Growers' Row: Snow and Veggies

By Pat Lang, Farm Production Director

Greetings from a chilly, cloudy, and snowy Poughkeepsie Farm Project! As this is my first newsletter note as PFP’s Farm Production Director, allow me to introduce myself to those I have yet to meet and to say hello again to folks in and around Poughkeepsie who knew me as a farm employee from years past (want to know more? Read my introduction on PFP’s blog). A warm hello indeed, and gratitude to all of you who are a part of the PFP community, whatever the capacity.

News from the Farm

Andre plowing the farm drive

The gentle winter weather that accommodated distanced outdoor gatherings was a blessing in December, but it didn't persist through to spring. Aside from sending most of us indoors more often, the snow and cold of February has complicated winter farm harvests and have increased our resource usage as we protect fresh kale, spinach, and lettuces from freezing conditions.

Winter sunset at PFP

The need for attention to detail and overall care for systems on the farm is magnified during a cold and snowy winter: water-carrying pipes and hoses can freeze and burst if not properly drained, storage crops like carrots and beets could be damaged if heat is not [gently] supplied to our coolers, and the beautiful winter greens growing in the tunnels could be compromised if folks on the farm are not attentive to a number of variables associated with the high tunnels. That said, the farm crew has distributed thousands of pounds of PFP-grown food this winter and is poised to continue doing so until field harvests begin! This success during a period of staff transition at PFP is a testament to farm crew members’ skill, patience, and sincere care about our work. Thank you farm team!

Winter Produce Goodness!

Looking to try a new preparation for fresh winter veggies? Whether you are a PFP winter share member or are picking up produce from your favorite market, we’ve got suggestions!

Liv, wholesale coordinator and farm crew member

This month, our new wholesale coordinator, Liv, shares some of her easy and delicious preparations of produce that is available right now. Liv is a new Poughkeepsie resident who joined the farm team at the start of February. She will be managing our sales to restaurants, institutions, and other farms in the area, sales that help make our winter CSA and winter donations possible by supporting year-round employment of farm crew members.

SUPER easy cabbage salad
You will need

• 1 small/medium cabbage head or half of a large head

• 1 lime

• salt & pepper

Enjoy the flavor of red or green cabbage sweetened by winter cold, without much else! Thinly slice red or green cabbage into long, very slender pieces. Add the fresh juice from a whole lime, and toss thoroughly to coat the cabbage. Add salt and pepper to taste if desired. Allow the mixture to sit for several hours to slightly soften the cabbage and for the lime’s tartness to spread.

Curry Carrots
You will need

• medium bundle of carrots (1 to 1.5 pounds)

• 1 to 2 Tbsp coconut oil

• 2 tsp curry powder

• salt & pepper

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Place carrots on a baking sheet (slice in half lengthwise if any are especially wide) and toss with oil, curry powder, salt, and pepper. Roast 20-25 minutes or until tender and brown, tossing the carrots once at the halfway point. Perfect complement to a snowy afternoon.

Thanks to Liv for sharing these cooking and preparation tips! I look forward to sharing more vegetable wisdom from PFP’s vegetable growers. If YOU have a favorite recipe or preparation of seasonal veggies that you’d like to share with our community, email me: pat [at] farmproject [dot] org

German transporting potting mix for greenhouse production.

Embracing Food and Community in the time of COVID-19

Written by Chris Gavin, Educator and After-School and Summer Program Coordinator

Youth intern and staff members preparing freshly harvested produce for donation

It would be an understatement to say 2020 has been a year like no other for Poughkeepsie Farm Project and how we offer educational opportunities to our community. Our world turned upside down in mid-March with the closure of schools in New York State, and all of our usual educational programs were abruptly halted. Since then, our team has been navigating the new realities of the COVID-19 pandemic and our country’s long-needed reckoning with systemic racism. The sudden upheaval to our work has given us a moment to pause and reflect on what we can do to better embody our mission of creating a just and sustainable food system in Poughkeepsie. Our education team has been digging into this important work with a sense of passion and joy to match the challenges of this unprecedented moment. While the structure and implementation of our programs has changed, the core goals of our work remain strong and in clear focus: making fresh vegetables and the means to prepare them at home accessible to our community AND engaging families in the important act of growing, preparing and eating healthy, nourishing, locally-grown foods.

