edible
san juan mountains
Traversing the San Juans to bring you the story of local food, season by season.
No. 12
Spring/Early Summer 2013
THE BALLAD OF THE DRYLANDER HOMEBREWERS
A STONE FREE LIFE
TELLURIDE'S ELIZA GAVIN
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CONTENTS
FARM HUB by Laura Thomas
10 COMPOSTING FOR THE MASSES by D. Dion
14 A STONE FREE LIFE by Rachel Turiel
4
WHO WE ARE Edible staff bios
18 THE BALLAD OF THE DRYLANDERS by Rachel Turiel
6
LETTERS TO US
8
FARM TO SCHOOL TAKES ROOT by Laura Thomas
26 THE SAN JUAN HOMEBREWER by Michelle King
29 CELEBRITY CHEF an Edible interview with 221 Bistro's Eliza Gavin
Picture Caption: Splits (half a bean) , wait in storage at Adobe Milling in Dove Creek, CO.
1
EDITOR'S LETTER
S
ince our inception (we are beginning our fourth year, which is confounding), we have been very cognizant and very sensitive to this community and the wide and varied cloth it cuts. The Noah’s Ark of the Southwest. To drive 50 miles across Highway 160 or 145 is to travel across the entire country. There is the Prius set and the F250 set (dually, of course). We have the composters (big-time composters: see page 10), and the people who sincerely appreciate the garbage man. There are the raw fooders, the red-meaters, the vegans, the hunters, the ranchers and the conservationists. We have the new farmer (your help may have arrived: see page 6) and the multi-generational farmer (your help may be needed: see page 6). We have the walk-in traffic at the Telluride Steaming Bean ordering their quad-skinny-fill-in-the-blank sculpted by the barista they covet like a good mechanic. Then there is the every-morning, crack-of-dawn pickup truck crowd at Deb’s Diner in Dove Creek, congregated at a back table taking great comfort in knowing that the Bunn-brewed coffee today will be exactly as it was yesterday; black, hot and delicious. There is the guy who wears the John Deere cap because it is hip and there is the guy who wears the John Deere cap because that is the cap they gave him when he bought his last John Deere. We have the Lutherans, the Baptists and the Mennonites sharing grocery-aisle space with the Wiccans, the “simply spiritual,” and the guy with jingle bells strapped to his ankles, and what appears to be something meaningful, yet indecipherable, tattooed on his forehead. Our people live in mansions and trailers, farm houses and basements, attics, campers, tents and tarps – not to suggest that tarps are at the bottom of the food chain of desirable housing. I do know a guy who lives in a tent in a location that will remain undisclosed. He has for years. Yes, years. I see him all the time. I’ve given him rides and I swear he consistently looks more put together than I do. I don’t know how he remains so well-groomed and wrinkle-free. I can’t sleep in a tent one night without looking and feeling like somebody physically assaulted me. But, as is often the case, I digress. In other words, here in the San Juans, it is evident that we are markedly different from one another.
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Rachel Turiel is a staff writer for this magazine. I don’t think she would mind me describing her as somewhat earthy (it is an understatement folks. She makes her own, well, everything). In this issue, Rachel tackled dryland bean farming in Dove Creek. Yes, the same place that doesn’t have Subarus or gluten-free anything. People in Dove Creek, who are battling ongoing drought conditions, believe in natural cycles. Everything in time. Hot now, cool later. Dry now, wet later. So comes snow after fire, but “it may be a few more years.” Deep inside, Rachel worries the problem may be bigger. Her perspective is different. But I know that Rachel, like all of our writers, was not there, or anywhere, to exercise her personal point of view. She was there to tell a story from the story’s point of view, whatever that may be. “I used to camp out there in Utah all the time,” she says “I would drive through Dove Creek and I knew there were dryland farms there. I garden a lot, and for the life of me, I didn’t know how they did it.” Another difference: drylanders and irrigators. “I respect those guys.” Well, she now knows and she shares the story in this issue (see page 18). Objectively. Agenda-free. Like, we hope, everything in this magazine. You might think it is difficult to appease such a diverse population. It’s not. What we believe we all have in common is curiosity. We all like a good story. And that, for three full years, has been our sole goal.
Rick Scibelli, Jr., Edible San Juan Mountains
edible
san juan mountains EDITOR AND PUBLISHER Rick Scibelli, Jr. rick@ediblesanjuanmountains.com
COPY EDITOR Chris Brussat
STAFF WRITERS Anna Riling Rachel Turiel Laura Thomas Jess Kelley
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS D. Dion Michelle King
PHOTOGRAPHY AND DESIGN Rick Scibelli, Jr.
DIRECTOR OF MARKETING
ON THE COVER: This is the first tractor Mike Coffey's ever used. It was 1967. The tractor was brand new. He was in high school near Dover Creek, Colorado, in the same country that he still farms. Just like his dad, and his dad's, dad. And the father before that. Warren is a dryland bean farmer (pg. 18). That means he farms without water. He depends on mother nature. "They say it hasn't been this dry since the 50's," Coffey said silently hoping that 2013 won't prove to be like 2003 where there was no crop at all. It was too dry for the dryland. "I think it will be another two or three years before it turns around." In Dove Creek, it is inherent that this too shall pass. Meanwhile, with the help of his son, he still farms the only way he knows, the dryland way, still on the back of that same John Deere. – RS
Laura Thomas Laura@ediblesanjuanmountains.com 970 946 7475
CONTACT US rick@ediblesanjuanmountains.com laura@ediblesanjuanmountains.com edible San Juan Mountains 361 Camino del Rio Suite 127 Durango, CO 81303 To send a letter to the editor, email us at rick@ediblesanjuanmountains.com. For home delivery of Edible San Juan Mountains, email rick@ediblesanjuanmountains.com; the rate is $32 per year. Edible San Juan Mountains is published quarterly by Sunny Boy Publications. All rights reserved. Distribution is throughout southwest Colorado and nationally by subscription. No part of this publication may be used without written permission of the publisher. © 2012. Every effort is made to avoid errors, misspellings and omissions. If, however, an error comes to your attention, please accept our sincere apologies and do notify us. Thank you.
