June 12, 2025 • 36 mins
This is a Vintage Selection from 2006
The Banter
The Guys talk about premium products and how much is too much to pay. From wild salmon to select chocolate, everyone has their spending limit…and The Guys wish theirs was a little higher.
The Conversation
The Restaurant Guys meet Farmer John Peterson to hear about the documentary The Real Dirt on Farmer John. John shares his story of suffering financial and emotional hardship to creating Angel Organics, one of the largest Community Supported Agriculture farms in the US.
The Inside Track
The Guys were eager to talk to John after seeing the documentary. John equates modern farms turning organic to people finding sobriety.
“When it's going from a chemical based system to a natural system, it has to be repopulated by the microorganisms. Maybe it's a little like someone going into an addiction clinic and then going from a dependent life to a healthy life. We were raising very unhealthy crops that the insects were invading. It took a long time to figure out how to build things up and how to get the soil healthy,” Farmer John Peterson on The Restaurant Guys 2006
Bio
John Peterson was raised on his family’s farm in Illinois. The financial calamity for the farming community hit the Peterson farm in the 1980s nearly closing the farm for good. John decided to rebuild using sustainable farming practices rather than the modern chemical-reliant approach. In 1991, Angel Organics was born. They opted for a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) model which continued until spring of 2025. Unfortunately, farming halted due to Farmer John having a stroke.
Info
The Real Dirt on Farmer John documentary
https://www.filmsforaction.org/watch/the-real-dirt-on-farmer-john-2005/
Info
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Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Mark (00:41):
Good morning there, mark.
Morning Francis.
How are you this morning?
I'm doing pretty well.
How about you?
Francis (00:46):
I'm doing all right.
Thank you very much.
Mark (00:48):
Yep.
So I gotta tell you, I'm, Iwanna start out this, this show,
talking about fish a little bit.
I.
Alright.
There's been a lot of, uh, pressabout, uh, uh, actually not a
lot, but certainly on the WestCoast there's been a lot of
press about the cost of wildsalmon.
Francis (01:05):
Something fishy there, huh?
Mark (01:07):
Oh golly.
Uh, wild salmon has sold for asmuch as$37 a pound for Copper
River Salmon in, uh,supermarkets.
Francis (01:15):
Let's backtrack and explain a little something to
our guests.
Um.
There's a big controversy now.
Wild.
Well, not controversy.
There's a big choice to be madebetween wild salmon, which
tastes better and is better foryou usually.
Uh, and that's my own personalopinion, so no one should sue me
for it.
Um, um, between wild salmon andfarmed salmon, um, now among
wild salmon, there are differentkinds of wild salmon and.
(01:39):
The different rivers, especiallyat the mouth of the rivers in
the Pacific Northwest and inAlaska.
Mm-hmm.
Copper Rivers is a specificriver in uh, Alaska.
In Alaska where the fish areknown because it's such a hard
river to get up the particulartype of fish.
And remember when we talk aboutspecific rivers, because salmon
always return to the same riverthey return to where they were
hatched to spawn.
(02:00):
So.
Different rivers will havedifferent types of salmon,
certain characteristics
Mark (02:04):
in the salmon, not just different breeds, which there
are obviously different breedsof salmon as well, but the
salmon themselves will havedifferent characteristics
Francis (02:10):
and you know, the, the Copper River is a very tough,
uh, river to get up.
And so the salmon build up ahuge store of fat at the
beginning of the year when theybegin the runs And, um.
There that fat, it translates toflavor.
Mm-hmm.
I mean, translates to beautiful,beautiful flavor.
But you were talking aboutprices.
Mark (02:26):
Well, so last year we had this big controversy over
counterfeit salmon in themarketplace.
New York Times did a front pagestory on it.
There was a lot of talk about,uh, uh, people selling wild
salmon, uh, farmy salmon as wildsalmon, right.
Counterfeit, which was a, whichwas a real issue this year.
The problem is, as.
More wild salmon's gotten moreand more press and more and more
(02:47):
people talking about the, thehealth benefits of wild salmon.
Uh, what we're seeing is a hugeincrease in price, 50 75, a
hundred percent in some places,copper River salmon in, in a
supermarket.
And that's what I started to saybefore.
$37 on restaurant, a pound 37, apound, a pound on restaurant
menus,$55 a portion, uh, on theWest Coast.
(03:11):
And I think this, that's a twopart.
Issue.
And the first is simply supplyand demand.
It's very early in the season,so you're not seeing a ton of
salmon in the marketplace.
So people are, are just spendingwhatever they need to spend to
get wild salmon.
We spent a fortune last weekendon an ivory wild salmon, a king
(03:31):
salmon, uh, from the, fromAlaska as well, but at the same
time, they're spending a lot ofmoney because there's just such
a huge demand for this fish.
You know, but I just, I'm not,I'm not ready to pay$37 a pound.
Francis (03:46):
I'm not ready to pay 37 bucks a pound for.
It's
Mark (03:48):
spectacular though.
It's something, it honestly, ifit were$37 a pound and that were
the price of it for forever,it's something I, it would
become a once in a while thingfor me.
Once a year, right?
Where, where now?
Wild salmon.
I must eat it in the 6, 8, 10week season where it's really
abundant.
You know, this late spring,early summertime.
I eat it, four times a week.
(04:09):
Mm-hmm.
Which, because I love it somuch, it's, it has got a, a much
richer flavor profile than, thanthe farm raised salmon that
we've all kind of becomeaccustomed to.
Francis (04:17):
But again, there's a difference between just general
wild salmon and Copper Riverwild salmon.
Absolutely.
Mark (04:21):
And there's also different breeds of salmon and that's
something that people need torealize as well.
The salmon that we tend to usein our restaurant, whenever
possible is king salmon.
king salmon is, is a salmon.
That's, that is, obviously that,just from the name of it you can
tell us is kind of the biggestof, of all the salmon and is,
tends to be very rich and, uh,has a lot of fat content.
When a product is scarce, whenit's rare and a lot of people
(04:45):
think it's really special andreally want it, price will go
up.
Francis (04:48):
Crazy stuff, you know, reminds me of there is a
chocolate that is Mark and myfavorite chocolate in the world
as far as raw chocolate.
There's, there are several, uh,C Chocolatier or um, c Chocola,
Laier.
Thank you.
Thank you.
C
Mark (05:01):
Chocola Tears.
I'm sure they'd love to becalled.
It's like a mouseketeer, but youmake chocolate, you wear the
hat, you don't wear the hat.
It's different.
It's different.
Francis (05:07):
Um, but the ears would melt.
Um, but if you go to, um, likethe GVA store mm-hmm.
Um, GVA does something betterthan almost any other
chocolatier.
I.
It's the boxes, the, the goldenboxes, very attractively
packaged, beautiful box of,they've done a great
Mark (05:24):
job
Francis (05:24):
packaging chocolate.
Mark (05:25):
Uh, I don't think, honestly, for me, I don't think
it's chocolate.
I just think that there arechocolates that I like better
that are.
12% of the price, 15% of theprice rather have a Hershey bar.
I would not rather have aHershey bar, for instance,
special dark.
I, I still, I would, I'd ratherhave good divers chocolate than
a Hershey bar.
But, but the next step up fromHershey Bar, I'd rather have
Francis (05:44):
than in, in the world of chocolate.
I mean, there's packaging andthere's also real chocolate
taste, and it's not just aboutcocoa content.
Mm-hmm.
It's about here's howchocolate's made.
I mean, it's, there, there arefour ingredients to chocolate.
It's cocoa, uh, cocoa butter.
Mm-hmm.
Uh, vanilla and sugar.
That's it.
That's all you get in realchocolate.
Right?
And, and how there's a cornsyrup in there.
You should.
And how that's done Well, evenamong high-end C chocolatier,
(06:07):
uh, what they usually do, uh,among high-end c chocola, laier.
Thank, I just can't say that allthe time.
You're just
Mark (06:12):
gonna keep saying C chocolatier.
I know.
It just sound fancy schmancy.
Then you're gonna keep gettingthat look from me from across
the studio that you've beengetting every time you say it.
Francis (06:19):
But, but what most high-end, chocolate makers do it
like Valona is, is a greathigh-end chocolate maker.
They actually make chocolate,but anything smaller than that.
Those people buy chocolate andmake candies.
Mm-hmm.
Um, there is a small company inItaly and Valona is a, a
chocolate maker.
Is a c Chocola here, and you canbuy Valona chocolate.
