Nice to meet you. My name is Shimamura from MONOSUS Food Research Institute .
I joined the company by working at a small shop called FarmMart & Friends in Yoyogi, Tokyo, and now I work at Kudan Shokudo in Kudanshita.
The products on display at FarmMart & Friends and the ingredients used in the menu at Kudan Shokudo are all provided by our connections all over Japan.
The more I learn about products and ingredients, the happier I feel like I've learned a little bit about what goes on behind the scenes of delicious food. I grow attached to them and want to actively incorporate them into my life. My daily meals become a little warmer than usual.
I learned this feeling through my previous job in Niigata Prefecture. The warmth of feeling close to the people who make the food. The more I get to know them, the more delicious it is when I eat it.
In order to convey this feeling to everyone who eats at our restaurants and cafeterias, I first want to know about the people who have helped me in the work I'm currently involved in. I'd be happy if I could share this feeling with the people around me. With that in mind, I decided to visit the people who have helped me directly.
The first place we visited was KURKKU FIELDS in Kisarazu, Chiba, which supplies the carrots and eggs used in FarmMart & Friends' jams. We learned about the various recycling systems that take place within the field, and the environment in which the chickens that produce the delicious eggs live.
table of contents
To KURKKU FIELDS
It takes about an hour and a half by car from FarmMart & Friends in Yoyogi to KURKKU FIELDS. There are also express buses from within Tokyo, so it's easy to get there.
We met Mr. Ito, the agricultural director, at the entrance. First, he showed us around the facilities.
Agriculture chief Mr. Ito
About 14 years ago, Mr. Ito and his family started farming by clearing a vast area of land that had previously been a ranch and a soil reclamation site.
In order to pass on the farmland to the next generation, they have engaged in organic farming, and now ship a lot of carrots, turnips, edamame, etc. all over the country, including Tokyo.
KURKKU FIELDS is a facility that was opened adjacent to the farm. In addition to growing vegetables using organic farming methods, the site is dotted with a cheese processing plant that makes cheese from the milk of the Brown Swiss cows and goats that graze on the hills, a charcuterie that processes game meat into sausages and ham, and dining and bakeries where you can enjoy delicious produce.
Visitors can experience nature and the cycle of life through a variety of experiences, including enjoying a meal, appreciating artworks, harvesting vegetables, and staying overnight. While having fun, we hope that it will also give you an opportunity to think about your own food and lifestyle. With this in mind, various initiatives are being carried out within the facility.
Mr. Ito showed us many places, but I'd like to introduce some of the places that made the biggest impression on me.
Dining that creates circulation
The ingredients used are primarily from the on-site farm or game hunted in the nearby mountains.
I had a plate of hamburger steak made with wild game meat as the main dish. It had the wild flavor of wild game meat and was full of powerful energy. The salad was full of red radish, which is in season. The freshly picked, juicy vegetables were topped with a homemade dressing that was also filling.
All the dishes were simply seasoned, and the flavors of the ingredients were vibrant. I felt like I was getting energy from the food I was eating.
Hand towels and takeaway containers are made from materials that can be recycled back into the soil. They are washed on-site before being returned to the soil. Takeaway containers are crushed and mixed with cow dung to be used as compost. A system called a biogeofilter is used to purify wastewater from the dining area by running it through a stream created on-site.
Zero-waste composting
There are several vermicompost pits set up around the site, behind the dining room and next to the office. The people working in the dining room put food scraps that are inevitably produced when cooking into these pits and stir the contents. After a few months, fully matured compost falls from the bottom. This compost is also used to grow crops on the farm.
Farm (organic farm & edible garden)
Within the venue, there is an organic farm where many vegetables are grown, as well as an edible garden where visitors can have a variety of experiences, including planting and harvesting.
Various crops are grown here throughout the year, and the compost made from the compost pile is also used. When I visited at the end of March, wheat ears were just beginning to appear.
Next to it, petit verts were in season, so I picked them in the field and took a bite. They were sweet and delicious! "If you like, please pick some," they said, and I put them in my pocket to take home. I grilled them at home and sprinkled salt on them, and they were in season! I was able to share this fleeting taste with my family.
There were many things on the farm that could only be seen at this time, and each and every one was truly fresh. Many plants bloom and sprout new leaves in early spring, but the period during which they can actually be seen in the fields is only a brief moment. The state of the buds and the opening of the flowers change from moment to moment. It was a precious time in which I felt the joy of actually seeing and feeling these "only now" changes.
Carrot Love
Mr. Ito, the agricultural director who gave us a lively tour of the fields, recommended carrots.
Although the harvest season had already passed, a few remaining carrot leaves were still peeking out here and there.
"The bright orange roots are topped with dark green leaves. There's no other tree with a color like this. Look, these leaves are so well balanced that they could be used for a Christmas tree. In winter, frost forms on the leaves. When this happens, the frost forms like white makeup and crystallizes. If you process this photo into a kaleidoscope, it's really beautiful."
"I love carrots so much that I even look for carrot-colored clothing."
Mr. Ito, who has an insatiable love for carrots, grows carrots that are made into jam and donuts at FarmMart & Friends.
Looking at the entire facility, including the dining area, compost area, and farm, everything has been designed to be part of a cycle.
What can we do to recycle most of the things that are normally considered "garbage"? At KURKKU FIELDS, everyone thinks about this and acts on it every day, and it is a place that truly embodies the idea of "not throwing anything away, but recycling it and creating something new."
