Ute City Farm Girls Keep The Faith

November 25th, 2006 at 08:46am Zele Community Table 117

Zele Community Table
11-21-06
Ute City Farm Girls

Megan Vanzandt with Anna Bryant, Dave May, Michael Conniff, and Zele director of marketing Lisa Zimet.

Michael Conniff: How did you hear about the Ute City Farm in Woody Creek?

Megan Vanzandt: My best friend is Lula Mae Chapman. I’ve known her since sixth grade. I went to drop her off and was intrigued by the place—it was surrounded by beauty. I guess it’s the farming, too. We’re drawn to it but we’re so far removed from it. I’m just a girl from the city, from Denver.

MC: What’s it like on the farm?

MV: The location in Woody Creek is absolutely picturesque. When you think of a farm, it’s that. The red barn, open views, mountains. Jennifer Craig and her mother Carol Craig own it.

MC: How long has it been there?

MV: Definitely since the 60s when they were riding horses. Jennifer took it over ten years ago with a couple of garden beds.  In the last four or five years was really when they got it going. Now we’re at the Farmer’s Market. Sue Carrolan was the manager. She was right in there with Jennifer. They used to hang out with Hunter Thompson. They had kind of a little crew in that area. People don’t really plan it, but it keeps drawing you back.

MC: What does Sue do?

MV: She works in New York City making hats for the Rockettes. Making Bette Midler’s costume, things like that. She’s a hatmaker. She’s in her late 30s. [The Ute City Farm Girls] are all different ages. All my friends are 24ish, but people are in their 30s, 40s, 50s.

MC: All single?

MV: Marcie is the only one married.

MCV: Do you feel an age difference?

MV: Yes and no. The essence is the same. It’s really funny when we get together. Men are obvious topics of conversation. The women who are older are very dynamic and young at heart. They’re gorgeous and they like to play. We can learn a little bit from older women. Life experiences.

Lisa Zimet: Do you have to apply for this job?

MV: It can be volunteer, but some people are employed.

MC: So you’re not communists.

LZ: Nobody can be turned down?

MV: After this blog, they’ll have to meet with Jennifer or Sue.

LZ: It must be a short season.

MV: There’s a guy named Robert who lives there full time. He’s in his 70s. The farm opens back up in June.  A couple of guys have come and gone.

Anna Bryant: I did inquire about volunteering. My schedule is limiting. I’m at the Wheeler. And I can’t squat because I was in a straight-legged cast.

LZ: Is it organic?

MV: Totally au naturel.

MC: How did “The Naked Garden” calendar come about?

MV: Here’s what happened. Originally, Lula is into making documentaries. Originally she wanted to talk about what we did there. The documentary is on Currenttv.com. That’s the beauty of it. A group of women coming together to work hard and have fun and produce organic produce. It’s been very powerful for all of us. It’s not something you do regularly, but it’s a nice piece to have in your life. We were thinking of documentary and how to raise money and the calendar idea came up to spread the awareness of small farms and organic farming and going back to the land. I met a director and he helped. He lives in Miami. We were feeling it the whole time, the fun, with all of our friends there in a beautiful environment. As the season came to an end and we didn’t want it too. It’s pretty special that it happened spontaneously. Everyone ended up there like a magnet. We did the calendar to capture the magic of that. A photographer I know named Alan Becker
came with [graphic designer] Michael Alvarez. We had the idea and I ran into Alan at the market. He said he’d trade for vegetables for five years.

MC: My guess is this was not too painful an assignment for them.

MV: They’ll have good memories. They were not unhappy about doing it.

LZ: How many women work there?

MV: Between ten and twelve. We knew Alan was coming. We knew we had to be there. Jokingly someone said maybe we should be naked behind the plants. Lula was the first one to do the photo shoot. She was fired up.

AB: She’s always fired up.

MV: She’s the one in the overalls. There was a lot of energy that day. We had more girls we wanted to shoot, but it’s tough to re-create that day in August.

MC: How big is the farm?

MV: Not that big. Basically three rows of 20 beds each. It’s small. But they have a lot of land. I don’t know what their dreams are for it. There has been talk of a greenhouse.

LZ: Who do you sell to?

MV: A lot of restaurants: Little Nell, Elevation, Rustique. You should have seen the spinach ecoli scare—every restaurant in town wanted to buy from us. We have such unique greens. Asian greens, rainbow chard, different kinds of kale. Stuff you can’t really find around here.

MC: Are there any other farms in Pitkin County?

AB: Somebody in Basalt does herbs but he has food. But he has a greenhouse and sells a lot of it commercially. Plums and peaches. He teaches people about permaculture.