We use Valona chocolate in ourrestaurant.
Mark (06:41):
Yeah.
A couple places like Cole Foods,there's a, there's a lot of
stores that not carry Valona.
Francis (06:44):
Um, but Amadei, uh, it's A-M-A-D-E-I mm-hmm.
Is an Italian, uh, cha laier,um, C chocolatier.
Um, and, and they makechocolate.
They don't just make candy.
They make some of the highestend chocolate in the world, and
it's just become available inthe country again for like.
A hundred bucks for a pound ofchocolate, which is just crazy.
(07:05):
We actually, when it was, therewas a, um, when it was in the
country last, um, we got some,and just before they lost their
last distribution, we picked upa bunch of it for 20 bucks a
pound.
We picked up like.
75 pounds of it for a hundredand, and awesome.
I mean, at 20 bucks a pound anabsolutely awesome talking.
It was tremendous.
But at a hundred bucks a pound,that becomes again, a once in a
once in a while, know, I think,
Mark (07:25):
I think a hundred dollars a pound and you're almost never
gonna get to hear me say thison, on the radio show for
something that I adore.
I think it's too expensive.
Francis (07:34):
Well, it depends.
You gotta make more from theradio show.
I'm just,
Mark (07:39):
or perhaps I'm not wealthy enough.
I think that're you're, you'reoutta the AM Lee.
Francis (07:43):
But the thing about Aade chocolate is they actually
make chocolate.
They buy raw cacao and makechocolate there, and they have
an expiration date on thechocolate.
And it really is, I'll tell youif you, if you see it out there,
'cause it's gonna becomeavailable, it's in a few shops
in the United States.
Mm-hmm.
The world has changed, huh?
Yeah, I was
Mark (07:59):
talking to somebody that, that AADE chocolate's no longer
available in the United Statesand they, they sent me a little
email like 12 minutes later.
Sure it is.
Look right here.
I Googled it.
I think you have it shippedthere.
It is.
Francis (08:09):
Uh, worth trying.
It is probably the bestchocolate in the world, but
unless you're rich, I don'tknow.
Might just give yourself ahabit.
You can't, uh, you can't livewith, Hey, listen, we're gonna
be talking with, with.
Farmer John is the subject of anew documentary that you can
find on PBS coming up next week,or you can find through our
website.
Really tremendous.
Stay tuned.
You're listening to TheRestaurant Guys, Our guest today
is someone I've been waiting togive on the show for quite a
(08:30):
while.
His name is John Peterson.
He is a lifelong farmer, uh, andhe also runs the, largest
community supported farm in thecountry.
Angelic organics.
Um, more than a thousandfamilies get their vegetables
delivered, uh, from John's FarmWeekly.
He's also an artist and awriter.
The real Dirt on Farmer John isa documentary spending decades
of his farm's struggle nearbankruptcy, rebirth, and return
(08:51):
to solvency.
It's also about him.
It's also about America.
Mark (08:54):
John, how are you today?
Welcome to the show.
I.
Good,
Francis (08:57):
thank you.
Mark (08:57):
Or should we call you Farmer John?
John (08:59):
A lot of people
Francis (09:00):
call me Farmer John.
So, so John, the, the film isabout your farm and your
family's been farming since thethirties and you went through
the, the debt crisis of theeighties and you had to sell a
lot of your land, and you'vebeen able to reinvent the farm
and make it solvent again.
This film spans your whole life.
Um, is the film about you, isthe film about farms or is the
(09:20):
film about America?
Um.
John (09:23):
Well, it, it's basically my life story and that includes
the farm because the farm and Ihave been woven together since I
was born.
Speaker 5 (09:31):
Mm-hmm.
John (09:32):
And there are people, they were talking to me about
creating a, a site on thewebpage that correlates my
personal history with that ofthe,.
the.
Macrocosmic history of Americanagriculture.
Mm-hmm.
So I haven't seen that yet, but,um, you know, there, there,
there's a lot of, correlations.
(09:53):
But then I'm, You know, I'm nota real typical farmer, and so
there's gonna be some deviationstoo.
For instance, I, I immersedmyself in the hippie era and a
lot of other farmers did not,
Francis (10:04):
yeah, that's not our image of farmers.
But still,
Mark (10:07):
but I would say from the time that you put the farm into
a, into a lot of debt based on,on, uh, I don't wanna say
promises from banks, butcertainly, false expectations.
Uh.
From that moment forward, Ithink that, that your plate was
very close to exactly what a lotof the small farmers in the
United States faced.
(10:28):
And, and that was what I reallyrelated to in the movie.
John (10:32):
I went through a very funny, weird program about my,
about the film recently, um,where experts were doing the
commentary on my life and it wasa really interesting thing that
they.
Yeah, I, I went in disguisebecause I was told that the
experts were the ones who weregonna, tell my story and that
they could do a good job of it.
(10:53):
And I was, I said, well, no, I,I think I could do a better job
of it since I was living mylife.
And anyway, it was interestingto hear these experts, uh,
analysis of the situation and.
And I, I had to finally, uh, youknow, stand up and reveal myself
to the whole audience.
You don't strike
Mark (11:11):
me as the kind of guy who would not reveal yourself to the
whole audience.
John (11:15):
I farmer John in disguise.
But the interesting thing was,they said millions of farmers
worked hard.
They were no nonsense.
They, they were great farmersand they lost their land in the
early eighties, and it justhappened that farmer, John
Peterson lost his farm at thesame time, but he lost it for
very different reasons.
He partied.
Francis (11:34):
Oh man.
John (11:36):
And, and you know, it's interesting, when I finally
revealed myself and I waswearing this goatee and this
wig, and I had all this makeupon, I spent the whole afternoon
at a costume shop in, uh, onBroadway in 11th in Manhattan
Speaker 5 (11:50):
Uhhuh.
John (11:51):
I, I just thought, well, this is gonna be really
interesting to hear what peoplehave to say about my life.
But the thing is, I feltagriculture should be
celebrated.
Speaker 5 (12:00):
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
John (12:01):
I felt that.
It had become very barren, veryvoid of actual life of, of, of a
kind of a heart relationship.
And so in the seventies I feltthat besides running a farm, we
needed to acknowledge that wewere on a farm and that we were
growing food and that we were ina place of.
Of life.
Francis (12:21):
You talk in your, in, in the, in the, in the film, it
follows you on a sojourn or anumber of sojourns to Mexico,
and it draws some starkcomparisons between American
agriculture and Mexicanagriculture that sort of speak
to that.
You wanna talk to us about that?
John (12:35):
Well, in the fifties, before the farm chemicals came
in and, and started to dominateagriculture, I, I feel that, uh,
American farmers really.
We're truly closer.
They were close to the land.
They lived out of a relationshipto the land.
It's a much more authenticrelationship.
(12:56):
And then when chemicals came init, they, they just got in the
way of that.
They, they got in the way ofthat profound intimate
connection to the land.
There's still a connection, butit's different.
And so I think the wholecharacter of.
rural society began to changeout of people farming with
chemicals and that changingtheir relationship to the land.
Francis (13:18):
How so?
How did it change the fabric ofthe society when people started
farming with chemicals?
John (13:23):
Well, it made it so farmers could farm more land,
and the consequence of that wasthat they were.
Less associated, less connectedto each unit of land that they
were farming.
Suddenly they went from these160 or 300 acre operations up to
(13:44):
the thousands of acres.
And so it kinda, I, I'm gonnause the term as maybe not quite
accurate, but it, I'd say itcommodified agriculture.
It turned it more into a, uh.
A, a business and a, a system ofproduction and a way of life and
a relationship.
Mark (14:02):
I, I think that's fairly accurate.
Francis (14:04):
and also I think that one of the things that film
deals with a lot is it changesrural agriculture in that each
person becomes more isolated.
I wanna talk more about that injust a moment with John
Peterson.
He's the subject of thedocumentary, the Real Dirt on
Farmer John, It's an amazingfun, a wonderful documentary
that talks about all the stuffthat we talk about, community
farming.
Organic farming, and the plightof the American farmer in
(14:25):
general.
And it's also a, a lot of funNow, John, you've also written a
companion book to the show, theFarmer John Cookbook.
Right?
Right.
What's that all about?
Is that just a cookbook?
John (14:34):
Well, I, I'm so excited about farms and I felt that, uh,
a cookbook that I write wouldhave to include the, the story
of the farm itself.
So it takes the reader or thecook right out to the farm and,
Gives an experience of how thevegetables were raised.
