A quick reminder: Our annual Tomato U-Pick is a favorite event of the summer and is just around the corner! You and your family are invited to our Garfield, Texas tomato fields next Saturday, June 16th to harvest your share of our tomato crop. Rows and rows of juicy red fruit, ripe for the picking. A note on the kiddos: We might be biased, but we really think this is one of the best events out there for your kids, and we really hope you consider bringing the whole family. Get your box now!

Potatoes! Photo by Scott David Gordon.

Did you know that the average age of farmers is around 58 and that this figure has been on a steady rise for the past 30 years? Even in Austin, a city where the hunger for local food is as vibrant as a vine-ripened tomato, it is increasingly hard to find folks who want to work at a farm. In the current May/June issue of Edible Austin, Kristi Willis wrote about the shortage of restaurant workers in a piece called "Calling All Cooks". We feel a similar plight, and the title could just as easily have been "Calling All Farmers". Often, we have trouble fulfilling our staffing needs, making it very difficult to harvest the vegetables that many of Austin's farm-to-table restaurants (as well as schools and CSA members) rely on. We are aggressive with our job postings, creative with our promotion of positions, offer competitive pay, health insurance, fresh vegetables, bonus opportunities, incentive programs, cold beer.... and still our job postings often go unanswered.

Last week, we had more potatoes in our field than we have labor to harvest. Specifically, we had over 10,000 lbs of potatoes that lay underground, unable to be harvested because our field crew is that understaffed. Such a debacle is a familiar problem to farms our size. When we planted these potatoes, we didn't account for the severe labor shortage seen across all of Austin for entry-level jobs.

Wonder why we are telling you about this dismal potato plight? Because there is a beautiful silver lining! We are very relieved and happy to announce that with the help of the Central Texas Food Bank, we cobbled together a plan to save these 'taters. Instead of getting plowed back into the soil, the CTFB helped us rescue these Yukon Gold and Red Pontiac potatoes last Friday, June 1st. We sent out an SOS email and the community responded. Volunteers came out in the morning and harvested as many potatoes as possible. The event was a HUGE success. With around 20 volunteers/staff, we harvested 8,690 lbs of potatoes in 4 hours. Can you believe it?

Wonder what's happening with the 'taters? CTFB is doing a couple different things with the potatoes that were harvested. About 10% have already been distributed to a local Austin partner agency of theirs - arguably some of the kitchens that need them most, and two main things will be happening with the rest:

• About half will be reworked into “Stew Bags,” a 10-20 lb bag of assorted produce CTFB distributes. These bags will be distributed to many of their partners throughout Central Texas.
• The other half will be sent on weekly container loads of produce that CTFB sends to Temple and Waco, where they will be split up between several partners of CTFB in those areas.

Check out some of the images from the gleaning day below. Thanks to everyone who came out, and a huge thanks to CTFB for everything you do in our community. Keep Central Texas fed!

Potato gleaning.

The potato gleaning crew.

Working hard, slingin' 'taters.

Look at all the potatoes!