The rocky hills of Trondheim, Norway were under a foot of fresh snow, and I found myself on a biodynamic veg farm filming with the Cook It Raw Norway team. I’d filmed a lot of veg farms, but none this picturesque, and certainly never in winter. Pretty tough to find something interesting to talk about on a veg farm in … Read More
Lactuca Urban Farm Spring Update
Sadly, our really early spring shoot got kiboshed by the site location – the one we’ve been working on in Inglewood all winter – getting tied up in politics. We had a cool shoot with snow around, cold frames doing their spring thing, and alas, it wasn’t in the cards to become our first vid of 2013. The story with … Read More
1867 – Joy Road
On a recent [amazing] trip down to the Slow Food Canada national meeting, I happened to end up in a restaurant for dinner in Penticton, Cam and Dana happened to be there as well, and the restauranteur happened to introduce us. They’d just been back from foraging, and had a van full of watercress and nettles destined for the dinner … Read More
Lactuca – New Site, So Close
I’m getting quite a few questions about the prospective new Lactuca Urban Farm site, so figured I’d share where things are at. The quick answer: it’s in Inglewood and we’re in the process of negotiating the lease. Although nothing’s a done deal, we’re very near the end of the process. Perhaps I need to back up a bit. Travis and … Read More
Episode 58 – Veg Glean
This one was a year in the works. Way back when, while shooting Episode 23 at Riverbend Gardens, I was enlightened to the situation that is common at vegetable farms in the fall: harvests fill up storage capacity, labour is relieved for the season, and anything left in the ground becomes compost-in-place. Sensible, really. Wouldn’t make sense to try to … Read More
Episode 51 – Cold Frame Build
I built my first cold frame back in March of 2011. It has undoubtedly changed the way I grow food. I’m now up to 8 frames under lids, with another 6 soon to be built for the 2013 season – the majority for market. This vid is simply a look at how we’re building them now, after much homework in … Read More
Late September Salad Greens
I find I’ve been under-representing how much I’ve dived head first into salad greens production for market with Travis from LACTUCA. It’s been a weekly harvest and seeding gig for the past few months, and I’ve learned loads, about zero of which I’ve documented here. Can’t win them all I guess. I blame spending most every waking hour in the … Read More
Slugs
This is not a complaint. Every time I feel like I want to complain about this year’s inundation of slugs, I consider what my yard was like before when it was an expanse of lawn, with zero life in or near it. Or I think about the west coast with their huge slugs the size of your index finger – … Read More
August Salad, week 1
Thursday has turned into harvest day here, and has become one of my favorite mornings of the week. I get to get up early, check out what’s at its best, eat some stuff fresh from the plant, and do some creative food stuff composing salads for Lactuca Micro Farm. I’m going to try to make a point of posting about … Read More
Cold Frame Ramp-Up
Wow have I been blog absent. Not a record stint, as I’ve had a few since 2005 when I started, but this one’s up there. Sorry about that. Back to regular programming. As it turns out, me bringing my greens to market in Ep 45 has steadily evolved into a bustling little business that Travis and I are having a … Read More