Um, not in a technical way, morein a dramatic or poetic way.
(14:57):
Uh, the weather dramas the, um,the cook on the farm writing in
a, in a very colorful way aboutharvesting the vegetables, the
photographs in the cookbook areof the vegetables growing in the
fields or of the people workingwith the vegetables, because I
feel that.
So often the, the food arrivesin the kitchen and then it's,
(15:18):
well, what now?
What do we do with it?
Well, where's the relationshipwith the food?
Where's the relationship withthe history of it?
And so I really wanted to bringthat in.
And, um, also, I think RudolphSteiner is an extraordinary, or
was an extraordinary man whooffered a lot to, civilization
and he's not very widelyrecognized or read.
(15:41):
And so I brought some RudolphSteiner and some of his insights
into food where he oftenregarded food or, or, uh,
expressed food as a material offorces that it has to do with
forces at least as much as ithas to do with substance
(16:02):
instance.
He said that.
Stimulated the rhythmic system.
Mark (16:07):
Mm-hmm.
The
John (16:08):
circulation and the, the breathing.
Mark (16:10):
You, you're talking about the biodynamics of, of
agriculture
John (16:13):
biodynamics.
And a very interesting thingthat he said, which is really
the basis for, uh, the, the, hislectures on, on agriculture,
which became biodynamic farming.
He.
Food no longer carries theforces that allows people to
transform their will into actionor their will into results.
That the Earth's forces aredwindling and that they need to
(16:36):
be re stimulated, reactivated,because people live in their
dream states.
They live in their.
Their, their desires, butthey're not able to transform
them into actions.
Then
Francis (16:48):
we're gonna have to take, we're gonna have to take a
quick, quick break there for thenews John.
We'll be back in just a moment.
Talking with John Peterson, he'sthe subject of the documentary,
the Real Dirt on Farmer John,back in just a moment.
Our guest today is JohnPeterson.
He is a lifelong farmer and,owner of the largest community
supported farm or CSA in thecountry with angelic organics.
Than a thousand families gettheir vegetables delivered
weekly from John's farm.
(17:09):
He's also an artist and awriter.
The Real Dirt on Farmer John isdocumentary spanning decades of
his farm struggles.
You can find out about it on ourwebsite.
Uh, he's got the Farmer JohnCookbook as well.
the documentary is great in thatit, it talks about.
A traditional farming family,how you, you know, took over
your family's farm at a veryyoung age due to some family
tragedy and how you weatheredthe storm of, of the eighties
(17:33):
and, and how you brought thefarm back and what exactly a, a
community supported farm is, isall about.
Can you talk to us about howyou, how you've reinvented it
that way?
John (17:41):
I went down very hard in the early eighties,
Mark (17:44):
like a lot of farmers,
John (17:45):
like a lot of farmers, and, um.
And I, I went from being a veryexuberant, enthusiastic,
hardworking person to being big,almost bedridden with grief.
And, um, and I was sick, or atleast I, I, I felt sick and, uh,
(18:06):
and how did I recover from that?
It was a very, very long journeyhere.
I'd lost most of the familyoperation.
My machinery was gone and, um,you
Mark (18:15):
had to sell off a lot of the family land.
John (18:17):
Yeah, I, I, I was humiliated and ashamed and, and
so I gradually restored myself.
I mean, how I did that, I, Iencountered, classical
homeopathy, which, uh, I thinkactually was my bridge later to
biodynamics.
And that works on a, deepconstitutional level, the
(18:38):
classical homeopathy does.
And so that gradually helped torestore me.
Actually going through andsorting out all the stuff that
had accumulated on the farm.
I, I, I started to organize myexterior world.
It took a couple years ofpainstaking work.
(18:58):
There's a lot of junk, a lot ofclutter around, and, I, as I
began to work with mysurroundings in that way, I
think it started to reorganizemyself internally.
Francis (19:09):
And, and so tell us how you, how you changed the farm
and how you changed the, thebusiness model of the farm.
John (19:14):
Right.
Well, I wanna say I was, I wason a creative journey too, and I
was doing a lot of, I waswriting screenplays, I was
performing, I was studying towrite the story of my life.
So a lot of these thingsconverged to.
Empower me finally to have thestrength to just think, oh, I
can, I can move forward.
So when, and you asked thequestion, I just wanna pick that
(19:37):
thread up.
You said, well, how, how was theUnited States different from
Mexico or the real culturedifferent?
Well, in me, when I startedgoing to Mexico, which I, I
started doing regularly after Ilost the land people there seem
much closer to the land and theculture that the society there
seemed more.
(19:58):
Sort of, I'm gonna use the wordrustic, but I, I think it's more
like landed more grounded.
So the way people talk and walkand move and, and then just
looking out into the fields,often you'll see people walking
or standing in the fields.
The, the landscape of Mexico isactually populated by human
(20:18):
beings.
Mm-hmm.
Drive through the heartland ofthe United States and you'll
hardly ever see a, a human beingout in the field.
it rekindled that feeling ofrelationship to the land to be
in this, this great countrywhere people were, were actually
living close to the land.
And that was something that Icould remember from the fifties
(20:40):
where it seemed that my owncountryside was more populated
by.
Much more populated by humanbeings for people, livestock,
and, um, more life, morevibrancy on the farms.
Now there's shelves, mostly inthe Midwest, but in Mexico, you
still get a feeling of life.
Just wandering around andinhabiting the, the countryside.
Mark (21:01):
I wanna talk about community supported agriculture.
I want, I really, really want toget into the, the CSAs and, and
how that has changed, uh, yourfarm and, and kind of brought it
up to date.
And the, and the first questionI want to ask you about
community supported agricultureis, is do you think it could
pierce the mainstream, the waythe hippie culture pierced the
(21:21):
mainstream in the sixties?
Do you think that, that that canhappen now 40 years later?
With CSAs?
John (21:27):
Great question.
I talk about this quite a bitbecause what I'm noticing now
is, well, 20 years ago there wasno community supported
agriculture farm in the UnitedStates, and now.
There are probably, uh, amillion people that get their
food from a community supportedagriculture program.
Francis (21:44):
Just briefly to explain what a community supported
agriculture farm is, that'swhere people get together and
they buy a share of the farm upin the beginning of, of the
season, and you subscribe to thefarm and you get the ve you get
the produce so that farmthroughout the season.
And so you absorb some of theeconomic risk of the farmer and.
You put yourself in the hands ofnature as to what's seasonal and
what's harvested when, and you,and you have, uh, coming from
(22:06):
John's heart, you have over athousand people who get every
week, get a box of vegetablesfrom the farm, not knowing
exactly what's gonna be in thatbox.
And, and that's what we'retalking about with community
supported.
And, and,
Mark (22:16):
and just so people know, stage left and Lombardi belonged
to, a local CSA in order to getsome of our products.
Francis (22:23):
So we interrupted you, John.
Go ahead.
John (22:26):
Well, uh, from our farm, there are probably about, uh,
5,000 people that are eatingevery week, which I think is
just, it.
It's a, it's a form of asacrament, really.
I mean, in a way it's a table.
The farm is a table.
5,000 people are eating fromthat farm's table every week.
And when you think about.
(22:47):
A million people in the UnitedStates that are doing this.
And, and when they do it, manyof them are thinking about that
farm that they're, that they're,um, a member of, uh, that it's
not necessarily an an ongoingintentional re um, relationship
or pondering, but it, it has tocome into people's consciousness
(23:09):
frequently when they're eatingthe food, when they get the box.
Mark (23:12):
I think it especially comes into their consciousness
when they encounter somethingnew and, and in the movie, you,
you, you, uh, bring kohl robeout and, and when they encounter
some product that they may nothave encountered in the past.
John (23:25):
Yeah.
Or, oh, wow.
Weather, weather affects the,the, yeah.
Speaker 5 (23:28):
Yeah.
John (23:29):
I'm, I'm now connected to the weather.
It's so extraordinary when youthink all these people now are
thinking about a place that theycall their farm.
Speaker 5 (23:37):
Yeah.
John (23:38):
Now they have something that they call their farm and,
and they go out, they take theirchildren out, their children see
these, these, uh, vegetablesgrowing in the fields.
And sometimes the people getinvolved in, in, um, you know,
helping on the farm,volunteering to work in the
fields.
And it, it re enlivensagriculture.
(23:59):
And it, it, you know, it, it rereen nobles, the farmer.
The farmer is acknowledged and,and held in a different regard
because.
Now it's the farmer.
