Brussels Sprouts

Not Your Grandma’s Sprouts

by Holly Madrigal


Those who dislike Brussels sprouts are legion. The cruciferous mini-cabbages of the days of old were so bitter that adults raised in the 1960s experience culinary flashbacks. As it turns out, though, they may be one of the vegetables most successfully altered, through plant breeding, by having the stark bitterness bred out of them. In the 1990s, scientists identified a specific chemical called glucosinolates that caused that disagreeable flavor. Plant breeders began growing older, sweeter varieties that had fallen out of favor due to their small harvests, and crossed these more delicious plants with modern ones selected for less of that bitter element. The result is that the Brussels sprouts you can now find at your farmers market or grocery are much more enjoyable, with a perfectly balanced flavor that creates a dish that is both delicious and nutritious.

Chefs have caught on to this vegetable wonder and created dishes that highlight and enhance its flavors. The Harbor View Bistro at the Noyo Harbor Inn has elevated this humble vegetable into a menu favorite. Their Flash Fried Brussels Sprouts are seared until they are bright green with a crispy char, then are tossed with morsels of bacon and diced pecans. A dash of Parmesan ups the umami flavor, and the maple syrup reduction and a splash of sherry coat each bite with a hint of sweetness. A tip for locals: if you come for happy hour, you can try these perfect sprouts as a small plate with a glass of white wine. Or you can add the Bistro’s phenomenal deviled eggs or wild mushroom bruschetta for a full meal.

Brussels sprouts are ripe now, and this dish beautifully highlights their singular flavor. Try it at home, or leave the prep to the pros and stop by the Noyo Harbor Inn. You know, for research.

Flash Fried Brussels Sprouts

Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cook Time: 10 minutes
Servings: 2

INGREDIENTS

• 3 cups Brussels sprouts
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp black pepper
• 1/4 cup sherry wine vinegar
• 1/4 cup maple syrup
• 1/2 cup diced bacon
• 1/3 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
• 1/3 cup chopped walnuts (can roast ahead of time, if desired)

DIRECTIONS

Cut the Brussels sprouts in half (or quarters if large). In a sauté pot, cook sherry wine, vinegar, and maple syrup until reduced to a thick sauce (about 2/3 reduction). In a separate sauté pan, cook the bacon until nice and crispy, then remove onto a paper towel to absorb the grease.

Keep the sauté pan with the bacon drippings hot and use it to sauté the Brussels sprouts until they are brown on the edges and cooked through (can cook until crispy, if desired). Transfer the sprouts into a bowl and toss them with walnuts, parmesan cheese, bacon, salt and pepper, and the reduction. Serve and enjoy!

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Noyo Harbor Inn
500 Casa del Noyo, Fort Bragg
707) 961-8000 | noyoharborinn.com

Open Wed - Mon
Happy Hour 3:00pm -5:30pm, Dinner 5:00pm to close

Brussels Sprouts photo by Matt Seymour courtesy of Unsplash.

The Boonville Distillery

A Trio of Talent

by Torrey Douglass


Natalie Sparks was 21 when her dad brought home some apple pie moonshine. “I thought it was delicious,” she recalls. “That sparked my interest.” She got a book and even considered making her own, but ultimately didn’t pursue it at the time. In fact, many years would pass before she seriously pursued the craft of distilling spirits. Today she is the owner of The Boonville Distillery, home of her distilling business, two restaurants, and the only full bar within 30 miles.

It makes sense that Natalie is doing what she does. A fifth generation Mendocino County resident, she grew up spending time at her grandparents’ home, conveniently situated above the bar they owned on Lake Mendocino Drive in Ukiah. She would rise with them at 5am to mop floors, motivated by permission to play the jukebox before the doors opened. “Being behind the bar is second nature to me because I witnessed it as a kid,” reflects Natalie.

Years later, after moving to Anderson Valley, Natalie decided she wanted to get into the restaurant business. She became business partners with Lauren Keating, owner and founder of Lauren’s restaurant, a long-time and beloved local dining spot in Boonville. Natalie worked alongside Lauren for a few years before taking over when Lauren retired. Eventually, she moved the restaurant down the street to the original home of the Anderson Valley Brewing Company. The Brewery’s owner had selected the property because it had a reputation for possessing “the sweetest water in Boonville,” which was ideal for his beer brewing.

Because of the location’s history as a brewery, Natalie was able to acquire a license to distill spirits and finally try her hand at the craft. She delved in, reading up on old and new techniques and learning from various distillers in Mendocino and Sonoma counties. She started with some good old fashioned apple moonshine, using fruit she picked with her son from their 50 apple trees.

Less than 8% of craft distilleries in the U.S. are owned by women (incidentally, the first known still was invented by a woman known as “Mary the Jewess” in 200 CE). To date, Natalie has produced her own vodka and agave spirits (as a Protected Designation of Origin, only the agave spirits originating in Mexico can be called tequila). She is devoted to using local ingredients, purchasing organic corn from the Sacramento Valley for the vodka and agave grown in central California for the agave spirits. Both spirits are used in their craft cocktails, and the menu is changed every few weeks to incorporate seasonal flavors. This past winter, Natalie featured an apple cinnamon agave spirit made with local apples, and to welcome spring she’s offering a strawberries and cream vodka.

One way to incorporate flavors is by “fat washing,” where the alcohol and a fat— like bacon grease, cream, or olive oil—are combined and left to mingle at room temperature for three days. The mixture is then frozen, which allows the fat source to be removed while leaving the infused alcohol behind. The result is a softer mouthfeel, intriguing and complex flavors, and a great starting point for crafting cocktails. Natalie uses vodka infused with local olive oil in the signature martinis, a customer favorite. The margaritas are popular as well, made with just three ingredients: house-made agave spirits, house-made simple syrup, and lime juice.

For Natalie, all the fun in distilling comes down to the flavors. “My focus is simple, scrumptious cocktails that highlight quality ingredients,” she shares. Some of those ingredients are grown right outside the restaurant door, like the mint used in mojitos, or the rosemary that is burned to infuse agave spirits for the smoked rosemary paloma, combining it with grapefruit juice to harmonize tart, smoky, and herbal notes into one drink.

Cocktails are served at the bar, in the restaurant area, or, if the weather is agreeable, on the decks outside. The food you can enjoy with those drinks changes depending on the night you come in. Tuesday through Thursday is Fiesta, when Libby Favela is in the kitchen serving up the authentic Mexican food for which she’s known.

Libby grew up in a small desert town 35 miles outside of Mexicali. The landscape was flat, the climate hot and dry, and fields of tomatoes, alfalfa, and cotton surrounded the small town. Libby always enjoyed cooking, which was a good thing. Her older siblings had left home, and she was responsible for feeding her eight younger siblings while her mother was at her job sewing clothes.

In 1980 at the age of 20, Libby and her youngest brother left for Los Angeles. A few months later they continued north to Santa Rosa, where they found work making Christmas ornaments. By 1986 she had met and married Jose, and the two moved to Anderson Valley. She washed dishes at a The Floodgate in Navarro. Johnny Schmitt, who would later become the owner and proprietor of the Boonville Hotel, was cooking there at the time, while Lauren Keating waited tables.

“I like to be around people to prepare and cook food for them,” shares Libby. She cooked at other establishments for ten years before opening her first restaurant with Jose in 1996 in Boonville. By that time, her daughters Belma and Alejandra were old enough to serve while she and Jose prepared the food. It was very busy from the start, with a line that stretched down the sidewalk as hungry diners waited for her delicious food. In 2000, she opened Libby’s in Philo, which was a local institution for 16 years.

Libby’s restaurant in Philo served up generous plates of her popular red enchiladas, carnitas, super burritos, camarones a la diabla (a frequent special), and more, but after 16 years her body needed a break, and they closed the restaurant. In the following years, she often heard from locals how much they missed her cooking. These days, her three nights a week at Fiesta is a good fit. She doesn’t miss the responsibility of running an entire business, and fans can get their Mexican food fix again, whether in the restaurant with a margarita or takeout to enjoy at home.

Friday through Monday is The Bistro, when Chef Chris Morrison creates elevated American classics like fried chicken, build-your-own burgers, and smoked ribs, as well as fresh specials inspired by the season. A grill-loving chef who grew up in the Long Beach area of Southern California, Chris knew from a young age that he wanted to be a chef. He’d grown up eating his mother’s top notch fare, and he enjoyed making food for his brothers. For him, it was the perfect combination of being creative and making the people he loved happy.

At 16, Chris got a job as a dishwasher and prep cook at a restaurant in Norwalk called Rosewoods. It taught him responsibility, time management, and the importance of working as a team. “It felt right being in a kitchen, meeting a different group of people, being around chefs, servers, and staff,“ Chris remembers. He went on to attend the culinary program at Cerritos Community College, which impressed upon him the artistic aspects of cooking—namely, how to see the plate as canvas and ingredients as the paints.

After he completed the program, Chris worked at Disneyland’s Plaza Inn before moving up to the exclusive Club 33. He was the pantry and sauté cook there for almost three years, cooking for presidents, basketball stars, and other celebrities. While he was there, the older chefs shared some wisdom: when a chef spends time in a variety of kitchens, they learn new techniques, ingredients, and flavors, so a good chef should never stay too long in one place.

Chris took the advice to heart, and in the following years he cooked all over, including at Paramount Pictures in West Hollywood, barbecue in Idaho, and three years of gig work around Europe. Each experience informed his cooking style, as did personal heroes Sean Brock, an East Coast chef known for popularizing varieties of rice once thought to be extinct, and Anthony Bourdain, author of Kitchen Confidential. Chris tries to keep a couple used copies on hand to share with anyone who might be a kindred culinary spirit.

The recession had hit hard by 2011, prompting Chris to return home from Europe to help his mom pay the bills. A good friend had opened a restaurant in Hermosa Beach—Barrons 2239—and reached out to Chris one day when the pantry chef failed to show. It turned into one of the most influential jobs of his career. Chris cooked there for five years, during which the restaurant earned two Michelin stars. “That’s where I learned about building plates and flavors,“ shares Chris. “I worked with talented chefs, and there was a lot of trust among the team.” Chris held a number of positions in the kitchen, including expediter, sauté chef, and grill chef.

Chris spent time in Idaho honing his BBQ skills after leaving Barrons 2239, then relocated to the Anderson Valley in 2024. When Natalie found herself unexpectedly without a chef in July, he was in the right place at the right time.

Chris has inherited menu favorites from the days of Lauren’s and made them his own, and he’s added new dishes as well. Guests can still enjoy hamburgers with prime beef, sautéed onions, and all the fixings, along with classic fries made from hand cut potatoes, while hungry kids can still gobble up Nora’s Noodles. But Bistro diners can also savor the popular fried chicken and mashed potatoes, barbequed ribs, chipotle salmon tacos, or fish and chips. For folks seeking lighter fare, there is a selection of fresh salads that are delicious and hearty enough to be a dinner entree. As Natalie declares, “We take our salads very seriously.”

“My goal is to bring food to the forefront that pairs well with alcohol,” confides Chris. He likes to make as much as he can in-house, like the fresh pasta dishes that show up on the specials menu from time to time, and even pickles and ranch dressing. “I want to make food with fresh, clean, big, bold flavors,” Chris continues. “And most of all, to have fun!” That fun might involve opening up the patio in the summer, playing with produce from area farms, and, as always, transforming hungry customers into happy ones. That is, after all, why he got into the kitchen in the first place.

Chris is helped in the kitchen by long-time cooks Maria Guerrero and Neli Simón, both of whom have been with Natalie since she took over Lauren’s 9 years ago. “I’m so grateful to them,” Natalie says. “They are a big reason why the restaurant is still here.”

Natalie sees the restaurant as a place where she can be creative and express her playful side. From the restaurant specials to the cocktail menu to the color of the walls, things are always evolving. But the constants remain—unfussy food that’s full of flavor, either from Fiesta or The Bistro, accompanied by craft cocktails, mocktails, regional beers on tap, and local wines. It’s a great place to stop if you are hungry or thirsty, or just ready for a break from the road when you are driving through Boonville. You can even pick up a bottle of agave spirits or vodka, and bring a little Boonville home with you.

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The Boonville Distillery
14081 Hwy 128, Boonville,
(707) 895-3869 | boonvilledistillery.com

The Bistro: Sat - Mon 11:00am - 8:00pm, Fri 11:00am - 8:30pm
Fiesta: Tues - Thu 4:00pm - 8:00pm

Food and cocktail photos by Natalie Sparks. All other photos by Torrey Douglass.

Mar Vista Farm & Cottages

A Seaside Slice of Heaven

by Deanna Boettcher


“It was no mistake or happenstance that we ended up at Mar Vista. As a matter of fact, I think we would both say that our entire career paths were leading us here all along, even when we weren’t aware of it,” shares Deanna Boettcher when she reflects on her life stewarding an 80-year-old hospitality resort into the future. Along with her husband, Christopher Boettcher, she purchased the lodging property and small farm known as Mar Vista Farm + Cottages in late 2020. Rather than referring to themselves as owners, they consider themselves stewards, preserving and protecting the land while creating enriching guest experiences that celebrate nature.

Christopher (Cab) has worked in hospitality his whole life, starting in restaurants, then hotels, and eventually private clubs. Deanna’s prior career was in the fashion industry. She grew up in New York and also lived in the Midwest, and no matter what she was doing, she always found room for gardening. Whether in pots on her balcony or in a community garden, she was always counting the days until she could really get her hands in the dirt. She turned her passion into a vocation when they moved to California in 2014, going to school for Environmental Horticulture and Design and then working as a fine gardener for homes and estates around the Bay Area. She also spent time with a few non-profits, building edible and native gardens for outdoor lessons at elementary schools.

It was late 2019 when Cab and Deanna began to dream up a new life, one where their work would embody the lifestyle they wanted to live. They craved work that connected with nature, including growing food and sharing it with others. They did not know Mar Vista existed yet, but it matched the business plan they had developed perfectly, including the three goats! Cab remembers the moment they slowly drove up the driveway, mouths hanging open in awe. "We could feel everything in our bodies slow down. This place was different, it felt like we stepped back in time." The goosebumps confirmed it—they had found their new home.

Mar Vista was originally founded by Louis Kovacs and Ramus Echsen Eriksen. The pair were immigrants from Hungary and Denmark respectively, and partners in both life and business. Louis purchased the land in the late 1930s but didn’t bring in Ramus until they decided to build on the site in the 1940s. Countless fishermen asking to crash in their barn sparked the business idea: building cabins for those same traveling fisherman. They built the first six in the early 1940s and the second six after the war.

Over time, Mar Vista has changed hands several times, and although there have been upgrades and improvements made, much of what Louis and Ramus built still remains: wide open spaces, ocean views, the original redwood soaking tub, ponds, access to Fish Rock Cove beach, a short but beautiful redwood forest walk, and the original Fish House (specifically built for pounding abalone and cleaning fish). Fishermen were eventually replaced with vacationing couples, families, and singles.

As for Deanna and Cab, they are delighted to be living the country life now. They enjoy morning walks through the small grove of redwoods or down to the secluded beach. Deanna spends a lot of her time in the dirt, working in the gardens and greenhouse, making sure there are year-round greens and microgreens for the guests (a perfect addition to the eggs delivered to their door each morning). Each cottage has a full kitchen as well as shears and a harvest basket, inviting guests to pick their own goodies from the garden (with help from instructive signs posted throughout). Or they can avail themselves of pre-picked offerings from the garden stand that Deanna stocks daily. There are Brussels sprouts in winter, brassicas in spring, and strawberries and blueberries in summer. Cucumbers, beans, and tomatoes also show up in the summer, though those are grown in the greenhouse due to the cool coastal location.

Besides the flock of chickens, the property is home to a dog, three cats, three (male) goats, and two bunnies. The property has WiFi and cell service, but is still an excellent place to unplug. There are no phones or TVs in the cottages. Instead, guests enjoy complimentary yoga and meditation on weekends, garden tours, backyard chicken-keeping classes, and animal interaction events like “goat gab,” “bunny banter,” and “chicken chat.” Area attractions include amazing ocean views at the Point Arena Lighthouse, endangered African ungulates at B. Bryan Preserve, and a fascinating 50-acre ode to stones at Mendocino Stone Ranch. River kayaking, horseback riding, and hiking are all on offer as well. And of course there are a number of local beaches on which to blissfully do nothing.

It could be days spent out in the fresh air, or the comfy beds and lovely linens, or even the lullabies provided by waves, frogs, and seals (depending on the weather and the season), but many guests report experiencing their best sleeps ever while staying at Mar Vista. Because of the farm's remote location, it "forces people to slow down, but in the most gentle way," Deanna reflects. "Some people just don’t realize how much they need it until they get here."

As for the future, Cab explains, “Our goal is to continue enhancing what is already here, while preserving and protecting the natural landscape and wildlife. Like the first time Deanna and I drove up the gravel road, feeling the magic of this place and the world melt away... that is exactly what we want for every guest that comes to Mar Vista.”

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Mar Vista Farm + Cottages
35101 S Hwy 1, Gualala
(707) 884-3522 | marvistafarmandcottages.com

Photos courtesy of Mar Vista Farm & Cottages

The Mendocino County Resource Conservation District

Helping Landowners Keep Forests, Soils, and Waterways Healthy for 80 Years

One of the best-kept secrets in Mendocino County is the Mendocino County Resource Conservation District (MCRCD), a special district of the State of California with a mission to conserve, protect, and restore wild and working landscapes in Mendocino County. It is a non-regulatory and primarily grant-driven public agency working to enhance the health of the water, soil, and forests through projects with landowners of all types. Their main office is in downtown Ukiah, with satellite offices in both Willits and Boonville.

Resource Conservation Districts (RCDs) were conceived during the Dust Bowl of the 1930s to help mitigate man-made natural disasters. Today, RCDs continue to support and educate landowners on best practices for natural resource management, as well as assist on conservation infrastructure projects through grants and government contracts. The MCRCD, now with a staff of 16 and a dedicated volunteer board of directors, has been serving landowners and land stewards throughout Mendocino County since 1945, with programs that span across four categories: Soil Health and Agriculture, Water Resources, Forest Health & Resiliency, and Land Stewardship.

The Soil Health and Agriculture Program works with agricultural professionals around sustainable land management and productivity, emphasizing healthy soils and climate-beneficial agriculture. The program offers technical assistance, outreach, education, and access to regional partnerships. It also links land stewards to funding sources for the planning and implementation of climate- beneficial practices.

Financial assistance for sustainable agriculture practices has decreased due to state budget constraints, but it is in higher demand than ever because of climate change and rising operational costs. Through MCRCD’s work on the 2024 California Department of Food & Agriculture (CDFA) Healthy Soils Program, over 40% of the roughly $1 million awarded in Mendocino and Lake Counties has gone to projects supporting socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers. MCRCD’s Soil Health and Agriculture Program will provide both technical and administrative assistance to these farmers through their full grant term.

