Boxing Shallots, Avoiding Real Work

The spring-planted (from seed, not bulb, mind you), August/September cured shallots got boxed today.  In other words, we spent the afternoon gettin our box on.

It was a nice alternative to real work, like pulling up drip tape in field 2, or cultivating the carrots.  It was upper 90s today, so real work sounded pretty tough (especially after a huge lunch of fettucini alfredo and ice cream).  I usually hate not doing something in the field during the afternoons, but today was the perfect time to box up one of our precious commodities.

We planted, so I thought, a lot of shallots in April.  The yield was okay, but we’re left with ~500 lbs of shallots to sell now (I hope the co-op sells lots of shallots).

Was it a good idea to try to sell this many shallots locally?  We will see.  We don’t want to get into commercial distribution because the prices suck for a small-acreage farm like Four Frog.  We are into getting more money/lb, not less.  Therefore, retail first, wholesale next, and, then (hopefully never) distribution.  If we ever go into distribution commercially, we will be office farmers, and I want to save that for older age, when I don’t want to be in the field everyday, all day.

Not that distribution is inherently bad.  It’s all good.  We’re all doing our best to make a living.

Anywho, shallots are so yummy.  Ours turned out giant-sized this fall.  Yum.  Restaurants might be a good outlet for us.  If you’ve never eaten one, come buy a shallot from Four Frog at the farmers’ markets.  If you live across country, we might mail you one!

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