Kardashian vegetables…

As I walked through our celeriac crop the other day, I realised that if all food was judged on appearances, then celeriac would never make the cut.

The beautiful vegetables of the tomato and pepper families would be right up there with the grand and beautiful Kardashians, but not celeriac. It scrapes the bottom of the barrel, but of course as we all know very well it is generally what is on the inside and not what is on the outside that matters. Where celeriac is concerned it packs a decent enough punch, it is of the celery family and has an amazing flavour and is loaded with vitamin C and vitamin K.

As with all beautiful and their not so beautiful vegetable cousins (and in my view all vegetables are beautiful so there will be no discrimination here please) the fresher they are the higher the nutritional content and the better the flavour and taste. So, what are we talking about here, well the point is I guess: size and shape doesn’t really matter when it comes to vegetable pecking order, but freshness does.

Now let’s take a magic transport capsule out of our mucky celeriac fields and transport ourselves into a glitzy shiny supermarket aisle, the kind that adorn our towns up and down the country, meccas to the perfect Kardashian like vegetable, clad in their shiny glitzy plastic wrapper, perfect of tone, shape, and proportions, to be admired and revered by all. You will find none of the “Ugly” crowd here they have not made the cut.

The forked carrots, the stumpy parsnips, the mishappen swedes and the knobbly ugly celeriac’s all get stopped at the door.  You will not find these reminders of an imperfect food system in these halls of perfection. Ah, but maybe we have this upside down and back to front, surely this cosmetic perfection is not what we should all aspire to, maybe the Instagram-able carrot in all its glory is not the pinnacle of our food system, maybe just maybe there is another way?   Maybe, it is time to start seeing the celeriac for the celeriac!

If one third of all food is dumped and part of that waste is created by food graded out and rejected based on shape, looks and imperfections at the supermarket’s door, then isn’t it time to get on board with accepting these nonconforming characters. 

As earth’s population grows and as the penny finally drops and we realise that land is actually finite, (we cant actually make anymore, the wealthy sand bars of Dubai aside) and if the only choice we have is to chop down more trees to grow more soya to feed more cows, maybe it is time to say enough is enough and firmly invite the celeriac’s of the world to the table.

If we can cut down food waste then we need less land to grow food, because we need to grow less food. (The argument to grow less soya to feed less cows by actually eating less cows is a story for another day, an adventure that we will embark on soon.)

Although this has been written very tongue in cheek, we as always have the power right here at our finger tips to make a change, to reduce our waste, to choose the beauty on the inside, and if you really want to go out on a limb and be adventurous then we have decided to reduce our Rescue box to €15 (class one produce to fill this box would cost €30). This is a box of 10-12 items, chosen on the day, they may not be perfectly perfect, but they will be good enough to eat, and we think it is better to offer these boxes, invest the time in grading, checking and building these boxes than contributing to that already bulging mountain of food waste. This is in our view a win-win. You win you get perfectly fine produce for half price, we win as we don’t waste the food, and the planet wins.

Finally, here’s to all the imperfect celeriac’s of the world, may they reign supreme and here’s to you for bringing a bit of sanity back to our food system.

As always thank you for your support.

Kenneth

PS We have received the first delivery of Irish organic apples this week from Richard Galvin in Waterford and they are amazing to see them and all our other fantastic IRISH organic produce we have here click here.

The rain, the muck and being grateful

As I was walking the crops the other evening and the sun was setting on our fields, so early now compared to even a month ago, it struck me as it always does how beautiful and bountiful our natural world is.

The rain of the last week or so has left the land sodden and mucky. Thankfully we had harvested a decent haul of parsnips before the land became unmanageable, parsnips can be very difficult to get out of the ground when you are knee deep in water. We are harvesting the last of the outdoor celery this week and not a moment too soon, as the mild wet conditions have led to the start of a fungal infection in the plants which is common at this time of year (in the absence of chemicals). We will move into the polytunnels which should give us another 2-3 weeks supply of IRISH organic celery. Our first harvest of celeriac is starting this week, a very underrated and sometimes labelled “UGLY” vegetable. I would heartily disagree on that one, after all its often what is on the inside that counts, and its beauty is definitely on the inside: the smell and the flavour of fresh celeriac is something that is quite amazing!

