(upbeat music)
- Hi there, welcome to the farm.
I tell you what,
my body's been really feeling all this
farm work I've been doing lately and I imagine my neighbors
have been feeling their farm work, too.
So I've invited a friend down to teach them
about farmer's yoga.
In exchange, I'm gonna make a delicious brunch.
For the ingredients, we're gonna head out to Amanda's Eggs
in Tilden, Wisconsin to gather some eggs
and then it's off for some dill Aquavit.
Gather with us Around the Farm Table.
I'm your host, Inga Witscher.
Good morning girls.
I'm Inga and I love everything about farming.
(upbeat music)
Midwestern farms are a bounty of good food
made by good people.
I love being able to travel to search out good ingredients.
Cooking is all about what's seasonal, what's fresh.
Everyday can be filled with good food,
good friends and a beautiful herd of cows.
Welcome to the farm.
Good girl.
- [Announcer] Around the Farm Table
is funded in part by
Kwik Trip,
big on fresh and proud to support
Wisconsin's farmers,
Wisconsin Farmers Union,
united to grow family agriculture,
American Provenance,
Heartland Credit Union,
and Friends of Wisconsin Public Television.
(upbeat music)
- Oh, Tracy, thank you so much for coming
to the farm today.
- Thanks for having me, Inga.
- I wanted to have you down
'cause I have some farmers who are interested
in doing some yoga and they're a little hesitant.
But I thought if I found a farmer who was
also a yoga instructor,
it might make them a little bit more
comfortable to do it.
- Great idea. I think so.
- Tell me a little bit about your farm.
- Our farm, my boyfriend and I
have the Lazy I Ranch in Clayton, Wisconsin
and we have a herd of Scottish Highland cows.
They're all grass fed.
- Oh, well that's the breed to do it with.
- It is.
- They're beautiful cows, too.
- They are and they do really well on grass
and they do really well in this climate.
- So as I'm trying to explain to my neighbors,
the benefits of yoga to them,
you know, I'm trying to say it'll help our bodies,
we're gonna feel better,
but explain in your own words why farmers
should be doing more yoga.
- Well, as farmers we're very active,
as you know, and a lot of the movements
that we do are repetitive and strenuous.
So we can injure ourselves.
We can use yoga to create a balance
and bring balance back to the things
that we do everyday and prevent injuries.
- I know for me when I'm picking up
a hay bale or picking up that bucket of milk,
I'm just doing it from one side
and it's just, it's taking its toll.
Like time after time.
And I'm not getting any younger
and so now I feel it a lot more.
- Definitely, definitely.
- That's something that yoga can do is help balance that out?
- Sure, we do all of the poses on both sides
and so that retrains the muscles and the nervous system
to bring balance back into the body.
- You can be any age to do yoga, right? - Oh...
- You can do it for your entire life span, right?
- There is no age limit on yoga.
I have a little six-year-old girl
that comes to my classes and I have a man in his 70s.
- I love that.
One of the things that I think is unique
about what you do at your farm is you offer
these Sunday yoga classes to the farmers
and the people in the rural areas.
And that is really important.
I love it that you're doing that.
For me to go to a yoga class,
I have to drive 45 minutes
and the classes are usually offered
at those times when I'm milking cows or doing something else on the farm.
And so having that person in the rural Wisconsin
that can get those classes,
that's just really a wonderful thing.
- Thanks, it's a wonderful group of people
and we really enjoy having class together.
- Tell me about some of your different farmer yogis.
What kind of span do you do?
- Oh boy, we have a pig farmer and a chicken farmer
and a sheep farmer and an herbalist
and a tattoo artist, and non-farmers.
We have a machinist, ex-military.
We have a business woman.
We have anyone and everyone comes to yoga.
- I'm hoping to get up to your place
sometime for yoga but in the meantime,
I'm gonna go out and pick up some ingredients
'cause I plan on making a delicious brunch for you guys.
So why don't you explore my farm and then I'll meet you
in the hayloft for a little farmer's yoga.
- Sounds great. - Well why don't we go pick up the ingredients
for our strata and our beet cocktail.
(upbeat music)
I've made it up to Deer Lake Gardens
in St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin.
I'm here in the dill fields to meet with Mike
and find out how he turns this dill
into some amazing Aquavit.
Let's go say hi.
Hey Mike. - Hello Inga. - Nice to see you.
