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As the summer winds down, I have been thinking about the future of the urban farm. My goal for next year is to produce enough vegetables to both feed my family and sell some at a local farmer's market.

I need more space!

I have a couple of options, in addition to the new raised beds I'm going to add next year...

1) Use land in other people's backyards. This would be the ideal way for me to keep my urban farm truly urban, while also putting someone's abandoned garden to good use or transforming lawn into something productive. Additionally, people who may want a vegetable garden-- but don't want to take care of one-- can enjoy the look of a garden along with eating fresh veggies grown right at home.

It might look something like this: I plant four plots in your back yard. You provide the chemical-free land and water and I do all the planting and maintenance. Two plots I harvest for me and two plots I harvest for you. (If you're interested in this option, please let me know!)

2) Rent or buy land. Buying an acreage is something we have been thinking about as a back-up plan. For now we could use the land for planting veggies and fruits and eventually build a house. I like living in the city, however, so this is an issue to overcome. Another option is renting land (an acre or less) and using it as my urban farm extension.


This week at the urban farm:

As I remove plants from the beds, some of them go to the chickens. In this photo they are enjoying a green bean plant. Most of the late pods I kept for next year's seed, but they got to enjoy eating these extra plants.

For the beds that are finished for the year I am using winter rye as a cover crop. This keeps the soil in place during the fall rains and adds organic material. It also suppresses weeds and just looks nice and lush!

Fall carrots are coming along.

Spinach and lettuce should grow well into the fall. I am planning to get some into the cold frame and see how far into the winter we can have salads.

Chicken dinner

We here at the urban farm are a multi-generational household. My parents are big fans of the hens (or as they call them, "the girls") and are, in fact, the reason we have chickens. I had been talking about possibly keeping hens for years, so for my birthday this year they broke down and gave me a coop. I say "broke down," because at first they weren't big fans of the idea of chickens in the city. But now things have changed. My mom even has a Buff Orpington who must have imprinted on her early. The bird now thinks she is her mother and follows her around incessantly.

Two Australorps and a Buff enjoying a zucchini.

So it was surprising to me when my dad texted the other day asking if I'd like to have chicken and dumplings for dinner. I believe the text read something like, "you provide the Australorp and I'll make dinner." What?!? Was he saying we should eat one of our hens (who are just now barely starting to earn their keep by laying eggs)?

Not sure they are really sweet or docile. But they are beautiful.

Apparently my parents have noticed that the chickens have been doing some singing. Now that they are laying a few eggs, the hens (mostly the Australorps) sing what is called an egg song. Every heard one? You would definitely know it! Here's an example I found (hopefully I can catch mine in the act one day soon and film it for posterity): egg song. They only do this once a day, so it's hard to catch.

I enjoy living in town and actually like to hear our neighborhood's sounds--song birds, playing dogs, a bicycle bell, the owl that wakes me up occasionally, happy children, the trash truck, and even the noisy geese as they make their final decent to the pond on fall evenings. So I hope my parents and neighbors can find some joy in their song.

Have a great week everyone!

Psst... check out my Instagram photos! (Click that little blue button at the top right of this page)

Recipe day: what to do with all those cherry tomatoes

I've had my second year in a row with a bumper crop of Sunburst cherry tomatoes. I was amused the other day walking through our local grocery chain when I saw this display:

10.5 ounces of conventionally grown tomatoes for $3.49 seemed like a good deal until I looked back and realized that so far this summer I've harvested over 10 pounds of these tomatoes from two plants (not including the ones we pick and eat while working outside). And my tomatoes have zero food miles and are grown organically.

Cherry tomatoes are often very prolific, but who REALLY needs 10+ pounds of cherry tomatoes over just a few summer weeks? There are only so many salads one can eat, only so many tomatoes the neighbors will take, and even though the chickens love to eat them, it seems like such a waste to feed them to the birds.

My friend Molly gave me a wonderful tip last summer on how to dry and save these tiny, sweet tomatoes. I tried it last year and liked it so much I knew I needed to share this secret. Whether you grow your own or you get too many cherry tomatoes from your CSA, this is a wonderful way to stretch the joy of the harvest out into the winter without too much trouble.

You can use these tomatoes in the same way you would use any sundried tomatoes. We especially like them on pizza or tossed with pasta, olive oil, and shredded parmesan. I've also thrown them in stir fried vegetables for an added sweet and tangy flavor.

How to do it:

• Lightly grease a baking dish
• Pre-heat oven to 250F
• Chop tomatoes in half and arrange them skin side down
• Bake for 2 hours (I check them about half way through)
• The tomatoes are done with they have mostly dried out
• When finished cooking, allow the baking dish to cool completely
• Place baking dish in the freezer for a few hours until the tomatoes are frozen
• Using a spatula, pick up tomatoes and store them in a baggie or other freezer-safe container
• The frozen tomatoes should last until the next summer

Tomatoes ready for the oven.

Dried out and ready to freeze. Like berries, freezing these separately on a tray keeps them from sticking together and makes them easier to use.

Oven-dried cherry tomatoes will be delicious in a fast weekday meal or on my Super Bowl pizza this winter!

In other news!

The little rain garden that I planted early in the summer has attracted Monarch butterflies, and we now have caterpillars. I am very excited about this urban farm update!

Have a great week everyone!

The good, the bad, and the really darn ugly

Since returning on Sunday from a camping trip, I have been very busy this week harvesting, mowing, weeding, and cleaning up plots. As I start to take out the old summer veggies and plant the fall lettuce, spinach, and cabbage, I'm taking a good look at how everything has gone so far this season.

I gorge myself on salads all spring. About the time I am ready for salads again, fall is here I can plant them to my heart's stomach's content.

I'm still tallying up total pounds of vegetables and fruits produced, but this is my photo evaluation of things that are going well and some things that are just plain ugly.

First the ugly:

The tomatoes aren't picturesque as they once were. After a couple of strong thunderstorms, all of the tomatoes and tomatillos are lying sideways. The chickens are enjoying eating the ones that fall on the ground (luckily not too many), and tomatoes on the ground are also easy targets for hungry prairie voles. But nonetheless, the tomatoes are producing very well.

The bad (also really ugly):

The popcorn was almost completely devoured (most likely) by raccoons. But better them eat the corn than the chickens!

The potted butternut squash that stayed very small and hasn't produced a single fruit convinced me that I need to learn more about growing plants in containers.

And because I like to end on a happy note... the good:

In our case the chicken came before the egg. This is the Buff Orpington hen who's egg is pictured below. And as of yesterday there is a second chicken laying eggs!

Egg #1 (It was delicious!) These first eggs are tiny, but experienced urban chicken ranchers have told me that they will get larger over time as the hens mature.

I canned Bloody Mary Mix for this first time. Since I have so much pasta sauce, I decided to divert some tomatoes into brunch.

I've noticed a dramatic increase in pollinators with the addition of the teeny tiny rain garden. I am very pleased!