Today in Lansing: Fresh produce at Ancona Farm Stand

6 to 8 p.m.

Ancona Farms

622 Hayford Ave., Lansing

Click here for event page.

Forget to catch a farmer’s market this weekend? Get duck eggs, jam and fresh produce at this Eastside farm stand.

With three plots of urban farming land in the Eastside neighborhood, Phillip and Kara Kurzeja run Ancona farms — a play on the Ancona ducks they keep in their backyard coop. Along with the duck eggs and jam, they will have Swiss chard, cucumbers, tomatoes, green beans, corn and squash in this week’s yield.

“Our ducks are the coolest pets, and they just so happen to give us eggs,” said Phillip. “They have twice as much good cholesterol as chicken eggs.”

As a botanist, Philip said urban farming provides an opportunity to try and grow the most produce within the least amount of space. “I’ve been growing potatoes in cages with straw compost like a column and am seeing a 10 to one return.”

Though it is a passion project, plans to turn Ancona farms into a small business are in the works.

Kara, a music teacher, said it is amazing to see what people are doing on the Eastside with urban farming. Most of their yield goes toward feeding themselves, and the extras are sold at the farm stand.

Though this year’s harvest saw a big influx of groundhog and raccoon problems, Phillip believes growing your own food is the best way to monitor your nutrition.

“I think it is important for people to control how they produce their food and what goes into their bodies.”