Well, there is certainly the "no till" contingency around here, but I have to say that if you don't know what your soil condition is, you aren't going to get very far, and probably the best way to establish that condition is to turn the soil over to at least a spade-depth. Don't worry, the soil fungi won't get killed by tilling. It'll just take them a few months to reestablish their hyphae.

No till makes some sense if your soil condition is superb. It doesn't make sense if your soil condition is crummy. 80+ years of forest floor humus may or may not qualify as the former.

Assuming that your soil condition is not superb (though it may not be crummy), a sensible strategy is just to dig in lots of compost. What worked for beech, red maple, and sugar maple may not work that well for tomatoes.

5% organic content is plenty. I wouldn't dig in "lots" of anything.

I wouldn't be surprised if you need to lime to adjust soil pH. You will have disturbed the soil enough in removing trees that some potentially bad weeds will need to be controlled, either by further tillage or mulching. Be especially careful if black walnut trees were even a small contingent of the trees.

Michigan State University is the likely source for information. They could advise you of reclamation practices, potential pests and ideal crops to grow.

Agree with the likely need for lime as leaf litter is quite acidic although it does mellow out over decades. That pH will control the availability of nutrients to your plants so you need to know what it is to begin with. A soil test from your county ag extension office is the place to begin.

Also agree that getting down to some bare soil and turning it several inches deep will be necessary as you are likely to find a large number of roots that will need to be removed and some of them will be allelopathic to plants..

A simpler solution to consider would be to build raised beds in the area sitting on top of the existing soil and fill those beds with trucked in bulk growing mix.

Dave

Major modifications may not be necessary - or desirable - at all. (All the more so since O.P. has indicated they don't want to undertake any). There is actually a history of various crop plants being selected from wild kinds that popped up on their own in freshly disturbed forest soils around recently constructed habitations. This is why there is a tradition of providing vegetable crops with high organic content soils - it duplicates the soil conditions in recent forest clearings.

That is very true if the OP is interested in growing ginseng, lambs quarters, various fungi like mushrooms, some wild grains, some of the wild Solanacea etc. But not too practical for commonly grown garden vegetables.

It's all in the goals. Most require upfront work, some more than others.

Dave

Get a soil test done to find out what your soil might want; the local cooperative extension will most likely do this or be able to refer you to someone who does. At a guess, based on your location, the soil is most likely acidic, based not on the leaf litter which tends to be relatively close to neutral, but based on the geology of the area. I doubt you need to worry about walnut trees since they aren't happy in zone 4 IME. Look for varieties of plants that are geared toward short growing seasons.

Depending on how your trees were taken down (trees removed by machinery or horses or just you) the soil may or may not have extensive damage, but I think you will be most successful if, as others have mentioned above, you look at the results of your soil test and amend as recommended, turning the forest litter and any amendments in. After that if you want to not disturb the soil, go for it, but as someone else mentioned, the soil conditions of a forest may not be the best for veggies. I create paths in my gardens so the beds are clear enough that they don't get walked on.

Just to add to the above comments, simply cutting down some trees does not eliminate their presence entirely. Maples in particular will regrow from cut stumps and that means their root systems will still be very much alive and could cause problems for vegetable growing down the road.