Community Garden Planning in Burnaby Takes Root

On Saturday, February 25, Burnaby Food First hosted a Community Garden Planning workshop at Burnaby Village Museum. The idea was to get people thinking about available public land that might be suitable for community gardens. The intention was to plant the seeds of an idea...

Workshop facilitator Grant Rice soon discovered that those seeds had already been planted: many of the Burnaby community members who showed up had already picked out a potential garden site. They had come to find out how to make their gardens a reality.

Presentations by guests Jason Hsieh and Michael Denhamer helped participants look more specifically at opportunities, barriers and ways forward for the development of their imagined community gardens.



Hsieh spoke about his experience with the City of Vancouver, and walked participants through different guidelines and municipal policies that frame the process of establishing a community garden in Vancouver.



Denhamer, who works with Can You Dig It, explained the support that his organization can offer community garden groups in creating sustainable projects that become community assets. Can You Dig It has already helped communities create thriving gardens through 3-year commitments that aid in: navigating application processes and grant applications, locating infrastructure (such as water sources), licensing and insuring the garden, and helping new community gardeners establish governance.

This process was discussed at length in the small groups that formed following the presentations. Grant Rice, events and conference coordinator for Burnaby Food First, passed around maps of Burnaby and encouraged people to identify sites with the potential to become garden spaces. Working with Burnaby's website and maps, he helped participants examine the zoning and context of the sites.

Community gardens are more than communal green spaces. As Denhamer remarked, "community gardens grow food and cultivate community." Many of those who came would like to meet further to discuss future projects and next steps. Rev Kunz, who manages the Gathering Burnaby Gardeners Facebook group hopes that interested community members will get in touch through her page.

The afternoon was an exciting opportunity for Burnaby Food First to meet with local citizens who are spearheading gardening projects in their neighbourhoods. We hope this will become the next step of a greener Burnaby that provides greater food security within our municipality.





Many thanks to the United Way Lower Mainland for their continued support of Burnaby Food First initiatives, and to Burnaby Village Museum for the use of their facilities for our community workshop last weekend.

March 4 - Join Burnaby Food First at the Rally to Reduce Poverty in BC

This Saturday, come meet us @ noon at Library Square (350 W. Georgia) and raise your voice: call out for a strategy to end poverty in the province.

What does poverty mean to Burnaby Food First?

• Students and employees cannot afford to eat 3 times a day


• Invisible hunger: malnutrition results from a lack of affordable nutritious food


• Families cannot afford to eat a variety of foods


• People on fixed incomes may not be able to fit nutritious meals into their budget


• More and more people do not have access to land, & cannot grow food to supplement their diet


• Local farmers struggle to put food on our table

 

Raise your voice for empty stomachs! Come find Burnaby Food First at the rally:

Catering prize for Manitoba Eco-Network's Reel Green Gala on CBC's Weekend Morning Show

This morning I presented the following recipes for CBC's Weekend Morning Show with interim host, Nadia Kidwai.  These are full of flavour but I've also made them very easy to prepare. 

On March 16th, Manitoba Eco-Network will be hosting our annual fundraising event, The Reel Green Gala.  Sponsors include Assiniboine Credit Union, Tire Stewardship Manitoba, Stantec, and other amazing supporters such as VIARail, and local producers.  I'm offering catering for four, supported by Almost Urban Vegetables, for the chicken, Vita Health for many other ingredients, and I'll prepare Moroccan food.

Tickets are available at www.reelgreen.brownpapertickets.com.

Moroccan Chicken with Prunes and Almonds

 1 chicken � (3 1/2 lbs)
Coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 cup prunes
1-2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 large yellow onions, halved and thinly sliced lengthwise
1 tsp ground turmeric
1 tsp ground ginger
1 cup whole blanched almonds
vegetable oil for frying

Rub all the chicken pieces with salt, pepper and cumin. Let stand for one hour.

Soak prunes if very dry.

Place onions in a wide shallow casserole with turmeric, ginger, cinnamon, salt and pepper to taste, 1/4 cup water, cover and steam for 15 minutes.

Brown the almonds in 4-5 tbs oil in a large skillet and drain on paper towels. Brown the chicken evenly on all sides in the oil and transfer to the steamed onions. Cover with parchment paper and cook in tajine on the lowest heat for about 1 1/4 hours.

Discard the parchment paper. Add the prunes and bring to a gentle boil. Remove from the heat. Serve with almonds sprinkled on top.

Enjoy!

Beet Salad I and II

1 lb Beets
1 tb Sugar
1 Lemon; juice of
1 tb Olive oil
1 lg Pinch of cinnamon
1 tb Chopped parsley
Salt; to taste

Wash beets well, being careful not to break their skins. Cut off the
tops, leaving a stalk of about 1 1/2". Boil in a 3 quart saucepan
until tender, covered. Allow the water to cool, then slip off the
skins, trim off the tops, and cut into bite-sized pieces.

Mix the remaining ingredients and pour over the beets. Let marinate
for 1 hour before serving.

Beet Salad II: Prepare as described above, but add 1 tsp. orange
flower water, 1/8 tsp. cumin, a pinch of paprika, and a little water
to the sauce.

