Magic City Chefs

Using talent to cook up something special & serve others

Story by Paul South
Photos by Mackenzie Free
Submitted Photos

On a sweltering June day, Jason Mullenix is at work in a steaming kitchen. While most, if not all of us, may only hear the clatter of pots and pans, Mullenix, the owner of St. Clair County-based The Magic City Chefs, choreographs a sweet and savory dance.

After just three years in business, The Magic City Chefs has a client base stretching from Atlanta to Birmingham to Smith Lake as he prepares gourmet lunches and dinners in the homes of his clients. Some want a daily lunch. Others may crave a gourmet dinner party for eight.

And Mullenix wants more than just pleased palates and stuffed tummies. He wants to turn back the clock and give back by bringing families back to the dinner table to talk, not text, make eye contact with each other instead of fixed stares at a smartphone screen.

“I noticed it in my own family, being a chef and working from sunup to sundown and most holidays,” he says. “I mean when families have Mother’s Day or something like that, they want to take them out to eat, you know, so that they don’t have to cook. It all falls back on the chef.”

For the culinary professional, which means missed family holidays, missed little league games, even lost chances to tell bedtime stories and give goodnight hugs.  “It really dawned on me. We were all sitting around a table at a restaurant when I had a day off, and I looked across the table, and they were all on their phones, including my wife,” he says.  And I’m like, there’s nothing to see on your phone. We all should be talking … I looked around the restaurant, and pretty much the same thing was going on at every table.”

He flashed back to the days when his mom cooked dinner, served at the dining room table, when families talked about their day’s triumphs and trials, laughed and kidded and became a family. Going out to eat was a rarity.

“It was more than just sitting there eating,” Mullenix says.

A 17-year culinary veteran, he was supervising a large institutional kitchen when the vision for The Magic City Chefs hit. For him, the joy of cooking had become nothing more than a book title.

“I was burned out,” he says. “The passion was gone. I was making great money, but I couldn’t enjoy it, and I couldn’t enjoy my family with it. I realized there were people out there who don’t have time to come home to cook a decent meal.”

He adds, “I wanted to do something different and find that passion again. If I can help somebody through the gifts that God has given me … If I can help people, I feel like I served my purpose.”

Genesis of a chef

Serving others and purpose are key ingredients in the The Magic City Chefs’ recipe, a process that began when Mullenix was in the Navy, serving first in the base store, then as a barber, then a launderer and three years as a chaplain’s assistant at the Singing River Island Naval Station in Pascagoula, Miss. His cooking interest flamed up when he ran the local observance of the National Prayer Breakfast.

While in the Navy, he took night courses in business administration, then went to culinary school. His first stop was as a baker at Panera Bread, working the night-owl shift. Then came restaurants, the University of Alabama (serving ESPN, the skyboxes at Bryant-Denny Stadium and Crimson Tide alumni) and other Capstone kitchens. He crafted not only pastries, but he learned the savory side of the culinary art.

Then came stops in Birmingham and Pell City. In the Magic City, he catered and cooked for events at the historic antebellum Arlington House. He cooked for dignitaries ranging from mayors to the Red Hat Ladies to Nicky Minaj, where the music superstar wanted everything from food to furniture in pink for a pre-concert party. The Real Housewives of Atlanta were also served during his six years at Arlington.

Of Minaj, Mullenix says, “She probably came in for like five seconds. We got stuck in an elevator for about an hour trying to leave because of security.”

He also worked for the firm that provided food service and vending for Honda in Lincoln. Then came another restaurant stop, followed by Birmingham-Southern College and a nursing home stint before the birth of The Magic City Chefs.

Chef Jason Mullenix puts his cooking skills to work.

The service business cooks prepared meals in-house for clients – one a day – that takes six or seven hours, depending on their choices. Every week, clients get a new menu. A family of four can go six months without eating the same entrée twice, with a wide-ranging menu.

Weekends are reserved for dinner parties, from formal sit down to informal family-style or plated meals of four courses. Mullenix also supplies glassware, tableware, linens and menu cards. Everything is catered to the client. Prices vary depending on the menu, generally from $100-200 per person. A romantic four-course meal costs $300. Diners must provide any alcoholic beverages.

“The majority of anything local I’ve done is around Logan Martin Lake,” Mullenix says. “I haven’t had any prepared meal clients. Most of the clients I have during the week are in the Mountain Brook-Vestavia Hills area.”

One of his first clients, a nonagenarian in North Birmingham, gets meals delivered daily. Mullenix tries to use ingredients the clients have in-house.

There’s also a creative cake arm of the business – for weddings, birthdays, etc., – that sees brisk business from March to October. Among the most unusual wedding cake requests: a “Nightmare Before Christmas” wedding cake.

“It turned out pretty good,” Mullenix says.

While cooking for any number of diners – from a romantic dinner for two to a wedding reception for hundreds – is a pressure cooker, there is a silver lining.

“There’s a good stress about being in the kitchen; it’s not always bad,” Mullenix says. “When everything is going as it should, and you’re creating wonderful food, there’s a ballet about it that’s hard to describe unless you’ve been there.”