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OUR STORYTELLERS
Deb Dion is a writer and editor living in the San Juans with her husband and their two children, a puppy and a one-eyed cat. She loves outdoor adventures even though it sometimes means eating dehydrated soup and making coffee with a sock.
Michelle King hails from the midwest, ending up in Durango with wanderlust and a B.A. in print journalism. When she is not freelancing (read: "geeking out") on random subjects for Backpacker, Climbing, or Bicycling magazines, she is getting lost in one of her 15 hobbies or researching potential new diversions such as scuba diving, knitting, or maybe raising miniature Herefords.
Rachel Turiel is a regular contributor to Edible San Juan Mountains, NPR’s Earth Notes, The Durango Herald and Mamalode, among other publications. After interviewing some of the best and brightest bean farmers of Dove Creek, she is feeling especially reverent towards the common pinto, though, as yet uncommitted to “pinto pizza” (see story on page 16). She cooks beans in a pressure cooker, after soaking overnight. Read more of her work on her blog, 6512 and growing, where she writes about growing food and a family at 6512 feet. 4 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
Chris Brussat (on left) loves words. Favorite subject in grade school: spelling! Has a BA in English, is researching and writing his family history, dabbles in graphic design and fine art, digs organic gardening, lives local, co-owns Darvill'sRarePrints.com, and can carry a tune.
Laura Thomas believes that people can be divided into two categories: those who follow recipes, and those who don’t. She belongs to the latter category. Recently, she followed a recipe because it involved baking, and everyone knows that messing with ratios in baking is dicey. The results were disastrous, thereby reinforcing her mistrust of recipes. She lives on a cattle ranch near Ridgway, and is approaching her freezer full of beef with alternating fits of bravado and fear, which is typical of those who don’t follow recipes. She is a staff writer and marketing director for this magazine.
Rick Scibelli, Jr is a freelance photographer and this magazine's editor and publisher. Along with food, foodies and farmers, he shoots assignments for other publications and advertising. He also shoots weddings. And when he isn't doing that, he pursures his love of Argentine Tango. Along with Edible San Juan Mountains, his work can be seen at rickscibelli.com and rickscibelliweddings.com.
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LETTERS TO US
To The Editor: It may have been the first time I have ever laughed out loud while reading the editor's forward! Nice work! Keep it up! The beautiful photography and writing is absolutely inspirational!! I miss the nostalgia of a well written magazine with breathtaking photos and clean mindful advertisement. Thank you for producing such a terrific piece for our little corner of the southwest. Gillian Arnwine, Durango
To The Editor: I've been enjoying your Edible magazine for the last few issues, but the current Winter 12/13 has inspired me to write you. From the opening letter to the quality writing to the exceptional photography throughout, I'm amazed that our little corner of Colorado has this publication at hand. Kudos. Duffy Brook, Durango (duffybrook.com)
To The Editor: Most excellent magazine. Usually great writing. Wonderful design and layout. Refreshing. Clean. Open. What font do you use ... ? Title, byline, text on the WONDERFUL layout of "The Art, Love and Chemistry of Fermentation"? LOVE the whitespace. Great pic. - Steve Self, Durango (formlessmountain.com)
To The Editor: I am really impressed with the Edible San Juan Mountains magazine; it is elegantly designed and well-written (your efforts very much included, Rachel). I hope it prospers and succeeds. The times they are a changing! That magazine could never have existed five years ago. I was just ahead of my tim in Durango.. Lynn Coburn, Durango
6 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
To The Editor: I don't know about your feeling the nuances of different beverage flavors, etc - but the photos, particularly of people, are some of the most beautiful I have ever seen. Consistently. The magazine is fabulous - always with a few stand-out articles. Plus, the Publisher's Letter, like this last one, is usually funny and thought provoking. Louise Teal
To The Editor: Thanks for another great edition done with excellent and timely information and overall presentation panache. Linda Barnes, local food wannabe
AGAINST, AGAINST PALEO To The Editor: I am so very sorry my food plan acquired a label and is now considered a fad diet. Paleo is not a “diet” at all and was not conceived as a weight loss program (though I assure you that will happen). It is the effort required to bring food back to what is was supposed to be and to return sound health. Indeed, we who do this have our own interpretation of what a Paleo or basic food plan should be and my own addresses things like GMO’s, additives like MSG and Aspartame, and sneaky stuff like Senomyx. It is very unfair that this food plan is maligned by the article “Against Paleo”. Heaven knows that it is difficult enough to pursue this life-giving food plan since friends and family often think we have gone off the deep end. I say, “Let them eat cake” (or bread as the case may be). I promise that they all will learn the hard way. Skip Halterman, blogspot: http://howfoodmadeyousick. blogspot.com
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IN THE NEWS
FARM TO SCHOOL TAKES ROOT IN MONTEZUMA COUNTY BY LAUR A THOM AS
I
n Montezuma County, much more is bursting from the soil than crocuses and cheat grass. Two years ago, the county joined a growing movement with the creation of the Montezuma School to Farm Project. Following the “Edible School Yard” curriculum developed by the famed chef Alice Waters in Berkeley, CA, Montezuma School to Farm Project has created permanent school gardens in Mancos and Dolores. At the Cortez Recreation Center, they installed a large summer garden for more than fifty day camp participants. The mission of the organization mirrors other School to Farm organizations: to encourage healthy eating, reconnect students to agricultural heritage, and teach conservation methods. Despite this initial success, the project’s director, Sarah Syverson, has proceeded with caution. “Burnout can be high with these gardens after the first year,” she says. To avoid losing momentum, the project employs professional garden managers rather than volunteers. Megan Tallmadge and Erin Bowman not only tend plants with the students of Dolores and Mancos schools, but align their curriculum to Colorado State content standards. “We have been able to tie our gardens into all subjects,” says Syverson, “even Spanish, because all those vegetables have Spanish names.” Another hurdle to the project’s success is our region’s notoriously cranky and brief growing season, which coincides almost exactly with summer vacation. 8 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
“Luckily, these are educational rather than production gardens, so there are ways to engage the students in experiments when we’re not harvesting,” Syverson explains. The program continues almost throughout the school year with students working in the garden until Thanksgiving. When they return from Winter Break, they begin choosing seeds, taste-testing various produce, and cooking from scratch. The thoughtful, holistic approach of the project’s staff has paid off: this year, Montezuma School to Farm Project won the National Farm to School Peer Mentorship Award. Montezuma is one of only twenty programs from around the nation invited to attend a summer training program that emphasizes sustainable development. Syverson herself envisions a role for the project beyond growing vegetables: “We are introducing students to a way of life. It isn’t just what happens in the garden, but the crafts, skills, social activities, and culture that grew up around it over many centuries.” In March, the Project threw a hoedown, complete with a square-dance caller, at the Mancos Opera House. Mancos students especially enjoyed the dance because they recently began to learn the tradition in P.E. With all of these activities, and a new plan to install their largest garden yet at Cortez Middle School this summer, the Montezuma School to Farm Project is thriving, somewhat like zucchini or pole bean vines in a well-tended patch of ground. `