The farmer for this group ofpeople that belong to the farm.
Francis (24:12):
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, and, and if you wannafind out about how to join a CSA
locally, there's an organizationyou can go to and we'll put it
up on our website.
You can go to local harvest.organd, and find out how you can
become a member of, of a CSA.
One of the nice things aboutthat I like about the film in
the end is, is how the familiesdo bring their children back to
the farm and, and sort ofparticipate.
Now you write newsletters andyou encourage that, right?
John (24:34):
Oh, yeah.
It's a very, very important partof it.
completes the picture.
And, and, you know, and it also,it, it just transforms the model
that we have of the, theconsumer and the producer.
It's, it's a different modelbecause people come together.
They, they get to know oneanother.
They get to know one another'sneeds.
And then, for instance, in ourcase, we needed land to have a,
(24:54):
the right size farm and our, ourshareholders.
Uh, came together and theybought that land and then they,
they leased it to the, to thefarm.
And so now we're able to havehalf of our land fallow every
year building up the fertilitywith, uh, alfalfa and clover.
And that's because these peoplewho are our customers, you know,
(25:14):
often the customers and the theproducer have an adversarial
relationship.
They're just trying to get, youknow, the both sides are trying
to get the better deal.
But in this case, there'scooperation, there's
understanding, there'scommunication, and.
Magical things have come out ofthat, you know, and
Francis (25:31):
that does, that does twist things on its head.
I mean, while it, it's certainlystill a capitalist endeavor
with, with our farms.
I mean, we are, once we get, geton board and come up with a, a
way to support things early on,we're all in the same boat
together.
And that's what a CSA is allabout.
Now John, one of the things Ithink that.
People don't realize when they,uh, when they pay extra for
(25:51):
organic vegetables, um, it'smore expensive to produce
organic vegetables and to getsomeone to make the change.
I thought one of the greatservices the documentary did was
to talk about that period whenyou changed over from chemical
based agriculture.
To organic agriculture and, andhow you got from, from one point
to the next.
Mark (26:11):
And one of, one of the things you just mentioned is
you, you allow the half of yourland to, to lay fallow for dirt
for the year.
So you can switch areas one yearto the next.
Very expensive.
Francis (26:21):
But even more than that, in making the switch.
I mean, you, you liken the, yousaid the land can become
dependent on chemicals, likepeople become dependent on drugs
and there's a period ofwithdrawal.
You wanna talk about that inyour experiences with it?
John (26:31):
yeah.
When, when it's going from achemical based system to a
natural system and it has to berepopulated by the
microorganisms and, maybe it's alittle like someone going into
a, a heroin, uh, clinic, anaddiction clinic getting from a,
a dependent life to a healthylife that the person was just
laying there on the bed in apanic and huge pain.
(26:54):
And so you, you can't see a farmrise like that, but you have a
feeling that's what it's doingbecause it seems like it shuts
down, like the system shut down.
And, and, and we were raisingvery unhealthy crops that in,
that the insects were invading.
And, uh, and it took a long timeto figure out how to build
things up and how to get thesoil healthy.
(27:16):
And, and a lot of other systemshave to be in place, not just
about, uh.
Healthy soil, but, but that's acornerstone of it.
And yeah, it took several yearsbefore we could actually start
getting, you know, full boxes ona regular basis.
Francis (27:50):
You know, um, I, I, I thought one of the other really
very interesting parts of your,of your story was there was
basically a point where when youcame back to the farm and you
decided to rededicate toyourself to the farm and decided
to go organic and, create thefarm in the way that you had it
in your imagination, in yourmind.
Um, it wasn't exactly a smoothreentry into the community.
There were, there were lots ofpeople that seemed to think that
you were a drug dealing, childkilling Satan worshiper are, are
(28:13):
you really a Satan worshiper?
That was facetious.
Uh,
John (28:19):
yeah.
That, that still persists a bitin the community.
Although, um, uh, I, now thatthere's this movie out, um,
people just seem to think.
I'm a much better human being'cause I was, I'm in a movie,
but really, I, I, I don't thinkthat makes me a better human
being.
I think, I think that redeeminga farm, getting a farm back on
(28:42):
its feet is a, a, a worthwhileand a, and a, a noble endeavor.
And I'm very happy that I didthat.
But it's interesting that in thecommunity, no one's ever came
and said, Hey, this is amazing.
You brought a farm back to life.
But there are people who say.
Oh, that's so great.
You're in a documentary film.
Mark (29:00):
That's funny.
Well, I, but I do think that,that what you've given people a
chance to see is, is behind thescenes, what actually happened
over that period of time.
I mean, it is amazing the amountof, of footage you have from
your early life and from theearly days on the farm.
I, I just don't think mostpeople have that much footage
of, their early life in the, inthe fifties and sixties.
John (29:23):
Yeah, no, and my mom loves the bounty of the farm.
She loved farming, and so youcan really see that in her
camera work.
Mm-hmm.
She just, uh, when we had a goodoat crop or a great corn crop or
a new piece of equipment, she'dgo out there and document it.
and wanted to, you know, show itto the neighbors later.
Francis (29:39):
Well, now, now your neighbors had some trouble with
you when you came back and, andrestarted the farm and turned
things around, but you'reobviously successful.
Forget the documentary for, youknow, you've turned a farm
around and made it economicallyviable again in a vibrant
business.
Are your neighbors followingsuit?
Are your neighbors asking foradvice?
Are is what's going on in theother farms around you?
Are other people turning farmsaround other ways?
John (30:00):
the most of the farms, they're really huge corn and
bean operations, or biglivestock operations in the
area.
And, and very few of thosepeople are interested in, in
raising vegetables at all, evenif they're struggling, uh, with
their own operations, thevegetable operations, so
dramatically different than thekind of farming that they do.
(30:21):
But when you go.
And you find pockets of, offarmers that are interested.
And there's a, the CSA learningcenter at the farming non-profit
organization has a, a program inthe winter where they help train
farmers into, uh.
Transitioning to organic or theyhelp farmers get or help people
(30:41):
get started farming.
Mm-hmm.
There's an interest, but, uh,right in my local community,
it's just a, it's just corn andbeans and happens on a massive
scale, which I, I wanna pointout before the, the show ends.
I, I don't know if you, uh, knowthis, but, the film won the Slow
Food on Film Golden Snail Awardfor.
(31:04):
And we're going to be presentingit in, in, uh, Italy in late
October to about 5,000 chefs andfarmers, and it's very exciting
that the film is, is recognizedby the Slow Food organization as
a kind of a, a, you a model foragriculture.
Well,
Mark (31:21):
the, the film has won a lot, a lot of awards and, uh,
slow food is just one of them.
John (31:25):
25 awards.
Francis (31:28):
It's, it's amazing.
And it's amazing to me thateverybody in your community
isn't like, just hasn't seen thefilm and seen that the, the
point behind it in, in whatyou've done with the farm.
Hey, John, I, I, the, the, thesuccess nationally and
internationally about this filmin, in, at least in cult film
circles, it's got, it's, it'sgotta be really surprising and
(31:48):
shocking, but it, it are yougetting more recognition farther
away from your home than you getat home.
John (31:55):
Yes.
Francis (31:57):
I think that, I think that's bizarre.
Well, I want to thank you forcoming on, on the show, the
movie's Great.
What you've done with it isgreat, and the message that
that's coming out is terrific.
Mark (32:05):
a really interesting and and riveting program, which I, I
think especially when you'rewatching this movie, the first
20 minutes or so of the movie.
Looks like the movie's kind ofgoing in, in one way and then,
your life kind of changes andthe movie kind of turns with it.
I found it very interesting.
John (32:22):
Yeah.
I wanna say I'm probably gonnabe in Europe for several months
in the fall and winter, becausethe film's got quite a, quite a
run going on overseas, probablyin theaters and, and in
festivals.
So it, it's really getting outall over the world.
So it's.
Very exciting.
But then again, being on a touris not farming.
And farming is, uh, uh, its ownform of excitement.
(32:44):
I was just about to
Mark (32:44):
say, you're not gonna quit farming on us, are you?
John (32:47):
Well, I definitely wanna have more time to perform and,
and to write.
That's very important to me.
And, and I think my mission wasmore to get the farm back on its
feet than it was for me to bepersonally farming, because as
you can probably tell from thefilm, um, I, I got a lot of
other creative interests, so.
The, the farm on its feet.
Now it gives me a whole newopportunity for my own life.