- Great to see you. Thanks for coming out to the farm.
- Yeah, you're just harvesting some dill for the Aquavit today?
- We are, we are.
We came up to do a little inspection
and take a plant or two home to see how it looks at home.
- Good, well my family has been drinking
Aquavit for generations and generations.
It's one of my favorite spirits.
But a lot of people aren't as aware, maybe,
of Aquavit and what it is.
Explain a little bit about what Aquavit is, please?
- Sure, it's the number one question I get when I do events.
People will come up and they'll just be like what is Aquavit?
And my generic answer is, from the research I've done,
is that it's the water of life.
Aquavit means the water of life.
Eau de vie in France means the water of life.
"Whiskey" in Celtic is slang for the water of life.
And it goes back to those Middle Ages
when water out of streams and rivers
was not necessarily drinkable.
You would have to ferment it into a beer
or a wine or distill it into a spirit
or at least distilled water in order to make it drinkable.
- The good old days, as I call it.
- The good old days, yeah, roughing it. (laughing)
They would use what they had available around them,
the great grains of Scotland and Ireland.
The great fruits of France.
And in Scandinavia they like to forage
and so they would forage for different plants
and roots and berries and bog flowers
and they would introduce those flavors
into their high spirits to add some,
some complexity, some interest to their high spirits.
- Yeah, Aquavit is a very,
herbal or floral.
It's just so different than anything else I've ever tasted.
- Yeah, they, they like their savory flavors
over in Scandinavia.
Common flavors are caraway, dill, coriander,
angelica, and on and on and on.
Every valley would have its own version of Aquavit
and there are hundreds of different recipes
over in the Old Country.
Somehow it disconnected, though,
when people emigrated to America.
They either just kept it in their own family
and didn't, didn't bother getting it out
into the mainstream bars and restaurants
or you know, just that the conditions
weren't favorable for introducing Aquavit
into the drinking public of America.
And so that's what generated the idea
of coming into a small distillery in our community,
45th Parallel,
and seeing if we can make our own version of Aquavit.
- Awesome. And community really is important to you
because you're, you have a whole team
of local people helping.
You've got farmers growing the dill for you.
You're using a local distillery.
I love these stories of collaboration
between farmers and distillers and folks
who wanna bring something new to the market.
- Certainly, I couldn't do this without them.
I've never felt more a part of the community
as I have since I started this venture.
I've done office jobs and when you're in an office
you pretty much, you know, have a limited
reach in your community, you know,
unless you do volunteer stuff or something
outside of the office.
But when you do a venture like this
you definitely have to touch the rest of the community
and it's all segments of the community.
People who do designs for your labels,
the people who print your labels.
The 45th Parallel who does the distilling for us.
What I really enjoy most about the business
is getting out on the farm,
seeing the farmers, talking to the farmers.
- How important is it to get that local dill
or those local ingredients?
- Well we felt it was critical.
When we were first doing our test batches,
it took us over a year to get it right.
And the first test batches we were doing
in 2011 were done in the summer
and they were small scaled and so we would
just get dill from the local co-op and do those
small batches that way.
And we got the recipe where we wanted it
and we felt kind of comfortable on a small scale
and so then when we ramped up, it was in December.
We went to the co-op, made the arrangements to bring in dill,
but of course, the growing season was done here.
So we had to get wherever they would get the product from
and that tended to be like Southern California
or Mexico, even.
So we brought the dill in.
And it took a couple days for it to be shipped in and
we put it into our infusion
and we, we started doing the distillation
a week later and when we did the distillation
the room smelled amazing and when we blended it down,
you know, after it came off the still,
it smelled great and we thought wow,
I think we got it, and then when we tasted it,
it didn't taste like dill.
We went back to the drawing board
and we tried to figure out well, what was missing there?
And the conclusion that I reached was
that we needed to get a local plant,
locally harvested, take it straight from the field
right to the infusion tank as quickly as possible
so that those essential oils that provide the flavor
would be available and not be drifted away
in some truck somewhere.
- That's why I'm always encouraging people to eat locally and seasonally
because the flavor, it's completely different
than having it shipped in from across the country.
When you're doing that it really does lose the flavor
so when you're eating from that season or from that farm
you really, it's a better experience, I think.
- Exactly. Fresh fish instead of one that's been
sitting in the freezer for a week or a month or whatever.
- Aquavit is becoming,
it seems like it's becoming more and more popular.