One recently implemented Healthy Soils grant facilitated the installation of a 350-foot hedgerow at Foursight Wines & Mendocino Lavender in Boonville. This pollinator hedgerow contains diverse native flowering plants including trees, shrubs, wildflowers, and grasses, all specifically selected to provide food sources like pollen and nectar, as well as nesting habitats, for pollinating insects like bees, butterflies, moths, and hummingbirds. As it grows, the hedgerow will provide ongoing food and shelter for local pollinators and other wildlife, while also serving as an educational feature of the lavender farm tours.

From 2021 to 2023, the Soils Program was part of CDFA’s pilot Farm to School grant with North Coast Opportunities, working with Laytonville and Fort Bragg school districts to increase farm to school education as well as school farm and culinary infrastructure. In 2025, the Soils Program will begin a new CDFA Farm to School grant with the MendoLake Food Hub in order to build lasting school access to local farmers and Food Hub infrastructure. MCRCD will provide hands-on food and agriculture education.

The Water Resources Program promotes and protects clean water and healthy streams, which are critically important to both aquatic ecosystems and human communities. Grant programs for road storm-proofing, streambank stabilization, and riparian restoration focus on water quality protection which benefits landowners by reducing erosion damage and preserving the water table. Salmon and steelhead benefit from stream habitat enhancement and the removal of instream barriers.

One example of stream habitat enhancement coupled with improved water security was implemented at Blue Meadow Farm, adjacent to Mill Creek in the Navarro River watershed. A 63,000-gallon storage tank was constructed to store water diverted in the winter for use in the summer. This tank, combined with a 39,000-gallon rainwater catchment tank, provides enough water for the food farm to operate, even during years of drought. By not diverting 63,000 gallons from Mill Creek in the summer and fall, that water remains in-channel to support valuable aquatic habitat for salmonids and many other species.

The MCRCD’s Forest Health & Resiliency Program promotes sustainable forestry and land stewardship focused on habitat conservation, sustainable timber production, watershed health, increased climate and wildfire resilience, and overall forest health on both public and private lands. The program has been increasingly active over the past several years as more state and federal funding has been made available for forest health and fuel reduction projects in order to reduce the risk of larger and increasingly catastrophic wildfires.

The Northern Mendocino County Forest Health Collaborative Project, funded by CAL FIRE’s Forest Health Program and the California Climate Initiative, was created to reduce wildfire risk and improve forest health. In this project, the RCD partnered with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Redwood Forest Foundation, Inc. (RFFI/USAL Forest), Humboldt County Resource Conservation District, The Trees Foundation, and local fire districts to implement critical forest health treatments across 1,400 acres in the South Fork Eel River watershed. Among other forest health treatments, this project reduced excessive fuel loads, created shaded fuel breaks, managed invasive species, and reintroduced prescribed fire to the landscape, all within BLM’s Red Mountain and RFFI/USAL Forest lands. These treatments have helped lower the risk of severe wildfires, improved containment options in case of future fire events, and strengthened the landscape’s long-term resilience to disturbances such as drought and disease.

Building on this success, the RCD’s Forest Health and Resiliency Program was recently awarded a $6.4 million CAL FIRE Forest Health Grant to support forest health and fuels reduction work on the Leonard Lake Reserve and Montgomery Woods State Reserve properties in central Mendocino County. Additionally, the RCD was awarded a $1.96 million grant through the North Coast Resource Partnership to carry out similar work east of Leggett, further extending its efforts to improve forest health and fire resiliency across the region.

In contrast to these large-scale projects, the MCRCD also leads efforts to assist smaller landowners through the North Bay Forest Improvement Program (NBFIP). Funded by CAL FIRE, the NBFIP helps private landowners develop Forest Management Plans (FMPs) and implement forest health and wildfire risk reduction measures on their properties. Since its launch in 2020, it has provided funding support to more than 25 Mendocino County landowners, helping them complete FMPs and implement forest health projects that enhance both wildfire resilience and long-term forest stewardship.

The Land Stewardship Program oversees lands set aside by Caltrans in the Willits/Little Lake Valley to mitigate the impacts caused by the construction of the Willits Bypass. The MCRCD has been managing this project since 2014. Through a partnership with Caltrans, project contractors planted over one million herbaceous plants, trees, and shrubs. It also has protected rare and threatened populations of Bakers Meadowfoam and North Coast Semaphore grass, created wetlands, and witnessed flourishing populations of elk, beaver, river otters, over 65 species of birds, and numerous aquatic species. Half of the 2,000 acres of the mitigation project is a working landscape utilizing carefully managed beef cattle grazing to reach some of the project’s goals. These grazing lands are under contract with five local ranchers, whose products are primarily sold locally.

The Willits Bypass Mitigation team administers a public outreach and education program that runs monthly educational tours of the lands. They publish a weekly blog and offer a YouTube channel that posts wildlife photos and videos captured on the project (check it out at https://mcrcd.org/ category/willits). The program also offers educational content to local school kids learning about natural history and conservation, and manages a room at the County Museum in Willits, open on Wednesdays, which serves as a classroom and also exhibits photographs and natural history displays from the project.

With 80 years behind it, the MCRCD remains as busy and vital as ever, supporting farmers, property owners, and other stewards of the land so they can improve the health of soils, waterways, forests, and the overall landscape. Their efforts result in improved wildlife biodiversity, water quality, wildfire resilience, and agricultural productivity, sharing knowledge and encouraging practices that will preserve those benefits for generations to come.

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Find out more at mcrcd.org

Photos courtesy of MCRCD.

This article was collaboratively written by Setphanie Garrabrant-Sierra (Executive Director), Joseph Scriven (Assistant Executive Director and Water Program Manager), Seth Myrick (Soils Program Manager), Doug Turk (Forestry Program Manager), Christopher Bartow (Land Stewardship Program Manager), and Linda MacElwee (Navarro Project Coordinator).

The Flavor of the Forest

Spring Fiddleheads

by Holly Madrigal


The curl of a fiddlehead, that emergent coil of fern, sparks something within me, a sort of primordial awe. A spiral born of the golden mean unfolds in perfect ratio into the leafy green that carpets our forests.

There are many types of ferns in the forests of Mendocino County. Unlike some mushrooms, you are unlikely to become severely ill from eating the wrong type of fern, but careful identification is always wise when eating anything from the forest. Some ferns do not have a particularly pleasant flavor, and others may give you an upset stomach.

You can find fiddleheads in the spring in areas near water or a creek with rich, damp soil in the shade. Midwesterners prefer the Ostrich Fern, Matteuccia struthiopteris, for its flavor, but in Northern California, Lady Ferns, Athyrium filix-femina, are more easily found. Look for the crescent-shaped stem—if it is a round stem, it’s not a Lady Fern, and you could risk an upset stomach. The bracken fern, pteridium aquilinum, is the most common, and dehydrated bracken fiddleheads are often used in Korean dishes such as Bibimbap.

The fiddleheads of the bracken fern can be foraged in spring. Think of foraging as thinning, not clear- cutting. Leaving some of a stand of bracken fern will allow it to grow and reproduce for years and years. Michelle Costa of Mendo Ferments enjoys selecting these morsels during her walks in the hills above Willits. She keeps her eyes trained on the dormant bracken fern patches for when the new growth emerges. Fiddleheads can be harvested when they are about three inches high but still firmly coiled. After a quick rinse to remove any woody debris, they are ready for the skillet.

An easy way to prepare them is to blanch them briefly, as described in Michelle’s recipe here. You may feel as if you are tasting the forest itself.

Simple Fiddleheads

INSTRUCTIONS

Toss your carefully washed fiddleheads into boiling salted water for 1-2 minutes, then drain. (Do not place the blanched fiddleheads in an ice bath, or you will lose the vibrant green color.) Ever so briefly, sauté with a little melted butter and a sprinkle of salt, keeping them firm, not mushy.

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Mendo Ferments
(707) 354-5147 | mendoferments.com
@mendoferments on IG

Photo by Tim Giraudier: beautifuloregon.com

Back from the Brink

Raising American Bison at J Bar S Ranch

by Lisa Ludwigsen | photos by Nik Zvolensky


In his documentary The American Buffalo, Ken Burns describes bison as “the most magnificent mammal on our continent,” adding, “The buffalo story is so complicated and so interesting because it moves through almost every era in our lives and touches on so many subjects you wouldn’t think it would touch on.”

Bison are the continent’s largest mammal, weighing in at around 1800 pounds, approximately the size of a small car. Inhabiting large swaths of the Great Plains, bison were virtually uncountable before the 1800s and estimated at 30 million in the early 1800s. The widespread arrival of Europeans drove the bison to near extinction. By the beginning of the 20th century, fewer than 1,000 bison survived. That decimation was due to market hunting— people wanted buffalo robes and the expanding railroad used hides as engine belts, among other things—and the effects of diseases brought in with domestic cattle. In addition, bison were killed off as part of the inten- tional eradication of Indigenous people’s crucial source of livelihood, in efforts to force them off their land. Native people have coexisted with bison for over 10,000 years in a profoundly reciprocal relationship, across a vast area of the central and northern plains of the continent. Killing off the bison impacted every aspect of the Great Plains Native American lives, devastating both people and animals.

