Latest Event Updates
Summer Solstice Celebration Saturday June 22nd
The Sonoma Valley Grange is partnering with Oak Hill Farm on a farm to table dinner. Featuring Oak Hill Farm vegetables, Bucklin and Fresh Wine Co wines, Straus Creamery and other local producers. Tickets support much needed upgrades to this Community center in the Springs!
Click the link below for tickets or contact sonomavalleygrange.org or call 510 557 7025. Member and farmer discounts available.
https://checkout.square.site/merchant/MLQ2B8CB03WPR/checkout/TV62MTQYPUUF64WASQQJY4OJ?src=webqr
Sonoma Friday Farmer’s Market
Spring Farmers Market Review
The Sonoma Friday Farmers’ Market at Depot Park is a Sonoma tradition that spans over 35 years. This outdoor event, set in the parking lot for Arnold Field, is the main source for Sonoma Valley folks to meet and shop with their local farmers and food producers. Running year-round Fridays from 9:00am – 12:30pm, these few hours afford us the opportunity for some of the best food available. A recent shopping trip provided a glimpse of what bounty the Spring season has to offer.
The lines were already forming at 9:00am from eager shoppers looking to beat the crowds (and perhaps score some of the limited specialty crops and items found here). I started at Mike the Bejkr’s booth, our local celebrity baker, known for using ancient grains, local ingredients, and always organic. Today the counters were brimming with baked goods – decisions, decisions! Fresh pretzels were coming out of the wood-fired oven, an easy first choice. Then for the sweet – ginger scones and the millet-hazelnut financier were the hard choices out of at least half a dozen. A large pan loaf of the Einkorn bread, made with one of the oldest cultivated wheats topped off my basket – and my bread budget!
Moving on down the line, Hector’s Honey has a large array of farm products – honey, beeswax candles, garlic, citrus, asparagus, and more. Ortiz Family Farm from Santa Rosa has big butter lettuces, kale, chard, beets and some nice tulips and daffodils. Speaking of flowers, Oak Hill Farm of Glen Ellen, one of the markets founding vendors, had fragrant white and purple lilac, pastel colored ranunculus, pink tea-tree and lots of carrots, celery root, potatoes (including the fabled Bodega Red!), chard, arugula, lettuces, shallots, radishes and fava greens. Rhodes Family Farm coming from the central valley had spring onions, carrots, green garlic, cauliflower, broccoli, citrus and avocados, and, amazingly, zucchini! Farms coming from out of the valley, though not technically local, do bring in other items not available, though some would say we can work to produce more locally, but avocados are a stretch! Rojas farms is another that brings a large variety of citrus, grapefruits, navel oranges and mandarins.
Paul’s Produce, another of the mainstays of Sonoma agriculture, had a line 20 people deep and growing. Folks came for their famous salad mix, carrots, beet greens, kales, cilantro, brussels sprouts, asparagus, artichokes, leeks, and staple storage crops like butternut squash, onion and shallots. Next door were free-range eggs by-the-dozen from Opal Moon Farm, with neighboring booth Sweetwater Spectrum bringing their fresh sprouts of all varieties grown right in city limits. Iconic Sonoma County dairy Strauss Creamery is onsite for all of your organic dairy needs, and Sonoma County Meat company providing locally raised meat – chicken, pork and beef. Rounding out these offerings are incredible edible and medicinal mushrooms from Bohemian Well Being Farm, the Hummus Guy with many varieties of hummus and mediterranean fare, baked goods from Baker and Cook, smoked salmon and seafood, roasted and pour over coffee and crepes.
All told, the Spring Farmers’ Market has everything we need for a well-rounded diet, providing opportunity for small local producers to sell direct and increase business viability and sustainability, all while offering us Valley residents some of the best things in life.
(Seth Dolinsky is Lecturer of Sonoma Valley Grange, whose motto is: Healthy Farms, Healthy Food, Healthy Community, and is owner of New Land Systems, a regenerative land management company.)
Superbowl Sunday Breakfast at the Hall!
Image Posted on Updated on
Another fantastic menu put together by Chef Sean Paxton!
A new flag for the Hall…
The aged flags that have stood for decades at the Hall were disrepair, and given a proper retirement. Representative Thompsons office graciously offered to replace, and went the extra mile in having this new American flag raised at the National Capitol in Washington D.C. on December 4th, in honor of the Sonoma Valley Grange 100 year anniversary in 2024!