Our own freshy harvested carrots are still in season but not for much longer, thankfully we have a great supply of fresh Irish carrots for some time to come yet. We are delighted to be getting the first harvest of Irish organic brussel sprouts from Padraigh Fahy of Beechlawn organic farm this week.  They are easily one of my favourite vegetables of the year, and his sprouts are definitely worth the wait. Emmanuel and Brenda have been very busy harvesting our own leeks every week and they are spectacularly fresh, so rich in flavour and taste, and there is nothing like smelling the crates of leeks as they come out of the field. There are all the other usual Irish organic staples, kales, mushrooms, herbs, winter cabbage, potatoes and more. We are grateful for the food we can produce here and feel lucky to have deep fertile soil and plenty of water to allow the plants to thrive.  (Too much water by a long way in some parts this week).  Some areas of the world are not so lucky.

A new report from the UN University (UNU) in Germany has set out a series of risk tipping points that are approaching. The groundwater risk tipping point has already been passed in some countries, such as Saudi Arabia, and is close in India, the report said. Saudi Arabia was a major wheat exporter in the 1990s but now imports the cereal after the groundwater wells were exhausted. It is undeniable that we are deep into our planetary overdraft with the limit looming, the natural equilibrium that leaves earths ecosystems in balance has been dangerously tipped towards the unsustainable, and we now find ourselves in unchartered territory. The floods, the fires and the droughts that are now occurring with a ferocious intensity and a frequency that was unthinkable only a decade ago.  The highest monthly surface temperature ever recorded was in July and was probably the hottest the planet has been in 100,000 years. We have accomplished all of this is in the last 200 years.

But there is much to be hopeful about too: the speed of adoption of renewable energy, the electrification of our transport system, the shift to local more plant-based diets, and an overwhelming desire for change and demand for sustainable practices from businesses and government by you and I. This is the world we advocate for a new world where nature is respected as a resource to be protected. After all, it provides everything we now have: our food, homes, and clothes and even the peace of mind that a walk in nature brings.

This is the future that we vote for, this is the future that we fight every day for. We know that we don’t always get it right, that we have a long way to go, that we are not perfect, but we aspire to doing better every single day.

Thank you for your support and Happy Halloween!

Kenneth

This couldn’t be more important

Plastic, plastic everywhere, 12 million tonnes are dumped into the oceans every year, and there are nearly 5 trillion pieces of plastic floating in the ocean. Plastic production has increased from 2.1 million tonnes in 1950 to 391 million tonnes in 2021!!  And get this every piece of plastic ever produced is still with us somewhere, (unless it has been burned). The largest market for plastic today is packaging materials. (Ref National Geographic).

If you follow us on Instagram check out my latest little video talking about plastic in one of our polytunnels, I recognise the irony here by the way, but you will need to watch to figure out why 🙂

We have been grappling with this plastic challenge on our farm for some time and we still have much to do, but it struck me today as I was talking to Ella our packing manager that the detail really does matter.

I was asking whether we could use tape guns to help with wrapping our courier boxes and she told me, the paper tape we use doesn’t work with them. Some time ago we switched from the plastic tape to the harder to use and more expensive paper tape. It was worth it though, it looks better, it feels better and crucially it is NOT PLASTIC!

That’s a small detail but an important one. Fossil fuel companies are now looking to push more plastic on us as the pressure comes on them to stop burning their dirty hydrocarbons. They make the stuff and giant food businesses and retailers profit from the stuff, so why aren’t they responsible for the cost of cleaning up this mess.

Our food system is now nearly 100% reliant on throwing packaging away after a single use and we really have to work hard if we want to choose differently. As much as emissions from burning fossil fuels such as carbon dioxide and methane are the unseen waste products of our energy system, plastic waste is the very real and identifiable byproduct of our current retail food system

There is no easy quick fix to this problem.  Supermarkets and large food manufacturers have the resources and the power to make far reaching and profound changes. But when profit is their ultimate goal, their actions will only align with sustainability when the consumer clearly demands it and they know their business will suffer if they don’t toe the line.  

16 years ago I spoke with a supplier about compostable bags, I am reasonably confident that he thought I had lost my marbles.   It wasn’t until some years later that compostable bags were available that would keep our salad fresh and now that’s all we use.

