As the first “Napkin Board lady” for Bates Dining Services, McCann learned early on about the care and work required to feed a crowd. That appreciation has grown some in the two years since she, husband Adrian Cole, and their two children occupied the farm where they raise vegetables and fruit, meat and eggs — aiming for eventual self-sufficiency.
Someday they’ll sell produce to supplement the revenue from their mulling-spices business, but in these days of salmonella and melamine scares, the first goal is simply to produce healthy food, food of known quality, for the family. If you can’t change the system, McCann says, “what we can do, in our own way, is to bring it local, to bring it home. And even if it’s a lot of work, it’s work we enjoy.”
