WINTER SOLSTICE: Happy first day of Winter 2024 – the darkest day of the year!
(Beauty Berry, Usnea, Moss, Turkey Tail Mushroom, Oak leaf, Honey Locust thorns, Fern tips, ring of Fire Bush leaves, on Walnut)
COCONUT KEFIR: Surprise! We made more Golden Milk and added some new flavors of our popular coconut milk kefir: Chocolate and Plain! These dairy-free vegan yogurts are made with all organic ingredients in our probiotic fermented coconut milk kefir for a Greek yogurt-style cloud of heaven on every spoonful. Grab one today exclusively at Wellness Emporium – Woodbury next to DTC!
WINTER SOLSTICE: Happy first day of Winter 2022 from all of us at Half Hill Farm. It’s the longest night of the year. The days only get longer and brighter from here, so hang in there!
Winter Solstice 2022 Mandala: (Sunflower, Rose of Sharon, Perilla, Foxtails, Broomsedge, Pine cone, Cedar)
FALL FLAVOR: It’s been the kind of Summer that just won’t Fall already! Treat your weary spirit with a bubbly glass of our farm’s Fall seasonal Mulled Pear Kombucha. This annual flavor’s got all the gut healthy probiotic magic of our small batch kombucha with organic cold pressed pear, cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, allspice and hints of orchards and normal holidays.
Get it by the cup or growler refill on tap now through Winter exclusively at the following locations:
FESTIVE FLAVOR: Make our new seasonal Cranberry Orange Water Kefir the probiotic treat your Thanksgiving meal deserves – organic fresh squeezed oranges and cranberry juice mulled with organic cloves – now on tap and available while it lasts at the Wellness Emporium!
FALL FLAVOR: Two things go great with today’s cool & rainy weather – your favorite ugly sweater and our farm’s seasonal Mulled Pear Kombucha! This annual Tennessee favorite is probiotic for good gut health and has all the Fall – made with organic cold pressed pear, cinnamon, nutmeg, clove and allspice with hints of bonfires and holiday parties. Get a growler on tap exclusively at the Wellness Emporium!
Half Hill Farm’s FireRoot Apple Cider VInegar Tonic – the troll chaser
Our small organic apple orchard here in Woodbury, TN will never produce enough apples for market, but with a little help it will be enough to make some amazing apple cider vinegar tonics!
A famous example that inspired our farm’s first seasonal apple cider vinegar tonic is Rosemary Gladstar’s recipe for Fire Cider. We call our tonic FireRoot, a spicy decoction of certified organic horseradish, onion, garlic, ginger, turmeric, orange, lemon, cayenne and black pepper in organic apple cider vinegar & mother lightly sweetened with local honey.
Half Hill Farm’s FireRoot apple cider vinegar tonic is just one way our farm honors traditional folk remedies. Each ounce of prevention will chase your trolls and light a fire under whatever’s thrown your way. FireRoot is available in both 8 oz and 16 oz bottles online or in our retail store in the Arts Center of Cannon County starting Thursday February 2.
Better health and well being
Apple cider vinegar has been used for centuries as a natural folk remedy for indigestion and a host of ailments. Research shows daily use of 1-2 tbsps naturally lowers morning blood sugar levels in people with diabetes, dramatically lowers mealtime glycemic levels associated with chronic diseases, helps people lose weight and may satiate appetite. There is some evidence showing anti-cancer properties, but the mechanism is not well understood. Less is known about widely reported uses as a cold and flu prevention, but it is suspected that apple cider vinegar’s alkalizing affects in the body helps prevent cold & flu. Using apple cider vinegar to decoct ingredients like garlic, ginger, and turmeric certainly helps increase the tonic’s antimicrobial and antiviral potential.*
To make FireRoot, our farm starts with all organic ingredients and unpasteurized apple cider vinegar that contains the mother, the naturally occurring probiotic yeast and bacteria that ferments the cider into vinegar. This will appear as a light sediment, so shake well to get all the botanical goodness in every serving!
How to use FireRoot Apple Cider Vinegar Tonic
If you’re a fan of bold flavor, take a tablespoon of FireRoot every day before or after your biggest meal. By using FireRoot with food, you can also lower your intake of salt and fat. Here are a few suggested uses below. Check back for recipes using FireRoot!
FireRoot is our farm’s first seasonal tonic release this year. Follow us on Facebook or Instagram to learn when other tonics will be available.
* Please consult your doctor before using any of our products for health purposes. These statements have not been reviewed by the Food and Drug Administration. Our products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.
A 5 lbs. mid-Winter harvest of organic Shiitake mushrooms from Half Hill Farm.
Once your Shiitake logs from Half Hill Farm start producing mushrooms, you can dry them, store some in the fridge for a couple weeks, or eat them! That’s exactly what we did using the following recipe and an unexpected January harvest.
There’s a lot you can do with your Shiitake mushrooms and a lot of good stuff it will do for you. One recent study, for example, shows medicinal compounds in Shiitake mushrooms can eradicate HPV, a virus that causes 99% of all cervical cancer, 95% of anal cancer, 60% of oropharyngeal cancer, 65% of vaginal cancer, 50% of vulvar cancer, and 35% of penile cancer. Here’s more research on this and other mushrooms we grow, and here’s our recipe for how to make some Pho-tastic Shiitake mushroom soup.
Shiitake Mushroom Soup
You can use either rice noodles or a little rice and quinoa. Either way, cook these first and set them aside. You won’t need much – about a total of half a cup if using rice/quinoa.
Put a little olive oil in the soup pot you plan to use and cook your cubed tofu. When complete, stir-fry the chopped garlic cloves and ginger with the cooked tofu. This takes a couple minutes. Now add the broth, mushrooms and either noodles or rice/quinoa. Let this simmer for 20 minutes and then add the Napa cabbage and let simmer for five more minutes before serving.
Place a little chopped cilantro and chives in a bowl and fill the bowl with soup. Add a generous squirt of soy sauce or Bragg’s and a squeeze of a couple lemon wedges and enjoy!
Our friends at Yellowbird Farms take a break from sheep to make Shiitake mushroom logs.
Our first season of mushroom log workshops is now closed as we head into the Winter thankful for another amazing year!
The 20 mushroom workshops we did this Fall on our farm helped introduce several people in our community to a sustainable way to grow edible Shiitake mushrooms. We are grateful to our neighbors who offered us their fallen or storm damaged oak trees for mushroom production. The logs we used helped sequester over a ton of carbon back into our food chain rather than being released back into the atmosphere as fire wood.
We were also excited to begin offering mushroom logs at our local farmers’ market in Woodbury this Summer and look forward to expanding these health & educational opportunities next year.
Despite a personal loss in our family with the passing of Sandra Landers, we were inspired to create Red Reishi and Turkey Tail extracts that now help others and fullfill our mission to be good stewards of our planet and our general well being. We are so grateful to those who seek us out and who continue to enhance our understanding of how our extracts are used.
The sum of the year’s goodness ultimately comes down to each of you. By taking a personal step to buy local, buy organic and support a sustainable lifestyle, your combined action has become the change we want to see in the world. We are forever grateful to see that at the end of a long season. Thank you for that!