Maybe it's, I just pay attention to it so much.
But it seems like you'll go to a farm-to-table
restaurant and there's a Aquavit cocktail on the menu
or you open up a food magazine
and there's a story about Aquavit.
I'm loving this because it really is one of my favorite spirits.
- I'm the same way.
I enjoyed the spirit and when I came back
from Scandinavia and looked for dill Aquavit,
I couldn't find it then and that's what eventually led to,
with small distilling now being available to make it our own.
Once it's available and you introduce it
to a restaurant of that quality
or a bartender who wants to do something exciting.
- Is excited about it, yeah.
- They will find amazing ways to introduce it
into a cocktail or into a dinner.
- So what part of the dill do you use?
Are you just using the heads or what?
- Well we use it all. - Really?
- We'll take it right down near the root
with our trusty high-tech tool. And, uh--
- I guess that makes sense. There's flavor in the whole thing.
- Exactly, exactly. And why waste it?
- Why waste it, yeah.
- So, we'll just take it down near the ground.
We'll fold it up just to make it more convenient.
And we'll store it in these cloth bags.
- That's just like a giant tea bag.
- Exactly. And we'll take it to the distillery
that same day that we do the harvest
and we'll get it right into the infusion
so we can lock in as much of that
essential oil and essential flavor as possible.
- Oh, that's exciting.
Well, I'm excited to introduce my friends
to an Aquavit today with a little beet Aquavit cocktail
and so I'm gonna get a bottle on the way home
but thank you for showing me the fields
and hopefully next year I can come back and help you harvest.
- Oh please. It was fun. Thanks so much for coming out to the farm.
(upbeat music)
- Hello Amanda! - Hi, Inga.
- It's nice to meet you. I've been seeing your eggs in the store
for quite a while now and I wanted to stop in
and just see a little bit about your operation here.
One thing I was reading on your website is
you started with a few chickens
and now you've really grown your business.
Can you tell me a little bit about
how you got started and why you wanted to do this?
- Yes, well when I was a young girl,
my Grandma Ellen, she always had a new batch of chickens
around every year and so I have a love for chickens
and when I got started in 2009 with 36 hens,
I was the mom of two
and now the mom of four,
but I wanted something that I could do and still
be here for my kids and raise my kids.
And also something that they could help with.
- That's wonderful. I think helping your parents on the farm
is something that I grew up doing
and I think it's important to pass that on to your kids
and give them that experience, you know.
Just allow them to have an experience of learning
how to work and being a part of the farm.
Is that something that's important to you, too?
- Yes. Yes, very much so.
It's great. It teaches my kids responsibility.
And even though it's hard to get them out here sometimes.
But also teaching them where their food comes from
and how to produce good food
and having those themes of stewardship of the land
and respect for the animals. - I love that.
- That's all really important for me to teach my children.
- I know that pasturing is a huge part of what you do here.
Tell me a little bit about why you wanna pasture
your chickens and how you do that.
- Okay, well pasturing is important
because it gives the eggs richer flavor,
darker yolks and better nutrition.
And also it's healthier for the hens.
And it also eliminates some labor of cleaning pens.
- That was my least favorite job as a kid.
- Yes, only during the spring and summer months, maybe.
[laughter] If the weather was nicer year round
we wouldn't have to clean pens at all
but yeah, it's healthier.
It keeps the hens healthier, too.
- Isn't it neat, too, to see how much
the chickens, they really eat grass.
Like, I have this little coop-- not as big as yours--
that I just pull around, my five little chickens.
And you can just see them mowing the lawn.
It's just amazing to just see that grass
is really a part of their diet when they're outside
and of course, all the bugs and everything, too.
- Yes, well it's important to understand
that chickens are really omnivores.
So plants, grains and bugs are all
really good things for them to eat in their diet.
- When you think about purchasing chickens,
what were you thinking about as far as breed?
What was important to you?
- Well what was important is the chicken
who would lay a lot of eggs a year.
As the income from them is based on selling eggs.
So a brown or red hybrid layer such as this
will lay an average of 300 days a year
compared to some heritage breeds that
are only 150 to 170 days a year.
- Oh wow, that's a lot of eggs.
- So almost twice as many eggs out of a brown hybrid hen.
- And you also do meat birds, too.
- Yes, I do about 2,000 jumbo broiler crosses each year.
I have a couple restaurants that I supply.
