WHAT COULD BE NICER

“What Could Be nicer than fresh spinach, lettuce and greens early in the spring?” That line caught my attention as I perused the latest edition of the local garden club newsletter. Sally Watson, a dynamic member of that growing organization, is reminding us all to start planting our spring vegetables patch. She goes on to say, “This is the time of year that gardeners get restless and the easiest “fix” is to have something growing on a window sill in our houses ready to go outdoors when the soil warms to the correct temperature for the vegetables in question.” That is 10 degrees for the early starters. Sally goes on to explain that “experienced island gardeners will tell you that it simply isn’t worth putting vegetable plants or seeds out in the garden too early - nothing will happen until that rush of warm spring air arrives to warm the soil and start everything growing. This does not preclude starting things off indoors so that you are well ahead when the warmth arrives. As the days get longer this gets easier and easier”.

Sally tells us that she already has a pot of garlic 9 inches high in her kitchen window growing great guns and her spouse, Malcolm, has small cauliflower and broccoli plants “resting” in the greenhouse waiting for the warmth to arrive, as well as lettuces in the cold frame and onions in the garden that have overwintered and will take off early.

One of the great benefits of belonging to our garden club is that those of us who are eager to learn more about the secrets of growing food benefit by listening to “the masters” and then sharing what we learn with others. I am experimenting, for the first time, with overwintering vegetables. The onions and garlic which were planted in the late summer are thriving despite snow and lashing rain. The broad beans, planted in October have really taken a beating due to some severe wind and snow storms. The plants are almost two feet tall and are tied to sturdy stakes. After a severe temperature drop they wilt totally yet once the air warms they rally once more. I am looking forward to the beans ripening in late spring as they are rich in nutrients and will make an interesting substitute for the tinned garbanzos used in my family’s favourite hummus recipe. A slow walk around the mucky garden after each storm is a great way of cheering oneself up and sustaining that important sense of anticipation.

HANDS IN DIRT EXPERIENCE

Breaking New Ground for a hands-in-dirt experience is the start of an interesting collaboration between North Island College and the city’s Land Use Dept. The joint project, Backyard Gardening and Small-Scale Agriculture, begins in mid-May and includes four sessions. It is exciting to hear that Kira DeSorcey will be the instructor. She is a former Timberline student and the inspiration behind the Edible Courtyard garden which has become a learning centre for students at the school interested in food production.

The course is designed to attract first time gardeners who are interested in healthy eating as well as those who are taking it a step further and want to learn about the small scale farming business. Kira is a horticulture technician, permaculture designer and the garden manager at BlueJay Lake Farm on Cortes Island. She currently does edible landscape design and particularly enjoys creating community and school gardens.

What make this course so special is that it includes hands-on learning in the campus garden as well as visits with local growers and info on the city’s plans to encourage and attract new farmers. I’m planning to enroll in the course and I hope to see many Urban Gardener readers joining me in this new venture. The fee is $95 and to book space please call the North Island College office.

Worms In A Tub farming is an easy way to raise those lively Red Wrigglers whose mission in life is to convert your kitchen waste into rich brown compost. There are tubs designed especially for raising worms but they can be costly. A local lady who recently retired from the business of growing worms has a few tubs for sale at the very reasonable price of $55 each. That includes the instructions on how to set up your worm farm. Her contact number is 923-8431.

ARE WE GUILTY OF GULPING

Are We Guilty of gulping down our meals in order to get on with the next activity… or do we savour our food slowly while enjoying each mouthful?

My friend Lesia revisited France this past summer and returned exclaiming that the French still have such reverence for food. As they settle down at the table the first few minutes are spent contemplating the presentation and asking such questions as where the cheese was produced or what herbs were used in the preparation of the appetizer Only then are the utensils lifted and the tasting begun. This is not about food snobbery but shows a profound respect for the whole process of planning and consuming meals. On the other hand my food writer friends tell me that the French are entrenched in a fossilized style of culinary arts. A new generation is rising that has created a reform movement called Le Fooding. This younger generation is fiercely challenging the snobbery surrounding French food while still embracing the idea of food as a pleasure, something to discuss and enjoy.

So here we are on the other side of the pond where many of us select our foods with a totally different criteria. We may ask “Is the recipe simple?” “Can we cook it in less than 30 minutes?” These are valid questions and we all ask them, especially those families where parents are working and time is a precious commodity. Perhaps our dining habits just need a bit of tweaking. There is nothing more pleasant than having all family members sit down to the meal at the same time. It creates a sense of celebration and is likely the best opportunity that busy people have to develop the idea of family togetherness. It is also an opportunity to discuss the ingredients used in preparing the meal, encourage the discussion of these flavours and help youngsters to appreciate the production of food. If you were raised in a family where the art of slow eating was entrenched then you received a precious gift. It is never too late to adjust one’s eating habits and pass the gift along to others.

