How We Grow

What We Grow

The crops we grow tend to trace back to a simple question about our parents, and theirs. What did they eat, and what did they feed us? The ones that don't have an English name, or have one that doesn't quite fit. The ones that show up in memory before they show up on any seed list.

Some of our most important seeds came through Judy's family directly. Her mother brought them with her when she escaped from Laos, across the Mekong to Thailand, where Judy was born. They travelled to Santa Barbara, where they fed the family far from home. They travelled with the family to Georgia and were then grown in red clay, and now the seeds are grown here in our field. Beans, cucumbers, and luffas that cannot be found in any catalogue because they were never meant to be, passed down the way that kind of knowledge travels, through people rather than institutions. We're still learning how to grow some of them well in a climate they weren't bred for.

We also grow the Asian pantry staples. Bok choy, gai lan, long beans, water spinach, and whatever else Judy is pulling into the farm dinner kitchen. For crops that cross cultures, like tomatoes, peppers, onions, cabbages, and cauliflower, we look for an Asian varietal first.