But of course, reuse is the holy grail of packaging, a tricky and costly system to put in place. Although I do recall once a upon a time not that long ago all milk used to come in glass bottles that were recollected and reused.

We do everything we can to eliminate plastic.  On our local delivery routes in Galway, Dublin, Wicklow, Mayo and Limerick we recollect our boxes each week and reuse them up to 10 times. Where we can’t recollect our boxes for all our customers on our National delivery routes we only use compostable materials and the packaging to protect your goods is made via a shredder from waste cardboard in our packing shed (which intself is reuse).

All of these materials can be recycled or composted at home. (as an aside: remember on your compost heap you need three parts carbon to one part nitrogen.!) Where possible all our loose produce is packed in paper, and for fresh greens such as salad we use compostable plant based bags. We also have an amazing array of plastic free groceries. Where ever you see the “pf” on our site you will know the grocery product is plastic free.   

So, where you can, avoid plastic, it is hard I know, but remember all these little positive changes are picked up by the big producers and this effects real change. We have more power than we realise.

Thanks for your support. 

Kenneth

PS We don’t know why but over the last couple of weeks we have seen a fall off in ordering, we know with the half term coming up we expect a tough couple of weeks.  As a small independent retailer and of course a food producer, every order counts. So please if you can at all keep us in mind for your fresh produce and sustainable groceries, thank you! Click here to see all the  IRISH organic produce we have here.

Do you have 2 minutes to help?

Glyphosate Aka Roundup; we all have heard the name it is the most ubiquitous herbicide used on the planet, nearly 10 billion kg have been used globally.  

It is a probable-carcinogen and it now contaminates most non-organic food stuffs. 

Today Friday there is a vote to renew the licence for it’s use in the EU for a further 10 years, please if you have a minute put your name to this petition to stop its renewal. 

Using chemicals to fight nature will never work. In the short term it may give a temporary reprieve from a certain disease or pest, but that pest will come back stronger and more resistant next time. It is in a way a self-perpetuating industry and GMO’s are another extension of this very lucrative business. 

Bayer the company that bought out Monsanto (the makers of Roundup) are lobbying heavily for its continued use, it’s a massive money spinner for them, why wouldn’t they? They argue its safe, remember tobacco companies said the same thing about smoking! 

But we don’t need this stuff on our food, we don’t need it contaminating our waterways, destroying our biodiversity. 

Generally, the application of Roundup is the first step when a conventional farmer sets about reseeding fields, or prior to sowing conventional grain, or in fact for weed control prior to harvest of conventional tillage crops. The application of roundup to grain crops prior to harvest is mind-blowing. This stuff is systemic meaning it gets absorbed into the plant, it stays there, and as the grain goes to be processed to flour it stays there. 

As a trained chemist, I feel strongly that these chemicals have no place in our food chain. They hurt our bodies, they hurt our land, and it begets the questions are these chemicals necessary? Is there an alternative path we can thread? A resounding ‘of course there is’ would be our answer. 

If you follow us on Instagram check out our most recent video there are plenty of “weeds” growing between our kale plants and yet the kale is amazingly healthy and happy and vibrant. Not only that some of these “weeds” are carry over from our green manure of clover and phacelia from the year pervious. They serve many valuable functions, they allow biodiversity to flourish, nature is diverse it is not a monoculture. They also help prevent leaching of valuable nutrients from the soil, effectively acting as a winter cover crop. 

When we first took on my granddad’s land here, it was not in great, shape nutrient levels were low and there was a very challenging dockleaf problem, but over the years through careful management we have reduced the burden of docks, there are still dock leaves growing but they are not a problem now. Total elimination was not necessary. 

We feel that there is a viable alternative path we can follow for growing good quality, tasty food without the use of chemicals, we have been at it for 18 years now, we still have a lot to learn but one thing is for sure, we will never ever look to the chemical cabinet for a solution to any of our challenges. 

Thanks as always for your support. 

Kenneth

PS Don’t forget that our Farm shop is open every Saturday from 10am to 5pm, H91F9C5. Also we have the first amazing savoy cabbage and crown prince pumpkin available from Padraigh Fahy in Beechlawn, plus our own gorgeous bunched carrots, fresh parnsips and leeks, see all the great IRISH organic produce we have here.

