On this episode of The Farmer & the Foodie, we're learning how to grow the freshest greens without soil or sun.

And in the kitchen, we are exploring the versatility of a familiar favorite.

I'm Maggie Keith and I'm the farmer.

And I'm Lindsey McClave and I'm the foodie.

And this is... The Farmer & The Foodie What first struck me the most when I was learning about FoodChain and coming here is the multifaceted nature of this organization.

In particular, the number of people they feed throughout their community and just the pure volume of food that gets out into both the community right here within blocks of their location, but also further on, kind of blew my mind.

It is the chain, all the way from the farmer to the distribution, aggregation, and it's solving a lot of our local food supply chain issues, and I wanted to see that in action.

That really inspired me.

FoodChain's mission is to forge links between community and fresh food, and we do that with education and demonstration of sustainable food systems.

We've been here since 2011.

The building we're in is called the Bread Box.

It used to be a Rainbow Bread Factory and was actually a bread factory all the way back to the 1800s.

So, this building is a huge part of Lexington's history.

The goal was to bring employment, vitality, and that element of food back into the neighborhood.

So, it's very cool having the brewery, bringing in the grains, just like the bread.

Then we've got Ouita Michel's Smithtown Seafood bringing in a restaurant.

Our aquaponics farm was the first idea that kind of sparked FoodChain and got everything started.

This neighborhood is one of Lexington's oldest and largest food deserts.

There's just not a fresh food access point, and so FoodChain really wanted to come in, work with the community, work with the neighborhood in order to develop that.

The idea of the kitchen was born, and so we opened this teaching and processing kitchen as a way that we could kind of go the next step in the food system.

So, we're showing how to grow food, we're teaching people about where it comes from, we're talking about sustainable food systems, and now we're gonna that into practice and do the processing side, connect with a lot more Kentucky farmers.

What does just a day in the life of FoodChain look like?

So our farm, it's really got its rhythm down, so it's feeding the fish, emptying out the solid waste tanks, maintaining and planting leafy greens that we're harvesting, bringing in volunteers and interns and educating them about the operations of an aquaponics farm.

The kitchen is quite the bustling, chaotic space.

Lots of food is coming in and out of this space on a daily basis.

We have a food rescue operation.

We are sending some of that food rescue into our kitchen to be cooked with.

Some of that goes out to community partners, so we have a lot of small organizations here in Lexington.

And then with that, we're also producing, you know, our nightly meal distribution on Monday, Wednesdays, and Fridays is over 600 meals, and then we're doing hundreds of snacks for afterschool programs, a couple hundred lunches, which in the summertime goes up to a couple thousand lunches a day.

And then, we do a lot of kind of afterschool food literacy programs.

We set up a mobile kitchen anywhere.

We've got lots of instant pots, electric skillets, lots of things, so we can just pack it up in the car, go into a school, use any classroom that we are provided, and cook with kids.

And that way we're really like providing that opportunity to process food, to touch food, to interact with it, to really develop those food curiosity.

And how has the community, you know, embraced you and supported you all over the past decade plus?

We really view our community as all of those different groups within the food system, and FoodChain really does view itself as a chain, being able to link and connect all of those disparate parts of the food system who often don't communicate with each other, and they're able to come together here and communicate really fast, and also communicate with a lot of compassion, empathy, and like forward thinking.

This was something that our community needed and wanted, and so it's been really gratifying to get to be a part of building that continuously over the past 10 years.

[music playing] Leandra, thanks for having us to the farm.

So tell us about this farm.

This is actually Kentucky's first indoor aquaponic farm.

We started this farm in collaboration with Kentucky State University.

Our aquaponics farm merges two different types of farming.

One is hydroponics, which is just growing food without soil, and the other is aquaculture.

So, aquaculture is the cultivation of any aquatic life.

So, the merging of these two types of farming is a way of maximizing efficiency and reducing waste so that we're able to grow in a hyper-efficient, year-round manner to maximize nutrition for our consumer base.

We feed our tilapia.

When tilapia take in that food, they produce waste.

We cultivate how a normal stream would deal with fish waste, which is beneficial bacteria.

We're constantly doing the process of transforming waste into plant food.

And then our plants are constantly uptaking that nitrogen out of the water, turning it into the DNA they use to multiply and grow their cells and make these big, bright, beautiful, leafy greens, while using about 90% less water than traditional aquaculture or soil-based horticulture would use in our recirculating system.

Wow.

You can feel the nutrient density in this room.

We just came from winter, and Lindsey and I were saying, it feels so good in here.

