Retreat

by | Sep 22, 2025 | Farming

Any land worth having was someone else’s land before you. Of course a house needs less land than a farm, and you can divide land, plant houses and write off the handprint of the farmers who tended the fields. Money isn’t everything, but as the houses got closer to the family farm, the taxes for what the farm was worth had more to do with the price of housing than the value of the crops it might produce.

 Taxes went up until Grandpa had to move on and we sold. We all moved north and kept at it with cattle and alfalfa instead of oranges and lima beans. The old place had tack rooms with old harnesses hanging. There was a forge and a place to work metal, the draft stock needed shoes. A can of carbide was in the corner and we could cook up acetylene, although I was too young to start cutting metal with more than a saw.  But we sharped nails with the grinding wheel and made spears. 

 Moving north meant the old horse drawn equipment, the steam equipment and that which was too big to truck went to scrap or over the edge into the barranca. The new equipment yard in Oregon was modern  for the times, but bigger just kept getting bigger, and by the time Oregon came apart the auction was a bloodbath . We put too much faith in those machines and they really broke hearts, and still it goes on — one farm sale to the next. 

 Maybe it’s not right that I should hold the machines responsible, but I do, and as the hedgerows came down, the fences, the property lines to the neighbors expansion and behemoths rolled across the good land, they killed off both the farmers and the towns nearby. They killed off the insects, the birds and after enough years, even the springs that once flowed.

 

Anyway I always wondered how it would be if we hadn’t mechanized, if we stepped back in horsepower towards minimalism rather than the grandiose. A hoe, maybe a couple of battery electric tools that could be replaced with something smaller and cheaper, in a pinch. But here it is, the end of expansion. Here we are and bigger is about to lose. 

 My time is arriving, although the auction was the end a long time ago. The old farm went down and I picked up a grub hoe. Grandpa had good advice I have tried to live by. He drove horses, fixed stationary combines, got big and got crushed. He said,  “Buy water, not land. “ He said I shouldn’t expect to make any money farming. I took his advice, bought riparian water rights, a little land with it, and I have never been surprised that I didn’t make money farming.  The houses are getting closer, everything else seems like it’s further away.

Growing from seed with no fossil fuel

by | Apr 29, 2025 | Farming

Purple garden majesty — Bruce’s garden after the April shower.
Purple garden majesty
There’s broccoli, artichokes, Brussel sprouts, kale, carrots, and in the background hard red wheat.

He grew everything from seed with no fossil fuel. He’s rightly proud of his endeavor, all direct seeded and weeded with a grub hoe.

@winfield_farm is eating plenty high on the proverbial hog these days!! The afternoon sun shines light on the abundance— agriculture as art!

POTLUCK CONVERSATION
(Purple garden majesty)

I was at a potluck that several local gardeners hold where they can show off their cooking and tell stories. I was bragging about my garden and showed some photos. Another gardener asked me, “What do you do with it all? “

I had a pat answer, which is: the pigs are always eager customers. The question has lodged in my brain, however, and I keep trying to rationalize — an acre of grains, red wheat, white wheat, spelt, barley and corn, along with lots of Cole crops from the winter garden – because the “what do you do with it all “question is also a “why do you do it all,“ or at least in my head it has morphed into that. 

Mostly I grow grains for dry storage, but I also try to keep two years supply in the drying shed and always keep seed for next season. I can answer “what I do” better than “why I do it,” because every season for many years, I have squirreled away the fall bounty. Finding the tools to process at very small scales is a parallel pursuit, and finding recipes are corollaries to the harvest abundance, but usually only pecking at the volumes waiting in the shed. 

 There is an advantage in growing grains in that they can be accurately weighed and entered in some sort of calorie ledger. “What is enough” is a valid question and it bothers me a bit, but “how much is possible” nags at me too, but in a positive kind of way.  

The garden is growing very big these days, but it is spring and the winter was mild. I keep planting and so I keep increasing how much garden I need to keep cultivated. It can catch you and overwhelm you as the heat turns on, too many weeds rooted too deeply. So, you cultivate between rows at the first hint of newly germinated weed seeds. Bare ground between rows is eventually shaded by crops, but lots of cultivation while it is bare is essential.  

What is possible, what tools, what seed, when to plant, those things I know. How to do it without lots of power, and again, what is possible? In that I have some confidence, borne by years and years of gardening. Still, it is a solitary pursuit and has been for most of the thousands of hours gardening in my life. 