BY LAUR A THOM AS
At a converted warehouse in downtown Cortez that now holds Let It Grow Farm Market and Nursery, Rosie Carter arranged a dozen chairs. She was preparing for the first night of an educational series called High Desert Homesteading, which proposed to cover topics ranging from backyard livestock production to growing beans and grains, to soil science. “I hoped we would have twelve or fifteen people at the first class,” she says. More than eighty packed the space that night. The turnout confirmed for Carter and a small group of collaborators that they were on to something big. Over the course of the previous year, informal, ongoing conversations among producers and advocates of local food in Montezuma and Dolores Counties had gradually coalesced into a fledgling organization. Contributors to these conversations identified several shared interests: to reconnect with the area’s rich agricultural heritage and resources, to build the agricultural economy, to support farmers and ranchers, and to educate newcomers to the project of growing food. From that cluster of ideas, The Montezuma Valley Farm Hub was quietly born. But things did not stay quiet for long. “We wanted to get a project under our belts,” explains Carter, “so we developed the idea of the homesteading course.” While the subjects that it covers are the standard fare of county agriculture extension agents, the approach is different, and speaks to The Farm Hub’s interest in connecting agricultural traditions with the current generation of neophytes. Each class is team-taught by a contemporary practitioner and an elder with a strong background in the subject. Carter is teaching the class on growing high-altitude vegetables with Pleasant View resident Bessie White. White, whose family immigrated to Montezuma County during the Great Depression, has been growing vegetables in the dryland style, with minimal irrigation, since her arrival. Farm Hub co-founder Nina Williams envisions the development of an organization that does far more than offer classes. “Ideally we will be able to support the whole local food system,” she says. This would include creating a centralized refrigeration space where farmers can aggregate their crops for easier distribution. Carter agrees, “It’s really about helping people make the leap from supplementing their income with agriculture to making a living growing
food. We would like to help them with distribution issues, and with overcoming regulatory hurdles. Usually, when they hit those hurdles, they just stop.” Meanwhile, Addie and Jude Schuenemeyer, the proprietors of Let It Grow, have been quietly rehabilitating some of the area’s hundred-year-old fruit orchards. With heirloom varietals that exist nowhere else, these orchards form the core of local agricultural heritage. Williams and Carter confirm that orchard restoration will also be an important part of the Farm Hub’s mission. Williams hopes they will be able to bring back the “Montezuma Valley” produce label that proudly graced the fruits shipped from our region eight decades ago. “And not just for our fruit,” she adds, “There could be Montezuma Valley garlic, potatoes, and a wide range of other produce.” “We’ve never really broken with our agricultural heritage here in Montezuma and Dolores Counties,” says Carter. “It is still alive and well here, perhaps more than in other parts of our region, because we have better resources in terms of land and irrigation, and aren’t suffering the same pressures from real estate development as some of our neighbors are.” In fact, the majority of producer contracts in the Durango School District’s local food program are from Montezuma County according to Williams. Despite the heritage and these small successes, many farmers and local food advocates have been frustrated with the barriers to bigger success, and the perceived fragmentation among initiatives that aim to improve the local agricultural economy. Williams recalls that The Farm Hub was born out of that frustration. “A hub is a visual representation of a connection between the many spokes of a thriving agricultural community.” The Farm Hub’s High Desert Homesteading Series continues through the spring. For more information about this or other Montezuma Valley Farm Hub initiatives, contact Rosie Carter at 970-5654170, Nina Williams at 970-560-1443, or the Facebook page of Let It Grow Nursery. `
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IN (and out of) THE KITCHEN
Lucas Price shows off his healthy earth worms that make their home behind his Tellluride restaurant – year-round.
COMPOSTING FOR THE MASSES BY D. DION
P
robably the last thing on your mind when you’re eating out at a restaurant is worms. But when La Cocina de Luz owner Lucas Price opens the lid of an old stainless steel freezer/vermiculture bin behind his restaurant and scoops back the top layer of decomposing tomatoes, straw, and velvety earth, he reveals hundreds of hungry, wiggling worms that are breaking down the organic matter and enriching the soil. “They love tomatoes,” he says, grinning. In another makeshift composting bin, built with plywood and an old hot tub cover, is a second steaming mass of decaying food waste, straw and dark soil. He recycles all of La Cocina’s food waste into these bins and uses it for the flowerbeds on his outdoor dining patio; he also dreams about having his own rooftop garden someday. Price is a pioneer of sorts in what is a burgeoning trend in Telluride: composting for the masses. It is one thing to throw your own wilted lettuce, onion butts, and carrot hair into a compost pile in your yard, but what about the food waste from the hundreds or thousands of people who eat out here every day? What happens to all the commercial food waste? According to the U.N. Food and Agriculture 10 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
Organization, Americans waste between 620–660 pounds of food, per person, every year; the organization estimates that one-third of all food, about 1.3 billion tons each year, is wasted across the globe. That’s a lot of tomatoes. Not all Telluride restaurants have space in the backyard to compost food waste, so Ross Dupuis is doing his part to help. Dupuis is starting a commercial composting operation on his 17-acre ranch in Norwood, with partner Scotty Abrahams, who sells wholesale compost in the community, called TeaCo Biological Supply. Dupuis’ truck bed is weighted down with a ton—literally, about 2,000 pounds—of pre-consumer food waste from local restaurants and businesses. There are food scraps from the Mountain Village Market, The Butcher & The Baker, CindyBread and a brewery, and coffee shavings from Tomboy Roasters. Even the Telluride school district hands over its food waste to Dupuis. He already has “windrows” of compost that are more than five feet tall, 200-yards long, and about 125°F, rapidly breaking down into nutrient-rich soil additive. “We see a huge demand for composting waste, and we’re going to take care of
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11 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS WINTER 2012/2013
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Ross Dupuis' and Scotty Abrahams' ever-growing commercial compost pile on Dupuis' farm in Norwood.
