Not many of us look at palm trees and immediately think of growing dates and yet, this episode may change that for you! Palm trees are usually on beaches, so seeing acres of them in grid patterns opens up a lot of questions. Luckily, I found the right place in the Coachella Valley just outside of Palm Springs to get all my questions answered — Hadley’s Date Gardens where Albert Keck was ready to show me around. And some of the trees I saw have been in the valley for 80-100 years — that’s a lot of jam, cookies, energy bars, etc!

The AI transcript for this episode is available.

Dates are on More Shopping Lists & Menus

The push for taste and nutrition in our diets means dates are a popular item these days. While farmers like Albert may prefer to eat them whole right off the trees, there are lots of possibilities out there.

A favorite for me is definitely on the culinary side stuffing the date with a soft cheese (usually cream cheese) and wrapping it in bacon but I had a date shake on my way out to meet Albert and it was wow good! And I’m trying to convince him to share the recipe for oatmeal-pecan-date cookies!

They deliver some great nutrition — lots of potassium, fiber and heart healthy vitamins and minerals. A lot of people are probably eating dates in their energy bars whether they know it or not because dates add natural sugars and carbohydrates. All of that is why that shake was a perfect way to refresh on a hot afternoon in the desert during my trip.

Farming Date Palm Trees

The importance of working trees is common in a lot of perennial fruits and nuts, but the structure of date palms certainly puts some spins on working orchards (often called date gardens) when it comes to all of the fruit being produced quite a distance from the ground.

In fact, palmeros (a Spanish word for the farmworkers who go up in the trees to work) are needed year-round as there are a number of jobs to be done in the trees while many other fruit & nut crops are likely to hire temporary workers. Palmeros are specialized as they gain experience and become adept at working at the heights day-to-day. They do ongoing safety training, as well as equipment inspections for the things that assist them. And while touring Hadley’s, I had the chance to see some of that happening in real time. It was clear that the Hadley’s team all works together.

What are the jobs palmeros do in growing dates?

Palmeros go up every tree half a dozen times in a year. That’s every tree and as you can see in the video, there are a lot of trees in a garden or orchard!

• In January and February they go up the trees to clear away any of the remaining fruiting branches from the previous fall harvest. They also take these huge thorns off the trees newest fronds (palm leaves) that sprout from the center.
• March and April are when trees are pollinated. That means workers go up the few male trees to collect pollen and up female trees to pollinate flowers that will turn into dates. Sure nature uses wind to do this but by planting more female trees and judiciously using the pollen, it gives commercial farmers a much bigger yield. And in a world where margins are so slim, that can make a big difference! So much so they make two trips up each female tree to ensure as much pollination as possible.
• The months of May and June, palmeros will check for dates setting on the tree and may need to help balance the load some as well as create supports from the growing fruit load by tying bunches to the nearby fronds.
• In July and August, those green dates are really taking shape and the team goes up the trees to put silk bags over each bunch to keep insects and birds from getting the fruit as it ripens. That’s what they were doing when I visited so photos/video on that are coming!
• And harvest starts in September!

Touring a Date Farm

When I first talked to Albert, I walked through the time needed like I do with all my guests. Discussing the need to capture clear audio for the podcast as well as get a chance to look at the farm and capture video. I asked for a 30 minute tour knowing how many things farmers balance, but we were having such a good conversation and seeing so many things that made me ask questions. Next thing I knew I had monopolized most of his morning! When I mentioned knowing he was busy, he laughed saying he was enjoying getting around the farm, touching base with the crew, etc and that I was “stuck with him.”

We had a chance to see date orchards at various stages of growth and development. We saw pups that were cut off younger trees to go to the nursery. Date gardens that have been planted in the last couple of years and are nearing production as well as trees nearing the century mark in age and no longer producing (they will soon be replaced). But my favorite by far was watching Rodolpho work a tree.

Get More Info & Stay Connected!

You may want to check out the website for Hadley’s Date Garden. The page on the farm’s roots has a few great old photos as well as video with Albert. If you want to purchase some of the Hadley’s dates, Albert suggests you look at local retailers. They are available in several places like Costco. You can buy them through Amazon but Albert points out the prices there tend to be higher since it’s not direct from the farm.

