HOW TO EAT LIKE A FARMER HAVING A GOOD DAY

If you spend enough time among the farmers in this country, you will come to notice that a certain type of character again and again appears in our fields and orchards and pastures. I’m not sure if it has more to do with the people who are drawn to the job, or else some set of pressures which, exerted over the course of years, shape a person into a farmerly mold. In truth, it is probably some of both.

By my reckoning, there are a few things that define this character. In terms of personality these people tend to be reserved, hardworking, ethical (each in their own way), quiet about their accomplishments, concrete in their intentions, apocalyptic in their habits of thought, and tired. They are typically generous, and frequently late. They are ruminators, and too much ruminating gives some of them a sort of cow-eyed gaze.

In appearance there is not much that binds them together except, often, an effortless stylishness that I believe to be less an expression of personality and more a testament to the conditions of the job: pants with real weight to them, shirts that hang somewhat off the body (and therefore keep sun off the skin), good fabric, broad brimmed hats, intense & unhip sunglasses. They are some of the last people to still be using bandanas in earnest.

Conversationally they are maladapted, a trait most obvious in the tendency to fall asleep at dinner tables. They wake too early, work too hard, and go to bed too soon (in the quiet season) or too late (during harvest). Being outside the social current, they live in telegraph time, and hear everything at a delay: they are indignant about the “news” a week after the rest of society’s indignation has faded.

Their diet does not always reflect their line of work. Now and again they will produce a great meal, a feast both rustic and delicious, but in general things are rather more slapdash, and very often they eat terribly. Mostly this is because they are busy. Much like mice or ants, farmers in this country rely on foods that can be obtained quickly and have a high caloric value. Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, chips of various kinds, and (at least in Northeastern Mosier) a fabulous number of gummy bears are all typical, even for the staunchly organic set. But if on a bad day their food is grossly synthetic, on a good day it is still humble, and from our winery stove you can often smell a dish most appropriately characterized as gruel (not so bad, really: just the fastest way of cooking grain).

 Sometimes things are better. When Brian has the time to make a loaf of bread, and when that time coincides with tomato season, great things happen here on the farm. An aura enclouds the place, the touch of heaven, and it can be felt for miles. The Italian language has a word for the kind of meal that comes next: companatico, or that food eaten alongside bread. You need not farm to appreciate the great privilege of a smear of mozzarella and slice of tomato alongside a slice of fresh bread.

That farmers rarely eat well is one of those cruel twists of fate. But in this fact there may be a clue as to why they keep farming, for there is nothing like subsisting mostly on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for a prolonged period to make a person treasure the improbable and incomparable majesty of a perfectly ripe peach, for example. It may be worth all that life force. This intimate appreciation for the raw ingredient has given birth, at least here, to a distinctive style of cuisine, the child of necessity and the freshest possible produce.

I asked Brian to write up a few sentences summarizing how he might cook on a good day in a busy season. The response below captures the essence of the farmerly way of cooking, which, like farmerly fashion, is sort of agrarian-chic. These sentences might also be a cause for you to make something so fast, so simple, and so good in your own kitchen, and to treat it as a meal. To make a meal that is both quick and delicious is worth, at the right time, at least one million dollars, but these instructions are free:

breakfast: Nancy's yogurt (whole milk, plain), store-bought cereal (Heritage Flakes are v. good), peach chunks, lacto-fermented red currants, oat milk to texture. 

lunch: farro, water, salt; cooked to tenderness; then olive oil, scallion rings (and likely more salt) [credit: Chez P.]; stir in chopped rocket leaves at serving, or cherry tomato halves if you have them (etc.)

tonight: peeled, chopped tomato & halved onion (like 3:1 by weight), butter (lots), salt; cooked to reduce; over pasta, onion removed (piled on toast tomorrow)

if you make it home from the farm tonight: Hendrick's (original), Dolin dry vermouth (with a cube; swirl to chill); lemon peel (the size of a bandaid)

if you don't: cold Rainier (or Ninkasi Gold, if it feels like things are going well)