it,” says Dupuis. “People are just throwing it into the trash and it has valuable resources in it. Anybody that’s in the food industry realizes that there’s a ton of waste, and that there is a better use to it than going in a landfill.” TeaCo is pretty particular about the stream of waste it takes in right now; the school district goes through a lot of fruit, the market contributes spent produce, both of which break down quickly, and the yeast and flour from the bakery and brewery encourage the microbial and fungal growth that speed up the compost process. Abrahams is selective about what goes into the compost because he wants to create the perfect soil additive—he custom formulates the compost he sells to fit his clients’ needs, whether they are farming hay on the county’s west end, cultivating community organic vegetable gardens, or landscaping the golf course or municipal parks in Telluride and Mountain Village. Abrahams wants to give his clients a competitively priced, healthier alternative to the industrial fertilizers on the market. "Most fertilizers are salt-based products that have to be mined far away from [where they are manufactured]. TeaCo Biological Supply products are captured through the local waste stream and manufactured locally in San Miguel County. Our liquid and dry products feed living microbes, fungus, and minerals to the soil, which cannot be replicated by an industrial, salt-based fertillizer." 12 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
The whole TeaCo thing is sort of a boutique, small-town food cycle, capturing the pre-consumer, commercial food waste and transforming it locally into bio-dynamic compost used all around the same community. The big stick in this harmonious wheel, though, comes every summer. In summer, Telluride is inundated by tens of thousands of visitors to its festivals, creating a massive influx of food waste. That’s when EcoAction Partners started working with the festivals on a composting initiative. Festival vendors are asked to provide compostable bio-plastic utensils and plates made of corn, and volunteers man the trash and recycling bins, helping people separate the reusable waste from refuse. Vermiculture or carefully produced compost can break down the large scale of waste that Price or TeaCo take in, but to deal with the post-consumer festival waste, EcoAction needed a mechanized, commercial composter—so they purchased one, which can grind and break down even the bones and leftover food waste, bio-plastics and all. Walter Wright, EcoAction’s zero-waste coordinator, says that every summer more than 500 cubic yards gets diverted from the landfill. “In most landfills, the compost produces methane, which is over 20 times worse than CO2 for greenhouse gas emissions. Plus we get to use the compost to help the soil in our parks and don't have to buy and import a product.” `
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KNOW YOUR FARMER
Chuck Barry and Rosie Carter of Stone Free Farm.
14 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
A STONE FREE LIFE BY R ACHEL TURIEL
I
f you’ve ever waited on line, anxiously, for a limited 20-pound bag of Stone Free Farm fall carrots – pacing like a junkie – only to find they’ve sold out in fifteen minutes, you are not alone. The lucky ones stroll away grinning, like they’ve just bought 20 pounds of endorphins, or sunk some cash in the savings plan: Root Vegetable Security. And you may wonder, “what is it,” about those orange missiles of beta-carotene that sell out every week, May through October, totaling 16,000 pounds of carrots (at $2 per pound) by season’s end? “I’m not sure I understand it,” Chuck Barry shrugs over the carrot craze, while his wife and farming partner, Rosie Carter, attributes it to the deep red soil, literally “stone free” and walloped with soil nutrients. Though, she adds, “it’s nothing we’ve ever tried to push.” For those of us who’ve highlighted passages in Barbara Kingsolver’s DIY farming tome, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle; who swoon over baskets of colorful abundance at our local farmers market; who harbor a sleepy seed of a dream about quitting the office and starting a small organic farm, Chuck offers a free reality check. “I don’t have enough fingers or toes to count how many farms have come and gone since we began farming,” he says, which is precisely 19 years on Stone Free Farm in Arriola, Colorado, northwest of Cortez. And, I would wager, neither are there enough digits to list all the reasons why the real work of farming can crush every dreamy illusion to dust. However, Stone Free Farm is one of the top-grossing farms in Montezuma County, which is saying a lot, considering its small size of two acres. I had the pleasure of interviewing Chuck and Rosie in their cozy farm house ten years ago, and though, shockingly, we’ve all aged imperceptibly since then, much has changed in the nature of their farm season. Chuck and Rosie work less (an unusually decent 40 hours per week), farm less land, have more employees, and net more income than ever before.
