Farm-to-Table Dining at Elderslie Farm in Kansas

Serendipitous findings are also fun, and one we encountered recently was finding a gem of a restaurant tucked away in the Kansas countryside north of Wichita.  Elderslie Farm  is the creation of owner George Elder, who grew up here, and his wife Katherine, who is the Executive Chef.

Elderslie Farm is tucked away in bucolic farm country in central Kansas, 15 miles north of Wichita.  Its name derives from the owner’s Scottish heritage. George Elder believes in sourcing local products, and in this case not only food, but also local timber at his woodworks and sawmill also on the property.

Goats are resident on the farm, having supplied milk and cheese for many years.  And now Elderslie is building a new Creamery. According to the farm’s blog, plans are to have a facility for about 100 goats for milking production. The focus will be on retail sales of artisan cheeses and gelato at the Creamery and  gift items available online.

Farm-to-table fine dining is offered on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays.  We strolled from the gravel parking area through a grove of trees decorated with lights to illuminate the path to the restaurant.  There is an attractive outdoor patio area where dinner service begins in warm weather months before moving to the tables inside.  But we were visiting when the evenings were too chilly so were escorted by Elder himself directly to our table in the first small dining room.  The tables are dressed in a rustic fashion without tablecloths, but the building is full of country charm, and the service is warm, friendly and inviting. 

We enjoyed the 7-course tasting menu.  The restaurant recommends allowing 90-120 minutes from seating to enjoy the leisurely paced meal.  Each of the courses is uniquely named on the menu, and the server takes time to explain all ingredients upon bringing each dish table side. Wine pairings are available to be added if desired.

Vegetables play a very important part in the menu. We began with a combination plate, consisting of Bouquet and Squash.   The salad portion combined baby greens, pistachio cream, brioche crumbs and serrano ham bits that created a wonderful medley of flavors.  Alongside was a delicata winter squash, served on dark pumpernickel toast with winter herbs and goat cheese fresh from the farm.

An additional vegetable dish arrived next, Sweet Potato.  It consisted of crisp black lentils and a rich white sweet potato and cashew broth poured overtop of them. Floating atop the soup is a nasturtium leaf with a mildly peppery flavor and an aroma reminiscent of mustard. The combination resulted in a delicious vellutata with very original flavors. 

Pasta was to follow, specifically Mezzi Paccheri filled with turnip greens braised in whey, horseradish and lemon, stuffed with seared and crisped mushrooms, set on a vegetable jus.  This was the chef’s innovative take on a vegetable sauce pasta, with the pasta used as the container for the other ingredients.

Somewhat surprisingly the bread was brought mid meal, but the fresh baked bread stuffed with cherry garlic herb butter was fragrantly delicious with the butter melting easily into the warm interior.

Another aromatic vegetable dish soon arrived, Carrot.   Poached and seared and seasoned with pushcart spice, the carrots were topped by a wonderful orange caramel glaze and garnished with crisp toasted bulgar grains and feta chards made here at the farm.  The taste of the carrot was deliciously accentuated due to the cooking method and spices.

The meat dish rounded out the savory entries.  A Short Rib, provided by Creekstone Farm, was accompanied by a combination of blistered shishito peppers, shishito romesco sauce and leek confit, all served on potato fondue.  The meat was like butter, it was so tender.

The experience concluded with dessert, Charlotte.  This extravagance consists of wedges of brioche French toast plus a poached apple decadently joined with apple cider caramel and apple skin powdered sugar dusted over the top.  To go even further, the chef added alongside a cardamom goat gelato set atop brioche crumbs, topped with vanilla bean crème anglaise and topped with dried apricots.  Sinfully delicious!  A take on Apple Charlotte but wonderfully inventive.

I was interested in learning more about the inspiration behind the farm restaurant, the chef’s background and future plans.  George provided some insights about these topics in response to my questions.

       1. Q. What was your main inspiration for starting the farm restaurant?

A. I have always been focused on regional identity and the cultural relevance of building methods, regional materials and agriculture which expresses a terroir.  After our marriage, I was already cultivating berries and my sister had extensive vegetable plantings.  Then on our honeymoon we traveled to California and near Carmel we ate at two places, Bernardus and the other was the Post Ranch Inn, and got to see a couple ways that a rural setting could marry with Fine Dining.  This combined with the necessity to market blackberries as more than a product, adding a summer café (which came before fine dining for us) which served to make us a destination for spending a day with your family and children, not just a market stand with berries in the middle of the country.

       2. Q. Can you share any more information on your wife’s culinary background and what she tries to accomplish at Elderslie farm with her menu preparation and selections?

A. My wife’s family has always been dedicated to a delicate and engaging culture of the table focusing on ways to treat even simple ingredients and vegetables in a way that they become exciting, something to linger over and talk about.  She and her family spent most summers in northern Italy with many trips through Europe, especially Paris.  Her father pushed her to excellent execution at a young age, famously making green Chile Souffle for some two weeks straight trying to get to know the dish and its variables.  As a physician cooking was for him and his daughter (my wife) a world at once technical, which gratified his need for using his head, and sensual, which helped relieve stress after long days spent with patients.  She carried that habit through her education (in Voice Performance and Chemistry) and brought it into the kitchen.  Since we began, she has actively pursued relationships with mentor chefs who are James Beard award winners in their own right in the Bay area and Orlando.  Over the past 3 years, she has gone to Italy once or twice a year leading Food and Wine groups to a family villa in northern Italy where she acts as a private chef and travels with the group visiting and cooking in Michelin star restaurants around Lake Como and Milan.  Her greatest asset is an uncanny quick sensitive pallet and intuitive perception of flavor profiles and how to cohesively build them into a dish.

       3. Q. To underscore your Farm-to-table focus, what all is raised or grown on the farm that finds its way onto the menus?  Speaking of your menus, these change monthly or seasonally?

A. Our menus change monthly, and each course is built to feature (though not made up entirely) of ingredients from our farm and other farms in the area.  There is a group of about 5 farms we often work with including Ories, Strong Roots, HomeGrown KS LLC, Meadowlark Farm, Serenity Fram and Firefly Farm.  Our product centers on brambles, but for our kitchen we grew numerous tomato varities, sour gherkins, cucumbers, squash and many herbs.  I grew up living around big gardens and the flavor profiles from a ripe and soil-grown vegetable just blow you away.  For the past 10 years I have spent a good deal of my time learning organic practices and the relation of flavor to growing practices and inputs.

       5. Q. I saw that there are other farm activities such as berry picking; what all is grown that visitors can come and pick? 

A. Blackberries are what started it and that is our lonely you-pick crop, which is because we believe that each culture we take on needs to be done with care, thorough technical understanding and rigorous management.  We are one of a very few farms in the U.S. that manage a You-Pick bramble (a bramble is any rough-tangled prickly shrub especially the blackberry bush) using organic practices.

       4. Q. Do you have any expansion plans? We read about the Creamery that is coming soon, an exciting new addition!

A. The Creamery is our biggest project to date and we will be growing into it over the next 4-5 years as we round out our product offerings and work at cooperation with our formal culinary team and Cheese Maker to produce cheeses and culinary combinations that showcase this new part of Elderslie.

The fine dining at Elderslie Farm is worth the trip if you are in the heartland and can make the drive to central Kansas.  The warm welcome, delicious food and charming setting will create fond memories of your excursion to the countryside and the serendipitous find of an outstanding meal amongst simple country surroundings.