Most people can easily find goat’s milk cheese in local grocery stores. But how often do you get to meet the goats who produced that milk and enjoy fine dining within steps of the barn? At Elderslie Farm, in Kechi, Kansas, you can do both. Taking its name from a Scotch term for “where the elders lie,” the farm actually encompasses four businesses operating under the motto “affection, endeavor, delight.”
Mustard lovers: Head to Middleton, Wisconsin. More than 6,000 varieties of mustard are showcased at the National Mustard Museum in this town just outside Madison. Admission is free, though the destination is open only five days a week during the coronavirus pandemic (face coverings are required; capacity is limited). Enter and you’ll encounter shelves groaning with mustards from all 50 states and more than 70 countries, along with displays of antique mustard pots, tins and jars, plus vintage posters and advertisements.
Petting zoos, picking your own produce—such as spring’s sweet berries and summer’s peaches—and winding your way through fall’s corn mazes before choosing a pumpkin can give you a taste of rural life. But if you’re looking for a more immersive event, a farm tour offers a feast for the senses.
If your mental image of a dairy farmer is someone perched on a three-legged stool to milk cows by hand, visit Hillcrest Farms for an update. The first robotic dairy farm in the state of Georgia is now giving tours at its fourth-generation farm in Dearing, a small community in McDuffie County near Augusta. Take part in a 90-minute tour and you’ll come face-to-face with cows, learn how the high-tech approach to milking has been implemented and how the cows have reacted (spoiler alert: they’re happy!), learn something new, spend time with nature, and bring new meaning to the phrase ‘farm-to-table.’
Curled up on the couch with a steaming cup of Sleepytime or swaying in a rocker with a glass of iced Red Zinger, most of us have had the pleasure of sipping Celestial Seasonings herbal tea. It is a cup of comfort known across the nation and beyond. Celestial Seasonings is the world's most widely distributed purveyor of herbal infusions, annually selling 1.6 billion tea bags that are all produced in the plant outside Boulder, Colorado.
“Find” Dining: Learn to Forage with Expert Guides Story by Ginger Warder Be Safe! Never eat wild plants without the guidance of a local expert, such as those found at the Native Plant Society Forget farm-to-table dining and take a learning leap into field and forest-to-table dining. Foraging—a
Taste Roanoke, Virginia From biscuits to baklava, craft beer to cabernet, Roanoke’s culinary scene is diverse. Story by Ginger Warder Poised between the Blue Ridge Parkway and the Appalachian Trail, Roanoke, Virginia mixes urban flavor with a small-town personality. Here you can find sophisticated cultural attractions like the world-class Taubman
If you know only one thing about the food that comes out of Berkeley, California, just across the bay from San Francisco, you probably know about Chez Panisse. There, Alice Waters opened her iconic restaurant in 1971 and, effectively, introduced farm-to-table dining to middle-class America. Thousands upon thousands of diners still make a pilgrimage to Chez Panisse every year to dine at the altar of the slow food movement.