But all was not lost. Successful conservation efforts have helped stabilize and grow the bison population in an encour- aging story that started back in the early 1900s by a zoologist named William Hornaday, with support from President Theodore Roosevelt. A few bison were shipped to the Bronx Zoo over 100 years ago for the purpose of breeding and ultimately re-releasing into the wild, and today there are over 400,000 in the U.S. in both wild and commercial herds. Other small conservation efforts by concerned ranchers helped to preserve and repopulate the plains.

Bison are not native to California. They thrive in vast tracts of prairie found in the central areas of North America, from Canada into Mexico. But in Mendocino County, there is a small bison herd at J Bar S Ranch, east of Ukiah just off Highway 20. Bob Lawson, the ranch’s owner, shared the story of his father’s longtime interest in bison. When Jim Lawson bought 40 acres in 1966, the ranch came with a few sheep. The ranch was not intended to be a working ranch at first. “My father brought in the first few bison in the 1980s just because he was interested in them. That herd now numbers around 60. It’s not a large group, but we keep the herd manageable for our environment. We are very happy to have 20 calves born this year from our three bulls and 35 cows.” Even though Lawson’s herd is a commercial herd, intended to be harvested for meat, it is one of many similar herds considered important within the conservation movement.

Lawson shares the concern of local beef ranchers about the lack of local slaughter facilities equipped to process bison in Mendocino County. This forces Lawson to transport his animals to his Wyoming ranch, which supports another 300 head on 1600 acres. “Bison are difficult to get to slaughter because they are so large and strong. We built special reinforced pens at our slaughterhouse in Wyoming to contain them.” Lawson has observed a full-grown bison clear a 6’ fence without a running start.

Lawson is optimistic about the future of bison as a viable meat source and steward of rangeland. Because bison evolved as they roamed the continent freely, they help sustain plains and prairie ecosystems as a keystone species. They are good for the environment and healthy to eat, too. “Our herd is grass fed and grass finished. They are handled as little as possible. We offer them an enhanced feed as they approach harvest, but the bison don’t really choose it.” Unlike cattle, bison have never been truly domesticated. They basically do what they want. A visit to the ranch illustrates just how large these animals really are. They were attentive to the visitors in the truck, but when asked if he or the herd manager could leave the truck and walk among them, Lawson’s answer was, “Not really.” They exude a sense of their wild heritage and they demand respect.

The National Bison Association based in Colorado boasts over 1,000 members who raise over 250,000 head of bison. The organization has adopted the slogan “Regenerative by Nature.” Regenerative agriculture seeks to improve the health of the planet by restoring nature, utilizing agricultural practices to increase soil biodiversity and organic matter. Building resilient soils also helps resist climate change impacts like flooding and drought. Bison are meaningful players toward this goal.

Grazing bison naturally support rangeland by stimulating new plant growth as they graze, by providing soil with vital nutrients from manure and urine, disturbing soil so native seeds can take root, and creating wallows that capture rainfall. “They basically do all the land management for us,” said Lawson. It’s well documented that healthy grass- lands created by grazing animals capture carbon from the atmosphere and return it to the soil. This is regenerative agriculture in a nutshell, and bison are the original livestock for this approach to holistic management.

Bison are naturally grass-fed and GMO-free because they aren’t raised intensively like cattle. Bison meat offers several health benefits. It’s a low-fat lean protein rich in nutrients like iron, zinc, selenium, and B vitamins. The expanding meat market helps to ensure both the survival of the species and the prairie ecosystem. “It is a niche market that began growing during the pandemic, when people started looking at new sources of food and discovered that bison tastes good and is a healthier red meat,” shared Lawson.

As part of the bison recovery, innovative partnerships between Indigenous communities, national parks, and educational institutions have formed which are contributing to sustainable management and economic empowerment. The largest tract of open rangeland for bison is owned by former media mogul Ted Turner. He began purchasing land in the Midwestern prairie states in the 1970s with the goal of supporting bison restoration. Today, the octogenarian’s Turner Enterprises owns 16 ranches in seven states, totaling almost two million acres that provide habitat for 45,000 bison. It is privately owned land with little public access, but the bison and prairie are thriving and protected from development. One of Turner’s ranches open to the public is Vermejo Park Ranch, a 550,000-acre guest ranch in north- eastern New Mexico where visitors can learn about local conservation efforts with the bison.

Preventing the extinction of bison is an American success story, not unlike that of the bald eagle. In the case of bison, providing open prairie and promoting both conservation and a sustainable commercial market for meat can keep the efforts moving in the right direction. If you’re bison- curious, find J Bar S bison meat for sale at the ranch store, at Mariposa Market in Willits, and Harvest Market in Fort Bragg. It is also on the menu at Ukiah Brewing Company. It is tasty and satisfying, and a welcome addition to a diverse local food system.

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J Bar S Ranch 6201
Hwy 20, Ukiah
(707) 485-6852 | jbarsranch.com

Open Wed-Sun 10:30am - 5:30pm

Lisa Ludwigsen has been working in environmental education and small scale agriculture for 25 years. She chronicles her experiences and travels at Food, Farms & Families at lisaludwigsen.substack.com

Growing Corn in the Desert, No Irrigation Required

This story originally appeared on Reasons to Be Cheerful, and is reprinted here with permission (reasonstobecheerful.world).
by Michaela Haas, Ph.D.

When Michael Kotutwa Johnson goes out to the acreage behind his stone house to harvest his corn, his fields look vastly different from the endless rows you see in much of rural North America. Bundled in groups of five or six, his corn stalks shoot out of the sandy desert in bunches, resembling bushels rather than tightly spaced rows. “We don’t do your typical 14-inch spaced rows,” he says.

Instead, Kotutwa Johnson, an enrolled member of the Hopi tribe, practices the Hopi tradition he learned from his grandfather on the Little Colorado River Plateau near Kykotsmovi Village in northeastern Arizona, a 90-minute drive from Flagstaff: “In spring, we plant eight to 10 corn kernels and beans per hole, further apart, so the clusters all stand together against the elements and preserve the soil moisture.” For instance, high winds often blow sand across the barren plateau. “This year was a pretty hot and dry year, but still, some of the crops I raised did pretty well,” he says with a satisfied smile. “It’s a good year for squash, melons, and beans. I’ll be able to propagate these.”

Dry farming has been a Hopi tradition for several millennia. Kotutwa Johnson might build some protection for his crops with desert brush or cans to shield them from the wind, but his plants thrive without any fertilizer, pesticides, herbicides, mulch, or irrigation. This is all the more impressive since his area usually gets less than 10 inches of rain per year.

In the era of climate change, the practice of dry farming is met with growing interest from scientists and researchers as farmers grapple with droughts and unpredictable weather patterns. For instance, the Dry Farming Institute in Oregon lists a dozen farms it partners with, growing anything from tomatoes to zucchini. However, Oregon has wet winters, with an annual rainfall of over 30 inches, whereas on the plateau in Arizona, Johnson’s crops get less than a third of that. Farmers in Mexico, the Middle East, Argentina, Southern Russia, and Ukraine all have experimented with dry farming, relying on natural rainfall, though conditions and practices vary in each region.

For Kotutwa Johnson, it’s a matter of faith and experience. Between April and June, he checks the soil moisture to determine which crops to plant and how deep. He uses the traditional wooden Hopi planting stick like his ancestors, because preserving the topsoil by not tilling is part of the practice. “We don’t need moisture meters or anything like that,” he explains. “We plant everything deep—for instance, the corn goes 18 inches deep, depending on where the seeds will find moisture.” His seeds rely on the humidity from the melted winter snow and annual monsoon rains in June.

His harvest looks unique, too. “We know 24 varieties of indigenous corn,” he says, showing off kernels in indigo blue, purple red, snow white, and yellow. His various kinds of lima and pinto beans shimmer in white, brown, merlot red, and mustard yellow. Studies have shown that indigenous maize is more nutritious, richer in protein and minerals than conventional corn, and he hopes to confirm similar results with his own crops in his role as professor at the School of Natural Resources and the Environment at the University of Arizona, and as a core faculty member with the fledgling Indigenous Resilience Center, which focuses on researching resilient solutions for Indigenous water, food, and energy independence. He earned a PhD in natural resources, concentrating on Indigenous agricul- tural resilience, not least to “have a seat at the table and level the playing field, so mainstream stakeholders can really hear me,” he says. “I’m not here to be the token Native; I’m here to help.” For instance, he attended COP 28, the 2023 United Nations climate change conference in Dubai, to share his knowledge about “the reciprocal relationship with our environment.” Kotutwa Johnson was born in Germany because his dad was in the military, but he spent the summers with his grand- father planting corn, squash, beans, and melons the Indig- enous way in the same fields he’s farming now, where he eventually built an off-grid stone house with his own hands. “As a kid, I hated farming because it’s hard work,” he admits with disarming honesty, followed by a quick laugh. “But later I saw the wisdom in it. We’ve done this for well over 2,000 or 3,000 years. I’m a 250th-generation Hopi farmer.” Unlike many other Indigenous tribes, the Hopi weren’t driven off their land by European settlers. “We’re very fortunate that we were never relocated,” Kotutwa Johnson says. “We chose this land, and we’ve learned to adapt to our harsh environment. The culture is tied into our agricultural system, and that’s what makes it so resilient.”

However, the Hopi tribe doesn’t own the land. Legally, the United States holds the title to the 1.5 million acres of reser- vation the Hopi occupy in Northwestern Arizona, a fraction of their original territory. Kotutwa Johnson estimates that only 15 percent of his community still farms, down from 85 percent in the 1930s, and some Hopi quote the lack of land ownership as an obstacle.