That dance includes shopping for the client’s dinner, setting the table, preparing the meal which features locally produced, farm-to-table ingredients.

And there’s still a dance, albeit alone, as he works in a client’s kitchen. It’s a pots-and-pans version of Billy Idol’s Dancing With Myself.

“I just put in my earbuds and do what I need to do,” Mullenix says.

Business is bubbling for The Magic City Chefs. And what’s more, Mullenix’s culinary passion has reignited, and he’s learning with every creation.

And, in keeping with his calling to help others, he’s cooked for temporary clients who need meals while going through physical therapy.

“It’s a lot more rewarding than cooking (in a restaurant) for a bunch of foodies.”

And Mullenix sees his calling and his vision – both that would make June Cleaver smile – families at the dinner table talking like the Mullenix family did long ago. Mullenix even does the dishes.

“That’s the most rewarding part,” he says, “actually seeing families able to do that.”

And at the end of the evening, Mullenix hasn’t only served great gourmet food. He’s given something even more precious.

“I don’t just sell great food,” he says. “I give back time.”

DeLoach Farms

Bringing good food
right to your door

Story by Roxann Edsall
Photos by Mackenzie Free
Submitted photos courtesy of DeLoach Farms

“Being married to a farmer is like being married to a professional gambler,” Kate DeLoach says. “There is so much investment to get a crop in the field.”

With variables like weather, labor shortages and the trade environment over which they have no control, keeping up their 840-acre farm is hard work. Kate and John DeLoach own and operate DeLoach Farms in Vincent, just across the St. Clair County line.

They have survived by taking lessons learned from the past and from the current pandemic and turning them into new opportunities.

The past two years have seen tremendous change in the farm, going from primarily producing soybean, cotton, wheat, hay and corn, to serving more of the needs of the local community.

John’s great grandfather used to deliver kids to school in this school bus, then load up vegetables to peddle on the courthouse square in Pell City.

Their decision to offer farmer’s choice food boxes came out of a desire to meet the needs of the community at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. They would put together a variety of fruits and vegetables in each box and meet customers for pickup. They now offer a full farm-to-table food box option with deliveries around St. Clair and Shelby counties. 

Kate says their son, Jess, developed the farm-to-table food box program. He is an accounting major at Troy University. He came home just a few months into college when the pandemic shut things down. He dreamed it up and started selling the boxes while he was home.

It has been wildly popular, and Kate says they are hoping to include meat and eggs in addition to the fruits and vegetables this year. There are several options offered and include things grown on the DeLoach farm and by other nearby farms.

The U-Pick strawberry patch was also inspired by Jess. They have nine acres dedicated to strawberries and grow several different varieties. Unable to keep up with the demand last year, they have more than doubled their number of plants from 35,000 to 75,000 this year.

Dozens of people are scattered throughout the fields on a sunny Wednesday enjoying the strawberry picking experience. A grandma holds the hand of a giggly little girl with strawberry-stained fingers and mouth.

Another customer checks out with her five gallons of strawberries. She’s making strawberry jam today.

Still another is from Michigan, visiting her cousin, who brought her here to enrich her Southern experience. They’re planning to make strawberry shortcake later in the day.

These are the people John works so hard for. “People and strawberries are my favorite,” he says. “Getting to see the people enjoy the fruits (literally) of your labor is pretty great.”

“We so appreciate people who support the local farmer,” adds Kate. “The local buyers help to insulate us from the global supply chain issues. We kind of support each other.”

Serving his community is a labor of love for John, whose ancestors bought the land on the banks of Kelly Creek back in 1820. For him, it’s also about respecting the land and his heritage.

The land is traced back to John’s great-great-great-grandfather, John Martin, Sr., who moved from South Carolina to what was St. Clair County (before the county lines were redrawn) and bought the land to start his life with his new wife, Sarah. His son, John Martin, Jr., returned to the farm from the Civil War after having his arm amputated due to injuries sustained in the war.

Fast forward to 1915, and Frank Harrison Lowe, John DeLoach’s grandfather, was born in the two-room house on the farm. The farm thrived for more than a decade, then fell into decay and neglect during the Depression. Frank returned to the farm after World War II and began working to bring it back to its former glory.

Kate feeds catfish at their fishing cabin

Tremendous progress had been made by the time John was born. John remembers being a young boy and working alongside his grandfather on the farm. Watching his grandfather help a cow struggle to deliver her calf is one of his earliest memories. When his grandfather died in 1988, John promised his grandmother that if she kept the farm, he would take care of it. He worked the farm every day after school. When he graduated from high school at 16, he took over the daily operations.

Over 30 years later, running the farm keeps him very busy. He’s up each morning by 4:30 and falls back into bed exhausted by 7:30 most evenings. While he has a handful of people who work for him, he does a lion’s share of the work himself.

Beyond the planting and harvesting work, he even finds time to make furniture, like the picnic tables in the strawberry patch, with materials sourced on the farm. He runs fallen trees through the planer in his sawmill to be able to use what would be wasted. 

He built a small fishing cabin with salvaged wood from former structures on the land and with cedar harvested there. The ceiling beams are from an old barn on the property that used to house a live nativity during Christmas.