I mean, the humidity, the light, the colors, it's like a salad bar.

We have just kind of really leaned into things that do well, micro-greens, super-fast, super high-yielding in this system.

Our leafy greens, we're able to actually keep them growing, and so we can harvest often 7-10 pounds per raft every single week.

So, it's pretty crazy how fast things can grow in this condition.

That's the beautiful thing about having a farm that's both education and demonstration, is we really get to let our imaginations determine a lot of what we grow.

[music playing] And I'm so curious why you picked tilapia versus another type or variety of fish.

The reason we love tilapia is they're from the continent of Africa, so they like the warm temperatures.

They're a freshwater fish, so obviously that helps optimize our freshwater plant growth.

The other thing that's really important is that we use tank cultures, so that means our fish are all together.

We want to optimize that space, so we need a fish that is really good at living in a group.

So, it helps that our tilapia actually love the party, so they're all in it together.

I love that herd mentality.

Yeah, again you'll see it when the lights are off, they all group together and keep each other's tail.

But we grow basically as close to organically as you can in aquaponics.

So, tilapia have this really cool fact that they have their skin that we think of as one, they have their scales which form that hard coat, and then they actually have an outer slime layer.

And the slime layer is actually antimicrobial, so it inhibits the ability of bacteria and viruses to get into their system, because if we did half a fish tank, we would have to treat them with antibiotics and throw away 100% of our plants.

So, our tilapia are actually growing from fingerling to harvestable weight in about six months.

So, are these guys hungry?

Like what time of day are they going to eat?

Oh, whoa.

Oh, yeah, that's what I'm talking about.

[music playing] Well, I sure am in my happy place around the background.

[laughter] So what do we have here?

Yeah, so this is some of the core plants that we grow here at FoodChain.

So, this is our Tropicana leaf lettuce.

So, we don't harvest this as a whole head.

We actually harvest individual leaves.

A lot of lettuce is bitter.

Tropicana, it has actually a lot of flavor, but none of that bitterness.

So, it's really fresh, it's really crispy.

Then we've got our curly kale.

This is another one that we just harvest by the leaf.

We don't harvest whole plants.

It's also like more tender than you will expect for a lot of curly kales.

They don't have that same resistance.

So, they're able to grow really tender, really soft, really juicy.

So, it's just interesting what aquaponics brings out in plants.

Being in the low resistance and high water environment just changes the flavor, and then, our rainbow chard, which is one of my favorites.

It brings such vibrancy.

It's super tender.

You can eat it.

Even the large leaves at this stage, you can eat as a salad green still.

But it still has the earthiness that you love in a chard.

And I mean, some of these plants are more than two months old.

So, they'll grow infinitely.

The limiting factor for us is, honestly, they outgrow the beds.

Yeah, the height, yeah.

They just start growing over here and everywhere.

Speaking of the beds, it kind of was amazing to me.

You shifted some things around and these are just like floating wraps.

I don't know what I was expecting, but it's so amazing.

Yeah, so you can see these are actually just insulation board.

And so, the roots are just literally hanging down.

The plants are just stuck in here.

So, these are grow grips.

They are just very gently holding the plant.

So, not many farmers get to just like move their plant beds around or pick up a plant and show a student, oh, this is what roots look like.

These are root hairs.

That's one of the things I just love about aquaponics is how, what a fantastic teaching tool it is.

And you can take so many of these same principles and use them in any other type of agriculture you're interested in [music playing] Today, we're actually just chopping up some of the rainbow chard from the farm.

Just a rough chop.

We're going to saute it with some peppers, onions, garlic.

It's going to go in a sweet potato salad.

How do you decide what you're cooking every day?

And then just the general logistics of an operation like that?

A lot of what we do here is food rescue.

And so, that really does inform what we're cooking because we're getting donations coming in from grocery stores, from food pantries, from farmers sometimes.

And so, it can be a little bit of a chop episode.

[laughs] What's in my box today?

What do I get to cook?

And then some of the programs that we have, like the ones that are grant funded, we do make a menu out a month ahead of time and we're purchasing those items from wholesalers.

And we are so lucky to be able to purchase from local farmers.

And then, there's folks without kitchens or maybe without the ability to cook and we can send them frozen meals.

So it's a prepared meal.

And there's even folks who don't have access to that.

And the place that we can eat them at is here's a sandwich kit.

And you can make up to like eight sandwiches.

And here's a snack to go along with it and some fresh fruit.

And just any way that we can help people have access to food, we're trying to do it.

So it's incredible.

