The Urban Chicken Farm, Part Two

In the late 1990s I lived in a delightful townhouse in a Mediterranean style villa, designed by Frank Anhalt in the 1930s on the West side of Queen Anne hill in Seattle. With magnificent views of Puget Sound and the Olympic Mountains, it was an idyllic and romantic location to pursue my culinary passions in my late twenties, whilst I commuted to my job as a software engineer at a medical device company on the Eastside. At the time, having recently graduated with a degree in Physics from the University of Washington, my heart was not in the tech sector, and I spent most of my cubicle hours dreaming of farming and cooking and cheesemaking. A co-worker of mine provided me with one of his retired laying hens and I setup a perch for her on the veranda of my Queen Anne home. This was pretty unusual in the city at the time, and with dreams of milk goats flitting through my mind, it wasn’t long before my farming fantasies led me to abandon the cubicle for a life in the country.

That first urban chicken experiment was instrumental in guiding me towards the birthing of Sea Breeze Farm on Vashon Island. Now, many life changes and locations hence, having landed in Portland Oregon, we have launched phase two of the urban chicken experiment. Being consumed by the operation of our restaurant, Coq Au Vin in Northeast Portland, we are not able to be at our farm property full time, so we are gradually bringing the farm to the city, beginning with a few layer hens. The kids are loving the interaction with the birds and we now have new “farm chores” as part of our routine—opening and closing the coop at dawn and dusk, feeding the hens, changing their water, gathering the eggs and replenishing their bedding.

Stay tuned as our nascent urban farm blossoms, producing eggs, produce and other delights featured on the menu, as we work towards building a fully sustainable urban outpost. We can’t wait to have you join us at our new location and take a peek at the new chicken coop and garden!