A League of His Own: Craig

At the point that I switched gears from chefdom to greenhorn, I was feeling rather lonely. I had just called my boss back at Jaleo, the restaurant where I had interned during culinary school, to let him know that I wouldn't be accepting a sous chef position at their new location in Las Vegas. On paper, the job would have been an incredible step up the professional ladder, actually launching me multiple rungs ahead, and giving me grounds for major pride. I never let myself feel proud for having been offered the job, because I feared my change of direction was disappointing and foolish from the outside. From the inside, I knew my tracjectory better than anyone. I had grown from an ambitious and unknowing high schooler to a culinary school graduate with insight into the true culinary scene and lifestyle. Having studied in the Hudson Valley, teeming with the farmers who feed New York City, I had caught a bug. The exposure to farming and "farm-to-table" culture was infectious and I felt that there was one very clear way forward. I'd swap my kitchen clogs for boots. And if there was one thing I learned from trade school it was to find yourself an inspiring mentor who you jive with. That person would be Craig.

I'd be remiss not to mention Craig in this series, the person who fostered Rich and my sparks of curiousity for farming. And really, the person who brought us together. I found my way to Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture when I walked the farm before a celebratory graduation dinner at Blue Hill Restaurant which sits overlooking its fields. The dinner was stunning, but the tour of the educational farm beforehand stuck with me much more than the artful course after course of Dan Barber fare. The next morning I was on the farm's website, learning about its educational mission to train young farmers, and eventually landed on the staff page. Craig was profiled as lead livestock farmer, tasked with managing mixed species of livestock and teaching apprentices the ins and outs of animal husbandry in a way that best fits into the local ecology and provides the best quality of life for the animals. Videos posted to the website captured a gentle soul and a deep thinker with a sense of responsibility to the land and the domesticated animals under his care. If only everyone could vet their managers in such a way.

I had an email out within the next few days, written and rewritten, asking for an opportunity to volunteer. At the time, I was working down the road from school as a farmhand on a private farm. I both helped to maintain the vegetable garden and drove a big old box truck packed with the harvests down the west side highway to The Standard Grill in the meat packing district of Manhattan. When Olivia, my awesome farm boss heard I was after an apprenticeship with Craig, she was incredibly encouraging of working with him, "a one of a kind person". I volunteered with one of his assistant managers on a Sunday, riding along for animal chores, and drove back up the Hudson to my apartment, giddy over the Berkshire pigs in the woods and the childlike fun which I still have when egg collecting. I had opened a little door, gotten a peek inside the world of animal husbandry, and felt a familiar, ambitious sensation coursing through me. The summer's livestock apprentices had already been secured, but there was always next year. I decided to keep my seasonal job as truck driver and veg gardener with Olivia and I'd volunteer anytime they'd have me on the livestock crew.

Soon enough I was just as intrigued by raising animals true to their nature (a largely abandoned practice in the hyper efficient agricultural climate of today) as I was to work on a team led by a humbly intelligent person. Coming from the culinary world, it was refreshing to meet someone who created a peaceful environment, warm with camaraderie. In fact, a group led in such a way is both highly productive and satisfied. I was welcomed as a weekly volunteer, starting and ending the day with animal chores and helping with all sorts of projects in between. It didn't take long to feel as if I had found my place, a sort of belonging that I hoped to justify by securing a paid apprenticeship for the spring. Craig encouraged long cookout lunches on Wednesdays, when rotating crew members would barbecue for the team with pastured meats from the farm. The rest of us would contribute sides brought from home. And we would sit on the lawn outside of the yellow barn, headquarters for the livestock crew, in our denim and boots and get to know each other, until it was time to get back to it. It was at one of these luxurious lunches that I met Rich, the new volunteer, and the guy who soon enough would disrupt my plan to be single.

As I've said before, it doesn't take long to get comfortable with people when you're working out in the fields in the elements together. It takes even less time when the captain of the team is so amicable. During my first month volunteering, Craig invited all of us over for a meal with his family: his wife Gabrielle and their two-year-old Bess. We tucked into their sweet farmhouse where Gabrielle, a serious food enthusiast and editor of a local food magazine, had scratch-cooked vegetable platters and well-prepared meats overflowing her counters. We filled plates, enjoyed music and local beer, and took turns entertaining Bess and vice versa. Sweet Bess. After running around the yard with her until dark, Gabrielle asked if I would ever want to babysit. It became one of my greatest honors to be invited into the inner sanctum of their home and family life. The magic by which they lived was influential for me, and I would find it was for this new volunteer guy as well.

Months into my time volunteering at Stone Barns, Craig walked with me over to Blue Hill, that super fine dining restaurant on the farm where I celebrated graduation, and where I had taken up yet another side hustle, and offered me an early apprenticeship starting in the winter. I would be able to leave my serving position and my job at a local bakery, live in the apprentice housing, and completely become a student of farming. And also...the new guy was offered an early start date :).

Over the course of the year, we functioned almost as a family. Birthdays were celebrated late into the night at the apprentice house, with all of us sitting on couches and the floor, wherever there was space really, and always with lots of good food from the farm in our laps. One of the long-standing volunteers on the crew had a performance at Carnegie Hall and Craig wrangled all of us to run down to the city to see it. Soon enough Rich and I were secretly dating, and then realizing it wasn't a secret to people who spent all day with us. And without speaking a word Craig gave us his blessing, as a friend and as our boss. We found common threads and wound up at a Wilco concert at the park in Brooklyn, just Craig, Rich and me. We even visited he and his family, and his parents in Cooperstown, watched the annual canoe race together and of course, shared a meal. And as soon as our apprenticeships were coming to a close, we lamented the fact that we would no longer live in the apprentice house, across the street from Craig and family.

It was only appropriate a couple of years later to ask Craig if he would marry us in Ohio in my mom and dad's backyard. And he did, leaving the farm to travel to the suburbs of Dayton for a summer solstice wedding, with Bess leading the way as our flower girl. I didn't bear the weight and understanding of a farm manager then, but I now see how generous he was with his summer time to perform the rite of matrimony at our request. But that's just it. He is a sage for this reason exactly: for keeping life in perspective, and never missing a chance to celebrate and make merry.

It's almost unfair to a young person to work for someone so special so early on in life. For he is one of a kind: a compassionate, sage, patient, light-hearted teacher. I've drawn much inspiration from the way that Craig leads his life, and attribute much of my passion for working with the land from the way he showed us. And if anything, I owe him for hiring "the new volunteer", and for allowing me to court him under his watch.

Thank you for reading.

My writing is free for all to read. If you would like to support it you can do so below: