Harvest Kitchen at the Extension Learning Farm

05/08/2026

Foraging and preservation were top of the to-do list this week, the Master Food Preserver volunteers harvested wild leek greens and brought them to the Harvest Kitchen to create a Ramp Kimchi! We celebrated the seasons by using the last of the Napa cabbage, carrots and daikon radish in storage from the 2025 harvest, plus the vibrant green of the fresh ramp harvest. Thanks to Kent Family Growers for the locally grown and stored organic vegetables. We saved some of the greens for a pesto making workshop, stay tuned for those pics. 🥬🥕🫚

05/04/2026

What's better than gathering with other farmers and food entrepreneurs to learn from each other?! A group that just completed the multi week online course Building a Home-Based Food Business joined a field trip including a tour of Laing Family Farm in Canton, lunch at Jernabi Coffeehouse with guest presenters of Sugar Valley Bakery of Potsdam and wrapping up the day at House of Greens and My Sister's Kitchen in Ogdensburg. From adorable lambs to developing wholesale contacts to sourcing packaging, our site hosts Traci, Scott, Kristen, Maranda, and Sam were generous with their wisdom and upfront about the creativity and perseverance required to run your own business. Thanks for being such excellent hosts and contributing to strengthening our North Country food system! This program is part of a multi-year initiative of Cornell Cooperative Extension of St. Lawrence County and Cornell Cooperative Extension of Jefferson County called the Ag and Food Producers Academy.

04/15/2026

Fresh-cut Farm to School processing just got easier! Thanks to Dave, Dave and Pat of St. Lawrence-Lewis BOCES for bringing over a scissor lift table and pallet jack scale to help handle the 2,000+ pounds of North Country produce that's lightly processed each week by Big Spoon Kitchen at Cornell Cooperative Extension of St. Lawrence County. BOCES has been a dedicated partner in working to increase the amount of local fruits and vegetables on cafeteria trays in 20+ districts throughout the region.

04/03/2026

Good times in the Harvest Kitchen!

We loved hosting these passionate young chefs last weekend in the Harvest Kitchen at the Extension Learning Farm. The students showed awesome teamwork and knife skills. Great job to the student teams from Potsdam Central School District and Salmon River Central School District! It's not possible without the good-natured coaches Nicole, Alicia and William as well as our judges Alicia of Applewood Orchards, Rosie of Big Spoon Kitchen, and Sarah of CCE. Big thanks to our partner St. Lawrence-Lewis BOCES along with our sponsors Kinney Drugs Foundation, SeaComm, Community Bank, N.A., and MVP Health Care. This program is a collaborative effort to inspire Farm to School programs by
encouraging regional middle and high school students to develop tasty, healthy recipes that showcase local produce and build lifelong cooking skills. 🥕🧅🍽️🍎

04/01/2026

It's no joke- the April Canning Jar Drive starts today! Donate jars and be entered for a chance to win a $50 gift certificate to the local farm or food business of your choice. Drop off used or new canning jars to the Extension Learning Farm at 2043B State Highway 68, Canton anytime 9am-3pm on weekdays through the month of April. Our Master Food Preserver volunteer Program uses the jars in our hands-on preservation workshops and redistributes them for free at farmers markets and other community events. Circulate the love of food preservation! https://bit.ly/donatejars
Cornell Cooperative Extension of St. Lawrence County

03/13/2026

Locally grown and lightly processed garlic is headed to schools! Today Flip, the manager of the Harvest Kitchen at the Extension Learning Farm worked with Katie on the Fresh-cut processing crew for Big Spoon Kitchen, to work up another trial batch. The garlic was sourced from the Martin Family and Big Spoon brought it to the Harvest Kitchen to clean, mince and pack. Our Farm to School partners St. Lawrence-Lewis BOCES will deliver it to their schools to add to soups, pizza, and more. We look forward to hearing their feedback.
Vampires- you've been warned!

03/11/2026

A jolly group experienced the step to safely pressure can using beef from C&M Beef/Dairy L.L.C of Lisbon. There are several brands of canners and the workshop participants saw Presto, Mirro and All-American in action. They function slightly different but the results are the same- tender, fully cooked meat in sealed jars! Stay tuned for our other hands-on preservation workshops in the Harvest Kitchen and around St. Lawrence County.

Cornell Cooperative Extension of St. Lawrence County

03/10/2026

The creativity and passion of food entrepreneurs is abundant! A BIG thank you to Lennie, Nancy, Lucy, and Daniel for opening your doors to our Ready-to-Eat Food Business class. After four weeks of online learning, the class participants spent a field trip day seeing Watertown food businesses in action. We kicked off the day at the Mexican Food truck El Buen Sazon, enjoyed lunch at craft brewer Garland City Beer Works and rounded it out with Chrissy Beanz Bakery. This class is one of seven we offer as part of the Ag and Food Producers Academy. Let's grow local!

Cornell Cooperative Extension of St. Lawrence County Cornell Cooperative Extension of Jefferson County

01/06/2026

Flip, the Harvest Kitchen Manager is excited to teach the Food Production with a 20C License starting Wednesday, January 7th! There course is four weekly webinars plus a field trip to commercial production kitchens. Join the 20+ other entrepreneurs who are developing new products and building their businesses! https://bit.ly/foodbusiness2026

Welcome to the Regional Food Business Incubator! From small farms and food entrepreneurs to helping retailers buy local, this program supports every chain in the field-to-fork pipeline. With hands-on education, personalized business guidance, technical assistance, and the cultivation of a buy...

12/20/2025

Check out this news story interview with Noel about our upcoming courses. Find more details and register at https://bit.ly/foodbusiness2026

The Cornell Cooperative Extension will be holding an Ag & Food Producers Academy.

12/15/2025

Pickles? Ferments? Jerky? Canned sauces? They all require a 20C License from NYS Ag and Markets to produce and sell to the public. Sign up for our course starting January 7th to learn all about it! https://bit.ly/foodbusiness2026

Calling all food producers and entrepreneurs in northern New York! Are you ready to kick-start or grow your food business? Our Food Production with a 20C License webinar series, starting January 7th, covers everything you need to know to make value-added products including recipe approval, labels, record keeping, inspections, and more. There's 6 other workshop topics in our winter Ag and Food Producer's Academy, find 'em all and register here: https://bit.ly/foodbusiness2026 Harvest Kitchen at the Extension Learning Farm