Going back in time...

Julian Even-hart a local historical researcher, metal detectorist, archaeologist and published author, is hopefully going to be able to tell us more about the history of the farm through a series of metal detection surveys. He’s already carried out a small survey of where the village dump used to be. “It was most interesting..I found fragments of Victorian glassware some from Wrights Lemonade who used to be at Walkern, a Ginger Beer bottle, a whetsone for sharpening shears and sickle blades, two corroded sickle blades, what is probably a Donkey shoe and then a 0.50 callibre bullet, a broken 0.50 shell case and then another complete case. This is fascinating as these bullets have two possibilities either from the 1943 crash at Bennington of a P47 Thunderbolt or from the 1944 B17 bomber that crashed down at Walkern.”

Farm News 25-06-10

Farm
• Wild Cherries are nearly ready. You can pick and try a few by wandering the new Woodland Walks and Picnic/Play area.
• Unfortunately, a 6-day old calf died this week. As well as the sadness of losing such a young one, we have to wait another year until Mum has another.
• Thistle wars are about to start, guided by the maxim - "Cut them in May and they will grow away, cut them in June and they will come again soon, cut them in July and they will die”
• Inspirational author Graham Harvey visited the farm this week.
• 10 Berkshire and 12 British lop piglets have been born in the Great Field.

Store, Café and Veg & Meat Boxes
• Have you heard about our weekly Farm boxes? Get your meat, veg, milk, eggs and bread all at once!
• Taste the Farm – try our meat tasters at the Store this weekend.
• It’s perfect BBQ weather - get your fresh BBQ cuts from the butcher in store.
• We’re now producing enough duck eggs to sell by the half dozen.
• This week’s salad will contain mixed lettuce leaves (including xanadu and roxy varities), pea tops, ruby chard, bean tops, and nasturtium petals.

Events, Workshops and Courses
• Are you interested in astronomy, photography or even both? If so, astronomical photographer, Nik Szymanek, will be coming to give a talk on the latest techniques used to photograph galaxies, the moon and sun at 7pm on Saturday 3rd July. Adults £6.50, Children £3.50.
• Due to popular demand, we will be running another herbal remedies course on Saturday 7th August. 10am-4pm. £20.
• Come along to our Campfire, Music and Sleep Under the Stars Weekend on 24th July. There will be jamming, campfires and camaraderie. No electric : No impact : Compost Loos : No litter. Just bring everything you need for your comfort and survival. Adults £10, Under 16s £8, Under 2s £2. Free for musicians and volunteers. Prebooking is essential.
• Our new summer events calendar will be out very soon. Look out for new workshops and courses on topics such as sausage-making, grow your own food and elderberry, as well as Church Farm favourites, such as beekeeping and spinning.
• As with all our events, pre-booking is essential.

Rural Care
• Rural Care has helped to collect goose and duck eggs and put them into incubators. The co-farmers are also helping in the incubating process so they should see them
hatching.
• They’ve been helping feed the chicks in the chick shed and have collected chicken eggs on a daily basis.
• In addition, the co-farmers have been sowing seeds for herbs to sell in store and building extra composting space to process all green/café waste.

Mother Goose Pre-School Visit

Sixty parents and children from Mother Goose Pre-School came on a school trip to Church Farm on 21st June. They went on tractor and trailer rides with the farmer, fed the animals and explored our new woodland walk/play area. They all had a smashing day!

“Can I say first of all how much we enjoyed our visit. What a wonderful day out! I found the tour around the farm really interesting. I think I was expecting some kind of tame, prettied-up tourist farm, but what you provided was so much better and more interesting than that. I would like to bring the rest of my family back soon.”

20,000 leeks!!!

The horticulture team have finally finished planting 20,000 leeks in our kitchen garden. Well done and a big thank you to everyone who helped out!!!

To be harvested next week…

The horticulture team will be harvesting courgettes, chard, beetroot, turnips, garlic, mange tout/climbing french beans, and broad beans.

