Welcome to episode 2 of From the Front Porch.

Conversations on Books, Small Business,

and Life in the South.

I'm Annie Jones, and this episode I'll be joined by travel writer Jody Helmer to discuss her new book

Farm Fresh Georgia. We'll talk about agritourism, yes it's a thing, shopping for

local foods and more.

Later in the episode, Katie and I debate what cookbooks are really good for,

and I list some of my favorite foodie memoirs.

Thanks for joining us. Okay, Jody, why don't you tell us a little bit about Farm Fresh Georgia?

So Farm Fresh Georgia, I describe as sort of an agritourism guidebook to Georgia. So it covers from the north Georgia to

south Georgia from the east coast to the west coast what farmers are doing that allows people to come onto the farm and have some

sort of farm experience or gets people closer to the source of their food. So

that might be a farm-to-table restaurant or a you pick or a farmers market or you may go directly to the farm and experience something there.

Whether it's a festival or an opportunity to go through a corn maze or pick your own pumpkins at a pumpkin patch and those sorts of things.

And it took a year of research to do the book. I traveled to all of the places that are included in the book.

So these are places that I have seen and experienced

and can personally recommend for people who really want

some sort of connection to their food. And when you talk about

agritourism and going to the farm, what types of activities are at these places? You

know you mentioned activities on the farm. What do you do at a farm?

It really depends on the farm.

So there are some farms that have what are called

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