Sitka Seafood Festival

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Scenes from the Sitka Seafood Festival events on Saturday, Aug. 12

After a year in hiatus, the Sitka Seafood Festival returned this month with a variety of events from Aug. 6-30 around town. The big day for the Sitka Seafood Festival was Saturday, Aug. 12, when there were vendor booths, fun and games, a fishermen’s triathlon and other events at the Crescent Harbor Shelter and nearby locations.

A slideshow of scenes from the market vendor booths and fishermen’s triathlon (which featured two-person teams coiling line into a bucket, putting on a survival suit/Gumby suit, a three-legged race using a pair of Grundens, setting a skate, and a tote race) are linked below. There are still a couple of events left on the schedule, so check them out at http://www.sitkaseafoodfestival.com/.

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Scenes from the fourth Sitka Farmers Market of the 2017 summer

Table of the Day: Sitka Farmers Market manager Nina Vizcarrondo, left, and Sitka Local Foods Network Bulldog On Baranof intern Al Simon, second from left, present the Table of the Day award to Ariane Martin Goudeau (holding baby Elodie Goudeau) and Geoffrey Goudeau of Goudeau’s Good-Doughs during the fourth Sitka Farmers Market of the 2017 summer, held Saturday, Aug. 12, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall. Ariane and Geoffrey sold cookies, bread, and a variety of other baked goods. They received a Sitka Local Foods Network apron loaded with some rhubarb, beets, a Sitka Local Foods Network t-shirt, and an Alaska Grown sticker.

It rained when we held our fourth Sitka Farmers Market of the 2017 summer season on Saturday, Aug. 12, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall (235 Katlian Street), so we moved most of our booths indoors. It also was National Farmers Markets Week, so we had a decent crowd despite some competition from the Sitka Seafood Festival.

While our cold weather this spring means we don’t have as much produce as we like, we still had several local produce vendors at the market (did you see the size of those zucchinis at the Sitka Local Foods Network farm stand?). We also had about three dozen vendors at the market (between those inside ANB Founders Hall and those outside in the Baranof Island Housing Authority parking lot) so there was a nice variety of items being sold. Vendors sold harvested foods (such as chaga tea and traditional medicinal tinctures), homemade baked goods, banana-Nutella crepes, hot seafood dishes, fresh smoothies, reindeer hot dogs, blackcod tips, arts and crafts, and home-baked bread. We also had an expanded selection of Alaska Grown products at the Sitka Local Foods Network farm stand.

The next Sitka Farmers Market takes place from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 19, at the ANB Founders Hall. There also are markets scheduled for Sept. 2, and Sept. 9. To learn how to be a vendor at the market, contact market manager Nina Vizcarrondo at (907) 738-9301 (new number) or assistant manager Charles Bingham (907) 623-7660, or email us at sitkafarmersmarket@gmail.com. We also have a new kids vendor program at the market for young entrepreneurs age 12 or younger. Don’t forget to like our new Sitka Farmers Market page on Facebook.

A slideshow of scenes from the fourth Sitka Farmers Market is posted below.

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Sitka Seafood Festival returns Aug. 10-19 after spending a year in hiatus

After spending a year in hiatus, the Sitka Seafood Festival returns Aug. 10-19 with a wide variety of events as Sitka celebrates its local seafood culture.

“Southeast Alaska is an amazing place, and the Sitka Seafood Festival is going to be a great opportunity to bring our community together to celebrate it,” Sitka Seafood Festival coordinator Emma Edson said. “There are a lot of great minds coming together to make it happen. It’ll be a lot of fun, and it’s all for a good cause.”

The Sitka Seafood Festival began in 2009 through the work of volunteers, and became its own nonprofit in 2012. But in 2016, organizers decided they needed to take a break.

The rekindled Sitka Seafood Festival now is sponsored by the Alaska Sustainable Fisheries Trust and the Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association. The proceeds from the festival will benefit the Young Fishermen’s Initiative, which helps young Alaskans get into the fishing industry with financing for permits and boats, deck hand apprenticeships, and policy programs.

“Central to the mission of the Sitka Seafood Festival (SSF), as well as the mission of Alaska Sustainable Fisheries Trust, is the belief that Alaska needs a vibrant and sustainable fishing industry supporting economically empowered and self-sufficient Alaska communities,” said Willow Moore, ASFT’s executive director. “Also, no one knows good seafood (and where to find it) like Alaskans. The Sitka Seafood Festival celebrates the fishing culture and heritage that local economies (and plates and palates) depend on, and the unique ecosystems of Southeast Alaska that sustain our local fish and families as they grow.”

In addition to the two host organizations, there are several partner groups hosting activities, such as ArtChange Inc., the Sitka Maritime Heritage Society, Sitka Film Society, Sheldon Jackson Museum, Sitka Local Foods Network, the Sitka Kitch, and Sitka Tribe of Alaska.

