Archive for the ‘Gardens’ Category
So What’s With the Blue Tree?
So What’s With the Blue Tree?
Well, now that you’ve asked, I’ll admit it. It’s my fault.
The ‘Forest Pansy’ redbud tree leafed out last spring and then dropped every single leaf a few weeks later. A dreaded virus? A bump from a produce truck? A roaming goat? Anything is possible at the Glasbern, and we will never know what caused the sudden leaf drop. The tree remained naked for weeks, saddening the landscape around it. And for weeks I suggested to the property manager that it was only getting deader, and the only solution I could think of involved a chainsaw. But still the dead tree greeted me every week when I came to the garden. One late July day as I weeded and pruned it occurred to me how lively the branches would look—if only they were not gray. I was midway into that thought when owner Al Granger raced up on his 4-wheeler (like magic) and asked, “Need anything?”
“As a matter of fact …,” I replied, “I was just thinking about a project.” Now what you need to understand is that Al loves projects. He lives for projects. You will quickly realize this if you just look around at the grounds and barns and lodges. “What project?” he asked. (aha, I thought with a glimmer of hope)
“I would like that dead tree down there to be blue,” I responded, pointing. The typical farm owner would let out a guffaw and wheel away. After all there were cattle to feed, fences to mend, fields to mow, events to plan. But nothing about the Glasbern is typical. “What color blue?” he asked.
Between that Friday and the next Al picked a chicory flower, took it to the paint store, and brought back a couple of gallons of chicory-colored paint. When I came back a week later the tree was the exact blue of chicory, which is also the color of the sky on a brilliant summer day (but try taking that to the paint store). It was elegant and majestic. It was a sensation!
But this is not the end of the story.
Guests marveled at the blue tree over the next few weeks. They photographed it and touched it. They posed with it. And after a period of being noticed and admired, the tree, which had been bare for well over a month, began to grow leaves! I kid you not. It was almost as if its little taste of fame gave it a reason to live.
Last summer, the blue tree was a lively note of surprise in the choreography of the garden. Now that winter is here it stands cool and regal in the snow-covered landscape. In a couple of months it may magically spring back to life. But, more likely, the color will fade and with it the dying spirit of the tree.
A consulting company visited the Glasbern the other week and suggested that the blue tree was somewhat out of place. You may agree, or you may not. Either way, I believe there is a lesson to be learned.
Life is fleeting.
Live it colorfully.
Meet Chef Stephen Browning
Browning does broccoli.
Last week chef Stephen Browning attended a seminar; he was the lone chef in a roomful of rangers. The farmers, herdsmen, butchers, slaughterhouse owners—and Stephen—learned about marketing their grass-fed meats, which is not as simple as it might seem. The demand is there—consumers are learning that when cattle graze on grass their meat contains more healthful lipids and antioxidants than their mass-produced counterparts—but slaughterhouses are often not equipped to give the meat the special treatment it requires. The beef grown and served at the inn is slaughtered at an off-site USDA approved abattoir, then delivered right to the Glasbern’s own butcher to be cut, trimmed, and shaped to Browning’s specifications. “Well, what did you learn?” I asked him. “That we’re doing it right,” he replied. “The Glasbern now has a cutting room, a butcher, and a cooler. People can buy our meats right from the source.”
Browning came to the inn a couple of months ago from Flatbush Farm, a Brooklyn restaurant known for farm-to-table eating. What lured him to the Glasbern was the opportunity to cook with the livestock that graze on the hill above the restaurant, to hand pick herbs, to get up close and personal with greens and broccoli and beans. When he’s not in the kitchen you might find him tasting sheep sorrel or purslane that grow wild on the property, or foraging for chanterelle and chicken-of-the-woods mushrooms. Cooking is an adventure to Stephen Browning. As his passion for different kinds of food preparation meanders, he learns new sets of skills. Besides whipping up wonderful meals with freshly harvested real food, Browning cures meats, he smokes meats, he cans vegetables. He uses the whole cow. This, he tells me, is not the usual way in the chef business.