And also individuals that I supply poultry to.
- It's exciting to see the local food movement,
especially in our area, growing with these
different restaurants and more co-ops and things
so that folks like us have that outlet
to be able to sell to people who are
interested in getting good, healthy foods.
- Yes, the local food market has really grown
in the last five to seven years.
And has given me the opportunity
to have a market to do this.
- And so you, where do you sell it? Just at co-ops?
- Local meat shops.
I have a couple of local, small grocery stores.
Local food co-ops and also several restaurants.
- Can I come here and pick them up if I'm in the area?
- Yes, I also sell eggs out of the driveway.
I have a self-serve system set up... - I love that.
- Where you can take as many eggs as you need and leave payment
in a coffee can on top of the fridge that's in the coop.
- Well I'm gonna go put a payment in and pick up
a dozen eggs for my brunch that I'm doing today. - Okay, sounds great.
- I'll let you get back to work.
Why don't you guys join me in the kitchen and we'll cook up a delicious brunch?
(upbeat music)
A few weeks ago I got invited to
the Muscoda Morel Mushroom Festival
down in Muscoda, Wisconsin.
It was a great festival.
It was fun to see all the people and to taste
all the wonderful mushrooms but my highlight
was I got invited to a little luncheon
with several of the ladies who had
put together this event and the food was amazing.
I had rhubarb cocktails, one of the best rhubarb desserts
I've ever had in my life.
And the main star of the, of the brunch,
was a strata that Vicki from Meister Cheese had made.
And she used a lot of her cheese
from their creamery and some morels.
It was delicious so I wanna try to recreate that here
today for my yoga guests.
The first thing I did is I started
browning some pork, it's just some sausage.
And this is right from, right from our farm here.
And now to this I'm gonna add some leeks.
So I think probably two leeks is enough.
Just the white parts only.
Then you can discard the leaves here.
And add those right to the sausage in the pan.
All right, give those leeks a nice stir around
and then we're gonna add some mushrooms.
Unfortunately I don't have morel mushrooms.
So I'm gonna use a cremini.
And I'm gonna take the...
stems off here.
And then just give them a slice.
And that looks like enough mushrooms.
And those are gonna go right in with the leeks
and the sausage.
And give those mushrooms a nice stir
and let them cook down for a little while.
Now I'm gonna season this meat mixture
with a little bit of salt and pepper.
Get that going on in there.
Little salt.
And some chili flakes 'cause I like a little bit of heat.
Yum.
A lot of chili flakes, actually. And then some fennel seed.
I thought the fennel would go good with the pork
so that's why I'm adding it, and I had it available.
You can season however you wish.
I love living on a farm because I love knowing
that I've got pork in the freezer,
I've got some beef down in the freezer.
I'm sad that I don't have chickens laying eggs anymore
but hopefully they'll start laying soon.
It's just nice.
It's nice to be able to,
to feed myself and my husband and guests
that we have over, right here from the farm.
It's very satisfying for me.
But I love, also, that I live in a great state
like Wisconsin where if I'm not growing it,
I know someone nearby is.
And they're growing it the best ways that they can.
When you add your spices you can let it cook
for another two, three minutes or so
and that allows the flavors to come out
of the spices and marry with the other ingredients.
Now, like I said, a strata's basically just
bread, cheese and eggs
with a little something else mixed in
And what I did with this bread, it's just a loaf of bread,
like a country loaf of bread,
and I tore it up last night and left it out
just on the counter so it can dry out.
'Cause once that bread is dried out
then it can soak up all the flavors
of the pork mixture and the eggs and the milk
and really get in there to make a lovely little breakfast casserole.
So you wanna put four cups of dried-out bread.
And you can always just toast your bread
in the oven for a little bit if you need to if you wanna do it that day.
But I like that process of drying it out overnight.
So let's see, I'm gonna eyeball about four cups here.
And I have a buttered dish that's already been buttered
and I'm gonna just add
a few more to cover the bottom of my dish.
And now I'm gonna do two cups of milk.
This is my great- grandfather's milk bottles.
He had a milk hauling company back in the old days.
And I'm glad that I can carry on the dairy tradition in our family.
So, and it's a half a cup of eggs,
which is about eight eggs.
And you can eyeball it here.
It's lovely being able to live in Wisconsin
where there's someone nearby growing quality eggs.
Now you can just whip those eggs right into the milk.