Some cool drone footage, and my thoughts on food waste…

First, I want to show you something: Darragh Wynne from the charity Goal Ireland was here a few weeks back and invited me to talk for a video, if you want to learn a little bit more about and see some cool drone footage of our farm (and even catch a glimpse of George and Florence check this video out.

George and Florence are happy pigs, they couldn’t actually have a better life, I really don’t think they could. Not only do they get to roam around nearly 2 acres of old and newly established forests, they have a dry straw lined shed to sleep in and probably best of all they get fed waste organic veg once a day. They are as happy as two pigs in muck could be. 

But they fit into this story very well, as they are the last step in our grandly termed food waste reduction strategy, we don’t have a formal document or anything like that, but we do have a belief system around food waste. 

So here is a crazy fact, one third of all food produced on the planet is wasted.  The area required to produce that food is 16 million km2, which is roughly an area the same size as Russia, which is a very big place. 

We all know we need to take urgent steps to reduce our impact on the planet, no surprise there, and as we pass yet another mind boggling climate record with September being the warmest month ever by a long way, that action is critical. 

So wouldn’t it be an amazing if we could cut the land used for agriculture by 16 million square kilometers and instead grow forestry? Of course, it would. 

But where is all this wasted food coming from? Well, that is where I will tell you the second part of my story, last week we took a delivery of carrots, we weren’t very pleased with these carrots, they were Irish, they were organic, but they were massive, and I mean they were big but we got our heads together and figured out how we could prevent them ending up in the bin. 

So, we set about trying to use them to sell them, to make sure we wasted as little as possible. There is one thing I can absolutely guarantee had these carrots landed at the door of a supermarket they would have been rejected, sent back, or wasted. 

Herein lies one of our bugbears, supermarkets insisting without remorse on unforgiving specifications and when produce does not meet them refusing to sell it or accept it. We have been there many moons ago, once upon a time having supplied supermarkets.  In the growing season we have had this year, produce may come out maybe a little smaller or bigger or twisted or forked and that in our view is the beauty of nature.  We wont grade out twisted parsnips, or forked carrots. 

Of course, there is still the possibility that produce will not meet our quality requirements, and this is where we do have a very well-defined system and we put a fair amount of effort into it to make it work. 

Maciek our quality manager has done amazing work creating his “Rescue boxes” each week these boxes are filled with “Class II” produce.  If we can’t use the produce in the rescue boxes our team get it, and if it is unusable it ends up in one of two places, actually one of three places! 

It either A. Goes to one of our three compost bays, or B. go to George’s belly or C. goes to Florence’s belly! 

(Interesting fact: We have to make two separate piles of food when feeding the pigs because Florence always bullies George and tries to keep all the food for herself!) 

So that is the end of the story for this week, just know you are supporting a little business that manages in our own way to keep the food waste mountain from growing at least on our watch and continues to step by small step help build a better food system. 

You are making it possible, thank you. 

Kenneth

PS Darragh Wynne from the charity Goal Ireland was here a few weeks back and invited me to talk for a video, if you want to learn a little bit more about and see some cool drone footage of our farm (and even catch a glimpse of George and Florence check this video out.

Two generations ago, intensification …

Two generation ago my Grandad farmed this land, it was a mixed farm, some tillage, some veg, some animals, he had two workhorses and I remember one was called Snowball.  He had an array of horse drawn implements to help with the work, and from what I have heard from my dad, there was a lot of work.

Of course, the advent of the tractor on farms and more complex machines helped reduce that work and I can’t imagine anybody lamented the demise of some of the back breaking tasks that were once part of the daily grind. From what I have heard though, I don’t believe it felt like a grind at least not all the time, there was I believe a degree of satisfaction in this local model of food production and the community it fostered.

Those days are gone, but It is fair to say that the model of the traditional Irish family farm worked at least to a degree.

Several years ago, I was invited to attend a rural development meeting and a manager from either the Dept of Agriculture or Teagasc stood up and asked amid much talk about intensification, “what was so wrong with the traditional family farm, why are we hell bent on driving ever faster towards the American model of intensification?” The room was silent and there were no comments, maybe a few tumble weeds blew through the conference room.

