the availability in their area. My personal feeling is that every local item they stock is a huge boon to that local organic farm, and rather than blighting Whole Foods for not having more, we should praise them for what they do have. To me, even the Iowa zucchini or Washington pear is better than the conventional alternative at Pick n' Save--and do we think Pick 'n' Save is going to have local choices? I can assure you, they do not.

Today was a shining example in favor of Whole Foods. Our Farmer's Market goes indoors for the winter. While there's still an impressive selection of veggies available, most of the booths are now crafts or meats. Even my favorite feta artisan was missing today--a sad day indeed. Our favorite booth still had a great variety of root crops, but no cabbage. I have a cabbage dish planned, and so searched thrrough all of the booths, and finally came back to the only one I had found. The box of cabbages was labeled: "$1 each". I asked the farmer if they used sprays. "Sprays? Yeah I use sprays. 'Course these have been in storage for a long time, and I haven't sprayed since September." I'm not sure what that was supposed to mean. Had he harvested before he sprayed? I don't think so. Did he think the pesticides had worn off with time? I grimaced, then handed him a dollar and selected a cabbage (see the cabbage on the right above). I still hadn't decided if I'd actually use it. Next we went to Whole Foods for our remaining groceries. I selected a locally grown organic pumpkin, passed up some local organic white mushrooms for crimini, and picked up a pound of organic Wisconsin cranberries. As I searched for (and found) local organic leeks, I spotted some gorgeous cabbages. I searched for their sign above, and lo and behold, they were local and organic (see cabbage on the left). Understand, I found a better choice at Whole Foods Market than I did at our incredible Farmer's Market. Besides the produce, I found locally (in-town) produced veggie burgers and baba ghanouj, milk (Organic Valley, but still-produced within an hour or two drive) and local yogurt, whose maker was handing out samples right there at WFM. Upon returning home, I saw that our favorite farm stand at the Farmer's Market sells to WFM too. (In fact, click the link to see the guy who sold Beo his 25# of sunchokes this Spring!) I think I had a better local haul at Whole Foods then at our farmer's market, which I consider one of the best in the world. Perhaps my Whole Foods is one of the best in the world too, and I've simply lucked out. Either way, it's part of the Whole Foods company, and it deserves to be recognized for the wonderful role it is playing in making small organic farms sustainable in Wisconsin.

I Believe in Organic Valley

Sunday I had the great pleasure of taking my family to the Organic Valley Kickapoo Country Fair. This is our second year attending the fair, and it was again a wonderful experience. I am a big-time Organic Valley advocate, because they are the future of Organic. They enable small family farms to be distributed on a national scale. Their system is so real that you can see the inner workings every year at the fair. In fact, I wouldn't doubt that if you called OV up, they'd arrange a tour for you at your convenience. The headquarters actually look a lot like the corporate logo, a large modern office structure but it looks like a barn. They have 20' swaths of native prairie planted on both sides of the long drive up to headquarters. Their aluminum roof channels rainfall into a system of giant holding tanks, which are tapped to water the vegetable gardens. They are as real as real can be. They are also located in one of the most beautiful parts of the country-the "driftless region" of the kickapoo valley, with rolling green hills, forests, streams, and rock outcroppings.

Each year the fair brings together many of the OV farmers, as well as other local organic farmers, artisans, coffee roasters, food co-ops, musicians, eco-organizations, and more. We passed booths with t-shirts with 'liberal' slogans on them, a fundraising booth for Habitat for Humanity that was selling organic ice cream, a hand woven rug stand, a booth for Chelsea Green publishing, a corn pellet stove manufacturer, an alternative energy cooperative, and the like. Good food and drink were in abundance. OV had a large crew of people separating recyclables from trash from compostables. (Even the paper plates, 'plastic' cups and spoons, and water bottles were compostable, thanks to OV.) The kids and I enjoyed making crafts and checking out the animals. (OK, the kids were a little wilted from the heat, a bit pouty, but it was still really neat. Meanwhile Beo took a course on Resources for Organic Gardeners and Farmers. He had to pass up a course on 70 mpg, 0 Emissions vehicles and Sustainable Building to attend that one.

After a lunch of a veggie burrito, pesto pasta salad, organic milk, and fruit, we headed on to a bus to tour one or OV's dairy farms. It is nestled in the hills about 20 miles from OV HQ, run by a really swell guy and his wife. The farmer told us a bit about how he and his wife got into organic dairy farming. They were drawn in by the appeal of seasonal milking. This means that they follow the cow's natural milk cycle, instead of forcing them to milk year round. The cows are allowed to "dry up" in November, and milking resumes in March. I love that system--it seems so much more--well, natural! The farmer took us out to the high pasture, and talked about the challenges of managing the balance between the natural grasses and clovers that grow there, along with what the cows like and need. He does semi-intensive rotational grazing (12 hours in one spot of field) but makes sure the cows are happy no matter what. He gets more milk out of them that way--but I'll take happy cows no matter what the motivation. So yesterday, with the heat, the cows not only had about 3 times the pasture space that they normally did, but he had opened up the lower "emergency" pasture to them. The lower pasture is in a valley and has lots of shade, so the cows can go down there to cool off if they feel like it.

This particular farmer has about 39 cows. We heard the OV represenative talking about how they breed for cows that like being out on pasture. He explained that if they stuck holsteins out on natural pasture, they'd hardly know what to do with themselves. So we heard about highly mixed cows--milking shorthorn, jersey, and more. The farm that we were at uses a bull as well as AI. The family built their own home on their land, as well as building the milking parlor. I was really impressed with how clean the milking parlor was. I realize they were prepped for a tour, but it was a working farm and I think it probably is kept that clean. The only ethical problem left that I can see is what happens when a bull calf is born. He had two there at the farm yesterday. I think I heard him say they were the only two born that year. Conversations overlapped and answers got hard to hear, but I thought he was saying that they keep them for a year and then they go into the OV meat production area. I have to say that I feel like that particular impact is a small one, ethically. Environmentally there is very little impact (one of the calves we saw was in a smaller penned area with pasture), and it fills a market demand in a very positive way. ( Even if I'm not going to eat it, I would much rather the cow be grazing pasture in the Kickapoo Valley than being raised in a stall fed on corn at an Aurora facility.)

It's hard for me to explain how powerful the experience really is. I feel incredibly un-eloquent and choppy--I could write for pages on why I feel so strongly about OV. It's too easy to get caught up in the details, and I want to be able to share everything about how amazing the farms are, and how much the farmer cared about his cows. He had names for each of the cows and would laugh as he shared about their personality. The cows were so docile, even friendly and sweet. They seemed to have the perfect life, having all of their natural needs met and with quite a view to boot. I know a lot of people have doubts about the humanity of milk, and the veracity of organic. I can honestly say that I feel even better about Organic Valley after having seen the workings of the farm than I did even before I went out there. If you are a milk drinker, and you believe in Organic, Organic Valley is the company to support. If you'd like to see more about the fair, you can visit OV's webpage.