Like on many reservations, the Hopi live in a food desert, where tribal members have to drive one or two hours to find a major supermarket in Flagstaff or Winslow. High rates of diabetes and obesity are a consequence of lacking easy access to fresh produce. “If you’re born here you have a 50 percent chance of getting diabetes,” Kotutwa Johnson says. “To me, this is the original harm: the disruption of our traditional foods. By bringing back the food, you also bring back the culture.”

Traditionally, Hopi women are the seed keepers, and the art of dry farming starts with the right seeds. “These seeds adapted to having no irrigation, and so they are very valuable,” Kotutwa Johnson says. He is fiercely protective of the seeds he propagates and only exchanges them with other tribal members within the community.

In that spirit, he was overjoyed to receive 800-year-old corn ears from a man who recently found them in a cave in Glen Canyon. Kotutwa Johnson planted the corn, and about a fifth actually sprouted. He raves about the little white corn ears he was able to harvest: “It’s so amazing we got to bring these seeds home. It was like opening up an early Christmas present.”

From a traditional perspective, “we were given things to survive,” he says. “In our faith, we believe the first three worlds were destroyed, and when we came up to this world, we were given a planting stick, some seeds, and water by a caretaker who was here before us.”

He doesn’t believe that climate change can be stopped. “But we can adapt to it, and our seeds can adapt.” This is a crucial tenet of Hopi farming: Instead of manipulating the environment, they raise crops and cultivate seeds that adjust to their surroundings. His crops grow deep roots that stretch much farther down into the ground than conventional plants.

“Our faith tells us that we need to plant every single year no matter what we see,” even in drought years, he explains. “Some years, we might not plant much, but we still plant regardless because those plants are like us, they need to adapt.”

Dry farming is “not very economically efficient,” he admits. “Everything is driven towards convenience nowadays. We’re not trying to make a big buck out here; we’re here to maintain our culture and practice things we’ve always done to be able to survive.”

Kotutwa Johnson does not sell his produce. He keeps a percentage of the seeds to propagate and gives the rest to relatives and his community, or trades it for other produce.

But his vision far surpasses his nine acres. He wants to pass on his dry-farming methods to the next generation, just as he learned them from his grandfather, and he often invites youth to participate in farming workshops and communal planting. That’s why he recently started the Fred Aptvi Foundation, named after his grandfather, to focus on establishing a seed bank and a Hopi youth agricultural program that incorporates the Hopi language. Aptvi means “one who plants besides another,” Kotutwa Johnson explains. “It’s about revitalizing what’s there, not reinventing it.”

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Michaela Haas, Ph.D., is a Contributing Editor at Reasons to be Cheerful. An award-winning author and solutions reporter, her recent books include Bouncing Forward: The Art and Science of Cultivating Resilience (Atria). michaelahaas.com

All photos courtesy of Michael Kotutwa Johnson

A Delicious Legacy

TomatoFest’s Ongoing Quest to Preserve Heirloom Tomatoes from Around the Globe

by Torrey Douglass


If the economy hadn’t stalled out like a neglected jalopy in the 1970s, then perhaps a young architectural illustrator in Boulder, Colorado, might not have been inspired to pick up sticks and pursue a new career in food and publishing on the central California Coast. But it did, and he did, and tomato lovers will be ever grateful.

Gary Ibsen relocated to Carmel, California in the early 70s specifically because it was a renowned culinary destination with world class restaurants. He had developed a passion for good food, partly inspired by the cookbook A Treasury of Great Recipes by Mary and Vincent Price (yes, that Vincent Price). The pair had sought out excellent eating around the globe, and the book gathers recipes from the best of those experiences. With inspiration from the Prices’ cookbook and his own love of culinary expertise, Gary started Adventures in Dining in 1974 to “celebrate and champion excellence in food, food production and food service.” For those first few years, he produced the majority of articles and photo- graphs himself, and under his leadership the quarterly won two Maggie Awards—essentially the Oscars of magazine publishing.

Gary is a man of many careers and has worked as an off-Broadway actor and singer, on a nuclear submarine while in the U.S. Navy, and as a grower of premium cannabis. He has owned two magazines, an art gallery in Connecticut, and a Cajun restaurant in Carmel. After selling Adventures in Dining in 1990 and finding himself again ready for a new pursuit, he decided to expand his personal love of backyard gardening into something more.

Years prior, a Portuguese farmer in Carmel Valley had opened Gary’s eyes to the mouth-watering magic of heirloom tomatoes by giving Gary a pair of seedlings. In those days, tomatoes were bred to endure travel to faraway supermarkets and were picked before reaching their full flavor potential for the same reason. For Gary, that first bite of an heirloom tomato was akin to biting into an oven-fresh chocolate chip cookie and realizing that for years he’d been consuming the cardboard box it came in rather than the real deal.

This marked the start of what would become a lifelong quest to find, propagate, and share heirloom tomatoes in all their variety, complexity, and beauty. As he searched out little-known varieties, Gary’s finds ran the spectrum of yellows and pinks, through reds and oranges, to purples and blacks. Some had fuzzy skins like a peach, and some were hollow like a red pepper. The flavors could be bold and acidic or layered and more subtle, with notes of chocolate, citrus, or tropical fruit. As news of his efforts spread, friends, relatives, and their friends and relatives began sending Gary their favorite varieties. Often they had been grown on family farms or in backyard gardens for generations.

As a fixture of the Central Coast food scene, Gary was delighted to share his expanding tomato harvest with his chef friends, watching their eyes light up, just like his had, with their first bite. He began selling the tomatoes to local restaurants and hosting backyard barbeques where friends could share tomato dishes and swap stories and ideas. Over time, those barbeques grew in size and renown, and once it was featured in Sunset magazine, their popularity soared. Soon the Tomato Fest became official, relocating to the Quail Lodge Resort in Carmel Valley and opening ticket sales to the public.

During its heyday, the Carmel Tomato Fest was an exuberant annual celebration of the tomato, hosting 3000 attendees, 70 top chefs, and 50 wineries. Over 350 varieties of tomatoes were available for tasting, as were the chefs’ creations. The event also featured wine tasting, garden demonstrations, a salsa showcase, a classic barbeque, and live music and dancing. The extravaganza lasted one day—a Sunday—so chefs could have time off from their restaurants. This buoyed the fun and festive vibe of the day. “It was a happy, love-filled event,” recalls Gary’s wife and partner, Dagma Lacey. “Everyone was so overjoyed to be there. It was an opportunity to be together, to see their friends.” Often chefs would ask to be located near their buddies, ensuring a generous helping of play along with all the work.

Dagma entered Gary’s life in 1998 when Tomato Fest was in full swing, and she fondly recalls how she was equally smitten with Gary as with his tomatoes. They courted from a distance while she remained in her hometown of Spokane, Washington, to finish raising her five teenagers, after which she relocated to Carmel to be with him full time.

The pair are a natural fit. Dagma’s predecessors were farmers from the Bohemia region of Germany until World War II. Dagma’s mother, Marianne, was 13 when Russian soldiers arrived at her school in May of 1940 and forced the students into a truck for transport to a labor camp. Marianne and four others leapt from the moving vehicle to escape, but only two survived. She traversed the Alps on foot with a friend, despite having been shot in the leg when crossing the Czech border, before ultimately arriving in Weiden, Germany. Years later, in 1955, she recon- nected with her parents and siblings with help from the Red Cross. After falling in love with an American soldier, she married in 1957, then relocated to Spokane, Washington to raise a family with him.

An orphan from New York state, Gary didn’t have much mothering in his youth, so his relationship with Marianne later in life was an added bonus to his courtship with Dagma. When Marianne’s sister from Germany sent her favorite tomato seeds to them, they named the variety “Marianne’s Peace” to honor Dagma’s mother and her life of courage, vitality, and resilience.

Another legendary woman is honored with a different tomato variety. Gary served on the founding board of the American Institute of Food and Wine with Julia Child for a time, where the two became friends. Julia was an honored guest at Tomato Fest 2000, and he credits her connection to the fest as one reason it became so popular. At Gary’s request, Julia agreed to have a tomato named after her. When he asked what said tomato should be like, she simply declared, “Tasty!” The tomato that bears her name was originally an unnamed family heirloom tomato sent to Gary in 1997. Part of his seed trials for four years before being released commercially in 2001, it is described as producing “4-inch, deep-pink, lightly-fluted, beefsteak fruits that have the kind of robust, smack-you-on-the-palate tomato flavors and firm, juicy flesh.” It is also the only instance of Julia permitting her name to be used for a product outside of her cookbooks.

In addition to the festival, Gary grew and sold his rare tomatoes to local restaurants and markets, including Whole Foods. At the start, the market ordered 100 pounds of tomatoes per week, but within the year it increased to one ton per week. This spike in interest did not go unnoticed by larger producers, and while Gary refused to sell tomatoes outside of their peak season, the bigger players had no qualms about growing in warmer climes and shipping tomatoes year-round. Finding themselves unable to compete with larger producers, but always up for a pivot, Gary and Dagma shifted the tomato business to primarily propagation and seed sales to the public, while still selling fruit to local restaurants, who knew a good thing when they had it. The annual TomatoFest event continued until 2009, at which point a cancer diagnosis forced Gary to retire from his leadership position. His son had moved to the Mendocino area years prior and thought the slower pace and wild beauty would be a good fit for Gary and Dagma. They moved up to Little River, continuing to farm tomatoes in Hollister while running the rest of their business from their new home. “We’ve been extremely happy with the people, environment, the small town,” shares Gary. “We get to live on a dirt road where the most precious commodity is quiet. We have super neighbors, [and] everyone looks out for everybody.”

