Rhubarb and Fiddlheads

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First, we hope everyone has had a great Mothers' Day. It certainly has kept us busy at the Tea Room and we had a wonderful time hosting celebrating families ...including our own.

This week, one of our kind neighbours dropped by with some Rhubarb. This reminded us that it was indeed the Season to pick and we had quite a bit to harvest ourselves.

Last year, we found a couple of large plants behind the house. We figured out how to "split" them and propagate them in a raised bed. 

This year, they are doing well and are now already at the flowering stage.

Our Rhubarb patch

We love Rhubarb and this one in particular. When picked at this stage, it is very tender (no thick skin to peel from the stems) and it is milder (less sour) than the traditional plant. It's called Strawberry Rhubarb and has short red stained stems.

Strawberry Rhubarb ready for processing

Along with Ramps, this week we've provided some of this Rhubarb to customers as part of our "Gifting Berries" or Gift Economy program. The rest, we're processing.

In this case, we've made a great jam. Meanwhile Chef is preserving some for a sorbet base.

The latest addition to the jam collection: Rhubarb

This time of year, our foraging activities continue and this week it was time to pick Fiddleheads (also an addition to "Gifting Berries").

Fiddleheads are the unfurled leaves of the Ostrich Fern. Just as the Ramps, our wet forest floor has gifted us another great food. This one we tend to find on mossy ground among the Skunk Cabbage.

Fiddlehead "hunting grounds" among the Skunk Cabbage

They are not difficult to find as they tend to protrude from last year's growth. So all you really need to find to get started is the old remains of last year's ferns.

The Fiddlehead

We did not pick any last year except for our own consumption. This year, we picked a touch more so that Chef could pickle them and our customers could try them.

A Fiddlehead harvest

Fiddleheads should be blanched before using. Once this is done, they can be used just like any other great green.

Chef's Fiddlehead Pickle....sometimes part of our charcuterie plate

One of the real pleasures of foraging is finding a great mushroom. 

Last year (thanks to our neighbour) we discovered the Pheasant  Back Saddle Mushroom. We enjoyed it, but it was rather late in the Season to pick and as such a bit tough.

The Pheasant Back Saddle Mushroom

This year, we remembered where to find them and managed to pick a few just in time....they were a real treat (once Chef got his hands on them).

Chef's special "Croque Madame": an open face sandwich with melted cheese, a meddley of mushrooms (including our Pheasant Back) and a fried egg.....finished with a drizzle of Birch Syrup!

With Spring fully underway, we are now extremely busy...but we still have time to enjoy a few things around the farm. So we'll end this week with the photo of a beautiful and ancient flower that adorns the marshes (since we've spent quite a bit of time foraging there). This is the Marsh Marigold.

The Marsh Marigold

Scapes, Ramps...and the Gift Economy

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Spring is truly well underway. Wild blooms are out and there is no better indicator than our garlic beds where the scapes are growing strong.

Our garlic bed is starting to turn green

What is even more interesting to us this time of year are some of the wild plants now ready for picking.

The first are the wild scapes. Our land is peppered with a wild spring onion that generates an amazing scape. This is the time of year to pick them. Early Spring, they are tender and stand out against the grass.

Wild Scapes

The taste of the scape is similar to onion or garlic and can be used wherever you use Chive (salad dressings, omelettes, etc.).

Wild Spring Onion scapes when picked

Once picked, we use them both at home and in our Tea Room kitchen. These can be frozen or pickled for future use.

Pickled Wild Scapes (available at our Market)

In fact, one special this week at the Tea room was Braised Rabbit Pasta with Mushrooms....and to top it all, shavings of Artisan Cheese and herbs, including wild scapes.

Braised Rabbit Pasta with Mushrooms...topped with wild Scapes

What is even more exciting for us though are the Ramps (also called Wild Garlic or Bear Leek). We discovered a few patches in our forest last year. This year, we found out we were very lucky to own a swamp! Lucky because these patches of Ramps thrive in moist areas usually where the Trillium grow and we found an abundance of them.

One of our patches of Ramps

Because these patches can be sensitive to over-harvesting, we have been diligent in picking just a small percentage of what is now growing on the forest floor (typically less than 1%). It is our understanding that these plants are illegal to pick in conservation areas and in Quebec, where they have almost been picked to extinction.

Picked and cleaned Ramps

The Ramp is a real delicacy (commanding up to 20$/lb in Toronto...if you can get them). They are peppery and very similar to garlic (although not at all related). The bulbs can be enjoyed like Garlic but for some of us, the leaves can also be the tastiest part. They are Garlicky with a mild sweetness, making them ideal for salads or soups.

