Farm Fresh

My first job out of college was with a corporation with a household name. The position was dealing with higher end food service. It was the type of operation that used chefs and "quality" ingredients. A higher priced operation with some fairly exclusive clientele.

My coworkers were from all over the world. They had left the far reaches of the Earth and worked in other far reaches before this particular stop in the shadows of Atlanta's skyscrapers. 

These folks knew good food.

So it caught my attention when I heard one of them comment, "why are we using canned peaches? Isn't this Georgia?"

Peaches weren't out of season. Some of the finest peach orchards in the world were an hour and a half down I-75. And we were using canned peaches. They might even have been from China.

The previous summer I had visited Atlanta. I was in Centennial Olympic Park with a couple thousand people from all over the world. One thing that sticks out in my mind was an exhibit to tell these visitors our story - to introduce us to them. It proclaimed "The South is Agriculture". 

It's true. If you can eat it, wear it, smoke it, chew it, turn it into fuel and burn it, we'll try to make it spring from the ground. Agriculture is such a big deal that parts of our agriculture depend on other parts of our agriculture.

And we eat canned peaches from China.

Georgia specifically: we grow peaches, pecans, peanuts, apples, native grapes (muscadine, etc.), Vidalia onions, cotton, corn, soybeans. We raise poultry, beef, pork. And more.

And we eat canned peaches from China. 

Earlier I read a Twitter tirade straight out of Tattnall County. It inspired this post. There's a man down there, a Chicken Hippie, if you will. He has this crazy notion that Georgia dirt, fresh Georgia air, and Georgia sunshine will produce quality, tasty, nutritious chicken, duck, quail, & turkey. No crowded chicken houses. (You can find him on Twitter at @GApasturedbirds and on Instagram at grassrootsfarmsga.)

Next time you pass a chicken truck on the highway, take a look at the cargo and see if you agree with him.

Admittedly, I don't buy birds from him. Not right now. He makes his birds available through a distributor and restaurants can offer customers sustainable, locally-grown, pasture-raised poultry. And then they can switch back to Holly Farms and not tell you any different.

Thus the tirade.

Listen to me. This isn't about being a foodie. It isn't about being a hipster. It's about being a Southerner. It's about English settlers founding Georgia on agriculture in 1734. It's about Native American tribes sustaining themselves on this red clay on agriculture seven centuries before the English came.

It's about Georgians not eating canned peaches from China.

And it's about not wondering how a small farmer in South Georgia is selling poultry to restaurants in Atlanta and beginning to wonder why such products aren't widespread in our grocery stores. Why do we settle for less just because it costs a little less?

And Grassroots isn't the only farm like this out there. I know several people raising cattle & crops the old ways. You'll find them if you look. 

There's more on this topic but it will have to wait for another time.

Until then...