Every week we venture out in the crisp fall air to our favorite markets to see what is ‘FRESH’ and LOCAL. Here are a few finds this week.
Organic Celeriac $4 each, Rutabaga $1, Squash(as marked) and Eggplant from SUN TRIO.
Root Cellar local Carrots $.99 lb,
Brussels $3.99 a stem,
and Watercress.
Have a great week!
Article and Photo’s by Mathew and Sherry
As the days get darker and colder, everywhere you look the once summer “FRESH” feeling seems to be retreating for the winter. Leaves falling to the ground, fields full of pumpkins and signs of the left over summer abundance decomposing into nutrients for next years harvest. Even though it seems like there is less abundance everywhere it is surprising what you can still find “Fresh Now”. We both love eating what we can get locally and are surprised to still find a good portion of our diet here.
Beautiful Organic Haberno Peppers (Top Photo .25 ea) Bell Peppers(1lb $5), Cucumbers ($1 each), Tomatoes (end of the season, gifted by Farmer Frank, Thanks!), and Wheat Grass ($14) Sun Trio
Sweet Peppers ($1-1.5)
And from Mitchells Farm, their own Cooking apples (5lbs for $3.5), Kale, Lettuce and Rainbow Chard($1.99)
We are both so grateful for the farmers for still working hard for our earthly delight’s!!
Article by Mat and Sherry, Photo’s Sherry
Well Autumn is upon us, the harvest moon has come and gone and our bountiful supply of fresh local veggies are dwindling in variety. At the last ‘Get Fresh Feast’ someone made kale chips, they were such a hit with us that we have been kale chippin’ regularly since then. With many local farms, such as Mitchells Farm on Pat Bay & Island View Rd, growing this ‘super good for ya green’ all winter long we are excited to know we can enjoy this treat through until spring. We make a simple dressing for ours but feel free to create your own flavors, let us know your favorites!
Step 1
De-stem the leaves and cut into chip size pieces
Place in mixing bowl and drizzle Olive oil (approx. 1/4 cup), Balsamic vinegar (just a few sprinkles) and salt and pepper to taste
For Oven instructions and another tasty version visit Eat Drink Better: Sustainable Food for a Healthy Lifestyle
Mix and massage oil and vinegar evenly amongst the leaves
Step 2
Place kale onto dehydrator racks and set to 110 degrees until crispy, about 4 hours
… insert jeopardy theme music… do do do do….
VOILA! Krispy Kale Chippies!!!
These melt in your mouth delicacies, which seem to shatter on your tongue, are still full of their nutrients and so addictive we feel we should post a warning with these instructions… Once you start you just can’t stop!…
Bon Appetit!!
Article and Photo’s by Mat and Sherry
It has been a whirlwind few weeks, lot’s happening, I have a lot to be grateful for. Some of you may know that Mat was away on his kayaking adventure with his Dad and Uncles up in the Bunsby islands. Unfortunately he was caught in the storm which hit northern Vancouver island and caused a State of Emergency. Landslides and bridges washed out, luckily for them they were rescued to Fair Harbor then were able to finally make it to Zeballos. I haven’t been on that end before, the end of the phone call when you find out something has happened but you have no way of knowing if everyone is okay. I am not one to worry until I get the facts but I have to say there were moments when the fear of never seeing him again seeped in. He left a message and in hearing his voice I felt sudden relief, then thoughts overwhelmed me of taking him for granted. I started thinking about how we all take something for granted: our loves, our family, our health, our friends, our FOOD! So many things we think will always just be there until we get that shock one day that it is gone. That is when we beg, plead, bargain and promise things will be different. If ONLY I appreciated my partner, family, health, food etc.