Buddha Bowls

I'm still not exactly sure what a Buddha Bowl is.  I saw this article on Buzzfeed and became intrigued.  I think they are supposed to be hearty bowls full of raw or roasted veggies and healthy grains that make our bellies so full we end up looking like little buddhas.  Does that sound right?  While I'm not sure I want to look pregnant when I'm not, I am on board with hearty and delicious bowls of goodness, aren't you?  So I made my own with brown wild rice, roasted kale, broccolini and sweet potato, crunchy seasoned garbanzo beans and avocado.  While a lot of these bowls have a tahini-based sauce, for this I simply drizzled some good olive oil and sriracha on top of the finished dish and it, was, sublime.      

To get a nice crunch on the garbanzo beans, it helps to remove there outer skin.  This is tedious, I won't lie.  I'm weird, however, and enjoyed it... but I also enjoy pulling every single last hair out of a hairbrush.  I'd even enjoy it if it was your hairbrush.  Yeah, I'm weird AND disgusting.  Anyway, it helps to rinse the chickpeas (garbanzos, is their a difference?) under water while removing the outer layer with your fingers and discarding in the sink.  Trust me, make a double batch of these for snacking... they are delicious and much healthier than playing with stranger's hairbrushes. 

Buddha Bowls 

Makes 2 bowls

Printable Recipe

1 bunch kale (I used black kale), stems removed and chopped

2 cups diced sweet potato

1 bunch broccolini, stems removed

Extra virgin olive oil

Salt and pepper

1 can garbanzo beans, drained, rinsed and outer skins removed

1/2 tsp cumin

1/2 tsp chili powder

1/4 tsp salt

1 clove garlic, minced

1 Tbsp vegetable oil

2 cups cooked wild rice or brown rice

1 avocado, halved and sliced

Olive oil and hot sauce for drizzling (optional)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  On a large rimmed baking sheet, place sweet potatoes, kale and broccolini.  Drizzle everything with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Roast in oven for 20 minutes, flipping veggies halfway through.  Remove, cover with foil and set aside.  In the meantime, place garbanzo beans in a bowl and add cumin, chili powder, salt and minced garlic.  Toss to coat.  In a skillet, heat vegetable oil over medium heat.  Add beans and saut� for 10-15 minutes, stirring every couple of minutes, until beans have a nice crunch.  To assemble bowls, add rice first, then roasted veggies, beans and avocado.  Sprinkle with olive oil, hot sauce and season to taste with salt and pepper.  

Nutella Chocolate Chip Cookies

After posting these Lobster Toasts the other day, someone wrote on my Instagram that they could be named Manchester By The Sea Lobster Toasts.  Get it?  Oscars?  You get it!  THEN, I flashed these bad boy cookies in an Insta story and someone wrote...wait for it...that they could be Nutella-la Land Chocolate Chip Cookies.  BOOM.  Man, I wish I could take credit for that.  I also wish I could take credit for these cookies, but I can't.  You can find the recipe HERE.  However, I can take credit for making them, right?!  And you can too!  If your children think Nutella is a food group like mine do, then you should most definitely make these.  Because then you can take credit for being a superhero.

Lobster Toasts with Avocado

Before I had kids, I was Academy Awards-obsessed.  It was like a holiday in my world.  I saw every Oscar nominated film prior to the big day (and usually by myself because I REFUSE to share popcorn - plus I can't handle it if someone doesn't enjoy a movie that I do).  My friends and I always had an Oscar viewing party that obviously began when the red carpet did so we could discuss fashion.  I could easily stay up to watch the entire, 11-hour-long telecast, because I had energy and slept through the night.  Now??  Now I've seen Trolls 150 times.  The last movies I saw in the theater were Rogue One and Zootopia (had to really rack my brain to come up with that one).  I haven't even heard of some of the Oscar-nominated films, nor do I know the actors in them (when I once knew their spouses and kid's names).  Do I still watch the show?  Yes.  As much as my exhausted self can handle (and I have to find a TV far, far away from my husband to catch any red carpet action).  

However, for those of you who love it, and still view it as a holiday, I'm going to offer you some Oscar-worthy snacks this week for your viewing party.  Like these elegant and delicious Lobster Toasts with Avocado.  If you buy pre-cooked lobster (which I found at Whole Foods) then these will come together in minutes, and they will also be eaten in minutes.  And the winner is... FOOD!  

Recipe HERE.

Lasagna Bolognese

 I've been gone for a long time.  What have I been up to?  We went to California, my husband won a golf tournament...

Also I made lasagna!   

You can find the recipe HERE.  Now listen up, people, I DID NOT MAKE MY OWN LASAGNA NOODLES like the recipe calls for.  I bought the kind in a box, and boiled them for 4 minutes and then rinsed them under cold water.  I baked the lasagna for about 40 minutes (the first 20 lightly covered with foil).  Maybe I'll make my own noodles the next time I make this, OR, in...oh...16 years when I'm an empty nester and actually have time.  Probably the latter, because did you know kids totally and utterly consume your life?  At least they're cute and worth it.  Do you know what else is worth consuming?  (That makes it sound like I eat my kids.)  THIS LASAGNA.  Yum.  

Check back next week for some Oscar-worthy appetizers!  Also, tune into Kathie Lee and Hoda on Tuesday for some yummy casserole recipes :)