The Fire at Next Step Farm
A Tragic Loss for the Grain Community
If you are financially able to contribute to the Next Step Produce relief fund, please consider doing so. You can donate here.
The other day I was talking to a friend about writing this post. I was explaining how my aim was to spread the news of the tragic fire at Next Step Produce, a highly respected produce and grain farm in Maryland. I told her how decades of selective breeding of grains had been tragically lost and how all the farm’s grain processing equipment had been destroyed. I then expressed that it felt like I was frequently covering bad news such as this and wondered, jokingly, if this made me a writing sadist. To lift my spirits, she asked if perhaps there was a bright side to the story; perhaps it would inspire people to help Next Step rebuild, or even just to remind them to appreciate and value the work that goes into the grains we eat. Maybe my telling of the story would inspire some sort of solution.
I reflected for a moment before saying, “The worst part of all this is that what Next Step was doing was the solution.”
As a baker, I’m always somewhat in awe of grain farmers. Farming is a notoriously difficult undertaking with high risk and low financial reward. Those farmers who, like Heinz and Gabrielle of Next Step, choose to invest their time in developing and growing specialty grains take even greater risks. We have a tremendous need for specialty grain farmers, but it seems, when it comes to food, modern society doesn’t always have its priorities straight. Rather than strategically incentivizing farmers to undertake the type of work Heinz and Gabrielle do, we rely on a bit of hope that enough farmers will work tirelessly to develop and protect our national grain supply because it’s their passion.
So, what happens when a passion project burns to the ground? What happens when someone doing it the right way suddenly can’t do it at all?
When Casey Gustowarow of Fireside Farm shared the news of the fire with us, he wrote, “The sheer number of varieties of grains, pulses and seeds that Next Step has experimented with and grown for their customer base is nothing short of amazing… They have shared their knowledge and resources with many and this is a huge loss not only for them but also the wider local food movement.”
Whitney Valcarcel, who is organizing a GoFundMe campaign to benefit Next Step, writes, “Their once bustling grain mill is no more and the grain cultivated and grown for decades has vanished with the smoke… On top of that, decades of work and germination testing, along with all the seeds saved, were also consumed in the fire.”
In essence, it’s all gone.
I feel the appropriate response to this tragedy is to do two things. First, I believe it’s apt to reflect on the magnitude of the loss. Second, I think we can use this as an opportunity to consider how to prevent these sorts of tragedies from happening in the future. Frustratingly, the reality is that the impacts of climate change will make fires and other forms of destruction more common, not less. In the U.S., increasing financial insecurity at every level will make it harder for farmers to spend their time and resources on specialty grains, and it will lessen our ability as customers to support those who do.
For now, let’s just do what we can. Let’s support Heinz and Gabrielle. Let’s support all our local grain farmers. And let’s really appreciate the grains that do make it to our plates.
This is sad. Thanks for spreading the news.