Francis (33:09):
Well, I think that's great, and the work you do is
really tremendous.
it's amazing what you've done.
Thank you.
Take care of that.
That was John Peterson.
John Peterson is the subject todocumentary The Real Dirt on
Farmer John.
It's a great.
Film.
I mean, even if you don't careabout farming.
It's a great film.
It's a tremendous documentaryand it's about John.
It's really interesting.
It's about John, but it has alot of lessons for, for, you
know, where our food comes fromtoday and a lot of what we talk
(33:31):
about.
So hope you've enjoyed the hourlistening to the restaurant.
Guys.
I'm Francis Shot.
Mark (33:34):
And I'm Mark Pascal.
Francis (33:35):
We are the restaurant guys, central Jersey 1450.
The time is 12
Mark (33:39):
noon.
Good morning there, mark.
Morning Francis.
How are you this morning?
I'm doing pretty well.
How about you?
Francis (00:46):
I'm doing all right.
Thank you very much.
Mark (00:48):
Yep.
So I gotta tell you, I'm, Iwanna start out this, this show,
talking about fish a little bit.
I.
Alright.
There's been a lot of, uh, pressabout, uh, uh, actually not a
lot, but certainly on the WestCoast there's been a lot of
press about the cost of wildsalmon.
Francis (01:05):
Something fishy there, huh?
Mark (01:07):
Oh golly.
Uh, wild salmon has sold for asmuch as$37 a pound for Copper
River Salmon in, uh,supermarkets.
Francis (01:15):
Let's backtrack and explain a little something to
our guests.
Um.
There's a big controversy now.
Wild.
Well, not controversy.
There's a big choice to be madebetween wild salmon, which
tastes better and is better foryou usually.
Uh, and that's my own personalopinion, so no one should sue me
for it.
Um, um, between wild salmon andfarmed salmon, um, now among
wild salmon, there are differentkinds of wild salmon and.
(01:39):
The different rivers, especiallyat the mouth of the rivers in
the Pacific Northwest and inAlaska.
Mm-hmm.
Copper Rivers is a specificriver in uh, Alaska.
In Alaska where the fish areknown because it's such a hard
river to get up the particulartype of fish.
And remember when we talk aboutspecific rivers, because salmon
always return to the same riverthey return to where they were
hatched to spawn.
(02:00):
So.
Different rivers will havedifferent types of salmon,
certain characteristics
Mark (02:04):
in the salmon, not just different breeds, which there
are obviously different breedsof salmon as well, but the
salmon themselves will havedifferent characteristics
Francis (02:10):
and you know, the, the Copper River is a very tough,
uh, river to get up.
And so the salmon build up ahuge store of fat at the
beginning of the year when theybegin the runs And, um.
There that fat, it translates toflavor.
Mm-hmm.
I mean, translates to beautiful,beautiful flavor.
But you were talking aboutprices.
Mark (02:26):
Well, so last year we had this big controversy over
counterfeit salmon in themarketplace.
New York Times did a front pagestory on it.
There was a lot of talk about,uh, uh, people selling wild
salmon, uh, farmy salmon as wildsalmon, right.
Counterfeit, which was a, whichwas a real issue this year.
The problem is, as.
More wild salmon's gotten moreand more press and more and more
(02:47):
people talking about the, thehealth benefits of wild salmon.
Uh, what we're seeing is a hugeincrease in price, 50 75, a
hundred percent in some places,copper River salmon in, in a
supermarket.
And that's what I started to saybefore.
$37 on restaurant, a pound 37, apound, a pound on restaurant
menus,$55 a portion, uh, on theWest Coast.
(03:11):
And I think this, that's a twopart.
Issue.
And the first is simply supplyand demand.
It's very early in the season,so you're not seeing a ton of
salmon in the marketplace.
So people are, are just spendingwhatever they need to spend to
get wild salmon.
We spent a fortune last weekendon an ivory wild salmon, a king
(03:31):
salmon, uh, from the, fromAlaska as well, but at the same
time, they're spending a lot ofmoney because there's just such
a huge demand for this fish.
You know, but I just, I'm not,I'm not ready to pay$37 a pound.
Francis (03:46):
I'm not ready to pay 37 bucks a pound for.
It's
Mark (03:48):
spectacular though.
It's something, it honestly, ifit were$37 a pound and that were
the price of it for forever,it's something I, it would
become a once in a while thingfor me.
Once a year, right?
Where, where now?
Wild salmon.
I must eat it in the 6, 8, 10week season where it's really
abundant.
You know, this late spring,early summertime.
I eat it, four times a week.
(04:09):
Mm-hmm.
Which, because I love it somuch, it's, it has got a, a much
richer flavor profile than, thanthe farm raised salmon that
we've all kind of becomeaccustomed to.
Francis (04:17):
But again, there's a difference between just general
wild salmon and Copper Riverwild salmon.
Absolutely.
Mark (04:21):
And there's also different breeds of salmon and that's
something that people need torealize as well.
The salmon that we tend to usein our restaurant, whenever
possible is king salmon.
king salmon is, is a salmon.
That's, that is, obviously that,just from the name of it you can
tell us is kind of the biggestof, of all the salmon and is,
tends to be very rich and, uh,has a lot of fat content.
When a product is scarce, whenit's rare and a lot of people
(04:45):
think it's really special andreally want it, price will go
up.
Francis (04:48):
Crazy stuff, you know, reminds me of there is a
chocolate that is Mark and myfavorite chocolate in the world
as far as raw chocolate.
There's, there are several, uh,C Chocolatier or um, c Chocola,
Laier.
Thank you.
Thank you.
C
Mark (05:01):
Chocola Tears.
I'm sure they'd love to becalled.
It's like a mouseketeer, but youmake chocolate, you wear the
hat, you don't wear the hat.
It's different.
It's different.
Francis (05:07):
Um, but the ears would melt.
Um, but if you go to, um, likethe GVA store mm-hmm.
Um, GVA does something betterthan almost any other
chocolatier.
I.
It's the boxes, the, the goldenboxes, very attractively
packaged, beautiful box of,they've done a great
Mark (05:24):
job
Francis (05:24):
packaging chocolate.
Mark (05:25):
Uh, I don't think, honestly, for me, I don't think
it's chocolate.
I just think that there arechocolates that I like better
that are.
12% of the price, 15% of theprice rather have a Hershey bar.
I would not rather have aHershey bar, for instance,
special dark.
I, I still, I would, I'd ratherhave good divers chocolate than
a Hershey bar.
But, but the next step up fromHershey Bar, I'd rather have
Francis (05:44):
than in, in the world of chocolate.
I mean, there's packaging andthere's also real chocolate
taste, and it's not just aboutcocoa content.
Mm-hmm.
It's about here's howchocolate's made.
I mean, it's, there, there arefour ingredients to chocolate.
It's cocoa, uh, cocoa butter.
Mm-hmm.
Uh, vanilla and sugar.
That's it.
That's all you get in realchocolate.
Right?
And, and how there's a cornsyrup in there.
You should.
And how that's done Well, evenamong high-end C chocolatier,
(06:07):
uh, what they usually do, uh,among high-end c chocola, laier.
Thank, I just can't say that allthe time.
You're just
Mark (06:12):
gonna keep saying C chocolatier.
I know.
It just sound fancy schmancy.
Then you're gonna keep gettingthat look from me from across
the studio that you've beengetting every time you say it.
Francis (06:19):
But, but what most high-end, chocolate makers do it
like Valona is, is a greathigh-end chocolate maker.
They actually make chocolate,but anything smaller than that.
Those people buy chocolate andmake candies.
Mm-hmm.
Um, there is a small company inItaly and Valona is a, a
chocolate maker.
Is a c Chocola here, and you canbuy Valona chocolate.
We use Valona chocolate in ourrestaurant.
Mark (06:41):
Yeah.
A couple places like Cole Foods,there's a, there's a lot of
stores that not carry Valona.
Francis (06:44):
Um, but Amadei, uh, it's A-M-A-D-E-I mm-hmm.
Is an Italian, uh, cha laier,um, C chocolatier.
Um, and, and they makechocolate.
They don't just make candy.
They make some of the highestend chocolate in the world, and
it's just become available inthe country again for like.
A hundred bucks for a pound ofchocolate, which is just crazy.
(07:05):
We actually, when it was, therewas a, um, when it was in the
country last, um, we got some,and just before they lost their
last distribution, we picked upa bunch of it for 20 bucks a
pound.
We picked up like.
75 pounds of it for a hundredand, and awesome.
