A local farming couple is planning to build a creamery in Delaware County, and hoping to bring the future of Catskills dairy farming with them.
By building the Kortright Creek Creamery, goat farmers Tom and Denise Warren are seeking to cash in on a booming demand for local food, and to help local dairy farmers who are currently selling commodity milk to learn the potentially much more lucrative business of value-added products. But it's unclear whether they'll get many takers. The world of Catskills farming is divided by a culture clash between long-established local farms and new, small-scale farmers. And the Kortright Creek Creamery is caught in the middle. Read more
The Dancing Cat Saloon and the Catskill Distilling Company have been steadily building a distillery right across the street from Max Yasgur's historic Woodstock-hosting dairy farm in Sullivan County for about a year now. Tomorrow, owners Monte Sachs and Stacey Cohen will finally imbibe the fruits of their labor with the debut batch of their first locally grown and distilled spirit, the aptly-named "Peace Vodka."
According to the distillery's website, Peace Vodka (officially trademarked as "Catskill Mountain Peace Vodka") is made with water from "the 2011 Catskill spring thaw" and locally-grown wheat. A "Catskill Mountain White Wheat Whiskey" is coming soon to join it.
The distillery will be serving its new vodka on Saturday as part of its grand ribbon-cutting event, which will also include live music, food, and fireworks. (Sachs and Cohen also own the Dancing Cat Saloon next store, so they know how to throw a party.) The date is a significant one -- the original Woodstock music festival was held this week 42 years ago.
Grand opening of the Catskill Distilling Company, 2037 State Route 178, Bethel, NY. Saturday, August 13. Doors open at 3pm. 845-583-3141. www.catskilldistillingcompany.com.
Do you enjoy watching mud-covered contestants leap over pits of fire en-route to glory, accolades and booze? The Warrior Dash, a 3-mile race, obstacle course, and after-party on Windham Mountain, had got your number.
Warrior Dash racers are a hutzpah-filled bunch. A blogger named Adrian went to last year's event on Windham and came away demanding that all the obstacles be bigger, muddier, and harder: Read more
Joe Sicinski, who runs the food bank at the Andes Presbyterian Church, has a problem on his hands. He's still got plenty of things like canned corn, cranberry sauce and green beans. But staples like tuna fish, shelf-stable milk, and vegetable oil are running out fast.
A few weeks ago, Sicinski got a letter informing him that the Andes Food Bank won't be getting any more deliveries from the regional food bank that supplies most of their food. Over a dozen small community food pantries in Delaware County are in the same predicament.
“There is food, but we can't pick it up, and they can't deliver it,” said Sicinski. “We'll be open until our shelves are empty. But I would imagine each week we'll have fewer and fewer items on the shelves.” Read more
Over 200 years later, Hobart's still celebrating the humble horseshoe with an annual festival that features a horseshoe tournament, a duck race on the Delaware River, antique farm equipment, a petting zoo, and fair food galore. After dark on Saturday, the Stamford Fire Department will set off fireworks at the nearby Cyr Center in Stamford.
Hobart Horseshoe Festival, Saturday, July 23, 10am - 4pm. Hobart Community Center Park, Hobart, Delaware County. Fireworks after dark, Frank W. Cyr Center, 159 West Main Street, Stamford.
Photo: Dave Jacke, author of the indispensable two-volume textbook Edible Forest Gardens and local hero of the permaculture movement, in action. Courtesy of the Northeast Permaculture Convergence.
"Permaculture" is a slippery word to define -- like "sustainable," another buzzword of the green-design movement, it means different things to different people. But the general consensus is that it entails designing ways to grow food that integrate with both natural ecological systems and human culture.
Keynote speaker Dave Jacke says it's bigger than agriculture: Read more
Delaware County's own Ellen Verni has been writing "Home Cookin'," her column of Catskills recipes and rumination, for 24 years. Today's column is guest-written by Ellen's daughter, Juliet Verni. You can get more of both talented Vernis on Ellen's blog, at homecookincolumn.blogspot.com. Read more
In the Saugerties Times today: A peek inside Jolly's Good Grub, a British grocery and lunch shop on Route 212. It's run by a cast of characters that includes a former world-traveling antique dealer who once drove a bus from London to India, her East End barrister wife, three dogs, a cat, and a conure who likes Annie Lennox and can say "Buy it or bugger off."
“What everyone really wanted here was a greasy Spoon,” said Helen Wells, owner of Jolly’s British Foods & Good Grub Groceries, a specialty foods store on Route 212 midway between Saugerties and Woodstock.
“But I sell hot coffee, wrapped sandwiches, and lots of British, Irish, Indian and organic foods you simply cannot get anywhere else,” said Wells, an even-tempered if occasionally crusty “career merchant” who’s led a fascinating life across several continents. Read more
During the last week of June, the town of Lexington in Greene County broke ground on its brand-new community garden in a way that most back-to-the-land DIYers can only dream about: with a plow and a team of mighty Percherons.
Roundup, a common herbicide, was sprayed this week along roads running next to the Pepacton Reservoir, which supplies much of New York City's vast supply of unfiltered drinking water.
Our columnist Ellen Verni sent us a photo of a notice posted on Reservoir Road in Middletown alerting residents of the spraying. The sign, she writes in an email, was posted right next to a patch of berries.
Verni reports that the spraying is new -- she writes that until recently, these same stretches of land were mowed. Read more