I probably should have whipped the eggs separately.
Now that I think about it, it probably would have been easier, then add them to the milk,
but who doesn't like a little bit of a challenge in the kitchen, right?
Now I'm just gonna season the eggs
with a little salt and pepper.
Mix that right on in.
And then I love dill and eggs.
I think they're a nice little friendship together
and they taste lovely.
So I'm just gonna chop up, oh, I don't know,
two tablespoons of dill.
Fresh dill.
I like to use fresh herbs as much as possible.
All right, and right into the eggs they go.
Give those a swirl.
And now we're ready to assemble everything.
So now I've got my pan with all the
dried breadcrumbs on the bottom.
And let's see how much filling I'm gonna be
able to fit in here.
I hope that I grabbed a big enough casserole dish.
We're gonna find out.
Just spoon your mixture right over your bread.
Make sure to spread your mixture out evenly
so that it goes all throughout the casserole.
The next step is adding the cheese.
I chose an Emmentaler-style cheese, a Swiss cheese.
I like the flavor of that with the mushrooms
and also the pork.
But you can use an aged cheddar would be nice, also.
Or a mixture of cheese.
Say some Parmesan and some cheddar
or even mozzarella would be fantastic.
I love these kind of recipes where you get
to use your imagination and whatever you have on hand.
That's my favorite way to cook.
And now just pour your egg mixture right over the top.
And this is gonna make it like nice custardy texture.
And that, folks, is how you make a strata.
I'm gonna pop this in the oven, get cleaned up and then
we'll make a little cocktail for the yogis.
(upbeat music)
I wanted to keep these guys limber
after their yoga exercise today
with a little cocktail but don't worry,
it has a little bit of health benefits to it
with some beets.
I hear beet's good for the liver so maybe it'll
counteract the Aquavit that we're gonna put in here.
But this is a nice Scandinavian cocktail
so let's get started with three quarters cup
of beet juice and I just put some beets through my juicer.
Look at that beautiful color. I'm gonna eyeball this.
The next ingredient is ginger beer.
Three quarters of a cup goes right in there.
And then a few little tablespoons of simple syrup.
And simple syrup is easy to make.
It's just about a cup of water.
You start that to boil and then add in about
a quarter to a half cup of sugar and just dissolve the sugar
and then you've got simple syrup.
To this now, I'm gonna add a few pinches of celery salt.
And then I'm gonna add a few squeezes of lemon juice.
Hopefully I got all the seeds out.
Lemon is always a nice flavor enhancer and balancer.
It adds a little bit of acidity to break things up.
And now the final and most important ingredient
is the dill Aquavit that we picked up.
I love it that we can not only eat locally
but also drink locally and Aquavit has been
a family favorite of mine for generations.
And now I'm able to get it right here
in the Midwest, which I just love.
And I love that the ingredients are coming
from the Midwest and it's a lovely story.
And we're gonna eyeball this, too.
It's a, I don't know, about a cup and a half.
We might give them a little bit more.
That's good.
That was probably way more than a cup and a half but,
that's okay.
Now that it's all mixed up I'm gonna give it
a little bit of a taste, little taste,
make sure the seasonings are correct
and also I've never had this cocktail before
so I really wanna know what it tastes like.
I love the color.
Look at that, it's gorgeous.
Okay, give it a taste here.
I think we're good to go.
Let me pack all this stuff up and let's go refresh
our farming yoga friends with a delightful brunch.
- Step your left foot forward.
Right foot back.
Reach your arms out to the sides
and turn your shoulders and hips square to the side.
Look out over that left hand.
(upbeat music)
- All right, brunch is ready. - Great.
(upbeat music)
- [Inga] Veggie strata with spring greens.
Tasty and a little bit healthy.
A perfect tipple after your downward dog.
Beets and dill Aquavit cocktail.
A simple yoga ending, local, fresh strawberries.
- Well I hope this has inspired you to do a little yoga in the barn
and I hope you'll gather with us next time...
- [All] Around the Farm Table .
- I'm your host, Inga Witscher.
Cheers. (glasses clinking)
*
- [Announcer] Around the Farm Table
is funded in part by
Kwik Trip,
big on fresh
and proud to support Wisconsin's farmers,
Wisconsin Farmer's Union,
united to grow family agriculture,
American Provenance,
Heartland Credit Union,
and Friends of Wisconsin Public Television.