MC: What’s that?

AB: Symbiotic plants growing together. It’s Garden of Edenesque. That’s how they do it in Guatemala.

MC: I know there are farms in Paonia, Palisade, Grand Junction. Chef Dava Parr brings in fruit and vegetables from Paonia. But I’m not aware of other farms.

LZ: There’s ranching going on but I don’t know about gardening.

MV: That’s the essence of what we wanted to spread.

LZ: Aren’t there community gardens in Aspen?  People buy plots of land. People who want to get back to the earth.

MC: They have those in cities, too. Community gardens.

MV: This is the most local produce you can buy around here.

MC: How are you going to keep it going?

MV: We have talked about it. It’s hard. Because the majority of us are age 24ish. To make plans a year from now is completely unrealistic. A lot of us want to come back to the summer. Our initial goal to make a documentary. Everything will take its own course. We just have to see who is around.

LZ What kind of budget is there for this?

MV: It’s a pretty low budget. It’s on the low end.

LZ: What do you get paid?

MV: $8.50-$12 an hour. My role was mainly on Friday and Saturdays. Cut and wash and bag for the market. Harvested, washed, and bagged. On Saturdays, wake up at 5:30 in the morning to load the truck, come to the market, and then take down the market.

MC: That’s a long day.

LZ: What do people pay?

MV: Betweeen $6 and $10 for a bag of lettuce. Especially if you watch the documentary you’ll see why. It’s hand-picked and -washed, hand-dried.

MC: Did you have regulars at the Farmer’s Market?

MV: Definitely regular customers. The Farmer’s Market in general attracts locals, but there are so many tourists, and second home owners--that’s a big one too, stocking the kitchen. We mostly sell out. We had a couple of bad weekends with a lot of rain.

MC: What do you do with what’s left?

MV: We’ll try to sell it to restaurants. Or girls take it home

LZ Do they grow flowers around the beds at the farm?

MV: They do grow a lot of flowers. You’ll see in the bouquets for the markets. They’re gorgeous. Pests are not a big issue. That’s a huge plus. If you do have pest problems, there’s experimenting you have to do.

LZ: Sounds like an idyllic setting.

MC: What’s the future look like?

MV: Part of the issue is Aspen. It’s a hard place to settle. You’re stuck with service industry jobs. Farming—you can’t give 100 percent  to that.  I first came here when I was 19 for a summer. Then I came back at 23. I left again and came back. Sue’s been coming here for fifteen or twenty years.

MC: Why do you keep coming back?

MV: I don’t think any of us had experienced anything like it. We all fell in love with farming through that experience. Hopefully we’ll put it in our life some way.

MC: It must have been hard shopping for vegetables after the farm shut down.

MV: Most traumatic was lettuce, even the organic ones. I don’t even know where they came from. I’m guessing California. They’re all prepackaged. They’re not looking good. I don’t know how chefs do it. The produce is pretty week.

LZ: I’ve always been surprised there hasn’t been a New York City-type fruit stand. People here more than willing to get really good fruit. You’d think the fruits would be better than they are.

MC: Like a Korean fruit stand.

MV: There is one behind Buttermilk.

LZ: That’s not in town. That’s good off-the-farm stuff. But it’s not every fruit you can imagine.

MV: The Farmer’s Market started five or six years old. It’s very popular. It expanded quickly. There’s the Vitamin Cottage in Glenwood but there’s no place to get fresh produce.

LZ: There was one called Strawberries below street level at City Market. That was a pretty good one. Clark’s opened one in Carbondale. Clark’s Natural Foods. Fresh produce, refrigerated, shelf, vitamins. The area couldn’t support it.

MV: The cost is too high

LZ: Whole Foods would be great here. I heard Basalt might be the spot. In El Jebel, the developer of the condominiums, part of his master plan is to have something like a Wild Oats. They’re just trucking it in and they need enough of a population to support it. The pop is so focused on health, but there’s only one vegetarian restaurant in town.

MV: You’re absolutely right. It’s amazing there aren’t more products.

LZ: It’s the designer stores.

MC: Them again. That damn Prada.

LZ: There’s a little organic food shop in Carbondale. It’s tiny.

MC: What’s next for the Ute City Farm Girls?

MV: Ali Wade’s been doing it four or five years. Sue’s been doing it for maybe ten or eight. Even though everyone leaves, there’s something about the summertime that lures everyone back. I think it could take on a whole ’nother life. They’re already talking about next year’s calendar.

Entry Filed under: Environment, El Jebel, Woody Creek, Pitkin County, Outdoors, Women, Paonia