We’re turning our backyard into a mini-farm, and so can you!  We started with a yard full of weeds, neglected fruit trees, and trash from previous tenants.  With the help of our housemates and friends, we’re reclaiming the space to make it both beautiful and productive.  Check out the progression thus far:

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Somehow, the extended winter vacation of our dreams to the tropics came true this year — and we didn’t even have to venture beyond our front porches. It was all fun in the sun for weeks on end, but today’s wind chill and patchy clouds, rain, even hail, all remind us that we are still indeed in the middle of winter. The sun was a fantastic treat for all of our late fall plantings at Sprout’s Garden, which finally came to meet their harvests in the past few weeks, and it inspired us to think toward our spring plantings pronto!

Our most local sweet citrus from Arrowhead Farms in Corralitos, which matures on a different schedule from the citrus coming from the valley, is beginning to ripen. Look for their Algerian Mandarins now available, as well as more varieties in the coming weeks. We just received a fresh stock of Serendipity jams yesterday, which we will be getting online shortly. Tempting new flavors include Nectarine (oh stone fruit…) and Strawberry Meyer Lemon Marmalade. Mustard Greens are going off at Fish Princess Farm, as well as Mixed Kale bunches, Arugula, and Chard. Go green!

Here at SCLF, we’re all about the highest quality, best tasting foods — we’ve been out sampling around to build up our selection, but now it’s your turn to do some sampling. This Friday, come try the sweetest, juiciest Organic Raisins from Lone Oak Ranch. Then, the following Tuesday, we will be sampling out rich, creamy yogurt from St. Benoit. We missed ice cream for last Tuesday because Mission Hill sold out after Valentine’s Day — look forward to more ice cream sampling at a future time. See you Friday & Tuesday for some happy sampling!

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Hey everyone. We’re now open for Friday pick-up / delivery. Check our Friday Locations for the details.

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We have spent the past few days restocking and connecting with farms to bring back favorites and gather some new items for you to try.

First, we’re excited to announce that we just connected with Schoch Family Farmstead out of Monterey County! This third generation family farm is one of three remaining dairies in the county (there were hundreds when they began in 1944). The third generation has grown tired of selling off their milk to dairy co-ops for next-to-nothing, so the brothers traveled to Cal Poly to study cheesemaking. They have grown into cheese artists, now able to use a small percentage of their fresh, raw milk to craft some amazing cheeses! They go beyond most other cheeses labeled as “raw” — their cheeses are made from the freshest of milks, straight from the cow, still warm! While the sons make the cheese, their father does the majority of the milkings, remaining connected to the animals. They graze 100 cows on 100 acres in the Salinas Valley, where the rich soil and the temperate coastal climate provide ideal conditions for grazing and milk production. The brothers would love to see much less of their high-quality milk sent away, its integrity lost to homogenization and pasteurization — we’re honored to be bringing this cheese to you so we can all be a part of helping this, one of the last family dairies for miles and miles, continue forward. Let’s get family farms off the endangered species list. Oh and by the way — the cheese is absolutely amazing, and it’s quality speaks for itself!

And another amazing addition: Heirloom squash and pumpkins from Crystal Bay Farm in La Selva Beach! We offered some of these last year, and we’ve lagged a bit in getting them online, but now they are finally here. Jeff and Lori Fiorovich go out of their way to grow some of the coolest looking, best tasting squashes — heirloom varieties on the verge of extinction, crying for a return of customer appreciation! Over 25 varieties! This may be an overload of choices for some, accustomed to the same three or so varieties seen in grocery stores year after year, but these are worth adventuring to try. Lori claims to be one of the toughest squash critics around, passing up anything watery, stringy, mushy… seasons have taught them their favorites, and they also continue to try new varieties as they come across them. One of our favorites is the Thelma Sanders (aka Sweet Potato Squash), which has some of the richest, most dense flesh we’ve had, with a unique nutty sweet flavor. We’ve chosen a handful of other favorites up for your sampling, including Marina di Chioggia, Long Island Cheese, and Sucrine du Berry. Enjoy!

And finally, you’ll find a freshly replenished inventory of Happy Girl Kitchen preserves, as well as a fresh slicing of Garden Variety Cheese wedges. Thank you for your interest in local foods! See you Tuesday!

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Wow — many great new products this week to mention. But first, we want to point out that we narrowed the pick-up time for the Live Oak Grange once again. It will now be from 4:00-5:00pm. We would also like to announce the specifics on our three new locations:

Felton: 4:30 – 5:00pm, The corner of Hihn st and Highway 9, (Near Rite Aid).

Scott’s Valley: 3:50 – 4:20pm, King’s Village shopping center parking lot, In the back near Tony and Albas & next to the bus station

Los Gatos: 4:00 – 5:00 pm, Levy Family Campus APJCC, 14855 Oka Road (Lark Ave. Exit), Far entrance near the back of the building.