I mean, at 20 bucks a pound anabsolutely awesome talking.
It was tremendous.
But at a hundred bucks a pound,that becomes again, a once in a
once in a while, know, I think,
Mark (07:25):
I think a hundred dollars a pound and you're almost never
gonna get to hear me say thison, on the radio show for
something that I adore.
I think it's too expensive.
Francis (07:34):
Well, it depends.
You gotta make more from theradio show.
I'm just,
Mark (07:39):
or perhaps I'm not wealthy enough.
I think that're you're, you'reoutta the AM Lee.
Francis (07:43):
But the thing about Aade chocolate is they actually
make chocolate.
They buy raw cacao and makechocolate there, and they have
an expiration date on thechocolate.
And it really is, I'll tell youif you, if you see it out there,
'cause it's gonna becomeavailable, it's in a few shops
in the United States.
Mm-hmm.
The world has changed, huh?
Yeah, I was
Mark (07:59):
talking to somebody that, that AADE chocolate's no longer
available in the United Statesand they, they sent me a little
email like 12 minutes later.
Sure it is.
Look right here.
I Googled it.
I think you have it shippedthere.
It is.
Francis (08:09):
Uh, worth trying.
It is probably the bestchocolate in the world, but
unless you're rich, I don'tknow.
Might just give yourself ahabit.
You can't, uh, you can't livewith, Hey, listen, we're gonna
be talking with, with.
Farmer John is the subject of anew documentary that you can
find on PBS coming up next week,or you can find through our
website.
Really tremendous.
Stay tuned.
You're listening to TheRestaurant Guys, Our guest today
is someone I've been waiting togive on the show for quite a
(08:30):
while.
His name is John Peterson.
He is a lifelong farmer, uh, andhe also runs the, largest
community supported farm in thecountry.
Angelic organics.
Um, more than a thousandfamilies get their vegetables
delivered, uh, from John's FarmWeekly.
He's also an artist and awriter.
The real Dirt on Farmer John isa documentary spending decades
of his farm's struggle nearbankruptcy, rebirth, and return
(08:51):
to solvency.
It's also about him.
It's also about America.
Mark (08:54):
John, how are you today?
Welcome to the show.
I.
Good,
Francis (08:57):
thank you.
Mark (08:57):
Or should we call you Farmer John?
John (08:59):
A lot of people
Francis (09:00):
call me Farmer John.
So, so John, the, the film isabout your farm and your
family's been farming since thethirties and you went through
the, the debt crisis of theeighties and you had to sell a
lot of your land, and you'vebeen able to reinvent the farm
and make it solvent again.
This film spans your whole life.
Um, is the film about you, isthe film about farms or is the
(09:20):
film about America?
Um.
John (09:23):
Well, it, it's basically my life story and that includes
the farm because the farm and Ihave been woven together since I
was born.
Speaker 5 (09:31):
Mm-hmm.
John (09:32):
And there are people, they were talking to me about
creating a, a site on thewebpage that correlates my
personal history with that ofthe,.
the.
Macrocosmic history of Americanagriculture.
Mm-hmm.
So I haven't seen that yet, but,um, you know, there, there,
there's a lot of, correlations.
(09:53):
But then I'm, You know, I'm nota real typical farmer, and so
there's gonna be some deviationstoo.
For instance, I, I immersedmyself in the hippie era and a
lot of other farmers did not,
Francis (10:04):
yeah, that's not our image of farmers.
But still,
Mark (10:07):
but I would say from the time that you put the farm into
a, into a lot of debt based on,on, uh, I don't wanna say
promises from banks, butcertainly, false expectations.
Uh.
From that moment forward, Ithink that, that your plate was
very close to exactly what a lotof the small farmers in the
United States faced.
(10:28):
And, and that was what I reallyrelated to in the movie.
John (10:32):
I went through a very funny, weird program about my,
about the film recently, um,where experts were doing the
commentary on my life and it wasa really interesting thing that
they.
Yeah, I, I went in disguisebecause I was told that the
experts were the ones who weregonna, tell my story and that
they could do a good job of it.
(10:53):
And I was, I said, well, no, I,I think I could do a better job
of it since I was living mylife.
And anyway, it was interestingto hear these experts, uh,
analysis of the situation and.
And I, I had to finally, uh, youknow, stand up and reveal myself
to the whole audience.
You don't strike
Mark (11:11):
me as the kind of guy who would not reveal yourself to the
whole audience.
John (11:15):
I farmer John in disguise.
But the interesting thing was,they said millions of farmers
worked hard.
They were no nonsense.
They, they were great farmersand they lost their land in the
early eighties, and it justhappened that farmer, John
Peterson lost his farm at thesame time, but he lost it for
very different reasons.
He partied.
Francis (11:34):
Oh man.
John (11:36):
And, and you know, it's interesting, when I finally
revealed myself and I waswearing this goatee and this
wig, and I had all this makeupon, I spent the whole afternoon
at a costume shop in, uh, onBroadway in 11th in Manhattan
Speaker 5 (11:50):
Uhhuh.
John (11:51):
I, I just thought, well, this is gonna be really
interesting to hear what peoplehave to say about my life.
But the thing is, I feltagriculture should be
celebrated.
Speaker 5 (12:00):
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
John (12:01):
I felt that.
It had become very barren, veryvoid of actual life of, of, of a
kind of a heart relationship.
And so in the seventies I feltthat besides running a farm, we
needed to acknowledge that wewere on a farm and that we were
growing food and that we were ina place of.
Of life.
Francis (12:21):
You talk in your, in, in the, in the, in the film, it
follows you on a sojourn or anumber of sojourns to Mexico,
and it draws some starkcomparisons between American
agriculture and Mexicanagriculture that sort of speak
to that.
You wanna talk to us about that?
John (12:35):
Well, in the fifties, before the farm chemicals came
in and, and started to dominateagriculture, I, I feel that, uh,
American farmers really.
We're truly closer.
They were close to the land.
They lived out of a relationshipto the land.
It's a much more authenticrelationship.
(12:56):
And then when chemicals came init, they, they just got in the
way of that.
They, they got in the way ofthat profound intimate
connection to the land.
There's still a connection, butit's different.
And so I think the wholecharacter of.
rural society began to changeout of people farming with
chemicals and that changingtheir relationship to the land.
Francis (13:18):
How so?
How did it change the fabric ofthe society when people started
farming with chemicals?
John (13:23):
Well, it made it so farmers could farm more land,
and the consequence of that wasthat they were.
Less associated, less connectedto each unit of land that they
were farming.
Suddenly they went from these160 or 300 acre operations up to
(13:44):
the thousands of acres.
And so it kinda, I, I'm gonnause the term as maybe not quite
accurate, but it, I'd say itcommodified agriculture.
It turned it more into a, uh.
A, a business and a, a system ofproduction and a way of life and
a relationship.
Mark (14:02):
I, I think that's fairly accurate.
Francis (14:04):
and also I think that one of the things that film
deals with a lot is it changesrural agriculture in that each
person becomes more isolated.
I wanna talk more about that injust a moment with John
Peterson.
He's the subject of thedocumentary, the Real Dirt on
Farmer John, It's an amazingfun, a wonderful documentary
that talks about all the stuffthat we talk about, community
farming.
Organic farming, and the plightof the American farmer in
(14:25):
general.
And it's also a, a lot of funNow, John, you've also written a
companion book to the show, theFarmer John Cookbook.
Right?
Right.
What's that all about?
Is that just a cookbook?
John (14:34):
Well, I, I'm so excited about farms and I felt that, uh,
a cookbook that I write wouldhave to include the, the story
of the farm itself.
So it takes the reader or thecook right out to the farm and,
Gives an experience of how thevegetables were raised.
Um, not in a technical way, morein a dramatic or poetic way.
(14:57):
Uh, the weather dramas the, um,the cook on the farm writing in
a, in a very colorful way aboutharvesting the vegetables, the
photographs in the cookbook areof the vegetables growing in the
fields or of the people workingwith the vegetables, because I
feel that.
So often the, the food arrivesin the kitchen and then it's,
(15:18):
well, what now?
What do we do with it?
Well, where's the relationshipwith the food?
Where's the relationship withthe history of it?
And so I really wanted to bringthat in.
And, um, also, I think RudolphSteiner is an extraordinary, or
was an extraordinary man whooffered a lot to, civilization
and he's not very widelyrecognized or read.
