Carol and a bundle of her Sunchokes.

Simmered in water, scant sea salt, and Louis Rainville’s sunflower oil, the Sunchokes (aka Jerusalem Artichokes) we get from Carol Collins of Singing Spindle in Waterbury all but melt into the seasoned body of Yellow Eye Beans we got from Jack Lazor at Butterworks Farm. The recipe is rounded out by chives from our farm’s gardens in Moretown, our own thyme-oil, and subtle notes of organic spices.

As a variation on the theme, and to give a shout-out to a time of the year when the air is tinged with the last hints of wood stoves’ smoke fading into the ensuing smells of ubiquitous grilling, we’ve introduced cracked organic smoked peppercorns into our recipe for a limited run batch that balances the buttery lightness of the sunchokes and yellow eyes with some subtle, earthy, smokey heat.

(Keep your taste buds around for this fall when we’ll be putting up local peppers in the new smoker at the Mad River Food Hub!)

While it’s perfectly acceptable to eat this by the spoonful, as you’ll be want to do, we recommend trying it wrapped up alongside your favorite early greens in a light and rewarding garden wrap.

Spread on a freshly-toasted slice of your favorite bread, drizzled with honey works for a light and satiating breakfast; a loose interpretation of beans and toast to keep a mug of Earl Grey company.

We’ve also taken to making a meal out of over-wintered carrots and the little piles of sunshine.

Now available at select co-ops in 8oz tubs. Soon to debut at the New Amsterdam Market in NYC and via Farmers To You in the Boston Area.

We also sell by the quart and gallon. Contact us for availability.  Special orders are certainly possible. Call or email for a quote.

Anyone in the Essex area has a great event to look forward to this weekend: the 5th Annual Junior Iron Chef competition.

The ranks of aspiring Iron Chefs will be trying their hands at seasonally-sensitive offerings that utilize local ingredients–in addition to the implicit expectations regarding taste and appearance.

We’re excited to have our founder, jefe and chefe Joe Bossen be there representing all things in good taste as a judge in the afternoon tasting round. He’ll be judging along side the likes of Paul Harlow (of Westminster Organics, one of our very own suppliers), Melissa Pasanan (freelance food writer whose done a feature on us for Vermont Life, yet to be released), Crystal Maderia (Chef and Owner of Kismet in Montpelier, one of the few restaurants that understands how to do plant-based foods with soul)…the list goes. Senators, Miss Teen Vermont, the works!

It’s all from 9-3pm this Saturday at the Champlain Valley Exposition in Essex. See you there!

We’re excited to announce a public event that’s part of the Center’s Local Food Program’s work on food access in the Northeast Kingdom.

Join Local Food Coordinator Rachel Schattman, along with Jack Lazor and Joe Bossen at the Kellogg-Hubbard Library in Montpelier at 6:15 p.m. on Tuesday, April 10.

We’d love your help getting out the word to growers and to buyers who may be interested in either aspect of Vermont-grown dry beans.

http://www.osgata.org/

If you eat, this concerns you. Find a way to help out the folks at OSGATA that are finding ways to help you.

Most folks in the know already know, but here’s some happy new news for the rest of you. Back in November we transitioned our production space to the brand new Mad River Food Hub, an invaluable piece of food system infrastructure born of Vermont’s Farm 2 Plate Strategic Plan. We became the first enterprise to use their vegetable  production space and have been a weekly tenant since.

The investments we’ve made in equipment over the last two years (thanks to an incredibly supportive community) put us in a great position to utilize the heightened production  capacity and storage space at the Hub. We can now store many times more local produce for our winter production, on top of being more than six times as productive with every kitchen-hour.

The added capacity has allowed us to drop our bean burgers’ retail price, expand our range for both retail and food service, and expand our product line.

Look for our line of three core and one seasonally varying Hummish; Vegan lasagnas and raviolis made in partnership with Vermont Fresh Pasta Company; our line of frozen and fresh burritos; black bean brownies (vegan, and made with organic maple sugar); as well as an expanded catering capacity.