The main festival day is Saturday, Aug. 12, when there are vendor and food booths plus a variety of fun and games events at Crescent Harbor Shelter. Knot-tying games open the event at 9 a.m., followed by kids games at 10 a.m., the vendor market from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., older kids games from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., a dock walk from noon to 1 p.m., tote races at 1 p.m., and the wild fishermen’s triathlon (which includes fish tote races and other obstacles) at 3 p.m.

Other highlights from this year’s event schedule include a pre-festival screening of the movie “Jaws” on Aug. 6 at the Coliseum Theater; Sitka Tells Tales hosting “Wet Feet: Stories On, In, Under, or Of the Sea” on Aug. 10 at the Beak Restaurant; seafood trivia on Aug. 11 at the Mean Queen; a lecture by Iñupiaq mask carver Erin Katherine Gingrich on Aug. 12 at the Sheldon Jackson Museum; a screening of the film “The Salmon Forest” on Aug. 14 at the Mean Queen; a class on filleting salmon on Aug. 15 at the Sitka Kitch; a class on canning salmon on Aug. 16 at the Sitka Kitch; a film screening of an ocean and fisheries documentary TBA on Aug. 17 at the Coliseum Theater; a “Coming to America: Invasive Species, Ocean Rafting, and Japanese Tsunami Marine Debris” lecture on Aug. a8 at the Sitka Sound Science Center; a walk about the docks on Aug. 19; an ocean treasures family day Aug. 19 at the Japonski Island Boat House; and a fish skin sewing class taught by Joel Isaak from Aug. 22-30 at the Sheldon Jackson Museum.

Don’t forget the Sitka Local Foods Network is hosting a Sitka Farmers Market from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Aug. 12 at the ANB Founders Hall, and another one at the same time on Aug. 19. So make time to attend both events.

The 2017 Sitka Seafood Festival grand finale will come with the Young Fishermen’s Expo and Season’s End Banquet, taking place in early November at Harrigan Centennial Hall.

For more information about the Sitka Seafood Festival, go to http://www.sitkaseafoodfestival.com, or call 747-3400.

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Sitka Kitch to offer two classes in conjunction with the Sitka Seafood Festival

Sitkans love their seafood, and the Sitka Kitch community rental commercial kitchen is offering two great classes in conjunction with the Sitka Seafood Festival — How to Fillet a Salmon and How to Can Salmon.

In the first class, held from 6-8 p.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 15, at the Sitka Kitch (505 Sawmill Creek Road, inside First Presbyterian Church), local chef Renée Jakaitis Trafton of the Beak Restaurant will teach students how to fillet a salmon. This includes lessons on how to remove the pinbones from the salmon and how to remove the skin. Participants must bring a fillet knife or let the instructor know they need one in advance. Knives can be made available for $15 for those who need them. This class costs $15.

In the second class, held from 5-9 p.m. on Wednesday, Aug. 16, at the Sitka Kitch, Jasmine Shaw of the UAF Cooperative Extension Service‘s Sitka District Office will teach students how to can the salmon (using the filleted salmon from Tuesday’s class). In addition, she will teach students how to make a simple berry jam while the class waits for the salmon to process in the canner. This class costs $27.50.

As a special deal, the Sitka Kitch has a $35 fee for students registering for both classes. The Sitka Seafood Festival is providing fish and jars for the classes, so there should be little or no food/supply fee.

The registration deadline is 6:55 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 14. Registration is capped at 10 students so sign up early to secure your space in these classes.

Register online at our EventSmart page, http://sitkakitch.eventsmart.com/ (click on class title, there is a separate class title to register for both classes and get the discount), using a debit or credit card or PayPal account. You also can call Chandler or Clarice at Sitka Conservation Society (747-7509) to arrange payment by cash or check. For more information about the two classes, contact Jasmine Shaw at 747-9440 or email sitkakitch@sitkawild.org.

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• Scenes from the 2015 Sitka Seafood Festival events held Saturday, Aug. 8

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ssflogo2There were tote races, a parade, a marathon/half-marathon, food booths, live music, canning classes, salmon-head bobbing, halibut-head tossing, the Sitka Highland Games, and scores of other events Saturday during the sixth annual Sitka Seafood Festival at Sheldon Jackson Campus.

There also was nice weather — a little cloudy with light rain for the marathon/half-marathon, followed by warm sunny weather for the tote races, parade, and marketplace events later in the day.

A few scenes from the 2015 Sitka Seafood Festival are in a slideshow below.

