Happy Birthday, Brooke!

Last night, a celebratory dinner for Brooke, the other half of our farm management team. We thought we'd have one more harvest of bamboo shoots--wonderful in a green curry--but the season is suddenly over, and the shoots are too tough to harvest. So it goes. We did have beets, my candidate for most underrated vegetable, kale salad, lettuce salad, and curry with tofu and chicken. Rachel baked a lip-smacking (though a bit tilted) carrot cake, and I made lemon bars.

Nothing would be too good for Brooke, though. She's our IT girl, the cat's meow, the best of the best.

In praise of girl farmers: Syd is here, chain-saw totin', tofu-eatin' Syd, working wonders in our overgrown yard. And Amelia and Sabine stopped by for morning coffee with Montana, one of last summer's interns, who brought us a megabag of dark-roast coffee from California, and some excellent wine.

Montana's been documenting Los Angeles rockabilly, which is apparently undergoing a worldwide renaissance. (Is it even legal to use "rockabilly" and "renaissance" in the same sentence? Where's Jerry Lee when you need him?) She tells me that there are even young Latinos playing "cumbia-billy", a hybrid mixing rockabilly with Mexican dance music. With its own dance moves. Who knew?

Girl farmers. Life wouldn't be right without 'em! Thanks for the coffee, Montana, and happy birthday, Brooke...