Of course, we will be using these in our Tea Room kitchen. Chef has been pickling some for sale at our Market or for use as a side with our restaurant's charcuterie plate.

Chef's pickled Ramps

Now this is where the Gift Economy comes to play.

Having previously posted how we have enjoyed the kindness of neighbours and friends over the past year, we feel it's time to give back.

We have decided this year that our fresh produce would become part of the "Gift Economy". There is no reason for good healthy food to be unaffordable...particularly when we see so much locally grown food go to waste.

Our society's effort to generate cheap food means that $/calorie count more than any potential impact this food might have on health or environment. Hence our recourse to industrially produced and genetically manipulated grains and soy.

Market prices are also skewed by quotas, marketing boards and various government restrictions.

So what are we going to do about this? We call it "Gifting Berries".

A selected amount of every fresh produce we harvest from the farm will be put for sale every morning at our Market. But the price will not be specified. It's all up to our customers. We will take what our client believe the produce is worth to them and what it is they can afford. We will also accept payment "in kind".

We believe that this is the only way to 1) identify the real local "market price" and 2) get people to try new, local and healthy food alternatives.

Scapes and Ramps now for sale every morning (and part of the Gift Economy).

Finally, we'll end this week with a quick announcement. Now that the Tea Room is open, we are taking reservations for Mothers' Day. The restaurant is rapidly being booked up, so do not miss this event since every Mom invited for lunch will be given a special free gift from Ridge Berry Farm.

Tea Room Opening May 1st

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Well we're finally at the point of re-opening the Tea Room and Market for the Season.

At this point, we really have to thank Mayor Dave and his staff for helping us meet our deadlines. The final results, designed by our local contractor (Tucker Construction) look simply superb.

The new Tea Room

The installation of patio windows allow us to provide some protection from wind, rain and insects, while opening up fully to give that great experience of dining outside.

For the month of May we will be open Wednesday to Sunday from 11AM to 7PM. This schedule will be extended to 7 days a week in the Summer months.

We still have a lot of work to do in the coming week, but we're prepared. Chef has worked out our Spring menu:

Table d`Hote High Tea   ...  includes a Selection of  Tea,

Assorted tea sandwiches  (Watercress on brioche with cream cheese, Curried chicken salad on dark Austrian bread, Egg salad on sourdough bread, Prosciutto and Five Brothers cheese with ice wine mustard on white bread); Hard boiled St. Ann's quail egg; Cream raisin scone with preserves and whipped cream; Mignardises and sweets (truffles, seasonal fruit tart, jellies and cookies)

Impromptu seasonal soup 

Green Salad from Herbs by Daniel and the farm with ice wine mustard vinaigrette

Mennonite summer sausage sandwich, lettuce, on sourdough, with soup or salad 

Warm salad of braised mushrooms, little salad from Herbs by Daniel and a soft poached egg and brioche croutons  

Open faced egg salad sandwich on sourdough with Niagara prosciutto, served with soup or green salad with ice wine mustard vinaigrette  

House made and Ontario charcuterie plate, sourdough, ice wine mustard and pickles

Sweet Plate  (a selection of our Mignardises)

Cream and raisin scones, preserve and whipped cream

Of course we will also have daily seasonal specials and deserts based on what is available from the farm and local producers.

As we begin the new Season, we're also proud to have been certified by FeastON, a new program sponsored by the Ontario Culinary Tourism Alliance. FeastON promotes establishments dedicated to using local foods (our basic operating principle).

The Tea Room is now certified by FeastON for 2014

On another front, it was time to finish our Birch syrup. This process is identical to that of Maple syrup. However, since the syrup is so dark, we decided to double filter before the finishing stage.

Double filtering the Birch syrup

The critical thing about Birch syrup is its rapid tendency to burn. As such, a very watchful eye is needed as the syrup approaches 104 degrees C.

Finishing the very dark Birch syrup

The final product this year has a strong taste of prunes with a molasses finish, perfect for meats and barbecue sauces. 

Birch syrup, bottled and just about ready for sale

Just like our Maple syrup, the Birch syrup will be offered for sale at the Market.

We will leave you this week with a picture of our first Strawberries. Yes they're already coming out...in the Growing Dome that is.

Our first Growing Dome Strawberries

Finishing Maple and Black Walnut Syrup

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First we'd like to wish everyone a Happy Easter. Although we had a surprising snow fall this week, it is really beginning to feel like Spring.

