Amish Farmstands

Amish Dinner

Local Amish communities often have dinners to fundraise for their schools or medical costs. Last night we drove to Andover, Ohio for an Amish dinner to benefit the Amish school. Dinner included ham, meatloaf, peas, mashed potatoes, noodles, salad, white bread, pies and home made ice cream. The dinner was held at 'Noah Yoder's farm'. 

Amish Benefit Dinner in Andover

I'm fascinated by the Amish and will do anything to get a peek into their lives. When I see them in the grocery store, I get in line behind them. I'll often drive the long way home just to go by Amish farms. And, when I see that there's an Amish Benefit Dinner or Auction, I make sure to go.

These pictures are from a dinner held to benefit an Amish school just across the Ohio border, in a little town called Andover. Dinner was typical Amish fare - meatloaf, ham, noodles, peas, 'smashed' potatoes, gravy, salad, pies, and homemade ice cream (you can see the men making ice cream in two of the pictures). The Amish like their starches! They also served an amazing date pudding, which was really more of a date cake with a carmel sauce and whipped cream. 

Each Amish sect has its own set of rules. These Amish, for instance, dressed slightly differently from what we see near Conneaut Lake. Mens' hats were a different shape and buggies (see above) were white instead of the black we're accustomed to. 

In the top left picture you can see a father taking care of a baby. This was very common at the dinner because the women were all busy, busy, busy running the show. In the bottom right picture you can see a woman running from the house (home to the kitchen and 'washroom' for the evening) to the dinner. They cooked, served, and cleaned all evening.

I'm still craving that date pudding. I found several recipes online. Has anyone ever made it? 

~Becky

10 Things I Love about Summers in Conneaut Lake

I adore summers in Conneaut Lake. In no particular order, here my ten favorite things.

1) Midway Beach - Accessibly only to cottage owners and renters in the Midway Beach area, this small beach is reminiscent of the 1950's. We've spent many hours here over the years. Little has changed from the postcard in my blog header.
2) Family - It's all about family here. In the picture below my son is teaching his little cousin to blow up water balloons. I love this daily interaction between cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents.

3) My Cottage
4) Tradition - So much of our time at the lake is built on tradition. Traditions that we've started as well as traditions that have continued for years and generations.
5) Warm Nights, Fireflies, and Thunderstorms
6) Sunsets - Each one is more spectacular than the next

7) The Spillway at Pymatuning - You really have to see it to believe it.
8) Hanks - The best Frozen Custard ever!
9) Antiquing - I've found the best treasures around here.
10) Amish - I love seeing them shopping in the grocery store, selling baked goods in roadside stands and hanging their clothes out to dry.


If you also spend summers in Conneaut Lake, what do you love most about the lake? If you spend summers elsewhere, where do you go, and what do you love about your special summer spot?

Dinner at an Amish House in Crawford County

Even though we knew not to expect much from the meal at Sarah's (after our experience two years ago), we gave it another shot just for the experience of eating in an Amish house. The setting is idyllic, so I was hopeful that our previous meal was just a on off-night in Sarah's kitchen.

We knew we were in trouble at this point. Someone asked if the corn was hers.  Sarah is surrounded by fields and fields of corn after all. "No, I buy it frozen" was her reply.

Mashed potatoes, noodles, white bread, fried chicken, roast beef (not shown), cole slaw covered with shredded cheese, and corn. We're pretty sure that nothing is homemade. After our perfect farm meal at the Bookamer's, this was so disappointing.

The kids, of course, couldn't be happier.

John especially enjoyed it.

They love this strawberry jam/marshallow fluff mixture on their white bread. If it weren't for this, there would be no color on our plates!

This made the whole trip worth it. On our drive home we followed this young Amish couple tearing down the dirt road on a tractor. She's barefoot and hanging on for dear life. I'm not quite sure why they have a tractor.

Amish Auction in Atlantic

We're living among the Amish here. At least that's how it often seems. We see them in the grocery store, pass their buggies on the road and buy produce and baked goods from their roadside stands. Each Amish community seems to have an annual benefit auction. We've been to a number of different Amish auctions over the years. Both 'English' (that's us) and Amish attend the auctions to eat, bid and socialize. The Amish community of Atlantic hosted their auction on Saturday and it was probably the best one we've been to yet. Auction items include everything from farm equipment and animals to Amish-made furniture and quilts. There is always plenty of food to purchase - this time breakfast including pancakes and homemade sausages, then hamburgers, Amish pizza, ice cream... As much as I would love to have taken more pictures of the Amish, I had to be polite and restrain myself. I can't begin to describe how darling some of these kids were. One group of kids were riding around in a tiny buggy being pulled by a miniature horse.

The family in the buggy is leading the pony to the auction to be auctioned off.

Auction items

I love this item - a rowboat hooked up to be pulled by a horse.

Here I am petting an auction item - a calf.

Amish washing machines

Quilts

Auction item #144

Amish in Nearby Atlantic

Atlantic is only a few miles away and it is just beautiful. While driving through this mostly Amish community it's not uncommon to see Amish kids running barefoot and Amish women hanging laundry to dry.

Clothes drying at an Amish farm.

The best Amish farm stand - Weeping Willow Farm Stand is all organic and affordable. The stand literally sits in the middle of this family's fields and you can watch the kids wheeling the wheelbarrow of produce to the stand. The sign says 'we're out picking vegetables. Leave your money in the slot'.

