Guest chef Clark Staub loves cooking in the field kitchen. He’s always up for anything – ask him about ferrying all his ingredients out to a sand spit in Morro Bay for dinner a few years back – and we love any excuse to bring him along with us. This will be Chef Clark’s tenth dinner with us (we’ll also see him earlier this season in Big Sur), and that doesn’t count his appearances at Coachella. He’s definitely an OITF favorite. We’ll be returning to set the table with our friends at Ampelos Cellars again this year. Host vintners Rebecca and Peter are always a welcoming site to a crew that has traveled the country for five months. The Santa Rita hills have the climate and soil that leads to very good wine — there will be no shortage of that as we dine together beside the vines.
Taxonomy: Upcoming Events
Bonton Farms
Not too long ago, this South Dallas neighborhood was a food desert. Now it’s home to several urban gardens, a food market, café and coffee house — plus a 40-acre farm that supplies the local community with fresh fruits and vegetables, meat, milk, honey and eggs. Host farmer Daron Babcock built this place from scratch with a goal of increasing food security, economic stability, health and wellness for his neighbors in need. Guest chefs Tiffany Derry and Tom Foley run Roots Southern Table and Roots Chicken Shak, two beloved Dallas restaurants rooted in Southern flavors and food traditions. Among their delicious offerings is Tiffany’s famous duck-fat fried chicken. Perhaps she’ll fry some up for us alongside our meal featuring Bonton’s bounty of autumn vegetables and herbs.
Burnt Hill Farm
It’s a rare opportunity to dine between the vines in the Piedmont Plateau — which is why we’re staying three nights. We’re thrilled to have another opportunity to stroll through their 117 acres of golden grape vines, vegetable beds, fruit trees and free-grazing farm animals. And to taste through many delicious varieties of their thoughtfully made wines, of course. Host vintner Andrew Baker is a conscientious farmer and winemaker who maintains a regenerative system meant to mimic nature in the vineyard and makes wine using zero additives in order to best reflect this historic property’s terroir. Guest chef Bryan Voltaggio will helm the field kitchen on our final night. He was mentored by Chef Charlie Palmer and has gone on to accrue quite a few culinary accolades, including an appearance on Top Chef and two James Beard nominations. He’s also opened several popular restaurants in Maryland including his newest venture, Thacher and Rye, where he cooks up locally sourced Mid-Atlantic cuisine.
Ayrshire Farm
We first visited Ayrshire Farm in 2009 and we’ve been back many times since. Our friends at Ayrshire raise many rare breeds of livestock including White Park cattle and Gloucester Old Spot pigs, plus heirloom fruits and vegetables — all on acres and acres of lush green rolling hills. From the table, it’s not unusual to catch a few shire horses galloping past or wild turkeys rummaging through the brush. Guest chef Tarver King is an old friend of ours, too — he first helmed the field kitchen in 2012. During the course of his culinary career, he’s earned attention from Bon Appetit, James Beard and Esquire. He also makes Norse mythology-inspired charcoal drawings with homemade charcoal. We’re excited to catch up and see what he’s been up to.
FarmerJawn at Elkins Estate
FarmerJawn follows regenerative farming practices that concentrate on soil health to produce healthy food. But Farmer Christa Barfield’s vision is much bigger than that. The vision is to better the health of folks living in Philly’s urban food desert by increasing access to good, organic food. Like Christa says, farming is the gateway to health. Come see how her vision is flourishing at Elkins Estate. Chef Andrew Henshaw, who worked for five years with Laser Wolf co-owner Michael Solomonov’s heralded Zahav, will bring Israel’s vibrant shipudiya (skewer house) cuisine to the Outstanding table. Laser Wolf’s universe is the charcoal grill, so Chef will be right at home here!
Renfrow Farms
Renfrow Farms and its sister business Renfrow Hardware encompass more than 100 years of history and five generations of family business. The store opened in 1900 and the 9-acre farm was birthed in 2011, growing a wide variety of vegetables, fruits, nuts and flowers. They also produce honey from their 50 beehives. In 2016, Hurricane Matthew chased us into the hardware store for a unique meal down the aisles. Other years, we’ve set the table between rows of blooming flowers, fragrant lavender bushes and a colorful array of vegetables. Wherever we end up this year, we’ll have guest chef Jamie Lynch cooking an extraordinary meal in the field kitchen. Jamie’s a bit of a Charlotte celebrity, from his time on Top Chef to his wildly popular New American hotspots. His first restaurant 5Church quickly became a Charlotte institution when it opened in 2012, earning him Best Chef from Charlotte Magazine several years in a row. Now the restaurant is known as Church & Union — part of his budding brand of New American restaurants across the Southeast. Jamie’s deeply dedicated to sourcing from local farms and even built his own 6-acre fruit and vegetable farm to help supply his restaurants. He’ll feel right at home cooking amongst Renfrow’s Fall bounty.
Joseph Fields Farm
Farmers Joseph and Helen Fields will host us at their 50 acre organic farm on John’s Island, where they grow for several local farmers markets. Joseph, a third generation farmer, was born and raised on the farm on John’s Island and entrenched in Gullah culture. They will tour us through their vegetable fields before we sit down for a feast of Filipino-infused Lowcountry
Bells Bend Farms
This 40-acre farm is just a stone’s throw from downtown Nashville, even though its rolling pastures, cropland and forests feels like a countryside escape. Bells Bend Farms is the result of community members who’ve fought city developers since the 1980’s to maintain the area’s rural roots. Farmer Eric Woolridge helped build the deer fence around the current property where he farms with wife Tyler. Together, they grow a wide variety of fresh vegetables and flowers for their Music City community, helping to maintain this thriving foodhub in Davidson County. We’ll toast to another season of hard work with an early autumn meal in their fields. Guest chefs Mailea Weger & Mike Kida are the team behind Nashville hotspot lou where they craft seasonal small plates paired with an impressive list of natural wine.
Sagaponack Farm Distillery at Foster Farm
Before the Hamptons became a world-famous summer beach destination, it was home to a wealth of potato farms — and the Fosters are some of the only remaining potato farmers on Long Island. To this day, the family grows 200 acres of potatoes in addition to 30 acres of fresh vegetables and a small lot of grain. A heap of their spuds go toward Sagaponack vodka, which we’ll have the chance to taste at reception before sitting down at the long table to enjoy a meal from our good friend Jason Weiner. Jason is a bit of an OITF celebrity. He’s been doing events with us since 2008, and this will be his 15th appearance in the field kitchen, more than any other chef in OITF history. Earlier this year, we worked with Jason at Holman’s Harvest down in Palm Beach, Florida, where he opened an outpost of his popular Bridgehampton restaurant Almond in 2019. We’re thrilled to host him back on the East End again this summer.
Verdant Hollow Farms
Produce and pasture. You’ll find it all here in the rolling green fields of southern Michigan. Verdant Hollow Farms is home to a menagerie of milking goats, heritage pigs, Katahdin sheep, geese and laying chickens. All watched over by June and Cash, Colorado Mountain dogs who help keep coyotes, foxes, and hawks at bay. Verdant Hollow is dedicated to regenerative farming practices, and the multi-species livestock earn their keep; each has a unique purpose and skill, and all provide rich compost for gardens of greens, fruit and vegetables and for the high tunnel greenhouse where cold-hardy crops grow all year long. Guest chef Abra Berens is a former farmer herself. She’s also the author of Ruffage: A Practical Guide to Vegetables and Grist: A Practical Guide to Cooking Grains, Beans, Seeds, and Legumes, which made the NY Times list for Best Cookbooks of 2021. She’ll feel right at home in the field kitchen.