Guest Blogger

We have a guest blogger here this week for the Introduction to Farming workshop. Heather from farmgirlgourmet.com will be blogging about what we are doing each day here at Quillisascut  as well as stories about the farms we visit. Let’s read what Heather has to say.

Several weeks ago I received an email from Lora Lea of Quillisascut Farm asking me if I’d be interested in coming to her Intro to Farming workshop and being a guest blogger. I had been to Lora Lea & Rick’s farm back in February during their Chef Retreat, an annual gathering of local Chefs that happens the weekend after Valentine’s Day, and did not hesitate to send back my response that I’d love to attend. read more

Dirty Love

Dirt a Love story

Yesterday while going for a walk I caught a whiff of something floral and sweet, a smell different then the damp rot of decay that lingers when the snow melts. This was an illusive scent, not lingering long enough to identify. Could it have been a soil bacterium called Mycobacterium Vaccae? A bacterium that releases serotonin in our brains. Maybe gardening is addicting.
I know that momentary whiff gave me a little lift. It was a promise that spring is here. Here is a wiki link where you can read about Mycobacterium Vaccae http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycobacterium_vaccae

More Love

A new episode of love from Lisa Simpson

How often do you know the exact moment your life changes? There’s obvious milestones like getting a driver’s license or getting married, but often the less noticeable pivot points aren’t seen until you look back at them.

On my first night at Quillasascut, I fed the chickens. The next morning I went with Rick to pick out the three slowest and most trusting. We ate them for dinner.

Quillasascut isn’t a monument that my life circles around, it is instead a sort of rumble strip that reminds me to pay attention to the road ahead. It’s where I learned a lot of hippie talk. GMO, food chain, local, seasonal, sustainable.

I learned the real trick of a great chef- recipes really aren’t necessary, technique and ingredients trump all. Thanks Kären! (I’ve given up trying to get the umlauts to appear, but she deserves them). Wood burning ovens kick ass. Continue reading “More Love”

Spring

Okay, it still seems more winter like then spring, especially in the garden. That is why we preserve our parsnips right in the ground where they were growing last summer. Then in March or April, when we are craving something other then cabbage and winter squash there are these sweet yet musky treats. I like them cut like french fries, lightly oiled and salted and roasted in the oven letting some of the juicy sugars caramelize. My web guru told me about trying sublime vanilla parsnips, they sound delicious, pan fried with plenty of butter and finished with vanilla infused rum.

Does anyone have a favorite way to prepare parsnips? Continue reading “Spring”

Letter from Quillisascut

To kick this off I am sharing this Letter to Quillisascut from Chef Greg Atkinson well known for his writing about food in the Pacific Northwest.

A Letter From Quillisascut
Wednesday, 24 August 2011
Recently I attended a Food Writer’s retreat at Quillisascut Farm School in eastern Washington. Gary Paul Nabhan was the facilitator, and the focus was on writing  from the perspective of promoting a healthier food culture.

For four days, we ate together, cooked together, milked goats, made cheese, harvested produce from the garden and berries from the wild. With few exceptions, everything we ate was produced right there on the farm. We talked, we gathered around the table, drank wine and shared stories. Every day we had a writing assignment, and every night, as the sun went down and the stars came out, we we shared what we had written. Continue reading “Letter from Quillisascut”