Being a good steward of the land is one of the reasons he was honored as Alabama Farmer of the Year in 2018. That same year, DeLoach Farms was named the 2018 Alabama Farm of Distinction. For that award, farms are judged on sustainability, success as a business and conservation mindedness.

John credits his grandfather with instilling in him the need to responsibly care for the land and the creatures that use it. “We do a lot of conservation on the land,” he says. “We have beehives and plant things like clover and partridge peas for the wildlife. We have deer, fox, bobcats and lots of birds.”

Twenty acres of property is set aside as wetlands.  The area is filled with stately tupelo trees, an important food source and shelter for migratory birds. It is also equipped with a special pump system that fills and empties the wetlands seasonally to support the health and sustainability of the habitat.

They live in the 10-room farmhouse built by John’s great-grandfather in 1918. “My granddad’s name in still written on a shelf in one of the bedrooms,” John says. It identified his grandfather’s personal storage space in a house full of children. The house was lovingly dubbed the “Halfway House,” because people said it was “halfway between where you were and where you needed to go.” And, according to family legend, it was a great place to stop for supper.

The house was also home to the first telephone line that connected local townspeople with doctors in nearby towns. It was installed in 1915 to give residents a way to connect people to the doctor in Vincent or the one in Easonville, the St. Clair County town now under water when Logan Martin Lake was created in 1965. They just had to make their way to the house and John’s great great-grandmother, Eva, would patch them through.

John’s great-grandfather, John Marion Lowe, also served the area by buying a school bus in 1925 to take rural children to school. After dropping them off at school, he’d come back to the farm, load up fresh produce and take it in to Pell City to sell.

The farm is one of eight in the state to be recognized as a Bicentennial Farm, a program that honors families who have owned and operated their farm for 200 years or more. “That’s quite a big deal,” explains Kate. “It gets harder and harder each year to stay open. There’s a lot of pressure to sell as the city creeps closer and closer.

“We’d love for someone to be here 200 years from now talking about the family farm.” But Kate adds, “It’s a hard way to make a living. We’ve never placed any expectations of farming on Jess.” His business and marketing sense in directing the food box deliveries and strawberry U-Pick operation seem to support that possibility.

DeLoach Farms seems to be playing the long game. When the chips were down, they adjusted to meet the changing needs in the community. And they are growing again.

They have purchased adjacent property with plans to add a blackberry U-Pick operation in a year or two. There are also tentative plans for an apple orchard. This summer they look forward to opening a new area for picking sunflowers.

They will also have vegetables for sale all summer. If you are interested in the farm-to-table food boxes, contact them via Facebook, on Instagram or at www.deloachfarms.com. l

Hemp Farming

Odenville farm family pioneer new crop

Story by Scottie Vickery
Submitted photos from Tiffany Roach, TNR Creative,
and Scott McLeod

There were days not too long ago when Bobby Isbell looked out from the front porch of his Odenville farm and saw lost opportunity. Years before, the family had dabbled in running a Christmas tree farm, but the fields had been dormant for a while.

“All we had out here was grass,” the poultry farmer of 32 years said of the six acres that make up his yard. For Bobby, who has a love of agriculture running through his veins, it was a blank canvas of sorts. The more he looked at the land, the more he could picture a lush green crop dotting the landscape.

That’s why he decided to join the first wave of farmers in Alabama to grow industrial hemp, a variety of the Cannabis sativa plant species harvested specifically to make an assortment of products – everything from paper and clothing to paint and biodegradable plastics. In addition, cannabidiol, or CBD oil, is made from industrial hemp and is widely used as a natural remedy for issues such as pain, inflammation and anxiety. 

“I got to reading about it, and I thought we’d give it a go,” said Bobby, who opened Baldrock Hemp Farm LLC in 2019. The business, like all of his endeavors, is a family affair, and after two seasons of growing hemp and selling it to processors, the Isbells recently launched their own line of organically grown CBD creams, capsules and oils. The oils, available in different strengths, are offered with lemon, peppermint, spearmint or natural flavors. There’s even a pet food supplement with a bacon and herb flavor.

“Bobby’s always looking for an opportunity to benefit his family,” daughter-in-law Haley Isbell said. “He saw an opportunity to get us in on the front end of something, and we all trusted him. We knew if anyone could do it, he could.”

The education process

Before 2019, it was illegal to grow hemp, which comes from the same plant species as marijuana, in the United States. The Farm Bill of 2018, however, reclassified hemp from a controlled substance to an agricultural commodity. The main difference between the two is the level of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the chemical usually associated with getting high. Industrial hemp has a THC level of 0.3 percent or less while marijuana has higher levels of THC.

“We spend a lot of time answering that question,” Haley, who coordinates marketing for the business, said with a laugh. “No matter how many times we say it’s not the same thing, we still get the wink-wink, nod-nod sometimes.”

Before they could educate their customers, they had to learn more themselves. Bobby’s son, Bobby III, who is also a poultry farmer, jumped in with both feet. They were among the first Alabama farmers licensed to grow or process hemp in the state’s pilot program in 2019.

