So small yet so large
Down at Joe’s Market Garden in Coburg before the sun gets hot farmers Rachel Rubenstein and Thanisa Adams (in the pic) harvest organic cos lettuce, Tuscan & curly kale, rainbow chard, bok choi and early cucumbers
Plunging the greens into cold water the harvest is packed into crates and taken 6km away over the Merri Creek and into the Fair Food coolrooms in Preston.
The next morning Hema, Mo and the Fair Food crew will carefully pack Joe’s harvest into orders to be delivered to Fair Food customers across Melbourne.
Unless you grow them yourself these are freshest greens you will find in this city.
Back when Joe Garita was still farming here, Pino, one his workers, used to pick and cook up the most tender and delicious chicory, rapa, sinapa or leaf amaranth for lunch.
Whenever I asked Pino for the recipe he’d shrug like I was a bit slow, take a swig of his homemade grappa and reel off the ingredients – olive oil, garlic, a little salt and pepper and a squeeze of lemon juice.
It took me a long time to catch on that these ingredients were only the support cast, what mattered to Pino was freshness and being a part of the garden where they were grown.
These days if I want to recapture the soft bittersweetness of Pino’s greens I know I have to find them close by and cook them on the day they come through my door.
Along with Joe’s Garden, Fair Food gathers almost all of our lettuce, bunched greens and herbs from a group of small growers farming in and around Melbourne.
Day’s Walk in Keilor, Farm Raiser in Bellfield, Green Gully in Cockatoo, Honey Lane in Brunswick East, Plenty Valley Produce, Remi’s Patch in Kilmore, Wattle Gully in Upper Plenty and Wildwood near Sunbury.
These farms couldn’t be smaller yet their influence couldn’t be larger.
They keep the old varieties and seek out the new.
They welcome the interns who come to farm and find their courage.
They feed us and our need to be part of something bigger.
Giving thanks
This time of year as so many of us gather and share food together, it is perhaps the closest thing we have to a Thanksgiving.
Thank you for your support this year and for all your recipes, your ideas, your poems, your pictures and your kindness.
Thanks to all the hard work of our packers and drivers, dispatchers and supervisors, buyers and marketers, customer servers and managers.
Thanks to the teachers at CERES School of Nature and Climate for connecting our heads, hearts and hands to the land.
And thanks to the farmers, foragers, growers, sprouters, mushroom magicians, bakers, beekeepers, chefs, cheesemakers & chocolatiers, brewers & wine makers, fishers & providores, soap crafters, egg collectors, tea towel artists and everyone who has fed and looked after us this year…
302 Flowers
3000 Acres
Al Naturale
Aquer Foods
Arancini 4 All
Aroha Earth
Australian Organic
Australian Pumpkin Seed Company
Australian Superfoods NQ
Back To Basics
Barambah Organics
Bbbyo
Bee Sustainable
Bellco
Berringa Honey
Biodynamic Marketing
Bite Me Fine Foods
Black Chicken Remedies
Blue Pumpkin
Blue Sky Organics
Boatshed Cheese
BOC
Botanical Beverages
Broth of Life
Brunswick Aces
Calendar Cheese
Ceasar Maruland
Cello Bags
Central Victoria Honey
CERES Bakery
CERES Fair Food
CERES Microgreens
Ceres Organics
Cherry Road Flower Farm
Claire Mosley
Clare Harvey
Cockatoo Grove
Cocoa Rhapsody
Cultiv.Ate
Dan’s Empanada Bar
Daylesford & Hepburn Mineral
Day’s Walk Farm
Dench bakers
Dorr Paper and Food
Dr Planet
E. & A. Salce
Eat Rite
Eco
Eddies Cider
Edwards Sourdough
Eighteen Thousand Islands
Emmeline Park
Encore
Eurostore Australia
Everlasting Farm
Farm Raiser
Farro Organico
Feel Good Foods
FieldTech Solutions
First Generation Organics
First Ray
Flavorite
Food To Make You Smile
Foothill Organic
Fourth Wave Wine Partners
Gazzola Farms
gfprecinct
Gippsland Free Range Eggs
Global By Nature
Gollings The Florists
Good Goods
Goz City
Grateful Harvest
Green Cauldron Farm
Green Gully Organics
Happygreen
Hawkers Beer
Health Magic
Healthybake
Heaps Normal
Henley Farms
Himalaya Tibetan Tent
Holy Cow Chai
Holy Crumpets
Home Stand Produce
Honest to Goodness
Honey Lane Farm
Iminamuck
Indys Pavillion
Inlay
Integeral Farmers
Island Home
J&M Alexandra
Joe’s Market Garden
Kadac
Kaddy
Kas Organics
La Madre Bakery
Legudi
Lello Pasta
Lil Bit Better
Little Tin
Little Tuna
Long Paddock Cheese
Love Commercial
Love Tea
Loving Earth
Luscombe Foods
Mabu Mabu
Madelaine Eggs
Maison Ilma
Mark Foletta
Melba Fresh Organics
Melba Fresh Providore
Melbourne City Rooftop Honey
Mount Zero Olives
Mountain Bread
Muddy Creek Gardens
Nature’s Cargo
Netti
Onya Think Reusable
Organic Growers
Organic Needs
Organux
P & H Kamvissis
Pepo Farms
PHD
Pierogi Pierogi
Plenty Valley Produce
Postmistress
Premier Fruits
Priest Bros
Pud for all Seasons
Pudding Nana
Pure n Cure
Pure Organic Harvest
Ratio Cocoa Roasters
Raw Materials Australia
Ray Gregory & Sons
Reed
Remi’s Patch
Roza’s Gourmet
RQM Holdings
Ryan Decoite
Schreurs & Sons
Schulz Organic Farms
Sealane FoodService
Shosto
Sisterworks
Smalt
Songbird Wine
Sophie Treloar Merri Creek
Soulfresh Group
Spiral Foods
St David Dairy
Stir Crazy Lady
SunButter Oceans
Sunzest
Tailor
Tenfarms
The Corner Store Network
The Dirt Company
The Fermentary Pty Ltd
The Forage Company
The Mushroomery
The O’Kelly
The Whole Food Kitchen
Trialia Foods
Tucker and Elm
Unearthed co. Mushrooms
Unique Health Products
Vedder
Velisha National Farms
Waldner Grain Mills
Warbotanicals
Warburton Wellbeing
Wattle Gully Produce
Wilhelma farm
Willow Zen
Zeally Bay Sourdough
Have a safe summer break, see you in 2024
Chris