Distance Learning

Poughkeepsie Food Power @Home, our new distance learning initiative, was born from our desire to stay connected with Poughkeepsie youth while in-person teaching isn’t possible. Our program consists of educational videosalong with cooking and gardening kits so families can complete the activities at home. We are aiming to provide families with a substantial amount of food to meet the growing food insecurity in our community, to give families engaging food-based projects to do at home, and to help families gain the confidence to grow and cook healthy foods. To date, we have provided 13 weeks of videos and activity kits to a total of 185 households. Some of our favorite projects have been growing microgreens at home, a container gardening project to meet the space availability of all participants, meal kits featuring recipes from around the world, and videos in English and Spanish to make our program more accessible to our community. In order to support our families during the start of the new school year, we also distributed over 300 educational supply kits and books to our participants.

PFP@Home participants proudly displaying their homemade kale quesadilla

Food Access

In response to the growing food insecurity in our community, our education team developed a food distribution program to get food into the hands of youth and families in the city of Poughkeepsie. Working in conjunction with the Poughkeepsie City School District’s Food Service Department, we have been distributing free produce from our farm at five free school meal sites every week since mid-March. In addition to providing fresh, healthy, locally-grown produce, we also give families printed recipes and storage tips to help people feel confident in preparing the food. One of the most powerful things about this food distribution model has been building strong connections with individuals and families, and we are proud to provide people with an experience that feels welcoming and positive in the face of the growing challenge of food insecurity. We believe that access to fresh healthy food is a right for everyone in our community, and distributing free produce in a dignified way is one step we are taking towards this goal.

Happy resident at a free produce distribution site

Community Harvest

Community Harvest Days at the farm are rooted in the ancient practice of gleaning, in which farmers would leave a certain amount of crops in the field and welcome community members to take what they needed. This serves the multiple purposes of cutting down on the waste stream in the local food system, gets food directly into the hands of people who need it, and connects people to the land and farming in a powerful community-oriented way. We’ve hosted 5 community events and harvested over 3,000 lbs of food for families to take home and to donate through partner organizations and school meal sites. Community Harvest Days have been a way for PFP to strengthen our commitment to food justice as we work to make our farm a place that feels welcoming to all and a resource for all in the community. In an effort to make these events more inclusive, we’ve incorporated live interpretation for Spanish-speaking participants, an indigenous land acknowledgement to recognize the original inhabitants of this land we farm, and opening the invitation to City of Poughkeepsie residents who participate in our after school programs and distance learning initiatives.

Community members gleaning peppers during a Community Harvest Day

Internship Programs

While nearly all in-person education was halted at the farm, we were able to provide a ten-week paid summer internship for six Poughkeepsie teens. The Green Jobs crew was involved in every aspect of growing, harvesting, and distributing produce in the community - working both in the farm fields and our educational gardens. In addition to this hands-on training, the teens also gained knowledge about food access in their own community as they acted as youth ambassadors during community harvest events and free produce distributions. This program also highlighted the links between food justice and racial justice as youth explored the historical roots of racial injustices embedded in our nation’s food system. The final project for the internship was creating an Anti-Racist Timeline and inviting all in the PFP community to consider how they are and can work towards being anti-racist advocates in their daily lives.

Braiding popcorn from the seed saving garden

We were also able to engage college students in new ways through both in person and remote internships. Our remote interns, a Vassar Community Fellow and a Shepherd Consortium intern, completed online projects to strengthen PFP’s virtual educational resources. Our new Food Share Story Map uses ArcGIS to explore how our Food Share Program is addressing food insecurity and growing community through sharing our harvest. Both also contributed to our Harvest of the Month Resource Hub which brings recipes, lessons, and engaging activities online for families and educators to learn remotely. Our on-site interns from the Culinary Institute of America and University of Vermont made valuable contributions to PFP through their work on recipe development, seed saving, weekly food distribution, and working in the gardens and farm fields to harvest vegetables and medicinal herbs.

Recipe testing

The Work to Come:

As this incredibly trying year comes to a close, we reflect as an organization on how we have met and continue to meet the challenges of 2020 - but there is much work still to be done. As an educator here at PFP, I can attest to the fierce joy and love that my team members bring to this work as we dig into our mission of building a just food system for all in our community. While the pandemic has highlighted so many challenges and injustices in our world, it has also brought people together in strength and solidarity. As a community, we must work together to ensure that everyone — regardless of their address, age, gender, or race — has access to fresh, healthy, affordable food. Let’s join together as a whole PFP community as we support each other on this journey towards accountability and equity - and of course delicious nourishing food. In closing, here are some personal statements from our education team on how we would like to strengthen our food justice efforts in the upcoming year.

