The Green Light

Alchemy Farms near Maple City pairs regenerative farming with medicinal plants and flowers.

By Rache Pasche

Somewhere in the Maple City area lies a farm full of plants grown with the intention of delighting the palate, body and eyes.

Alchemy Farms started a little over three years ago, though owner Naomi Call says she has been focused on herbalism and holistic wellness for most of her life.

Among other things, Call’s intention is to reintroduce an array of nutrients and minerals into foods through plants and flowers, many of which she grows herself.

She also says she wants to focus on increasing awareness of flowers as medicine, food and pollinators.

Alchemy Farms is only one small component of a larger vision that Call holds.

“As we bring that vision to life, we will be able to truly showcase how regenerative farming and working with plants as medicine is the path toward a healthier, more equitable future for all beings,” she says.

Call says that the plants’ and flowers’ nutrients are key to what modern diet has lost.

“There are so many key nutrients that our diets have lost,” she says, “and these plants and flowers provide key nourishment that our bodies crave.”

Some of the products use plants not often found on the shelves, like edible flower bouquets using oregano and parsley blossoms, sunflower, bee balm and bachelor’s button.

One thing that Call emphasizes is the use of the entire plant rather than just some parts. Stems, petals and leaves are all used in her edible creations, bringing with them a host of beneficial nutrients that aren’t consumed when only part of the plant is eaten, she says.

Call and her son, Loghan Call, work together to put on events through Loghan’s company, Planted Cuisine. They curate plant-based meals that contain a vibrant array of flowers and plants.

“One of our favorite things is when someone calls us a few days later and tells us how amazing they felt after eating one of our dinners,” Loghan says. “I think we get a lot of repeat customers for that reason.”

Naomi agrees, saying that she finds a lot of people react positively to her edible bouquets, tisanes and other offerings.

All of the blooms used in her edible arrangements are entirely consumable by design, she says.

“There are a lot of minerals we just aren’t getting that our bodies crave, and you notice a difference when you finally give your body what it’s asking for,” she says.

The duo use a mixture of growing techniques with a focus on permaculture and biodynamic styles and hope to soon add greenhouses and extend their growing season into the colder months.

Sustainable growing practices without pesticides, additives and other chemicals allow them to cultivate a whole host of plant life that is not only beneficial to those consuming it, but good for the soil as well.

Their flowers also support pollinators like bees to flourish, spreading pollen that is free of chemicals.

In addition to the edible bouquets, Alchemy Farms also has a range of herbal tisanes, culinary flower blossom salts, perfumed essential oils, dried pressed culinary blossoms, hydrosols, floral bath salts, and compostable plant straws.

Some of their products are intended to nourish people’s immune systems by supplying powerful and critically important antioxidants, while others focus more on the spiritual and wellbeing of people. You can find their products at the Sara Hardy Farmer’s Market in Traverse City, Farm Club, Oryana, at a Planted Cuisine event, or at their Alchemy Farms Etsy shop.

ALCHEMY FARMS’ BEST-SELLERS

One of the products that Naomi Call recommends is the Plant Broth, a mixture of dried herbs including nettles, chive stems, oregano stems and leaves, horsetail, oat straw and more. Creating a stock out of these plants is a simple way to get nutrients without much work, she says. The amber rose perfumed oil (pictured above) is another big hit, Naomi says. Made with fractionated coconut oil, rose petals, rose quartz and essentials oils of amber and rose otto, these bottles smell incredible and look even better. They’re a perfect natural floral scent for anyone who wants a true rose essence, or someone who is bothered by traditional perfumes. Alchemy Farms also makes a variety of herbal tisanes, described as “nourishing and elevating for your body, mind and spirit.” Each of these tisanes is labeled with an affirmation on the package. Some of the tisanes include Radiant, a blend of berries and blossoms; Divine, a mixture of tulsi and peppermint; and Grateful, with mineralrich herbs, rose petals and goji berries. Northern Express Weekly • october 04, 2021 • 13

As “America’s funniest science writer,” acclaimed author and journalist Mary Roach’s whopping six best-selling books – all of which are science-centered – seem no less than par for the course.

Released last month, Roach’s 11th book, “Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law,” is stories of various attacks by animal assailants.

And it’s a far more global issue than we might have guessed.

What’s “fuzz?” The answer is threefold, says the New York Times best-selling author.

“It’s ‘fuzz,’ as in police,” says Roach, “and ‘fuzz’ as in a fuzzy animal.”

She’d had the idea for a few years, but under a different title.

