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T H E F A R M
Up until almost four years ago, and with the exception of a few small farms that she was dealing with directly, Chris Keff was not very satisfied with the selection and quality of produce that she was getting from her local commercial sources. While her direct farm contacts did have fine quality, their harvests were too inconsistent to base a menu upon. "I thought if I could have a serious financial arrangement with a particular farmer, it would make it worth their while to work with me and I could get better produce into the restaurant," explained the chef. So she decided to invest half of the restaurant's produce budget in subsidizing a local farm. In 2003, Keff forged a unique relationship with Whistling Train Farm in Kent, Washington. She contracted with owners Mike and Shelley Verdi to grow organic produce specifically to supply her busy seafood bistro in the heart of Belltown, Seattle's famed restaurant district. Chef Chris first funded money to Mike and Shelley, which allowed them to expand their acreage and operations to accommodate the needs of the restaurant. Flying Fish continues to pay the farm a flat monthly fee to plant, grow and supply what the restaurant needs with a lot of input from Chef Chris. The relationship is a variation of the recent trend of subscription produce that some growers are doing through Community Supported Agriculture programs (C.S.A.). However, in this case Chef Chris collaborates with Shelley and Mike over their crop plan before plantings and makes daily menu changes based on a morning conversation with the Verdis about what is ready for harvest that day. While Chef Chris still must fill in with some fresh produce from other parts of the country during the winter months, most of the time the menu of Flying Fish reflects what is growing at Whistling Train Farm. "It does get to be a bit of a challenge during the late fall for instance, when there’s an abundance of winter squash but not much else coming out of the fields," said the chef, "So we do something like maybe make a wonderful roasted squash soup, and then we'd make a pumpkin gnocchi to go with one of the dishes, and we might have a straight candied squash side dish. The trick, and fun of it, is to make each dish look and taste completely different so that the same item might be on the menu three or four times but in totally diverse forms." The chef went on to observe, "Not only has this partnership allowed us to support local farmers and sustainable agriculture, but it has also stretched our creativity and encouraged us to think seasonally. With all of these fresh, beautiful ingredients that we have to work with, we can’t help but be inspired in the kitchen!" From the Verdi's point of view, the guesswork has been taken out of what to plant, plus their production is not subject to the traditional supply-vs.-demand dynamic that governs the price of each crop in the commercial marketplace. Shelly Verdi puts this in practical terms, not only as a grower, but as a mother trying to run a household: "Since Flying Fish pays us basically a salary, where we get a check every two weeks, you can imagine the financial stability brought to our business and our family. Chris' input and the steady income helps us concentrate on farming. We now have money when we need to have money to hire the help we need and plus buy our seed or fertilizer on time. That leaves us free, assuming the weather cooperates, to just focus on growing stuff, and growing a lot." "The relationship has really matured our business," Shelley went on to explain. "Since any restaurant needs some consistency of available product, agreeing to provide Flying Fish with as much seasonal produce as they could use meant that we had to center our crop plan on the goal of keeping Chris and the kitchen happy. It forced us to come up with an actual plan of what we would have available to harvest throughout the year, and provided the background for some new crop experiments that we could not justify before, like a 20-variety Italian radicchio field trial or our newest experiment with Belgian endive last winter." From the Whistling Train Farm commitment, Chef Chris then began to think about all the other raw products for her restaurant that would better impact the planet if they were organic. She noted that her guests had begun asking questions about sustainable and wild seafood as far back as 8 or 9 years ago, so Chris began schooling herself and her staff about the many issues surrounding food from both the sea and the land. As part of her ongoing personal and professional evolution, Chef Chris made the decision to convert 100% of Flying Fish's raw products (dairy, produce, meat, dried goods) to organic. "Moving our restaurant toward being 100% organic is really a natural extension of our learning," she explained, "Many here in the Pacific Northwest have become enthusiastically involved in the protection of our wild resources, working to protect habitat and genetics, to ensure that we will have diversity of wildlife for the next generations. I don't know if one restaurant can make an impact in this big issue, but it is a move that gives me a feeling of control of my own patch of turf to try."
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