"My hope is that this is a year of making good on our mission at PFP." - SonyaJoy

“Bringing people from the community into the Poughkeepsie Farm Project space is definitely something I want to do more of. Because it's just down the street from the community and it’s just not something people recognize as theirs, but it really is.” - Larissa

“Getting to be a part of neighbors coming together to share their love for growing and cooking delicious veggies! Continuing to listen and learn and bring ancestral wisdom and delicious recipes from Poughkeepsie families into our school and farm programs.” - Kathryn

“I want to continually expand what food justice looks like at PFP. And I want to help make PFP a safe and brave space where we can have needed conversations about racial justice in Poughkeepsie.”- Chris

“In 2021, I dream of creating a path to year-round jobs for youth in Poughkeepsie, and empowering our youth to see the connections between food justice, climate justice, and racial justice! All while planting seeds of language justice in our community so those who don’t speak the dominant language can begin to see the beauty in our bounty.” - Laura

“I am looking forward to strengthening our work at the intersections of food justice, racial justice, environmental justice, and language justice while taking leadership from our beautiful Poughkeepsie community.” -Jamie

New Garden Brings Produce Closer to Home

Written by SonyaJoy Key, Community Engagement Manager

What could happen if the soil beneath our feet were healthy? What if all youth could safely plunge their eager fingers into the soil to plant a seed, find a worm, or harvest a head of lettuce?

Sabrina Floyd, Rip Van Winkle Apartments Social Worker and Lead Garden Instigator.

Environmental injustice impacts most Poughkeepsie growers who labor toward food sovereignty, our ability to exercise the right to healthy foods that are culturally relevant. Years of improperly disposed of waste and degraded building materials can leave city soils too toxic to grow food. Yet we need fresh food everywhere we can get it, especially to thrive during COVID-19.

Just 4 months ago, residents of Rip Van Winkle Apartments, known as RIP, would exit the building to see a grassy expanse of lawn. Now a raised bed community garden greets residents with a cheerful expanse of tomatoes, kale, cucumbers, sunflowers and so much more! A project like this takes a lot of hands to turn the wheel, and a hub for the spokes to turn from. Sabrina Floyd, social worker at RIP, is that central hub.

Sabrina is the kind of person you talk to for an hour when you intended to just say a quick hello. On top of her regular work connecting the community of residents at Rip Van Winkle Apartments to local services and providing informal counseling on subjects from health to education, Sabrina decided to tackle the vision and installation of a community garden on site. She already had a hunch based on how many residents picked up fresh produce from the weekly PFP Food Share and Food Power @ Home meal kit distributions, that a garden would be well received.

In May, Sabrina surveyed the entire building to see who would get involved if a garden could be established with resident support. I drafted a garden plan that included a welcoming, multi-generational garden space with built-in benches for seniors or those with less mobility to sit while gardening.

Jacob and Rakim, summer interns at PFP, unload hundreds of pounds of rich soil into the beds.

In July, an 18 bed garden was installed by contractor Michael Conti. Poughkeepsie Farm Project staff and interns hauled compost, painted beds, and installed over 300 plants donated by PFP. Dozens of RIP youth residents stopped by to support, as well as Perfect 10, a girl’s empowerment organization based in Hudson, NY. The garden went from start to finish in a little over 2 weeks!

PFP intern, Tania, transplants gold and red beet seedlings.

On September 30th, gardeners of all ages gathered for the first Harvest Day. Expert support was available from PFP Educator Lala Montoya and Greenhouse Manager André Luis de Oliveira Domingues. Families and friends harvested healthy heads of buttery lettuce, bunches of dino kale and the last tomatoes of the season. Some of the kids goofed around, seeing who could bite into a spicy pepper and keep their cool. Discovering how sunflower seeds grow was probably the most fun exploration that afternoon, only topped by the last garden hose water fight of the summer!

Lala, PFP Educator, gives some cucumber growing tips to a young RIP resident.

Summer beds flourishing!

Because of partnerships like these with Rip Van Winkle Apartments and visionaries like Sabrina, growing above the ground in healthy soil means that block by block, fresh produce is growing closer to home.