It’s because they’ve been patient students in the economics of their farm – “it’s a business,” Rosie reminds – that they’ve been able to steer the ship of their farm into such fortunate waters. “We keep meticulous records,” says Rosie. They could tell you what they grossed in bok choi sales in a particular weekend in 2005, which is the precise information they’ve used to optimize their business. Or put simply, rather than grow ten varieties of eggplant in every gorgeous, earthy shade, they grow what sells best, using the least amount of land and time, and they grow a lot of it. Chuck and Rosie plant a succession of new seeds every week, ensuring that there is always a full market-stand of crops ready to harvest. Lettuce, arugula, radishes, and Asian greens all have a quick turnover at approximately one month and are always in demand. They sell 200 pounds of salad mix (at $4 a pound) every week; for a visual, that’s 270 gallons of dainty leaves. Running their farm like a business doesn’t detract from the joy of farming; it assures that Stone Free Farm will be around for a long time. Chuck and Rosie love the farming lifestyle: working outside, the ag community, schmoozing with customers, and the gift of time for winter pursuits. For Chuck, this includes being singer/songwriter of the acclaimed alt-country band, Beautiful Loser Society; and for Rosie, making art (see her work at ruralunderground.com). Other than a refrigerated truck, the only thing on their current wish list is a six-hour workday. In time, undoubtedly. At the interview’s end, Chuck and Rosie send me off with Beautiful Loser Society’s new CD and a bag of carrots. Yes, those carrots. It’s February at the time and a full 96 days, 3 hours and 12 minutes since I’ve last chomped into a Stone Free Farm carrot. I can
15
hardly remember what the hype is about. I tote the bag of bright roots home and my kids descend on them like they’ve been withering from nutritional deficiencies all winter. The carrots, harvested a full four months ago and stored in a root cellar, are amazingly juicy, crisp and
ROSIE'S SESAME AND GINGER PICKLED RADISHES
sweet. We mean to horde them, parceling out these gems of the earth, but we finish the entire one-pound bag over lunch. Look for carrots, and other Stone Free Farm delectables, at the Durango and Cortez farmers market sometime in May.. `
ROSIE'S SPICY ASIAN SLAW WITH PICKLED SALAD TURNIPS
ingredients 1 batch of Sesame and Ginger Pickled Radishes” 2 tablespoons mild vegetable oil such as safflower 1 tablespoon water 1 1/2 quarts thinly-sliced pak choi stems and greens 2 cups thinly-sliced green cabbage 3 green onions, cut into 1/4 " lengths, white and green parts 1 tablespoon chopped cilantro 3 tablespoons toasted sesame seeds (I prefer black sesame seeds but the tan ones work just fine)
ingredients 2 bunches radishes 1 cup rice wine vinegar 1 tablespoon sugar 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon toasted sesame oil 1 teaspoon hot chile paste 1/2 teaspoon freshly grated ginger method Cut the radishes in half lengthwise and then slice into 1/8 " half-circles. Set aside. Combine all the other ingredients in a jar with a tight-fitting lid. Screw on the lid and shake vigorously until the sugar is dissolved. Add the sliced radishes, cover and refrigerate overnight. They’ll be ready to eat the next day and will get stronger with time. They're addictive just as they are, but can also be tossed into salads, added to sandwiches or mixed into egg or tuna salad for an Asian twist.
method Make a batch of the Sesame and Ginger Pickled Radishes the night before and let marinate in the refrigerator. Just before assembling the salad, remove the radishes from the liquid with a fork or slotted spoon, reserving the liquid. To the reserved liquid add the vegetable oil and water and taste. This will be the dressing for the salad so adjust as you like. Toss pak choi, cabbage, green onions, cilantro and pickled radishes in a large bowl. Drizzle with the dressing and toss to coat. Sprinkle with the sesame seeds and serve.
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IN THE FIELD
Longtime bean farmer, Mike Coffey in his Dove Creek work shed.
18 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
THE BALLAD OF THE DRYLANDER STORY BY R ACHEL TURIEL
F
irst, forget everything you know about farming in the Southwest. Pull up the black snaking lines of your irrigation system - the ones you know to be the very circulatory system of your garden. Next, shelve the gardening books, including those that tantalizingly promise you can grow more vegetables on less land, in less time, with less money. The knowledge you need is passed from grandfather to father to son, accumulated like ones very DNA. Abandon fertilizers, whether they’re sourced from a bag, your neighbor’s cows, or the compost pile you tend with maternal love. Finally, pray for moisture, for the deep white blanket of winter snowpack, for the gentle fingers of spring rain massaging deep into the earth, and for late-summer clouds that rove the sky menacingly, ambushing the land with water before evaporating back into the clear blue. Now, maybe, just maybe, you are cut out to be a dryland bean farmer. If you live in the bustling city of Durango, the hip hamlet of Telluride, or even bitty Mancos, where ag and art meet at the 21st century altar of mixed marriages, you may notice that Dove Creek, CO has followed a different trajectory. You will not find a microbrewery in Dove Creek; there is no yoga studio, mountain bike shop, nor sushi fusion joint. And, while many of us here in the San Juans preach a loud and passionate sermon from our local-foods throne, the residents of Dove Creek---who in a 2004 survey named “freedom” as one of the highest community attributes---have been quietly growing one of the most important food crops for the past century. Dove Creek, (self-proclaimed) Pinto Bean Capital of the World, contains the carpet of farmland rolled out flat from the mountain ranges of the La Platas, the Sleeping Ute, and the Abajos. A metal bean silo rises over hwy 491 like the region’s own economic, religious and cultural icon. The bean fields, a red, sandy loam blown in from Utah’s Monument Valley containing “12 feet of friable, rockless soil,” according to bean farmer Dan Warren, are sliced by deep gashes of red-rock canyon. The entire region once housed the original masters of dryland agriculture, the Anasazi, for whom beans were a staple crop.
