There is an old saying, well maybe not a saying, but it’s an older line from, “Time Marches On”, a country song by Tracy Lawerance: “The only thing that stays the same is, everything changes”. Over the years, we here at Levesque’s Organic Farm have found that to be very true! The seasons change, the years change, the crops we grow change, families grow, how the farm looks now isn’t how it looked five years ago, and by the end of the year even more things will be different than they were at the time of this article being written. With all this change, it's sometimes easy to forget that you, our valued customers, may be left out of the loop on what's going on and what to expect when we open our doors for the start of our twenty sixth season of business later this month. It is true that we post updates on some of our projects on Facebook, but we also understand that some people like to avoid social media, so we wanted to take the opportunity to catch you up on all the new and exciting things that are going on around the farm so far this year!
The biggest news by far, in our opinions, is that the farm stand is getting a facelift! After years of talking about expanding the sales space we have decided to pull the trigger. We started last fall by expanding our parking lot and moving our roadside sign. We also got to work removing the old walk-in cooler and sinks from behind the building to make room for the expansion. Over the winter, the project was put on the back burner, as we had a new greenhouse to put up, but more on that later. Once the snow left us and we were sure of some warmer weather, we constructed forms and had a cement pad poured behind the existing building. After a couple days of curing time for the cement, we began construction on the floor, using wood sawed out at our own sawmill from trees harvested off of the farm's land. The new floor connects to the back of the farm stands existing floor, and when you walk on the new section, you may notice that some of the boards are up to 16 inches wide. Paul actually had these wide boards sawed out almost 20 years ago from trees he had harvested from the farm. Over the years, every time a project came up in which we would have use for these boards, everyone would agree that they were “too nice to use on this” and so the boards would wait. We all knew they had a special calling, and that calling was to be the base of our new sales floor!
Speaking of lumber with a history, if you think of it the next time you visit us, take a look up into the roof rafters and you may spot some old 2x4 beams holding up the roofing. These rafters are actually 21 foot long 2x4s that we salvaged from the old Silo in Josh and Julia’s barn. The old sturdy silo was not being used, and we had no plans to use it in the future, so instead of letting the beautiful lumber be claimed by time, we decided to repurpose it. Paul, Pete, and Josh deconstructed the silo one piece at a time and were able to salvage enough usable 2x4s to make up almost all of the new roof rafters!
Since we are talking about the farm stand, we thought you would like to know, we will have some new offerings available this season! If you happen to enjoy our canned goods, you may want to keep your eyes open for our new “Cowboy Candy” which is pickled Jalapenos! We have also added in a “Spicy” pickled egg which everyone agrees has an amazing tangy kick. We also added a unique “Burger Topper” which is composed of onions, peppers, and garlic, pickled in a sweet brine. It goes wonderfully on burgers (as the name implies) but it also goes great with steaks, hotdogs, sausages, and more!
As promised earlier, let’s talk about our other major construction projects this past offseason. We broke ground on our newest greenhouse back in October. This may sound late, but thankfully the weather was good last fall right into December. The ground posts were driven and leveled in the first few days, and the metal “hoops” were standing and secured by the end of the first week. Unfortunately, we had other things that needed our attention, so we weren’t able to focus on just the greenhouse project, but we picked away at it a little at a time and by the end of the year, we had the front and back walls studded in, and by the end of the first week of January we had done as much as we could; we were at a standstill until better weather arrived in the spring. We decided to try a new material for the front and back walls on this greenhouse. Instead of a wood siding, we used a clear polycarbonate that will allow sunlight and heat through, hopefully increasing the amount of light the plants are able to absorb. Jump ahead to the middle of March and the new polycarbonate siding was up, vents and fans were installed and what was left was to put on the two layers of plastic and do the electrical wiring. We managed to wrap up everything in this greenhouse by the end of March. Just in time to get the soil ready for the first planting of Tomatoes that went in just 2 weeks after the last of the construction was done on the greenhouse!
During this time we also replaced the plastic, hipboards, baseboards, and trim on our “02” house. We deconstructed the walls of our seedling house, replacing the walls with more of the polycarbonate that we used on our newest greenhouse. As well as changing the plastic and trim on our seedling house and installing an inflator to blow air between the two layers of plastic on the house, this creates a layer of air insulation which should make it more energy efficient and more cozy for the seedlings on any cold nights!
Taking a step away from the farmstand and other construction projects, there are other changes going on as well! There are new faces on the farm this year. Josh and Julia welcomed their third daughter, Samantha Elliot Levesque, to the family this past April. On Mother’s Day, one of our Belted Galloways named, Snuggles gave birth to a healthy heifer calf that Nathaniel, Paul and Sue’s grandson, lovingly named, Snugglebump. We also are in the process of raising a dozen ducklings that have managed to bring much laughter to everyone on the farm! One of our older ducks named Maggie is also currently sitting on a clutch of eggs and we are in hopes of her hatching out a small flock of ducklings of her own.
We hope that this brief glimpse into the new and exciting changes going on at the farm helps bring you up to date. You can always check us out on Facebook to stay more up to date with what's going on at the farm. As it was mentioned earlier, we plan to open the farm stand for our 26th season of business later this month. Stay well, and we look forward to seeing you all soon!
Farm Updates
We have filled all our available openings in our Senior Farm Share program for this season. If you would like to be added to the waiting list, please call us at (207) 524-5535
All our open work positions have been filled. We thank everyone who showed interest in joining our team.
We have several varieties of product in the ground and growing happily!
We will be opening later this month.
We hope to be welcoming some new calves this month, keep an eye on Facebook for updates on this, and much more!
Verses
How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? Romans 10:14
For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. 2 Corinthians 4:17
I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth. Job 19:25
Rhubarb Bars
Ingredients
Crust
· 1 cup all-purpose flour
· ½ cup sugar
· ½ cup room temperature butter
Filling
· 2 large eggs
· 1 cup sugar
· ¼ cup flour
· ¼ tsp. salt
· 2 cups diced rhubarb
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350F. Line the bottom of an 8x8" pan with parchment bringing it up the sides so that it will be easy to remove the squares after. Whirl the crust ingredients in a food processor and then press into the prepared pan. Bake for 15 min., crust will still remain very pale in color.
While crust is baking mix together eggs, sugar, flour and salt and whisk well. Stir in rhubarb. Pour onto the hot crust and continue to bake for 40-45min.
Let the bars cool and remove with the parchment paper. Cut into squares.