These days TomatoFest is exclusively a seed business for heirloom tomatoes, selling their 650 varieties only online. All are organic, and they hail from around the globe: Italy, Ukraine, Spain, India, Russia, China, and all across the U.S. Every year Gary and Dagma shepherd their tomatoes through the seasons, first as seedlings in the greenhouse, then planting into the dirt, followed by harvesting the fruit, then processing and packaging the seeds. Harvest time in Hollister is a family affair, with their combined eight children and 17 grandchildren coming together to get it done. They return home with green hands, seeds for their customers, and a bounty of tomatoes they turn into sauce to give to friends. “We put our hands on everything,” muses Gary. “I touch every seed,” Dagma adds.

It is an undiluted joy to bite into a summer-ripe tomato. Exploring new and unusual varieties in order to spread that joy far and wide has been a central undertaking for much of Gary’s life. He and Dagma consider these seeds to be their legacy, one they must protect, expand, and, above all else, share. Over 200 charities benefit from their Tomato Seed Donation Program, with some seeds going into school and community gardens, and others propagated into plant starts to sell for raising funds. Ultimately, both the donation program and the seed-selling business exist for the same reason: to provide an organic, GMO-free, and nutritious food source to as many people as possible. The humble tomato, crowd-sourced, is available in an astounding scope of sizes, colors, and flavors to light up eyes, delight palates, and set imaginations free to explore new culinary possibilities.

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Browse over 650 varieties of heirloom tomatoes at tomatofest.com.

Photos courtesy of TomatoFest®

The Humble Radish

Commercially Nonviable, Yet Eminently Practical

by Gowan Batist


In the early spring the rain comes in heavy battering waves. On the coast it was hard to tell where the sea ended and our salty wind-whipped garden began. In the spring, the last of the garlic is sprouting, the potatoes are shriveled, the winter squash is diminishing, and the jars are leaving the cupboard. A handful of beans and some bones thrown in a pot with dried herbs is a regular dinner.

Then comes the radish. They add a fresh crunch to a winter diet that can otherwise be very homogeneous in color and texture. The first radishes taste of rain and crunchy sulfur burn, a nose-crinkling sensation and a rush of hydration on the tongue. Pulled out of the ground, they’re often decorated around the shoulders with the round shallow bite marks of snails, who slide across the garden in the early spring, their shining trails of slime disappearing into the general wet.

When I worked as a farm hand up north during college summers, I harvested radishes in the early mornings. The rows were 500 feet long, stretching so far the end would be invisible in the dim morning light and mist of the Pacific Northwest, imbuing a mythic, almost Sisyphean sense of futility to the work. Those radishes were not decorated with the round white marks of snails that made the red globes look like spotted cartoon mushrooms, but instead with the mica flecks of iron phosphate, an organic approved substance that repels and kills the kind of soft bodied creatures that mar the radishes. The flecks looked like gold glitter, but felt like tiny shards of glass if they made their way into my gloves.

The radishes can’t have been worth the cost of the amendment. The old man who owned the farm, operated by his son and grandson, ruled the farmstand with a grip that allowed no space for current market realities, costs of doing business, comparisons with peers, or the evidence of a balance sheet. He believed that people came to a farm stand for a deal, and expected to pay much less for produce than the grocery store. In a way he came from the same school of thought as my grandparents, who treated home-raised food as essentially free, and anything purchased as a luxury item. He lacked, however, my grandfather’s enthusiasm for every new agricultural development I brought to his attention, his favorite being the solar electric fence. This old man believed that wisdom was dispensed from the past to the future via a one-way valve, and treated any attempt at flow reversal as a plumbing emergency.

When I worked on his farm in 2011, a bunch of radishes from who-knows-where were sold for $1.20 at the Safeway near my bus stop. He sold them at farmstand for $0.30 per bunch, and tolerated no imperfect red globes, no cracks, no yellow clinging cotyledons. Radishes are one of the only crops other than baby greens that grow fast enough that they might still have those first emerging leaves clinging to them, but we sprayed them away with a high powered hose, under his fastidious gaze.

Harvesting the radishes was brutal work. Down on the ground, with wet knees that every pebble ground into, we would scoop a bunch per hand, alternating hands as we went down the row. I only had a moment to glance at every handful and flick away any split, tiny, or misshapen radishes before a band went around them and they were tossed into a crate. Once the truck was filled with crates they would be driven up the muddy lanes to the farmstand, which perched along a busy road on the outskirts of the city, and aggressively sprayed down. Inevitably this process would damage some leaves, which unlike the roots bruise easily and don’t store well. Any bunches with wilted leaves at the end of a busy farm stand day would be tossed, each gesture a firm rebuke, into a compost bucket by the old farmer, increasing the feeling of futility the next morning spent racing the sun to harvest more.

Those experiences were part of the mental classification system I developed for evaluating crops. A crop that only yields one harvest per planting, that you have to kneel all the way down on the ground to harvest, that is vulnerable to both weeds and pests, that doesn’t hold up well in a retail display, AND sells for a low market price ... ranks bottom tier across the board. This position of dishonor is occupied by the humble radish.

After experiencing all the physical pain and domestic strife a radish was capable of causing, and the small amount of money they were able to make, when I left that job and moved home to the Mendocino coast, I was sure I wouldn’t grow radishes. I didn’t stick to that plan for very long.

Radishes, for all their commercial faults at scale, are incredible for the small garden, and especially for the farm to school experience. I was managing Noyo Food Forest in my first years back in Mendocino, and I knew that radishes were a crop that a student could see, from seed to harvest, within the scope of a lesson plan. I could also be sure the cafeteria would always take the radishes for their salads. In that new context, radishes made sense, and I forgave them their downsides and embraced their peppery potential.

It wasn’t always smooth. I once spent fifteen minutes deliberately showing a volunteer the difference between the fat lobed radish leaves and the lacier, more hirsute wild radish weeds, and with a solemn nod she agreed she could “weed the radishes.” When I returned from a group of students, she sure had. All the baby radishes, no bigger than dimes, lay in a pile on the ground, carefully differentiated from everything that wasn’t a radish, which remained in the ground.

Radishes are a cold season crop, but here on the coast, that’s all year. I soon overproduced them, and, inspired by my mother, learned to drag them through soft butter, sprinkle them with the coarse sea salt we made ourselves, and pop them whole into my mouth. Another brainwave she had was roasting them whole with a little honey. The sugars caramelized and softened in the oven, the spice mellowed to a warm interesting note that separated the radish from a roast turnip, to which it was otherwise identical.

My favorite way to eat radishes is pickled, with sliced carrots, onions, and jalapeños, a combination I was turned on to by the taco trucks I visited in college. I have jars of this mix, homemade from our garden and the MendoLake Food Hub farmers, in my pantry right now. Their fresh, spicy, and acidic crunch is the perfect complement to a rich dish that needs the levity. I like to go bite-for-bite between a burrito and the pickled veggies.

I’ve grown well over a dozen varieties over the years, and my favorites are still the humble cherry belle, a plain red variety that stays sweet and resists pithiness, and purple plum, a beautifully shaped and colorful radish (more lavender than plum, really) with unusually strong leaves and a mellow flavor.

In the pasture, I’ve also come to embrace the virtues of radishes. We’ve grown daikon radish three feet long as part of a multi-stage process of managing invasive species. After gorse removal, the ground is exposed and unstable and needs a cover crop to muscle out the aggressive weedy species. The more diverse the mix, the better it is. We plant a mix that includes grasses for carbon, legumes for nitrogen and pollinators, and daikons for their amazing ability to add organic material to the soil. When the sheep graze the cover crop mix, they bite the radishes off at ground level, leaving round white dots the size of a golf ball speckled all around the ground, their surfaces grooved with the marks of their teeth. Post grazing, it looks like an untidy driving range. Once the sheep move on, the root left below ground rots and breaks down, and the space it once occupied provides valuable aeration.

It is a truth of capitalism that some of the plants that seem the most eager to work with us, and produce the most generously, end up being valued the least. Without the market as a factor, everyone would revere a plant that gives and gives and gives, but if you’ve ever sold zucchini in August, you know that practical utility rarely translates into financial windfalls. These crops will keep you alive, though, and will reward the beginner, the distracted parent, the disabled gardener, the gardener with little space, and the parents guiding their child’s clumsy fingers to press their first seeds into the soil.

All of that generosity and reliability gets overlooked in an economic environment that values the rare and unobtainable. The zucchini, the potato, and the humble radish are never going to be status symbols. They don’t offer us prestige, just a little thing called survival. Only what keeps body and soul together. Just the stuff of life. As someone who has run a vegetable farm ostensibly for profit, these “easy” crops weren’t at the top of my list. But in the first year of our child’s life, exhausted and physically reeling and adrift as we were, even the likes of us could make potato and kale soup from our garden. We could grill zucchini, and we could make an arugula salad. Radishes are still easy when life isn’t.

As a laborer, I resented radishes; as a business owner, I disparaged their profit margin; but as an eater coming out of a long winter of soft, starchy stored food, I have pulled their glowing roots into the low light, washed them in the rain that gathered in my palm, and crushed them between my teeth as a sign that spring really is here. As a teacher, I have watched children experience their short life cycle with wonder, and as a parent, I will soon accompany my own child on that journey.

