Green Eats

Long-time Slow Foods activist and author Sherri Brooks Vinton is coming to the Triangle to promote her new book “Put ‘em Up!: A Comprehensive Home Canning Guide for the Creative Cook”. The more than 150 recipes range from staples like Bread and Butter Pickles and Apple Sauce to more unique offerings like Strawberry Vodka and Cherry Preserves with Black Pepper. Stretch summer’s bounty and enjoy great local food all year long with this insightful guide!

You can meet Sherri and learn more about canning during the following events:

Tuesday, September 7
7-8pm
Flyleaf Books

Put ‘em Up! Canning Demonstration @ Fosters Market (next to Flyleaf)
750 Martin Luther King Junior Boulevard
Chapel Hill, NC 27514-5700

Wednesday, September 8
6-8pm
A Southern Season
Put ‘em Up! Canning and preserving class. Registration required.
University Mall 201 S. Estes Drive Chapel Hill, NC 27514
Visit A Southern Season for details.

For more about Sherri and a list of current appearances visit www.sherribrooksvinton.com.

(Thanks to the folks at Slow Food Triangle for the heads up!)

If you haven’t been to one of Carolina Farm Stewardship Association’s wildly popular farm tours, here is your chance! Check out this press release from CFSA’s Amy Armbruster for more details:

The skinny on the Tour:
The 5th Annual Eastern Triangle Farm Tour
Sat. & Sun. Sept 18 & 19, 1 to 5 PM.
http://www.carolinafarmstewards.org/etft2010.shtml

This year we have a record twenty-four sites on the tour, including eight
new farms!

We will be showcasing ten farms with sustainable and humane livestock
operations, getting the word out about healthy, local meat options. Several
are Animal Welfare Approved and all have beautiful animals!

We will have mushrooms again (Spain Farm) and honeybees for the first time
(Betsey’s Bee Farm.)

On the urban scene, we are happy to welcome an urban mini-farm in Durham
(Two Ton Farm sponsored by Bountiful Backyards) and the farm of the Inter
Faith Food Shuttle in Raleigh. These farms, along with the SEEDS Garden in
Durham, highlight how to grow a lot on small acreage in the city and how
youth can be engaged in the movement.

Another newcomer to the tour this year is Durham County’s newest goat dairy;
located in Bahama, Prodigal Farm has 65 goats and a brand new milking parlor
and cheesemaking building. Very cool.

And, of course, the tour includes a strong collection of vegetable, flower
and fruit producers, where foodies and growers can learn about organic and
sustainable horticulture practices.

The tour brochure, an interactive Google map of all the farms and ticket
information are available at our website.
http://www.carolinafarmstewards.org/etft2010.shtml.

Buttons are $25 per carload in advance and $30 the day of the tour.
Single farms are $10 per carload.

Make your way down to the South Estes Farmers Market on Saturday, July 17th, from 8-12, for the 3rd Annual Tomato Festival. There will be tomato tastings, demonstrations, and a workshop for kids where they can learn how to build a solar pizza oven!

South Estes Farmers Market is located at 201 S. Estes Drive at University Mall in Chapel Hill, across the parking lot from A Southern Season. Market hours are Saturdays from 8-12 and Tuesdays from 3-6.  For more information, or to volunteer, e-mail farmersoforange@gmail.com.

Last week I made my way to Cohen Farm in Silk Hope, NC to attend a pasture walk with renowned farmer and sustainable agriculture rock star Joel Salatin. I’d never been to a pasture walk, so I wasn’t sure what to expect; in the end it was just as it sounds, we walked through a pasture.

There were 50 or so folks in attendance, a mix of students, advocates, and farmers, and Salatin spent about an hour and a half answering some of the farmers’ questions on things like pasture-siting, water issues, and herd maintenance. One thing you cannot call Joel Salatin is shy – the man likes to speak! Luckily for us he is a fount of sustainable farming knowledge, and a great advocate for small farmers everywhere.

Click through for more photos from the pasture walk.

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I’ve recently been turned on to the idea of Meatless Mondays from Chapel Hill mother-daughter food bloggers Pattie and Allie and their blog Bramasole…to yearn for the sun. I did a little digging and found the official Meatless Monday website, and from this Monday forward I am planning on going meat-free for all of my Monday meals. From the Meatless Monday website:

“Meatless Monday is an international movement to help people reduce their meat consumption by 15%, in order to improve personal health and the health of the planet. We are a non-profit initiative of The Monday Campaigns, in association with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
The tradition of Meatless Mondays began in WWI, when the FDA encouraged the rationing of meat, wheat and other staples to help the war effort. The campaign was relaunched in 2003 as a public health campaign to help individuals reduce their saturated fat intake.”

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Literally and figuratively. This past Saturday three intrepid South Estes Farmers’ Market customers gathered to put their culinary skills to the test in an Iron Chef-style battle for the ultimate prize, a professional Wusthof knife set donated by Kitchenworks. I put together the event in my capacity as a member of the Friends of the Market Committee and the Community Representative on the Board of Directors, with LOTS of help from SEFM Market Manager Andrea Wood. I’ve done lots of events in my life, but this was my first time doing a cooking competition and needless to say I was a little stressed! Luckily everything worked out wonderfully, and I’m happy to say that SEFM customer Jennie Heck wowed the judges and walked away with the grand prize! Click through for the photos and a link to the winning recipe.

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Renowned farmer and sustainable agriculture advocate Joel Salatin (of Food, Inc. and The Omnivore’s Dilemma fame) will be giving a seminar at Central Carolina Community College in Pittsboro on June 30th. The seminar, entitled “Local Food to the Rescue”, will be hosted by CCCC’s Sustainable Agriculture and Natural Chef programs along with the NC Tobacco Trust Fund and the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association. This free event will begin with a tour of the CCCC student farm at 5:30pm and refreshments at 6:30pm (the farm has a brick pizza oven!); Salatin’s seminar will begin at 7pm. I plan on being there to support my program and to meet Joel Salatin, and I hope that you will be able to join me!

Central Carolina Community College is located at 764 West Street in Pittsboro, about a mile west of the traffic circle.

Hat tip to Carrie & David of Crumb for the heads up, via the Western Wake Farmers’ Market website.

Head on down to Pittsboro this upcoming Sunday, June 13th, from 5-7pm for ChathamArt’s 5th Annual Potluck in the Pasture at the student farm on the campus of Central Carolina Community College. Great art, delicious food, and all kinds of fun can be had for only $8 (only $5 if you buy in advance online). Please visit the ChathamArts website for more information and to purchase tickets.

I know this isn’t food or ag related, but its important to support you local community in all ventures, so please check out this press release from fellow eater Johanna Kramer, aka @durhamfoodie on Twitter.

Neuse River Golden Retriever Rescue is coordinating it’s first ever Fur-Raiser and Fun-d-Raiser. The idea is to bring the community together to help raise money for NRGRR and collect fur to send to help with the Gulf oil spill.

Tyler’s Taproom of Durham has sponsored the Pavilion at Durham Central Park for NRGRR’s use for the event. “We are so grateful for Tyler’s sponsorship”, says Johanna Kramer, Event Coordinator and Foster Volunteer. “This now provides us with a covered venue and allows us to raise fur and funds, rain or shine.”

Any and all clean hair is welcome. NRGRR will have collection boxes on-site and groomers to comb out and collect dog fur.

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For more information visit the Farm to Fork website.