Highwood Crossing Farms by Terry Juzak and Jennifer Cockrall-King
Edible Prairie Journal, Number 5 2005, Volume 2

If Italy has its cold-pressed extra-virgin olive oils, then the Prairies have Highwood Crossing’s cold-pressed organic canola oil. 

Highwood Crossing farm is the home of Tony and Penny Marshall. It’s an idyllic piece of land that runs east from the Highwood River, near the town of Aldersyde, south of Calgary. There’s a shallow point in the river on the farm where travelers used to cross in the days before brides or roads, hence the name Highwood Crossing.

The land has been in Tony’s family for five generations, and is now a green oasis just off Highway 2 amidst the sprawl of Okotoks and Calgary. For the past 13 years, the farm has been certified organic, growing hay, peas, flax, wheat, oats, sweet clover, barley and rye. It’s a system that Tony says works well on the small (by current-day standards) farm. Four different crops are planted each year and the Marshalls rotate the crops from field to field, year to year.

As Tony explains, “Because organic farmers don’t have the same tools (chemicals) available to us that conventional farmers have, crop rotations in an organic system are very important. It helps reduce the weed and pest pressure and is generally more healthy for the soil than growing the same crop in the same spot year after year. Each crop takes and gives different nutrients from and to the soil.” Some crops are seeded early in the season and some later. Some crops like fall rye and winter wheat are seeded in the fall to give them a jump-start on weeds the next spring. Tony says that he’s simply using the ‘old tricks’ that farmers used to use before the advent of chemically intensive farming.

We head for a walk around the farm area, and we chat about Tony’s deep roots and attachment to this area. His grandfather went over to France to import some of the first Percheron horses to Alberta (no small undertaking), the all-season workhorses so important in early Alberta farming. Tony also told us about the summer day a few years back that the Marshalls had planned a huge party to celebrate the farm’s 100th anniversary. Unfortunately, the hailstorm of the century hit the night before, and every field was hailed out, the flowers and gardens were flattened. The rented marquee tent was torn through and the leaves on every tree were shredded. But friends and neighbors arrived early in the morning for clean up and the celebration took place on schedule.

The next stop on our farm tour was the Marshalls’ chef garden. It started our as an experiment and when Penny had her first crop ready, she approached Calgary’s River Café’s chef at the time, Glen Manzer, with a list of available products. To her surprise and delight, he bought the whole list and the Marshalls have been supplying the restaurant with seasonal produce ever since. The Marshalls now grow about 80 different organic vegetables and edible flowers, most of which go to River Café.

Next we went into the heart and soul of the operation, Highwood Crossing’s production facilities. Here, the Marshalls make and package flaxseed muffin and pancake mixes, “Power Grains” hot cereal, granola, old fashioned rolled oat flakes, stone-ground dark rye and stone-ground whole wheat flour. And finally, in this compact facility, this is where their signature products, the cold-press canola and flaxseed oils are pressed and bottled.

The idea to start pressing oils came from a friend who told Tony about a small-scale oil mill in Germany. Freshly pressed oils are more common in Europe than they are in Canada and the US. “The idea of healthy, unrefined oils that were pressed fresh each week really appealed to us. I traveled to Germany and visited the place where the presses were made as well as several small farm-based oil factories. We purchased the press shortly after.”

From the look on our faces, Tony knew exactly what we were thinking. “Don’t worry, most people are underwhelmed when they actually see the press,” said Tony. True enough, it was the size of a home meat-grinder. And this was where the rather famous Highwood Crossing oils came from!

In a very simple mechanical procedure, the canola seed or flaxseed is fed from the hoppers into the small metal mill. The oil is separated out under pressure and fed directly into the bottles. The leftover meal is extruded in pellets, which then becomes animal feed.

In order to be “cold-pressed” it’s important that the oil is never heated about 40 degrees celsius in the process. The oil flows from the press right into the square, dark-glass bottles. Because of each oil’s extreme perishability, a “bottled on” date as well as a “best before” date is stamped on each bottle. As an unrefined and cold-pressed product, fresh oils are full of flavour (as opposed to the flavour-free oils we have become accustomed to) and nutritional benefits. 

Highwood Crossing’s cold-pressed flax oil must be kept refrigerated, even unopened, and has only a four-month shelf live. Once opened, you really need to use it up in four to six weeks. The cold pressed canola oil has a slightly more forgiving shelf life and, unopened can be stored for up to a year. But it’s a product that’s worth the care and attention, not only because of the wonderful nutty flavours and incredibly deep colors, but also because of the nutritional goodness from these oils (vitamin E, omega-3, and omega-6 fatty acids in the canola oil, and flax oil is a power house of omega 3s).

Oddly enough, our tour ends at an outhouse! A friend of the Marshalls was working on the Clint Eastwood movie, Unforgiven, which was filmed in and around the Calgary area. After the shoot, there were props – like this outhouse – and some leftover lumber from one of the sets. It now has a new life as the perfect tool shed in the Marshall’s garden.