Open Farm Days tour and dinner at local farm a unique experience

Danny and Shannon Ruzicka have been welcoming guests to Nature’s Green Acres for an outdoor dinner for eight years, through their partnership with RGE RD restaurant of Edmonton.

The last two years, the dinner has been held in conjunction with, and through, Alberta Open Farm Days.

Chef Blair Lebsack opened RGE RD eight years ago, and he says it is a priority for him to forge relationships with farmers like the Ruzickas. In fact, his is also the only restaurant in Edmonton that they will sell their meat to.

He says it’s good for him, because he knows what he is getting, purchasing grass-fed beef, pork, and lamb, and it’s good for Danny and Shannon, because they know they have a market for their animals.

He buys the animals whole, and butchers them himself.

Lebsack and his wife, Caitlyn Fulton, along with their team, created a culinary delight for 77 visitors to the farm on Saturday, Aug. 18, who each paid $150 a plate for the experience.

After a personal greeting by the Ruzicka children at the gate, guests checked in and enjoyed refreshing water in a cozy, sheltered area of the farm, where everything was set up to sit, relax, and take in the scenery.

The experience started off with a selection of mouthwatering appetizers, served in an idyllic farm setting, with Ruzicka’s abundant garden to the side, and the odd wandering chicken.

Danny Ruzicka, who is not only a farmer, but is a very busy farrier, demonstrated how to shoe a horse for the guests, with Shannon providing an entertaining and informative commentary.

The couple then led guests on a walking farm tour.

First stop was the bush pens, where the Tamworth, Large Black, Mulefoot, and Berkshire pigs live.

Shannon told guests that three of the four breeds are nearly extinct, and on the Critically Endangered Farm Animals list. “We need to eat them to save them,” she says.

She talked about how well the breeds get along together as some sows will suckle any piglet that approaches.

She also described some of them as accomplished escape artists, and for a number of those animals, it’s easier to keep track of where they are in a rotational-type grazing situation which is moved around the pasture as the animals eat the available grass.

The pigs enjoy shade, a portable shower, enough water to wallow, and fresh grass regularly, although with this year’s drought situation, the pasture is pretty dry.

Next it was on to the lambs, where Shannon explained about the Dorper and Katahdin breeds being ‘hair’ breeds. “Because their hair is different, it doesn’t have lanolin oil in their wool, and don’t take on a muttony flavour.” She told guests that the evening meal would include fresh lamb from the field.

It’s a big thing for the Ruzickas, knowing what their animals eat, and it’s because of how they raise their stock that it’s so attractive to the restaurant owners.

After the livestock tour, which didn’t include the cattle, which were being grazed elsewhere, guests walked down to the pasture nearest Iron Creek, where Shannon showed guests some standing teepee rings, which she says have been claimed by both Cree and Blackfoot.

Because the surrounding pasture is so rocky, it had never been worked, and archeologists came out to verify that the rings are consistent with a winter camp, likely for either.

Down by the creek, a large tent had been erected, with two long tables inside and pretty table settings, beside an amazing outdoor kitchen that incorporated everything from a grill to an old cast iron stove to a stone oven.