Frog Log

Well, I got called on my last entry when I was whining about the pole beans. Tom, my friend and writing buddy, rather gleefully pointed out that the beans could not "rappel" up the poles because rappel only refers to going down. Well, I was wrong, but I was also right because those beans never did go up the poles; they mae a weak attempt and then RAPPELLED back down to the ground. And although pole beans have a flavor and substance that is so reassuringly beany, we had to stop picking the patch. We did give Tom a chance to pick it, as a reward for his astute blog reading! We exchanged pole bean picking for melon picking, and that was a pretty good trade! Just as mysterious as the pole bean's inability to climb is the rich sweetness in almost all of our melons this year. The sun, rain, heat and melon fairies conjoined in just the right combination to bring us a bumper crop. Finding that right combination is what must keep farmers, apparently gamblers at heart, coming back ...

Pole Beans. You see them pictured in the garden catalogs - lush vines covering six-foot high poles that have been arranged in a teepee shape. There is always a cute kid peeking out from this leafy green playhouse. Okay, we set up lots of pole teepees; we planted and watered this old-fashioned variety of pole beans, and we even taped the vines to the poles when they seemed to struggle with the concept of expertly wrapping themselves around those poles in order to rappel to the top of the arrangement and create the picture perfect bean house which would also make it mighty darn easy to pick those beans conveniently dangling at eye level. Forget the catalog pictures! I'm out there on a late Friday afternoon. It has been a long picking day and it's hot. The bean field is pitched to perfectly catch the full force of the late afternoon sun. Did I mention I was tired? Did I mention that the "pole beans" all lie in exquisitely tangled piles of vines, beans and leaves at the...

I was just listing some of the fresh herbs that we will bring to market for the "In Season" section of this web site. The spell checker didn't like the word "Arugula". When I right-clicked for its suggestions, I got "argyle", "regular", and "Uruguay"! Obviously my spell-check program needs to get a little more hip! With the growing interest in fresh vegetables and traditional cuisine, Arugula, though admittedly more popular in Europe, has become at least familiar to many American shoppers. We were the first growers to bring Arugula to the Ann Arbor Farmer's Market. Sometimes we called it "Rocket", which is an English version of the French name, "Roquette". Arugula is the Italian name of this tantalizingly spicy/nutty flavored herb, and this is the name that seems to be winning out. I remember early days offering customers a taste of this unfamiliar green. I also remember the customer who, after her first ta...

Heat and rain - it has been downright tropical and this would have been the year to grow papayas and mangoes. :) Instead we'll have to settle for our homegrown tomatoes that we have been enjoying for a week or so. They have such a sweet and rich flavor. I have always said that our vegetables taste like fruit, and our fruit? Well - oh, but I said I wouldn't go on any more strawberry rants! (They did taste like ambrosia!) The rain and heat is helping the vegetables to grow, but the weeds are happily growing as well. We have been cultivating nonstop it seems. Along with the weeds, certain insect populations have exploded. Many of you who garden know about the flea beetles in the early spring. Some of those little buggers are still hanging around. There are no great treatments for flea beetles that I know of. A lot of organic practices depend on timing. In the spring, if we can protect the vulnerable plants until they are big enough to resist decimation by these voracious little be...

I sort of fell off the Frog Log for a while. We had some catching up to do after the party. It probably isn't the best time to schedule a party right in the middle of the growing season, but we're not sorry! Hopefully we'll get some rain soon to bring the crops home. Tomatoes are just on the cusp of ripening. We have been eating some early starters and they are delicious!

We are cleaning up the farm for our festivity tomorrow. We hope that many of you can make your way out to Frog Holler, perhaps some of you for the first time. Even if the weather threatens, we can move the food and festivities into our "party barn", as my three-year-old buddy, Arianna, calls it. The Party Barn is the latest incarnation of a building that has served in previously much more work-oriented capacities. When we moved to Frog Holler, the barn was a big, beautiful classic animal barn, with a huge haymow and stalls for draft horses in the lower floor. Apparently, Frog Holler had been a working orchard with trees planted in the 1940's by Dr. Gesell. (See "History" for more background on Dr. Gesell. Also the June 11 Frog Log.) When the Gesells were no longer involved, one of their caretakers kept sheep on the farm. Apparently he had an innovative idea for managing the sheep. He kept them in the former horse stalls, but he never got around to cleaning tho...

Okay, this is my last strawberry rant. If you just found our site and are reading this in August - sorry - you missed one of our best berry years ever. I just tasted a berry that was sun-kissed sweet with melt-in-your-mouth tenderness. I confess to have eaten probably hundreds of berries this season, but I'm still not jaded because their flavor has been exceptional. If you're reading this in real-time, I encourage you to gorge yourself for another week! Have strawberry shortcake for breakfast! With homemade biscuits, and fresh whipping cream, you have several major food groups covered and will be doing just fine. And then, after the season's end next week, vow never to eat a strawberry until next June, when you can get fresh, organic, local strawberries that taste like they're s'posed to taste! Okay, if it's December and you want a little color on a fruit plate and don't mind that the taste is faintly reminiscent of a strawberry with slightly bitter underton...