As long as it matters that people need to eat, profitable or not, radishes will matter. Their cheerful roots popping up out of the ground, begging to hop into your crate only to nip your tongue, will always embody to me the dynamic complexity of spring on the north coast.

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Gowan Batist of Fortunate Farm is a Post-Industrial Pastoralist following sheep around the skeleton of a boom town. She is seldom seen, but sometimes glimpsed with a baby on her back, propagating native plants, spinning wool, hand shearing sheep, or meal prepping baby food with local bulk food via the MendoLake Food Hub.

Radish photo by Daiga Ellaby courtesy of Unsplash.

Tasting Time

Thoughts on How to Age White Wines

by Holly Madrigal


While undertaking a renovation project in my 150-year-old house, I came upon some intact magazines from the 1950s, brittle, covered in dust, and wedged between the studs. I have long heard stories of mythical vintages and treasures having sat forgotten only to emerge through happenstance to delight the finder. The previous owners had told me a story of how, when they were working on this old Victorian, they had found a bottle of red wine within the joists. They decanted that bottle and said it was quite good. Some time later, the couple who had owned the place a generation before stopped by and inquired about the wine, hoping to retrieve it, but too late!

Somehow the tales of aging wine always involved reds, so imagine my surprise when I learned that some white wines improve and develop over the years. I recently was fortunate to taste a 2010 Russian River Bernalillo that had matured into a deep golden hue. The flavors were deep, toasted, and rounded, altogether different from a younger glass.

To learn more about this world of white wine, I spoke with Wendy Lamer of the Disco Ranch wine shop in Boonville. The amount of viticultural knowledge in this proprietor’s head is staggering. “Yes,” she says, “people can and do age white wine, but it needs to be the right kind.” According to Wendy, white wine varietals like a white Burgundy, Riesling, Premier Cru, or Gershon Mont Ruche will improve over time. The higher the quality of wine, the longer it can last. “You can taste these wines young, and they may be good, but when you wait and let the flavors develop they can become something greater,” she adds. Wendy explains that aging a wine is typically three years or more. Those who want to “lay wines down” like to set aside a case to drink later, after they have matured, for a minimum of five to eight years. Three to five years will start to be the drinking window, but if you can wait you will be rewarded. Wines like the Premier Cru can be aged for seven to ten years, and the Grand Cru les Mon Ruche or Tar Mon Ruche can go as long as twenty-four years.

Wendy states that the traits of single vintage and high acidity can aid a good wine in maturing well over time. To begin with, the wine needs to be balanced—meaning, equal aspects of acids and sugars. “If it is not balanced to start, it will not be good later,” she asserts, continuing, “Napa Chardonnays, for example, don’t really age that well because they are manipulated. Malolactic acid is added because it is so hot there. But Riesling, if it’s dry, can age for ten years. If it is an Auscultatia or Bernausclatia, it can go for twenty years. They begin to develop those coveted petroleum flavors and notes that you want.” According to Wendy, Semillon and White Bordeaux age quite well. And Rioja, because the acidity is so high, can age for seven to ten years. “These wines deepen to a golden color and develop almond notes while retaining that acid. In 1976 the Germans made some of the most spectacular wines ever. They still taste fresh and young in 2024,” she adds.

For my first attempt at aging white wine, Wendy recommends a 2023 Riesling from Read Holland. This local winemaker, Ashley Holland, has no showroom and crafts relatively small batches. Instead, she showcases her vintages at Disco Ranch. “I am drinking the 2019 right now,” says Wendy. “So when she gets ready to switch vintages I will buy her last thirty cases. Then when the new wines start coming out, I bring out the older cases which are then perfectly ready.

The little bit of age develops the richness of flavor. This year she was written up in Food & Wine magazine as one of the twenty-five winemakers to watch. Decanter magazine has Ashley Holland as one of the top ten Pinot Noir winemakers of the past year. “She is on fire,” Wendy explains.

With red wine, you are judging for an integrated mix of aspects: fruit, acid, and tannin ratio. In reds, the tannins help them age, but with white wines, it’s the acidity or residual sugars that time matures. “Chenin Blanc ages well,” Wendy notes, as she pours a small glass. “GW Lussier Chenin Blanc out of Green Valley, Miramar Torres, and Iron Horse get most of their fruit from there. Forty-two-year-old vines, and even in one year it will taste different. You will get lanolin and some beeswax if you can wait longer. We sold out of this 2019 so quickly because people just went crazy for it. Even in a year, it will become more complex, richer, and rounder on the palate.”

The concept of aging white wine is a bit more commonplace when thinking of wine with bubbles. Bottles of champagne from decades ago grace tables for many a special occasion. “Champagnes age extremely well, like twenty years, easy. When you hear that they discovered a shipwreck and found a carton of champagne which tastes so fantastic, it is because it ages so well over time,” comments Wendy. Roederer Estate in Anderson Valley recently hosted a Library Tasting where they uncorked bottles from a twenty- year-old L ‘Ermitage, an in-person demonstration of how champagne can age deliciously.

When selecting a bottle of champagne (or sparkling wine, if not made in France) Wendy points out all the information listed on the label. France has an AOC Appellation Controlle designation with strict rules and standards. It describes a level of excellence that is tightly regulated. Premier Cru and Grande Cru varieties come out of that designation. For example, you can only harvest a particular amount of fruit from a given vineyard. When picking a champagne to age, Wendy suggests choosing a single vintage, meaning a wine from one particular harvest year (many wines are multiple-vintage wines).

The wine label is required to provide some details, such as the types of grape or wine and the creation and disgorgement dates. “That label is something you want to focus on,” says Wendy, holding a bottle of Roederer Grand Cru. “So, this bottle is a 2016 base wine with a disgorgement date of 2021, meaning that it had that time on the cork, which brings out all the flavors of brioche. It has been on the lees for four years.” Brioche literally means bread. Toasty notes and bread flavors that you can smell and taste will develop in that time. “The magnums taste better than the 750ml because they are often stored longer and left to evolve ... real champagne geeks want magnums,” she adds.

The logistics of aging wine should not dissuade the novice buyer. On the West Coast, most homes do not have cellars. Serious wine enthusiasts may purchase a EuroCave wine cabinet, which is a wine-specific refrigerator made for ideal temperature and humidity. Wine storage lockers have also become popular over the past few years. You need to be able to store the bottles for the long-term where they can be undisturbed. For short-term storage, a closet can work, ideally tiled, cool, and with minimal vibration. Some amount of temperature control is a must. “When I lived in Georgia, everyone has basements because of tornadoes,” Wendy explains. “My basement garage had these hollow cylinder blocks that I thought were perfect for wine storage. When we got a tornado warning, the neighborhood showed up because, unbeknownst to me, it was the neighborhood gathering place. When we got to the basement, they said ‘No, these are for people to hide in during a storm!’” Wendy had to make way, moving her wine storage to fit all her neighbors. She reflects that Georgia has a 67% humidity and 55-degree temperature in the basement, perfect—if you could discount the tornado part.

The aging of wine is, in essence, a gift to your (or somebody else’s) future self. It involves a level of delayed gratification and optimism for the future. You can be sure that I placed my own bottle of red wine, last year’s vintage from Absentee Wines, within the walls for future residents of this home. And I will set aside four bottles—not within the walls of my house but rather within a dark closet—to be revealed, like a treasure hunt scheduled for 2036. Seeing as that date feels as theoretical as 2025 once did, it will be an experiment in mindful forgetting. We shall see what time—and taste—develops.

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Disco Ranch
14025 Highway 128, Boonville
(707) 901-5002 | discoranch.com

Holly Madrigal is a Mendocino County maven who loves to share the delights of our region. She’s fortunate to enjoy her meaningful work as the director of the Leadership Mendocino program and takes great joy in publishing this magazine.

White wine photo by Anastasiia Rozumna courtesy of Unsplash. Wine bottles photo by Holly Madrigal.

Ready for Disaster

The North Coast Emergency Food System Partnership

By Lisa Ludwigsen


Picture this scenario: During an unexpectedly severe snowstorm in your remote community, 100 stranded motorists, including non-English speakers, families with young children, and even someone returning from a hospital stay, need food and shelter. A trailer from the County Office of Emergency Services, filled with cots, blankets, and other supplies, is parked next door, but you don’t have permission or the lock combination from local officials to open it. This was the scene in Laytonville during February of 2023.

By the time the official okay was given two days later (along with the correct lock combination), an intrepid group of volunteers led by Jayma Shields Spence, Director of the Laytonville Healthy Start Family Resource Center, had already pulled together sufficient supplies to keep everyone comfortable until the roads opened. “We proved that a little town with limited resources could host a group of stranded travelers and make a difference, and I think we saved some lives that first night,” Shields Spence shared. “I can’t imagine some of our guests in high-risk health situations being left in the cold. I wasn’t going to be the one to not open my doors to help those in need—I’d be ashamed of myself if I had the power to help a group of people and I didn’t because of a rulebook.”

This relatively brief and small-scale local emergency illustrates just how easily breakdowns can occur during disasters. All the good intentions, resources, and funding can’t help without clear communication. Federal, regional, and county groups can’t be effective if they don’t know what resources are available and how to connect with one another. Rural communities are often left under-served as more densely populated cities and towns get help first.

Snowstorms aren’t the only circumstances with the potential to interrupt the availability of food and other supplies. Pandemics, catastrophic wildfires, earthquakes, and floods all make the list of recent disruptions to local food systems on the north coast.

