Bees on the Roof

bees-at-tru

Chef instructor Ron Rosnetreter has found a new passion in the past couple of years — his bees on the roof. This fundraising dinner will be in support of the on-going longevity of his bees. The dress code will be semi formal and you are encouraged to dress in black and yellow.

GUEST POST by David Masurat

I wanted to let you know about a fundraising dinner that Culinary Arts, in collaboration with local beekeepers, is putting on for March 1, 2013. We are doing this to raise funds for the upkeep of the Bees at Thompson Rivers University and hopefully some bursaries. The menu will be highlighting the use of honey in the dishes and also using local foods. It sounds fabulous! The ticket price will be $50.00 and you will receive a four course meal. If you can join us we?d love to have you. The website for ordering tickets is:
Bees on The Roof Fundraiser.

Here is the Menu:

Walnut and Honey Soup

Sablefish Glazed with Honey and Soy
Textures of heirloom carrots

Dominion Creek Ranch Lamb
Cooked three ways and served with honey and mustard scented jus

Pre-Dessert
Earl grey and TRU honey sorbet with hazelnut cr?me fraiche

The Land of Milk and Honey
Rice pudding scented with local honey and milk with spelt mousse

David Masurat is President of the Kamloops Beekeepers. “Kamloops Beekeepers have many years of experience in all aspects of honey production. They share this knowledge through meetings on the 3rd Wednesday of every second month at 7:00pm at Thompson Rivers University and at field days throughout the year.”

What’s a Starving Student to do About Food?

sausage-omelette

The first step is to learn how to cook. The second step is to find local sources of quality foods. Give yourself time to learn home processing skills. Last year we learned how to make sausage with the help of an experienced neighbor. Learning new skills is a challenge, but the rewards are great!

Recently, I was contacted by Mimi Nakamura, a fourth year journalism student at Thompson Rivers University. She was working on a story in her journalism class regarding local foods in Kamloops. After the interview, I started wondering if other people on a budget might find the information useful. Here is our interview.

1. How did you decide to start the website eatkamloops.org?
I started the eakamloops.org website because I was new to Kamloops and I was finding it difficult to find local food. I wondered if other newcomers were having the same problem. I was a member of the Weston A Price Foundation and decided I wanted to do more for my community so I became a WAPF Chapter Leader. Part of my responsibilities is to maintain a list of local food producers. (Local food producers can be found here.) Doing a website is beyond what the WAPF requires but I thought it would be easier for people to get information about local food this way.

2. Do you personally buy local food? If so, what do you usually get?
My family gets most of our fresh produce and meat locally. We look for organic, un-sprayed and/or pasture-based food. We tend to do large bulk purchases once or twice a year for dried goods and “exotic” foods. When we buy food from farmers we don’t know, we buy certified organic. We buy whole foods and avoid processed foods:
Winter Storage I
Winter Storage II
Presently, we produce a number of products for our own personal use: raw dairy, pastured eggs, pastured fowl, and some produce. We use organic grains, legumes and un-sprayed hay. We give the animals whole food supplements such as kelp, unrefined sea salt, oyster shells, rock minerals, etc.

3. What is the importance of consuming local food?
Local food is important but it is just as important how the food is grown. Ideally, buy local food that is grown using organic principles and/or pasture-based. What’s the good of “local” food that is loaded with herbicides and pesticides filling the local environment with poison? There is a new good reason to buy certified organic foods. Certified organic foods do not allow GMOs. There is mounting evidence that GMO crops are contaminating non-GMO crops, including organically grown crops. No one really knows what will happen to our ecosystem due to these changes in the basic genetic structure of our food crops. (This is a scary thought. These genetic changes are permanent and cannot be stopped.)

4. What is the challenge that local farmers are facing right now?
The greatest barrier for small farmers and ranchers is government regulators with their one-size-fits-all-regulations. We will not have a local food system if those guys get their way. Many of the regulations now needed in the Industrial Food System were caused by the practices of the Industrial Food System itself. I would like to see consumers being able to buy directly from the farmer or rancher without onerous government regulations. Read some of my posts on raw milk. Just remember, this issue has nothing to do with ?safety? and everything to do with ?control?. I talk about this sad state of affairs in Speak Softly and Carry a Big Stick.

5. Do you have any suggestions for university students to buy local food but stay on their grocery budget? (Any suggestions for cheap but healthy local food diet?)
Everyone’s situation is different but I would suggest a student read 25 Steps to Nourishing Traditional Foods and Where to Start: Limited Time and Budget. The student should try to work on one new step every two weeks. Some steps are easy, others are costly, and some require planning. Many of these steps will save money in the short and long term. Having a stable household would be ideal but for many students this would be difficult. Before looking for “cheap” food, a student should get reacquainted with their kitchen and learn how to cook real food. Without the skills to cook whole foods, the food will go to waste which would be costly for the student. After the student masters cooking with whole ingredients, the student should stop eating processed foods out of the Industrial Food System. The Industrial Food System specializes in “cheap” convenience foods but the student will pay again and again with their health. Cheap food isn’t very cheap when a student is always sick and weak.

At the same time, my family eats extremely well, cheaply. We produce many expensive foods ourselves by putting in our own labor. We are very careful about how we feed and treat our animals so the food we produce is of the highest quality. Foods we do not produce ourselves, we get in bulk from quality sources. We eat our meals together at home and we almost never eat out. When we are traveling we bring our own food.

I have another suggestion for the starving students looking for good, cheap food. I just found a new website by Arabella Forge. She is the WAPF Melbourne Chapter Leader and has just written a new book called Frugavore. Unfortunately, her book is not available in North America yet, but her website is very helpful. Take the Frugavore Challenge!
Frugavore introduces modern readers to the fundamentals of peasant cuisine, in which nothing is wasted, every part of the animal eaten, abundance from the garden preserved in traditional ways, and delicious meals prepared from scratch with fresh, local ingredients.
Thumbs Up Book Reviews by Sally Fallon

Updated December 9, 2010: Wendell Berry has been writing passionately about local food and farming issues for over forty years. For more information please read Wrong Turn and Are you a producer or a consumer?

Updated Feburary 13, 2011: I got out of school during in the late 1980s during a really bad recession. It was impossible to find work and it was one of the reasons I ended up starting my own business. During those early years I read a book that changed the way I looked at money. The book is called Your Money or Your Life by Joe Dominguez and Vicke Robin. I would highly recommend this book for any young person getting out on their own and trying to get control of their finances. I also got a chance to read Frugavore. It’s a fun book with great money saving recipes.

Learning Home Cooking

omelette-cabbage

Food doesn't have to be complicated to be good. If you are new to cooking, start with breakfast. Eggs are a superfood. A simple omelette with sauted mushrooms and onions can be wonderful. Garnish with cilantro for a fresh taste. Have a salad in summer or cabbage in winter. Some people like eating their cabbage with kelp.

Home cooking is fast becoming a lost art. I have had a number of requests for good starter cookbooks. I would recommend:

Nourishing Traditions: The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats by Sally Fallon
Recipes and information about nourishing traditional food preparation methods.

Full Moon Feast: Food and the Hunger for Connection by Jessica Prentice
“Moon by moon” seasonal cookbook based on seasonal local foods.

The Joy of Cooking by Irma Rombauer
This is a reprint of the original 1931 edition or get any copy between 1932 and 1979. Later editions start to go low fat and do not have much information about food storage and cuts of meat. I like the 1930s and 1940s editions best.

On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen by Harold McGee
Not a cookbook but full of information about the science of food and cooking.

Thompson Rivers University has a Culinary Arts Program and Retail Meats Processing Program. If you are looking for inspiration, The Culinary Arts Program runs a Cafeteria and Bistro. The Accodales Dining Room is run by Chef instructor Ron Rosentreter, and has won awards for their fine foods.

For online videos and courses, you might want to have a look at Rouxbe Online Cooking School. There are free videos that explain basic cooking techniques. You can get a membership and take courses. The website is supported by Northwest Culinary Academy of Vancouver.

omelette-chard

Omelettes are so flexible and can be eaten for breakfast, lunch or dinner. Don't worry if the omelette doesn't come out perfectly. It will taste wonderful even if it is messy.

Updated November 23, 2009: I have just found a link to an online library of classic American cookbooks from the late 18th to early 20th century. Feeding America is a good source for old-style recipes.

Updated June 22, 2010: We have been having a discussion about favorite cookbooks on the Weston A Price Leader’s Board. Two suggestions caught my attention. Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child was recommended by Suzanne Waldron of the WAPF Memphis Chapter. Here is a link to The Self-Sufficient Homestead: Surviving Civilization on the Homestead which has audio presentations and links to some early American cookbooks.

AgriCULTURE Week – April 27 to May 3, 2009

I received an email from One Hill Productions. One Hill Productions constructed a wonderful directory of services for Kamloops called Access Kamloops. If you want to know what is happening in Kamloops bookmark these pages.

The Kamloops Urban Hen Movement is having a week long event! It’s got movies, lectures and workshops. Go to Omelettes for Everyone for the schedule.

I want to make a mention about all the local activists that are right now out there fighting for our collective freedom. I find my heart is filled with renewed hope for my society when I think of these young, enthusiastic people working towards making all of our lives a little freer. Here are links to just a few of our local heroines working towards a better world:
One Hill Productions run by Skylark Disraeti, a local writer, editor and web designer. She has done so much work for social justice in Kamloops it’s too much to list here.
Kamloops Urban Hen Movement run by Bonnie Klohn, a student at Thompson Rivers University. Along with her full time studies she works at Campus Climate Network and is working towards changing bylaws to allow chickens in the City of Kamloops.
Urban Hens for Kamloops run by Sarah Harder, a local landscape designer and chicken lover. Kamloops Urban Homestead run by Karin Wilds who is working towards her own food independence and is challenging other Kamloops residents to do the same.

We are very fortunate to have big hearted people in our community. So lets get out there and change the world together!

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
Margaret Mead