It's absolutely incredible, yeah.

And how are the relationships with the farmers?

It's a very close working relationship because there will be things like a late frost that killed all of their crops.

And now their family doesn't have the income that they need.

Or we have a lot of second carrots.

So, they're not the ones that we can send to market.

But could we send them to you guys?

And they'd still get that food to the community and still get paid for them.

So, it's almost like a day-to-day touchpoint with local farmers.

Tell us about the educational portion of that.

When you go out into the community, I know you're doing a lot of food literacy.

It feels like a privilege for me.

I grew up kind of a little bit in the system, like I was the kid who was receiving the food box at my house.

And so, to get to be able to like curate that box now for families and to know like maybe another oldest daughter is having to make dinner with this tonight.

So, I want to put something in there that helps her understand maybe a little bit about the culture where she's cooking from or a new technique that she can learn.

I feel like food literacy is such a great name.

It's not just a cooking class that we're teaching because I think you're empowering kids to take charge of maybe their own health.

But you're also teaching them about how they impact the world around them.

You know, like if these sweet potatoes came from a Kentucky farm, then you're helping that family too.

So, you're not just taking, you know, you're getting to give back in your own way.

And learn about where things came from.

And all of that is just like such a bigger impact than here's clay to food.

The passion in the whole team was inspiring.

These people know they're making a difference.

And I love watching people light up from having purposeful work.

When you're working with food, you're working with agriculture.

When you're working with your hands to provide meals and gather people around a table, that's going to make a big impact.

FoodChain has the most perfect name for their organization because they literally have thought of every part of the connection of food to people and in their community.

Right now today, there's immediate effects, but you can just, you know, being here and learning what they're doing 5, 10, 20 years down the line, FoodChain will continue to be having impact on this community.

I'm like overflowing with inspiration from our time at FoodChain.

We are so lucky to have brought home a couple of these beautiful tilapia with us today.

I really wanted to preserve this fish.

I mean, I think the idea of cooking a whole fish can feel very intimidating, but it is actually beyond simple.

We are going to also just keep it that way by simply stuffing it.

And there was plenty of inspiration in their farm with the greens, particularly one of my favorite moments was tasting this Puerto Rican oregano they had.

Yes, I have my propagation going right now.

That's right.

[laughs] It's so, it has so much like such a perfume to it.

it.

It's so wonderful.

So, we are going to stuff our fish with that, some fresh sliced lemon, some ginger, and then some crushed garlic and all the greens that they grow as well, like the Swiss chard and the kale.

And I thought it'd be nice to toss that with just some fresh quinoa.

Any grain would do, but I just thought that on a bed of the quinoa would be a really lovely, healthy bite.

And just to keep it, you know, a little decadent, maybe a homemade aioli for a creamy note.

Well, let's get stuffing.

Yeah, let's get stuffing.

So, the first thing we want to do is make sure the inside of the fish is well seasoned.

So, I can be dirty hands, you can be cleaning.

So, you want to do that?

Okay, so I'm playing opposite roles right now.

Yeah, that's true.

Yeah.

Okay.

So, I'm going to open up the inside of the fish and you always want to season the interior of the fish really, really well.

Perfect.

And then if you want to get some salt, you go with that.

Obviously you want to season the outside, but just like if you were roasting a whole perfect, a whole chicken, that'll come from the inside out.

So, as it roasts and it, you know, retains that moisture and it steams.

Oh my gosh, it's going to be delicious.

And this is what's nice, you don't have to overthink this.

You just kind of stick it in there.

Any nice herbs will do here.

And this is a way you can make it seasonal too.

And same thing with your aromatics, I mean, onions, limes, all sorts of different things there.

[music playing] Okay.

So, all seasoned, the only thing we need to do now is make some slits in the skin.

That adds some steam to release and allows the skin to get maybe a little bit crunchy.

And you, as you go down, you can feel it hit the rib cage in there.

And that's sort of a nut.

So, just do about four splits.

Beautiful.

Perfect.

All right.

She's ready to go, 400 degrees, 30 to 40 minutes.

And we'll be ready to eat.

And while that's cooking, we will make our quinoa.

Great, let's do that.

All right.

We're adding one cup quinoa to our pot along with two cups water and a healthy pinch of salt.

We're going to put it on the stove, bring it up to a boil, then put the lid on, take the heat down to a simmer and let it just barely simmer for about 15 minutes until the water's been absorbed and the quinoa is light and fluffy.

I really love when I'm steaming rice, quinoa, couscous, any sort of grain like that.