(15:41):
And so I brought some RudolphSteiner and some of his insights
into food where he oftenregarded food or, or, uh,
expressed food as a material offorces that it has to do with
forces at least as much as ithas to do with substance
(16:02):
instance.
He said that.
Stimulated the rhythmic system.
Mark (16:07):
Mm-hmm.
The
John (16:08):
circulation and the, the breathing.
Mark (16:10):
You, you're talking about the biodynamics of, of
agriculture
John (16:13):
biodynamics.
And a very interesting thingthat he said, which is really
the basis for, uh, the, the, hislectures on, on agriculture,
which became biodynamic farming.
He.
Food no longer carries theforces that allows people to
transform their will into actionor their will into results.
That the Earth's forces aredwindling and that they need to
(16:36):
be re stimulated, reactivated,because people live in their
dream states.
They live in their.
Their, their desires, butthey're not able to transform
them into actions.
Then
Francis (16:48):
we're gonna have to take, we're gonna have to take a
quick, quick break there for thenews John.
We'll be back in just a moment.
Talking with John Peterson, he'sthe subject of the documentary,
the Real Dirt on Farmer John,back in just a moment.
Our guest today is JohnPeterson.
He is a lifelong farmer and,owner of the largest community
supported farm or CSA in thecountry with angelic organics.
Than a thousand families gettheir vegetables delivered
weekly from John's farm.
(17:09):
He's also an artist and awriter.
The Real Dirt on Farmer John isdocumentary spanning decades of
his farm struggles.
You can find out about it on ourwebsite.
Uh, he's got the Farmer JohnCookbook as well.
the documentary is great in thatit, it talks about.
A traditional farming family,how you, you know, took over
your family's farm at a veryyoung age due to some family
tragedy and how you weatheredthe storm of, of the eighties
(17:33):
and, and how you brought thefarm back and what exactly a, a
community supported farm is, isall about.
Can you talk to us about howyou, how you've reinvented it
that way?
John (17:41):
I went down very hard in the early eighties,
Mark (17:44):
like a lot of farmers,
John (17:45):
like a lot of farmers, and, um.
And I, I went from being a veryexuberant, enthusiastic,
hardworking person to being big,almost bedridden with grief.
And, um, and I was sick, or atleast I, I, I felt sick and, uh,
(18:06):
and how did I recover from that?
It was a very, very long journeyhere.
I'd lost most of the familyoperation.
My machinery was gone and, um,you
Mark (18:15):
had to sell off a lot of the family land.
John (18:17):
Yeah, I, I, I was humiliated and ashamed and, and
so I gradually restored myself.
I mean, how I did that, I, Iencountered, classical
homeopathy, which, uh, I thinkactually was my bridge later to
biodynamics.
And that works on a, deepconstitutional level, the
(18:38):
classical homeopathy does.
And so that gradually helped torestore me.
Actually going through andsorting out all the stuff that
had accumulated on the farm.
I, I, I started to organize myexterior world.
It took a couple years ofpainstaking work.
(18:58):
There's a lot of junk, a lot ofclutter around, and, I, as I
began to work with mysurroundings in that way, I
think it started to reorganizemyself internally.
Francis (19:09):
And, and so tell us how you, how you changed the farm
and how you changed the, thebusiness model of the farm.
John (19:14):
Right.
Well, I wanna say I was, I wason a creative journey too, and I
was doing a lot of, I waswriting screenplays, I was
performing, I was studying towrite the story of my life.
So a lot of these thingsconverged to.
Empower me finally to have thestrength to just think, oh, I
can, I can move forward.
So when, and you asked thequestion, I just wanna pick that
(19:37):
thread up.
You said, well, how, how was theUnited States different from
Mexico or the real culturedifferent?
Well, in me, when I startedgoing to Mexico, which I, I
started doing regularly after Ilost the land people there seem
much closer to the land and theculture that the society there
seemed more.
(19:58):
Sort of, I'm gonna use the wordrustic, but I, I think it's more
like landed more grounded.
So the way people talk and walkand move and, and then just
looking out into the fields,often you'll see people walking
or standing in the fields.
The, the landscape of Mexico isactually populated by human
(20:18):
beings.
Mm-hmm.
Drive through the heartland ofthe United States and you'll
hardly ever see a, a human beingout in the field.
it rekindled that feeling ofrelationship to the land to be
in this, this great countrywhere people were, were actually
living close to the land.
And that was something that Icould remember from the fifties
(20:40):
where it seemed that my owncountryside was more populated
by.
Much more populated by humanbeings for people, livestock,
and, um, more life, morevibrancy on the farms.
Now there's shelves, mostly inthe Midwest, but in Mexico, you
still get a feeling of life.
Just wandering around andinhabiting the, the countryside.
Mark (21:01):
I wanna talk about community supported agriculture.
I want, I really, really want toget into the, the CSAs and, and
how that has changed, uh, yourfarm and, and kind of brought it
up to date.
And the, and the first questionI want to ask you about
community supported agricultureis, is do you think it could
pierce the mainstream, the waythe hippie culture pierced the
(21:21):
mainstream in the sixties?
Do you think that, that that canhappen now 40 years later?
With CSAs?
John (21:27):
Great question.
I talk about this quite a bitbecause what I'm noticing now
is, well, 20 years ago there wasno community supported
agriculture farm in the UnitedStates, and now.
There are probably, uh, amillion people that get their
food from a community supportedagriculture program.
Francis (21:44):
Just briefly to explain what a community supported
agriculture farm is, that'swhere people get together and
they buy a share of the farm upin the beginning of, of the
season, and you subscribe to thefarm and you get the ve you get
the produce so that farmthroughout the season.
And so you absorb some of theeconomic risk of the farmer and.
You put yourself in the hands ofnature as to what's seasonal and
what's harvested when, and you,and you have, uh, coming from
(22:06):
John's heart, you have over athousand people who get every
week, get a box of vegetablesfrom the farm, not knowing
exactly what's gonna be in thatbox.
And, and that's what we'retalking about with community
supported.
And, and,
Mark (22:16):
and just so people know, stage left and Lombardi belonged
to, a local CSA in order to getsome of our products.
Francis (22:23):
So we interrupted you, John.
Go ahead.
John (22:26):
Well, uh, from our farm, there are probably about, uh,
5,000 people that are eatingevery week, which I think is
just, it.
It's a, it's a form of asacrament, really.
I mean, in a way it's a table.
The farm is a table.
5,000 people are eating fromthat farm's table every week.
And when you think about.
(22:47):
A million people in the UnitedStates that are doing this.
And, and when they do it, manyof them are thinking about that
farm that they're, that they're,um, a member of, uh, that it's
not necessarily an an ongoingintentional re um, relationship
or pondering, but it, it has tocome into people's consciousness
(23:09):
frequently when they're eatingthe food, when they get the box.
Mark (23:12):
I think it especially comes into their consciousness
when they encounter somethingnew and, and in the movie, you,
you, you, uh, bring kohl robeout and, and when they encounter
some product that they may nothave encountered in the past.
John (23:25):
Yeah.
Or, oh, wow.
Weather, weather affects the,the, yeah.
Speaker 5 (23:28):
Yeah.
John (23:29):
I'm, I'm now connected to the weather.
It's so extraordinary when youthink all these people now are
thinking about a place that theycall their farm.
Speaker 5 (23:37):
Yeah.
John (23:38):
Now they have something that they call their farm and,
and they go out, they take theirchildren out, their children see
these, these, uh, vegetablesgrowing in the fields.
And sometimes the people getinvolved in, in, um, you know,
helping on the farm,volunteering to work in the
fields.
And it, it re enlivensagriculture.
(23:59):
And it, it, you know, it, it rereen nobles, the farmer.
The farmer is acknowledged and,and held in a different regard
because.
Now it's the farmer.
The farmer for this group ofpeople that belong to the farm.
Francis (24:12):
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, and, and if you wannafind out about how to join a CSA
locally, there's an organizationyou can go to and we'll put it
up on our website.
You can go to local harvest.organd, and find out how you can
become a member of, of a CSA.
One of the nice things aboutthat I like about the film in
the end is, is how the familiesdo bring their children back to
the farm and, and sort ofparticipate.
Now you write newsletters andyou encourage that, right?
John (24:34):
Oh, yeah.
It's a very, very important partof it.
completes the picture.
And, and, you know, and it also,it, it just transforms the model
that we have of the, theconsumer and the producer.
It's, it's a different modelbecause people come together.
They, they get to know oneanother.
They get to know one another'sneeds.