Flavors of Fall

First Frost & Flavors of Fall

The first frost of the season has arrived!

If you have a garden, you know it’s time to say farewell to summer crops like tomatoes, peppers and eggplant, which do not like cold. The cooler temperatures of autumn are, however, ideal for lots of greens such as arugula, cabbage, and yokattana -- cooler-weather crops that do best at the beginning and end of the growing season. CSA members are seeing this shift happening now in their weekly shares. 

Here is a round-up of some of our favorite fall crops, along with storage tips and recipe ideas to help you make the most of your CSA bounty or wherever you get your fall vegetables!

Black Futsu Squash

Besides looking lovely on your table (it *is* decorative gourd season, after all), this deep orange-fleshed squash has a sweet nutty flavor reminiscent of hazelnuts. Plus, unlike some squash like acorn that have tough skins, the skin of the Black Futsu is tender enough to eat! 

To store: Keep on your counter in a cool spot. Use within 2 weeks. 

To prepare: Halve and scoop seeds. From here, slice it into quarters or slices, rub with a little butter or oil, and sprinkle with salt and/or any spices you like (try coriander and ginger, or some cayenne for a kick). Bake at 350 until fork-tender. Or, cut squash into cubes to simmer in your favorite coconut milk-based curry or sausage-and-kale stew. Get more recipe ideas from one of PFP’s interns in her blog post Nosh on Squash!

Bok Choy

This mild-tasting green is closely related to napa cabbage, choy sum and turnips, and slightly more distantly related to cabbage, collards, kale. It’s generally not bitter or spicy, but rather tender and very mild with watery crunch.

To store: Keep in the fridge in a crisper drawer or ventilated bag to keep in some moisture. Use within a week. 

To prepare: These are a nice addition to brothy ramen or miso-based soups. The fat ribs are best tossed into the soup or fry-pan first, with the darker leaves to follow. Try this mushroom miso soup with grilled bok choy.

Chinese (or Napa) Cabbage

You may have seen Chinese or Napa cabbage before… but did you know it also comes in *purple*? The flavor is the same (mildly cabbage-y and sweet) but this variety does wonderful things when combined with acid such as rice vinegar or lemon juice. Watch the leaves change from dark purple to bright pink before your eyes! 

To store: Keep in the fridge in a crisper drawer or ventilated bag to keep in some moisture. Can keep for 1-2 weeks. 

To prepare: Chinese cabbage is very versatile. Enjoy it raw in a slaw, stuff the leaves to make cabbage rolls, stir-fry it or make it into stuffing for home-made dumplings. Try a stir fry with onions, ginger, garlic, mushrooms and eggs over rice, or get tips on how to make a stir-fry without a recipe. Like its cousin bok choy, chinese cabbage is also nice addition to brothy ramen or miso-based soups.

Dandelion Greens

These dark leafy greens have that bitter edge and velvety-crunchy texture of their cousins escarole and radicchio. Dandelions can be eaten raw in salads or cooked. Their bitter crunch is best balanced by other punchy flavors: garlic and lemon, anchovy, parmesan, black and red pepper are all great pairings. 

To store: Keep in the fridge in a crisper drawer or ventilated bag to keep in some moisture. Use within a week. 

To prepare: Try these dandelion greens with a fried egg and anchovy dressing or use in place of escarole in your favorite soup. 

Kohlrabi

Another cabbage-collard relative, this close cousin of broccoli tastes essentially like a big round broccoli stem: mildly sweet, mildly vegetal, and delightfully crunchy. 

To store: Keep in the fridge in a crisper drawer or ventilated bag to keep in some moisture. Can keep for a month or more. 

To prepare: Carefully remove the tough outer skin with a sharp knife (it is too thick to use a vegetable peeler). From here you’ve got options. Slice into wedges or matchsticks and snack as you would on an apple or carrot sticks. Cube and roast with potatoes, carrots, celeriac or your favorite root vegetables. Or shred them to make kohlrabi fritters (or these ones without flour). 

Violet, Scarlet & Hakurei Turnips

This rainbow of turnips can be eaten raw in salads (or like apples, if you’re a farmer!) or cooked. Simply simply cube and roast with your favorite vegetables and spices (have you tried turnips and butternut squash roasted with cumin, coriander and nutmeg?) or see more ideas below.

To store: If your turnips come with greens, cut the greens and store in the fridge in a crisper drawer or ventilated bag to keep in some moisture. Use leaves within a week. Roots can keep for up to a month. 