I really enjoy if I have a nice green, tearing it or cutting it.

And right when it's done, the grain, taking the top off, putting the greens right on top, maybe mixing them in just a little bit and then putting the top right back on.

And especially when they're more tender, they will steam in there, but still kind of remain nicer and fresher than if you were like boiling them.

So, that's just a fun little trick I enjoy.

And I thought, you know, usually kale for me would not apply there.

But the way they grew the kale at FoodChain, it makes it so crisp and so bright.

And it was so fun to sit with Leandra in the farm, amidst the fields, for their version of a field.

But I couldn't help but think when we were sitting there, what it must feel like for you sitting in an indoor farm.

You know, I'm a dirt girl.

I'm an outdoor dirt farmer.

I like big pastures and cattle fields and ranches.

So, it felt a little confining, but I did see the efficiencies of it, the tenderness of it, the ability to grow a lot of food and make an impact.

So our quinoa is almost done.

We'll take the top off.

Like I said, we'll put these in.

We've got a little spritz of lemon juice on top and let those steam.

[music playing] Now we're going to make our aioli.

So, we start with one egg yolk, and we're going to add just a little bit, about a teaspoon of Dijon mustard, a little bit of rice vinegar, about a tablespoon of fresh lemon juice, garlic clove, I like to grate it in there, healthy pinch of salt, some pepper.

And we'll go ahead and whisk all of this together.

[stirring] And then we're just going to very slowly add in our olive oil.

Just kind of have a slow and steady stream.

That's perfect.

And this is one of those you just kind of watch until you get the texture you want.

So, it's sort of a slow and steady process and stream of olive oil, but it will suddenly kind of start to get thicker and become more creamy.

This isn't unlike making a dressing, or take to the point where the viscosity is creamy.

And honestly, this is mayonnaise.

Yeah.

And I know it's a little cumbersome, but it is important.

If you poured the olive oil just straight in, it would never come together.

I don't know how you do this without a friend.

[laughter] Thank goodness you're here.

Thank goodness you're here.

And certainly any tender herb in here would work great.

This is a special herb.

This is a unique one -- This is a unique one.

-- that we're very lucky to be playing with today.

You know, basil, parsley, chives, you name it.

It's going to be great in here.

Well, that's pretty.

Oh, it is.

All right, so we'll just kind of stir that in.

Because it does release some oils when you chop it like that, it's going to perfume this.

So, we'll let this kind of hang out, mellow.

And I think our fish is cooked, as is our quinoa, obviously, and greens.

So, let's plate this up and eat.

Let's do it, yeah.

[music playing] Well, this is a beautiful plate of food.

I'm so excited to try it.

And I know you want to dig right in and I do too.

I sort of had inspiration from Leandra.

She talked about their Tropicana lettuce that they grow there, how bright and fresh it is, and how she loves to make little wraps with it.

So, I am going to take that as a little inspiration and layer some of our -- I love it.

-- quinoa and greens in here.

Oh, I love it, a little taco situation on a lettuce wrap.

Yeah, exactly.

I would love to have people over for dinner and present this on the table.

I know, right?

That would be incredibly exciting.

Well, and you know, you have to be a little adventurous here.

I mean, it's a whole fish, so you can see there's bones in here.

But you just dig right around it and you get these beautiful pieces of fish.

Try a little.

Yeah.

And I'm going to add just a little extra bit of aioli on top of mine.

Oh, that's a good idea.

Woo-hoo.

And then, yeah, just wrap her up and dig in.

Cheers!

Cheers.

So tender.

It is super tender.

I mean, tilapia is a very, very mild fish.

It's so light, yeah.

It is.

So, really, what's great about that is it will take on any flavors you give to it.

So, I definitely get that lemony oregano coming through from both the aioli.

And then, I do think it perfumed the fish as it cooked.

So, that's in there.

I think it's seasoned really nicely.

And the quinoa is just bright and fresh and really tasty.

It makes me want something fried, though, too.

Oh, okay.

So after this -- Let's do it.

--healthy freshness, what if we indulge in a little bit of fish and chips?

Let's play with some beef tallow for our french fries.

Make a really good, like, beer batter for some of this tilapia.

Yeah, what do you say?

Take me to England.

This recipe is one, I call it my weeknight french fries, because it is the most simple, straightforward, easy-to-execute french fry recipe.

I usually fry them in, like, peanut oil or something like that.

But today is extra special because you've brought me a treat.

Yes, so I brought some beef tallow from our farm.

So, I take the leaf fat from our animals, and then we render it down.

