Jodie: First Blog Post

My section of this blog will focus on our food and the food systems we are engaging with on the World Hunger Relief Farm. We are given, as part of Wes’ internship, food for this year. It will be a combination of the staples purchased for us as well as bounty from the farm. Our staples consist of the following: white/brown sugar, white/whole wheat flour, honey, red/green lentils, white/brown rice, tortillas, bread, lemon juice, peanut butter, jam, butter, yeast, oats, pasta, black eyed beans, red beans, couscous, oil, spices, pearl barley, baking powder/soda, raisins, prunes, vanilla and cocoa.

The regular food items that come from the farm are: goat’s milk, eggs, animal organs, onions, garlic and any in season fruits or vegetables.

In season this week are: green peppers, egg plants, okra and watermelons.

We are trying to live off the staples and the fruits and veggies in season so we are choosing to limit our grocery to $10.00 a week.

As I spent time dreaming of the farm and wondering how the food systems would work, I imagined that we could eat as much as the farm produced. I was also in the middle of reading Barbara Kingsolvers “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle” (which I highly recommend if you love food, gardening or have interest in the current US and Canadian food systems). The operational farm we find ourselves living on works quite differently. All our best produce gets sold to the paying customers. The interns and people living on the farm get the small or irregular produce. Which taste equally as good as the perfect ones but might take a bit more effort to prepare.

I was delighted to find a pomegranate tree just outside our suite. I asked around and no one was interested in its fruit. Attempt number one of picking a pomegranate, I realized fire ants love the fruit just as much as I do. I was wearing flip flops and of course the best fruits are a bit out of reach. I picked the best looking one and came out of the bush with approximately 50 ants biting my ankles. Once I attended to the ants, I looked at what I thought was the perfect fruit only to discover I was not the first to discover this juicy little number. Yes, sadly the ants had beat me to this one too! Attempt number two of picking the pomegranates was much more successful. I wore rubber boots and came prepared with a large container to carry my fruit back to my kitchen. I picked a dozen and started using my finger nails to pry back the tough outer shell. This was clearly going to take me all day! Then I got the bright idea of using a knife to cut them in two and then began to extract the juice-covered seeds. Once all the fruit was in my pot I began boiling the kajeepers out of it. I ended up with 5 cups of juice.

I tried a Pomegranate lentil soup for supper with homemade French bread and watermelons sliced for dessert. Quite yummy if I do say so myself!

Here is the recipe for the soup:
¾ cups lentils (I used green)
2 TB butter
1 medium onion
2 cloves garlic
5 cups water
1 cup rice (I used brown)
1 tsp tumeric
salt & pepper to taste
½ cup basil
3 cups pomegranate juice

1. Rinse lentils
2. Sauté onions & garlic in butter
3. Add water, lentils, rice, tumeric, salt and pepper and simmer for 45 mins
4. Add pomegranate juice and basil and simmer for final 15 minutes