We love talking about a different food and farm topic every two weeks for the podcast. And it’s wild how that has built a library up! You can probably find a favorite food in our previous episodes or maybe you’d just like to wander around the map to see something close by. You can subscribe to get emails on future episodes from the website, listen to the podcast in your favorite app and connect with us on social media. In fact, if you find a platform we aren’t on, please let us know so we can add it!

The post Growing Dates: Coachella’s Longest Running Jam Session appeared first on Grounded by the Farm.

When you search for Dino Giacomazzi online, you find a farmer who is focused on the environment. You also read a lot about dairy farming, but last year, the Giacomazzi family sold the cows & shifted their focus to crops including the almonds they had nurtured for the past five years. Dino shares how that came to happen and how environmental sustainability learned in the dairy is leading to innovation in reducing water use. He also has sons (12 yr old Miro & 7 yr old Gio) join us to discuss the new business they started while out of school due to the corona virus.

Growing Almonds — Two of the Hottest Topics

Dino says he’s known people ask certain questions about almonds, but the family’s move to a direct supplier – customer means he gets those questions more directly. Appreciate his addressing the question of bee health and water use as both topics have been discussed widely but rarely include a farmer’s voice.

What Growing Almonds Looks Like

Millions of Americans eat almonds, but only a few of us have ever been lucky enough to go visit an almond farm. This post provides photos and videos that will help you visualize almond trees and get a feel for farms like the Giacomazzis.

Links mentioned in the podcast:

• Blog post that includes a look at almond trees at various times of year 
• Buying almonds from the Giacomazzi Brothers or GBNuts.com
• Video of Dino and his father Don on the dairy farm with a post I wrote while visiting years ago
• Article highlighting some of the environmental work in almonds Dino is doing
• Video of the Giacomazzi Brothers 
• Nut milking exposed video (so funny) 

Other links of interest:

https://californiagrown.org/blog/meet-a-farmer-dino-giacomazzi-of-giacomazzi-dairy/

Subscribe So You Don’t Miss an Episode

• Apple podcast — Grounded by the Farm  
• Spotify for Grounded by the Farm 
• Google podcast link to Grounded by the Farm 
• Libysn is where we host so we can also be found there 

The post Growing Almonds and Starting a Flavored Almonds Business appeared first on Grounded by the Farm.

Almond trees weren’t part of my world growing up. The latest episode of Grounded by the Farm, I talk with Dino Giacomazzi about growing almonds and his family’s new business with flavored almonds.

When I was a kid, I remember sitting down with a nut cracker to open up so much goodness from the various shells. Pecans and walnuts were something we saw a lot of since we had trees in the family, but almonds… now and then we’d get almonds. They were different, unique. I loved how the almond shell seemed to tell a very different story was and pondered what almond trees looked like.

That was in the times of encyclopedias rather than Google and YouTube, so I had much more creativity than answers and photos. So when I started working in agriculture and found myself in California on farms for work, I’d drive and look at trees and plants. It’s amazing how your mind can rush with new images. And with the number of orchard nuts and fruits all in the valleys, I spent a lot of time pulling over on the roadside and using my zoom lens to try and get a view of what I was looking at.

Closeup of almond trees in full bloom courtesy of AlmondGirlJenny.com 

Spring — Almond Trees in Full Bloom

I have to confess, being in the San Joaquin Valley (SJV) in spring was disorienting. There are SO MANY blooming trees…. and if you aren’t familiar with them you struggle to identify anything. I always felt most confident about plums, peaches/nectarines/apricots and walnuts based on what I saw most often at home. But you suddenly have all the things blooming!

Now I can say with some confidence that almonds are among the prettiest blooms and these days they are likely the most abundant too! An estimated 80 percent of the world’s almonds are grown in California’s Mediterranean climate.  And with all those trees blooming in the spring, and lots of honey bees needed to do the pollination, the SJV is buzzin!

Friends Holly Christine & Trent Bown did a video when they visited a mutual friend one spring…. it shows you how beautiful those blooms are as well as gives you a little feel for an almond farm.

Autumn — Getting Ready for Almond Harvest

Like other nuts, almonds have a husk on the outside that protects them through the season and slowly starts to open up as the almond matures and the temperatures drop for fall. I can remember seeing almonds on the tree at that pre-harvest phase and being a bit confused by what I was looking at. You can see in this photo that various colors start coming into play as harvest nears.

And you can see how the almonds begin peeking out of those husks in this closeup.