To prepare: Slice thinly and wrap in a pie crust with herbs and goat cheese to make a turnip galette. Saute simply with garlic and oil, then add in their greens (if you get them bunched) at the end. This buttered turnip puree pairs nicely with pork or a roast. Turnips, potatoes and celeriac cut into even sizes and roasted along with a chicken are a savory and tender treat.

Watermelon Radish

The watermelon radish is the diva of winter vegetables. Her pale green exterior is hiding a hot pink inside. You won’t see much of her before winter, but there’s a good chance she’ll pop up in CSA shares at least once before the end of the season. (Note: winter shares become available later this month!)  Like kohlrabi, watermelon radishes can be sliced and eaten raw, much as you would carrot sticks. They make a stunning addition to a raw vegetable plate.

To store: Keep in the fridge in a crisper drawer or ventilated bag to keep in some moisture. Can keep for a month or more. 

To prepare: Peel the light green skin with a vegetable peeler. Slice for raw snacking or into a ginger carrot salad, shred into slaws (perhaps with carrots, red onion and your purple napa cabbage?), or cube and roast with red and gold beets. 

Yokattana

Sometimes called vitamin greens or komatsuna by mistake, yokattana -- like many of its cousins -- is an easy substitute for either. The thinner ribs of yokattana make it easier to cook evenly than its cousin bok choy, and the flavor is slightly richer than that of a bok choy. 

To store: Keep in the fridge in a crisper drawer or ventilated bag to keep in some moisture. Use within a week. 

To prepare: Use yokattana in any recipes that call for bok choy. Stir fry with turnips, garlic and soy sauce and serve with rice. Or add to your favorite miso soup recipe. Because of its rich “dark green” flavor, yokattana can also substitute for dandelion greens, kale or collards in soups and stews. 

How are you enjoying your vegetables this month? Send us your recipes! Email shareinfo @farmproject . org 

From Sky to Soil: One Former Flight Attendant's Journey to Becoming a Farmer

written by Beth Hentschel, Farm Intern

The dirt will never come out of the cracks in your hands.” 

This was what Leon told me over the phone before I started working at the farm, warning me what to expect in my first days in the field. In my mind I chuckled. I’d been a flight attendant the past ten years. There were no cracks in my hands.

In training at American Airlines we go though “Image” which is training on how to keep your lipstick looking fresh and your hair and uniform looking tidy at the end of a twelve hour day and, famously, we are taught to keep our hands looking polished and immaculate.

That phone call was back in April, when the pandemic had already closed down New York state. While flight attendants are considered essential workers, demand for air travel had fallen off a cliff and the airlines all found themselves incredibly overstaffed. They began to offer leaves of absence to anyone who wanted one. 

I leapt at the chance to take a summer away from flying and experience life in a line of work I had been interested in for years. I started farming in May. 

My first day at the farm we seeded, or planted seeds into trays. I learned that seeds like to be buried twice their width down. We transplanted seedlings that had already had several weeks to grow in the greenhouse into the fields. For the first time I rode around on the back of the transplanter, a tractor fitted with seats behind it that float just over the rows so we can transplant the seedlings from their trays into the ground. We harvested hundreds and hundreds of pounds of radishes and Hakurei turnips and arugula. 

I was amazed at how fast and organized the other farmers were, moving from one task seamlessly to another, organized and holding the day's many moving parts in their minds. 

I was amazed at how dirty we all got. Every single day.

As we moved into summer I have continued to learn from my fellow farmer’s example how to work as a team. I'm learning how to adapt the plan to the weather, to the plants that aren't ready when you thought they would be and to the plants that came in sooner than you planned and to the seeds that didn’t germinate and then to change the plan again. My fellow farmers have taught me that it is possible to work in July's heat and without complaint, and that you can rally again, and again, and again. As many times as it takes to get the harvest in.

It's a pleasure to work alongside people doing their hearts' work.

In addition to all of the field work, I have really enjoyed running the CSA distribution on Saturdays mornings. It is so deeply satisfying to give the food we grew from tiny seeds, moved to the field, weeded, watered and then harvested -- it is so satisfying to then actually hand them to our members, who will go home and use them.

