Proposed Bill Makes Farm Interns Legal In Kitsap

Apprenticeships and Internships in most occupations, including the law, trades, and agriculture were the standard until the early 20^th Century. If you were lucky, you got to work with your parents, mostly likely your father, to learn his trade. It’s all well documented: both the benefits and the abuses. Fair labor laws went a long way to correcting the abuses, but those safeguards also threw up a series of barriers to entry. The two factors, abuses and barriers, make this Small Farm Internship Program a necessity to passing along knowledge and skills to a new generation of farmers.

The Washington Small Farm Internship program extends the initial two-year pilot program for another five years, until December 31, 2017. The bill expands participating counties to include San Juan, Skagit, Whatcom, King, Pierce, Thurston, Jefferson, Kitsap, and Spokane counties.

The 2010 program, which expired at the turn of the year, allowed small growers (revenues less than $250,000) in Skagit and San Juan counties to employ unpaid interns under two conditions: the farm provided workers' compensation coverage (frankly, the most important aspect for the state), and offered agreements that included a defined curriculum teaching farming. Six farms participated.

For Winter Quarter 2010, Kelly, who works for us, interned here through WSU, which is legal and defined her curriculum, but not all farm interns can be students at a university. What Kelly tells us she learned is that farming is a hands-on learning experience gotten only through work experience. She has said to me so many times, it is so different than in the book. We agree, because we are changing how and what is farmed here, as are most all other Kitsap County farmers. We have practiced certified organic farming for 8 years. We have learned a lot and have a lot to learn, too. Working with interns will make us a better farm.

To read more about this, see the January 12, 2012 Capitol Press editorial.

SB 6392 Title: An act relating to a farm internship program. Brief Description: Establishing a farm internship program. Sponsors: Senators Ranker, Kohl-Welles and Conway.

Find your Legislator: http://apps.leg.wa.gov/DistrictFinder/Default.aspx

CSA PICKUP WEEK and Farm Store on Tuesday 2:00 to 6:30 p.m.

We have some Braeburn apples in from Tomlison's orchard. Certified Organic. Plus there are yams and sweet potatoes. 

Kelly will be picking for Tuesday in this lovely sunny weather.

Here's a great apple recipe plus a Maple Whipped Cream topping recipe.

Apple Custard Pie

1 single pie shell in 9-inch pie plate

4 large apples peeled and sliced for pie

1 Cup sugar

1 Cup whole milk (this is a wonderful reason to try Dungeness Valley Creamery Whole Jersey Milk)

1/4 Cup flour

1 Tbsp cinnamon

1 to 2 Tbsp butter

Preheat oven to 350ºF.

Peel and slice apples about ¼ inch wide. Mix together flour, sugar and cinnamon. Add apples. Cover apples in dry mixture.

Pour apples into crust, evenly spreading all of dry mixture. Dot the top with butter.

Add milk slowly so that it is absorbed by the dry mixture and surrounds the apples.

Bake 45 minutes. The custard should be set. If not, check every 3 to 5 minutes until it is done. Cool completely, then chill in refrigerator until ready to serve. Top with maple whipped cream if you want an incredible experience.

Maple Whipped Cream

1 Cup cream

2 to 3 Tbsp Maple Syrup (depends on taste)

Place cream and syrup into a cold, deep bowl. Chill bowl for about 1/2 hour in refrigerator. Stainless steel, ceramic, or copper is best. Whip cream until it is in folds that stand on their own. Serve immediately.

Only three inches of snow, so far. Cliff brushed it off of the hoop houses and the green house at 4:30 a.m. Paul went back out and brushed it off at 6:30 a.m. They went out later and did it again. The roads were icy last night, so I am sure that under the snow it is very slick.

The chickens, ducks, and geese declared this an affront. Rex and Rosie are well camouflaged as they lie in wait for predators. It is a very quiet day. Here is a great cold day recipe for your sunchokes. Sorry, we can't help you with the ham right now.

Cream of Ham and Sunchoke Soup

1 1/2 lb sunchokes

4 Tbsp butter

2 tsp thinly sliced garlic

1 Cup thinly sliced scallions or yellow onions

3 Cups vegetable or meat stock

2 1/4 Cup whole milk with cream

Sea salt and freshly ground white pepper to taste

2 pounds cubed cooked ham

Scrub and peel sunchokes and thinly slice into rounds, and let sit in ice water. Peel and thinly slice garlic and scallions.

Melt butter in a large soup pot over medium heat. Add garlic and scallions. Cook 2 minutes. Drain water from sunchokes, add to garlic and scallions and stir until thoroughly mixed, reduce to low heat, and cook until sunchokes are soft about 5 to 10 minutes.

While sunchokes are cooking, cut ham in 1/4 inch cubes. Puree sunchoke, garlic and scallion mixture. Add Ham. Add stock. Bring to a boil and immediately remove from heat. Add stock slowly to milk until milk is warm (to keep milk from curdling) and then add to rest of stock. Reduce heat to maintain a low simmer. Cover and cook for 20 to 30 minutes. Serve hot.

A skiff of snow is frozen to the ground.

♦  Happy 60th Birthday, Cliff! ♦

The weatherman forecasts that there might be snow. The sky looks like the snow might be on its way, but if the temperature sits just above freezing, it will rain. We battened down the hatches for winter growing many weeks ago. Heaters are positioned in the tunnels, high and low, to melt the snow, so that they do not collapse. 

Today, one of the crew is planting garlic. This is primarily Purple Glazer. This weekend more garlic will go in, too. Our crew planted out the last of the Alby's Gold potatoes for the spring this past week. We will plant more from our own seed in a few weeks.

In about three or four weeks the lettuce will be planted in one of the low tunnels. The cool/cold weather crops in the high tunnel are growing well. Check on Tuesday for what is fresh picked.

Have a great weekend.

Wednesday — TODAY — CSA pickup in Silverdale and Port Orchard.

We have yams and sweet potatoes in the Farm Store and freshly harvested sunchokes (Jerusalem Artichokes). A recipe for each is below.

Baked Japanese White Sweet Potatoes.

Sweet potatoes (about 1/4 to 1/2 lb per person)

olive oil

Preheat oven to 375°F.

Wash the skins, but do not peel. Make quarter inch slices part way through, leaving a quarter inch spine so that the slices fan out when cooked. They do not fan when raw.

Lightly oil the bottom of a glass baking dish. Place sweet potatoes, uncut side down, into the dish. Drizzle olive oil over the top allowing some to coat each slice. Cover with foil. Bake 1/2 hour. Remove foil and continue baking for additional 1/2 hour. Sweet potatoes are done when they are soft but hold their shape. Gently fan them. Serve hot.

Roasted Sunchokes

4 to 5 medium sunchokes

3 to 4 cloves of garlic

2 Tbsp olive oil

1/2 tsp salt

Pepper to taste

Leaves from 1 sprig of fresh rosemary.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

Clean the sunchokes under cold running water. Slice 1/4-inch thick lengthwise. Peel garlic and leave whole. Toss the sunchokes and garlic with the olive oil. Coat the bottom of the roasting pan and add the sunchokes and garlic. Spread sunchokes and garlic evenly.

Sprinkle with the salt, pepper, and rosemary. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, until the sunchokes are tender inside, like a potato.