Farm to Table

Southwest of Ann Arbor, less than half-an-hour's drive from our house, an area of beautiful farmland remains productive and relatively undisturbed by urban growth. In many cases, farms have been in the same families for several generations. Shopping at the Ann Arbor Farmers Market, I've often bought eggs, chicken, lamb, wheat-berries, and other produce from the Ernst family farm in this area. Curious, I drove around there near the address on their food packages and took a few photos.

Beautiful silos, grain cribs, animal barns and fields of corn still stand unchanged, although closer to town, much farmland has been bulldozed for subdivisions and shopping centers. Also among the farms are quite a few barns that have now been turned into wedding venues or other non-farm uses.

This cow seemed to be checking me out as I drove by.
(I wasn't that close -- this is taken with a long lens!)

Ernst Farm products are now available at the new Argus Farm Stop near our house, along with meat from several other local producers and local fruit, vegetables, cheese, and more.

Ernst Farm meats in the Argus freezer -- we bought some brats, and...

After defrosting the brats, we threaded them with scallions on skewers to grill on the barbecue.

Along with the brats, we cooked some portobello mushrooms. If anyone is growing
mushrooms locally, I don't know where they sell them -- not at Argus or the Farmers Market.
We bought these at Kroger's. I'm hoping someone starts a local mushroom farm!

Brats on the grill.

The mushrooms, with garlic slivers inserted in the gills,
were sprinkled with rosemary & basted with oil and balsamic vinegar.
They were quite delicious. Another recipe from Steven Raichlen.

Leftover brats and mushrooms went into a pot of chili with adobo peppers,
black beans, corn kernels, etc.