Pumpkin-Studded Fennel Fun

Late Autumn allows us a wide range of local ingredients to draw upon for our seasonal limited runs. Above is a transformation of Cedar Circle Farm’s pumpkins and Seth Johnson’s jacob’s cattle beans into a spreadable infusion of fennel seed, coriander, and just enough peppery heat. The pumpkins’ seeds are roasted with Louis Rainvilles’s sunflower oil, sea salt, and fresh cracked pepper before being sprinkled on the finished spread.

Ninja Bennet Skinning Oven-Roasted Pie Pumpkins

We’ve started in on our phase of Autumn-centric offerings to make the most of these ever-short-lived bounties.

The Twilight in the Meadow fundraiser for RAFFL was the first venue we debuted our Sas-squash Sliders this year. A mash of Great Northern beans chocked full of red kurikubocha squash, anchos, herbs from Alchemy Gardens. These all coalesce around a bouquet of our other standard local leanings in an aromatic batter before being tossed in some organic Vermont-grown cornmeal and getting touched off in our oven.

The Cambridge Hotel (Home of Pie a la Mode) championed our black bean burgers throughout the summer and then recently became the first restaurant to plate our timely and, possibly majestic, Pumpkin Jake Burger. Curious?

A Pumpkin Jake Burger = Jacob’s Cattle beans from Seth Johnson and Morningside Meadows up in Glover…Pumpkins from amber-toned fields of several organic Vermont growers…onions from Evening Song Farm…three different varieties of pepper-heat…and (of course) a top-secret blend of herbs developed by NASA for the Space Station.

These are full of yum and zero on gluten—and every other food allergen/dietary consideration I’m aware of. The same should be said of our latest hummish, the nefarious Pumpkin-Seeded Shallot Spread. For those among us who take our meals in spoons or on chips, voila! What we have here is much of dear Pumpkin Jake’s gusto met with the formidable advantage of ready-to-eat, portable, packable, smotherable qualities.

Available by special order, in select venues, and at the New Amsterdam Market. If supplies hold out, expect to see it at one of the several winter farmers markets in Vermont we’re planning to vend at. Check back in for more details.

Farms from some of the most northwestern parts of the state, all the way across and down to the southwestern counties have had to find ways to cope with flooded fields, erosion, silt-laden lands, crop diseases stirred on by the sustained wetness… the list goes on. There were endless heavy-hearted tales shared.

A few weeks ago we started a humble campaign to try to help relieve some of the financial hardships for and share the tale of our friends at Evening Song Farm. Kara and Ryan tell the story best of their ambitions and healthy progress towards their goals; and then the effects of having a riverbed where their acres of vegetable fields once thrived at their website: www.eveningsongcsa.com

Check that out and please offer any direct aid you can as there is still much to do all these days later.

Evening Song Spread

While you’re at it, one more way you can help is by keeping an eye out for our Evening Song Spreads at a few select stores around Vermont, as well as the New Amsterdam Market by the South Street Seaport in lower Manhattan. We’ve showcased the onions and garlic Kara and Ryan were able to harvest into batches of limited run white bean dips that lean on Kenearly beans donated by the likes of Yoder Farm in Danby and Jacob’s Cattle purchased from Morningstar Meadows in Glover. 60% of proceeds get funneled directly to Evening Song Farm to help with the rebuild. You can always get in touch with us regarding shipping as well.

Our hearts go out to Kara and Ryan, along with the lovely folk of Arethusa Farm and the rest of the Intervale farmers who’ve lost out this year after an already tough wet start to the season. Here’s to all those who’ve lost out and all those who’ve found the beauty of willing and able neighbors on all sides through this.

For other ways to help all of those still in need, and there’s still no shortage:

Vermont Strong: campaign funneling funds to the Vermont Food Bank
Mad River Valley: relief for one of the harder hit valleys in the state
Intervale Center: Burlington-based incubator farms that were inundated
NOFA-VT: your one-stop spot for all things organic farming in Vermont
Evening Song: in case you missed the link earlier

Respect for the kind of knowledge that enables grass seed to grow grass; the cherry-stone to make cherries.

