AdAgrA 2020: A Living Parable

Homesteading

Bob Gregory

Lynnita Gregory

AdAgrA: Adventist Agriculture Association

Storing Food for the Long-Haul

I want to first let you know that we are from West Virginia.

We grow a wide variety of crops, we're market growers and we have a training program there too.

If you'd like to talk to us more about that, we'll have a table open after lunch today.

But because we grow so much stuff for marketing, we found that we've had the blessing of having a lot of fresh stuff available to us most of the year.

That is really our preference for food is to eat it fresh.

And 1 of the things that we as a people have kind of lost sight of in the last couple of generations is that there is actually counsel in the Bible about how we eat certain things.

And that counsel comes from Ecclesiastes chapter 3 where it says, to everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under the heavens.

We as grocery consumers have typically just totally cast that aside.

I remember as a youngster growing up, even in California, I was raised in Northern California and lived most of my life there, that the only times when I was a kid that we saw peaches or grapes in the grocery store was during peach season or grape season.

If they weren't in season currently, then we had to rely on canned peaches or grape juice or some other form of preserved fruits.

But today we have all of this abundance in our grocery stores from all over the world, and we can get anything we want at any time we want.

Of course, that's horribly compromised food, because there's a lot of things that go into making that happen that are kind of behind the scenes and that most of us are not aware of.

Frankly, I think we need a hazardous material sign in front of every grocery store today.

But even in our home gardens, my preference is to eat seasonally.

And if we do that, we have found that even where we are located in West Virginia, we have fresh stuff on our table year round.

And we currently have crops growing right now that we'll be going to home to.

I have carrots, I have beets, I have kale, I have brussels sprouts, we've got some spinach.

So we don't can a whole lot of vegetables for that reason.

There are some things that we do preserve, and Lenita will be sharing that with you.

And we also preserve some of our staple crops, And that's what I'm going to talk about here first because many of us store pumpkins for example or winter squash and I want to talk from the growers point of view about what's necessary to do that successfully before you even harvest it.

Because that is really important, and it's a lot, Some of our carrots, here's the crops that we store.

There's some things that we have to do with these crops.

I'm gonna talk about this first column here and then Lenita will address the rest of it.

We do a lot of winter squash and pumpkins, potatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, garlic, and some herbs.

Herbs can go on either side of this list.

But 1 of the things that is important for storing these particular crops is that some of them require a period of curing.

And that's actually preparation both before and shortly after harvest that needs to be taken before they will store well.

And things like field corn, dry beans, winter squash, potato sweet potatoes, onions, and garlic all require either a pre-curing or a curing process in order for them to store well.

Where we are, we have real moist weather conditions during corn harvest.

So 1 of the things that we practice is We want to dry that corn down well before we harvest the corn to shell it off the ears and to make cornmeal from it.

And we want all of the energy of that plant, and this holds true for other small grains too.

If you're, you know, in a capacity to be able to grow things like wheat or barley and need to dry it more thoroughly.

We do what's called shocking our corn, which is basically putting in stacks like you see behind me in this photograph and allowing it to feel dry.

That stack was made by taking about a square yard of corn and leaving a corn plant rooted in the ground at each of the corners of that square yard, or 6 feet or however large you wanna make your stack.

And then we cut all of the other stalks a couple inches off the ground and pile them together using those 4 corner posts, so to speak, to kind of anchor it to the ground.

And then we just use a corn leaf to tie the whole thing together.

And what that does is it stops all the moisture from the root system from continuing to keep that corn green for a longer period of time.

And as the plant dries out, it dries out more evenly.

All of the carbohydrates that are stored in the stem of the plant and the leaves migrate into the seed that is finishing off and you get a better quality seed.

This process helps with a couple of things at the cellular level in crops that allow it to be stored and kept for a longer period of time.

The cell walls accumulate more potassium and calcium that hardens the cell walls so that they're more durable.

It's called, you know, it's a hardening off of the crop that takes place when you do this.

And we shell the corn and, you know, grind it.

We have a neighbor that has a flour mill that's powered by his tractor and he grinds this for us into various different grinds that we want.

And then we just basically store it in plastic bags and quantities that are suitable for our use.

So we get it back in 50 50 pound bags and then Lenita breaks it down into these smaller packages and my suggestion if you do this is to take these packages and put them in the freezer for 2 or 3 days and that process kills off any insects or Or insect eggs that might be in the flower when it's ground and Prevent it to help prevent it from being infested with weevils and things.

After it's been in there for a couple of days, we'll take it back out and just store it in a dark, dry environment.

We do cornmeal, we try to do cornmeal every other year because it lasts for a long time.

And when we do it, we usually grind about 3 to 500 pounds of corn to meet the needs that we have.

