State farms prove fertile ground for exotic
HOLYOKE - The aji dulce pepper seedlings sprouting in a 120-degree greenhouse here will have the same sweet, mild bite as those grown in Puerto Rico.
On Martha's Vineyard, the 1,000 jilo plants germinating on Jamie Norton's farm will bloom with plump, oval-shaped eggplants that shimmer with an emerald color so common in Brazil.
And at farmers' markets this summer from Coolidge Corner to Marblehead, the boc choi, fuzzy gourd, and pea tendrils sold at Sheng Lor's stand will attract shoppers no longer intimidated by Asian produce.
"They just pick, pick, pick - no questions," Lor said. "They know just what they are looking for."
These days, homegrown produce in Massachusetts means a lot more than cranberries and McIntosh apples. Flourishing ethnic crops and immigrant farmers have helped fuel a larger trend that increased the number of farms in the state by 27 percent from 2002 to 2007, surging to a level not seen since the 1960s, according to a census released last month by the US Department of Agriculture.
The federal government considers a farm any place that grows and sells $1,000 worth of crops or animals a year. The census found an uptick in small operations in Massachusetts run by people who cultivate land part time. Farming in the state requires no license or permit, except for the use of certain pesticides or sale of some food products such as milk.
These boutique ventures help meet the mounting demand for locally produced food, evident from the increase in farmers' markets in the state from 90 in 2000 to 166 last summer. The definition of local has evolved to mirror the state's growing diversity.
"There is a real increase recently in ethnic-type crops," said Scott J. Soares, assistant commissioner of the state Department of Agricultural Resources. "Not only for the ethnic community, but the high-end restaurants are also taking notice."
Last summer, Zephrus Restaurant in Vineyard Haven featured a goat-cheese tart with velvety taioba, a Brazilian green with elephant-ear-like leaves.
"It really filled a specific niche for us," said chef Robert Lionette, "particularly in midsummer when local spinach became scarce."
In the aisles of A. Russo & Sons market in Watertown, bins overflow with more colors than a painter's palette from some 400 varieties of fruits and vegetables from across the globe. Owner Tony Russo thought about one of his local growers in South Acton and ticked off the types of eggplant: Sicilian, Dominican, graffiti, white, Chinese, Thai, Japanese, Indian.
"Before it was just eggplant," Russo said. "Old-fashioned purple eggplant."
Although exotic local offerings may be more plentiful, the harvest is not about to overtake the state's largest cash crops, which include hay, tobacco, and potatoes. But the newest plants seem to be thriving in part because of a strong support system.
Agencies that work with immigrants, such as Lutheran Social Services of New England, have added agricultural programs that help form business plans. The state Office for Refugees and Immigrants launched a farming program two years ago when it saw a flood of asylum seekers with agrarian backgrounds. For all new small farmers, the state offers a business training program that has been so popular that classes have been expanded.
A pillar of the support network is Frank Mangan, an associate professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst who has spent a decade adapting foreign crops to grow in local soil. His greenhouse holds the leafy Central American herb chipilin. An East Boston farmers' market sold about 10 cases a week last summer, predominantly to Salvadorans.
"These vegetables are very much a part of their culture," Mangan said.
At the 70-acre Flats Mentor Farm in Lancaster, Hmong refugees have cultivated rented plots since the 1980s. Sheng Lor's family initially grew food for themselves. In 2000, they made their first trip to a farmers' market in Coolidge Corner. Last summer, Lor, 27, hit seven markets a week, peddling such traditional herbs as parsley and basil alongside Chinese broccoli, bitter melon, and pumpkin vines.
A newer arrival to local agriculture is Lutfi Azizov, 39, a Meskhetian Turk who moved with his extended family to West Springfield in 2006. They came from Russia, the most recent stop for an agrarian people chased across Central Asia for generations by ethnic hatred and intolerance for their Muslim faith.
Now in Holyoke, Azizov motioned with his calloused hand at a snow-covered field at Nuestras Raices, a 30-acre farm along the Connecticut River where immigrants work incubator plots. The burly man with bushy black hair grew tomatoes, cucumbers, green peppers, and eggplants last summer that he sold to local pizzerias.
"My father farmed," Azizov said recently in Russian through a translator, recalling his own 15 acres in Krasnodar, near the north shore of the Black Sea. "My grandfather farmed. My great-grandfather farmed. Now I bring my kids to the farm to teach them."
The ethnic influence on farms has had a cross-pollination effect beyond immigrants. Norton first planted jilo on his Martha's Vineyard farm in 2004 for seasonal Brazilian workers and produced 400 crops last season.
This year, he has already begun using tweezers to plant 1,000 tiny seeds, an increase aimed in part at tourists and islanders who have never before seen the emerald Brazilian eggplants.
"They look attractive and people say, 'What is this?' Norton said. "And they take some home and experiment."