Feast Or fandom?

When it comes to ever-changing food fads, writes Paulette Whitney, the trick for farmers is to winnow the wheat from the chaff.

- Paulette Whitney

Trend is a dirty word when you’re a farmer. We have to play the long game.

It’s a tricky thing. The kale that was a fad a couple of years back – not withstanding people having eaten kale for millennia – took me a few seasons to master. Planted too early, it succumbed to marauding grubs; too late and the first frost checked its growth before it had even begun. When I’d finally grown enough to satisfy demand, the smoothie fanatics had raced off in their active wear to find some turmeric and açai berries, and I was left with just the few customers who understood the timeless joy that braised kale brings.

Micro-greens, historically sprouted in pantries or on windowsills by people with a hankering for greens in the cold months, become a bizarre use of resources when shipped for miles. I once weighed the snip pings from a pot of micro-shiso – actually purple mustard greens, misleadingly labelled as shiso – and the seed used could have grown 50 shiso. Oh, hang on, mustard plants. My five bucks bought me five whole grams of tiny, tasteless food, along with a plastic pot, bag and label destined for the bin.