Turning a New Leaf

California has changed me.

In Chicago I never thought about lettuce. In summer there were iceberg, romaine and a couple of heirloom varieties that cost as much per pound as prescription drugs. In winter there was depressed-looking iceberg, whose finish was pure cardboard, and cost as much as a house call.

Here, 52 weeks a year I have to--have to--go to the farmer’s market and choose from a dozen varieties of succulent, organic, photogenic, freshly harvested lettuces that cost a buck a head. Usually from Coleman Farms.

Bill Coleman is a large, weathered, rumbly baritone whose stolidity is belied by the kaleidoscopic batik shirts he favors. On six acres in a canyon near the ocean at Carpinteria, Bill and his wife, Delia, raise commercial crops of lettuce, kale, herbs, beans and flowers, and personal crops of children, grandchildren, chickens, pigs, rabbits and one lone but extremely happy dog. Then there’s a sprawl of aviaries housing about a dozen species of brilliantly plumed rare birds. Bill is fond of exotic birds. They match his shirts.

Bill learned to farm from a Filipino grandfather “who was organic because he didn’t know any better. After picking a crop he’d mulch the weeds. ‘Feed your soil as you feed your children, and they’ll both grow up good,’ he always said. And he’d taste the soil to decide what should grow there.”

So Bill weeds, then mulches. When the soil needs a heftier meal he adds poultry- and bovine-generated nitrogen packets from an organic dairy and organic poultry farm. Bill plants small plots of each crop to avoid attracting concentrations of particular insects. That doesn’t help with voracious white butterflies, so grandsons Kirby, 12, and Grant, 9, do. They net the butterflies and feed them to black thrushes (one of the exotic species Bill collects). Nothing is wasted.

I get a tour of the crops from Romeo Coleman, 31, the third of Bill and Delia’s six offspring, the only one who went to agriculture school and into the family business.

(“Worked out fine,” Bill observes. “When I’m gone there won’t be a squabble over who gets the farm.”) Romeo reveals the secret to harvesting a head of lettuce: If you cut the stem too long it’ll bruise the other heads during transport. If you cut the stem too short the head falls apart. This was as technical--and metaphorically existential--as any discussion of lettuce he gave.

When I ask Bill to describe his heirloom lettuces--the Red Oak, Perilla, Little Gem, Simpson and Sierra--he demurs. He says other farmers have begun copycat plantings. This being Monday, his one non-market day, the slow day, there are 14 at lunch: Bill, Delia, one son, three grandkids, two aunts, four friends and two guests. The table is laden with fragrant soups, pickled vegetables, homemade spring rolls--and not a shred of lettuce salad.

Turns out one of the aunts makes vast amounts for her bingo club. Can’t stand the sight of it the rest of the week.

Lettuce: Love it, but keep it in perspective.

Winter Mesclun

Adapted from “The Paris Cookbook,” by Patricia Wells (HarperCollins, 2001)

Serves 6

1/2 cup lamb’s lettuce leaves

1/2 cup baby spinach leaves, stemmed

1/2 cup arugula leaves, stemmed

1/2 cup dandelion greens, stemmed

1/2 cup sorrel leaves, stemmed

1 cup torn red radicchio leaves

6 leaves Belgian endive, cut into ribbons

1/4 cup fresh mint leaves

1/4 cup fresh dill leaves

1/4 cup fresh tarragon leaves

1 tablespoon sherry vinegar

1 tablespoon red-wine vinegar

1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

Fine sea salt to taste

Freshly ground white pepper to taste

Rinse, dry and remove stems from all greens and herbs. Place greens and herbs in large bowl and toss with your hands to mix. To make vinaigrette, combine vinegars and sea salt in bottle. Shake to dissolve salt. Add oil, shake to blend. Drizzle over salad and toss to coat evenly.