Tell your friends!

We’re wandering outside of our radius this week to bring some juicy fruits onto the scene. We can’t seem to find a good supply of citrus close by (let us know if you are aware of one!), so we are hooking up with Twin Girls Farms on their farmers market route. They fall within a 150 mile radius instead — and they are bringing us Satsuma Mandarins, Valencia Oranges, Pomegranates, and Hachiya Persimmons this week!

We’ve also added bottled Apple Juice, Pear Juice, and Apple Cider Vinegar from Nana Mae’s Organics in Sebastopol, which is a few miles outside of a 100 mile radius. They use their estate grown heirloom apples and pears to make their delicious juices and vinegar. Find the juices in the “Preserved Food” section.

Also, noticing our apple selection has gotten slim, we’ve reconnected with Silva Orchards from Watsonville for some Newtown Pippin and Pink Lady apples. We’ll be adding two new cheeses from Garden Variety Cheese by tomorrow — Moonflower and Black-eyed Susan. Rebecca of Garden Variety let us know that she will be out of cheese for the season by next month, so enjoy it while you can. She will spend the winter focusing on nurturing her little lambs (if anyone wants to help, let us know, and we can link you up) and she will return to cheese making in the spring.

See you Tuesday!

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Hey folks, today we went on a much needed spontaneous road trip. We headed south and stopped by the new Happy Girl Kitchen / cafe in Pacific Grove hoping they might have some local goodies for us. Alas, they were closed for a workshop; we could see Jordan perched up on a stool lecturing a very attentive crowd of food preserving pupils. From there we continued down the coast to Big Sur. It’s kind of sad — I’ve been living in the South Bay area almost my entire life and have only been to Big Sur once when I was a teenager. It’s absolutely amazing; the vastness of the wilderness was dizzying. Being mainly in cities for the last year, our eyes have gotten used to closed off spaces and things like reading and computer work. It was almost like an optical illusion looking at those peaks. They seemed to be wavy like some sort of dream.

We pretty much beat the rain, but we felt it come down on our skin — especially Mira because she was shirtless. She loves being outdoors. When we are out at the farm or in our backyard garden she starts batting and grabbing all the plants and flowers; it’s quite adorable. Anyhow, we already knew but we were reassured that she is a great hiking companion, and we are planning another trip down there. Next time we will do an overnight hike to the hot springs.

On the food front:

Last night I made polenta out of the cornmeal from Pheobe Farm, topped with home made red sauce. I used tomatoes and fresh herbs from our backyard, some dried dry farmed tomatoes from Happy Boy, cippolini onions from Coke Farm, Garlic from Pinnacle, and salt from Big Sur. Eleanor is not a fan of cooking with oil, which is definitely a challenge for me. I am so used to making a base of olive oil sauteed onions and garlic, as this combo pretty much makes any meal. So last night I just chunked the tomatoes and started cooking them down, added the onions and garlic, soaked the dried tomatoes in hot water, drained them, and added them to the sauce pot… and let it all cook down for about 45 minutes. After it had cooled a little bit, I added a ton of the olive oil from Oils of Paicines. We love that oil and practically drink it — the two of us go through a gallon of that in a little over a month. The sauce was great, even without the cooked oil, and topping the polenta was delish!

Tonight we had some steamed kabocha squash and a salad with grated apple and watermelon radishes. Kabochas are seriously our favorite squash right now. Just add oil and salt or heck even just eat it plain. They have a great hearty texture and you can even eat the skin.

Lastly while we were on our way back from Big Sur we stopped by Whole Foods in Monterey. It’s the only natural food store that we knew of on the way back to our house, which is in Corralitos now. While we were there, we sampled a great new local cheese. It comes from the Salinas Valley and is called Schoch Farmstead. They use raw cows milk and make a few different types of aged cheese. We are for sure going to contact them to get it listed on SCLF. Check back for that soon.

Until next time… We’ll have photos of our new open pantry and more..

Schoch Brothers

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If you had been following our posts, you probably noticed we haven’t had any for a while. The short of it — we’ve been so so busy, moving to a new place out in Corralitos, and then of course the usual farm business baby trio — going to bed felt more important for a minute.

But we are still livin’ la vida local!!! Right now, Noah has a tamale casserole in the oven, using locally grown and ground cornmeal from Phoebe Farm, plus dragon’s tongue fresh beans from our farm, some pumpkin from our backyard, carrots, and a sauce sprouted almonds, red bell pepper, and smoked peppers from Crystal Creek Farm. I’m waiting to try some!