The manager I assume was close to retirement because he was most definitely not toing the company line. That was probably 7 or 8 years ago, and how much has changed since then? The speed of change in our agriculture sector has been eye watering, consolidation, intensification, growth, pushing of yields and so on. It seems we have stepped onto a conveyor belt, and it just keeps on getting faster, the famers have no choice but to march ever faster just to stand still. So, this is our food system now. I wonder though at what point do we say no more, we can’t possibly intensify any further.

After all, nature is finite, is it not? The last time I looked you couldn’t create matter from nothing, that kinda goes against the laws of science. Well in my view we have gone too far already, just look at the damage done to Loch Neagh in Northern Ireland, look what happens when we pass the tipping point and ecological systems break down, the main driving factor here is the runoff of excess nitrogen from farms.

The quest for ever cheaper food is the driver here and to an extent part of the problem. Whilst everything else is getting more expensive, food and I mean basic food here, the likes of raw potatoes out of the ground or the oats harvested from the field are staying the same or getting cheaper in some cases. How can this possibly make sense (There is no doubt that there has been some greedy grubby profiteering by the big corporate food giants, yeah, these guys are not to be trusted as far as you can throw them) but otherwise primary producers are still getting a raw deal no doubt about it.

So, what to do about all of this? I am not claiming to know what the answer is. But I do know that taking care of the land whilst producing food is the sane way to proceed. Plant trees, plant hedgerows, reduce stocking density, reduce fertiliser application, grow more clover in grass swards, but for all of this to make sense it would mean an increase in the price of primary food, is this acceptable? Well that really is the question?

If you are reading this and are supporting our food model you must believe things can be different, in fact need to be different. So, until the big solution offers itself up, we will keep plugging away here doing what we believe in, and always being thankful for your support. 

Kenneth

Reflections and the future

This week has seen another reasonably dry week on the farm which has made life that little bit easier, our harvesting machine for parsnips has worked well, and we are pulling them out of the ground fresh and clean, the kale is vibrant and amazing and we are harvesting lovely sized heads of broccoli. The tomatoes, cucumbers and courgettes have nearly run their course, our weekly harvest of courgettes is down from a near high of 500kg a week to just over 100kg now, soon they will be finished for the year. 

It is at this time of the year I often reflect on our food system as a whole and whilst there is plenty of good I find myself wondering that there must be a better way to grow our food, there needs to be a better way. The planet simply cannot sustain business as usual. Amongst other things, our food system as run by giant food corporations is crippling out planet, not only that it is destroying biodiversity. Loss leading of fresh food by supermarkets, simply does not leave enough on the table to allow farmers to protect the land, to work with nature, it is a road to nowhere.   

What will we do when we have exhausted the soil, when we have polluted the rivers and lakes, when we have pumped enough greenhouse gases into our atmosphere to cause the planet to warm up beyond critical tipping points. We will not be able to sustain ecosystems never mind a healthy balanced food system. 

What then? All that profit and greed, and short termism will mean little. Where do we look then for fresh water, for healthy food, how will we feed 8 billion or more people? How will all the other life we share this planet with be sustained? 

Can we continue to consume resources and food as we do now? Do we not need to consider what we are eating (and how it is produced) now.  The animal industry consumes a disproportionate amount of our land mass and contributes relatively little relative to grains and plants to our calorie and protein intake:    

Of our habitable land, 46% is used for agriculture, of that land area 77% is used for animals, and this only produces 18% of our global calorie supply and astoundingly only 37% of our protein consumption. (Source: UN Food and Agriculture association) 

And that is without even beginning to talk about animal welfare in the large factory farms that produce the cheap meat? When did chicken literally become cheaper than chips?  

Clearly this is not just unsustainable, you can imagine that future generations may look back and wonder at our insanity. Using land to grow more vegetables and eating more plants allows us to reduce the land mass required to produce our food. This is not an argument for not eating meat or dairy it is simply a fact that we need to use our land wisely and cut down on the consumption of foods that have a high land high carbon footprint, low calorie output. 

Would it help to approach our living world with a little more empathy, for the land, for the creatures we share the planet, for the environment? Things could and would be so much different if we were all to be a little more mindful and showed a little more respect for our one home. 