The reason the almond shell always intrigued me is it looks so rough compared to the smooth shell of pecans or walnuts. And seeing how flat it is compared to the rounded or oval nuts…. well, it still catches the eye making me wonder. Of course, most of the almonds I buy now are all shelled, maybe combined with granola for breakfast, coated with a savory flavoring or even dipped in chocolate!

Parts of this article previously appeared on a post on what almonds look like on the tree and as we talked about the Boersma family in the A to Z of farms on my lifestyle site. 

The post Checking out Almond Trees on California Farm Visits appeared first on Grounded by the Farm.

This post includes an affiliate link for the book. Using and purchasing through that link may generate income for this site. 

As I prepared for the interview with Matthew Sligar of Rice Farming TV about growing rice, I was pulling together questions I had, questions from friends and then I had a new source of discussion topics — the children’s book Matthew recently published. The book, Daddy’s Got Dirt: A California Rice Story  (available directly from the author & from Amazon) provides a story from the viewpoint of Matthew’s daughter. It’s presented in rhyming verse with great illustrations that is perfect for children who have an interest in food or farming.

To get a good feel for the book, I not only read it, but had a young friend read it aloud for her family & me last week. As someone who loves to share the story of how our food is grown, I enjoyed it and so did the family I shared it with.

The Basics of Daddy’s Got Dirt

Daddy’s Got Dirt is a book that brings words and pictures together in a way that lets us have an intimate peek of a rice farm in California. The story is told by a daughter who learns about the soil, seeds and more from her dad and is passing along their story.

Planting and harvest seasons are time when long hours are spent at work growing rice, and the book shows images of what the various tasks are. It provides more of the story than just saying we need to plant as you see what is done to prepare for that I couldn’t help but think the story would resonate with a wide range of children and families as you have big tractors moving dirt or harvesting crops one minute and see the connections families have with farm dogs and wildlife the next.

A Bonus I Can Get Behind

Our family loves coloring, drawing, etc. and to see that there is a free downloadable coloring book that comes along with Daddy’s Got Dirt gave me a big smile. And yes, I had to download it and break out my box of 64! Fun to take a break but more importantly, I’m sure a lot of people (like me) learn more by interacting with things.

Coloring the pages gives you a chance to slow down and think about even talk about the various components of the image.  I wish I’d printed copies before I went to visit friends cause coloring is so much fun with friends. And I can totally see myself printing a page or two when I go read to a classroom in the future.

Growing Rice Is A Unique Job, but Touches So Many

American families eat a good bit of rice. In fact, according to Think Rice, we average eating 26 pounds per person each year although that differs among cultures, geographies, etc. As Matthew and I discussed in the podcast, I think my family helps pull the average up since we are Southern and have Asian family members too.

But rice is only grown in half a dozen states or so, that means a lot of us enjoy the food but probably haven’t had much experience in how it is grown. This book is a way to see how it’s grown as is Matthew’s Rice Farming TV channel on YouTube. (you can watch this year’s rice crop from week to week too.)

Details on Daddy’s Got Dirt

Here’s are a few of the details on the book Daddy’s Got Dirt you may want to know:

• 40 pages
• Hardcover
• Full color
• Beautifully illustrated by Daniel Vincent
• $19.95 plus shipping (available directly from the author & from Amazon)

Don’t forget to listen to the podcast episode with rice farmer Matthew Sligar too!

The post Learning About Growing Rice from a Children’s Book appeared first on Grounded by the Farm.

While I didn’t meet a rice farmer til I was an adult, I have a lot of them to thank for a lifetime of enjoying rice! I’ve had the chance to meet and talk with rice farmers across the U.S. and in several countries in Asia. I love hearing about how it’s grown. So sitting down for a conversation with Matthew Sligar who farms in Northern California is something I relish. We’ve had the chance to visit on his farm several times but for this podcast episode, we were two thousand miles apart.

What kind of rice is grown in California?

Matthew and other rice farmers in California (the northern Sacramento Valley) grow medium grain rice, he explains that it is the sticky rice that is such an integral part of many Asian foods including sushi! The long-grain rice that is used in some other foods is usually grown in Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, Louisiana and Mississippi.

Since for many of us, we think about brown and white rice as the types of rice we put on the plate, Matthew walked through the process of milling with us. The milling process is where they take the rough rice that farmers grown and remove the hulls and determine whether the bran will remain making it brown rice or the bran is polished off making it white rice. He walks through the process in this video.

