More Pictures from Adamah (These are from other people)

This is the sign that greats you as you enter Isabella Freedman Jewish Retreat Center.  It doesn't lie.  When you get to this lovely place, you should be slowing down and getting ready for rest and relaxation.  Well, as long as you aren't part of Adamah!

This is the entrance to Beebe Hill (Kaplan Famiy Farm) which is the other land that we work.  This is were the chickens and male goats are, plus more veggies and berries.

At the end of retreats we sell our products.  We made a variety of lacto-fermented products (pickles, sauerkraut, pickled beets, kimchi), jam (blueberry, strawberry), hot pepper "bomb" jelly, salve, and schug (Yemeni hot pepper sauce).

Hard at work on Beebe Hill.  We used very little machinery and did almost everything by hand.  We are weeding.  I'm easy to identify in the red hat.

Just another day hoeing!

Adamaniks preparing veggies for the CSA and kitchen.  We had to clean and organize the veggies, and with some of them, such as carrots, beets, etc., we made bunches so they were easier to divide amongst the CSA members.

Goofing around, which is what made the hard days easier.  Daniel and Emi are holding up Ellie, the farm manager, and I'm supporting her back so she doesn't fall.

Ellie posing with the Rainbow Chard and Red Russian Kale.

Veggies for sale.  These as the sign says are Japanese eggplant.

Emi, one of the dairy/pickle apprentices, holding a kid goat so that we could weigh it.  It's harder than it looks since we had to figure out a way to keep track of which goats we had already done.  Oh yeah, and you have to catch them too.

Another shot of the front entrance to Beebe Hill (Kaplan Family Farm).  So peaceful.

Isabella Freedman sits at the foot of the Berkshires, which is apparently amongst the oldest mountain ranges in the world.  They are incredible.

Many of our plants were started in trays like this in our greenhouse and then transplanted.

Another view of the trays of starter plants in the greenhouse.

The truck loaded with trays of plants heading to the field for us to plant.

Adamaniks having some fun hiding behind our harvest.  From the left: Poppy, Jonathan, Erin, Me, Nachson, and Bonnie.  The produce from left to right is: Rainbow Chard, Red Russian Kale, and Dinosaur Kale.

Nachson cleaning kohlrabi (I think).

Many hands makes quick work in the field.  This is in the Sadeh, and we are weeding and possibly thinning the row.

Me and Julia, another dairy/pickle apprentice.  Not sure what we were doing.  We were probably either weighing and shaving the goats, or perhaps we were moving them to another pen.

Showing off the first tomatoes.  We had such wonderful tomatoes.

Yet more evidence of the fun that we liked to have.  From the left: Jacob, Jaclyn, Bonnie, Nachson, Ayelet, and me.

Another shot of the Rainbow Chard and Red Russian Kale.

Rows of probably eggplant, cucumbers, and not sure what else, on Beebe Hill.  We put down this cloth (Reemay) to protect them from insects and too much sun.  Plus it helped to keep the soil warm and moist which some plants really need.

If you don't know who this, not sure why you are looking at this blog.

Happy farmers with cabbages.  From left: Ellie (farm manager), Lauren (field apprentice), Daniel, Laura, and Ayelet.

Oh the harvesting of carrots.  So many carrots!  Since they are a very popular veggies, we planted lots of them.  I'm on the left, in the back, in the red hat.

I believe Yisroel took this.

This one too.

And this one.

I like this shot.  Very artistic.

The sunflowers reaching toward the sky.

Veggies for sale after a retreat.

We are taking a break on the Hazon 2010 NYC Bike Ride.  What a day that was.  Yisroel, who is sitting to my right, had to have both tires replaced, and we started out over an hour behind everyone.  Also note the Timberlands.  That's right, he did the 100+ miles in his Timberlands!  Still we managed to catch up.  Ari is sitting next to Yisroel.

Not sure who did this but it is cool.

About to set out from Camp Kinder Ring in New York on the first day of the Hazon Bike Ride.  If only I knew what an interesting day that would be.  I still had fun though.

We made pizzas in the cob oven.  Most of the ingredients on the pizza came from the farm.  It was a great meal.

Saying our goodbyes on the rooftop of the JCC in Manhattan.  The Hazon Bike Ride was over and so too, our summer at Adamah.

More goodbyes.

Our first day at Adamah.  Almost the whole group.  We are missing Ayelet.  From the back left: Jonathan, me, Daniel, Yisroel, Laura, Bonnie, Erin, Nachson.  Front row left: Eric, Jacob, Rachel, Jaclyn, and Poppy.

