From Our Delicious Cornucopia
We opened our shop and café in Great Barrington eight years ago. We chose the Berkshires over New York or Boston, despite the vigorous protest of our sales projections, because we wanted to be in the country. We wanted to live and work among the farms and farmers and artisans we so depend on for our livelihood. It wasn’t enough for us just to know where our milk comes from, or our eggs, or the greens for our salad. We wanted to see where they come from, every day, and to know the farmers and the animals and the land.
This is old farming country, and our food traditions are strong and growing stronger. A new generation of small growers and artisan craftsmen has embraced the principles of organic and sustainable production and our grassy hills are given to free-ranging heritage-breed cattle and hogs and flocks of goat and sheep. And much of what they produce is truly world class. I’ve tried below to distill from the local bounty a list of the most exceptional. I’m sure I’ve missed many.
Rawson Brook Monterey Chevre
There is a danger of taking for granted this little fresh queen of Berkshire County cheeses. It’s mild and unassuming and content to be sweet and simple. Buy it anywhere, but better yet, buy it at the farm, barely three days old.
Raw Milk
No food excites such controversy as unpasteurized milk. Health officials warn of its hazards. Zealous proponents extol its virtues. But it is beyond question that fresh, raw milk, from healthy, carefully raised, happy cows, is delicious. Two stand out: Sheffield’s Moon in the Pond Farm’s Normande milk is rich and pale straw yellow. Sean Stanton’s Blue Hill Farm Devon-cross milk is sweet and bright. Available, by law, only at the farms.
West County Cider
Since the untimely passing of her husband, Terry, Judith Maloney now runs the presses at Colrain’s West County Cider, transforming rare apples from orchards in the Hilltowns into some of the best hard ciders in the world. Some are bone dry, like the Pippin and the Ashmead’s Kernel; some are crisp and sweet, like the McIntosh and the Redfield.
Windy Hill Farm Heritage Apples
Among the Delicious, the McIntosh, the Honeycrisps and the Fujis, a few gnarled trees yield rare Baldwins, Cox Pippins, Roxbury Russets and other old varieties. Ugly, blemished, tart more than sweet and nearly forgotten.
Moon in the Pond Liverwurst
One could never have predicted the cult following of Dominic Palumbo’s plump, gold links of pork liverwurst, made from the livers of Moon in the Pond’s free-range Large Black hogs and pigs from other kindred farms.
Barrington Coffee Roasting Company
You can’t grow coffee in the Berkshires, just yet. But Barth Anderson and Gregg Charbonneau select and import some of the world’s finest beans to their Lee roastery, and roast them to order with their characteristic light hand—just enough to bring out the characteristics of a variety or the charms of a blend.
Berle Farm Yogurt
Farmstead yogurts can be, well, farmy. Complex, rustic, fascinating, but not always what I want on my granola in the morning. Bea Berle’s organic, grass-fed cow’s milk yogurt is rich and clean and sweet.
Erhard’s Pflaumenmus
Every year, when plums are ripe, Erhard Wendt, chef and innkeeper of the Williamsville Inn in West Stockbridge, makes a single batch of Pflaumenmus, a spectacularly rich German plum preserve spiced with star anise, allspice and vanilla.
Hillman Farm Cheeses
You have about as good of a chance of coming across one of Carolyn Hillman’s goat cheeses as you do a griffon or Brigadoon. But if by chance you do, at some Hilltown market, savor the moment. And the cheeses. They are some of the best in the world.
Berkshire Mountain Distillers
Chris Weld makes superior gin, vodka, whiskey and rum from local grains, molasses, botanicals and the cold spring water that runs through his Sheffield Farm. The first legal distillery in the Berkshires since Prohibition (though I admit I’ve had a bit of ’shine in these hills).
And seek out the excellent cheeses of Cricket Creek Farm in Williamstown, Shirl Gard’s Granola from Southfield, fine chocolate confections from Josh Needleman’s Chocolate Springs and Michael Tesoro’s Ooma Tesoro marinara sauce.
