August 25, 2010 by Debra.

Notices for Fall events are starting to come in, including these two from Brookford Farm in Rollinsford:

Our Next Hayride is on September 11

 

Bring the kids out to the farm for a hayride on Saturday, September 11th, at 4 p.m. They’ll get the grand tour of the fields and animals, including cows, pigs, and chickens — and maybe they’ll even get to see some newborn calves. It’s totally free and no reservations are required.

 

 

October Quark Festival

 

This October 10, 2010, from 11 – 4, Brookford Farm will be hosting an event in celebration of real food & local culture with a harvest festival we are calling the Quark Festival, in honor of one of our favorite cheeses. Local artisans will be there, as well as chefs from celebrated local restaurants, and we’ve invited local musicians and farmers as well. Sample our delicious artisinal cheeses as well as other dishes made with our pasture-raised beef and pork, organic vegetables, and renowned dairy products. There will also be workshops on traditional crafts like beekeeping and food preservation, pumpkin-carving, a straw labyrinth, and of course a hayride through beautiful countryside. For kids, there will be crafts, games, activities, and more!

 

For more information, you can check out our farm website and blog at www.brookfordfarm.com and www.brookfordfarm.blogspot.com.

Posted in author: Debra, events | Print | No Comments »

August 25, 2010 by Debra.

The fourth annual Kneading Conference has just ended. This yearly gathering takes place in Skowhegan, Maine, and has been a growing influence in providing our regional food system with locally-produced grains. If you haven’t had the chance to attend, a New York Times article by Marian Burros covers this year’s conference and the Artisan Bread Fair that accompanies it:

Their Daily Bread Is a Local Call Away

 

THE 250 farmers, bakers, millers, scientists and just plain eaters, all of them fanatics about the kind of bread that is so good it doesn’t need butter or jam, gathered here last month for the fourth annual Kneading Conference. They spent two days at the fairgrounds talking about locally grown, mostly organic grains — and how, after 100 years of neglect, breads made from them are beginning to pop up, in limited quantities, nationwide.

 

There were plenty of freshly baked loaves, hot out of an assortment of portable bread ovens, to persuade the uninitiated that nothing tastes as good as bread made from richly flavored varieties of grain.

 

The Kneading Conference is part of a quiet revolution whose center is Skowhegan, a town in central Maine that produced enough grain in the 1830s to feed 100,000 people. As interest in local food has risen, federal and state agriculture departments are underwriting experiments to find the best varieties of wheat, and artisanal bakers are eagerly trying the flours they produce. But it is the conference that has helped turn the scattered movement into the next new thing for locavores, and the practical topics discussed this year — building more gristmills, making old farm manuals available — reveal its progress from infancy to adolescence.

 

To read article, including mentions of Borealis Breads and Stone Turtle Baking and Cooking School >

 

The above photo is from this year’s conference. To see more photos of the 2010 Kneading Conference and Bread Fair >

Posted in author: Debra, eating locally in the media | Print | No Comments »

August 25, 2010 by Debra.

The final NOFA-NH Farm Tour of 2010 will be at Tuckaway Farm in Lee on Tuesday, August 31. If you are interested in organic, no-till techniques, small grain and oilseed production and processing, and/or production and use of biodiesel, this is a farm tour you won’t want to miss!

Organic No-Till Farm Tour

NOFA-NH 2010 Summer Organic Garden & Farm Tours

Tuckaway Farm, 59 Randall Rd, Lee, NH

Tuesday, August 31, 5:30 PM

 

This tour will be focused on organic no till equipment and limited/no till establishment of covercrops to build soil organic matter. Small grain and oilseed on-farm variety selection as well as harvesting and on-farm processing of grains and oilseeds for feed and fuel will also be discussed. On-farm biodiesel production and use will be briefly covered as well.

 

Dorn Cox has been growing organic grains and oilseeds for 7 years and researching varieties, cultivation and harvest practices. He helped found the Great Bay Grain Cooperative with nine other farms. They have helped build a local knowledge base around local grain and oil seed production and processing. Dorn is currently enrolled in the Natural Resources & Earth Systems Science PhD program at UNH focusing on carbon policy and soil based carbon sequestration. Four generations of his family currently live on two farms, Tuckaway Farm and Sheltering Rock Farm. Tuckaway Farm is a diversified mixed power (draft horse and tractor) family farm with hay, timber, small fruits and berries and a market garden with direct sales.

 

Directions:  From Concord: take US-4 E to the Rt-155 N ramp toward Durham/Dover. Turn Left onto NH-155 / Turtle Pond Rd. Stay on NH-155 for 0.8 miles, then turn left onto Randall Rd.

 

Workshop is $10 for NOFA members, $15 for non-members (children under 18 no charge). To pre-register, or if you have questions or financial need, please contact Barbara Sullivan, Business Manager NOFA-NH (Northeast Organic Farming Association of NH) 4 Park Street, Suite 208 Concord, NH 03301 Ph: 603-224-5022 Fax: 603-228-6492 Email: barbara@nofanh.org.

 

Details at: http://www.nofanh.org/node/140. Tours are held rain or shine (extreme weather will cancel).

Posted in author: Debra, events | Print | No Comments »