And then, for instance, in ourcase, we needed land to have a,
(24:54):
the right size farm and our, ourshareholders.
Uh, came together and theybought that land and then they,
they leased it to the, to thefarm.
And so now we're able to havehalf of our land fallow every
year building up the fertilitywith, uh, alfalfa and clover.
And that's because these peoplewho are our customers, you know,
(25:14):
often the customers and the theproducer have an adversarial
relationship.
They're just trying to get, youknow, the both sides are trying
to get the better deal.
But in this case, there'scooperation, there's
understanding, there'scommunication, and.
Magical things have come out ofthat, you know, and
Francis (25:31):
that does, that does twist things on its head.
I mean, while it, it's certainlystill a capitalist endeavor
with, with our farms.
I mean, we are, once we get, geton board and come up with a, a
way to support things early on,we're all in the same boat
together.
And that's what a CSA is allabout.
Now John, one of the things Ithink that.
People don't realize when they,uh, when they pay extra for
(25:51):
organic vegetables, um, it'smore expensive to produce
organic vegetables and to getsomeone to make the change.
I thought one of the greatservices the documentary did was
to talk about that period whenyou changed over from chemical
based agriculture.
To organic agriculture and, andhow you got from, from one point
to the next.
Mark (26:11):
And one of, one of the things you just mentioned is
you, you allow the half of yourland to, to lay fallow for dirt
for the year.
So you can switch areas one yearto the next.
Very expensive.
Francis (26:21):
But even more than that, in making the switch.
I mean, you, you liken the, yousaid the land can become
dependent on chemicals, likepeople become dependent on drugs
and there's a period ofwithdrawal.
You wanna talk about that inyour experiences with it?
John (26:31):
yeah.
When, when it's going from achemical based system to a
natural system and it has to berepopulated by the
microorganisms and, maybe it's alittle like someone going into
a, a heroin, uh, clinic, anaddiction clinic getting from a,
a dependent life to a healthylife that the person was just
laying there on the bed in apanic and huge pain.
(26:54):
And so you, you can't see a farmrise like that, but you have a
feeling that's what it's doingbecause it seems like it shuts
down, like the system shut down.
And, and, and we were raisingvery unhealthy crops that in,
that the insects were invading.
And, uh, and it took a long timeto figure out how to build
things up and how to get thesoil healthy.
(27:16):
And, and a lot of other systemshave to be in place, not just
about, uh.
Healthy soil, but, but that's acornerstone of it.
And yeah, it took several yearsbefore we could actually start
getting, you know, full boxes ona regular basis.
Francis (27:50):
You know, um, I, I, I thought one of the other really
very interesting parts of your,of your story was there was
basically a point where when youcame back to the farm and you
decided to rededicate toyourself to the farm and decided
to go organic and, create thefarm in the way that you had it
in your imagination, in yourmind.
Um, it wasn't exactly a smoothreentry into the community.
There were, there were lots ofpeople that seemed to think that
you were a drug dealing, childkilling Satan worshiper are, are
(28:13):
you really a Satan worshiper?
That was facetious.
Uh,
John (28:19):
yeah.
That, that still persists a bitin the community.
Although, um, uh, I, now thatthere's this movie out, um,
people just seem to think.
I'm a much better human being'cause I was, I'm in a movie,
but really, I, I, I don't thinkthat makes me a better human
being.
I think, I think that redeeminga farm, getting a farm back on
(28:42):
its feet is a, a, a worthwhileand a, and a, a noble endeavor.
And I'm very happy that I didthat.
But it's interesting that in thecommunity, no one's ever came
and said, Hey, this is amazing.
You brought a farm back to life.
But there are people who say.
Oh, that's so great.
You're in a documentary film.
Mark (29:00):
That's funny.
Well, I, but I do think that,that what you've given people a
chance to see is, is behind thescenes, what actually happened
over that period of time.
I mean, it is amazing the amountof, of footage you have from
your early life and from theearly days on the farm.
I, I just don't think mostpeople have that much footage
of, their early life in the, inthe fifties and sixties.
John (29:23):
Yeah, no, and my mom loves the bounty of the farm.
She loved farming, and so youcan really see that in her
camera work.
Mm-hmm.
She just, uh, when we had a goodoat crop or a great corn crop or
a new piece of equipment, she'dgo out there and document it.
and wanted to, you know, show itto the neighbors later.
Francis (29:39):
Well, now, now your neighbors had some trouble with
you when you came back and, andrestarted the farm and turned
things around, but you'reobviously successful.
Forget the documentary for, youknow, you've turned a farm
around and made it economicallyviable again in a vibrant
business.
Are your neighbors followingsuit?
Are your neighbors asking foradvice?
Are is what's going on in theother farms around you?
Are other people turning farmsaround other ways?
John (30:00):
the most of the farms, they're really huge corn and
bean operations, or biglivestock operations in the
area.
And, and very few of thosepeople are interested in, in
raising vegetables at all, evenif they're struggling, uh, with
their own operations, thevegetable operations, so
dramatically different than thekind of farming that they do.
(30:21):
But when you go.
And you find pockets of, offarmers that are interested.
And there's a, the CSA learningcenter at the farming non-profit
organization has a, a program inthe winter where they help train
farmers into, uh.
Transitioning to organic or theyhelp farmers get or help people
(30:41):
get started farming.
Mm-hmm.
There's an interest, but, uh,right in my local community,
it's just a, it's just corn andbeans and happens on a massive
scale, which I, I wanna pointout before the, the show ends.
I, I don't know if you, uh, knowthis, but, the film won the Slow
Food on Film Golden Snail Awardfor.
(31:04):
And we're going to be presentingit in, in, uh, Italy in late
October to about 5,000 chefs andfarmers, and it's very exciting
that the film is, is recognizedby the Slow Food organization as
a kind of a, a, you a model foragriculture.
Well,
Mark (31:21):
the, the film has won a lot, a lot of awards and, uh,
slow food is just one of them.
John (31:25):
25 awards.
Francis (31:28):
It's, it's amazing.
And it's amazing to me thateverybody in your community
isn't like, just hasn't seen thefilm and seen that the, the
point behind it in, in whatyou've done with the farm.
Hey, John, I, I, the, the, thesuccess nationally and
internationally about this filmin, in, at least in cult film
circles, it's got, it's, it'sgotta be really surprising and
(31:48):
shocking, but it, it are yougetting more recognition farther
away from your home than you getat home.
John (31:55):
Yes.
Francis (31:57):
I think that, I think that's bizarre.
Well, I want to thank you forcoming on, on the show, the
movie's Great.
What you've done with it isgreat, and the message that
that's coming out is terrific.
Mark (32:05):
a really interesting and and riveting program, which I, I
think especially when you'rewatching this movie, the first
20 minutes or so of the movie.
Looks like the movie's kind ofgoing in, in one way and then,
your life kind of changes andthe movie kind of turns with it.
I found it very interesting.
John (32:22):
Yeah.
I wanna say I'm probably gonnabe in Europe for several months
in the fall and winter, becausethe film's got quite a, quite a
run going on overseas, probablyin theaters and, and in
festivals.
So it, it's really getting outall over the world.
So it's.
Very exciting.
But then again, being on a touris not farming.
And farming is, uh, uh, its ownform of excitement.
(32:44):
I was just about to
Mark (32:44):
say, you're not gonna quit farming on us, are you?
John (32:47):
Well, I definitely wanna have more time to perform and,
and to write.
That's very important to me.
And, and I think my mission wasmore to get the farm back on its
feet than it was for me to bepersonally farming, because as
you can probably tell from thefilm, um, I, I got a lot of
other creative interests, so.
The, the farm on its feet.
Now it gives me a whole newopportunity for my own life.
Francis (33:09):
Well, I think that's great, and the work you do is
really tremendous.
it's amazing what you've done.
Thank you.
Take care of that.
That was John Peterson.
John Peterson is the subject todocumentary The Real Dirt on
Farmer John.
It's a great.
Film.
I mean, even if you don't careabout farming.
It's a great film.
It's a tremendous documentaryand it's about John.
It's really interesting.
It's about John, but it has alot of lessons for, for, you
know, where our food comes fromtoday and a lot of what we talk
(33:31):
about.
So hope you've enjoyed the hourlistening to the restaurant.
Guys.
I'm Francis Shot.
Mark (33:34):
And I'm Mark Pascal.
Francis (33:35):
We are the restaurant guys, central Jersey 1450.
The time is 12
Mark (33:39):
noon.
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