The summer internship at Poughkeepsie Farm Project is usually three months long. I began mine a month early, in May, because of the pandemic. But even four months wasn't enough. By the end of July I was beginning to feel sad that I would be leaving at the end of August and wouldn’t see the winter squash or the potatoes we planted get harvested. The thought of leaving the farm and going back to working indoors, where it is air conditioned and you always stay clean, was really starting to get me down. And then, another reprieve: they asked if I’d be willing to stay on until Thanksgiving. Again I jumped at the chance. 

After three months in the field I found out Leon was right. The dirt does not come out of the newly formed cracks in my hands. And I hope it doesn't anytime soon.

Growers Row: Hustle and Bustle

We farmers have been busy—so busy that we didn't even have time to write this post!

Decreasing the size of Workshare shifts (to maintain a safe working environment for our members) means we've lost 50 person-hours of labor a week to help manage weeds. 

Packing 530 boxes weekly means we're up 30 person-hours of labor a week just to get CSA shares out the door. 

And then there's harvest. On Mondays our all-women harvest crew pulls, cleans, and bands an average of 650 bunches of various crops. (Switching to pre-packed boxes has meant an increase in labor spent bunching and bagging things we would normally put out loose, like chard and arugula.) Last week we harvested over 2,000 lbs of cucumbers alone, and next week we'll need to start harvesting tomatoes, with eggplant close on their heels (if tomatoes had heels). 

Finally: In order to continue providing the freshest, most nutritious and delicious produce in the safest way possible for our members, we're having to rethink and re-create so many of our systems. Changing systems takes time... at a time of the season when there isn't a minute to spare. 

In short: we are so busy we don't even have time to write this post! 

So instead, here are some of the photos we've been too busy to share with you on Facebook or Instagram: 

We bought a fancy expanding roller-table for packing boxes every week. The set-up required some real feats of physical pretzeling, and squashed a few fingers in the process -- but here it is all set up, and working great!

Left: Isabel unpacks the rolling table. Right: Erin maneuvers it onto a pallet during set-up back in April, and secures it in our new-and-improved wash station in May.

We bought a new tent for our new drive-through CSA Distribution! We are upping our pepper-staking and trellising game this year, so keep your fingers crossed for a good pepper crop.

We've been checking the PYO flowers (they're open for picking this week!) and garlic clove differentiation (they're almost fully developed!)

To continue to offer PYO during the outbreak, we have installed a handwashing station and limited the number of people picking at any one time. So far it's working well - and we've welcomed many CSA members to pick one of the best strawberry crops we've seen in a few years!

New generations of baby ladybeetles have been flourishing on the farm and helping us keep our aphid problems in check! (Top: ladybeetle eggs hatching. Middle: ladybeetle larvae. Bottom: ladybeetle lovin'.)

PS If you see one of these little alligator-looking dudes in your CSA share, don't squish them! Put them in your backyard or in your garden where they can grow into adult ladybugs

CSA Harvests have brought in thousands of pounds of beautiful food every week, including some farmer-favorites like Yokatta-Na, Lacinato Kale, Dandelion Greens and Escarole. (CSA Members: check your email for shareinfo@farmproject to receive weekly recaps, recipes, storage tips and more for your weekly share.)

Every week, amid the chaos of keeping our drive-through CSA distribution running smoothly, we look forward to a colorful new note of encouragement and appreciation from Angela and her picky-eater kids! (We see you and YOU ROCK.)

Thank you to all of our CSA members for your encouragement, support, patience, and gratitude!

And now—back to the fields!

Growers Row: Everyone’s Here

Our Farm Crew Grew! 

Yes, we’re growing vegetables: arugula, beans, beets, bok choy, cabbage, carrots, chard, collards, cucumbers, eggplant, escarole, herbs, kale, peppers, potatoes, salad mix, scallions, tomatoes, winter squash and zucchini are already in the ground. It's been a cold spring, so most of them are still very small -- but they're surviving. And with the warmer temperatures at the end of May, soon they'll be thriving. 

But that’s not the kind of “growing” we mean. This year, we’re also growing in size. 

View fullsize

Andre, Isabel, Katy, Beth, Erin and Natalie receiving a lesson from Leon on planting potatoes

View fullsize

German, Andre, Erin and Leon assess the first CSA harvest

Our team is bigger than it’s been since 2017! As you may already know, PFP is temporarily suspending all workshare activities. (For the safety of our members and the farm crew, we will no longer be inviting 30+ members each week to participate in projects such as weeding and harvesting. Read more here.) All together, the suspension of workshare means that the farm is essentially losing 90 person-hours of labor every week. 