 So why so much? I don’t really know, but I imagine somewhere in my gene line an answer lies. It wasn’t always a full larder, and no I can’t compensate for the distant past, but an empty belly has a very long memory, I think, or no memory at all. 

Bruce

We’re Delighted to Announce: We’ve Got HAM!

by | Jun 4, 2024 | WF News

Thanks to our new association with Schreiner’s Fine Sausage in Glendale, we’re now able to produce Smoked Boneless Mangalitsa Ham!

We’re offering Winfield Farm Mangalitsa ham in two styles:

The specialty of the house:

Boneless Mangalitsa Black Forest Brand Ham

Shreiner’s dips boneless Mangalitsa ham in caramel #29 to produce an amazingly succulent, flavorful treat!

Get 4, 5, or 6 pound packs (Price $23 / pound) now from our limited supply of Mangalitsa Black Forest Brand ham at our online market.

We’re also offering:

Smoked Boneless Mangalitsa ham

Get 5 or 10 pound packs (Price $18 / pound) of Smoked Boneless Mangalitsa ham now at our online market.

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ANNOUNCING A NEW “PARTNERSHIP” and A NEW PRODUCT (with more to come!)

by | Mar 6, 2024 | WF News

Our hunt for a USDA certified smokehouse that could process our Mangalitsa bellies into hickory smoked bacon led us to Schreiner’s Fine Sausages. Family-owned, Schreiner’s has been located in Glendale since 1952. (Glendale is about 2 ½ hours south of Winfield Farm.)
Wally Schreiner is now the third generation to run the family shop, which still smokes all of its own meat, under USDA inspection.  Wally said of course he could smoke our bellies, since our pigs are slaughtered and butchered by USDA certified establishments. But we would need our regular butcher to slice and package the bellies for bacon. (This extra step is now needed because our regular butcher no longer smokes product inspected by USDA – a requirement for resale.)

The saying ‘when one door closes, another door opens’ is so true — and serendipitous. We discovered a veritable treasure trove of unique and very tasty offerings at Schreiner’s — and the opportunities are virtually endless!

To wit, we’re delighted to announce that, in addition to Mangalitsa bacon smoked by Schreiner’s, we’re now offering Smoked Mangalitsa Sausage – Hungarian style. Ground Mangalitsa pork is seasoned with salt, paprika, black pepper, onion, and garlic. The encased sausages are smoked, fully cooked, then packaged and frozen. The flavor is sensational!

The introductory price on our online Mangalitsa Market is $18 per pack of 5 sausages.


A package of Hungarian Style Mangalitsa sausage straight from the freezer. These weiners are so good, we often eat them straight out of the package, cold.

The future of our new relationship with Schreiner’s is bright! Schreiner’s can make Mangalitsa Kielbasa (Polish sausage), black forest ham, and many other specialty items for Winfield Farm. We’ll keep you posted on progress.

Meantime, we encourage you to try Schreiner’s smoked Mangalitsa sausage – Hungarian style.
We love these weiners, and hope you will too!!

Note: Smoked Mangalitsa Sausage – Hungarian style is now available for online ordering!

 

Panchetta from Winfield Farm Mangalitsa

by | Dec 7, 2023 | Recipes, WF News

According to Wikipedia, Pancetta is salt-cured pork belly meat.
In Italy, it is often used to add depth to soups and pastas. Foodies worldwide value Pancetta’s flavor profile. Two basic types of pancetta are arrotolata (rolled) and stesa (flat).

For cooking, pancetta stesa may be cut into cubes for use in carbonara pasta or pizza, as is typically found in central and southern Italy. In northern Italy, pancetta arrotolata is commonly served rolled and thinly sliced, and consumed raw (although guanciale, cured jowl meat, is generally considered more traditional).

Photo credit: Nachoman-au – CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=522168

The art of pancetta, as with all salume products, is in the curing process. Here at Winfield Farm, we are pleased to offer an exclusive treat: Mangalitsa pork pancetta cured by Alle Pia Fine Cured Meats.

Following their family tradition, and inspected by USDA, Alle Pia first marinates the Mangalitsa bellies in vacuum-sealed bags for three weeks, to infuse special seasonings, including rosemary, garlic, juniper berry and sea salt. As part of the curing process, the bellies are then removed from the bags and hung in a temperature-controlled chamber for 30 days.

You can taste Mangalitsa magic by special ordering Mangalitsa pancetta (stesa). Email us directly at Winfield Farm (dplesch@gmail.com). Supply is limited (not listed on our online Mangalitsa Market).

$35 / lb Pieces average approx. 4-5 pounds each