Farmer's Table Summer Solstice

Here is a little more about the farm dinner we hosted last Saturday. We held it outside, on our family farm. When we decided to hold one of our farm dinner's in the summer, we knew that we'd be tempting Mother Nature. Here in south Alabama in the summer, you never know what the weather will do. Tropical storms, 100 degree temps, 99% humidity...you get the idea. So the week before our dinner we watched the weather, held our breath, and said more than a few prayer's, that the weather would participate. As the week-end neared we had a 50% chance of scattered showers in the forecast. Around here that means it may rain at your house but half a mile away the sun may be shinning. Would it rain or not? It was any ones guess. Our back-up plan was to put all the tables on the wrap around porch of my parent's house.
With our guests arriving at 5:30, at about 4:00 we decided to go ahead and set up outside. It would be nearly impossible to move everything if it did start to rain. Lots more prayer's were said!
At 5:30 our 22 diner's began to arrive. We had a table with various cheeses, homemade cherry chutney, and a tomato, basil, and garlic salsa, for them to munch on while they mingled. Our famous mint tea and a strawberry lemon-aid were on offer to drink.
Just before we planned to have everyone sit down for dinner, Splat! Some fat raindrops began to fall! NO! was the collective cry, and God listened. The rain stopped, the clouds right above us parted and opened to a patch of blue sky. The dinner was wonderful, featuring fresh local ingredients, with as many as possible coming from our farm. Here's what was on the menu:

Farmer’s Table Menu
Summer Solstice


Artesian Cheese Table


Grilled Flank Steak with Portabella Mushrooms
Grilled Alabama Shrimp Skewers

Blue Cheese Potato Salad with Apple wood Smoked Bacon
Grilled Slocomb Corn on the Cob with Basil Butter
Summer Grilled Vegetables with Picnic Vinaigrette
Waterberry Farm Green Salad with Purple Radish and White French Dressing



Blue Ribbon Dessert Table

Fried peach hand pies

For dessert, we had a friendly competition. Mom, my sister, a family friend and I, all made fruit desserts. Then we let the guest tell us their favorite. Everyone had a great time tasting and retasting all the desserts, but we never did come up with a clear winner. Maybe that's because all the choices were delicious. We had quite the spread. There was old fashioned apple pie with sour cream topping, a mixed berry crisp, freshly fried peach hand pies, mini blueberry tarts, rhubarb cake, cherry cobbler and strawberry and blueberry ice cream. With choices like those it's no wonder we never could pick a winner!

About 45 minutes after dessert was served, everyone was still sitting around the table talking. All of a sudden the rain started to fall lightly. Perfect timing! It was a truly wonderful evening.
If you didn't make it to this dinner, we plan to host another dinner this fall. We'll post the date and menu for that dinner in late summer so you can make plans to join us!
The pictures in this post were taken by Angela Davidson