Potato Wedges are divine! If your youngsters are old enough to help with chopping foods this is a great way to involve them in the fun of meal preparation. It is also a slick way to use up odds and ends in the fridge. Take two pounds of white or sweet potatoes, a half cup of olive oil, some salt and fresh garlic. Try thyme, sage or rosemary for extra flavour. Wedge-cut the potatoes and toss them in with the herbs and the oil. Roast uncovered in a 400 degree oven for 40 min. or less if you are using yams or sweet potatoes. There’s a bonus if you have organic potatoes as it isn’t necessary to peel them. An over ripe tomato or a bit of dried up cheese lurking in the back of the fridge can greatly add to the taste. Beware! One can get addicted very easily to potato wedges.

CHIFFONADING IS QUITE POSH SOUNDING

Chiffonading is a posh sounding description for a very simple leafy vegetable dish. “Chiffon” is French for “rag” and is a cooking technique in which herbs or leafy greens such as spinach, beet leaves, basil or kale are cut into long thin strips. This is accomplished by stacking leaves, rolling them tightly, then cutting across the rolled leaves with a sharp knife, producing fine ribbons. Cut out the stems first if they look tough. I did a column on chiffonading almost two years ago, not that I used that particular word at the time to describe the process. However people continue to stop me in the street and ask for the kale recipe and I love to share the steps that convert the nutrient rich kale into a delicious addition to your meals.

So…here we go. In a heavy frying pan melt a tablespoon of oil and a knob of butter in medium heat. Toss in a small spoonful of grated ginger and the same amount of chopped garlic. Then add a tablespoon of water. I often add a pinch of sugar if the leaves are coarse. Mix the greens well with the other ingredients and use a heavy lid on the pan. After three or four minutes, on medium heat, pop the lid and the kale should turn intensely deep green and be ready to serve. It will make a delicious addition to your plate as well as a visual treat.

In September, as mentioned in the past column, I visited Powell River in order to experience the annual Edible Garden contest. I picked up two new ideas from a contestant in Lund, which is north of town. He had cleared a small garden site out of a deeply forested area and was successfully producing a variety of food stuffs and fruit. He told me one of his secrets for growing great grub was to feed the plants horsetail tea. Now that interested me was I am so enamoured with the new famous chicken dung tea. He claims that because horsetail has such deep roots it draws up nutrients from the earth that are not available to shallow rooted plants. To prepare the tea he harvests armfuls of the plant and chops it into smaller lengths. It is then left to soak in a large barrel for a couple of weeks while it gradually turns to a deep green brew. He then siphons the liquid out of the barrel and uses it in the same way that we traditionally fertilize our plants.

Composting our kitchen waste is a fairly easy process but what to do with the coarse stalks left over from clearing the garden and cleaning out the handing baskets can be a problem. The horsetail farmer made it look easy. He took a big clear plastic sack and tossed in all the garden refuse and small pruned branches. Then he sprinkled in a bit of water, tied the sack up and left it lying on the ground in the direct sun. He claims that by next spring all his scraps will have turned to sod. Now that is a tidy solution and if it works it is actually a brilliant solution! That’s one I must try.

CITY TAKES A QUANTUM LEAP

City Council Took a quantum “Green Leap” into the locally grown food movement last week when councilors officially approved the Agriculture Plan. The steering committee, of which I am a member, formulated the plan and recommendations for a strong agriculture sector to be developed in Campbell River. It was a great moment for our team. A year has passed since we received funding from the Agriculture Foundation to retain a researcher and a soil specialist to assist city staff and our committee to prepare a plan.

Readers of this column were surprised to learn that one third of municipal land is designated ALR (Agricultural Land Reserve). The research has now confirmed that there are specific areas in the community including the Willis Road, Duncan Bay Road and Airport South areas that have high soil values. These are equivalent to rich agricultural lands in the Vancouver delta area. As well, there are very accessible areas for possible commercial greenhouses.

Vancouver Island once produced more than half of the region’s food requirements. In the past 50 years this number has dropped to an average of less than ten per cent. The sad stats for local production show that we produce less than one percent of our food needs in Campbell River. Agriculture is now re-establishing itself on the Island and the Ag. Plan committee’s vision is that Campbell River become more sustainable with the production of local food, grown on it’s own land. This is an exciting time to be setting new directions and looking at new ways to strengthen our economic diversity and become part of the exciting locally grown food movement on Vancouver Island.