Now that you have a cutting room, fresh herbs, a farmer who grows your vegetables, and a forest to forage in, is there anything left on your wish list? I asked Browning. He thought for a moment, and replied, “I’d like a smokehouse.” Then he added, “and I’d like to do some gardening.”
That one, Stephen, I can help you with. I just happen to know of a garden bed full of garlic mustard (which makes good pesto!) and sheep sorrel. A chef who experiments with edible weeds and a time-strapped gardener—sounds like a match made in heaven to me!
Home on the Range
This is a cowboy's smile
Not everybody gets to be a cowboy.
But when Al Granger, the owner of the Glasbern Inn and farm, gets an idea into his head there’s no stopping him. It was in 2003 that Al decided the inn could use a few Scottish Highland cattle—nobody who knew him was even slightly surprised to see them out on the range within weeks. Now, six years later, Al has learned a thing or two about raising grass, which, as it happens, is the key to raising cattle. Ask him what gives him the most satisfaction about the multifaceted inn/farm/wedding venue/restaurant that he built and his answer is decisive. “I’ve loved watching the land come back.”
Back in 1985, when the inn consisted of a farmhouse, a barn, and a few dilapidated outbuildings, the land was chemically farmed. By spreading compost and loads of aragonite, a soil conditioner made from seashells, thus making conditions right for growing vigorous grasses, Al has literally brought the fields back to life. Successions of Katahdin sheep and Devon-Highland cattle now graze the pastures. Hens follow the cattle rotation, foraging for insect larvae that hatch in cow patties, and redistributing the nitrogen. Like a giant game of musical chairs, animals are moved daily from pasture to pasture. And who knew that in the world of grazers, a revolution is happening—Al is looking ahead to having his cattle forage the little mini solar collectors we know as blades of grass year-round to produce meat you can feel really good about eating. But I’ll leave the details of how he keeps track of all that motion, and the question of how a cow can nibble grass through snow, for another time. The subject at hand is a boy named Albert and his cowboy fantasy turned reality.
What’s your dream?
What is Pasture to Plate?
If you’ve stayed at the Glasbern Inn you know about the romantic atmosphere of the restaurant, the luxurious whirlpool tubs, the beautiful gardens. In the background you may have noticed a flock of sheep, or some steers grazing up on the hill. What you may not know is that those animals in the background are, in some ways, at the very heart of what’s happening at the Glasbern Inn. Yes it’s a thriving inn, a beautiful wedding spot, a weekend destination. But it’s also Al’s grass farm. Al is the owner of the inn and the 100-acre property that surrounds it, and he knows that taking care of the soil—which sustains the grasses, which feed the livestock, which end up on the table—is a fundamental piece of the process. Pasture to Plate is not just a catchy phrase. I’m trying to be tactful about this but we must face facts. Those photogenic Scottish Highland cattle on the hill are not just for show.
Visit the Glasbern for a romantic getaway or a stupendous meal of homegrown meats and vegetables. Visit this blog to learn the behind-the-scenes stories of the people, animals, and plants that make, or in some cases become, the delicious Glasbern experience. Every living thing on the property has a purpose. Take this 6-month old pig, for example. She is a hard-working pig. Right now she’s enjoying a well-deserved break from 
rooting out weeds and cultivating the soil. Maybe (probably) she’s fertilizing the soil too. Last Friday she and her pig friend followed me around like a puppy, nudging the unmentionable and nibbling the inexplicable. Now to you and me, muck boots are not a delicacy, but to a pig, evidently, there is nothing tastier. Kendell, the inn’s farmer, enlightened me about the pigs’ farm chores as we did the pigtrot, which is similar to the foxtrot in that feet must remain in constant motion in order to avoid toe damage. Other VIPs you might encounter on the property are Lottie, Kendell’s Jack Russell, who spends her dog days chasing groundhogs (a full-time occupation at the Glasbern) and Gracie Lou, the greenhouse kitty in charge of mice. All of this is in the pursuit of honest food. Real food. Tender greens and carrots. Sun-ripened tomatoes and sweet delicata squash. Spicy fennel bulbs. Grass-fed beef.
And yes … sausage.