Field & Feast: Sublime Food from a Brave New Farm

Carlson, a derivatives and bond trader, and his wife, Emelie, left everything behind in the wake of the 2009 financial crisis to purchase Wyebrook, a 320-acre farm in southeastern Pennsylvania that was in disrepair. The duo transformed the farm into a terrifically vibrant, vital enterprise with the help of a talented team. Over the course of the book’s 250-plus pages, Carlson and his coauthors share recipes highlighting key ingredients to illustrate their versatility and encourage readers to use as much of the animal as possible. Once a pig is slaughtered, for example, it’s used for simple fare like a smoked pork loin, a variety of sausages, and rigatoni with pork liver and ramp ragu. Heritage breeds of cows, goats, lamb, and chickens are also on the premises, showcased in dishes such as short rib ragu with candied orange and oil-cured olives, and goat rillettes with Pennsylvania chile sauce. The dishes run the gamut from simple (honey panna cotta) to epic, such as seven fires–style roast lamb, which calls for processing an entire lamb and building a frame using rebar to roast it. Though few readers will likely go to the effort of procuring fresh hay and a bone-in hind leg of goat for Goat in Hay, foodies who are passionate about farm-to-table cookbooks will be hard pressed to find a better example of the genre. [em](Feb.) [/em]