About

Thanks for visiting my Farm to Jar Food blog.   I started this blog to share my farming, cooking and canning experiences with fresh fruit.   I have a small farm (23 acres) where I grow and specialize in blueberries and heirloom tomatoes, which I sell fresh at various farmers markets in the St Paul and Minneapolis area.  While we grow a wide range of other berries and vegetables on the farm, this “other” produce is grown either for our own family or to use in preserves that we make in the commercial kitchen located on the farm.

At the Stone Arch Festival

Over the past 14 years I’ve been selling the produce from our farm primarily at the St. Paul Farmers’ market, and my daughter has been selling for many years at the Mill City Farmers’ market in Minneapolis.   Based on experience and customer response at these markets, we have gradually evolved into four main specialty seasons:

• In the spring we start and then sell heirloom tomato and pepper seedlings;
• In the summer we sell fresh organic blueberries, overlapping with fresh heirloom tomatoes in late summer;
• In the fall the heirloom tomatoes are still going strong but we start bringing more of the jams and preserves;
• In the winter we do a number of indoor markets and events showcasing our unique line of preserves.

One of my favorite activities in the world is spending time at research and planning.  My education and first career was in Environmental Planning.  This blog is an attempt to share some of that research, as well as the hands-on experience resulting from the research.

I may wander around a lot with topics, sharing farming experiences, recipes, business experience, health & gardening issues, and sometimes just my life in general.   The overall theme of the blog however, is to share our farm experiences with fruit, canning and using jams in all kinds of dishes (beyond toast).  I hope you enjoy and I certainly welcome comments about your own experiences on these fun, flavorable, and sometimes frustrating topics.

Thank you for reading and sharing!

Dorothy