Salvador Tinajero and the Organic Garden at Rancho la Puerta

I think it’s safe to say that most Mexican fruits and vegetables we find in our supermarkets are grown with chemical fertilizers, doused liberally with pesticides and herbicides, and have acquired a good-sized carbon footprint thanks to moving them from there to here. I want to tell you the story of a piece of land and the man who manages it that gives me hope for the future of Mexican produce. Like so many small organic farmers in the U.S., he is working against the odds. But unlike so many organic farmers, he has the support of an organization that in 1960 set aside a piece of land which continues to be a testament to the organic principles and practices I hold dear.

The organization is Rancho la Puerta, an amazing spa just south of San Diego, CA in Tecate, Mexico. Founded by Professor E. B. Szekeley, a Romanian-born philosopher and scholar and his young wife, Deborah, the Ranch welcomed its first guests in 1940 ($17.50/week; bring your own tent) and from the beginning offered organic food, a fitness regime, and lectures from people as diverse as Aldous Huxley and J. I. Rodale. The present accommodations are way more luxurious but the pioneering combination of fitness, nutrition, spiritual practice, hikes, and healthy living continues to this day. For four years, we have gone to the Ranch the week before Christmas. From Saturday to Saturday I unplug from my usual routine, take daily yoga classes, learn about nutrition, eat lots of organic fruits and vegetables, and have a spa treatment or two. I return to Berkeley feeling healthy and fit and perhaps a few pounds slimmer.

My very favorite activity is the two-mile Breakfast Hike to the organic garden, Ranchos Tres Estrellas, which leaves the Ranch Lounge at 6:00a.m. You might wonder what on earth would get me out of bed at 5:30a.m. when I’m on vacation. For me, the answer is Salvador Tinajero, the manager of the organic garden. Even more than the delicious breakfast and hot chocolate awaiting us at Tres Estrellas, I look forward to his tour of the garden which I’ve taken six or eight times over the years. He never fails to amuse, delight, and instruct.

Salvador greets us with a smile, wearing a blue jacket and gray pants, with his knife and pruning shears in a leather holster attached to his waist. He can hardly contain his excitement in talking about the organic fruits, vegetables, and herbs he grows on six acres of land at the foot of sacred Mount Kuchumaa. He uproots a broccoli plant, shows us the root structure and the soil, and then hands around the beautifully developed head of broccoli so that everyone can have a bite. He harvests six or seven carrots, washes them and has us notice how sweet they are in winter as we chomp and chew. He talks about planting annuals between perennials in order to draw the good insects, about how the carnivorous spiders help with any potential aphid problem. He delivers this information in accented English, speaking so quickly that occasionally I fail to catch what he says. Never mind, I want to cram in as much as possible before we hike back to the Ranch.

Salvador started working at the Ranch when he was 19 years old and has been at the garden for 23 years, the last six years as manager. In addition to giving the tours, he does the planning, orders supplies, organizes work schedules for the seven guys on his team, and sells any crops that aren’t used by the Ranch. His primary job, he says, is “to grow the soil” and it is crucial to his enterprise. Growing soil involves building compost from organic matter gleaned from the garden itself and from manure. His crew produces about seven tons a year and returns it to the garden beds, year after year. Water is also crucial. Currently the nine inches of annual rainfall is sufficient to water his mostly drought-tolerant crops. But he worries about global warming and how it is already affecting the garden. Higher temperatures, unpredictable weather patterns, and less rain could all take their toll on the garden’s ability to produce.

He dreams of growing an even greater variety of produce and is always looking for new possibilities. The more diversity the better. He receives requests for new items from the Ranch chefs and from guest chefs who teach at the cooking school, La Cocina Que Canta. Chicago’s Rick Bayless, for example, requested “Mexican oregano.” At first Salvador was stumped. He discovered that Mexican oregano is actually lippia graveolens, a member of the verbena family, and is not related to our supermarket oregano. He found a source for the seeds and grew it successfully. He also dreams of being able to travel to trainings in Mexico or California to learn more about gardening, to meet like-minded growers, and to spread his knowledge about organic farming to farmers in Mexico.

Salvador is passionate, curious, patient, devoted to the land, and committed to doing the best job he can. I appreciate his infectious grin, the twinkle in his eye, and his irrepressible exuberance as he shows us the garden. He pours affection and real love into everything he grows; we at the Ranch, this plot of land, and the surrounding community are all healthier for it. We thank him for his efforts on our behalf and wish him well in reaching farmers in Mexico who might adopt the Ranch’s organic practices and principles.

More Urban Farmers: The Patch in Sonoma

Walking down The Path in the town of Sonoma (it runs east to west from Sebastiani Winery to Highway 12), you can’t miss The Patch. It is a 5½-acre piece of land filled with thriving plants of all kinds: tomatoes, squash, onions, eggplant, corn, cucumbers, beans, and more. There’s a farm stand on the 2nd Street East edge of the plot, open every day from about 10 to 5, July to November. A rickety sign marks the spot. Where else but Sonoma would there be a huge plot of land, next to a vineyard, growing vegetables? I fell in love.