Overconsumption is costing us the earth and human happiness

Have you seen the Story of Stuff by Annie Leonard on YouTube? A frank and cleverly animated short film telling the story of the American love affair with stuff and how it is quite literally trashing the planet. Three years on and it's a viral online phenomenon; seen by 10 million people in homes and classrooms all over the world. Now she has followed up the video with a book of the same name. Leonard has surprised many, though, by not actually being against stuff. She isn't even anti consumption. In fact, she feels lots of people should be consuming more. Just not most of us in the western world who often over-consume. Consumption can be good, she says. "I don't want to be callous to the people who really do need more stuff". But consumerism is always bad, adding little to our wellbeing as well as being disastrous for the planet. "[It's] a particular strand of overconsumption, where we purchase things, not to fulfil our basic needs, but to fill some voids about our lives and make social statements about ourselves," she explains. "It turns out our stuff isn't making us any happier," she argues. Our obsessive relationship with material things is actually jeopardising our relationships, as well as our communities. "Which are proven over and over to be the biggest determining factor in our happiness [once our basic needs are met].“

Find out: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jun/21/overconsumption-environment-relationships-annie-leonard

Farm News: 18-06-10

Farm
• Despite being knocked back somewhat by a break-in and the theft of batteries and meat the night before, Open Farm Sunday was a great success and we had over a hundred visitors to the farm.
• There is now a woodland walk and play area where people can picnic and children can explore.
• We’re trying to figure out how we can treat the 3000 posts on the farm over the summer!
• Sheep shearing was completed in amazing time. We now have plenty of fleeces in the shed and the ewes are looking trim.
• We’ve been topping thistles and chain harrowing pastures this past week.
• Two calves have been born. Both are doing well. Two pigs are also due to farrow anytime.

Store and Veg & Meat Boxes
• The butchery area in the store will be ready in less than a month. We’re counting down the days…
• Please note that any changes to box deliveries need to be emailed to meatandvegboxes@churchfarmardeley.co.uk before 4pm on a Tuesday for Friday’s delivery

Café
• Our new trial home-made ice cream flavour for this week is banana and chocolate.
• New on the menu is our savoury summer pudding.
• Coming soon: American-style breakfast pancakes. Yum!

Events, Workshops and Courses
• For June and July only – while the sheep are being shorn – we will only be charging £35 for a day of spinning tuition (including tea/coffee) and £5 for materials.
• Our three hour beekeeping courses, which cover why bees are kept in hives, the life cycle of the bee, essential beekeeping equipment, the risks involved and include the hands-on experience of opening up our bee hives will be taking place on 25th June (6pm-9pm), 17th July (2pm-5pm) and 7th August (2pm-5pm). £30.
• An additional knitting workshop has now been arranged for 10th July (10am-12pm). £10.
• Chicken keeping course dates have been extended to August and September. They will be running from 10.30am-3pm on 18th June, 30th July, 17th August and 11th September.
• Remember you can still help the farmer collect eggs everyday at 11am and 3pm. £4.95per child (free for accompanying adult). You’ll get to feed the chickens and take half a dozen eggs home with you!

A very merry 'unbirthday' to you

Florence celebrated her 6th birthday in style on Sunday by having a Mad Hatter’s Tea Party with all of her friends and family at Church Farm. There were lots of fun games including pin the grin on the Cheshire cat and an Alice in Wonderland photo mission in the woods. They even had a chance to feed the piggies! ☺ If you’d like more information about our birthday parties or group functions, please contact Faye on 01438 861 447 or faye@churchfarmardeley.co.uk.

Tesco is no champion to the poor

Sir Terry Leahy is retiring as head of Tesco after 14 years, "to spend more time with his private investments.“ He got the sort of press that'll make a nice decorative feature in his downstairs loo. He is one of the "10 people who have most helped the poor in recent decades," said the Tory blogger Tim Montgomerie in a Times piece, straplined 'champion of the poor'. "Every little he did helped us," said The Sun. "The outstanding businessman of the decade," said the Mail. Do these people get out at all? They could visit one of the towns in Britain, such as Inverness, where three in every £4 is spent in a Tesco store; take a walk down the high streets reduced to a pathetic straggle of charity shops and tanning parlours. Then Leahy's fans might begin to see why another part of the population - among them farmers, small business people and independent shop owners - don't think Sir Terry helped at all.

Full article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2010/jun/10/tesco-terry-leahy-supermarkets

A treat of a day for your Dad

Celebrate Father’s Day at Church Farm this Sunday. Dads can hop onto the tractor and trailer ride for FREE or walk the footpaths and feed the animals with all the family. Purchase BBQ or traditional cuts of meat from the store for your Father’s Day lunch or dinner. And, if you’re still looking for that perfect present, why not buy some of our unique Father’s Day sausages or Church Farm vouchers. Alternatively, take advantage of the special introductory price on our sausage-making taster sessions. The workshops – taking place in August and September - will involve a butchery demonstration by Pete, our new butcher, followed by a lesson in making your very own sausages. You’ll even get the chance to take home half a dozen. £50.