“I began – jokingly – referring to [the book] as ‘Animal, Vegetable, Criminal,’ [and] my agent was like, ‘That’s your title,’” she says. “So, I kind of wrote the book around that.”

That is, until a New York Times food writer published a book similarly titled. And thus, “Fuzz” it was.

The study of animal criminal behavior began with the turn-of-the-century book, “Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of Animals.”

Published in 1906, the book details such past absurdities as pigs being accused of and tried for murder, and even legal maneuvers taken against insects.

“Initially I thought, ‘Is this a hoax?’ But it wasn’t,” says Roach. “It’s a very welldocumented book, with appendices of the original legal documents.”

Yes, you read that right: There are legitimate legal proceedings in place that dictate what to do when animals break the law. Of course, this system presents an obvious problem, Roach says.

“These are animals and (the laws) are written for humans,” says Roach. “Using the legal system doesn’t seem like an ideal way to deal with animals misbehaving, so I thought, ‘What can science bring to the table?’”

First and foremost, “Fuzz” offers alternative solutions.

“There are better and more humane options than a ‘pest-control’ mindset, even for a mouse in the wall,” says Roach.

A self-proclaimed “softie,” Roach’s firsthand scouting in Eastern countries – most recently India and the middle Himalayas, where animals often represent gods – unveiled to her an innate preference for compassion that she says Western culture simply lacks.

“Many people (there) have this positive relationship with nature,” she says.

This in contrast to the American reflex, which Roach says is all too often trigger-happy.

“Because we apply the word ‘pest’ to [so many of] these animals, it gives us a certain permission to just set a trap or call an exterminator without first thinking ‘How could I prevent this?’ says Roach. “So, (this book) is kind of a reset for that automatic mindset.”

Although this is her 11th science-based book, Roach’s academic studies centered on liberal arts.

“I don’t have a science background,” she says. “I just kind of thought, ‘Oh, I’ll figure it out.’”

A graduate of Wesleyan University, Roach arrived in California in 1981 on the fringe of an economic recession, where she moved in the direction of writing first as a copyeditor and eventually as a freelance journalist.

“Out of the blue, I sent a piece to the ‘Sunday Punch,’” she says, “which was a section of the San Francisco Chronicle’s Sunday paper. That was when I began to get the sense that it might be more fun to write the stuff in the first place than to try and clean it up.”

So, when one of Roach’s editors made the switch to Hippocrates, a health and science magazine, it only made sense that she follow suit.

“The reporting of those stories was consistently the most interesting thing I’d worked on,” says Roach, who spent more than 10 years as a contributing editor there.

“I landed a passive path to writing about science, but then when I got there it just seemed right.”

We aren’t about to argue with that. Of course, no Mary Roach release would be complete without a sprinkling of her signature humor.

“It’s fun,” she says. “It’s not an earnest policy book at all.”

Structured as a series of standalone shorts, “Fuzz” falls in with the ranks of classic satire.

“For me, that [inciting] moment was where I [decided to] go crime by crime,” she says. “We’d start with the felony crimes – manslaughter, breaking and entering, ‘grand-theft sunflower seed’ – and then move on to misdemeanors. For me, it was a more relatable and fun way to present the topic.”

Quirk and comedy aside, “Fuzz” also provides a valuable peek at the effects of when these two worlds collide.

“It’s essentially about human and wildlife conflict, which is a field of science I was not familiar with,” Roach says.

And humans are also to blame, she says.

“I just want to introduce [readers] to the complexities and challenges of this very interesting world,” she says.

And just like a cat with multiple lives, she can’t help but test those limits a little. Still, it’s that very same sense of novelty that led Roach to her literary niche. And with her next book proposal already in the pipes, it’s safe to say she’s figured it out.

“The worst advice I ever got was to look around at other people’s successes, and say ‘Oh, I want to do something just like that,’” she says.

It’s all about following your own curiosity and style, she says.

“Wherever it takes you and whatever you’re most passionate about,” she says, “that’s probably the most important thing.”

KANGAROO COURT:

Science humor writer Mary Roach’s 11th book spotlights animals and their misdeeds in society.

Mary Roach Takes the (Virtual) Stage at National Writers Series Oct. 7

New York Times bestselling author Mary Roach will join the National Writers Series for a virtual event on Thurs., Oct. 7 at 7pm to discuss her newest science release, “Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law.” Guest host for the event is local radio personality and performance artist, Kendra Carr. Virtual tickets are $10.50. For more information, ticket sales, and registration, visit nationalwritersseries.com.