Spring Ferments
Last Saturday was my husband’s birthday. We started the day off with a date to our local farmers market. With our wacky schedules, it’s not often we are able to go to the market together, which made it all the more special of an excursion.
I had slyly suggested the market (in truth, I may have demanded a market trip…), as that is where we needed to pick up his birthday gift, a fermentation crock from our friend Isha Devine.
If the pottery looks familiar that’s because Isha also made the bowl that adorns the cover of our Spring Issue, HOME. We’re lucky in our friendships and lucky to live somewhere where art and food are celebrated, often hand in hand.
While at the market, we decided to christen the crock with its first batch of kimchi. We picked up carrots from Fields Edge Farm, Napa cabbage and spring onions from Garden Variety Harvests, and went home to harvest some radishes and garlic from the garden. Then, I read through my conversation with Jen Naylor of Mama Bird for inspiration. We chopped up the vegetables, massaged in spices, and placed the potent mixture in the crock. In several weeks we will have a funky and delicious batch of kimchi and you better believe we are making Jen’s recipe for kimchi pancakes.
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Lisa - Publisher & Editor
EVENTS
Have an event you’d like us to share? Email: info@edibleblueridge.com
5.31-6.02 Lebanese Festival - Roanoke
6.01 Edible Landscaping Spring Fruit Festival - Afton
6.01 Flowers & Facials with Harmony Harvest Farm- Weyers Cave
6.01-6.02 Cocktails for a Cause - Charlottesville
6.15 Summer Solstice Fest - Blacksburg
6.15-6.17 Batteaux & Banjos - Gladstone
6.23 Oenoverse Cookout - Charlottesville
6.29 First Bank Beer & Wine Festival - Roanoke
6.29 Stars & Stripes Spectacular - Spotsylvania
MORE TO CHEW ON
Ever wonder how sourdough is made at an industrial level? EATER shares an inside view 🍞
🌲Shenandoah Permaculture Institute has released their workshop schedule for this fall.
Can you compost your 🐕 🐕 pup’s poop?💩 - Mod Farmer reports
WHAT WE’RE COOKING
Jen Naylor’s recipe for Kimchi Pancakes is the best I’ve come across. Her secret lies in keeping the batter ice cold until you’re ready to fry the pancakes. This yields pancakes that are crisp on the edges but delicate towards the center. A regular meal in our house, we often add in either diced mushrooms or shrimp for protein, or fry some eggs alongside for a hearty brunch.
POEM OF THE WEEK
Walking Each Other Home by Barbara Kingsolver My friend lives on this road the same as me, two hollows down, two gladed mountainsides, briar patches that go without saying, fields in pumpkin or hay or fallow. Once, we can never forget, a bear. And once for too long a season a road-killed deer whose return to dust we both watched, the ragged pelt dried to leather, the shipwreck of rib cage. My friend alone saw the bear, and told me of it, the winter of her chemo. I was the one to see the deer fresh struck, and had to find words, though even now I can hardly bear to say how I watched hooves beating air, reaching for some blind heaven. Between us, we know this map by heart. I walk from my house to hers and then together we speak of things— or don’t, we are often quiet— all the way back home to mine. Or she walks here first, collects me for her return. Either way, this is the road where we live. Always we walk each other home. And always we walk some of it alone. From How to Fly (In Ten Thousand Easy Lessons) by Barbara Kingsolver. Copyright © 2020 by Barbara Kingsolver
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