Our first breakfast at Beit Adamah (Adamah House).  it was delicious.  Fresh eggs and veggies, kimchi.  I was in heaven.

The whole group at Chubby Bunny Farm, which is the farm that we partner with for our CSA.  Makes it easier to ensure that the members get good shares and that there is a nice variety.  Dan, the owner, is on the far left.

The day before we left Adamah, spending some quality time at the Overlook.  Nice to start out our journey and end it at the Overlook.  We had just spent some intense time telling each other how much we appreciated them.  It was very emotional.  I don't think there was a dry eye by the end.

Fun in the field.

These are baby tomato plants.  You have to trellis them.  Tomatoes are a lot of work.  We unfortunately lost some because a bunch of plants fell over.  Oh well.  Live and learn.

A rather full altar.  As I said before, we decide to build small altars and leave one of each plant that we harvested as a symbolic way to connect to our ancestors and the Universe.  It allowed us to stay conscious of the face that we didn't do all of this by ourselves.  There is so much involved in farming.  It at times, really seems magical.

Goofing off.  This is great because not everyone is doing something funny.  From the left: me, Daniel, Julia, Emi, Aitan (dairy/goat manager), Shamu (Executive Director). Jacob and Ayelet.

The chicken tractor.  This is a very sustainable way to utilize the power of chickens.  We have several roosters in there.  We moved them everyday and they would dig and scratch for insects and bugs and do most of the weeding for us.  What a great idea!

Oh what a day that was.  We had finally gotten a deer fence and an enclosed pasture put in on Beebe Hill.  We took the male kids up there.  They would spend the rest of there lives up there.  Unfortunately, not 2 days later, they managed to escape and walk almost a mile back to the retreat center!  We spent several hours rounding them up.  I had experience tackling animals before, since I was in FFA (Future Farmers of America) in high school, and spent my summers on my Grandpa Bob's farm.  This is us on the back of a truck taking the boys back.

Another group shot.  From left back: Me, Poppy on Erin's shoulders, Jonathan, Lauren, Bonnie, Jaclyn, 

Just another day of work.  Note the bike and bag in the background.  We rode our bikes to get around to the fields.  We averaged around miles a week.  Not too bad.

Yisroel took us out on his family's boat.  They let me man the wheel for a bit.  It was fun, though not much wind at that point.

Garlic scapes.  If you've never had them, you are missing out.  Ever garlic plant puts out one scape.  They taste and smell just like garlic but they are more like a green onion.  I love them.  They pickle well too.  It's sad you don't see them in stores.  My guess is farmers don't do anything with them which is so sad and wasteful.

Me and Jonathan posing with our hoes!

CSA shares being put together at Chubby Bunny Farm before they make the journey to White Plains, NY.

Out on the water with Poppy, Laura and Yisroel (left to right).

A Chioggia beet.  They are an Italian variety and have a cool look to them.  They taste good too!

Aitan jumping onto the back of the truck so we could take the male goats back to their pasture.  What a day!

Me, Laura and Yisroel.  Not sure where this is.

Our pickled beets.  Yum.

Working in the fields.

I like this picture a lot.

Chickens enjoying the leftover food from the kitchen that will be turned into compost.  We had a great system.  The leftover food an scrapes from the kitchen were brought for chickens to eat.  Whatever they didn't eat became compost and then the compost was used on the fields.  Sustainability at work.

Radishes.  I love radishes.  They pickle nicely if you ever want to pickle something.

Weeding the kale I think.

Mountain of garlic before it has dried.  Garlic must be cured (dried) before it can be used.  Otherwise it doesn't have a very strong taste and will spoil.  This way you can store it.

Loading up our box truck for delivery.  One of my favorite jobs.  The truck was cool because it ran on used vegetable grease.  Very sustainable.  Also since we drove it to White Plains which was a 2 hour drive, we could run it on like 95% or more grease, and what fuel we did use was biodiesel.  The exhaust smells like fries.

Boxes of veggies after being washed.

Another shot of the truck being loaded.

Basil plants.  We had so much basil that we harvested the whole plant rather than just giving bunches to our members.

More weeding.

Peas!

A shot of the Overlook.  Such beautiful mountains.

Veggies at the start of their journey to our CSA members.

This is what we start with when we put together our CSA shares.  This series will show you what a box looks like from start to finish.

And there you have it.  One of our CSA shares complete.  The great thing about a CSA is that you are not only eating fresh, locally grown produce, but you also eat seasonally too.  So while at the beginning of the season you get lots of green, leafy veggies, by the end it mostly root veggies and squash.