- Farm to Table (7)
Crow Vineyard has been a fixture here in the community for three generations. As a working farm, it has provided agricultural commodities, beef, jobs, and now superb wine for all of us to enjoy. Judy and Roy Crow’s commitment to their family’s traditions, their craft, and their community lead inexorably to the decision to promote similar businesses rooted in the same locale and committed to the same high standards of quality, innovation, and community. It is through the dynamic promotion of local partnerships that those of us who make and sell locally produced quality food and drink can succeed and provide a better solution to food products made distantly by corporate behemoths with no commitment to our community.
Keeping Products Real by Making Them from Locally Sourced Ingredients
My business, Figg’s Ordinary, in Chestertown, Maryland, uses locally-sourced ingredients in its relentless quest to produce original, gluten-free, and refined sugar free baked goods and prepared foods. Figg’s Ordinary shares Crow Vineyard’s emphasis on all things local. Our commitment is specifically intended to benefit our neighbors’ businesses, diminish carbon emissions by reducing the needless transport of food commodities, and help the community grow and prosper. That is Figg’s Ordinary’s pledge – to keep our products rooted in home-grown, keep our products fresh and original, and keep it REAL.
Serve the Community, not the Company
It is no surprise that Crow’s and Figg’s bonded instantly. Our shared values enable us to leverage each other’s products and to grow them and the community they serve. Figg’s Ordinary has begun the process of featuring Crow’s wine at our shop. What a combination! Delicious, mouth-watering Figg’s Ordinary foods and savory, sultry wine from Crow Vineyard. It will not get any better than this!
Make LOCAL “real”…. 5 Quick strategies
- The Figg’s Ordinary menu changes on a weekly and seasonal basis to optimize locally harvested foods. This variety best serves our customers and utilizes locally harvested produce.
- Figg’s Ordinary is a zero waste business. We compost all food scraps and recycle other waste as possible in Kent County, Maryland where our business is located.
- Figg’s Ordinary knows exactly where our food comes from and the farmer who grew it or the farmer whose chickens hatched the eggs we serve and use in our baked goods.
- Figg’s Ordinary works hard to establish a real community. Our name “Figg’s Ordinary” is a good example. “Ordinaries” provided a communal table around which travelers, politicians, and townspeople shared a meal and paused for conversation in the days of Colonial America. We replicate that sense of community today.
- Present authentically crafted foods and goods in a true farm environment.
Crow’s community farm to table events give businesses like mine the chance to tell our story in an authentic farm environment. Crow’s fits our partner model on many levels at their farm. Crow grows grapes and uses them to craft their own estate wines locally at their farm winery. They also offer seasonal menus and farm style family meals at their much celebrated B&B. Their chickens and cats delight in compost scraps (maybe wine too!)
Setting Farm to Table
Crow has been successful with the quality of its wines that have generated awards and inspired healthy sales. What’s behind this success? The genuine hospitality of the Crows to vineyard, B&B guests and local food producers alike who are welcomed to the farm to sip and eat local.
Please enjoy further chapters on this series “Setting the Farm Table” by subscribing to this rss feed and even better yet by visiting Crow Vineyard & Winery.
About the Author: About the Author: Ingrid Hansen is the Owner of Figg’s Ordinary, Gluten and Refined Sugar Free Foods and Cafe in Chestertown, Maryland. Ingrid has an academic background as an art historian, DC gallery owner, plus an MBA that led her into international trade economics.
photos: loblolly.biz