Angela Moragne loses track of time when she gardens at “That Hood Ranch,” her urban ranch. It’s “soothing” and “poetic” to watch “nature starting to incubate its own self,” she says. But it’s also good business. The backyard of her house contains 21 separate gardens where she grows tomatoes, cabbage, cucumbers, hot peppers and ginseng for six companies that pay to use the land.
Consisting of 20,000 square feet, the ranch is a fixer-upper located in Lincoln Creek on Milwaukee’s North Side. Moragne, a social entrepreneur, purchased the abandoned property from a local developer in 2014.
Moragne created the ranch two years ago with five gardens where she grew ingredients for That Salsa Lady, a gourmet salsa and tortilla chip company that she owns and operates with her daughter, Stevey Pitts, 26. In March, she added 16 more gardens in collaboration with Good Stuff Gardens, 2520 N. 20th St., which makes jams and pickled goods.
Read more at the Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service.