Mange tout, bacon and poached egg salad

Ingredients
A small handful of mange tout (topped and tailed)
A handful of salad leaves
2/3 rashers of smoked bacon
1 egg (hen or duck)
Tablespoon of Malt Vinegar
Salt and Pepper
Salad dressing (Optional)

Method
1. Put a pan of water (minimum of 4 inches deep) on to boil with salt and a tablespoon of malt vinegar. Bring to the boil. Turn the heat down so that it’s still boiling but bubbles are just breaking the surface (rolling boil).
2. Meanwhile, put a frying pan on heat and pick your leaves to required size. Fry the bacon in no oil and poach the egg for 3 – 3.5 minutes until soft.
4. Arrange the mixed leaves around the outer edge of the plate. Put the picked and washed mange tout in the middle of the plate. Remove your poached egg from the pan and dry off on a paper towel. Place the bacon on top of the mange tout and the egg on top of the bacon.
5. Optional: Dress the salad but not the mange tout. Add a slight sprinkling of cracked pepper and salt just prior to serving.

New ways to work conference

• Rural Care co-farmers and joint degree student nurse/social worker, Emma Lesurf, ran a stall at the ‘New ways to work conference’ on 11th June in Hatfield. The conference focussed on progression routes into employment for young people aged between 16 and 25 with learning disabilities. Katy, one of the co-farmers said: ’We had a great day and sold eggs we had collected earlier that week’.
• Three of our co-farmers finished their college course for the year this week and were awarded with certificates and presents while having a picnic in the woods.

Hyssop and Herbal Remedies Course

Hyssop has been noted for centuries in herbal medicine. The ancient use of this plant was an insecticide, insect repellent and pediculicide. The plant has been used in herbal medicine for the treatment of sore throats, colds, hoarseness and as an expectorant. Some herbalists also believe that hyssop has beneficial effects for asthma, urinary tract inflammation and appetite stimulation. Its effectiveness in relieving gas and colic are also listed under its medicinal uses. What’s more, recent studies suggest that hyssop may be useful in healing AIDS patients.
http://www.drugs.com/npp/hyssop.html

It’s Herbal Remedies Week from 19th – 26th June. So, if you’d like to learn how to make a range of simple herbal remedies and beauty products using plants from the local environment, sign up to our herbal remedies workshop on 7th August from 10am – 2pm. The 4 hour session will cover choosing plants, harvesting and drying herbs, infusions, decoctions, tinctures and syrups, hot and cold infused oils and how to make creams, ointment and body butters. £20

Farm News: 11-06-10

Farm
• Another Red Poll calf was born this week. The chicks have been moved to growers’ wood and the cattle are rotating pastures.
• It seems our climate is more extreme these days. In the past few years, there have been alternating droughts and floods. Did you know that statistically we get more rain in the summer than in the winter?
• We have been battling red mite in a few chicken sheds this week – the solution is diatomaceous earth. This consists of fossilized remains of diatoms, a type of hard shelled algae. The chickens are dusted with this, and it’s put in the sheds to act as a mechanical insecticide. Harmless to people and chickens, the abrasive fossil cuts the insect cuticle, thereby killing them.
• Please leave gates as you find them. We spent a stressful 4 hours chasing cattle around the farm on Wednesday because someone had left one of the gates open! Store and Veg & Meat Boxes
• Church Farm mange tout and strawberries are selling well in the store.
• The butcher is now able to take meat orders and answer any questions on the preparation or cooking of different cuts of meat.

Store and Veg & Meat Boxes
• Church Farm mange tout and strawberries are selling well in the store.
• The butcher is now able to take meat orders and answer any questions on the preparation or cooking of different cuts of meat.

Café
• Try out our new home-made ice cream flavours: apricot and almond, banana, blackberry and kiwi.
• All of the flowers in our salads are edible!
• Tip: To stop asparagus going limp, cut half a centimetre off the base and place in cold water in the fridge.

Events, Workshops and Courses
• Our Campfire, Music and Sleep Under the Stars Weekend went down a storm! Why don’t you book into one of our other weekends in July or September?
• A big thanks to volunteers from DuPont who came to help us transplant 4,000 leeks last Friday!
• Did you make it to Open Farm Sunday???

