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It’s summer harvest season up on NYC’s newest and biggest rooftop farm!

If you haven’t been, and I know most of you haven’t, you need to see The Brooklyn Grange. I visited a few days ago to see what Farmer Ben Flanner was growing for the summer, and I was quite impressed with the progress he’s made in such a short amount of time. His 40,000 square foot farm (just under an acre) was lush with greens, cabbage, tomato plants, corn crops, carrots, swiss chard, various herbs and root vegetables. I seriously didn’t think the farm would look as finished or as polished as it did when I set foot, especially since they only began planting in late May. But, it did. The plants looked happy and tasted great, further proving the case for more NYC rooftop farms. Watch the video and see for yourself. Plants like rooftops…or it seems that way to me!

Restaurant Accounts & CSAs & Farmer’s Markets

The Brooklyn Grange estimates that they’ll grow close to 16,000 pounds of produce this growing season. Right now, they have enough produce for 3-4 more restaurant accounts in Queens or North Brooklyn (trying to stay as local as possible), so if you know of anyone who may be interested in meeting their $100 minimum give them a call. In addition, Ben will begin offering 20 CSA shares to a few lucky individuals who want a piece of The Grange produce for the entire season. The cost is a little under $20/week and will last for the next 16 weeks until the end of October or early November. So sign up now if you’re interested!

Local cooks can get their hands on the rooftop produce at the many farmers markets they hold throughout the week:

  • The Brooklyn Grange Farmer’s Market: Tuesdays & Thursdays: 3718 Northern Boulevard, Queens, 3-7pm
  • (NEW) Vesta Trattoria Farmer’s Market: Saturdays, 2102 30th Avenue, Astoria, (time TBD)
  • Roberta’s Farmer’s Market: Sundays: 261 Moore Street, Brooklyn, 11-5pm

And if you hate to cook, but want to try the bounty of what’s being produced up on the farm, you can visit Frankies Sputino, Juliette, Roberta’s or Northeast Kingdom and check out their menus for Brooklyn Grange inspired dishes.

Volunteers and interested visitors are also more than welcome on the farm, so to get your hands dirty and help out a farmer just contact brooklyngrangefarm[at]gmail.com.

Happy Eating! And thanks for watching food. curated.