This week we decided to stop the tapping of our Maple trees and start finishing our syrup. Technically we probably could have collected sap a bit longer, but we were also keen to start on our Birch trees as well.

Our objective this year was to increase our Maple syrup production and we certainly managed this by tapping a few more trees. Our process was changed however since we did this as a single batch. We acquired a large 60 litre pot to which we continuously added sap as it was evaporated. The entire thing was heated by a propane burner.

Our batch processing set-up for Maple syrup

As we continuously added sap each and every day of our collection, it slowly took on a dark amber shade. Once the container was half evaporated on the last day of collection, it was time to finish the syrup indoor.

We had filtered every batch of sap, but before finishing the syrup we filtered it again to prevent the occurrence of Maple sand (the crystallization of natural  minerals like calcium and magnesium).

Second filtration of the Maple sap

One of the obvious findings this year is that the syrup would turn dark. We also noticed that the sap had a very high sugar content (just handling it off the trees made our fingers sticky). We also noticed that some of our trees generated a yellowish sap which was the sweetest of all (we had to try it). Perhaps the trees this year stored much sugar than last year, as a result of the bitterly cold Winter.

Differences in sap colour seemed to also indicate differences in sugar content

Back in our professional kitchen, we loaded our sap after final filtration and started another boil. We used a candy thermometer to monitor the progress in syrup production.

The kitchen set-up for syrup finishing

The point at which the syrup is done is when the boil is sustainable at 4 degrees C above the boiling point of water (104 degrees C at sea level...which proves good enough for us in the Niagara Peninsula). For those at significant altitude, all you need to do is first boil water to determine its boiling temperature and then add 4 degrees to this.

One of the things we did notice is that you can almost tell things are done by sight. When the sap boils at 100 degrees C, the movement is rapid and turbulent. When the syrup stage is reached, a massive amount of small bubbles are created on the surface.

Boiling at 100 degrees C

Boiling at the syrup stage

After quickly getting the syrup off the stove, it was time to bottle. We're really pleased with the finished results and will be selling these at the market.

Ridge Berry Farm Maple syrup: "cuvee" 2014

With the Maple syrup done it was also time to conclude our Black Walnut syrup experiment. Having tapped a couple of trees, we really wanted to see if this syrup is also worth producing.

The process is identical to making Maple syrup, however it should be noted that Black Walnut syrup consists of both fructose and sucrose (Maple is primarily sucrose). Our Birch syrup experiment last year proved that fructose was much more sensitive to heavy boiling in the finishing stage (and as such easy to burn).

We noticed that the Black Walnut was also sensitive but perhaps not as much as Birch.

So what did we end up with....3 little jugs of a fine syrup which was surprisingly good with some floral and nutty tones (not the heavy Black Walnut taste we were expecting).

Our Black Walnut syrup

The ratios of sap to syrup turned out to be similar to Birch (roughly 80 to 1). As such, Black Walnut syrup is an expensive product to make. Things are a bit worse than Birch since it seems that Black Walnuts do not produce as much sap (although we still need to look into the timing for tapping these trees).

In the end, this was an experiment worth completing and next year we expect to have Black Walnut syrup on our market shelves.

With this work complete, we could now look forward to Birch syrup production. Last year was an experiment, this year we aim to produce enough to sell.

Tapping Birch

On a final note this week, someone decided to drop off some apples and some great apple cider at the side of the barn....Thank You!

The latest "freebie" dropped off at the barn

Over the past year we have really benefited from the kindness of friends and neighbours. We have received everything from Apples, Quinces, Peaches, Grapes, Nuts, etc.  even help with snow removal.

This has given us an idea. We will not discuss it now, but you can expect an interesting announcement in June, when our first berries are picked.

We will conclude this blog entry with a quick photo taken this week. Hopefully this will be the last snow we see in a long while.

Pelham in mid-April???

Water Management in the Growing Dome & Planting Haskaps

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Now that we are finally enjoying some great Spring weather, we actually ended up spending most of our time "inside"...inside the Growing Dome that is. We had two motivations for getting more active in this "off the grid" greenhouse: 1. our water pipe to the well finally thawed out, and 2. the mainly sunny days allowed us to test our new solar-powered hydroponic configuration.

Water is finally flowing from the well to the main water tank in the dome.

