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Wednesday, October 30, 2019

Devour, Wolfville, NS

We just arrived back in Toronto after spending a week in beautiful Wolfville, Nova Scotia. The occasion of the trip was Devour, the Food Film Festival, a five-day extravaganza of eighty films, plus three large dinners, prepared by chefs from Canada, the U.S., and Europe. Culinary workshops were taught by well-known chefs and there were also workshops on film-making, foraging, wine-tasting, and cheese-tasting—as well as trips to wineries and breweries.

 

My reason for writing about the festival here (aside from the hope that some of you might be inspired to attend Devour next year) is to tell you about a few of the movies that inspired me.

 

Two movies ("Dive" and "The Food Fighter") deal with the question of food waste, showcasing people who work tirelessly to inform us and to persuade (for example) large grocery chains to send their perfectly good packaged products to soup kitchens rather than to the dumpsters behind their stores. Very inspiring stories.

 

"Billion Dollar Bully" investigates the accusations that Yelp! is running a mob-like extortion scheme.

 

"The Game Changers" views plant-based eating not just as the best choice environmentally but as a way for athletes to achieve their best results. Fascinating and very persuasive.

 

Finally, "Maxima" and "Honeyland" are portraits of very strong women thriving in harrowing circumstances. Maxima lives in mountainous Peru, where her small piece of land is coveted by a giant gold-mining company. "Honeyland", set in rural Macedonia, follows the life of a woman who uses ancient traditions in the keeping of her bees.

 

All of these movies are well worth your time. "The Game Changers" is already on Netflix, so it's easy to find. I urge you to watch for the others during the next year, whether on-line or at your local theatre.

 

And do go to www.devourfest.com to learn more about the festival, which will celebrate its tenth anniversary next year.

 

 
Copyright © 2019 Ann Tudor
Musings blog: http://www.scenesfromthejourney.blogspot.com
Audible.Ca: go to https://www.audible.ca and search for Ann Tudor
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Sunday, October 20, 2019

October

Overnight,

frost turns the parsnips sweet and

brings forth the boys of October,

who endured the summer heat

for the promise of chilly

post-season

play.

 

 
Copyright © 2019 Ann Tudor
Musings blog: http://www.scenesfromthejourney.blogspot.com
Audible.Ca: go to https://www.audible.ca and search for Ann Tudor
Audible.Com: go to https://www.audible.com and search for Ann Tudor




 

Sunday, October 13, 2019

The Squashes of Fall

I haven't tasted a winter squash since last April. Between October and April we eat a lot of winter squash and by spring are ready to enjoy the lighter vegetables. All summer we dine on salads, greens, tomatoes, green beans, peas, buying endless bunches of green onions, basil, parsley.

 

 But now I find myself unable to resist, at the Junction Market, a medium-sized Hubbard squash. The Hubbard is my second favourite squash, the favourite being Kabocha for its dense, smooth, sweet bright orange flesh. The Hubbard I am drawn to for the colour of its shell—almost seafoam green, a pale blue/grey/green—and for its size. A Hubbard can be bigger than a full-sized Halloween pumpkin, and it is made even more striking by that unexpected pale blue shell.

 

Supermarkets and farmers' roadside stands alike often hack the Hubbard into more manageable chunks—the size of half a loaf of bread, say—since few people these days are ready to deal with that giant ghostly-looking winter squash.

 

The one I found at the market is the size of a large football (American football), and the tapered stem end reinforces the comparison. When I got it home I discovered that it weighs nine pounds—no wonder the shopping cart was so hard to pull.

 

It sits still in the wooden bowl where I keep apples, ripening avocados, and pears. The Hubbard dominates the bowl. Soon I'll have to deal with it.

 

I bought it earlier than I should have, just because it caught my eye and reminded me of autumn. I need to get my fill of tomatoes, peaches, and the summer pattypans before I bite the bullet and give in to the coming months of apples and winter squash.

 

So some day this week I'll whack it open, remove the seeds, and roast it, cut side down, until I can plunge a fork through the skin and into the flesh. Then I'll let it cool, peel off the pretty blue rind, and freeze the orange flesh in two-cup batches ready for soups, casseroles, patties, fritters, and pies as the weather cools. I expect to get a lot of usable squash flesh from my Hubbard.

 

If I don't find another at the market before it closes at the end of October, then I'll move on to my real favourite, the Kabocha, which is available in more and more places throughout the winter. As a last resort I'll buy a butternut, especially when it has a long neck that can so easily be sliced into rounds that I'll gently sauté in butter. I'll use the round end for soup, because butternut, though my third-place squash, does make a good soup.

 

For sure, however, I won't be putting my money down for an acorn, that stringy tasteless squash whose only attraction is the cute name and the ruffled shape.

 

 

 
Copyright © 2019 Ann Tudor
Musings blog: http://www.scenesfromthejourney.blogspot.com
Audible.Ca: go to https://www.audible.ca and search for Ann Tudor
Audible.Com: go to https://www.audible.com and search for Ann Tudor




 

Sunday, October 6, 2019

The Search That Takes a Lifetime

During the 10 years I spent making things, I was an artist wannabe, an artist manqué, an artist groupie.

 

But let's face it. With all my fibre arts I was at best a half-decent craftswoman; never an artist. I recently heard a description of an artist's little studio filled with tapestry, paints, clay, paper—all the accoutrements of different artistic modes—and all necessary so that she can address the urges of each day. I have lived like that, in a way, so surrounded by yarns and fabric that I was often overwhelmed—spoiled for choice. And then it was over. I couldn't stand the jumble and the mess. Now all the yarns and fabric are gone, except for some precious examples that reproach me for no longer knowing how to make something of them.

 

It took me a long time, didn't it?, to find who I am. I take that back. I have been many, many people through my life. The difference between then and now is that I was then always searching, always dissatisfied. Always wanting to know who I really was.

 

And here's where I am now. I know who I really am, today—but I also know that I am still continually changing and I might not be the same "me" tomorrow. But what I have learned (how many years has it taken?) is that that's okay. It is in my nature (maybe in yours, too, or maybe not) to be fluid. Glimpsing a photo of sheep in their blue fleece-protecting coats, I interpreted it as a picture of large boulders in a fast-running blue stream. And that's how I see my life now. Some days I am the boulder. Some days I am the rushing stream, on its way, on its way.

 

But I am always and ever who I am, because that is the person I take with me on the journey.

 

 

Copyright © 2019 Ann Tudor
Musings blog: http://www.scenesfromthejourney.blogspot.com
Audible.Ca: go to https://www.audible.ca and search for Ann Tudor
Audible.Com: go to https://www.audible.com and search for Ann Tudor