POWELL RIVER GREENS OPENED OUR EYES

We’re Being Left in the dust, when it comes to dirt, by our progressive coastal neighbours. A mid-August day trip to Powell River to attend the 3^rd Annual Edible Garden Contest really opened our eyes to the possibilities of food gardening. Whether one’s property is at 750 feet or down at sea level, whether the land is carved out of a clearing in the deep forest or a perfectly groomed display in a posh residential area, it is possible to produce remarkable amounts of nourishing food for the family table.

I have been following Powell River’s progress online since 2006 when this gutsy little community of 18,000 announced it’s intention to begin a 50-Mile Eat-Local challenge. My daughter, Kathie Klassen, and I were eager to see what they had achieved since that radical idea of eating local was first launched. Checking the map, the only other shopping area inside the boundaries of that circle is the Comox Valley. But at almost $30 roundtrip for a foot passenger on the ferry, shopping for food outside of Powell River doesn’t make economic sense.

The garden contest covered as far out of town as Lund so we were fortunate to have Kevin Wilson, an avid member of the town’s garden community, to act as driver/tour guide. What interested us particularly was the fact that three out of the four properties we toured were literally carved out of clearings surrounded by deep forest. One stop was at Pete Tebbutt’s site. He was one of the shareholders in a six family acreage known as the Craig Road Co-op. The veggies were thriving despite a healthy supply of rocks that were being removed one by one. What really amazed us was that he was growing greens and tomatoes on property that was sited 750 feet above sea-level.

In a future column I will share more details about specific gardening techniques used by Powell River residents that will be inspiring to readers. Meanwhile, I want to list the number of organizations that have renewed themselves or sprung to life since this amazing community embraced the “radical” idea of growing and eating local food; The Edible Garden Tour, The Community Resource Centre which organizes the Winter Farmer’s Market, A Good Food Box which has set up a bulk produce buying program, Kale Force which meets every second Wednesday of the month in the Community Centre to share a potluck and conversation about food and gardening, P.R. Food Security Project, Skookum Food Co-op, the Skookum Gleaners which was formerly known as the Fruit Tree Project and lastly, the P.R. Food Literary Council.

What inspired me about Powell River was the enthusiasm and pride we experienced at every one of the ten gardens we visited. It is a community sharing a common vision and a belief that they are making a difference in the quality of their lives and the security of their food sources…enviable goals for sure.

A MIRACLE, CHICKEN DUNG TEA

The Ultimate Gift for a food gardener… a gunny-sack of chicken manure. No one but a couple of elderly farm kids could understand the thrill. My friend Walter and I were thinking back on childhoods in the 1930s raised by families that maintained large food gardens. There was no such thing as running to the store and returning with bags of purchased food. We vaguely remember lugging home a small sack containing salt, pepper or tea, sugar and flour which would cover the essentials but very little else.

However, we both vividly remember the dripping sack of chicken manure that hung in a huge barrel of water, outside the woodshed. Our families used the liquid inside the barrel, which we referred to as “Chicken Dung Tea”, on veggies, flowers, young treelings and in fact any growing thing that looked like it needed a shot in the arm. As a recent surprise gift for me Walter spotted a 60 gal. blue drum at the local auction and was the successful bidder for a modest $10 bill. He dragged the drum home, drilled a hole near the bottom for a spigot and filled it to the top with water. Next he found a metal bar that fitted nicely across the top of the barrel and from that he hung a gunny sack filled with about 10 pounds of chicken manure.

I viewed the operation with childlike enthusiasm and every morning I pulled aside the lid to peer into the depths and check if the manure was gradually dissolving into the water. Walter said “wait at least two weeks” but that didn’t suit my impatient nature so on the seventh day I twisted open the spigot and filled my watering can with this delicious offering. Flowers, veggies, blueberry bushes, fruit trees and roses all got a generous dose of the chicken dung tea and I quickly used up the contents of the 60 gal. drum. Since then we have made and used two more barrels.

Now I want to tell you without exaggeration my 10 tomato plants literally shot out of the ground. They are now averaging between four and five feet high in fact getting so rangy that I clipped most of the tops off as the fruits are beginning to shape up and too much foliage will weaken the plants ability to grow tomatoes to full size. The three rose bushes are remarkable as well with dense green shiny leaves and exquisitely formed rosebuds. That humble sack of chicken manure in a dirty old gunny-sack turned out to be the “bestest” present I ever had!

There’s an Edible Garden Tour on Aug. 7 held at Powell River which sounds fascinating. Gardeners over there are kicking off the sixth annual 50-Mile Eat Local Challenge and the third year for the edible garden tour. What a great way to see how other people in the region are producing some of their own food and I hope to see you there. The tour includes Lund, Wildwood, Westview, Cranberry and Townsite. Here’s an opportunity to view what other small communities are doing to promote the locally-grown food movement which is sweeping across the islands. For more info check Google for Powell River’s third annual Edible Garden Tour.