Meet Richard Knuckles. He’s a 3rd generation Dove Creek dryland bean farmer, “on his own” since 1971. Knuckles lives with his wife, Pat, in a spic’n’span ranch house, and farms up to 1000 acres of beans. He speaks a reverent farmer vernacular that requires a welltuned ear to follow. “I just like to see stuff grow, be outdoors,” he says by way of career explanation. His beefy hands look out of place indoors and idle on a February afternoon. Overalls stretch across the bridge of his belly and his eyes are warm and twinkly, even as he describes his summer farming schedule: 10-16 hours a day, 7 days a week. Outside of say, the Costa Rica rainforest, how does one grow thousands of acres of food without irrigation? In Dove Creek, early June, the sun asserting dominance and frost-danger mostly in retreat, the dryland farmer plunges the bean (which is a seed itself) into the top layer of existing soil moisture. On an average year this bean seed will sit 5 - 7 inches below the soil surface. How do you determine soil moisture? “Oh, you just dig,” says Richard Knuckles. Under the influence of subterranean warmth and moisture, the seed coat cracks open and a white root wriggles down into the reservoir of moisture below, which on an average year is a cool 3-4 feet. Next, the plant sends the brave sentry of stem up through a half-foot of soil, searching for the light. The seed leaves unfurl in the vegetal yoga pose: pinto sun salute. The first hurdle is over. Summer dawns. Heat pours. The bean plants continue to grow, leafing, branching, vining, drawing from the deep savings account of moisture. While every other farmer is fiddling with ditches and irrigation pipe, the dryland bean farmer waits, perhaps in prayer-like posture, for the summer monsoons. “A good winter takes you through the 3rd week in July,” Richard Knuckles says. After that, the late summer monsoons are essential for the bean plants to flower and set seed. “You gotta be a kind of a gambler,” admits Mike Coffey, another longtime bean farmer, who grows pintos, anasazi, bolitas, zuni gold, mortgage lifters, blacks and cannellinis on 1200 - 1400 acres. There are always surprises: promising winters followed by a fizzling
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Third generation pinto bean farmer, Richard Knuckles, patiently waits for planting season in his Dove Creek home.
20 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
Retail inventory (minus the hunting trophy) at Adobe Milling in Dove Creek, CO.
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monsoon season, or the reverse. Mike Coffey’s worst year was 1996. His best? 1997. Growing dryland beans is a clever business. Farmers can easily save their own seed. There are no costs in irrigation equipment, labor, or the water itself. Dry beans store and ship well. And, bonus: the bean plant---in the legume family---creates its own fertility via bacteria that attach to legume roots and convert airborne nitrogen to a usable form for the plant. When the beans are harvested, stalks left on the soil surface add nitrogen (an essential plant nutrient) to the soil. This is one reason most dryland bean farmers don’t use fertilizer. Other reasons: adding fertilizer to dry ground burns plants, farmers rotate beans with winter wheat (the stubble of which, left on the fields after harvest, adds nutrients), and many Dove Creek bean farmers are certified organic and can’t use typically available fertilizers. And yet, this clever business may be a dying business. “When I was a kid, there was a farmer on every 320 acres,” Dan Warren, 3rd generation dryland bean farmer (3000 acres) says. Now, most farmers operate at least 1000 acres to make a modest living. Rhonda Waschke, who farms with her husband, Billy, remembers when harvesting 4-5 sacks of beans (each sack contains 100 pounds) per acre used to indicate a poor year, “now you get that, you think you’re in heaven.”
22 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
What has changed in Dove Creek is precisely the most critical component of dryland bean farming: natural moisture. Never a mecca of precipitation, the average totaling just 15 inches/year (“enough to make a pretty good bean crop” says Dan Warren), things seem to be drying out. Dan Warren remembers “always getting tractors stuck in wet soil,” adding, “there’s none of that now.” Conditions were “real favorable” when Mike Coffey started farming (50 years ago at age 14, with his father), and though “this country is naturally subject to horrific droughts, there’s been a lot more dry years since the mid 90’s.” Richard Knuckles notes that “the last 8 or 10 years have been pretty dry,” which Rhonda Waschke shrugs off as “just a cycle.” Whether it’s permanent climate change, natural vagaries of high desert weather, or a latent curse of the Anasazi, times are changing for the dryland bean farmer. “You don’t like to admit it, but it’s happening,” Dan Warren remarks. Some farmers are finding auxiliary or permanent work in Cortez or elsewhere, and many have already replaced bean acreage with dryland sunflowers, more drought-resistant than beans, though taking a bigger toll on the soil. Denise Pribble, owner of Adobe Milling (which stores, packages and ships literal tons of Dove Creek beans), sees larger threats than a few drought years to the livelihood of the dryland bean farmer. She cites new business-hurting tax laws, as well as the next generation “getting a little education and not wanting to work in a field they can’t control.” Despite the jingle about beans being a musical fruit that children (and husbands) like to recite during a burrito dinner, beans are a knock-out punch of nutrition. There is no cheaper protein, plus a whopping delivery of fiber, folate, iron, magnesium, potassium. (pintos are currently at 100# for $65 at Adobe Milling in Dove Creek. At Durango Natural Foods, 10# of organic Dove Creek pintos are $16.63) Even after decades in the business, beans are still a staple meal of the Dove Creek bean farmer. The consensus: drop a ham hock and a sprinkle of salt in a pressure cooker and cook until beans are buttery soft (approximately 45 - 60 minutes). Soaking dry beans for 1-3 days, changing the water daily, eliminates much of the music-making oligosaccharides (teach your kids that word) in the seed coat. Richard Knuckles’ wife, Pat, tells about the year of the beanfest, when her husband explained that he didn’t think he was going to sell many beans. “‘We’re gonna have to start eating them’ he told me. So, we made pinto bread, pinto pizza, pinto everything,” she laughs,
Nicholas Coffey (son of Mike Coffee), a fulltime bean farmer, and fulltime mill worker at Adobe Milling in Dove Creek, CO. offering the recipe for pinto pizza, which was tasty enough to secure a permanent place in the Knuckles’ menu rotation. Now, April: the snow---what little there was of it---is disappearing fast. The Animas river, running through Durango, is gaunt, skeletal rocks protruding above the surface. It’s like a bad sequel to last year’s snowpack story, only worse. Drought classification across 89% of Colorado is “severe;” Dolores County (of which Dove Creek is county seat) fares slightly better at “moderate.” What do the bean farmers think about the current state of soil moisture? If they opt not to plant beans they can collect insurance, to which no bean farmer is a stranger, though it only covers partial expenses, no expected profit. “Oh, I’m gonna plant some beans,” Mike Coffey states with decisive and heroic hopefulness. He adds, “maybe less acres than normal, but you got to work with what you got.” Dan Warren echos this sentiment, “we’ve got about 2 1/2 feet of soil moisture now...kind of iffy, but if you don’t plant beans, you won’t harvest any beans.”