We all can make a difference; we can all take steps that will help. Of course, bigger stuff needs to happen, governments need to act, net carbon zero needs to occur, policy and infrastructure and systems needs to change, and they are changing but the speed of change needs to increase. 

Can our mindset around food change? Embracing the idea of eating more plants, understanding that cheap does not always mean good value, these are the things that will help save our health and that of the planet. 

We here on our farm find ourselves struggling to standstill, it is always a tough battle to compete in this supermarket dominated landscape. It is difficult to continue to support local organic Irish farmers including our own farm, it costs more, but that is the course we have taken, and one we will never deviate from.   

Your support is making a difference. You are making a difference. 

Thanks for your support. 

Kenneth

PS The autumnal winter crops are definitely creeping in now, with the harvest of swede and parsnip truly beginning, we are also delighted to have the first delivery or Irish organic carrots next week. It has been a tough year for root crop growing, but finally we are getting there.

First Prize! Well done Gerry and the bees…

First prize in the Galway honey competition, what a fantastic result and testament to the amazing work of Gerry who looks after the bees who have been residents on our farm for close to 10 years now.

Gerry has a deep understanding and respect for the bees and is constantly checking in to make sure they are alright and by all accounts they are certainly that! In fact, they are a level of magnitude above alright.

A couple of weeks back while having a chat with Gerry he mentioned that out of the 6 apiaries under his supervision the hives on our farm are producing 3 times the amount of honey compared with the others!

We all know we need to look after our pollinators without them the world would be a very different place, our apple trees, the courgettes, tomatoes, cucumbers and many other flowering plants rely on our flying friends to produce food. So, it’s only right we keep an eye on their welfare too.

It seems that the wildflowers and the weeds and the general high level of biodiversity on our farm has had a very positive impact on bees and the honey they make. A great example of a healthy environment leading to healthy food. The honey was judged on colour, texture and flavour.

This year though the impact of a changing climate has had a negative effect on the bees and the professional judges all said the same thing, in show after show there was a lack of honey due to the wettest July ever recorded.

Gerry and the bees did extremely well, but we won’t be handing out little mini trophies to all the queen bees on our farm just yet though, as it seems there was one rogue amongst all the hard workers.

One of the queen bees turned rogue.  Apparently, it does happen and when it does it is not at all pleasant. For some reason one of the queens became extremely aggressive and as a result the whole hive followed suit. It really wasn’t nice, these bees were chasing people out of the fields, and Emmanuel and his farm team were stung on multiple occasions and as a result the harvest had to start before the bees came out!

Gerry stepped in and removed the rogue queen and rehoused her to a far way bog where hopefully she will live out a long angry life away from human beings!

The amazing thing is once the belligerent queen was removed everything settled down almost immediately, seems all groups are the same…..

I am delighted that the judges held Gerry’s honey in such high regard and I am also delighted to have nice calm bees back buzzing around again and that our nearly always happy bees are happy again.

Kenneth  

PS We are seeing the change now in the weather and are moving more heartily into the autumnal crops, you will see our first harvest of parsnips fresh from the fields, and we are excited about the first main crop floury potatoes coming soon, lots of cauliflower and broccoli too, as always thank you for your support. 

To forget how to dig the earth and to tend the soil is to forget ourselves

We had the final farm walk of the season last Saturday. Thank you to all who came, we were blown away by the turn out. The day smiled on us too it was dry and warm and even George and Florence played their part well!

This year has been as all years are when it comes to growing and selling food in the current climate: a challenging one. Saturday helped me remember why it is we do what we do. I heard first hand, some honest and deep levels of appreciation, stories of customers that have been ordering from us for over 10 years of others who value the ethos of the business, others who were delighted to discover our farm shop tucked away here in the Galway countryside and others who just truly enjoyed the lovely organic tomatoes they got to pick in our tunnels.

I heard too  an appreciation for how our planet, our environment and how we produce our food are interlinked,  and how now more than ever our food system needs to change for the sake of our planet. We don’t have the deep pockets of the supermarkets and it is hard to compete in a landscape dominated by these corporations that control the gates to our food system.

