It's a Long Road to a Tomato
It's a Long Road to a Tomato,
by Keith Stewart, wasn't quite what I expected. For some reason, I
figured the book was one of those
city-guy-goes-to-the-country-and-gets-a-chicken books (which I often
enjoy), and in some ways that is the gist of the story. Stewart
and his wife did move out of New York City to start an farm...but the
book sums up twenty years of experience, and the author did far more
than keep a chicken.
Stewart developed a
12-acre organic-vegetable farm, run by himself with the seasonal help of
six interns per year (who require more management than Hispanic
laborers would have, but who he pays less). Not counting large
investments (like tractors, of which Stewart owns three), his annual
expenses come to just shy of $150,000, which should give you an idea of
the scale of his operation. He grows all of the usual high-end
vegetables and herbs, with garlic being one of his favorites, and he
trucks the produce into the big city to sell in a Manhattan farmer's
market every week.
While I heartily recommend It's a Long Road to a Tomato
for anyone considering beginning their own market garden, the book has a
wider appeal. If you're new to the topic, you'll probably learn a
lot about problems with our current agricultural system, running the
gamut from encroaching development to government regulations. And
even if you're not interested in agricultural policy or starting your
own organic farm, you'll probably enjoy the chapters in which Stewart
writes about life on the farm, while you'll definitely love his wife's
woodcuts.
In the end, I didn't learn anything new from It's a Long Road to a Tomato, but I enjoyed the read. Chances are you'll feel the same.
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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