Richard Knuckles’ recent soil probe showed 2 feet of moisture. “You need a foot of good, wet moisture at planting time to get the beans up,” he says. That extra foot could easily evaporate, or possibly grow, by June, depending on spring rain and wind conditions. “It’s not an exact science; we’ll watch and see” Dan Warren says, which seems to be the banner under which dryland bean farming exists. Go to The Blue Mountain Cafe in downtown Dove Creek sometime in late May, where farmers congregate, and where Dan Warren says, “you look for a familiar truck and get a little BS with your coffee,” and the rest of the story will come clear. What is clear now is that these dryland bean farmers are champions of working within the constraints and gifts of nature. Bean farmers produce some of the highest calorie and storable protein per acre in Colorado, a task which deserves attention and respect. And when you listen between the lines, a deep, reverent love for their work and land rises to the surface. “I done it for a long time. I hope to do it for a while yet,” says Mike Coffey, his words ringing like a bell of hopefulness. `
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Anasazi beans
cannelini beans
pinto beans
pink eye beans
Colorado River beans
Zuni gold bean
24 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
black beans
mortgage lifter
Recipes from the 1967 edition of "From the Queens Kitchen." The annual cookbook's recipes came directly from the participants in the Pinto Bean Cooking Contest held every year in Cortez, CO. The now defunct contest, which started in 1957 (and ended around 1982), was part of the Four Corners Harvest Festival. Copies of the vintage Four Corners cookbook can still be found for sale online. 25
THE COMMITTED, THE PASSIONATE, THE SOCIAL, THE SAN JUAN HOMEBREWER STORY BY MICHELLE KING
It is spring in the San Juans and the woods will be peppered with foragers. Homebrewers are no exception. Many can be found snapping off spruce tips for spruce beers, and laying claim to budding patches of yarrow to use in yarrow beers. They know what they like, and they brew to their own specifications. They are altogether nonconformists, wary of commercial brews, supportive of the local micro brewers, but secretly superior to bigger operations. Once you’ve tasted a good homebrew, you will never go back. Neal Prell, president of the Wort Dreams club in Farmington, NM, and a frequenter of the Animas Alers Homebrew meetings, explains: “So many people come over to my house and taste a homebrew and they want to get into it. One, it’s really good beer and, two, it’s really cheap.” At local breweries a pint costs around $4 to 5 or $2 to 3 on pint nights. “We are making this stuff for 30 to 40 cents a pint – same beer,” says Prell. Though the goal is to make the best, cheapest beer, the draw is the creativity of the process. “You can ferment anything!” states Eleanor Schnose, a member of the Homebrewers of Pagosa Springs (HOPS). And yes, there is an app for that. With an app called Beer26 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
smith Lite, homebrewers can now brew and drive with their mobile device. With ingredient input from the brewer, the app predicts the alcohol content, color, and flavor of the brew. Local microbreweries are happy to inspire homebrewer efforts. ”Everyone is interested in better beer,” says Prell. Many San Juan area microbreweries host homebrew meetings, sell equipment, and chime in on conversations about recipes and techniques. “I did a milk stout one year, and I was down at Ska Brewery in Durango, and one of the brewers recommended I brew with cocoa nibs and mint. It made a fantastic chocolate mint stout,” says Prell. While breweries plan seasonal brews to spark consumer interest, ”we brew whatever the hell we want to brew,” states Brian Leavesley, president of the Animas Alers in Durango. In fact, Prell’s newest concoction made of 4-Way horse feed (corn, barley, oats, and wheat) won high accolades with Wort Dreams members. Fondly called HPA, or Horse Piss Ale, it weighed in at $1 a gallon. “Surprisingly smooth with just a slight hint of hops at the finish,” states an amused Prell. Encouraging homebrewers to follow their whims, today’s easy access economy allows them to get their hands on any ingredient,
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at any time, with few exceptions. Hops are grown locally as well as shipped in from all over the world, and if the local spruce harvest has passed, never fear, spruce tip harvesters in Pagosa have you covered (www.spruceontap.com). In the 1600s, brewers’ hands were tied. They were forced to brew bocks and stouts in the winter and ales in the warmer summer months due to the yeast’s fermentation process in the ambient temperatures. Cold fermented beers (winter beers) ferment from the bottom up, creating dark, high-alcohol, high-protein beers known as bocks, stouts, etc. The lighter (more wheat content) of these brews were tapped in spring, and known as “maibocks.” This sparked the idea of seasonal beers. In warmer summer months, beers ferment from the top down, creating ale with less alcohol content, and a cleaner, crisper taste. Now, in the age of modern climate control and refrigeration, homebrewers with the right setup can brew any kind of beer at any time. This is where the passion borderlines on obsession. Prell has a freezer set up to maintain a customizable cold temperature for brewing high-alcohol, long-fermenting dark beers. But why not become obsessed? The process is quite simple: grain and/or malt is boiled to release the sugars (the grain/malt is called the mash at this point). This process makes the wort. The wort is then filtered a bit and sparged (the process in which sugars are rinsed out of the mash). Next the wort is boiled with hops or any other imaginative ingredients, then chilled, poured into a sanitized fermenter, aerated and pitched with yeast. There are different commitment levels within this process. Kits are sold to simplify and shorten the process. New homebrewers generally start with extracts, allowing brewers to skip mashing and sparging, and go straight to boiling the wort, hops and other ingredients. Partial-mash is a stepping stone to all grain brewing – using some grain and some extract (shorter process, less complicated). The all-grain process is the most expensive (more equipment), but most customizable process. It is usually recommended for those who have been extract and partial-mash brewing for a while. “Making the extract is 99% of the heartache, but it is 99% of the character of the beer,” states Leavesley. To buy all the equipment for all-grain brewing, a homebrewer can expect to shell out a minimum of $300-$400. Using the extracts and partial mash kits, the cost can be cut in half. All the little details that make a beer taste good are learned along the way from trial and error, or passed on from homebrewer to homebrewer. “You can ask 10 different homebrewers how to make a brew, and you will get 20 different answers,” warns Prell. “Everyone does it differently. But everyone is learning and there is always the next step.” With the overwhelming amount of information online and in homebrewing books, being part of a group helps guide the newcomer to gain valuable feedback. “When you brew together, you will find the path of least resistance,” says Leavesley. “There are great books out there, but being able to survey people directly is priceless. It’s nice to get to know the people, to know that they are credible,” explains 28 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