You shock the popcorn, let it dry thoroughly, and then just shell it off the cobs.

In order to store a seed or a grain, it's got to be lower than 12% moisture or you run the risk of it rotting.

So in terms of our popcorn, We do the same thing we did with the field corn, let it dry down thoroughly.

If we get lots of periods of rain and the stalks get moist and wet, then we'll pull the cobs off the stalks and bring them indoors and dry them down until they meet that criteria being less than 12%.

And that's a fairly simple thing to determine.

I use my pocket knife as a moisture meter and if I put my corn kernel or any seed on a hard surface and push down on it with my pocket knife.

If it shatters, that's a good indication that it's thoroughly dry and suitable for storage.

If it slices or if I crush it or if I cut through it, it's not quite dry enough yet, but it'll shatter like dropping a glass if it's at 12% or less.

We grow quite a few dry beans as 1 of our staple crops.

And with this, we stop the irrigation when the seeds are fully formed.

Even though the plants may still be green and looking very vigorous, we wanna cut the water off at that point.

And when the seed is fully ripened, the skin won't be easily injured.

And that's the point at which we cut the water off.

So we'll open a few pods, examine the skins, kind of manipulate them with our thumbs a little bit.

If it slips real easily, it's not quite fully mature.

When that skin stays intact, then we know that it's mature.

And 1 of the methods that you can use in a moist environment to cure these plants is to basically cut them off just above the ground.

When they harvest commercial dry beans, that's what we do is we actually use a what's called a bean knife and we drag it through the field with a tractor and it simply cuts all the plant off and then the plant is left in the field for a period of time to cure until before they go in and thresh the beans.

And once the plants are completely dry and that's indicated by the pods beginning to actually crack a little bit or pop open, that's when it's time to thresh the beans.

And that can be done either by hand or by using an empty trash can and just taking the whole plant and taking all your frustrations out by beating it against the trash can.

And that'll separate, oftentimes, the pods from the stems.

You can throw the stems away, and then you've got a trash can full of loose beans, full of pods, and full of leaf debris, typically.

And at that point, you can separate the leaf debris by pouring of those beans or whatever's in the bottom of your trash can from 1 container into another in front of a box fan, just using the fan to blow the lighter material away.

And you repeat that process 2 or 3 times to eventually get the pods out of it too, and shell whatever is left that needs to be shelled by hand at that point.

Finish drying them indoors, clean the seed, bag, again we temporarily freeze those just to preclude any insect hatch potential in the dry beans and then we store those in a cool dark location.

Just before we came here, we had lunch last Sabbath with a neighbor of ours who was lamenting that the butternut squash that he harvested in October was already rotting in his storage.

And he thought it was because he didn't store it in a good place.

And I shared with him that no, that has nothing to do with it.

It's the way that you cultured it at the end of the crop that caused it to store and 1 thing with squash and pumpkins is you want to fertilize these only when you plant them you want to make sure you've got enough nutrition in the ground when you plant them so that you're not adding additional nitrogen during the growth cycle.

And the reason for that is the additional nitrogen will soften the fruits.

It also stimulates vegetative growth in the plant And it won't harden off properly if you have too much nitrogen late in the growing season.

And again, once the fruits are fully formed, cut off the water.

How many of you have had cantaloupes from the southwestern desert areas?

As opposed to cantaloupes that are grown in the southeast.

Okay, I thought there might be more of you.

Anyway, I'm from the western states, so we're accustomed to southwestern-grown cantaloupes, and they have far better flavor, and they're far sweeter than the ones that grow in this part of the country.

That was 1 of the things that disappointed me about farming in West Virginia is I haven't been able to get a really great cantaloupe.

I get good ones but they're not really great.

Part of the reason is because at the end of the development cycle, the sugars are built as the plants are under stress and drying down, the carbohydrates accumulate in the fruits and the skins get harder, the cell walls, just as with the corn, get more durable and the sugar content starts to increase.

And by cutting off the water you allow that to take place.

If you are continuing to irrigate right up until you harvest, you're harvesting a fruit that has far more moisture in it, and as a consequence, will not store as well.

It does slow the ripening, yes, yes, right.

Intensive: Bagging the Bounty

Bagging the Bounty Part 1

This class is basically going to be discussing what we do with the crop that we don't use immediately.

And the idea here is that we want to give you some information about how we keep our crops for the long term.

How do we preserve, dry, dehydrate, we do cellaring, some cold storage, and we'll be talking a little bit about canning, freezing, and dehydrating, and some pickling too.

And 1 of the things that we really try to emphasize on our farm is that fresh is best.

When you can use fresh product, you're far better off than using any kind of a preserved product in any 1 of these forms.

And the basis for our agriculture program is to show you how to do those things.

