Open Farm Days Offers A Look Behind Local Food

• 

• 

• 

• 

Alberta Open Farm Days returned Aug. 15 and 16, opening the gates to farms and food-producing businesses across the province.

The annual event gave visitors a chance to meet producers, walk through working farms and learn more about where their food came from. Locally, visitors experienced two very different sides of food production at Kross Farm near Mannville and during a cheesery tour in Vermilion.

Kross Farm welcomed guests into its regenerative, no-till market garden, where they learned how vegetables were grown without chemicals and with very little watering or weeding.

The wet summer had created some challenges. Some crops were delayed, the compost area was muddy and visitors had to use the driveway rather than entering through the field. Peas, beans and carrots were ready for the u-pick, while smaller amounts of cauliflower and broccoli were also available.

Rather than trying to make everything look perfect, the farm used the conditions as part of the lesson.

One side of the cabbage patch had more weeds because there had not been enough mulch placed in that area. It gave visitors a clear look at how much difference proper mulch could make in a no-till garden.

Tours of the passive solar greenhouse were offered throughout the day, along with composting demonstrations when conditions allowed. Picnic tables were also available for visitors who wanted to bring lunch and spend some time enjoying the gardens.

The farm’s chickens were kept away from visitors as a precaution against avian influenza.

In Vermilion, the cheesery tour gave visitors a close-up look at how milk was turned into fresh curds and cheddar blocks.

• 

• 

The process involved far more hands-on work than many may have expected.

During the cheddaring stage, two large slabs of cheese weighing about 110 pounds each were flipped every 15 minutes to help drain the whey and create the right texture.

Once ready, the slabs were cut into smaller pieces, salted and either packaged as fresh cheese curds or placed into moulds and pressed overnight to become cheddar blocks.

The cheesemaker, Valerie Martel (Roberts), joked that without an automatic machine, she had become “the cheese mill,” chopping the warm curds as quickly as possible before they began sticking together again.

Visitors also heard that cheesemaking involved plenty of trial and error.

Changes in temperature, the milk itself and even the pH of the water could affect how a batch turned out. An attempt to make cottage cheese once failed because the town water reacted differently than the water used at the farm. That unsuccessful batch eventually helped lead to the creation of cream cheese.

Even a change of just a couple of degrees could make a difference. One batch of Brie soured overnight after the building became slightly colder than usual.

The tour also covered the testing, cleaning and inspections that happened behind the scenes. Every load of milk was checked for temperature and antibiotic residue before it could enter the production tank.

The new facility was designed with natural light, better drainage, proper air circulation and large windows so people could watch the cheesemaking process instead of having it hidden behind closed doors.

Together, the two stops gave visitors a much better idea of what went into local food before it ever reached a grocery store shelf.

At Kross Farm, that meant mud, weeds, mulch and a growing season that had not gone quite as planned. At the cheesery, it meant heavy lifting, careful timing and learning that even a small change in temperature could affect an entire batch.