×

Reconnect with food grown locally

There’s something about a warm blanket of sunshine on our shoulders, finally afforded to us in earnest these past few weeks, that makes us hungry for a stroll through the local farmers market.

With the start of most outdoor farmers markets still a few weeks away, we’ll have to wait a little longer before we can dig into some of our favorite warm weather staples, but that doesn’t mean it’s too early to support the local farmers working to grow them.

Despite the short growing season in this region, there’s still plenty of produce and other locally made goods to buy right now. Potatoes, radishes, kimchi, onions, eggs and milk from Essex Farm. Decadent, silky butter from Crown Point Farm and Dairy. Sheep’s milk yogurt from Blue Pepper Farm. Crisp, fluffy focaccia from Triple Green Jade Farm, sourdough from Red Oak Food Company and hearty bread loaves from The Drifter’s Loaf. Rainbow carrots, beets and lush, leafy greens from Juniper Hill and salad mixes from Wild Work Farm. Succulent meat of all sorts from Mace Chasm Farm, Norman Ridge Farmstead and Reber Rock Farm. Cheese from Asgaard Farm, North Country Creamery and Sugarhouse Creamery. Maple syrup from Black Rooster Maple, Whitney’s Maple Spring Farm, Mark Twain Maple Works or South Meadow Farm. Flowers from Little Farmhouse Flowers and the Champlain Peony Company.

Most of these places — and many more not mentioned here — have farm stores, open to visitors at various hours during the week, and it’s certainly worth the drive to visit on a sun-soaked weekend to pick up some fresh products. But many of them are also available at locally-owned grocery stores, at the Saranac Lake Farmers Park-It, online or through the Hub on the Hill in Essex.

Eating food grown and made locally isn’t just the most environmentally-friendly and most delicious choice, it’s the right thing to do when you have enough resources to do it. Buying local can be expensive, and sometimes less convenient, but we would argue that it’s necessary — without putting our money behind local farmers, who are our neighbors and who genuinely care about growing good food for us, these businesses won’t survive. We need small farms as much as they need us.

During the pandemic, lots of people seemed to remember this — business, for local farms, was booming for months in 2020 as more people began signing up for CSA shares and perusing farm stores and farmers markets. Some farms increased production to meet the demand. However, since then, business for many farms has dipped — especially those who relied on buyers in New York City, where the pandemic outmigration hit sales at farmers markets hard. The effects of the pandemic continue to linger for many businesses, long after many of us have returned to whatever a “normal life” is now.

Earlier this month, Enterprise Staff Writer Lauren Yates sat down with Ian Ater, the owner of Fledging Crow Vegetables in Keeseville, which declared bankruptcy in December after 15 years in business. The farm has halted its public sales. This is a huge loss for the region, and we hope this isn’t the first of other closures to come.

Farming is a complex thing.

“A farm is a manipulative creature,” Essex Farm’s Kristen Kimball wrote in her book “The Dirty Life.”

“There is no such thing as finished. Work comes in a stream and has no end. There are only the things that must be done now and things that can be done later. The threat the farm has got on you, the one that keeps you running from can until can’t, is this: Do it now, or some living thing will wilt or suffer or die,” she wrote.

Imagine living this way, then facing the immense challenge of getting the fruits of your labor out into the world.

Much like a town or school district outlines its priorities through its annual budget, the choices we make with our money — where it goes, how much of it we spend — underscores our priorities, too. Plus, with our priorities — and the demand we create — we could entice more purveyors to source more products from within the region. We think supporting local farms is worth prioritizing, even if it sometimes means less convenience and a higher grocery bill.

NEWSLETTER

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *

Starting at $4.75/week.

Subscribe Today