As a Cane Creek volunteer I get to see the farm when it is at its most beautiful. I see it just after dawn when the dew is still fresh on the fields. I see it at mid day when the bountiful harvest is coming in from the fields. And I see it on the weekends when those of us closest to the farm are preparing it for special events and private gatherings. I really love my time on the farm.

Even when the volunteers are intent on their chores and elbow deep in orka, the farm still has a picturesque quality. On a regular day you will see bussels of fresh produce surrounding the barn. Five different colors of red peppers, two different colors of eggplant, three types of spinach, squash and zucchini galore and endless amounts of herbs, flowers and greens to choose from. It is an absolutely beautiful scene of abundance and vitality.

So, last week when I had the opportunity to help prepare the farm for our “Come Grow With Us” dinner to benefit Georgia Organics and The Cumming Harvest, I jumped at the chance. What better way to inspire others to support the cause for fresh, local, organic foods than to share with them the source of our inspiration. With the help of the chefs at The Five Season Brewing company, we presented a feast that will surely not be soon forgotten. We dressed the tables, polished the silver and lit the candles with anticipation for the great event. Once the scene was set, I stood back, and was impressed with how lovely and serene the farm can feel on a early autumn evening as our guests began to appear.

And I often wonder, does everyone else see what I see? Do our guests see the magic of Cane Creek Farm like I do? So we asked Yvonne Williams, one of our very special dinner guests, to share her experience, dining on the farm….

City Girl Seeks Fine Farm Cuisine…

In my family, life revolves around dinner table, and Saturday night dinners were the event of the week—for twenty years now, my parents have maintained a weekly ritual of Saturday night dinners with their best friends, Mark and Judy Robson. The two families take turns preparing that weekend’s dinner, and year after year we’ve introduced each other to new culinary adventures.

Saturday, September 24th marked one more new adventure for my family. Judy, invited my family out to “her farm” where she has been volunteering her time, for one of the best Saturday night dinners I’ve had in a while. The secret to a good meal is good ingredients—if you have vegetables that never see real sunlight, never absorb real dirt, and then are processed to make thousand mile journeys, you can’t expect much from the end product. But if you have vegetables that bask in Georgia sunlight, that are grown according to our seasons, and are picked days (or hours) (and never weeks!) before cooking… well, you have the foundation for culinary perfection.

The air was crisp with the first hints of fall, which meant I had to pull out a sweater as our hosts brought out the first of the evening’s palate pleasures, but it also meant I started the evening with my first bowl of butternut squash soup of the season. You could taste the sweetness of the ripened squash, and the fresh bread that accompanied the soup tasted the way bread should: full and rich, not weightless and chalky!

As we moved on to the mains we were treated to a salad of mixed greens with fantastic peppers, grass-fed beef which practically melted as you ate it, a variety of vegetables which were vibrantly flavorful, mouth-watering chicken, and a finale of freshly baked goodies including my favorite – a sweet bread with fig! The dinner was a perfect demonstration of how good life is when you take the freshest ingredients, mixed with the best of company, and put it in the most beautiful of settings.