I love this sign in the window of the Atlantic bulk foods store. The sign on the left says, "Please do not leave your children in your buggy unattended' and the one on the right says, "All horses must be tied at hitching rail".

Amish at the Mall

You know you're in Amish country when you see this at the outlets...

Amish Fish Dinner

One of my favorite things to do here is to read the local classified papers. You find adds for everything you can imagine, including all of the local events. Another of my favorite things to do here is to watch the Amish, so when I saw the ad for the Amish Fish Dinner (at Noah Yoder's farm) to benefit the Andover Amish School, I knew I had to go. Dinner included fried fish, french fries, coleslaw, beans, white bread, pie and ice cream. Amish women served the food, the men made the ice cream and the kids ran around the farm.

A horse and buggy parked next to the barn.

Ben eating his second serving of Shoofly Pie. Shoofly Pie is a traditional Amish pie, but it's the first time we've seen it served at any of the Amish places we've visited in this area of Pennsylvania. It's made with molasses, which attracts flies, hence the name.

Ben is actually shooing a fly in this picture.

The fields behind the barn.

Amish Dairy Goats

We enjoyed an absolute treat today during our stop at Schwartz's Country Store, a local Amish store. Schwartz's caters to Amish and carries everything from black boots and shoes to coal and coal burning stoves. We were greeted inside the store by the very talkative father and five of his very quiet girls. Another toddler girl and three young boys ran around outside.

The Schwartz's also run a dairy goat business, so after shopping (a tub of bag balm for me- supposedly great for chapped hands - and a pair of scissors for my mom) we wandered over to the barn to peek at the goats. One of the girls happened to be walking behind us on her way to milk the goats. Delilah invited us into the barn to watch the milking, which takes place twice a day - at 4 am and 4 pm. We watched as the four girls (the oldest no more than 15) ran barefoot through the barn, filled the troughs with feed and led the goats in to the milking area. With bare hands and tin buckets, they milked each goat. An amazing thing to watch. I managed to get a few pictures of the goats, but didn't take any of the family since they don't allow their picture to be taken.

After watching the milking, though, I will say that there is a reason our dairy products are pasturized. I would not recommend raw milk products!

Our view inside the barn. The goats were very noisy and ready to be fed and milked.

The baby goats jumping up at us.

These goats are ready to be milked. The walked into this room from the attached barn that you see in the background. They immediately jumped up onto the raised platform and found their place.

Amish in Crawford County

I have no idea how many Amish live in Crawford County (Conneaut Lake's county), but they can be seen everywhere you go: shopping at WalMart, canoeing, playing a video game at the market, or eating frozen custard at Hank's. Like anyone else, we have found some to be very friendly and talkative, and others to be more reserved.

An Amish buggy parked in front of a yard sale. The man waited in the buggy (you can see his legs) and talked to an 'English' man while his wife shopped.

I spotted this cart, decked out with a seat from a car, at the Amish auction. The horse was tied in the trees.

You are almost guaranteed to see Amish at WalMart. They hire 'Amish Taxis' to get there (vans driven by 'English' people).

This is the phone outside the Amish house where we had dinner.

Amish Dinner in Guys Mills

Last night we ate dinner at a nearby Amish house. Sara, an Amish woman, cooks and serves family style meals out of her home. The drive to Sara's house was about half an hour, and near the end we found ourselves on dirt roads, surrounded by Amish farms. To make the setting even more idyllic, we passed a few young Amish men in buggies. Once we arrived at the farm, Sara quickly told us to go around to the rear entrance. She somehow managed to single-handedly serve dinner to 15 of us and make it appear effortless. The meal was served on paper plates and in a very simple setting.

The picture below is facing away from her house. That's our car in the picture.

The dining area is in an addition to the main house. The Amish don't have churches and take turns having Sunday services in their homes. Church benches were stacked along the wall. The lights on the ceiling are propane.

The dinner menu: white bread (baked by a neighbor) with freezer jam mixed with marshmallow cream (a favorite with the kids), cole slaw (with cabbage and iceberg lettuce and topped with grated carrots and cheddar cheese), corn (off the cob with a lot of butter), noodles slathered in butter, mashed potatoes, fried chicken and ham. Notice a color trend with the meal! It was all delicious, of course. The cole slaw was surprisingly good. The kids devoured the food and kept complimenting Sara on the meal.

Just when we thought we couldn't eat any more, Sara served coffee and three pies: pecan, Dutch apple and peanut butter. The entire meal was $7 a person!

Some of our kids outside underneath the clothes line...

Amish Auction to Benefit the Amish Schools of Guys Mills

This is the second year that we've attended the Amish Auction to benefit the Amish schools of Guys Mills, Pennsylvania. The auction, both a fundraiser and a social event for the Amish families, goes on for hours and attracts mostly Amish, but also some 'English'. They sell hot dogs, hamburgers, fresh lemonade, sodas, homemade donuts and baked goods. Auction items include potted plants, Amish made furniture and sheds, Amish taxi service, horses...anything!

Buggy parking (below). If you look in the buggies, you'll sometimes see batteries that operate the lights for night time and even the occasional fan. The horses are in the barn.

Making homemade ice cream. Notice the generator.

The benches below are filled with Amish. The auctioneer is on the podium in the back of the picture (difficult to see because of the light).

A calf to be auctioned off...

Amish boys playing on a tractor. These boys showed us the items they got in their grab bags. For $3 you could buy an 'age appropriate' bag. They got the 6 and up boys bag, which included marbles and a pocket knife.