meat - beef, pork, lamb and chicken. we always have meat to take to market. sometimes we are low on beef, but have lots of pork and lamb (like now). sometimes we have minimal pork, but lots of beef. but regardless, since our meat is all vacuum sealed and frozen, we always have meat to take to market.
eggs - one market we go to we take eggs. we can easily sell 12-15 dozen eggs at one market. the chickens are producing less right now. their energy is spent keeping warm, not making eggs. since we only have one market a month to sell eggs at, that is fine right now.
wheat berries - high protein grain. wheat is harvested in the summer and stored in the freezer. it will pretty much keep as long as you need it to in there. we sort through the berries, weigh and bag them for market.
stored produce - sweet potatoes, garlic, shallots, dried hot peppers and dried herbs. sweet potatoes were harvested in september, cured in the greenhouse and have been stored in a cool, airy place since then. some sweet potatoes don't survive storage, but for the most part, they store very well. we still have many baskets of potatoes to sell. garlic was harvested in july, cured, cleaned and stored. we weigh and bag it for sale. we still have about 2lbs to sell. shallots were also harvested in the summer and are weighed and bagged for sale. there is about 1lb of shallots left. during the 'regular' growing season, we try not to sell produce that is more than a week old. so any hot peppers we have left after a week, we put in the dehydrator or convection oven to dry. we weigh, bag and label the hot peppers for sale for our winter markets. as long as the peppers are completely dry when bagged, they should last as long as we need them to. we started off with 5 varieties that we sold dried, but only have 2 varieties left. some fresh cut herbs last longer than others, especially depending on how you store them. we tried to dry herbs once a week during the 'regular' growing season, but time didn't always allow. to dry herbs, we pinch the leaves off, lay out on a piece of paper towel and put in the microwave for 30 seconds at a time, 1-2 minutes total. doing this quick drying method, the herbs stay green and retain their great flavor. i was skeptical about drying some herbs, knowing that when you buy them in the grocery store, they are brown and almost tasteless. but it worked with everything we dried. everything was still green, fragrant and flavorful. we started off winter markets with about 10 different varieties of dried herbs. we are down to one. they sold much quicker than i thought, though i am happy about it.
fresh produce - what?! fresh, local, organically grown produce in pennsylvania in february?? nah! well, yes, actually. we have several different varieties of cooking greens growing outside under hoops and plastic - collards, mustard, spinach and kale. for this past winter market, we harvested 12 - 1/4lb bags of spinach, 10 - 1/3lb bags of collards, 24 - 1/3lb bags of kale and 8 - 1/3lb bags of mustard greens. that's a lot of greens...17lbs of cooking greens growing outside in february in lancaster. not too bad, if you ask me. but there is more. we have a small greenhouse where we grow salad greens for winter markets. we grow arugula, cress, lettuce, mesclun mix and swiss chard. the cress and arugula we sell on their own, but the lettuce, mesclun mix and swiss chard we mix all together to make a salad mix that we sell. for this past market, we had 9 - 1/8lb bags of arugula, 5 - 1/4lb bags of salad mix and 21 - 1/8 bags of salad mix. that makes 5lbs of salad greens. now if you compare these numbers to other numbers from the spring or fall, they don't seem like a lot. but think about what it takes to grow and harvest in the winter - through the ice, snow, cold, wind and shorter daylight days. plus, the greenhouse requires some heat. we have been able keep the heat very low, but still. so, yes, we charge a bit more in the winter for these precious greens, mainly because where else are you going to find them. most farmers don't want to be bothered with winter produce growing. and i can sometimes understand why. when you are outside cutting leaves of kale with scissors and your hands get cold and wet. it seems to take hours for them to warm up. or is it worth it to fight the wind and get more weights to keep the plastic down over the produce outside? or is it worth it to heat and water a small greenhouse to grow a few bags of greens? but then you take your greens to market and you watch them, literally, disappear. with all those bags of greens we took to market on saturday, we came back with ONE bag of salad mix. that's it. if we had more, we could have sold it. people get so used to going to local markets during the spring, summer and fall. they begin to crave those fresh greens in the winter, too.
fresh herbs - cilantro, parsley, chives, oregano, thyme and lemon thyme. parsley is still growing out in the field. it is covered with hoops and plastic, but i had no idea it was so winter hardy. i plant cilantro in the greenhouse b/c it is suppose to help repel bad bugs, but it also sells well. we decided to move the herb garden this year and start fresh. so before the ground was worked up, i dug up some of the perennial herbs and put them in large pots in the greenhouse. they've been doing well so i cut some for market. we took a total of 28 bunches of fresh herbs to market and came back with 10. 18 bunches of fresh herbs sold in february in lancaster. cool.
the length of this post alone shows just how much we have to sell and do for winter markets. yes, it costs time and money to be producing year round, but it is also worth it when you come back with empty coolers.
