I love the country, but because I don’t have a car, I jump on any chance to get out there through other means. I had a wonderful time on the Pacific Coast Farmers’ Market Association farm tour along the San Mateo Coast last year, so I signed up for this year’s tour to Watsonville as soon as I learned about it.
Watsonville is close to Santa Cruz and known for its agricultural produce. We visited three farms on this trip: Phil Foster Ranches, Far West Fungi, and Hillview Farm. Like last year, we enjoyed an outdoor farm-to-table lunch prepared on the spot in the middle of the trip.
Each farm operates very differently from one another. Phil Foster Ranches is a large, commercial, all-organic farm that hires tens of workers and uses machinery extensively. It grows a wide range of crops. During our trip in late August, we saw leeks, lettuces, chards, summer squash, strawberries, and the early crop of apples.
Rows of chards
These are summer squash actually
When Phil encouraged us to go into the fields to taste the strawberries and apples, we were like kids unleashed and scouted for the plumpest fruits. Nothing beats the taste of freshly picked fruits; the strawberries were amazing.
The scenery was also picture-perfect. Imagine a boundless clear sky under which long, parallel rows of crops gradually converge into a backdrop of gently sloping mountains. Phil was proud of his farm; even his dog was having fun when showing us around. Obviously it was an idealized picture, but I wondered what it’d be like to live and work on a farm like this.
We then moved on to Far West Fungi. Before we toured the farm, we sat down to have lunch made using produce from Phil Foster Ranches and mushrooms from Far West Fungi. The vegetarian menu included crostini topped with pureed broccoli and grilled mushrooms, cauliflower soup, and a salad of tomatoes, cucumbers, red onions, and feta.
The most delicious items were those that brought out the freshness of the ingredients, such as the mushrooms and salad. It was a hot day, so the aqua fresca the chefs made from several types of melons served as a great thirst quencher.
Far West Fungi is a small, multi-generation family business. It sells both edible and medicinal mushrooms, and has a store in the San Francisco Ferry Building. The farm has great views of the Pacific Ocean, but it’s far from quaint. This was my first time seeing mushrooms grown on a commercial scale, and I quickly realized that they don’t come from enchanted forests we read about in fairy tales.
Instead, the mushrooms sprouted from “blocks” of organic matter housed in dark, damp container-like structures. I can’t remember exactly, but the organic matter was something like compost or dead wood. It takes months for the mushrooms to break down the organic matter and grow big enough for human consumption. The blocks were placed on rows of shelves, and it’s a bit eerie walking past blocks of protruding mushrooms in various shapes.
Yellow-headed mushrooms, but I couldn’t remember the name
Intimidating-looking matsutake mushrooms
Before we left the containers, the owner offered some maitake mushrooms for us to taste raw. But the smell of decay inside the containers put me off and I didn’t taste any.
Our final stop of the tour was Hillview Farm, another family-run business that grows 100+ varieties of apples and other fruits. Walking among the apple trees under the sun is like experiencing California in the movies, and I couldn’t help marveling the bounty.
California’s bounty – apples everywhere
Since everything seemed so perfect, it was a letdown when the owner told us he sprayed the apples and couldn’t afford to go organic. I understand organic farming is expensive, but as a consumer, I was reluctant to taste any more apples on the farm after the revelation. Perhaps there’s a better way for the owner to convey that piece of information?
As we were heading back to San Jose at the end of the tour, I felt thankful that I could join a tour like this again. Call it a marketing ploy on the part of the farmers if you want, but it makes a huge difference for me to know the person who grows my food, given the problems of our faceless, industrial food system. I’m now more determined to buy from farmers’ markets whenever possible.
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