This commemorative flag was then sent across the country to be presented in early January to the Sonoma Valley Grange. Members and officers were present to receive, and will fly at the Hall on a new flagpole in honor.
Thank you Mike Thompson and assistant Rebecca Hermosillo!
Happy New Year!
A New Year’s Letter of Thanks
Dear members and friends of the Sonoma Valley Grange-
As we say goodbye to 2023, I want to thank you for all of your support for the Grange this eventful year. Whether a member, or a visitor enjoying our farm fresh, locally sourced, elegant pancake breakfasts, you have been a part of our success. With member participation key to our operation, we were able to formally reestablish as a local Grange, securing our new charter as of April.
The Grange, nationally, is the oldest farm organization in the country, founded in 1867. The California State Grange is the oldest in the State, founded in 1873. A Fraternal organization started to support the family farm, has expanded to support all people of the communities they serve. Our Grange was founded in 1924, and we acquired our building in 1934. We live by our Mission of “Healthy Farms, Healthy Food, Healthy Community.” But how do we serve?
Acting as a home for valley farmers and food producers, the Grange Hall has served many Valley residents as a local meeting and gathering space, for celebratory events, farm to table meals, an emergency center, a food distribution center, an educational space, a small business incubator, and so much more. These opportunities expand as we are able to open up more for events, meetings and rentals in the new year.
We hosted the SOS free meal program for the year, providing a venue for their expanding service. They have moved into a new facility just down the road, intent on being able to further expand their important service to the community.
We are pleased to announce that we will continue that tradition, as we will now be hosting the local Meals On Wheels of Sonoma, which will use our kitchen to good effect, making meals to deliver to seniors and the homebound. We look forward to this new community collaboration.
Reaching out, we participated in regional Grange Pamona meetings, working on issues of all Sonoma County Granges. We participated in the State Grange Annual Convention and State policy committees, defining the course of the State Grange for the coming year. Our Secretary Laurie Gallian was voted onto the State Grange Foundation, which makes it easier for all Granges to seek donations. Our member and Chef, Sean Paxton made most of the meals for the State Convention and was well received. He brings the same expertise and passion to our pancake breakfasts and will helm future meals.
As we come into our 100th Anniversary year, we will both celebrate with community events and seek your donations. Our goal is to become a fully functional emergency center, replacing heating and air conditioning so we can become a viable warming or cooling center during extreme weather events, being able to operate during power outages by having solar with battery backup. Emergency centers also need to be hubs of communication, relaying vital information during crises. Seeking funds to manifest these lofty, necessary goals will be a heavy lift, but possible only with your support.
Along with these higher goals, we must expand our capabilities to attend to the mundane maintenance issues of caring for an older building and property, from the replacement of fences to a storage container owned not rented, to updated kitchen equipment. Taken together, we have set our fundraising goal at $100,000.
While these funds allow us to move forward, the movement only happens with people who can put in the work, the members and volunteers, giving of their time and labors. We gather in the firm belief that our tradition of mutual support for community and agriculture, and for our Hall as a base for that mutual support, drives us all to a better future.
Please join us, please donate, and be a part of that future.
You can reach us at:
Sonoma Valley Grange #407
PO Box 546
Boyes Hot Springs, CA 95416
Thank you again for 2023, and looking forward to 2024.–
In Fraternity and CharityRaymund Gallian
President
Sonoma Valley Grange #407
Sonoma Valley represents at State Grange Convention!
Last month, Sonoma County hosted the 148th annual Convention of the California State Grange. Since the first gathering in 1875, a lot has changed in California, and Sonoma for that matter. The Sonoma Valley Grange is nearing its own 100 year anniversary from incorporation in 1924, and was proud to show support by attending the convention both as delegates and in support from the kitchen, as we are often “wont to do”! Sonoma Grange Executive Chef Sean Paxton volunteered to cook and serve the majority of the meals at the convention, including the great Hawaiian-themed meal seen being served above. Sean gave a great speech on the value of using local, organic ingredients, and supporting local farmers and food producers, a goal close to our heart here in Sonoma Valley.
Stay tuned for the next Grange event, dates and times will be posted ASAP!
Sonoma Valley Grange #407 