Thanksgiving weekend is a perfect time for a ‘fresh’ start and look at our lives with a new perspective. With the yearly celebration of the harvest it is nice to look at what we are grateful for, the small things, the big things. I feel so blessed to have met the love of my life, have amazing family, friends and to live in a paradise where we can grow so much food. Sometimes in life it’s easy to get caught up day to day with what we are lacking, what is not working and how things are not how we want them to be. I have been there so many times, focusing on the problems and how I wish my life was different. Now with just shifting my perspective to all the things that I am grateful for, doors have opened up and opportunities have arisen to possibilities I never knew existed. We are all human and have a tendency to fall back on old behaviors but every moment is an opportunity to make a ‘Fresh’ start: To move from a place of lack to a place of abundance. It is everywhere, if we look around us, this time of year, such an abundance of local food: cabbage, apples, pears, pumpkins, kale, beets etc.(check out the Farm Fresh Guide for all the local abundance available.) So much to be grateful for.
I looked up the History of Canadian Thanksgiving and found out that the first Thanksgiving was in 1578 when explorer Martin Frobisher celebrated surviving his journey from trying to find the Northern Passage way to the Pacific Ocean. Frobisher’s Thanksgiving was not for harvest but homecoming, having avoided the later fate of Henry Hudson and Sir John Franklin. With Mat safely home I can’t help but feel a correlation and think sometimes it would be nice to give thanks to ourselves as well, for the journey we have endured to get to where we are today.
Well, I have made it home from my kayaking adventure. Now safely tucked into my little nest with my family, the hurricane force winds, wild Pacific seas and BUCKETS of rain seem like a distant memory. I must say I am very grateful to all the volunteers and kind people of Zeballos, their hard work and understanding made the bitterness of being stranded much more palpable.
After reading the history of our Canadian Thanksgiving I am also reminded of some of the things which I so easily take for granted. On my day to day journeys I find it easy to miss the rich diversity of abundance which is ever present in my life, how I can overlook this is unfortunate because it is really an eternal well spring of love and positive transformation. I guess that’s what Thanksgiving Day is to me, a reminder of how gratitude is an active proponent of personal growth and transformation. If I am alive, I am Grateful. On that note, Happy Gratitude day to all of you :)
Article and photo’s by Mat and Sherry
Needing a quick ‘Fresh’ Meal? Have you made any Pesto yet? Well if you have (if not you can use a sauce you have on hand) here is a quick and easy meal.
Chop your tomatoes into desired size. I used orange, red and yellow, all different sizes from Sunwing. By the way, this is your last month to buy your local tomatoes, fresh Basil and garlic if you do want to make some pesto to freeze for the winter!
Add pesto, or sauce of your choice,
Fill your lettuce leaves with the mixture. We also added julienne carrots, smoked tofu and sliced avocado. We wrapped up the larger pieces of lettuce and ate the smaller ones like boats! Yummy!!
If you have any ‘fresh’ fast idea’s please share!
So exciting, all this talk about ‘Fresh’ food and sustainability last week came at the perfect time. I was fortunate enough to go to the movie ‘Fresh‘ that was put on by Open Cinema: Cinema with a Social Conscience. It was so cool to watch this inspiring movie that celebrates the farmers, thinkers and business people across America who are re-inventing our food system. ”FRESH is more than a movie, it’s a gateway to action. Our aim is to help grow FRESH food, ideas, and become active participants in an exciting, vibrant, and fast-growing movement.” (excerpt from their website).
Change is happening everywhere, a grassroots revolution is taking place and it’s time for me to take action! I look for a quote that keeps going through my head, something about a few like minded people changing the world, but find this one which resonates more “It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.” ~ Charles Darwin. If ever there was a time for change I think it would be now!
The Question is…. are we ready to get ‘FRESH’? I pondered the word again……FRESH- ‘Retaining the original properties unimpaired; not stale or spoiled’. I started seeing areas in my life that I want to freshen up. When you look at a child you see their unimpaired vibrancy. I want that feeling again. So I decided to set the intention to have the best year of my life and look at certain areas that were a little stale. My diet was one, getting involved in the community was another and how I related to myself and others. So I decided to go on a Juice Feast to freshen up my body, learn and get involved in the community with something I believe in and look closer at my behaviors towards myself and those around me. That should shake things up a bit!! So this week I have been cleansing and healing my body with beautiful juice made from local fresh produce.(except the citrus)
And now getting to know what is happening in the community for our food sustainability. There is a lot going in out there I just had to look for it!