Bobby Isbell shows off a young plant, below

Growers, handlers and processors must be licensed by the Alabama Department of Agriculture and Industries (ADAI), and the regulation process is strict. According to Gail Ellis, hemp program manager for the department, the state issued 173 grower licenses for 2021, including three in St. Clair County.

Bobby’s wife, Lynn, said that her husband and son participated in seminars and conferences in Tennessee, Kentucky and other places to learn more about the industry, the products and the methods for growing hemp. “We tried to pick up as much knowledge as we could before we got into it,” Bobby said. “You can read all you want, but you have to learn by doing it. The first year was all work and no play.”

Besides following state regulations, the Isbells have also earned organic certification from Food Alliance. “My generation wants a more organic product with fewer chemicals, so we went through the process of being certified,” Haley said. “We wanted to offer a hemp product that was locally and organically grown so that we could provide our customers with the most natural way to address health and wellness issues.”

Learning curve

In addition to growing hemp, Bobby and his son are both still poultry farmers. Bobby raises about 125,000 chickens while Bobby III has about 127,000. “That first year, we were like single women,” Lynn said. “We didn’t really see them that much.”

Bobby and his son worked from daylight to dark, plowing the field, tilling the soil and preparing to plant hemp seeds in six acres. “That was way too much,” he said. “Now we just grow four acres, which is about 10,000 plants.” The planting process takes place in late May, and the crops are harvested in September or October.

The first year, they planted the seeds by hand. Last year, they germinated the seeds in the greenhouse and planted the seedlings. “That way you know you’ve got a plant in every hole,” rather than a seed that may or may not grow, Bobby said.

Like the vast majority of hemp grown in Alabama, the Isbells’ crop is grown for CBD oil. “Once the days start getting longer, they start sending out flowers and buds,” he said. “That’s what we want – the flowers to produce the oil. Out west, a lot of hemp is grown for the fiber. Carmakers make seats out of it.”

Drying the plants

This year’s crop is the Isbells’ third, and they’ve learned a lot along the way. The first year, they planted the rows too close together and couldn’t get a mower through, so they had to cut the grass with a weed trimmer. This year, they made sure to leave enough space for a riding lawn mower. 

Although the Isbells use organic methods to control bugs, Alabama hemp farmers have to be careful about the types of pesticides they use. “If you spray with something you’re not supposed to and take it to a processing plant, they’ll kick it out,” Isbell said.

In addition to approving seed sources and pesticides, the ADAI tests each crop in the state for THC levels, as well. If the level is higher than 0.3 percent, the field will be destroyed, according to information on the agency’s website. Growers must also submit GPS coordinates, which are forwarded to law enforcement so that officers can differentiate between a legal hemp crop and an illegal marijuana crop.

Bobby said he talked with the St. Clair County Sheriff’s Department, the district attorney’s office, and the Moody and Odenville police departments before planting for the first time in 2019. They also put up a fence with a green screen to keep animals out of the field and to discourage curious visitors. “Lots of people have stopped and looked, but we haven’t had any issues so far,” Lynn said.

The final product

Once the hemp is ready to be harvested – about 100 to 110 days after planting – the workload really increases. Last year they hired extra help, and it takes about two weeks to get it all out of the field. “We cut it by hand, and we try not to ever let it hit the ground,” Bobby said. “We unload it by hand, and then we hang it in the drying shed by hand.”

The Isbells hung netting from ceiling to floor in the climate-controlled building and they stand on scaffolding to hang the hemp upside down in the nets. The crop dries for 7-10 days, and it takes two or three cycles to get all of the hemp dried. “It’s like cooking. If you rush it, you don’t get a good end product,” Bobby said.

Once dried, the hemp is stripped by hand, and they collect the finished product in 75- to 100-pound bags. The first year, they loaded up the bags and took them to a processor in Colorado since there weren’t many options in Alabama at the time. Last year, they used a processor in Huntsville.

The Isbells launched the Baldrock Hemp Farm line of CBD products in February, and the oils, creams and capsules are produced from their hemp by Sustainable CBD in Selma. “We definitely believe in what we’ve got, and we have lots of repeat customers,” said Haley, who designed the label and launched the website, baldrockhemp.com. “It’s a natural product that a lot of people have found relieves anxiety, joint pain and other symptoms.”

The family is some of its own best customers. Bobby III has found it helps him sleep when his body can’t shut down after a full day of physical labor. Bobby’s 87-year-old father uses the cream for joint pain, and Lynn takes it every night. “Sometimes, if I’ve been anxious, I’ll put a dropperful of the lemon flavored oil in my tea, and the anxiousness just goes away.” A family friend with a stressful job said that it helps keep him calm, Bobby said.

Although adding a hemp farm to the demands of poultry farming has been a tremendous undertaking, the Isbells said they are glad they took the leap of faith. “I enjoy it,” Bobby III said. “It gives me something to do in the summer.” The comment doesn’t surprise his wife.

“They can’t sit still,” Haley said of her husband and father-in-law. “If they hadn’t done hemp, they would have found something else.”