As gatekeepers they control how much producers are paid, and they continue to devalue and ‘loss lead’ with fresh produce.  We do the best we can, but growing, packing, and delivering food (all done as sustainably as is possible) to people’s doors is an expensive business. We cannot compete with celery for 49c. But critically as consumers we need to have the option to choose food that is grown sustainably, now more than ever before, and we as growers and sellers need the breathing space to be able to survive and dare I say it, thrive, to develop truly sustainable farms and food businesses.  Here are 5 reasons why:

  1. Healthy sustainable food nourishes our bodies, naturally: Organic food supercharges our health. Unlike conventionally grown food, it’s free from synthetic pesticides, herbicides, and genetically modified organisms (GMOs).
  2. Preserving our planet: Organic farming practices are a breath of fresh air for our planet. By avoiding synthetic chemicals, we protect soil health, promote biodiversity, and reduce water pollution.
  3. Tasting the difference: Take one bite of a local organic carrot, and you’ll understand.
  4. Supporting local communities: Organic farming often prioritizes small-scale, family-owned operations, which helps create jobs and strengthens local economies. By choosing organic, we’re investing in a greener, fairer future for everyone.
  5. Protecting future generations: Organic farming practices help preserve fertile soil and protect biodiversity, ensuring that future generations can continue to enjoy our planet. 

Indeed as Gandhi said ‘To forget how to dig the earth and to tend the soil is to forget ourselves

The feedback from you our customers brought me back to my roots and reminded me that maybe we are on the right track and that we must continue to fight for our health and the health of the planet. Thank you so much to those of you who said thank you, it is appreciated and makes a difference. It also reaffirmed my belief that we are not alone and there are many out there who care about how our food is grown and the affect it has on our planet.

You are the very ones that are changing the world.

Thank you.

Kenneth

PS A big thank you to the two ladies from St Vincent De Paul who came to the farm walk to say thank you for all the food donations. They told me how the fresh food that we deliver to them each week is making a massive difference to families who otherwise would not be able to afford fresh local food. So a massive thank you to all our customers who have chosen a “Charity box” you can rest assured that it is being put to very good use.

Turnip Juice… do you remember it?

I remember as a child picking peas in my grandad’s garden.  He had apple trees, he grew his own veg. I remember sitting on his lap drinking a mug of turnip juice, (I can’t imagine trying to get my kids to do that today!) most of the food was grown on his farm. (Photo: backfired, me trying to feed my daughter broccoli many moons ago!)

Things have changed so much in a generation.

When was the last time you tasted a freshly harvested carrot, can you remember what it should taste like?  There can be such pleasure in the simple foods, and there are of course remarkable ways to cook these amazing seasonal gems.

September is a month of local seasonal plenty. The tomato season is still in full swing still, and there is a myriad of great Irish vegetables available, courgettes, leeks, swedes, cabbage, scallions, kales, beetroot, broccoli and so much more.  

As an organic farmer, the arrival of September allows a sigh of relief. The relentless pressure of the summer is finally winding down and we are settling into a routine of harvest.

The trees are starting to turn, the wild-flowers have gone to seed, the hedgerows are full of berries, the bees are slowing down too, even the birds are relaxing a little, everything seems to slow down. Something we could all do a little bit more of.

September too can be a time for reflection.  As a farmer the simple things like tree planting, growing hedgerows and leaving wild patches can give immense pleasure. This is easy stuff that pays the most amazing dividends for the person and the planet, but in modern food systems it is often dismissed as non sensical and left to one side in favour of production. The irony of course is that food production is facilitated and improved by all these positive things.

Cheap food has a price and a story. The real stories are hidden behind the glitzy shiny wrappers, there is always a story, a story of environmental or human exploitation.

The truth ironically can be hard to swallow, but it doesn’t have to be like this.

There are amazing and positive alternatives. Our parents chose well, they ate seasonally and locally, they ate less meat. Who doesn’t remember cabbage and turnip and the endless ways to cook potatoes!

We have more power than we realise.  

We choose our phones, our clothes, our cars, our jobs, and yet our food and our planet can be relegated to the bottom of the decision pile if they are thought about at all.  Time is short we are all busy but maybe just maybe they deserve a little more consideration because our choices matter a lot and when it comes to our food positive choices will improve our health and the health of our planet.   

What we eat and how our food is produced can literally change the world.

Kenneth