My Pictures from Adamah

All of these pictures are mine. Any other posting will have pictures that other people took.

This is our hand-packed, kosher cheese. I think it's probably chevre.

Finished product. More cheese. The table isn't actually a table. It's a big chill tank and in the background behind the cheese is our pasteurizer/mixer/bulk tank.

These are buckets of pickles. We made amazing, lacto-fermented pickles. My favorite are the Spicy Lemon and Israeli-style.  Miriam, our pickle lady, is on the right.

One of our compost piles covered in weeds that we pulled by hand. The work that we did was almost all by hand and with hand-held tools.

This is a very of the Sadeh (field) where we grew most of our veggies. I believe that is kale in the foreground.

More kale. Red Russian on the right and Dinosaur on the right. The dinosaur really does look like lizard skin but it's so good.

Baby squash. Probably pumpkin.

Rainbow Chard. So beautiful and colorful.

A closer shot of a Rainbow Chard leaf. Truly amazing and vibrant color.

The squash are hiding from me. These are yellow Pattypan squash. We planted to much squash. It was crazy. They are also difficult to harvest because you end up getting scratched up.

This, believe it or not, is a zucchini! Like I said, we planted too much and they got out of control. We ended up having to return many back to the earth because when they get so big they don't taste good and the texture changes.

A row of baby cabbage. The plant to the left is dill. We used so much in our pickles.

Delicious carrots. It is such a wonderful feeling to pull a carrot out of the ground, wipe off the dirt and eat it. So great.  Side note: you can't really pull carrots out of the ground by hand.  You have to have some digging tool to loosen them up before you yank them out.

Another view of the Sadeh.

A Pattypan squash.

More massive zucchini.

Heirloom tomatoes. We grew 8 different varieties plus tomatillos.

Our lettuce. The red is Red Oak. Not sure what the other variety is.

Baby beets. We grew several varieties of beets. Most we sold through the CSA but some were pickled. The most interesting variety were Chioggia, which are an Italian variety that are pink on the outside and candy striped on the inside. Very tasty.

Yet another view of the Sadeh. In the back right corner is the entrance to the river were we would Mikvah on Friday afternoons. A Mikvah is a ritual bath that is done to purify and renew your spirit. Traditionally done before Shabbat, before weddings, and for women after they're menstrual cycle.

This is one of the many things that I miss about Adamah. I loved this ritual.

A row of herbs maybe. Not sure.

Another view of the Sadeh. Such a peaceful place to be.

This is our Dibbler. We used it to make sure we were evenly spacing our plants. It takes two people to roll it, and it makes indentations in the soil a foot apart, so spacing plants is easy. It's a pretty neat system.

More of the field. One of the Adamahniks laying in the field. Probably Daniel or Jacob.

The path into the Sadeh. It had this magical, hidden quality to it. You really wouldn't know there was a field unless you were paying attention. I liked that.

More compost piles covered in weeds. WE probably had close to 10 different piles going all over the field.

The view when you first come into the Sadeh. To the right, that tipi looking thing is actually a little altar we set up. In Jewish tradition it was traditional to take the first fruits and vegetables from your fields and the first of the flocks and offer them up to the Creator. This was our way of reconnecting to that tradition and taking the time out to remember that for all our work, there is so much else that has to happen for us to have a successful harvest.

Another shot of the altar.

A close up of what we placed on the altar.

Playing around with my camera and self-portraits.

Playing around with my camera and self-portraits.

The view of the mountains around the Sadeh, which gave it such privacy.

Lake Miriam in the center of Isabella Freedman Jewish Retreat Center. It greeted me every morning when I walked out the of the forest where I slept in a tent.

Lake Miriam. So beautiful.

The dairy barn and goat pen.

Some of our ladies.

The girls lined up waiting to be milked.

A better view of the girls waiting to be milked. They loved it because they got grain and got rid of that heavy milk. They had their own order too.

Me and Poppy milking.

Me and Poppy milking.

Jonathan and me milking.

Me, Jonathan and Poppy milking.

Me and Poppy milking.

Another shot of the goats lined up, patiently waiting to be milked.

Goat face close up. So sweet.

Goats eating from the hay feeder.

Yentl and Lentil. Yentl is a teenage mother. They hadn't expected or planned for her to get pregnant. She is very protective of Lentil.

I think this is Sabina resting.

This is what I saw almost every day when I got up. This is Lake Miriam covered in mist. It was beautiful and such a wonderful way to start the day. After I walked out of forest, where I slept.

Misty Lake Miriam with geese.

Onions in the greenhouse curing. That means that they are allowed to dry out a bit. When onions and garlic are first harvested, they have a lot of water in them and would quickly spoil if they are let to dry out or cure.

More onions curing.

More onions curing.

Our tractor with a front loader, which is very handy.

Our greenhouse.

These are two boxes for our CSA. CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture and is a system where people buy a portion of the harvest for the session starts. They then get a weekly delivery of whatever was harvested. The great thing besides how fresh it is, is that you will get different veggies as the season changes.

The honeycomb must be uncapped before you can get the honey out.

A close-up of a honeycomb. So beautiful.

This is the box that has the racks of honeycomb.

Another shot of the racks of honeycomb.

You have to uncap the honeycomb. What the bees do, once they have filled a comb with honey, is they cap it with wax so that they can store the food for later.

A empty comb. The bees will clean it when it is placed back in the hive. Then it can be removed and stored for next year.

This is beeswax from the uncapped honeycomb.

This is the honey spinner. It uses centrifugal force to get the honey out of the comb.

Another shot of the honey spinner.

That is probably 2 gallons of raw honey. The stuff on top is bites of beeswax. It was delicious.