Gateway Community Garden

Growing a bounty to serve others

Story by Carol Pappas
Photos by Carol Pappas
and Graham Hadley and Glenn Wilson

Much like the single seed planted years earlier that grows into the towering oak tree offering shade and comfort to next generations, today’s Pell City Gateway Community Garden thrives as an example of what dogged determination, a patch of dirt and a smattering of seeds can become.

In 2013, a handful of Pell City citizens envisioned a garden for their community. In that group were Merry and Dave Bise, Renee Lilly, Lisa Phillips, Kelly and Sheree Wilkerson, and other community volunteers. Taking root on the old Avondale Mills property, the garden on a quarter-acre plot was small, but productive – just like their dream. Early help came from Pell City Civitans, which provided the nonprofit status they needed for grants, and the City of Pell City, which provided the patch of earth they needed to grow their bounty, and it began to sprout.

Seven years later – in a new location thanks to St. Simon Peter Episcopal Church – and a growing army of volunteers, Gateway Community Garden is reaping the benefits of what it sowed by helping others.

Early mornings and late afternoons nearly all year long, you’ll find a group of “do-gooders,” city dwellers on a mission, toiling in the dirt, nurturing their crops to feed the hungry.

Row upon row tells the story of their bounty – potatoes, okra, squash, bell peppers, corn, tomatoes, butter peas and pinkeye purple hull peas in summer. Collard greens, cabbage, turnip greens, broccoli, sweet potatoes and more okra emerge in the fall.

Fruit trees and bushes abound – apples, blueberries, blackberries – a future dream now in its fledgling stage. An irrigation system is in place. A greenhouse, courtesy of Master Gardeners, has been erected. And on any given day when the sun is out, chances are these gardeners are, too, watching over their harvest like protective parents tending to their young.

Debbie Smith, a longtime gardener and board member, calls it “God’s blessing. It is always amazing to me that you plant a seed in the ground and get this beautiful plant that feeds others.”

Lisa Phillips logging hours

Her experience as a gardener is rewarding in the way she is able to use her education background to teach others how to plant, grow and harvest. She describes the end result – whether it’s someone enjoying the garden’s solitude and beauty or actually laboring in the soil as a “healing and restorative garden. It works on both ends.”

Worth Barham, project manager who fellow volunteers have labeled ‘CEO,’ agrees. “It’s a wonderful experience,” he said, noting that the whopping two tons of food grown there so far have made their way to good homes in the Pell City Christian Love Pantry, Pell City Senior Citizens Center and Lincoln Food Pantry.

“Everything is based on the wonderful volunteers we have,” Barham said. Bringing different skillsets to the organization, they have been able to write grants, develop an educational component, bring community organizations into the fold, design the garden’s physical future and of course, grow food for the needy. St. Clair Co-op has provided many of the plants. David Wadsworth brings his tractor to clear the ground for planting, and Master Gardener Tom Terry tills the soil.

“Without the grants we have received, we would not be where we are today,” Barham said. “Without our volunteers, we would have no organization at all.”

Lisa Phillips became involved early on – first as a Pell City Civitan, then as a gardener. In addition to the Civitans lending their 501(c)(3) nonprofit status to the fundraising effort, the club has provided access for the handicapped and special needs, like accessible paths for wheelchairs and lower tables for produce.

To be a part of it has been “a great feeling,” said Phillips. “And I think it has been great for the community.”

“I am awestruck at what we have been able to accomplish with a small group of folks,” said Linda Tutwiler, another board member. Volunteers only number a dozen or so on a regular basis. “I don’t think any of us envisioned what we could accomplish in such a short time.”

In 2017, it moved from Avondale to a 5-to-6-acre plot given to them to use by the Episcopal church across the street. And that is when the garden grew to its next level and beyond. First helped by a Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham grant and then a Community Foundation of Northeast Alabama contribution as part of its Sacred Places grant program, the garden began to really take shape.

Three years ago, Barham said, the garden grew 820 pounds of fresh produce to give to those in need in Pell City and St. Clair County. Last year, it was 3,600 pounds. Today, their harvest tips the scales at 4,000 pounds.

Nearby is a newly constructed nature trail. A handcrafted, oversized sitting bench underneath the trees welcomes one and all as a place for quiet reflection. A journal to record thoughts is there, as is a miniature reading library. Peace, tranquility and reflection are key to this sacred space.

A greenhouse is home to trees that grow Meyer lemons and will soon grow plants from seed. A shed painted with brightly colored sunflowers holds tools of the trade and a work log, where volunteers record their hours for grants.

On a Saturday morning in November, a group of Scouts marveled at gardener Laura Wilson’s lessons of how sweet potatoes are grown, how to pick a turnip or cabbage leaf. They ran through garden patches with prize in hand – a freshly picked turnip – with smiles almost as wide as they were tall.

They earned a badge that day. But more important, gardeners will quickly tell you, is they learned the value of growing a garden with your own hands and what it can provide in life – not just for you, but for others.

Renee Lilly, one of the founders, talked of the personal rewards reaped in those lessons for her and her husband. “It’s a wonderful experience for me. My husband is involved, too. It’s a great thing for the community, and I’m excited the word is finally getting out,” she said, encouraging others to join them in the effort. “It really does take a village.”

Tomato Time!

The next generation of Smiths have taken over running the family farm.