To compensate for this drastic loss, as well as the increase in labor in bunching, bagging, and packing that comes with the change to pre-packed shares, we’ve had to bulk up our crew. Our farm interns, who normally start at the beginning of June, started a month early. And we brought on a whole other team member. 

Which means: we have some “new” folks for you to meet! They may be new to the crew, but they’re not new to PFP. Read on to meet the most recent additions to our farm team:

Katy, Erin, Natalie, German, Leon, Andre and Isabel on a recent field walk

Katy Cassady, Farm Intern

Some of you may recognize Katy Cassady from her recipe sampling at CSA distributions over the past year, where she made beet brownies, pickled radishes, kohlrabi fritters and more delicious farm-fresh dishes. Prior to joining PFP as a Farm Intern, Katy was at the Culinary Institute of America. 

Beth Hentschel, Farm Intern

Beth first joined PFP as a CSA member in 2019, where she delighted in a cascade of winter squash and a varied assortment of radishes. A flight attendant by trade, Beth has taken an educational leave for the summer to grow some roots to balance her wings. 

Isabel Morrison, Farm Crew & Education Liaison

Many of you will recognize Isabel, either from her time as a Farm Intern with us last year, or from the four years she spent as an Education Intern during her time at Vassar. Isabel brings numerous seasons of experience to her position as Farm Crew & Education Liaison, and we are lucky to have her back on the team. 

Together with Andre Luiz-Domingues (Greenhouse & Plant Sale Coordinator), Erin Moylan (Wholesale Coordinator), German Gutierrez (Equipment Coordinator), Natalie Marshall (Foodshare Coordinator), Lauren Kaplan (Assistant Farm Manager) and Leon Vehaba (Farm Director), we have a solid team of nine. 

Our farm crew grew.... And now we have work to do. 

With the highest number of CSA members we’ve had to date, the least amount of help, and a new COVID-related curveball what feels like every week, we definitely have our work cut out for us. In all honesty, it’s daunting. But. With a team this hard-working, smart, capable, collaborative and enthusiastic -- it’s hard not to feel a sense of optimism for the days ahead.

Change is Here!

Change is Here!

In these uncertain times, we've been working hard to find new (and safe) ways to bring you the programming you enjoy and the produce that nourishes you. 

Plant Sale is online. The online farm store is open for plant sale purchases. Browse the Plant Sale today! Orders placed by Thursday May 7 will be available for pickup on Saturday May 9. Learn more or get growing. 

CSA (Farm) Share: Sale! All New Member Fees will be waived for the next 5 weeks! New Members: Sign up for your CSA (Farm) Share by Friday May 22 to receive the discount. Save today. 

Invite a Garden Educator into your home -- Virtually, of course! Our Education team has been hard at work putting together read-alongs and other materials to support students in distance learning and keeping gardens growing for when students return. Learn more.

Distribution is going drive-thru. Unlike our usual market-style pickup, CSA this year will begin with pre-packed shares. Make your selection for the week online, we'll pack it up and have it ready for you at our drive-thru distribution day. (As soon as it's safe to go back to our regular, market-style pickup -- you bet we will!) Learn more or get your share. 

Pick Your Own will continue. That's right: you can still pick! CSA members will sign up for a weekly picking slot, to limit the number of people picking and make social distancing easy. And we'll have hand-washing stations available in the field. Learn more or sign up for CSA to get PYO access.

Free meals made with PFP produce. In need of meals or groceries? Our amazing partners Dutchess Outreach and Community Collaborative (a collaborative community food program of Hope on a Mission, Community Matters II, ChangePoint Church and Bread of Life) are offering both, with PFP veggies! (We've donated 5,000 lbs and counting.) Learn more or support our donation efforts. **Note: This photo was taken mid-March before masks were recommended!**

Buying local is easy and safe. In addition to plants, vegetable boxes, and a new way to browse CSA (Farm) Shares, our farm store is an easy way to shop for local products like Back Paddock Farm grass-fed beef and North River Roasters fair trade coffees, roasted fresh here in Poughkeepsie. Support small businesses.

Check back for more updates to other farm & education programs. We'll be posting updates here first. 
Stay safe, take care of each other, and we’ll hope to see you (if only from behind a mask) soon.

Growers Row: COVID Can’t Stop This Tractor!

