Tim Stewart, Deb Jones & Bill Ronay chat at the Farm Dinner

At the five course Summer Bounty Farm Dinner Monday night at Muss & Turner’s restaurant in Smyrna, we had the distinct pleasure of sitting next to two of the ingredients’ providers – Pearson Farm out of Fort Valley and Rockin S Farm in Free Home Georgia.

The Pearson family, for over 100 years, has raised peaches & pecans. They do a mostly wholesale/mail order business, selling to restaurants, grocery stores, at farmers markets and through their catalogs. And they offer historic tours of their Peach Packing Shed. You are welcomed to enjoy some peach ice cream afterward, and to take home fresh-off-the-tree peaches with you.

Al Pearson and his nephew were at the dinner representing the dessert course – angel food cake, macerated peaches, homemade peach ice cream and whipped cream. Muss & Taylor’s chefs hit a home run on the dessert! because they had quality fruit to work with!

I sat beside Nichelle Stewart, who with her husband Tim, runs the Rockin S Farm in Free Home, in Cherokee County almost at the Forsyth County line.

If you have a copy of the June 2010 Georgia Magazine, you’ll see Tim & Nichelle and their miniature rooster, Doodle, smiling at you from the cover. Or if you follow them on Facebook, you’ll already know that Doodle is the hero of Nichelle’s first children’s book, Doodle ‘s First Farm Camp. Lee, her sister, is illustrating it.

Nichelle is a master at multi-tasking. So she’s trying to put the book together as she’s canning and teaching and painting and leading farm camps and running their Fresh Market Stand.

The Pearson Family and the Stewarts strengthen their communities every day as they work. And when they are away from the farm, they represent their communities so well that those they talk to want to get into their trucks and come home with them.

And when you buy from the Pearsons and the Stewarts and other Georgia farmers, you strengthen local economies, help protect  the environment, and support small businesses. Georgia Made Georgia Grown will help you get to know your local family farmers. They are well worth learning about and from.