And then, you get all the solids out, and it becomes this, like, delicious, smooth fat.

I love it because it's less greasy to me when I'm frying foods.

And a lot of the feedback I get from my family is, oh, this is delicious, it's crunchy, but it doesn't have that, like, heaviness that some other oils can have.

Uh-huh.

And you said leaf fat.

What is that?

Yeah, so that's the fat around the kidneys.

So, it's going to be a very super clean, lean, your body's going to treat it differently, so you're not going to feel that, like, low, heavy ugh after you eat it.

You're going to still have the energy to go on.

I'm just cutting matchstick fries just like this.

Any potato really will work.

Yukon Gold are sort of the gold standard for this.

They've got a really nice starchy quality.

And we're doing a cold fry.

So, we're going to just put these.

We've melted down the beef tallow.

We've let it cool a little bit.

We're just going to put these in enough fat to cover.

And then, we're going to turn on high.

We're going to let them boil.

We're not going to touch them.

That's the tricky thing.

You don't touch them because they will start to come apart.

But as they cook in the tallow, they will become crispy and develop a nice little shell.

And after about 20 minutes, we'll give them a very light little toss with a spider strainer or a mesh spoon.

And yeah, then we just look for color.

Take them out, season them, and we'll pair them with a fish.

We're just going to start with a really simple flour batter to go with our beer.

And I'm just going to do.

This is just AP flour.

I'm just going to do about a cup and a quarter or so.

We've got a pound of fish here.

Two tablespoons of baking powder, teaspoon of garlic powder, a little granulated onion in there.

This is a great place to break out like some old bay seasoning, you know, paprika.

Yeah, sky's the limit.

But I just kind of wanted a nice classic batter there.

And then, we want a little heat.

We've got cayenne from your garden.

So, I'm going to do just a smidgen of that.

You think that's enough?

Oh, yeah.

Okay, great.

Delicious.

Yeah, I think so too.

And then, we're definitely going to want like a really healthy amount of salt and pepper in there.

And I'm just going to whisk this together.

And then, you know, with the french fries, I was talking about the ease of frying in this cold oil method.

For this, we definitely -- anything you use in a batter, you don't want to do that.

It's just going to soak off in that cold oil.

You want your oil to be hot.

And we're looking for 350 degrees or so for this.

So, go ahead and add just like a nice sprinkle of salt over these.

Perfect.

I'm going to pop open.

Oh, woo-hoo.

Cheers.

Cheers.

And then, you're looking for kind of like a loose pancake batter texture here.

So, I just kind of start to mix it in.

Oh, so bubbly.

You can tell those bubbles definitely add to the crispiness.

I know.

Exactly.

And that with the baking powder, it's just going to kind of they really like playing together.

So, they're going to add a little bit of extra airiness to our fish batter.

We're just going to put, let's start with these guys, the kind of bigger slices.

So, we're just going to turn them over.

And it's a nice thick coating, but I really like that.

It's going to have those crunchy little bits that come off the sides.

Yeah, that's just my favorite.

Very carefully place your fish fillets into the oil, putting them in, going away from you so the oil does not splash towards you.

You'll want to let them fry for around four minutes.

The most important thing here is they have their own individual room.

You do not want to overcrowd the pot.

Around four minutes in, you're going to lightly turn them.

So, you just kind of make sure you're getting an even deep fry.

You go for another three to four minutes, depending on the thickness of your fillets.

Season with salt, splash of lemon.

You're ready to eat.

[music playing] Well, I don't mean to brag on us, but I think this is a pretty gorgeous presentation of our fish and chips.

Our fish fried and it's crispy and delicious.

All right, well, I cannot wait any longer.

Let's try.

Yes, dip in.

Dip.

Take our times dipping.

[chewing] It's so crunchy and so yummy.

Yes.

These fries are crispy, crunchy, the perfect amount of salt, but with that aioli, it adds the tanginess.

You do taste the beef tallow.

Yes, yeah.

I mean, it doesn't, I wouldn't say -- It's not strong.

No, but it adds like an earthy richness to it.

They're not greasy, they're not heavy.

This is definitely like a nice, like, if I want something fried, this is what I want.

So, I'm so glad it is exactly that.

Look at this, this is just like perfect.

And I really love, you know, the mildness of the tilapia.

You can mix and match, you know, the flavors of this breading.

Different types of beer would blend different, you know, textures and tastes to it.

So, I'm just gonna keep munching and appreciating all that FoodChain does for the community and the food that they've created.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Cheers.

Cheers to spring.

[music playing]