We talked about season extension in the last class this morning, and we try to take that to its full extreme, meaning that we grow crops year-round on our farm in a part of the country that that's typically not done.

And unless you're above about 45 degrees latitude, that's a real possibility for you.

And I'm gonna maybe share a little bit about how we kinda get that far into the growing season with things.

We had a lady here this morning that was talking about crops in her high tunnel that you know are doing just fine at those far northern latitudes, but that things aren't growing this time of year.

That's the case because the length of the days is so short.

The timing of our crop becomes important because you want it to reach full maturity before it stops growing.

But even a crop that's at full maturity at around the first of the year, you can harvest on through the succeeding months because the plant's really not growing.

So you've got essentially field cold storage at that point.

Things are stored right in the field for you and then you harvest them as you need them.

This is true of things like our carrots and our beets and some of the other things that we have in the ground.

Right now they're mature, they're ready to harvest, but I don't have to harvest them because if I pull them out of the ground and put them in a refrigerator, it's no different than leaving them where they are because they're refrigerated anyway So fresh is best.

I'm gonna spend some time talking to you about curing crops Most of you probably don't know what that involves but to give you a quick short definition, it's how do we manage the crops before we harvest them for storage?

We had a friend over on Sabbath that had a Sabbath meal with us, and he was complaining because he had a beautiful crop of butternut squash this year.

And he picked those butternut squash, and they're all rotting on him right now.

And it's not what he did after he harvested them, It's what he did before he harvested them that was the reason for that.

So I'm gonna touch on that and that is part of what we're gonna be talking about as far as curing the crops for harvest and for storage too.

Showed you this slide earlier this morning too, but what I want to emphasize here is that we want to use as much fresh product as possible.

So let's plan our gardens, organize our gardens in such a way, using a combination of low tunnels, high tunnels, low tunnels inside high tunnels, to extend our growing season so that we can manage our crops.

Most people are not aware that there are a lot of crops that can tolerate being frozen.

I actually grow a couple of varieties of red leaf lettuce, even down to single digit temperatures.

Now at night, these are unheated high tunnels and low tunnels.

And at night, by dawn anyway, The temperature inside the season extension device is just the same as it is outside.

I mean if it's a 5 degree morning and I measure the temperature of that lettuce under a low tunnel like this, at that time of the day, it's going to be 5 degrees too.

And if you flick your finger on a lettuce leaf, it's going to shatter, just like a fine glass would.

But by using the low tunnels, it does retain the heat once the sun comes up and creates temperatures in there that are warm enough not just to thaw the lettuce out, but to actually keep it alive and let it grow on for a while more.

Now after a lettuce goes through a cycle of maybe 10 times freezing and thawing, it starts to get a little bit bitter, but it's still good quality lettuce and you can harvest that lettuce in the afternoon after it's thawed out, you'd never know that it was frozen in most instances.

So we do apply this to crops that are tolerant of being frozen.

The crops that we store and what we're going to talk about today are kind of in 2 categories.

I'm going to handle the first category here and then Lenita is going to share with you what she does for the second category.

But the crops that we store are largely corn in the way of cornmeal.

Now where we live, growing small grains is a real challenge.

Things like wheat, rye, barley, that type of thing.

And it's partly because we have such a humid climate, it's difficult to grow those to a point where they can be harvested without fungal disease damage.

And corn is 1 of our primary staple crops.

We try to grow as much of our own food as possible.

We like avocados, we like pineapples, we like bananas, we like a variety of things in our diet.

But at the end of the day, if, you know, if the end of the day comes and we no longer have access beyond our farm, we are perfectly capable of being totally 100% self-sustained right on our farm.

You know, that's a feeling that is just amazing.

I've only had that feeling twice in my life as far as being aware that I can feed my family no matter what.

And the other time that I had that feeling was when I paid off a mortgage and nobody else had any strings on my land anymore.

The independence, the sense of independence that comes with being able to supply your food needs and your family's food needs is really a profound experience.

And I say that because from my perspective, a lot of the problems that we see on the planet today stem from fear.

I think the enemy's greatest avenue into disrupting God's order on this earth is to instill fear in us.

And whether you realize it or not right now, you have a fear inside of you that's affecting every decision that you make that you're probably not even aware of.

And that decision is, where's my food gonna come from?

If you're not growing it yourself, you're relying or you are dependent on a system of bringing food to you, right?

Okay, now you're probably not giving this a lot of conscious thought, but your subconscious certainly is aware of that.

That creates a sense of anxiety in our minds that can manifest itself in all kinds of different aspects of aberration in our thinking.

When we have the capacity to feed ourselves as well as to draw breath ourselves without having to get that from someone else, as well as being able to have the water that we need for our physical needs, we've met all of our physical needs.