In the meantime, our adventures in local food have caught us feeling quite hungry a couple of times lately. With being so busy and living further from our office, we’re having to get into the habit of thinking ahead about what we’re going to eat. On Monday, we found ourselves knee deep in work, but foodless — no way to get prepared food to eat on the spot. Even though many restaurants use local ingredients in Santa Cruz, they also include non-local ingredients. We could grab some fruits or vegetables from the grocery store, but we didn’t have a way to prepare anything, and it was difficult to tell what was truly local, even upon asking employees. I found myself starving, but Noah saved the day, and whipped out a magnificent salad to feed us both. Now we’re keeping our rice cooker at the office so we can at least steam some veggies on the spot if need be!

Another time, we traveled to San Jose to take our car into the shop. Their only natural foods store is Whole Foods, and there it was especially difficult to find anything to eat. I ate as many strawberries and raspberries as I could stomach — still felt hungry. So many items just say they are from “California.” Kind of vague. But Noah found local cheese from Cowgirl Creamery, actually, and was pretty satisfied.

Our previous living situation had us without a stove, which wasn’t a huge loss for us as we often eat salads and smoothies anyhow, but we like to cook, too! So, since we have moved, we are enjoying having a stove again. The other night, Noah made a simple-and-simply-delicious blended soup with carrot and celery root. I’ve been enjoying the roots raw as well, making them into thin noodles with our mandoline, and then tenderizing them by adding a little salt and crunching them with my hands. Then I add some olive oil, or some other sort of dressing.

Dinner is here — yum!! We have been going a little heavy on the roots, so this is a great change!

One more piece of news. Our local foods potluck in the park was a success! Noah, Daniel, and I made some roasted roots and salad, and we ate them together under an oak tree in the rain!! We were beginning to think everyone else was at home cozying up with a book and a hot bowl of soup for the season’s first rain, when two Santa Cruz High School students (twins even) showed up with a pot of vegetable soup and a pear crisp, all using foods from their garden! They were awesome — unfortunately I accidentally ran the piece of paper with their names and emails through the wash… Mimi & (not sure of your name…) — thanks for coming!

Until next time.

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As I made lunch today, I was pondering the excellent fat sources we have available in our area. I made a dip for Noah & myself out of soaked almonds, avocado, lemon juice, Crystal Creek Farm’s smoked Jimmy Nardello and mature padron peppers, olive oil, chives, garlic, and salt — loaded with high quality fats and completely delicious. Healthy fats like these are an important part of our diet. And other sources that fall within 100 miles include raw dairy products (pasteurization and homogenization transform the fats and make them less usable by the body), grass-fed meats (these actually have omega 3 fats when the animals are pastured), pastured eggs, walnuts, olives…

I was just thinking how grateful I am to have such access to these foods. In some other areas, particularly to the north, there aren’t as many fat sources available — especially not vegetarian. I may be a little less excited about eating locally if I were missing olive oil. I suppose I could turn to butter, but I’m not much of an animal products eater. If I were stranded in some northern climate with no imported foods, I suppose I would have to reconsider.

Until then, glorious fats, I thee wed. I’m sharing our recipe from today because it was just that good!!! Keep in mind that it is an approximation… I didn’t measure.

Smoked Pepper Dip

1 cup almonds, soaked overnight
1 small avocado (or 1/2 medium or 1/4 large)
2 tbsp olive oil
2 smoked Jimmy Nardello peppers
2 smoked Mature Padron peppers, seeds removed
1/2 cup lemon juice
1 small clove of garlic
a few chives
1/4-1/2 cup water for consistency
Salt to taste

We blended this in our high-powered Vitamix blender. It may work in a regular blender too with extra water, or maybe a food processor — you may need to soak the dried peppers to get them to mix in well.

Enjoy the dip with fresh veggies!

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Exciting local food news from the up at the farm on Highland ave. We just planted out 300 baby kale plants. Along with those (dino and red russian) we are growing 5 other varieties still waiting to get put in. The garden is going all out for the winter and fall. We’re planting our favorite lettuces and greens like arugula, mizuna, tatsoi etc.. and a few different salad mixes. We’re also planting out lots of delicious root crops like rainbow carrots, daikon, watermelon radish, parsnips, rutabagas and more. And then there’s the four varieties of cabbage and broccoli and 5 varieties of cauliflower we have in the ground now.

As far as the food scene at our house goes, we had another super busy day, as usual. We steamed a huge pot of mixed root veggies: parsnips from Route 1, inca gold potatoes from Lonely Mountain, carrots from Happy Boy, and celery root from Coke Farm. We had our regular smoothie midday with tons of super nutritious protein rich bee pollen (this stuff is our steak). We’ve been loving the asian pears from Arrowhead Farm and from Kashiwase Farm. Whenever I crave a snack, I just grab an asian pear, maybe even two. They are crisp and watery — downright satisfying.

So much great food to enjoy right now. While riding my bike today, I noticed some huge pineapple guavas that had fallen off of a tree. They are almost ready. These are some of my favorite winter fruits! Our new house has a 200 ft. hedgerow of these trees. We will be sharing with everyone when the season rolls in.

But for now — bed.

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