The farm crew has been moving full steam ahead. Because while so much is unknown, one thing is certain: we all have to eat. So, we have spent the last six weeks:

Seeding in the greenhouse. More than 100,000 seeds are starting their green little lives, some of them destined for our online Plant Sale while others are headed for farm fields (many for the first May Share harvest). (PS: Plant sale is online now!)

Clearing and replanting the high tunnels. Usually we have Vassar Intern help with this… but this year we’re doing it all ourselves. Goodbye winter greens, hello summer darlings. 750 cucumbers and over 1,000 tomatoes were planted in our high tunnels, cozy and protected from cold spring nights (and potentially deadly frosts), to give them a head-start to the season. 

Plowing our fields and laying down compost. We’ve made a lot of beds for all of those tens of thousands of seeds destined for the farm fields. 

Planting our first field crops! Arugula, scallions, beets and chard are starting to take root. Kale, collards, cabbage, bok choy and more are soon to follow suit. 

Showing our perennials some love. Rhubarb is up, and looking great so far. The raspberries have received their annual bedding of compost and woodchips, and the strawberries are looking very… er, green. (PS: Read about updates to PYO here.)

n addition to all of the work we are usually doing this time of year, we’ve also:

Launched an online store, where you can buy vegetables, CSA shares, and local products. 

Made some important decisions about what CSA and PYO will look like this year.

Scrambled to donate as much food as we can -- so far, we’ve donated 5,400 lbs of food and counting. 

Spent a sum total of 30+ person hours per week simply washing our hands. Crazy but true.  

And yet -- despite ramping up to full-steam-ahead way earlier in the season than anyone was expecting -- we are still finding energy to be excited about this season. We hope you are, too. Because we’ve got some good vegetables (and some good energy) coming your way. 

COVID can’t stop GOOD. And COVID can’t stop this tractor.

Growers' Row: April Showers Bring Gloves? and Gratitude

Everything is changing. 

We are washing and sanitizing everything. We are going through a lot of soap and a lot of gloves. We have given up our beloved “lunch club” where we take turns cooking lunch for each other. We are even eating at separate tables.

 It all feels so… strange. Little is certain.
Here is what we know:
We are still growing food.

We are showing up every day to plant seeds. To water them. To spread compost and make beds in the fields for them to grow in. 

We are finding ways to adapt our CSA to overcome these new challenges. We are exploring ways to keep everyone in it as safe as possible, while continuing to grow and distribute food as planned.

We are showing up for our students. While the Poughkeepsie Food Power at Home program is on hold due to school closures, we are collaborating with Chef Dave and PCSD to make bagged fresh vegetables available to our students and their families. Last week we distributed 180 bags of carrots, radishes, and turnips at 6 meal delivery sites in Poughkeepsie. This week we are delivering 200 bags.

View fullsize

View fullsize

We are showing up for our emergency food providers. Now more than ever, our Foodshare Program is needed. In the past four weeks we have scrambled to donate 3,000 pounds of produce to organizations like Dutchess Outreach, Hudson River Housing, Salvation Army, Second Chance Foods, and the Rondout Valley Growers Association. (If you haven’t already, join us on Instagram or Facebook to follow along with our community efforts.) 

We are still breathing. We are moving air in and out of our lungs, and not taking that for granted. 

We are feeling grateful to have fresh, nutritious food to eat -- and to be able to provide that food to others. 

We are feeling lucky to be able to come to work every day; to be able to perform an “essential service” for a living, and to love doing it.

View fullsize

View fullsize

Having work. Having food. Sadly there are plenty of folks who have not been assured of a constant supply of both of these things. But many of us -- at least until recently -- have not had to worry about these things. 

We have been able to take them for granted. 

We have even taken for granted the chance to have a face-to-face conversation; the twinkle in the eye of one of our CSA members whose deadpan jokes often go unnoticed by those around her. 

Food. Friends. Occupation. Now, more than ever, these feel like gifts. We will strive to hold these gifts in our conscious awareness -- now, and months from now. After folks have returned to work. After grocery stores have ceased to become scary places, and people can thoughtlessly brush shoulders in a crowded aisle. After things have returned to “normal”.

May you find moments of peace and gratitude amidst this chaos. May you find your own lessons in it, and ways to feed your body (and your soul) throughout it. 

Breathe.  

And if you’re hungry, reach out to us.