And that fear dissipates and goes away and the channels of our thinking are far clearer and far more capable of dealing with the real issues at hand, which we know to be the great controversy and the issues surrounding that.

So I really want to encourage you to take as much time and effort as necessary to put yourself in a position where you can meet that need and no longer be dependent on a system over which you have no control.

Buying your food at Whole Foods, even if you're all organic and non-GMO and blah blah blah, is not the same as growing it yourself.

It's not the same quality, it's not the same nutritional value, and it's not the same spiritual food that you'll find if you've used your efforts, your hands, your family, your land to accomplish that.

Corn In the form of cornmeal is 1 of our staples.

And we use those on a very frequent basis as a protein source.

I'm gonna include those 2 together because they're very similar.

In fact, a pumpkin is nothing but a winter squash with a different name.

Squash and pumpkin are basically the same thing when we're talking about the winter squash now.

Potatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, garlic, and herbs are all things that we store.

And I'm going to address most of these, then Lenita will be talking to us about tomatoes, sweet corn, green beans, herbs, peppers, berries, fruits, and the last few on this list are things that we store short term, And that's cabbage, beets, carrots, and turnips.

And when I say short term, I'm talking about a period of 60 to 90 days.

You can prepare them for long term storage, too.

But since we have a constant input of food from our garden, we don't need to store them for a long period of time.

And my preference, instead of making things like sauerkraut or canned beets or canned carrots, is to simply store them for a brief period of time.

And then, you know, as we talked about the seasonal eating this morning, to eat whatever is next in the crop cycle, in compliance with that statement from Ecclesiastes chapter 3.

I want to talk about something regarding food preservation that very few of you have probably given consideration of.

And this is curing the crop before storage or before, even before harvest.

And basically this process of curing hardens the plants off, it builds sugars within the plant, and it prepares the plant for a long period of dormancy, or prepares the fruit of the plant for a long period of dormancy.

And this is precisely the reason why my neighbor's squash, butternut squash did not store this year, because it was not properly cured prior to him putting it into storage.

And curing involves primarily drawing the plant down and allowing the plant to harden off.

In this hardening off process, potassium levels rise in the plant, which makes the cell walls more durable and tougher, basically.

It allows sugars to increase within the plant so that you get better quality, better sweetness in things like squash, better mineral levels in things like corn and beans.

And it also raises the level of calcium, which is also involved in the cell wall structure within the plant to strengthen the cell walls and help it resist deterioration while it's in storage.

And field corn, dry beans, winter squash, pumpkins, potatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, and garlic all go through this process prior and shortly after being harvested before we store them.

1 of our most important crops economically are the garlic and onions.

Those actually are things that are very marketable in our area.

But 1 of the challenges we have is storing them in our area.

And I am going to walk you through the process of what we do to accomplish that so that they don't rot after storage.

We're gonna start with a little discussion about field corn.

And field corn, if you're supplying all of your own food on that 2 3rds of an acre, working your half an hour a day, is gonna involve growing some field corn.

And by curing it, what I do is I stop all irrigation on the crop once the ears are fully filled out.

Once the corn cobs are fully shaped and the kernels of grain on the cobs are fully sized, stop watering.

Bagging the Bounty Part 2

A couple of things that Bob talked about that I'll mention also, when he was talking about preserving both garlic and onions, they can both be dehydrated.

They can be reconstituted and used in soups and stews.

You can even take your dehydrated vegetables and drop them down in the freezer for even longer.

Garlic can be ground up into a powder and you can use it, your own granulated garlic.

So there's a number of things that you can do to preserve your crops and after you've prayed about it, and the resources are amazing, just don't be afraid.

Pray, don't be afraid, experiment, use small amounts.

But you know just really I encourage you to learn, because I'm going to share with you, I've never done this before.

I'm a nurse, I speak 1 on 1 with people, and I'm terrified of being up front, And I thank you all for being my guinea pigs, my husband's encouragement.

Never worked all this, but I'm going to do it.

And the reason I say that isn't so much as a disclaimer, but to tell you you can do this.

I knew about gardening from my grandparents, but I never canned so when we moved to West Virginia in 2009 besides the fact that I was married to a grower and Of course conversationally other things I learned but I also spoke to local people and asked their opinion.

And not only are they helping you, but you are helping them and you're doing what God put us here for.

And so the country wisdom, when you all are looking for your homes, the country wisdom that you will run into is amazing.

Back to Menu

Presenter

Lynnita Gregory

3 Teachings

AdAgrA 2020: A Living Parable

Storing Food for the Long-Haul

56m

Bagging the Bounty Part 1

46m

Bagging the Bounty Part 2

44m

Sound Doctrine