The Hudson Valley is quite familiar with what it means to be farm-to-table, but what if the farm is also practically right next to the table, even in the more urban and metro areas? Here in the Hudson Valley, a 20 by 20-foot shipping container is being used to grow up to 400 pounds of fresh produce a month at Farmers & Chefs restaurant in Poughkeepsie.
Last year, the restaurant partnered with an Israel-based agro-tech company Vertical Field to grow herbs and vegetables for its dishes in a new and innovative way. Poughkeepsie's Farmers & Chefs is one of the first businesses in the Hudson Valley to try shipping container farming. The restaurant's 20 by the 20-foot climate-controlled container (pictured above) produces about 400 pounds of fresh produce a month.
John Lekic, chef and owner of Farmers & Chefs, grows everything from buttercrunch lettuce, kale and baby arugula to herbs like rosemary, sage and basil in his enclosed vertical farm. The container is divided into four growing fields and is set on the restaurant’s property for customers to see, which has drawn even more interest to Farmers & Chefs as of late.
“It’s a dream come true for chefs to be involved from the seed to the plate,” said Lekic. “It’s a great experience when you grow your own ingredients.” Lekic pursued vertical farming after coming across Vertical Field during an exhibition showcasing a number of Israeli-based companies involved in food and agriculture at the Culinary Institute of America in late 2019.
“There is a huge importance of having urban farms where the demand is,” said Lekic. “The problem with today’s agriculture is that everything has to travel. Most people are not aware of it, but depletion of the nutrients in our food is a huge issue.”
In another regional example, Evergreen Market, a grocery store in Monsey in Rockland County, partnered with Vertical Field to grow vegetables that ultimately stocked the store’s produce aisles, while also inviting customers to view its micro-farm when they visit the store.
This farming approach isn’t for everyone and there are drawbacks. “While it does offer some solutions to things like land access — which is, frankly, a huge barrier to the farming we advocate for here in the Hudson Valley — there is a lot of infrastructure needed,” said Kathleen Finlay, president of Glynwood, a center for regional food and farming based in Cold Spring.
“That brings a whole other set of challenges — how to create enterprises with a high capital upfront cost, how to get sustainable systems. It’s a different suite of challenges than more land-based production.”
Read the complete article at www.timesunion.com.