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• Scenes from a series of Sitka Seafood Festival food preservation classes at the Sitka Kitch

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ssflogo2On Aug. 6-8, the Sitka Seafood Festival hosted Leslie Shallcross from the Anchorage District Office of the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service to teach a series of food preservation classes at the Sitka Kitch community rental commercial kitchen (Aug. 6-7) and Sweetland Hall on Sheldon Jackson Campus (Aug. 8).

Leslie taught a class on Thursday at the Sitka Kitch about how to make low-sugar jams and jellies (a class on preserving local garden greens was canceled), and on Friday she taught a class on making kelp pickles and sauerkraut and a class on canning salmon. On Saturday, she moved over to the Sweetland Hall to be closer to the Sitka Seafood Festival events and she taught another canning salmon class and a class on the process of smoking salmon.

For those who missed the classes but still want to learn more about home canning, the UAF Cooperative Extension Service has a series of online tutorials on its website called “Preserving Alaska’s Bounty.”

Also, don’t forget to make sure your pressure canner gauge is tested at least once a year. Jasmine Shaw from the Sitka District Office of the UAF Cooperative Extension Service has a tester in her office and you can call her at 747-9440 to schedule a test.

kitch_logo_mainSitka Kitch is a community wellness project from the 2013 Sitka Health Summit designed to improve food security in Sitka. The different parts of the project include creating a community kitchen Sitka residents can rent to prepare food for their small businesses or to preserve their family harvest of fish, game, or garden veggies; expanding Sitka’s emergency food storage capacity; and providing education about preserving food and building family emergency food pantries.

For more information about the Sitka Kitch project, go to the Sitka Kitch website or Facebook page. For rental information, contact Kristy Miller at sitkakitch@sitkawild.org. Click this link to take a quick tour of the facility.

A slideshow with scenes from the various classes is posted below.

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• Sitka Local Foods Network to host booths at Sitka Seafood Festival and Chelan Produce on Saturday

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Sitka residents wanting to buy some fresh local produce will have two opportunities this weekend, even though no Sitka Farmers Market is scheduled.

The Sitka Local Foods Network will have a booth selling produce and SLFN swag at the Sitka Seafood Festival Marketplace from noon to 6 p.m. (or until it runs out) on Saturday, Aug. 8, at Sheldon Jackson Campus. It’s been a couple of years since we’ve hosted a booth at the Sitka Seafood Festival, so we’re looking forward to being at this local-foods-oriented event.

We also will host our regular table on Saturday and Sunday at the Chelan Produce truck on Katlian Street across from AC Lakeside Grocery. For the last couple of years we’ve had a table with fresh local veggies at the Chelan Produce truck on weeks where we didn’t have a Sitka Farmers Market. We appreciate Chelan Produce giving us a chance to sell some local produce when it brings in its produce from Washington State.

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• Food preservation classes to be offered in conjunction with Sitka Seafood Festival

Sitka food preservation classes

ssflogo2Leslie Shallcross from the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service‘s Anchorage District Office will be in Sitka to offer a series of food preservation classes on Aug. 6-8 as part of the Sitka Seafood Festival.

The classes on Thursday and Friday, Aug. 6-7, will take place at the Sitka Kitch community rental commercial kitchen (inside First Presbyterian Church, 505 Sawmill Creek Road), while the Saturday, Aug. 8, classes will be at Sweetland Hall on the Sheldon Jackson Campus. Each of the classes will cost $15, but jars and other materials will be provided by the Sitka Seafood Festival.

The class schedule is:

  • Thursday, Aug. 6, 2-4:30 p.m., at Sitka Kitch — Low-sugar jams and jellies — Learn how to use a boiling water bath canner for preserving fruit by making low-sugar jams and jellies.
  • Thursday, Aug. 6, 6-8 p.m., at Sitka Kitch — Local garden greens — Learn how to cook with and preserve your garden greens.
  • Friday, Aug. 7, 10 a.m. to noon, at Sitka Kitch — Kelp pickles and sauerkraut — Learn how to make kelp pickles. You will “start” some sauerkraut as well as learn some of the science of fermentation.
  • Friday, Aug. 7, 3-5 p.m., at Sitka Kitch — Canning salmon — Learn how to use a pressure canner for preserving fresh, frozen or smoked fish.
  • Saturday, Aug. 8, 10 a.m. to noon, at Sweetland Hall — Canning salmon — Learn how to use a pressure canner for preserving fresh, frozen or smoked fish.
  • Saturday, Aug. 8, 1-2:30 p.m., at Sweetland Hall — Process of smoking salmon — Learn the steps in smoking fish.

kitch_logo_mainFor those who might miss the classes but still want to learn more about home canning, the UAF Cooperative Extension Service has a series of online tutorials on its website called “Preserving Alaska’s Bounty.” Also, don’t forget to make sure your pressure canner gauge is tested at least once a year. Jasmine Shaw from the Sitka District Office of the UAF Cooperative Extension Service has a tester in her office and you can call her at 747-9440 to schedule a test.