Would you know who to call or where to go if the food supply chain was suddenly disrupted during an emergency? What if the disruption extended for days, or weeks? For rural communities and at-risk populations such as children, older adults, and people with limited financial resources, the concerns are compounded.

As the North Bay Food Systems Advisor for U.C. Cooperative Extension, Julia Van Soelen Kim’s job includes supporting the development of regional farms, food hubs, and distribution channels. “Because of our region’s susceptibility to climate change-induced disasters, a lot of my work focuses on collaboration to support the resilience of our emergency food system to respond to and recover from disasters,” she shared. When a USDA funding opportunity designed to support partnerships that develop local and regional food systems crossed her desk, Julia and her colleagues and community partners seized the opportunity to bring together stakeholders to create a network of emergency food systems professionals across Northern California.

The North Coast Emergency Food System Partnership is a four-year initiative bringing together food producers, local and tribal governments, food policy councils, the University of California, and community-based organizations that provide emergency food assistance. There are 275 participants from the six counties of Marin, Napa, Sonoma, Mendocino, Humboldt, and Del Norte, representing roughly 1 million people spread over 11,500 square miles. The area encompasses isolated rural areas, densely populated urban places, and everything in between.

I was invited to join the partnership because of my work in natural foods, food policy, and small-scale farming in Mendocino and Sonoma counties. During the quarterly online and in-person meetings, representatives from a variety of agencies and community organizations have shared their experiences developing emergency preparedness strategies, as well as how they have problem-solved in moments of need.

Though I knew of the network of refrigerated nodes installed by the MendoLake Food Hub to provide central locations for farmers to deliver orders of fresh produce and other local food for distribution, I did not know about Del Norte County’s need to helicopter food to isolated residents when flooding washed out roads, or the emergency feeding plan developed by Marin County to get food to those who need it most in disasters, and which is now serving as a model for other counties. I’ve also come to understand how rural communities must be prepared to rely on each other during crises, as Jayma Shields Spence and the Laytonville folks did during the snowstorm. Jayma reports that since the snowstorm, “We have formed the North County Community Organizations Active in Disaster group, NCCOAD for short. The group meets four times a year to share resources and plan better for the next disaster/emergency and how we will handle things on our own if needed.” She adds, “In 2025, I will be pursuing funding to build a storage warehouse that would serve multiple purposes: Laytonville Food Bank storage, emergency food storage, emergency shelter supplies, and a commercial kitchen.”

Now in its second year, the North Coast Emergency Food System Partnership is moving forward toward its three goals:

• Working to create additional market opportunities for local producers within emergency food supply chains to mitigate risk and maintain income during disasters

• Building collective capacity to improve emergency food systems by creating a strong network of partners, developing emergency feeding plans, and inventorying local emergency food supply chain infrastructure

• Identifying barriers to their work and devising recommendations to establish effective local and regional emergency food supply chains

“Even though our regional project is still in its infancy, we’re already seen a lot of new relationships formed, increased awareness about innovative practices, and greater capacity of local food systems stakeholders to address climate change—fueled disasters. We hope to connect the dots across jurisdictional boundaries, local food and farming collaborators, and emergency managers,” said Van Soelen Kim.

Local farms are key to a healthy food system, one that is able to ease the challenges of widespread regional emergencies. Food produced nearby doesn’t need to travel long distances, and a diversified network of farms can be utilized in times of need. Ensuring that local farms remain sustainable becomes vital when considering all the ‘what-ifs’ during an emergency.

We can all contribute to our communities’ readiness for emergencies in a few easy ways. Stocking up on our own supplies and staying in touch with neighbors helps our immediate preparedness. Supporting local producers during the good times will help them be around for the challenges coming our way. Buy locally whenever possible and support the local grocers and markets that demonstrate a commitment to local agriculture.

As we improve our own preparedness, the North Coast Emergency Food System Partnership is connecting the resources that will provide emergency relief during those inevitable challenging times. The collective effort is powerful and reassuring and will help us weather whatever lies ahead.

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The North Coast Emergency Food System Partnership can be found online at ucanr.edu/sites/NCEFSP.

Road photo by Torrey Douglass. Shelter photo by Jayma Spence Shields.

Schnaubelt Distillery

Unexpected Flavors Abound at Noyo Harbor’s New Watering Hole

By Holly Madrigal


The sun shines through the ocean mist as I find my way to the Schnaubelt Distillery in Noyo Harbor. Boats are moored unloading their catch; sea lions bark as they jockey for space in the docks. Because of a desire to maintain the working harbor, all businesses there must have a link to the sea. How then does a distillery meet that standard, you may ask? Well get ready to try ... smoked salmon-infused vodka. If you are not the brave sort suited to seafood-infused liquor, you could try a spirit imbued with local candy cap mushrooms with hints of sweet cinnamon and maple syrup. A menu of these vodkas, rums, and whiskeys will provide an array of interesting flavors to try.

John Schnaubelt’s sea legs go way back—his family has been fishing in the harbor since the 1920s. His mom’s people come from Portugal, and his dad’s moved to the area in the 1940s to work the fishing trade. The men traditionally did the fish-catching, while the women often were the ones to filet the fish into sellable parts. The Schnaubelts have worked as commercial fishermen, truck drivers, fish and chips sales, and even fish fertilizer sales. Over time they have purchased different properties around the harbor, formerly housing their fishery where Caito Fishery is now. The Schnaubelts’ business interests once resided in the space now occupied by Princess Seafood Market.

The eventually secured a dockside location and opened Sea Pal, a hole-in-the-wall fish and chips joint that serves up some of the most delicious crispy golden fish with a vast selection of Northern California beers. “My mom and dad traded a property for the spot where Sea Pal is now,” shares John. “My mom had a little smoked salmon shop for years. My dad was dealing with back issues and health challenges from a lifetime of fishing. My dad and I used to go to the bowling alley, back when we had one, and go bowling and get a burger. I have really fond memories of that. After the bowling alley closed I decided to make a go of the fish-n- chips place. I tried to recreate the taste of that burger, and that’s what we sell at Sea Pal.” The eatery has really taken off. The outdoor dining tables, large outdoor fire pit, and riverfront deck are regularly filled with visitors and locals alike.

At one point, John went to a bachelor party in Kentucky, where he and his friends had a great time. One of the key events was a tour of multiple distilleries. While tasting, John looked around and realized that much of the equipment looked similar to what he had worked with at home. He started to think that maybe he could weld up his own tanks and find equipment to distill his own spirits. He experimented and found that he had a knack for it.

The Schnaubelt Distillery now resides in an old icehouse on the inside corner of North Harbor Drive. John has outfitted the retro building with a refurbished bar and a reach-in fridge from the 1950s. A pinball machine fills one corner, and picnic tables are out front for patrons with tasting flights. “We don’t have a kitchen here, but if people want to order food from Sea Pal across the street, they can pay for it and have it brought over,“ he explains.

John wants to continue to push the boundaries of what they can distill on site. He has been working on an absinthe that he is excited about, explaining, “We are trying to incor- porate locally-sourced ingredients whenever possible, like the wild fennel, used in the absinthe, we found here along the Noyo River. We may also branch out to a Moonshine. We’re interested in making well drinks for Fort Bragg bars and distributorship more broadly around the area.” They are also thinking about producing a lavender gin, and they’ve begun canning their mixed drinks like the Seabreeze and the sophisticated Greyhound. These cans are a perfect size for a trip to the beach.

It is fun to taste the different types. Paige, who works the tasting room, brings over their whiskey. “This has a tequila nose and an unusual grain bill of 88% malted barley, 2% malted wheat, and 10% corn,” she describes. “We did 30 bottles of this and we’re still playing with the recipe. It has honey notes and an oat finish.” My palate found caramel flavors and an almost coffee taste. One taste of a whiskey-in- progress was 150 proof, and it stands up and slaps ya. “I like the flavors of that stronger one. It sort of has a butteryness to it. Some whiskeys feel like they strip the tastebuds off your tongue, but others have a way of coating it with flavor. That’s what I like in a whiskey,” adds John.

They infuse some of their drinks like huckleberry, adding the local fruit to their vodka, which uses a corn base, adding a residual sweetness. The ruby-hued drink is tart, and the locally-sourced huckleberries have a hint of citrus. The huckle- berry vodka mixed into Sprite creates a stunning sipper. Candy cap mushroom is also infused into their vodka, and it makes for a unique gift. The unusual smoked salmon-in- fused vodka was created because the zoning in the harbor requires a fishing connection. It is surprisingly savory and would be a perfect addition to a Bloody Mary or with a raw oyster plate.

John Schnaubelt is pushing the boundaries of distilling in his business by the sea. His stills fill a space comprised of a tower of round windows reaching up to the ceiling like a spaceship. The distilling process lets evaporation carry the condensed vapor higher and higher, increasing in alcoholic proof, until it reaches the top where it is piped into a condenser and then bottled.

Stop by the Schnaubelt Distillery—it is well worth it for a taste of some unique flavors. You may find yourself learning a whole lot about not just liquor, but also the history of the harbor and those who live and work there.

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Schnaubelt Distillery
32425 N Harbor Drive, Fort Bragg
schnaubeltdistillery.com

Open Hours
Thu - Sat 12pm - 5pm, Sun 1pm - 5pm

Whiskey bottles photo courtesy of Schnaubelt Distillery. Other photos by Holly Madrigal.