A Visit to Dooryard Farm

May 20, 2014
I am lucky to live across the street from one of the only farms in Camden, Maine: Dooryard Farm. For you locals, it’s the beautiful green rolling fields on your left when you’re headed out of town towards the Snow Bowl. Cooper Funk and Marina Sideris are the proud owners, along with there darling son Julian and their black & white boarder collie. Previously, they managed a farm in Northern California called Dinner Bell Farm, where they focused on growing vegetable and raising chickens. At Dooryard Farm, they are growing beautiful salad greens, tomatoes, peppers and raising chickens as well as their first few pigs. They invited some friends over to meet the piglets and feast on their very own grilled chickens, pickled ramps, green tomato jam and a rhubarb crisp: a perfect spring meal. As I looked around at all of the young parents, mumbling toddlers and homegrown food, I was reminded of why I live here in the Camden Hills. A community of ambitious young farmers, artists, writers, craftspeople and entrepreneurs like myself grows in each passing year that I live in midcoast Maine. Together, we live fuller, richer lives and eat absurdly well.