To register for the classes, please contact Jasmine Shaw at 747-9440 or jdshaw2@alaska.edu.

 

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• Schedule firming up for 2015 Sitka Seafood Festival on Aug. 7-8

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ssflogo2While the official schedule for the 2015 Sitka Seafood Festival still hasn’t been posted on the event’s website at the Sheldon Jackson Campus, the schedule is firming up.

The Friday night, Aug. 7, Sitka Seafood Festival Extravaganza banquet is close to selling out, so if you haven’t gone online to reserve your tickets you better do it now. Tickets are $65 each for this special seafood dinner event (cooked by guest chefs) at Allen Hall on the Sheldon Jackson Campus, but there are only a handful left. This event starts at 6:30 p.m. and will feature a variety of seafood dishes prepared by guest chefs Caleb France of Indianapolis, Dave Thorne of Anchorage, Rob Kinneen of Anchorage, Jeren Schmidt of Sitka, and SSF culinary scholarship winner Adam Kanayurak. Don’t forget to get your VIP cocktail hour tickets ($35) from 5:30-6:30 p.m., too.

OK, got your banquet tickets? Here is information on the other events.

Sitka cooks can participate in the banquet by entering the dessert contest, which will feature cakes, cupcakes and pies (no refrigerated desserts, please). The desserts will be auctioned off at the banquet, and the top desserts will receive prizes. Rules and entry forms are at the link above. The entry forms must be submitted by Wednesday, Aug. 5. For more information, contact contest coordinator Megan Pasternak at 738-2290 or mwpstnk@ptialaska.net.

As usual, the bulk of the sixth annual Sitka Seafood Festival events take place on Saturday (Aug. 8, this year). The fish tote races usually start at 11 a.m. at Crescent Harbor, with the parade following afterward from Crescent Harbor to the Sheldon Jackson Campus.

The Sitka Seafood Festival Marketplace opens at noon, and this year all of the booths will be outdoors on the Sheldon Jackson Campus. The booths usually stay open until 6 p.m., but some may close earlier if they run out of product. You can find out more information about hosting a booth here.

highland gamesIn addition to the marketplace, there will be kids games on the lawn, live music and other entertainment until 5 p.m., and the Sitka Highland Games until 6 p.m. The highland games participants already are practicing their events, and potential participants can check out the Sitka Highland Games group on Facebook for practice times (usually 5-6:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday, depending on weather and work schedules).

There will be other events announced over the next week or two, and some may happen on Thursday, Aug. 6, or Sunday, Aug. 9.

The festival also is looking for volunteers to help prior, during and after the festival. There are countless ways to help, such as kitchen help, banquet help, parade, contests, games, highland games, booths, tent set-up and take down, stage help for bands and cooking demos, etc. If you are interested in volunteering, please contact Alicia Olson Haseltine at alaska_al33@hotmail.com. For more info on the festival, go to http://www.sitkaseafoodfestival.org.

 

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• Sitka Seafood Festival offers culinary scholarship and paid internship opportunity

culinary scholarship description

Scholarship 2015Are you a budding chef from Sitka who’d like an opportunity to work with some top-notch chefs from around the country? The Sitka Seafood Festival is offering its culinary scholarship and paid internship again for 2015. The application deadline is Monday, June 22.

This $500 scholarship will be awarded to an individual interested in pursuing the culinary arts. The program includes the opportunity to work with renowned chefs for 3-5 days, a $500 stipend for three days of work, letters of recommendation from Sitka Seafood Festival staff for future career moves, and recognition to the community during the Sitka Seafood Festival community banquet on Friday, Aug. 7. This is a great opportunity to give back to the community of Sitka.

This year’s guest chefs haven’t been announced yet. But last year the executive guest chef was Caleb France, with returning guest chefs Seth Caswell from Seattle, Mickey Neely from Chicago, Robert Kinneen from Anchorage, and Jeren Schmidt from Sitka.

This year’s Sitka Seafood Festival takes place on Thursday-Sunday, Aug. 6-9, with a variety of activities around Sitka. This year’s event schedule hasn’t been announced yet, but typically there is a community banquet featuring a variety of local seafood on Friday night, while Saturday’s activities include fish-tote races at Crescent Harbor, a parade down Lincoln Street, Scottish Highland Games at the Sitka Fine Arts Camp, live music, cooking demonstrations, and a variety of food, informational and artist booths in the marketplace at the Sitka Fine Arts Camp.

For more information, go to the Sitka Seafood Festival website, or contact the festival at sitkaseafoodfestival@gmail.com. You also can contact Alicia Haseltine at (928) 607-4845.

• Click here for a detailed description of the SSF Scholarship program.

• Click here for an application to the SSF Scholarship program.