M is for Marion Street Cheese Market

As the CVSF meat CSA has grown and we've wanted to add delivery sites, we've looked for places similar to where we've already had success - namely wine and cheese shops. (See my post on K is for Kellner).

One of the best in the Chicago-land area is Marion Street Cheese Market. We're proud to deliver our meat CSA to the best wines shop, cheese shop, and bistro in Oak Park, IL. We are continually impressed by co-owner Eric Larson and executive chef Leonard Hollanders commitment to local, artisansal food and sustainability.

Eric Larson

                                                          Leonard Hollander


              Leonard Hollander

Marion Street Cheese Market is a Greeen Certfied Restaurant and recently earned a three star rating (one of only three "three star" Green Restaurants in the region - we, also, deliver to one of the other 3-star rated restaurants in Chicago, you'll learn about them in a future post!)

J is for Jack

Jack is our youngest, but is quite easily the most enthusiastic about farming. A couple of months ago he told me: "Dad, when I retire from being a pro soccer player, I want to be a farmer just like you."

 Whether it's helping pick eggs, feeding the pigs or moving the cows to a new pasture, Jack wants to help. If I have tractor work to do, he rides along. When I go to pick up feed or farm supplies, Jack rides with. The whole time is filled with questions about what, why, and how we do things. In his nearly six years, Jack has absorbed an incredible amount of knowledge about our sustainable farm.

Last year, at the end of a long day in Springfield for the Local Food Lobby Day, Jack and his brothers insisted that they come along to our meeting with Lieutenant Governor Simon.

All our boys are emeshed in our farming enterprise with Jack most of all.

D is for Duncan

An A-Z blog theme on our farm's community needs to include some mention of family. Today, I'm going to introduce you to Duncan. He is our farm's naturalist and the one who always up for a walk in the woods or explore the creek. This week, he was hanging out/helping me trouble-shoot a shorted out electric fence.

As I worked, he climbed trees and explored. Walking along the pasture's edge, I told him that the best place to find night crawlers was under old cow pies. So, we started to turn some of them over. Not only did we discover worms in the well rotted manure but many other living things from fungi to grubs to a sprouted honey locust seed (the cows eat the pods in the fall and deposit the undigested seeds all around the pasture - a perfect seed starter medium).

Yesterday, we ate a salad that Duncan had foraged with Beth and his little brother, Jack. The salad included water cress that grow along one of the many natural springs on farm, and sorrel a perrenial that is great as a cooked green (scrambled eggs and sorrel is favorite of our friend John Breslin) but works in a salad when the tender leaves are picked. It's so gratifying to have our kids so connected to our farm way of living.

 Duncan is a Lego designer as well - hopefully those design skills will translate into useful stuff for the farm as he gets bigger!

Here, he takes a break with Beth on a recent trip to the Field Museum.