Chandler Mountain comes alive
in a sea of red at Smith Farm

Story by Elaine Hobson Miller

Photos by Graham Hadley

It’s tomato-picking time again on Chandler Mountain, the unofficial Tomato Capital of Alabama, where 800 acres of St. Clair County soil are devoted to this popular food every year. For several weeks now farmers have been pulling them from the plants, packing them up and selling them to distributors and the public alike.

Picking got off to a late start this year at Smith Tomato, a fixture on Chandler Mountain for more than 35 years. Cloudy days and excessive rain pushed back the picking, which usually begins the first of July, by a week. Coronavirus pandemic permitting, it will end with a big fall festival sometime in October.

“We’re only picking 1,500 to 2,000 boxes a day now, where we’re normally doing 4,000-6,000,” Smith Tomato co-owner Kista Smith-Lowe said in mid-July. “We pick every other day because it’s more productive. We get twice as many in less time because they don’t all ripen at once.”

Picking began on July 10, and they sold out of their Number One grade the first day. “The Number Ones have no imperfections, while our Number Twos have some flaws, but they taste the same,” Kista (pronounced Keesta) said. Distributors picked up 1,500 boxes, each weighing 25 pounds, that first day, but that’s far less than a normal day’s pickings.

The Smiths grow more than 100 of the 800 acres of tomatoes planted on Chandler Mountain each year. The exact amount varies because all fields aren’t the same size, and they rotate the fields. “We have about 200 acres all together,” Kista said. “We sell directly to the public and to distributors or middlemen, who then sell to grocery stores, etc., in Florida, Texas, Mississippi, even as far away as New York and Pennsylvania.”

Kista’s parents, Leroy and Kathy Smith, purchased the Smith farm 35 years ago from her uncle, who started growing tomatoes in the 1960s. The Smith kids have added to it and now have about 200 acres, plus some leased land. “We lost both of our parents in 2018,” Kista said. She and her two brothers run the place. Kista is in charge of bookkeeping and public sales, Phillip handles irrigation and fertilization and Chad handles spraying for pests. A crew leader answers to Chad. The Smiths were raised working with their parents in the fields, and Kista’s two daughters, ages 19 and 14, are already helping in sales, restocking and in the vegetable garden.

Their parents probably grew about half what the Smiths do now because it’s easier to grow tomatoes today than it used to be. “They had to do lots more field work by hand,” Kista said. “Daddy put quality before quantity, and that’s the way we were raised. I’m super proud of what he accomplished.”

Even though harvest time lasts only three or four months, tomato farming is a year-round affair, with only a couple of months off in late fall and early winter. The process begins in February when they work on the equipment. During March and April, they break ground. In April, they start planting, and from March to October, they’re staking, tying, setting fall plants out and picking. After each setting, all the tomato plants are staked and tied at least four times.

Buckets of hand-picked tomatoes are carried to trucks for sorting.

When October rolls around, the guys clean all the tractors and winterize the equipment. Their only down time is November through January, but even then, they might be placing orders. And that’s not counting the time they’re planting cover crops like hemp, wheat, turnips and other greens for winter, to put nutrients back into the soil. “Early in the year, we spend eight to 10 hours a day working this farm,” Kista says. “Four months of year, we have 14- to 16-hour days.”

The field process starts with plowing, using a machine that digs deep into the soil and brings it up in clods. Next comes fertilizing, using spreaders pulled by tractors. Then a chisel plow with gripper feet rips the ground and loosens it, and a tiller with rotating tines turns those clods into fine dirt. A plastic machine (that’s what they call it) pushes dirt into piles to form rows, puts down drip lines (plastic tubing, part of the irrigation system), fumigates, then covers the rows with plastic sheeting. “Our dad was the first farmer on Chandler Mountain to use a plastic machine,” Kista said. The fumigation chemicals go away in two weeks, before they put down the plants. A plant setter pokes holes in the plastic and drops water into those holes.

“Our migrant workers put the plants in by hand,” Kista said. “It’s much faster than machines can do it.”

The cost to grow tomatoes is about $10,000 per acre, and that’s before picking. It costs another $3.50 per box to pick, sort and grade them, so that’s about $7,000 in boxes and packing per acre. “We strive for 2,000 boxes of tomatoes per acre per season,” Chad said. “We have had as many as 3,000, but 2,000 is our feel-good mark.”

They wait until after April 15 to start planting to be sure they’ve seen the last frost. “We’ve had to pull up thousands of plants and re-plant due to a late frost,” Kista said. “Some companies put Styrofoam cups over them to protect them from unexpected frost, but that’s costly.” Even if the tomatoes live through the cold, it stunts them, and they won’t yield as much. “They’ll be fewer and smaller and more prone to disease,” Chad said.

Theyput about 400,000 plants into the ground each year, buying the seeds and having a plant grower raise them until they are about four weeks old. “We plant, stake, string and pick by hand, with a crew of about 50 people,” Kista said. “The tomatoes areprocessed in the field, meaning they are sized, graded and boxed there.”

“There’s so much technology now, andsome larger processors have machines that can detect size and grade the tomatoes,” Chad said. “Here, we used to have machines that graded them. We would put them on belts that had different sized holes in them. We went to grading in the field because it’s better production.”