I am humbled by how supportive our community of friends and family have been. With these kitchen bottlenecks now overcome, expect to see Bean Crafters in more places in Vermont (particularly in schools and larger grocers) as well as more thoroughly present in our neighboring states around New England.

This is huge for us, and huge for our farmers. We expect to double our weekly output right of the bat, and have it triple by the new year.

The flip side is that we still need your help via pre-orders (CSA-stylee) of our burgers and hummish so that we can foot the grocery bill to accommodate the hike in our kitchen capacity. Here’s a reminder, and slight enhancement to the deal on the table:

Send in $50, $100, $250, or $500 by September 10th and you will receive, starting December 1st, a ration of frozen bean burgers and/or hummish delivered every two weeks in whatever portions you specify. You’ll be getting these at our wholesale prices. And don’t forget the limited edition Pumpkin-Poblano-Kidney Bean-Thyme Burger we’ll be throwing in for all supporters.

Beyond all of that, all participants chipping in $250 or more will receive a follow-up email containing details of a special community meal I will be putting together this Autumn to show my appreciation. It will be three course localvore bounty complemented by ciders and brews from the valley specially made for the event. Live music. Lovely folk. Served up family style at an area farm.

I’ve still been too busy to throw a Paypal button up, but soon! In the mean time, if you’re enticed, just call or email me and we’ll sort details out. Remember, we’re looking to pull all of this together by September 10th!

Again, a heartfelt thanks to all our friends without whom there would be no such movement.

Things are good in Bean Crafter Land. Perhaps too good.  Growth in demand for our winsome craftings has officially outstripped our humble kitchen and team’s capacity. What’s an aging one-year old company to do? Two banks and one leasing company have essentially told us that in light of our brief history, our consistently increasing sales amounts to little more than…well…a pile of beans.

Pile of beans...complete with Crafters.

Good news really. Being ‘unbankable’ has placed us in the happy position of further aligning ourselves with our community (and alternative modes of business) in fun and fancy new ways.

Here’s what I mean, and where you come in:

In order to raise the $15k capital to get us to our next economy of scale we’re soliciting two opportunities to accrue value for our neighbors and fuel for our company:

1.) You can pre-purchase $100 worth of burgers and receive a bonus four-pack of a limited run mid-summer burger as a thank you. This extra capital will be put towards our wholesale grocery list that entails more than seven-times the quantity of local veggies we purchased last year for our Fall and Winter production.

-or-

2.) You can invest $1,000 in your friendly neighborhood Bean Crafters and receive $100 on your principle 14 months hence. A better return than any stock market index, let alone CD (and these days I’d argue with less risk). The math/return stays the same whether you scale your investment up or down. These dollars are slated for kitchen equipment (forming machine, new oven, food processor upgrade, root cellar and storage infrastructure).

The timeline is, well, ASAP. We need to raise this all one way or another by the end of August to stay viable–or at least vivacious. I’ll be posting our progress at the end of each week as well as a list of folks who’ve partnered up with us.

I’m sure there’ll be questions, so feel free to email me at joseph.bossen@gmail.com or call 802-325-2144. If you’re ready to chip in, please send checks or love notes to PO Box 836, Pittsfield VT 05762. You can also bring them to either the Rutland Downtown Farmers Market or New Amsterdam Market.

We’ll be adding a PayPal option to our website later on this week.

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This is all about you asking and us doing our damnedest to deliver. It looks like to do so involves asking you in return. Funny how demand begets demand… lovely how auspicious that can be when it’s energy being cycled through our community all the while.

Lest we forget, more than fifty cents on the dollar we receive goes directly to the farmers we depend on. Versus less than ten cents through mainstream products and marketplaces.

Join us in putting our money where our mouth is: this soil.