Church Farm Broccoli and Stilton Quiche

Ingredients
250g short pastry
6 eggs
200ml cream
1 onion
1 head of broccoli (cut into small florets)
100g stilton
Salt and pepper

Method
1. Roll out the pastry. Line in a 7inch pastry ring. Prick the base
and blind bake using baking beans or a suitable alternative e.g.
dried peas. Blind bake for 12mins at 220°C. Remove baking
beans and then bake for a further 3mins. Remove from the oven.
2. Blanch florets until al dente. Cool and place in a bowl.
3. Sauté the onion on a low heat until translucent and add to the
broccoli.
4. Whisk the eggs, cream and seasoning together, then sieve.
Combine with the broccoli and onion and add to pastry base.
5. Roughly crumble the stilton on top of the quiche.
6. Bake at 150°C for 40-50mins until firm to touch.

Vinvolved

Vinvolved North Herts brought 9 young people to the farm this week to learn more about our volunteering opportunities. As well as a tour of the farm, they collected eggs from the orchard, boxed eggs for the shop and helped feed the pigs. The youngsters were completing a five week programme, organised by Vinvolved, for young people with moderate learning difficulties and disabilities. This course aims to help increase their self confidence and self esteem, and prepare them for volunteering and the world of work.

What happens to the wool?

At Church Farm, we believe that it is important to preserve and promote traditional crafts such as spinning and weaving, so as long as the weather proves fine on Open Farm Sunday, we will be shearing our sheep and providing a demonstration on how to spin using Church Farm fleece.

*SPINNING PROMOTION*
Remember you can also sign up to one of our Spin in a Day courses. For June and July only – while the sheep are being shorn – we will only be charging £35 for a day of tuition (including tea/coffee) and £5 for materials. Give us a ring to find out more. Susan Dye and Brian Bond from the Guild of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers also visited the farm last weekend to run a workshop on peg-loom weaving. It was a thoroughly enjoyable experience for everyone involved. Look out for more peg-loom weaving workshops in the near future.

Sheep shearing and wool production

Sheep shearing and wool production has been an important part of the UK's sheep industry over the last six thousand years. The earliest sheep had pigmented coats and moulted allowing farmers to collect the fallen wool but as time went on breeds developed with improved wool characteristics. By the middle ages wool was the UK's most important output, being exported throughout Europe. Later, as exports declined, production was used domestically in the fast growing cloth industries where technological advance fuelled the industrial revolution and the move from an agrarian to urban society. Today the UK remains an important producer (7th largest in the world) exporting around one third of the annual 60,000 tonne clip. However, with wool prices at about 50 pence per kilogram the value of the raw wool that is exported is little more than £10 million and for most farmers the value of the wool does not cover the cost of shearing.

“A traditional method known as blanching…”

Waitrose has become the first UK retailer to begin selling Lasting Leaf - a new brand of bagged lettuce which is guaranteed to stay fresh for two days longer than standard bags of salad once opened. The new product has been designed to help reduce food waste and has come after several year’s research by supplier Natures Way Food (NWF). The secret behind Lasting Leaf’s extended shelf life is a traditional method known as ‘blanching’ which is used by chefs around the world to wash and refresh iceberg lettuce and other hardy leaves. According to NWF, washing hardy leaves in warm and then cold water immediately after being cut helps delay the pinking process that occurs when oxygen comes into contact with the cut surfaces of pre-packed leaves ( i.e. as soon as a bag of lettuce is opened), thus enabling the leaves to stay fresher for longer.

Farm News: 4 June 2010

Farm
• Two new bull calves and a heifer calf were born within hours of each other on Tuesday.
• Two bumper litters of 12 piglets have been born in the Great Field. All of the pigs have settled into their new field and are enjoying the new rooting and grazing.
• 350 Norfolk Black and 50 "roly poly" day-old chicks arrived on Wednesday and are viewable in the stable. The 100 guinea fowl are also doing well in the chick shed and we’ve moved some ducklings into the orchard in the middle of the village.
• Perfect weather for grass growing this week – it was sorely needed!

Store and Veg & Meat Boxes
• We have a new butcher in store – watch this space!!!
• Browse our selection of BBQ meat, marinades, ice creams and lollies.
• Buy sustainable charcoal ready for your summer BBQs.

Café
• Look out for our refreshing summer dishes including salads, Church Farm strawberries and cream, and homemade ice creams.
• Our mange tout salads with bacon and soft poached egg have definitely gone down a treat this week!
• Did you know that child portions were now available?