Getting His Creative On

As you can see in the video above, Matthew has a creative side that combines with helping people better understand where their food comes from.

I found him online several years ago because a video he did offering trick or treaters a single grain of rice rather than the expected candies. And while most of his videos are more directly related to the way food is produced, this rice farmer always makes the videos interesting with his witty sense of humor and video style including fast edits. His YouTube channel is called Rice Farming TV and he produces videos weekly! You can follow the 2020 rice crop in this playlist too.

And this year, he also has published a children’s book about what happens on his farm! The book Daddy’s Got Dirt:  A California Rice Story is great for young kids with rhymes and images. You can read Grounded by the Farm’s review of Daddy’s Got Dirt here too!

Show Notes

Blog post that provides photos & more:   https://groundedbythefarm.com/rice-farmer/  

Where to find Matthew Sligar online:

• RiceFarming TV on YouTube 
• RiceFarmingTV.com

Rice recipes from some farmers who love to cook

Where to find Grounded by the Farm online:

• groundedbythefarm.com
• YouTube Grounded by the Farm
• Instagram GroundedbytheFarm_
• Facebook https://www.facebook.com/groundedbythefarmpage/

Matthew’s videos we mentioned:

• Offering trick or treaters a grain of rice 
• Explaining what it’s like to be a Rice Krispy Treat farmer 

• Making sushi 
• The difference in brown and white rice 

• Planting Rice! Tractors Working on the Farm Day 1 
• The full 2020 crop year playlist 

• 2019 harvest on the farm— a story of breakdowns 
• 2019 rice harvest is Brazil 

The post A Rice Farmer Who Loves Farming, Food & YouTube — Meet Matthew Sligar appeared first on Grounded by the Farm.

The search for the perfect avocado is a search many of us have been on. But avocado farmers like Mimi Holtz, who is known simply as Mimi Avocado online, know what to look for and what impacts the tasty goodness we all crave. Listen as she shares favorite recipes, some of the everyday ways the Holtz family enjoys avocados, insight on how the crop is grown and tips for delighting kids. 

Selling Produce Direct

The family started a business called California Avocados Direct several years ago and it has found a real niche for itself — her son Ben keeps this building and daughter Maryanne is working with customer service. I’ve ordered several times over the years and recording and editing this episode certainly made me crave the perfect avocado so I have a box on my table now! Because they have so many different varieties, and different varieties are ready at different times of year, they have subscribers who get boxes monthly. I hadn’t realized the fit avocados have for people with celiac disease or vegans/vegetarians using them as a staple in diets. But those groups alongside avocado enthusiasts like me love getting the best flavor possible. And really…. the farm employees picked & boxed avocados for me on Monday and they made it from Southern California to my front porch in St. Louis Wednesday by lunchtime!

The farm also grows tangerines and sells them by the box. And Mimi pointed out that with the process so well established for years on those crops & so many people staying home, they are now packing produce from other farmers too. They quickly adapted to source and pack potatoes, onion, celery, various fruits, nuts and more that was available. The boxes have been getting rave reviews on Facebook and how cool to know it could be could potentially be reducing some of the waste some farmers are suffering.

Varieties of Avocados They Grow

One of the reasons the Holtz family can do year-round direct avocado business, is Ed Holtz has kept tending and planting different varieties of the fruit throughout the decades he’s been in Escondido.

Mimi points out that most Americans are familiar with the Haas avocado — one with a bumpy, thick skin that ships well. The variety did such a good job with production and throughout the supply chain, that the US market moved largely to Haas variety decades ago. And that success has led to more Haas avocados being planted in Mexico and other countries who supply US consumers with fruit.

But the family has always enjoyed the different flavors and textures of various varieties. And different varieties ripen at different times of year too. Mimi explains that April is peak season for the fuerte variety and I have to agree with her… the flavor of fuertes is so much richer than what I’ve gotten from grocery stores. The box above is of fuerte avocados and you can see the skin is smooth, it’s also really thin. They also grow Bacon avocados (they don’t taste like bacon but everything goes well with bacon!), Reed avocados which are big & round like cannonballs, Nabal, Gwens and more. In fact, when I was there in October, Ed gave me a few Mexicola avocados that were new to the farm. They had a really deep purple skin (you can see they sort of look like eggplants) and the skin was really thin which was notable once I cut the avocado. I did a short video at the time if you would like to see.