The first time I visited the farm stand, it was on the honor system with a scale to weigh your produce and a metal canister with a slot in the top for your money. I was amazed that whoever ran this enterprise considered his customers honest and trusted that they would pay for their vegetables. I found this extraordinary. Clearly something special was going on here.

The next time, I met Leo. He always sits on a white plastic chair at the far end of the stand. Sometimes he’s listening to a baseball game (the Giants and the Red socks are his teams) on the radio. Sometimes he’s waiting patiently for the next customer. Always he asks, “What’s for dinner?” and really wants to know. He is a man who knows his way around the kitchen. He watches Jamie Oliver and Rick Bayless on television and regularly makes ratatouille and Mexican green chile stew for himself. He also really knows his vegetables and recently has been complaining loudly about our need for more heat to bring in the sweetness of the melons and the tomatoes. I always look forward to seeing him on my regular farm stand visits. So how did he get here?
















Leo Salais was born in Los Angeles in 1932. His mother was a Mexican from New Mexico and his father was from Chihuahua. He moved to San Francisco in 1941 and says that he was always crazy about the city: the people, the food, and the environment. He worked for the School Department for 18 years as a maintenance foreman and then drove for Regal Delivery for Macy’s for 10 years before retiring in 1999 and moving to Sonoma where one of his daughters and grandkids live. He says, “I left San Francisco and reinvented myself.”

He started working at the farm stand for Betty Kolstad about seven years ago and stayed on when Lazaro Calderon took over in 2003; currently he works about five days a week. He is full of admiration for his boss, Lazaro, and for the team who “work their asses off” to grow the vegetables he sells. I was surprised to learn that he is also passionate about jazz, in addition to food, his family, and baseball. He studied the saxophone at the Berkeley School of Music in Boston from 1955-57. He loves the music of saxophonists Charlie Parker, Woody Herman, Art Pepper, and Stan Getz and listens to their music most every night.

So that’s Leo. He was my initial introduction to The Patch but there is a second equally important story.

There are two Farmers Markets in Sonoma: Tuesday evening and Friday morning. One market day I noticed a produce stand with a large sign reading The Patch. But Leo, the only face I associated with The Patch, was not selling. The fellow in charge was gracious, knowledgeable, and friendly. He handled the vegetables with great care. Once I had established myself as a regular customer, this fellow would occasionally add an extra tomato to my sack. He mostly worked alone, but occasionally would be joined by another man who looked remarkably like him. I learned that his name was Lazaro Calderon and the second fellow was his brother. Lazaro is on the left, his brother Fernando on the right.

















Lazaro was born in 1974 north of Mexico City, the sixth of eight kids, four brothers and four sisters. He moved to Petaluma with his father when he was 14. After high school he worked with his dad in a nursery and on the side grew hydrangeas which he took to the city to sell. He also sold wreaths which his uncle taught him to make. Lazaro moved on to Skylark Nursery in Santa Rosa, working with fresh cut flowers, and then to Oak Hill Farms where he worked with Paul for a couple of years. In 1994 Paul referred him to Betty Kolstad, who was then running The Patch, and Lazaro signed on to work for her. The Patch at that point was mostly planted in corn with a few vegetables on the side. In 2003 when Betty decided it was time to do something new, Lazaro took over the operation, leasing the land from the Castellanos family, who raise Clydesdale horses down the block.

















He made some changes. He started growing more tomatoes and less corn. He increased heirloom tomato production from two varieties in 2003 to 16 now, in addition to Early Girls and Beefsteaks. In a couple of weeks, Xochimilco tomatoes—his new favorite—will be ripe and in great demand. He also started growing a wider variety of squashes, onions, cucumbers, and eggplants as he saw what his customers wanted.

















He started selling his produce at Farmers Markets in Sonoma, Santa Rosa, and Sebastopol. During the growing season he goes to more than five every week, in addition to organizing the work in the fields.
He brought his two brothers, Fernando and Vicente, to work with him and has a great team in the field harvesting the produce. In addition to The Patch, he grows flowers and peaches on 2½ acres that he and his family own in Santa Rosa where they live.

During the winter when The Patch doesn’t need his full attention, he finds other projects to keep him busy. Recently a large private school building across the street from his mother’s house in Mexico where he was raised came up for sale. He and his siblings as kids used to clean and sweep around the property for a little money and a Coca Cola. The owner of the school had always told them, “One day this could be yours.” When the owner was ready to retire, he offered them the school saying, “You are the right people to have it.” They bought the property and are now in the process of turning the school into a night club. He goes to Mexico at least twice a year to work out the arrangements and oversee the remodeling. He expects it to be open in a year or two.

















Several things are clear from my conversations with him: in spite of the hard work and long hours, he loves what he does. He is in love with tomatoes. He loves to work this land which is so filled with history. He loves maintaning the tradition noted on his card which says The Patch: No Chemicals since 1870. He will continue to farm the land as long as the owners are willing to lease it to him.

We are the beneficiaries of Leo’s dedication, patience, and good humor, of Lazaro’s entrepreneurial spirit and huge capacity to learn and grow, and the team’s immense effort to nurture and tend this special plot of land. I, for one, am immensely grateful to all of them.