Workers were picking about a third of their normal crop in mid-July, but sunshine and an upcoming full moon were sure to help. “A full moon when tomatoes are ripening is like 24 hours of sunlight,” said Chad. “It speeds up the process.”

“It’s very tiring but very exciting work,” said Kista. “Harvest is the most exciting time, especially when we pick more than ever for one day. Sore hands and backs, from picking, lifting, repairing tractors, planting are occupational hazards for us and the crew, too.”

Theyfight worms and insects that can kill the plants, like aphids and white flies, using insecticides and fungicides that are EPA-regulated. About a third of their chemicals are organic. Chad figures fertilizers and other chemicals and the plastic sheeting and tubing probably cost $400,000 per year. “Our profits may be four or five cents a pound after costs,” he said. “That would make us a good living.”

Your turn to pick

In August, when a field has only a couple of thousand tomatoes left, the Smiths turn it into a U-Pick farm, allowing the public to pick their own tomatoes at a cheaper cost than buying them by the box or basket. “It’s not productive enough for the migrants to pick at that stage, because they generally pick 5,000-6,000 tomatoes per day,” Kista said. “Their record is 8,000.”

They usually end the season with a big fall festival the first or second weekend of October, depending upon the Bama football schedule. “We grow pumpkins and sell those and cornstalks and other outdoor decorations like acorn squash and mums,” Kista said. “We have face painting and vendors who sell food and arts and crafts. Last year, we had close to 1,000 people show up. It’s hard to count because we don’t sell tickets. It’s free.” She said they aren’t sure whether they’re having the festival or not this year, due to the coronavirus pandemic, but urged readers to check their Facebook page for updates.

Cucumbers, squash and other produce are also grown and sold on the farm.

Tomatoes aren’t the only vegetables (or fruit, depending on the definition you prefer) that the Smiths sell. They grow melons, cucumbers, green beans, yellow squash, zucchini and grape tomatoes, and they buy potatoes and onions, jams and jellies out ofthe Birmingham Farmer’s Market, to sell to the general public out of their warehouse. That warehouse is open to the public from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., seven days a week, during tomato season. They’re on Loop Road, just off Gallant Road, in Steele. (That’s 4575 Loop Road, Steele, for your GPS.)

They get anywhere from 25 to 100 customers a day, who buy for home canning and cooking. Customers can also pick up a T-shirt or baseball cap emblazoned with the Smith Tomato logo. It’s worth a trip to their warehouse just to see all the signs and symbols hanging on the walls and from the ceilings, like Farmall tractor advertisements, old license plates and kiddie pedal tractors, including one Chad drove as a youngster.

Looking ahead, the Smiths are contemplating opening a diner in two or three years. It will feature fresh, home-cooked vegetables and some sandwiches and lots of tomato dishes. Then folks can make a day trip out of shopping for fresh vegetables and eating them, too.

Now that’s something to look forward to!

Follow Smith Tomato on Facebook and online at smithtomatollc.com.

Serrell Fleming Tractor Man

Tractors line Moody Parkway between Odenville and Moody.

Saving ‘ageless iron’ from rusty oblivion

Story by Elaine Hobson Miller

Photos by Graham Hadley

If you want to see a child’s eyes light up, put them on a tractor. Better yet, take them by Serrell Fleming’s house at 8701 Moody Parkway, between Odenville and Moody, where they will have almost three dozen tractors to climb on. They can turn the steering wheels, push the buttons and play with the knobs and gear shifts without fear of reprimand. In fact, the tractors’ owner encourages such behavior.

“I take the batteries out of most of them so kids can push all the buttons without starting up the tractors,” Fleming said.

Serrell Fleming showing off one of his vintage restored Ford Tractors.

Old tractors are, as one writer put it, “the antique cars of the farm,” which makes Fleming an antique dealer extraordinaire. He has been buying and restoring old and rare ones for 45 years, simply because he likes them.

For the past 25, he has lined them up in front of his house during major holidays and invited any with an interest to drop by.

His current count is 35 standard-size tractors in his display, plus a few lawn tractors and some children’s pedal models. He puts them in his front yard for at least a week around Memorial Day, July 4 and Labor Day. Many are decorated with American flags. During the Christmas holidays, he displays them for more than a month beginning in early December and extending well past New Year’s Day, decorated with lights.

He replaces the batteries and puts as many as he can find drivers for in the Odenville Christmas Parade. “All of them will run,” he said proudly. During the parade, he also pulls a flatbed trailer with child-mounted pedal tractors behind his pickup truck.

Cases, John Deeres, Minneapolis Molines, Olivers, Allis Chalmers models, Fords, Farmalls and Massey Harrises cover Fleming’s yard like wildflowers, their ageless iron shining under new coats of red, blue, orange and yellow paint. There’s even a pink one, a Power King that Fleming painted to show support for the American Cancer Society, even though the color is usually associated with breast cancer awareness. “I saw one done that way at an International show at the Coliseum in Montgomery,” he said. After his wife’s death from COPD two years ago, he dedicated it to her memory. “Her favorite actually was the Oliver 440, but she didn’t want it painted because it’s more valuable like it is,” Fleming said.

