Chef's tastings, farm tours, a rescue goat named Sundae: a day at Montgomery Sky Farm
ASHEVILLE - A local couple has turned a 50-acre farm into a rescue home for animals and a respite for human visitors.
Chef Taylor and Fran Montgomery have a lot on their plates between owning and managing operations at their home, Montgomery Sky Farm in Leicester, and delivering farm fresh ingredients to the plates of diners at Urban Wren restaurant in Greenville, South Carolina.
“There are times when Fran wakes up at 5 or 6 o’clock in the morning, and she’s like, ‘What the hell are you doing?’ And I’m packing boxes of tomatoes. I’m filling orders,” Taylor Montgomery said.
Their lives are vastly different from when they met in 2016 when they worked together at a country club in Burnsville where Taylor Montgomery was the executive chef.
At the time, Fran Montgomery owned a half-Highland and half-Dexter breed of a cow named Millie.
“I found this old house and met Fran and Fran had a cow. So, farmhouse, you’ve got a cow. It kind of worked out,” said Taylor Montgomery, a Waxhaw native.
Millie may be credited for helping bring the couple together.
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“Our first date was in the pasture to meet my cow,” said Fran Montgomery, a Los Angeles native. “I’m thinking, ‘There’s no way this chef is going to miss a dinner service to come meet my cow,’ but he did and here we are five years later.”
In 2018, they officially founded Montgomery Sky Farm, which began as the couple’s home and evolved into a multifaceted agricultural and communal hub.
Visiting Montgomery Sky Farm
Montgomery Sky Farm, at 336 Turkey Creek Road, is about a 20-minute drive northwest of downtown Asheville. From West Asheville, it’s accessible from New Leicester Highway going into Leicester, a community that continues to see development.
Montgomery Sky Farm still is nestled within open fields and hilly landscapes, surrounded by other local and family-run farms and ranches.
The Montgomerys have welcome guests to their farm for tours and holiday-themed family-friendly activities, by invitation.
However, that wasn’t part of their original plan.
“I don’t think we ever had an outlook of sharing it with the public. It wasn’t until COVID hit that I was like, ‘There’s so many families, so many neighbors asking for things to do with their kids, what if we start letting people come to the farm to visit, hang out for the day and spend time on the grass?’” Fran Montgomery said.
Since then, area residents and people traveling from across the country, including Florida, Pennsylvania and California, come just to see the cows and other livestock, they said.
On April 1, the farmers will host their third annual Easter at Montgomery Sky Farm ticketed event for children and adults that will feature an egg hunt, baby farm animals and more. Tickets may be purchased on Eventbrite.
At the time of publishing, the event was nearly sold out, but there will be more opportunities for the public, such as the upcoming Mother’s Day tea in the barn.
Chef-tasting experiences will launch soon with details to be announced. They’re considering weekly “Charcuterie with Cows” cocktail evening and picnic series, too.
“I’ve been in the kitchen since I was 14 years old, and I’ve worked hard to get where I am now, but eventually I want to come home," Taylor Montgomery said. "I want to come home to this, and I want to come home and still cook for the public but just on a smaller scale, whether it’s in the pasture or in the field with the crops we’re bringing in to make it all come together.”
Tours must be booked in advance and may be guided or private. The farm is not open to the public daily, as it’s their home and a working farm. To book a tour, send a message via the website, montgomeryskyfarm.com/Events-and-Tours.
Also, the barn ― which the couple built for their wedding in 2019 ― may be rented for private, intimate events for special occasions.
“Once they realize that the money that they spend with us goes back to the rescue animals and the organic food, as much as we can, you’re actually giving back when you’re purchasing dinner or a tour, so it’s one big circle,” Taylor Montgomery said.
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Meet Millie, Sundae and the rest of the farm friends
In the farm’s founding, the Montgomerys first strived for a self-sustained style of living by planting gardens, Taylor Montgomery said.
Then, they began breeding heritage animals, beginning with Highland cows.
“I’ve had gardens all my life and with the land, we started to grow, not only vegetables but animals, too,” he said. “We went from one cow to a dozen now, four Kune Kune pigs and another 12 or 15 sheep.”
At Montgomery Sky Farm, an average day may mean waking up with the roosters and keeping the hours of a night owl. Daily tasks begin with caring for local rescues and farm-bred livestock.
“In the beginning, we took in all the rescues we could get so anybody who was in the area who was like, ‘Oh, I have a chicken with a broken leg, would you guys want it?’ We were like, ‘Sure.’ Same with the goats,” Fran Montgomery said.
The Montgomerys also manage a breeding program in which the livestock are not processed for food, but they reproduce.
“The Scottish Highland (cows), they were on the endangered livestock list and the Valais aren’t too common in the States either – it’s just been the last couple of years they’ve been here. They weren’t imported,” he said.
In addition to the family’s dogs, they raise livestock like pets ―that includes the Kune Kune pigs and Highland cows.
Millie, Fran Montgomery’s first cow, comes when her name is called, and is known to put her head on Fran’s lap and fall asleep. She grazes the pasture with full-bred Highland cows.
Just outside the farmhouse is a flock of Valais Blacknose sheep and purebred rams, including their first acquired ram, Reuben. Their wool is used for fiber arts.
“They’re really cool and they’re really rare and we love them ― and they’re super friendly,” Fran Montgomery said.
Sundae, a two-and-a-half-month-old rescue goat, is rarely far from her side and likes to snuggle up in her arms and give kisses.
Garden-to-plate model
The Montgomerys also tend to their garden and greenhouse with nearly 80 species of vegetables and herbs, including lettuce, kale, tomatoes, pumpkins, melons and anise hyssop. Much of the crops are used on the menu at Urban Wren in Greenville, where Taylor Montgomery is a partner and the executive chef.
This spring, his second restaurant will open in Greenville, a casual eatery called The Bellwether.
“What’s cool about it is this allows me to put together a menu that no one else has, and if I were to purchase these things, they would be very expensive,” he said. “Chefs are paying for pea tendrils probably $16/pound and we get them for free. It’s good for my bottom line, too.”
On average, the chef hauls home 300-500 pounds of food waste per week that he uses for the farm’s compost or tills into the ground. The harvests that grow are then used at the restaurant.
“It’s cool to see that circle. We’ve integrated the chickens and the pigs. Their predominant purpose is composting so chickens will scratch up and dig up and turn the soil so then we’ve been able to use that as compost, too," Fran Montgomery said. "It’s been cool to see if from scrap, actually be worked by our ‘workers’ here on the farm, that’s then put on the bed that produces new vegetables.”
Currently, the pigs are pitching in by eating weeds and fertilizing the apple trees.
The Montgomerys have partnered with other small businesses to provide small batches of produce, too.
At Urban Wren, the chef has offered a dish called “Walk in the Garden” in which guests who ordered the farm-fresh meal would be given a bag of vegetables to take home with them.
The commute of up to two hours one-way may be wearisome at times, as is having only the two of them operating the farm without human farm hands. But Taylor Montgomery said he will never sell the farm.
“People ask us, how do we do it? Well, we’re youngish and we work hard now so we can enjoy this sooner than later,” he said.
The couple's motto, #keeppushing, was adopted to keep them motivated to continue the farm's growth.
“We believe in life you have to keep pushing because the sky is limitless,” Fran Montgomery said.
Tiana Kennell is the food and dining reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times, part of the USA Today Network. Email her at tkennell@citizentimes.com or follow her on Twitter/Instagram @PrincessOfPage. Please support this type of journalism with a subscription to the Citizen Times.
This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Montgomery Sky Farm offers chef's tastings, rare livestock farm tours
