Potatoes. Why Did It Have To Be Potatoes?

My task this week was to cut 350 pounds of seed potatoes up for planting.  John has been kind enough to give me tasks that take my bad back into account, so I was comfortably situated at a rescued restaurant counter.  Even so, being confronted with all those potatoes gave me flashbacks to every soup kitchen I ever worked in.  "Hey, new girl, start peeling that pile of potatoes.  We'll tell you when you're finished."  At least this time, I didn't have to peel them.

Seed potatoes look just like the regular potatoes you get at the store.  A lot of people throw out their potatoes when the eyes sprout.  Next time yours look like this, cut them up so there's an eye on each piece and plant them.

After about 5 hours of work with a pocketknife, I was done.  Finally.  This is what 350 pounds of potatoes looks like.

After all that cutting, it was time to visit the greenhouse.  I didn't take any pictures last week, but there wasn't much to see.  All the gazillion dozens of tomato seeds I'd planted had yet to sprout, leaving me fretting that I had done something wrong.  I was quite relived to see them growing quite happily this week.

Last week, I planted a more varieties of tomatoes than I could count.  Most of them were seeds John got from trading online with other growers.  (Check out Tomatoville if you want in on the action.)  All told, he estimates there are more than 40 varieties working their way through the dirt and into the sun.  He's also growing more than 100 varieties of peppers.  (Traders should go to ChiliGrower or The Hot Pepper.)  They're not producing much yet, but some of the winter ones have struggled valiantly and managed to produce some tiny peppers.  Here's a Cleo's Dragon Habanero, your requisite pepper porn for the week.

That little beauty is about the size of the tip of my thumb.  John described it as very sweet up front, but then building to a very surprisingly hot level in the finish.

Out in the field, I met Ben.  He's worked for John for the past few seasons.  He spent the day busily weed whacking down the overwintered patches of greens to make way for new plantings.  There's already a nice bed of lettuces growing.

Some of the overwintered greens are still worth something before they're whacked into oblivion.  This patch of brassica and arugula has gone to blossom.  Since the blossoms are both beautiful and edible, don't be surprised if you see them garnishing your plate at Bistro Bethem.

Ben was also sorting through some hops seedlings that had overwintered.  Not all of them will make it, but there was enough to make a good start.  Eventually they'll be trellised along some teepee-shaped chains so they can stretch themselves to the sun.  Hops are beautiful when they're flowering, so I can't wait to see them grow.

Those are all Cascade, but there will be Centennial and Crystal as well.

All of this activity was, of course, supervised by the farm's manager, Sophie.  She was feeling quite lazy this week, but managed to plant herself in the middle of all the activity with a great vantage point to our hard work.  She really understands the fundamentals of good management.

Speaking of great vantage points, this was my view for the day.

The farm has over 500 cattle.  The dairy ones, like these, are Holsteins.

The meat ones are primarily Angus, with some Hereford blood mixed in.  Thirty years ago, there were about 100 dairy farms in Spotsylvania County.  Today, there are just 4.  The milk was once processed here in Fredericksburg, 26 miles from the farm.  Later, it had to go to Charlottesville, about twice as far.  Now, it has to go all the way to Norfolk, more than 150 miles away.  There, it gets mixed in with milk from all over the place and processed.  As much as I try to buy local, I've discovered there's really no such thing as local milk around here.  (There is, but it's totally illegal to buy it, and the government gets downright cranky about it.)  I have yet to see John mention the dairy side of the farm without hearing, "the dairy industry is ridiculously over-regulated."  I'm still learning the full extent of what that means.  But don't worry--you'll be learning it right along with me.