Events, Workshops and Courses
• Help the farmer collect eggs everyday at 11am and 3pm. Children £4.50 (must be accompanied by an adult). You’ll get to take home half a dozen of your own freshly collected free range eggs – how great does that sound!!!
• Come along to our Campfire, Music and Sleep Under the Stars Weekend on Saturday and Sunday (5th and 6th June). Relax in Handy Corner, camp or sleep under the stars. There will be jamming, campfires and camaraderie. No electric : No impact : Compost Loos : No litter. Adults £10, Under 16s £8, Under 2s £2.
• Remember, you can camp in the wild or hire one of our log cabins at anytime. Pre booking is essential.
• Did you know that we provide the perfect place for birthday parties, weddings, educational visits, Corporate sustainability events and meetings and much more?

Recipe of the Week: Church Farm Scones

Now you know our secret ingredients!

Ingredients
700g self raising flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
160g butter
6 dessert spoons caster sugar
Pinch of salt
350ml milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Optional: 80g sultanas

Method
1. Sift flour and baking powder together. Add salt.
2. Rub in the butter until it looks like bread crumbs.
3. Warm the milk and vanilla extract.
4. Add sugar to the flour mix and combine. Optional: Add
sultanas.
5. Add the milk and mix with a blunt knife.
6. Pat the dough so that it’s roughly 11/2 inches deep. Then cut
out with a plain cutter. Place on a warm baking tray 2inches
apart.
7. Bake for 9 minutes at 200°C until the base is golden brown.
8. Serve with clotted cream, butter and jam.

Hints and Tips
Before putting the scones in the oven, brush with egg wash or milk for added colour. If you want taller scones, use a plain cutter. A warmer tray and milk also starts the raising process quicker!

Jeremy and Phil having fun in the store and kitchen

A couple of our co-farmers help out in the store on Fridays. They serve customers, price up goods and clean. They absolutely love it. Here’s Jeremy having fun with the
pricing machine.

Phil is also back in the kitchen again and this time he’s helped bake a cake!

Be Prepared for your Big Butterfly Count

Here’s a Speckled Wood Butterfly spotted at Church Farm last week. Did you know that seven out of ten species of British butterfly are declining and half are threatened with extinction? Launching a campaign to save one of Britain's best loved insects, Sir David Attenborough warned that five species of butterfly have become extinct in the last 100 years, while more than 60 species of moth have vanished from the UK. The wildlife presenter called for farmers to tackle the crisis by encouraging more wild flowers and cutting the use of pesticides. And he urged people to take part in Butterfly Conservation's the Big Butterfly Count, which is the largest ever survey of the creatures. From 24 July to 1 August, people will be asked to look for butterflies in gardens and fields and record the species they find on a website.

Be prepared for your Big Butterfly Count
Identify the different species that can be found during high summer on a walk-and-talk with butterfly expert Andrew Wood at 10am on 10th July. Adults £6.50, Children £3.50. Or join moth expert, Colin Plant, to learn about these widely misunderstood nocturnal creatures at 10pm on 30th July. Adults £6.50, Children £3.50.

References:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1283275/Demise-butterfly-DavidAttenboroughleads-
fight-avert-extinction.html#ixzz0pgT8NWkS
http://www.bigbutterflycount.org/

The role of Rural communities and UK agriculture

Rural communities and UK agriculture must play a vital role in achieving a more sustainable society and economy…More than 400 shops went out of business last year alone, and with them not only post offices, newspapers, food and drink, but also social spaces, places to bump into friends and share news with neighbours. Once at the heart of many rural communities, the double-bypass surgery being carried out by the recession and a ubiquity of superstores has seen pulses slow, and eventually stop. 'Local shops are there not just for people to buy things but to be sociable, to say hello to people,' says Kate Westlake of St Germans in Cornwall, chair of a local committee that is in the process of setting up a community-owned shop. 'Without them, places like this would die.’ At Church Farm, we see a current and future opportunity for rural areas to rediscover their identity and purpose, and to tackle long-standing issues. These include: economic decline, social isolation, poor services and facilities, the cost of living, the lack of affordable housing, threatened wildlife, an ageing population and the numerous difficulties facing UK farmers, trying to produce safe sustainable food.

http://www.theecologist.org/how_to_make_a_difference/culture_change/496546/savin
g_and_rebuilding_community_shops.html