A New Farmer for City Market: Lorenzo's UrbanGreens

As I written here before, we need more farmers in Vermont. With a long list of local product gaps, and with the average age of farmers across the country steadily pushing toward retirement age, it’s vital that young people get started in farming.

^{The training of a future farmer? Photo by the UVM Farmer Training Program}

City Market helped train a dozen future farmers last summer, participating in the UVM Farmer Training Program. We hosted three groups of these students here at the Co-op to learn how to get into wholesale markets and discuss customer demand for local food. 

^{The class of 2011 show their pipes. Photo by the UVM Farmer Training Program.}

Working with these students was inspiring. I knew we were making a long-term investment, one whose return might come one day in the form of fresh local veggies, meats, grains, or cheese for our shelves.

But I really had no idea that we would see tangible results so soon. Just six months after the program, our investment landed local microgreens on our produce shelves. 

^{Annette Lorenzo with her microgreens.}

Annette Lorenzo is the first of the UVM Farmer Training Program's graduates to start producing food. As a vegan, Annette knew she wanted to grow greens and saw an opportunity to grow them indoors in the depths of Vermont’s winter.

^{Outside Annette's greenhouse on a cold January day.}

First up: microgreens, tender baby vegetables (including arugula, mustard greens, beets, and cabbage) harvested as small, intensely flavorful shoots and leaves after just 10-12 days of growth. Used as a garnish or salad, microgreens give us a nibble of summer greens 6 months before they will be available from local farms. 

^{Indoors it's sunny and warm, and the plants are loving it.}

By tapping into existing infrastructure at UVM, her business, Lorenzo's UrbanGreens has been able to produce microgreens without the overwhelming need for start-up capital that stymy many potential farmers. She rents greenhouse space by the foot from UVM who also provide assistance with the sprouts' almost constant watering demands. 

^{Annette pampering her microgreens.}

Before coming to farming, Annette was an MBA professor at the University of Redlands in Redlands, California. Given her business savvy, she’s frank about the challenges of profitably producing microgreens – she calls her trays of baby plants the most pampered plants in town. But there’s something beyond money that compels her forward. To Annette, the greenhouse, full of vibrant green leaves, red stems, and purple hues, is her art – art she’s eager to share with the Burlington community.

So just what do you do with microgreens? Aside from eating a pile of microgreens as a delicious vegetable, you can enjoy them:

Breakfast & Brunch

• As a garnish atop eggs

• As a tiny side salad (microgreens are so delicate and tender, they require no dressing) 

Lunch

• Add to salads

• Garnish soups, sandwiches and wraps

Dinner

• Top grilled fish, chicken or any other meat or seafood (try the reddish microgreens with pale foods)

• On baked potatoes and other vegetables

Plate Garnish

• Anytime, any plate, sprinkle microgreens around the perimeter or anywhere there’s “empty space” 

Cocktails

• Garnish savory drinks like martinis and Bloody Marys

• Float atop sweet drinks that need some pizzazz from a sprinkling of exotic Red Amaranth