Passion ignited

Fleming’s tractor passion started with buying used ones and restoring them for his own use.

Later, he began selling them, then decided to become a collector.

He often finds out about them at tractor auctions like the one on RFD-TV on Tuesdays and has been all over Alabama and parts of Tennessee retrieving them. He finds most of them within a 50-mile radius of where he lives. “I don’t find them, they find me,” he said.

When he buys an old tractor, it’s usually in pretty rough condition. “Most are basket cases,” he said. “They have been welded on and patched up and rusted so bad. The (Ford 2000) Hi Crop looked like it had been in a junk yard. I have to disassemble them, strip them (of any remaining paint) and replace parts.”

He has no trouble finding parts, sometimes through salvage yards, sometimes through Steiner Tractor Parts, a Michigan-based company that makes reproductions. A retired sheet metal worker (Hayes Aircraft), he, too, knows how to make parts when he can’t find what he needs. “When it’s using oil and smoking, I have to buy a part,” he said.

Every nut and bolt, manifold and carburetor is color-coded like the tractors: blue for Ford, orange for Allis Chalmers, green for John Deere, red for International. When the U.S. had a more agrarian-based economy, farmers bought whatever brand their local dealer had, and dealers usually specialized in one brand or another.

Fleming’s grandson, Chad Brantley, helped him research information on each of his tractors online, printed that information, encased it in plastic sleeves and attached it to the respective tractors for visitors to read. “It keeps me from having to answer so many questions,” he said. But he doesn’t mind answering a few and loves to talk about his favorites.

Tractors 101

The Oliver HG 68, for example, is a metal tractor that was used in apple orchards in Tennessee because it wasn’t easy to turn over. The Ford 2000 Hi Crop is a favorite because it’s so rare and unique. “I only know of two others, one in Leesburg,” he said. “I looked a long time for this one.” He bought it in 2018 and he’s only its second owner.

“My grandfather, Cecil Smith, bought this tractor for me to drive when I was 15,” said Mike Smith, in the printed information attached to the tractor. “It has remained in our family solely from 1964 to 2018.”

Another favorite and his rarest specimen is the Oliver 440, one of only 600 produced. He also has a rare Minneapolis Moline, one of only 137 built. “Honestly, my favorite is the one I’m working on at the time,” he said.

Then there’s the John Deere 40 All Fuel, so named because it has both a gas and a diesel tank. The one-gallon gas tank got the engine hot, then you flipped a switch to use the 10-gallon diesel. “It’s not loud, it’s a beautiful sound,” he said as he cranks up the engine and listens to it purr. “It was practical. It didn’t have a water pump because they wanted it to run hot to burn the diesel.”

Parade of visitors

Fleming is with his display from daylight to dark, watching the happy folks examining the tractors. They come from all over Alabama and nearby states, having seen the Tractor Man on Fred Hunter’s Absolutely Alabama (WBRC-Fox 6 TV) or read about him on his daughter’s Facebook page (Janice Fleming Brantley).

Others just notice his display as they drive by on Moody Parkway. This past July 4th, he even had a couple from North Dakota who were in town visiting relatives and read about the tractors in a local newspaper. He doesn’t have any way of keeping a count of visitors, because he doesn’t sell tickets, but for this year’s July 4th, he gave away all 500 of the tractor-listing sheets he had printed. He gives away bottled water during the warmer months, too.

“I plowed my garden with this one,” he told a visitor who was admiring an Allis Chalmers G. The G stands for Gadsden, where it was made in 1944. Whitt Davis, age 21 months, climbed all over the G while his mom, Jessica Davis, and granddad, Ron Chamblee, watched. “He loves tractors,” said Ron, a Springville resident. “We have to take a tractor or lawn mower ride just about every day.” Ron restores tractors, too, but not to the extent of Fleming.

Serrell loves to talk about his tractors. He knows just about everything about every machine on his property.

Abel Hilliard of Woodville, 15, visited July 3 with his dad and brother. “Dadread about it online,” Abel said. “I think it’s pretty cool. Dad has an old Farmall that he’s working on, too.”

Fleming loves watching the kids’ faces as they play on the tractors and enjoys hearing their parents’ comments, too. “Parents thank me for putting these out for them and the kids,” he said. “They say they appreciate what we’re doing here. One guy left a message on my answering machine saying he saw the tractors but couldn’t get in my driveway.”

Fleming also said the display, which is stored in a couple of sheds behind his house between holidays, is really a family thing. His daughter lives next door, helps with traffic and posts notices about the display on her Facebook page. His son-in-law helps drive the tractors out and back into the sheds, and on off days, he walks the rows of tractors, helping Fleming answer questions.A couple of neighbors keep him company under his sun tent. “There’s no way I could do all this without the help of my family,” he said.

He pauses, gazes out at the rows of tractors and the smiling faces of the visitors, and a broad grin lights up his face. “I’m so glad the young people are bringing the kids,” he said. “Tractor collectors are getting older, and we’re losing the heritage of these.”

The Tractor Man is doing all he can to maintain that heritage.