Since our early experiments last year, we have been working on a new configuration with our hydroponic tables. The main design constraint is that everything should work based on a single solar-powered water pump. Since we now have 4 sets (of 2) hydroponic beds to feed water to, the key issue has been the distribution of water to these beds. We decided to use one of our spare hydroponic beds as a "holding" tank.

The prefabricated hydroponic beds are rectangular with beveled corners. This meant that we could install outlets at the four corners of a tank to feed our growing beds.

The beveled corner of a prefabricated hydroponic tank

The key to the installation would be to achieve a steady flow of water to the four branches of our installation. As such, the leveling of the holding tank and the position of the water feeds would be an issue. We therefore decided to mount the holding tank on a frame with 2 threaded rods which would allow for the adjustment of the tank's tilt.

The holding tank support frame (upside down).

It was then time to address the "spouts" or fittings we would use to transfer the water from the holding tank to the hydroponic tables and from the hydroponic tables back to the main tank.

Last year our experiments proved that the standard grommet and tube fittings were not only difficult to water proof but also proved much too small to handle the flow rates from our solar powered bilge pump.

We decided to use and electrical fitting normally used to guide cables across barriers where water may be an issue. these are fitted with an O-ring which we doubled in order to have a good water seal on both sides of the tank walls.

The new fittings used to tansfer water from one tank to another.

One additional feature of these fittings is that they fit snugly in tubing with a 5/8 inch inner diameter (standard garden hose dimensions).

The holding tank was equipped with 4 of these fittings as well as each tank in the 4 branches of the assembly.

Water  flow fitting on the holding tank 

Water flow fitting between hydroponic tanks

Since our design constraint means that water must return to the main tank via gravity, the last hydroponic bed in each of the 4 branches was fitted with a simple garden hose leading back to that tank.

Garden hose leading back to the main tank.

Experiencing a few good days of sunshine, we were able to test the entire system at what would be a maximum flow rate from the bilge pump.

The first results did create a bit of panic. The fittings held up, but after balancing and leveling everything we could, we came to the realization that the flow rates were just too much even once the flow of water was divided into 4. The net effect was an overflow of the hydroponic tables.

To reduce the flow rate we added an "overflow" mechanism at the holding tank (thereby reducing the amount of water distributed to our hydroponic tables. The water overflow went directly to the main tank.

Holding tank overflow mechanism.

The net result is that we were finally able to reach a steady state of water through the entire installation at what would be a maximum flow rate.

The entire system finally running at steady state.

Of course, things can always go wrong and in our case, once we had everything working....the bilge pump stopped functioning. We're not entirely sure what has happened yet. We simply lost all pressure from the pump and it can longer lift a column of water higher than 6 inches.

In any case, we know we'll be able to overcome this and it's finally time to consider populating the main tank with fish.

With the weather as it was, it was also a great time to work outdoors and this week we received our first root stock ready for planting: Haskaps.

Not many are familiar with the Haskap. Haskap is the Japanese (Ainu) name for the edible Blue Honeysuckle and the word means "berry of good vision and long life". It is native to large regions of the Northern Hemisphere and is found wild in every Canadian Province with the exception of BC.

This berry is actually related to the tomato and the varieties available in Canada were developed by the University of Saskatchewan. Some are descendants of a Russian cultivar brought to Canada in the 90's.

Why would we consider these: the berries are large and oblong (~1 cm in diameter); their taste profile has been compared to Blueberries, Juneberries, Currants, Raspberries (very hard to define); their seeds are not noticeable in the mouth (similar to Kiwis); once frozen, when thawed the skin disintegrates (great for processing); their juice produce a very intense purple red colour and apparently can be used to produce a good wine (similar to Grape or Cherry).

The Haskap

So it was time this week to start planting our Haskap "plugs". We re-tilled our newly defined rows (from last fall) with our trusty BCS.

We'll digress a bit here but we will swear by the performance of the BCS tiller. It has been one of our best equipment purchases over the past year. Anyone looking for a small but highly capable machine should look into this. I will have to add a couple of caveats. Like every piece of performance machinery from Italy (eg. the Ferrari car) it has its issues: first the human-machine interfaces could use some serous re-thinking; second it is not cheap. But the performance is simply superb!

Preparing our Haskap rows with the BCS tiller

Planting the Haskap "plugs"

The Haskap requires cross-pollination so we have two varieties in a ratio of 2:1. With a total of 252 plants to get into the ground this is really back breaking work.

Although the weather this coming week does not look great, we'll end this blog entry with a couple of photos that clearly show the onset of Spring.

The Skunk Cabbage is appearing in the wetlands.

Small flowers are starting to bloom