This past Sunday was the Eat Here Now event to bring awareness for a downtown covered local food market. It was great to see so many supporters for our food security on the island. Here is Saanich Organics, one of the many booths out to support the cause.
We only grow 6% of our food on the island and the thought of having an event like the Blizzard of 96 bring chills up my spine. We only have about three days of food here on the island. So this gets me thinking, with all this beautiful land we have here, why are we not growing more food? It seems that it is in our hands, “the power is in our pocket books” I hear from a friend. This is true, if we step up and start supporting our local farmers they will be able to produce more food for us. We need the support of each other as a community for this to work and all it takes is buying a few of your items from the ‘local’ section of your grocery store, or picking up one of our guides to get to know our island farmers and where they are located. Mat and I usually take a day each week and enjoy a beautiful drive in the country to get our produce. Look at this amazing ‘last supper of summer‘ that I had before starting my juice feast.
Sprouts and cucumber ( absolutely the best I have ever tasted!) from Sun Trio, beautiful heritage tomatoes from Sun Wing and a dollop of my pesto! So delicious!!
As for my behaviors, I am choosing to be more compassionate with myself and those around me, we are all doing the best we can!
Have a fabulous week!
Article and Photos by Sherry (Mat was unfortunately caught by the weather conditions and is stuck in Zeballos)
I just got home from an inspiring life changing weekend at the O.U.R EcoVillage in Shawnigan Lake where the ‘Get Fresh’ team had our booth full of beautiful items from our guide. I have heard about this auspicious place for years but never really knew where it was, it sounded so magical to me. ‘A sustainable learning community and demonstration site’ that is working on, and succeeding, in being a totally self-sustaining community. Everyone gets a say, helps out and are all working toward a bigger goal. “We base our work on Permaculture principles and offer learning opportunities for Natural Building, Sustainable Food Production and Leadership.”
BRILLIANT! Exactly what the world needs right now!
With so much inspiration this weekend I really got a ‘Fresh Perspective’ on my inter-relationship with the Earth. INTER-RELATIONSHIP-’reciprocal relationship’ how cool is that! Our relationship with the earth definitely is RECIPROCAL-’given or felt by each toward the other’) So the first thing I decided to look at was our relationship with food. I have never really heard things like ‘food security’ before. Overwhelmed by the quantity of the food at our grocery store, in my naivete, I think “it LOOKS secure to me!” Well, it turns out “food security requires not only addressing access to healthy food by people of diverse income levels, but also ensuring that food production and distribution occur in an environmentally sustainable and economically viable manner” An excerpt from a FoodShare research in action report. I didn’t realize that even choosing organic food at the grocery store had such an environmental impact.
At O.U.R. Ecovillage they are using inspiring principles like the Zero Mile Diet inspired by Victoria’s very own local organic gardening guru, Carolyn Herriot. This concept got me thinking…. how ‘fresh’ is our food? FRESH- “Retaining the original properties unimpaired; not stale or spoiled.” I am seeing that the fresh produce in the commercial grocery stores isn’t as fresh as I thought. With my new awareness I have decided to shop as local as possible, as much as possible. I can’t deny the fact that I love a ripe juicy mango in my salsa or a that I am addicted to Mat’s guacamole, and obviously the ingredients have come pretty far to get here. But I do know that I can take steps toward lessening my impact on the Earth. All Mothers deserve a break, especially the only one we all share!
Article and Photos by Sherry (Mat is on a kayaking adventure and will be back next week!)
Inspired by the recent rainy days we were suddenly jolted out of our ‘summer last’s forever’ mentality. We love fall and winter, the cozy rainy days, tucked in with a good book and a cup of tea by the fire. The one thing we do miss in the winter is the FRESH farm food. Luckily we do have certain local produce that grows all year like beets and kale, but what about our basil and tomatoes that we have become addicted to! We decided to see what we could preserve for winter days. So with our food processor and our dehydrator on hand we ventured to see what we could do. Our latest obsession has been with pesto. Love it, on crackers, on pasta, on sandwiches, pretty much on anything that isn’t desert….. pesto on Vanilla ice cream?! Flipping through the “Summer Delights” herb cook book by Noel Richardson, I saw that we can make pesto and freeze it. Soooo excited! Starting with 5 bags of basil from SunWing Farms, only $2.50 each, then fresh local garlic from Oldfield orchard and a mixture of sunflower seeds (we didn’t have pine nuts on hand), and olive oil.