Mr. Ito and the rest of the staff were not able to create this system right from the start. They continued to learn every day, discussed things, and got the local community involved in the "circulation" project. It was impressive to see how excited and happy they looked, even though it was a difficult task.
Take a look at poultry farming
"We call it the chickens' exercise area," says Ito happily, as he takes us to the chicken coop where the chickens are running around energetically.
One chicken even escaped from the playground. Apparently it has great jumping ability and is always walking around outside, so it's been nicknamed "Usain Bolt."
At FarmMart & Friends, we sell the eggs laid by these chickens, which are then delivered to us.
Matsumura Kodai, who is in charge of poultry farming, gave us a detailed explanation about the chickens and the eggs.
Here I would like to share with you some of the things that stood out to me during the talk.
Mr. Kodai Matsumura
Something that Matsumura treasures: Chicken beaks
"90% of chicken farms in Japan use caged rearing methods. At KURKKU FIELDS, we raise the chickens on the ground in free-range farming. The chickens we raise here are Momiji and Okazaki Ohan, purely Japanese breeds."
A chicken can be called purely domestic if it has been raised domestically for three generations.
When observing chickens, you will notice that the hair on their bottoms is thinning in all of them.
"The chickens peck at each other's bottoms and become bald. They love blood so they peck at each other even more. In free-range farms they can even cannibalize each other."
It was shocking to see them cannibalizing each other.
In order to prevent chickens from hurting each other, a practice known as "de-beaking" is sometimes used on typical chicken farms to cut off the chickens' beaks.
At KURKKU FIELDS, we do not de-beak our animals in order to raise them as naturally as possible, and we try new things every day to prevent their pecking behavior from getting too bad.
"It's very important to keep them from losing their feathers or eating them."
Matsumura's powerful words also made us realize the depth of his love for chickens.
What Matsumura values: What chickens eat
While listening to Matsumura's story, Ito plucked the grass growing outside and threw it into the playground. The chickens were very excited. Of course, they were given plenty of food, but it seems the chickens still like the lush green grass.
"They also like the vegetable scraps that the agricultural team gives them. From my observations, chickens have three main needs when it comes to food. They love water, animal protein, and green feed (leafy food). Now is the time of year when the agricultural team will be mowing the grass, so the chickens will start eating more leafy food. When they eat more leafy food, the egg yolks become yellower."
The eggs at KURKKU FIELDS change depending on the season and what the chickens eat.
It seems obvious when you think about it, but it was something I only realized after someone pointed it out to me.
"The chickens know that there will be lots of grass in the spring. They can see the lush green grass growing in the field in front of them, but they can't eat it. I wonder if that's stressing them out. It must be hard for them to bear it..."
A word that Mr. Matsumura suddenly blurted out. Mr. Matsumura always cared about his chickens.
The animal protein that the chickens eat is also made at KURKKU FIELDS from things that would normally be thrown away.
At the "charcuterie" meat processing and sales store, they start by butchering wild game such as deer and wild boar caught in the nearby mountains. The meat that cannot be used as food that is generated during the processing is used as chicken feed.
What Matsumura values: Egg season
"Usually, chickens' egg-laying rates drop towards the winter solstice, and peak in the spring. In general chicken farms, artificial light is used to control the hours of sunlight so that this fluctuation does not occur too much throughout the year."
Artificial irradiation shortens the egg-laying period, but stabilizes the egg-laying rate for one season. However, it also means that the chickens stop laying eggs sooner and are slaughtered sooner. While this may seem like a good way to increase efficiency, Matsumura's method is more similar to nature.
"The egg-laying rate is higher in the spring, so the supply tends to increase accordingly."
"Even eggs have their seasons."
It was a new fact for us.
"Even eggs and milk, which don't seem to have any particular season, do have their own season. It would be kind of nice if we could learn to appreciate this," Ito said.
Noticing the small changes in the seasons can be a hint for enjoying daily life. If eggs also have a season, then surely there is something we, who sell eggs and make and deliver donuts, can do as well. The thought of it got me excited.
On our way out, we received a souvenir of mismatched eggs from Mr. Matsumura, the poultry farmer!
When I opened the lid, I was surprised to find a four-leaf clover surprise inside! (This is the photo of the first egg.)
I want to share how warm-hearted Mr. Matsumura is to everyone who comes to our store!
Together with the store members who accompanied us, we are considering ways to communicate which eggs are in season through our stores, wondering if making and selling lots of products that use a lot of eggs in the spring, such as custard cream donuts and puddings, might be able to inform customers who buy them of which eggs are in season.
I hope that I can convey to customers the world and personality that lies beyond the eggs, so I put the photos I took that day in front of the storefront of FarmMart & Friends. I would be happy if you could come to the store and see Mr. Matsumura and his chicken coop.
This was my first time visiting KURKKU FIELDS. Wherever I walked in the field, I made a series of new discoveries. I was shown around almost all the fields, but I feel like I needed more time to enjoy each one.
When we visited, the scenery was in spring, and our imaginations ran wild as we thought, "I bet there will be lots of ripe vegetables in summer," and "I wonder what the atmosphere inside the facility will be like at sunrise in the early morning." It was a place we'd like to visit in every season.
There is also accommodation available, so I'm thinking of staying there next time I visit.
We encourage everyone to come and experience KURKKU FIELDS for themselves.
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