Animas Alers member Tim Biggert. With Colorado being a microbrew Mecca, nearly every town has a homebrew club. Membership in the Durango club is free; HOPS asks a $5 donation for non-members partaking of brews at the club meeting. HOPS membership is $20 a year which earns you discounts at Pagosa Brewing Co. during the meeting. Many groups share their passion as well as their equipment to help new brewers get on their feet. There is no pressure for each member to be actively homebrewing; many groups are open for simple education about beer styles. Come, drink, learn, and brew – though not necessarily in that order. `
SPRUCE PALE ALE
FIND LOCAL CLUBS AT HOMEBREWERSASFor 4½ gallons: SOCIATION.ORG 1 pound caramel malt, cracked and steeped in 2 gallons of 160-degree water for 30 minutes, then HOPS PAGOSA: WWW.PAGOSAHOPS.ORG rinsed and strained out. Bring water to a boil, adding another gallon to DURANGO: make three. CONTACT BRIANIMAS ALERS AtLEAVESLEY the boil: AT ANIMAS.ALERS@GMAIL. AN Set a timer for 60 minutes and add: 7 pounds pilsen light dry malt extract COM 1 ounce fresh-cut, new growth spruce tips (the WORT W_DANlighterDREAMS colored partFARMINGTON: at the end of the branch) 1½ ounces Willamette whole leaf hops (5.1% alpha VER@HOTMAIL.COM acid) At 30 minutes, add ½ ounce spruce tips and ¼ ounce LLLL Apollo whole leaf hops (19% alpha acid) At 15 minutes, add ½ ounce spruce tips and ¼ ounce Apollo hops At the flame off (after 60 minutes of boil), add ½ ounce spruce tips and ½ ounce Cascade whole leaf hops (7% alpha acid) Cool and rack to a sanitized carboy, topping off with water to make 4½ gallons, taking a gravity reading (should be in the neighborhood of 1.06) and adding a package of Wyeast American Ale yeast. Let ferment until beer has visibly finished and gravity is in the 1.014 range or below. Rack to a secondary fermenter and let sit one more week, then bottle or keg. Find local clubs at: homebrewersassociation.org HOPS Pagosa: www.pagosahops.org Animas Alers Durango: contact Brian Leavesley at animas.alers@gmail.com Wort Dreams Farmington: w_danver@hotmail.com
CELEBRITY CHEF (but 100 percent Telluride) an Edible interview with 221 South Oak's Eliza Gavin
E
liza Gavin has known since a very young age that she wanted to own a restaurant. The chef -part was just an after-thought. Owning was the goal and 221 South Oak was the destination. Now more than decade later, Gavin is is still at the helm and the culinary arts, as it turns out, ended up being her gift. Gavin recently gained national notoriety with her appearance on the infamous Top Chef. Edible San Juan Mountains: Since our last issue, you have been on the infamous Bravo show, Top Chef. How did that come about? Were you, in a sense, discovered?
Eliza Gavin: I can’t really talk much about the interview process, but I can tell you that I was made aware that they were doing auditions in Denver, so I flew up their on a lark. It seemed like something fun to do. And from there it took on a life of its own, if you will. Did you have any reluctance in doing the show? I can’t say I had any reluctance in doing the show because I did it. I was not happy to be leaving my family and my business but it was an honor to be chosen for the show. But the word reluctant doesn’t really come to mind. When I got on the plane to go to Seattle, I was very nervous.
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How did you do? I didn’t do all that well on the show, for sure. It was difficult for me to be taken out of my element here at the restaurant where I have the whole place to myself. That part was difficult ... to share. Do you have any designs to further pursue your budding television career? Say, the next Julia? Living here in Telluride, a television career is not all that easy of a thing to do. Telluride doesn’t lend itself well to producers. I would have to go to a larger town. I am just happy doing what I am doing here. You went to the CIA. Then you went to France to Le Cordon Bleu. How did that come about? Was it planned all along or a welcomed detour? How long were you there? The CIA in Napa Valley is one for continuing education for
30 edible SAN JUAN MOUNTAINS SPRING/EARLY SUMMER 2013
professionals. I could take one-week courses, which was good. But I always knew that I wanted to go to Le Cordon Bleu. It seemed like such a dream to go to France and learn how to cook. So I went to CIA just to figure out if I did like school and was going to be okay going back. Le Cordon Bleu was just wonderful. I was in France for a year. Did the chefs yell at you at Le Cordon Bleu? Briefly describe the scene there. I picture old chefs with big mustaches that are perpetually upset. No, not really. They are kind of sweethearts. Some were nicer than others. Some absolutely refused to speak English which I thought was pretty cool. But overall they were pretty helpful. It was a great place to learn the classic French technique. If you weren’t a chef, what would be your second choice? I think I would like to be an accountant. I just love working with numbers. They are fun for me. Either that, or a professional skydiver. Do you cook at home? I don’t really have much time to cook at home because I’m here at the restaurant a lot. A lot of my cooking at home involves peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for my son at school. When it’s just me and my family, they are just happy to have me around, so we will sit around and order in Siam, or Gavin, my husband, will cook us turkey tacos. What is the most common food item you have in your home kitchen? Ground turkey. What is your family’s favorite meal? Turkey Tacos.
(formerly Cocina Linda)
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outtakes
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Lunch, M–F 11:30 to 2:30 Dinner, nightly from 5:30 Brunch, Sundays 11:00 to 2:00 Bar opens daily at 4:00 p.m. for drinks and apps
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