Pesto Sauce
2 cups (500ml) firmly packed basil leaves
2-4 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
1/2 cup olive or veg oil
3 tbs pine nuts ( substitutions: sunflower seeds or walnuts)
1 Cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
Put basil and garlic in food processor or blender. Pour in oil and process until smooth. If too thick add more oil. If you are wanting to freeze now would be the time, placing the pesto in your containers and covering with oil. After thawing you want to add the pine nuts and Parmesan before serving. We chose to add the sunflower seeds at freeze time but no cheese. If you choose not to freeze it will last in the fridge for a few weeks.
While blending all the ingredients in our food processor, the beautiful fresh green scent of summer filled the air! We had some small canning jars that a friend so kindly gave us, thanks Sean. We filled them up (keeping in mind freeze expansion), covered with olive oil then popped them in the freezer! It was that simple! GOTTA LOVE SIMPLE!!
So knowing how much we love fresh tomatoes and also sun-dried tomatoes we took this equation to the logical next step. LETS DEHYDRATE!! Down to SunWing Farms we go (again!), and pick up a flat of ‘on the vine’ beauties ripe and ready for the mission at hand, for only $15. We broke the seal on our handy new V’slicer to create a mountain of consistently sliced tomato discs ready for the racks. In they go into the mighty Excalibur, aptly named after the fabled sword of Avalon. Now for all those who aren’t familiar, dehydrating is a wonderful connection between the worlds of cooked and raw foods. It is a method of preservation that when done under 115 degrees Fahrenheit helps retain living food enzymes and nutrients. This process removes enough moisture to prevent bacteria, yeast and mold. So we put our tommies on the racks, set the beast to 105 and let her run. The time allotted in our dehydrating book was 12hrs but we found they needed a couple extra hours to reach what we thought to be dry enough, which was when they no longer had the smear factor .
The drying process can also be done in the oven. The directions are found at www.seasonalchef.com/tomdehyd.htm
So as fortune would have it Sherry’s cousin Michelle dropped off some of her famous homemade pasta. What perfect timing! You haven’t had pasta until you’ve had FRESH HOMEMADE PASTA!! (Made to order, angel hair, fettuccine and ravioli. If interested send us your email and we will get you connected!) The combination of fresh pasta, sundried tomatoes and pesto, probably one of the best combos out there! By also adding a little bit of our ‘Michell Brothers Farm’ Kale from the peninsula and ‘Soya Nova’ Westcoast Smoked Tofu from Saltspring Island we were excited about our fresh local healthy creation!
Gotta run, it’s getting cold! See you next week ;)
Article written by Mat and Sherry, Photo’s by Sherry
We recently moved into a new house and found ourselves amongst a plethora of Plums and Blackberries. We decided to start ”Local Adventures” in our own backyard. Never having much of a yard or a garden, we were happy take on the challenge and see what we could create with our new found treasure. Mat’s love affair with my oatmeal pancakes made the decision quickly for us. Mmmmmm……. comfort food!
Now what to do with our mountain of plums?? We decided to create a reduction with our plums by boiling them down and substituting them into one of our favorite new recipes. This is a whipping cream alternative from a local raw food chef Elissa James in her new E-Book “Uncomplicated Raw”. http://uncomplicatedraw.com/
1 Cup Cashews, soaked
1/4 Cup + 2Tbsp Water *
2 Tbsp Agave Nectar
1 Vanilla bean, Seeded
Place in blender on High till smooth. Store in fridge for 2 hours before serving, stored in a sealed container.
* We substituted our plum reduction instead of water by twice as much, and at the end added some water to our desired consistency
This is a super yummy recipe!
With added blackberries to our favorite pancake recipe, topped with Vanilla Plum Cream Sauce and pure Canadian maple syrup, it was a perfect breakfast for dinner!!
Article written by Mat and Sherry, Photos by Sherry.
