Gathering Place
Feeding the family on a farm sets the rhythm of the day.
Menus change with the seasons on the Wyoming prairie.
Whether you are cultivating vegetables outside a sod house in 1889 or tending a handful of tomato plants in a suburban backyard in 2020, the heartbeat of a homestead remains the same. And that heartbeat is food.
Food is the vein that runs through all homesteads, past and present. Even in our age of industrialized food production, for those of us who choose to take a step to a simpler way of life, food brings a structure and rhythm to our days in a way nothing else can. The cadences manifest themselves in different forms, but they are persistent and remain at the forefront of the day.
The rhythms of production and growth determine which projects are priorities and when we might dare leave the homestead for a short vacation. When will the new baby chicks arrive? When will the garden require planting? When will we need to stay close to watch heat cycles and breed the cows again?
The rhythm of the harvest determines our menu. There are times we gorge ourselves on every egg dish you can imagine, and times when squash appears in at least one dish per day. And then the seasons change and we take a forced fast from eggs or squash or whatever else we’ve been indulging in.
And the rhythm of mealtime determines the day’s arrangement. The anchor of our daily schedule is suppertime. Our goal is to have food on the table at 5:30 p.m. so we have time to do dishes and head back outside to wrap up projects before bedtime. We all feel more rooted when we take a purposeful break to sit at the table and bond over food.
Sometimes a friend or neighbor
`Food is the vein that runs through all homesteads, past and present.
joins us—there’s always a project happening outside, so it’s pretty common to have help over during mealtimes—but usually it’s just our little family. We talk over maple-glazed pork chops about what we accomplished that day, discuss tomorrow’s tasks over noodles smothered in butternut pasta sauce, or chat over steaming bowls of beef stew about the blizzard that’s blowing in. It’s never a fancy affair, and we don’t eat on fine china (or even matching plates), but the time to draw close and reconnect is one of the best parts of the day. You don’t have to live on a farm to embrace this ritual—just turn off the TV and let the home-cooked food bring you together with the people you love.