Auntie Em's Kitchen, Catering and Local Organic Produce Delivery: the chicks are growing!

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

the chicks are growing!

our baby chicks are now two months old. the are so much bigger! they grow so fast. they live full time in their beautiful coop that my good friend jimmy hole built. i thought that they needed to stay in the house in their box longer, but when ming ming (the white and yellow one) flew out of her box and the dogs cornered her i knew it was time to make the move to their new home in the yard. they sleep in the coop at night and during the day they peck around and eat bugs and vegetable scraps that we give them. when they first made the move to their new home they were not eating the veggie scraps that i was giving them. i took a couple of days and they finally figured it out. their favorite things are over ripe bananas, pincher bugs, pill bugs and ants. they dont like grapes or apples yet. they eat so much of the leftover veggie scraps that i dont have any left for the compost heap. its amazing. they are just getting to the point where they dont run away and hide when we go into the coop. i have made a habit of saying "hello girls" to them every time i go in, and giving them their veggies. they are starting to associate my voice with treats. they all have names now; ming ming, hattiet, diamond, lucille, and dotty. the grey chicken (harriet) is the leader of the bunch. she is the most friendly, always the first to investigate new food and she will actually eat out of our hands now. they are about 4 months away from laying eggs. they still are not roosting at night on the stick that jimmy put in the coop for them. they all huddle together in a corner. im sure it is because they are still keeping each other warm. the biggest challenge so for is dealing with the predators. the other day we drove away and saw two feral cats on top of the coop. the coop is very predator proof so far.

lucille (red) and harriet

harriet

the penthouse

1 comment:

Elissa ChandlerMay 11, 2010 at 11:41 PM
LOVE THEM!!!!!!
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Why I Started Auntie Em's Organic Local Produce Delivery Service

You might have already figured out that these produce baskets are my passion. I opened the restaurant 10 years ago, and have been doing the catering for 14 years now. I hit a point a couple of years ago where the restaurant and the catering pretty much ran themselves. I have the best staff in the world (all friends). I found myself in a place where I didn’t have that much to do anymore. For months and months I tried to come up with something to do. Another restaurant-no way! If I were 20 again, I might have the energy to do it all over. But as you probably know, it is really hard to start a restaurant. I didn’t want to have to do it all over again.

While visiting New York a few years ago, I came up with the idea for the produce baskets. Everything in New York City is delivered! Dry cleaning, groceries, sheets, furniture, plants-everything. I would sit in cafes sipping coffee and watch chefs from all of the local restaurants wheel carts of food to office buildings. This really got me thinking. I would bring the beautiful produce from the local farms to my customers who cant get to the farmers markets. This, I knew was not reinventing the wheel, but I wanted to personalize my service. Give recipes, let customers know what farms their food is coming from, pick all of the produce myself, and really inspire people to start cooking again and get them excited about food. Most importantly, the service would give back to the community. It would support local, small sustainable farms; it would keep the money local, giving it to small local farms rather than a big corporation. Which also means that there are less people in our area having their food shipped in from who knows where. Less demand for food that has no taste, that is sprayed with pesticides, that is grown by giant corporations that only have regard for making money and don’t have a passion for what they are actually doing. Less demand for it means they sell less, produce less and ship less!

I also wanted the service to offer “cute” boxes, and not crummy grocery sacks; something that could be re-used over and over. This, to be honest, was the hardest part. I searched and searched high and low for an appropriate box. I finally designed and had made the boxes that you get today.

I wanted a grass roots company. Not a giant company that needed backers with lots of money to start it. That is how I started my restaurant. When we got more customers I would get more boxes made, and so on. I am happy to report we have a new space to pack the boxes. We grew out of the space that we used in the back of the restaurant. We have tripled the amount of customers that we started with. Yes, my team has grown from one (me) to Tommy and Scott (your delivery people), Michelle (handles new customers and billing) as well as Fabian and Virginia (who helps pack the boxes). The farms and farmers that I buy from are ecstatic. I am helping bring their hard work to more people.

Most of all my customers are happy. I get so many emails about what you are cooking, how much your kids love it, how this produce has totally changed they way you and your families eat and how you are introduced to produce you have never had before.

I set out to do everything I wanted and much more. I have a little community of healthy eating foodies, more friends that I am employing, happy farmers, and my little contribution to a healthier society.

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

the chicks are growing!

1 comment:

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