Favorite Ways to Enjoy the Perfect Avocado

While I tend to eat out several times a week and travel a lot, I have been home and cooking. I told Mimi about making lots of avocado toast and slicing some up for chicken tortilla soup recently. She has a million ways to use them!

“Well, we sliced them on top of scrambled eggs or with an omelet. You know we buy those bacon bits at Costco and put them into the scrambled eggs with a little onion maybe. And then slice avocados on top with a little cheese.” Mimi explains. “We always have tortillas in the refrigerator so that we could make a burrito or a taco or quesadilla and then, you know put slices of avocado on top or we mash the avocado and do different kinds of guacamole. You don’t have to have, you know, the traditional guacamole. You could just grate onion into mashed avocado and try that or add a little crab meat if you happen to have a can of crab in the pantry or some in your refrigerator.”

I love that she also cuts shapes out in avocados! It certainly brings a smile to your face to have a heart sitting atop a bowl of soup or salad and she sends a clear stay home message with an avocado house.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Mimi Holtz (@mimiavocado) on Apr 1, 2020 at 11:57am PDT

More on Avocados in the Podcast

Listen to the episode to learn more about avocados including:

• How to store avocados at home
  
• Understanding avocado trees growth & care
  
• How long do trees produce?
  
• Food safety
  
• Pruning and picking

Links Mentioned in this Episode

• A video tour of the perfect avocado farm (this is my adjective, I’m sure Mimi & Ed would laugh and say not perfect but always working to be better)
• Mimi Avocado’s blog (includes great recipe, farm stories, etc)
• Website where the Holtz family sells avocados & other fruits & vegetables direct  

The post Getting the Perfect Avocado For Our Kitchens & The Farm appeared first on Grounded by the Farm.

Join me as I tour an avocado farm. This video was shot in late October as we looked at young fruit on the tree. Those same avocados are being picked and packed as we publish the tour because April is when California’s avocado season gets underway offering great flavor!

Our host was a woman known in social media circles as Mimi Avocado. Mimi showed me around as her husband, son and others were busily working to care for the trees on the farm outside of San Diego, California.

Hope you enjoy learning about growing avocados from a farm family who proudly grows them. You can even order some to be delivered from this farm directly to your door via CaliforniaAvocadosDirect.com.

Young Avocado Trees

First up on the avocado farm tour for us was young avocado trees. The family plants trees regularly as they want to maintain the productivity. As we looked at a nursery field of newly planted trees, Mimi pointed out how the shiny leaves are a good sign they are healthy and getting enough water, etc. Young trees will produce blooms and try to grow fruit but for a couple of years they have growing to do before they can really contribute to yield so the farm has a routine for replacing trees that allows them to keep producing year after year.

What Avocado Flowers Look Like

Once trees get taller, more leaves and branches, the fruit (both blooms and the avocado that will ultimately be picked) grow in the sun. It’s really different from a lot of other tree nuts (including our beloved pecans) and fruit trees in that it has blooms on it for one year while fruit is also ready to be picked. That tropical nature is pretty cool. The blooms have a bright yellow to them while avocados can be a bit camouflaged in all the greens of the tree.

But dang there were lots of them!

Caring for Mature Trees

Mimi explained that pruning is a part of the regular care of trees and it serves a couple great purposes. It helps clear out any limbs that may have broken, etc that could pose safety concerns to pickers. And it also means the tree will need less water. It is so interesting that along with pruning them, sometimes they cut avocado trees down to the trunk and let them start regrowing.

I love that avocado trees are always shedding leaves and putting on new ones though I’m not sure I’d love it if I had one in my yard. It is kind of convenient to have all the leaves on my trees drop in just a couple of week period.

More on Avocados!

The new podcast episode with Mimi talking all things avocado will be coming out tomorrow so check it out in your favorite podcast app or come back and listen to it here.

Mimi has a fantastic website mimiavocado.com with lots of information about avocados — recipes for all the avocado dishes you can imagine, some glances around the ranch/farm, and based on a conversation I had she may have put this one together on how to freeze avocados — I also find chopping them up and putting them (airtight) in the fridge makes avocado toast so dang easy for days!

You can join me in ordering avocados from the farm via californiaavocadosdirect.com.

And you may enjoy a few photos and video from the first avocado farm tour I ever took — it was at Mimi’s years ago!

The post Want to take an avocado farm tour? Sit down and enjoy the ride. appeared first on Grounded by the Farm.