Meet Teresa Birtles of Heartland Family Farm in Indiana. Teresa sells at the Bloomington Community Farmers Market, but mostly she grows custom crops for chefs like Jeff Finch of Finch’s Brasserie and Dave Tallent of Restaurant Tallent.

Her focus on flavor guides her to choose countless heirloom vegetables.  And she thinks about what goes together on the plate, choosing foods like fennel and herbs that might make a great sauce with her Roma tomatoes.

What are your favorite tomato recipe links we should think about?  Yes, tomatoes are months away in the Midwest but outdoor markets open in a few weeks and we can start to dream.

Please share your thoughts so I can start salivating!  I’ll start:  panzanella.

Farmer Friday is a weekly quick-post featuring farmers I met on my research road trip across eight Midwestern states.  If you’re interested in local food, please subscribe to my newsletter, or my feed. Or tweet with me!

Photos compliments of Janine MacLachlan, www.RusticKitchen.com.  All rights reserved.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 23rd, 2010 at 1:46 pm and is filed under Farmers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.