education

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• Gardening column reminds us time to harvest food is now

Anchorage Daily News garden columnist Jeff Lowenfels, a member of the Garden Writers Association Hall of Fame, in his column on Wednesday reminded us that the time to begin harvesting our vegetable gardens starts now. We don’t want to let any food go to waste on the ground. If we don’t want the food, there are others who do.

In his column, Lowenfels tells us which plants to harvest and how to do it, with special tips for broccoli, Kohlrabi, cauliflower, carrots and others. While geared toward the Anchorage audience, the column is worth a read for Sitka gardeners.

On a side note, Lowenfels is the garden columnist who first suggested the “Plant a Row for the Hungry” campaign, which encourages gardeners to plant an extra row or two of food that will be donated to local homeless shelters or food banks. He raised the idea in his column as a way to help out Bean’s Cafe, an Anchorage soup kitchen, and the Garden Writers Association liked the idea so well that they made it a national effort.

Click here to read the Anchorage Daily News gardening column by Jeff Lowenfels about the time to harvest is now

Click here to learn about the Garden Writers Association’s “Plant a Row for the Hungry” campaign

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• UAF Cooperative Extension Service offers online resources for home canners

Salmon ready for canning in jars (Photo courtesy of University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service)

Salmon ready for canning in jars (Photo courtesy of University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service)

Did you catch a lot of fish this summer and now you want to can some of them to eat this winter? Do you want to make salmonberry preserves with all those lush, ripe salmonberries you picked this week?

The University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service recently launched a series of interactive online demonstrations called “Preserving Alaska’s Bounty.” Want to learn how to can salmon using jars? Click on the link and you are taken to a page with photos and short descriptions mixed in with video clips to show you how to can your fish. There is an introduction and sections on equipment, preparation, packing, canning, cooling and storage. There also are links to additional resources.

If you want to learn about making jams and jellies, there’s an online demonstration on that topic. There also are demonstrations about canner basics, acidity, canning fish using cans, canning wild meats in jars and in cans, and more. Jeff Fay from the UAF Cooperative Extension Service said there also are DVDs that cover some of the same topics, and more titles are expected to be added to the site in the next year or two.

If you do a little bit of surfing around the UAF Cooperative Extension Service’s Web site, you’ll find all kinds of how-to materials. There are materials on gardening, recipes, home construction, food safety, winterizing your house and other topics.

If you can’t find what you need on the UAF Cooperative Extension Service site, other state land grant universities have their own version of the Cooperative Extension Service and most of their materials are available for download off the Internet. One of the attachments below is to a handout from the Iowa State University Cooperative Extension Service about how to freeze a variety of fruits and vegetables to maintain freshness and nutritional value.

Click here to go to the “Preserving Alaska’s Bounty” page on the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service Web site

Click here to go to a catalog of available DVDs from the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service

Click here to go to the main page for the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service

Click here to open an Adobe Acrobat PDF file of a handout on freezing fruits and vegetables from the Iowa State University Cooperative Extension Service

A batch of fruit is ready to be canned in jars (Photo courtesy of the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service)

A batch of fruit is ready to be canned in jars (Photo courtesy of the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service)

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• A broccoli pesto/dip recipe from Sitka’s Keith Nyitray

Broccoli pesto/dip made by Sitka resident Keith Nyitray

Broccoli pesto/dip made by Sitka resident Keith Nyitray

A broccoli pesto/dip recipe from Sitka resident Keith Nyitray

What a wonderful year for gardening! If your garden is anything like mine this year, you probably ended up with an overabundance of broccoli. You’ve sold or given your broccoli away, gorged on steamed broccoli, made broccoli quiche, broccoli rarebit, cream of broccoli soup, and maybe even blanched and frozen some for the winter. And STILL the plants keep producing, especially those side florets!

Well, here’s a variation of pesto that stores well and can easily be transformed into a great dip for other fresh vegetables from your garden. The best thing about this “recipe” is that amounts aren’t written in stone. Feel free to play around with it. Personally I like to toast my pine nuts and double the amount of garlic!

Broccoli Pesto/Dip

3 cups broccoli florets
1/3 cup olive oil (or more as needed)
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 cup pine nuts (walnuts also work)
1/4 cup fresh parsley (optional)
2 or 3 large cloves of garlic
1 teaspoon salt (sea salt if you have it)
1/4 teaspoon pepper
splash of lemon juice

Steam the broccoli in a medium saucepan until bright green and just slightly tender, drain and immediately rinse in cold water. (You can also cook the florets in a skillet with a pinch of salt, olive oil, and a little bit of water to retain the maximum amount of nutrients. Do not rinse.)

Place the broccoli, half the olive oil, and the rest of the ingredients in a blender or food processor and purée. While blending, drizzle in as much olive oil as is needed to reach a smooth, almost creamy, consistency. (Note: if you’ve got a small blender like mine, this can be done in two batches and mixed together by hand in a separate bowl.)

Once blended, toss it with cooked fettuccine noodles as you would a regular basil pesto. It will store in a refrigerator for weeks and almost indefinitely in a freezer.

To convert this into a hearty vegetable dip, just blend in a little sour cream, cream cheese, mayonnaise or yogurt to taste.

Broccoli growing in the garden

Broccoli growing in the garden

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• Eight fun facts about Saturday’s first Sitka Farmers Market

SitkaFarmersMarketSign

1. The first of five scheduled Sitka Farmers Markets this summer takes place from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, July 18, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Hall on Katlian Street.

2. More than 20 local vendors will be selling fresh veggies, fish, art and more.

3. The Gajaa Heen Dancers will be selling fry bread as a fundraising project for the group. Other ready-to-eat food includes black cod, crepes and fresh oysters.

4. Live music will be provided by the Sitka Blues Band inside the hall. Also, an open jam session will take place under a tent outside — all musicians are welcome.

5. Registered participants in the state’s Women, Infants and Children (WIC) supplemental nutrition program can exchange $5 vouchers for fresh produce from one of several approved stands. The Sitka Farmers Market is the first market in Southeast Alaska authorized to process WIC vouchers.

6. The children’s craft activity this market focuses on healthy eating and is called “eating by the colors.” Please bring the kids!

7. Creating the Sitka Farmers Market was selected by Sitka residents as a top community health priority at the 2008 Sitka Health Summit.

8. This event is sponsored by the Sitka Local Foods Network, Alaska Native Brotherhood/Alaska Native Sisterhood, Baranof Island Housing Authority, Sitka Conservation Society, the Alaska Farmers Market Association and the SEARHC Health Promotion and Diabetes Prevention programs.

Musicians play in the jam session tent

Musicians play in the jam session tent

Grilling black cod collars from the Alaska Longline Fisherman's Association

Grilling black cod collars from the Alaska Longline Fisherman's Association

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• Welcome to the Sitka Local Foods Network blog

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Hello and welcome to the Sitka Local Foods Network blog. The Sitka Local Foods Network is a 501(c)3 non-profit group dedicated to promoting the growing, harvesting and eating of local foods in Sitka, Alaska. This blog will be used to keep people updated on what we’re doing and let people know how they can participate in this community effort.

The 2008 Sitka Health Summit planted the seeds for the Sitka Local Foods Network when Sitka community members got together and chose two local-foods-oriented projects as community health priorities. The Sitka Health Summit participants wanted to start a public market so Sitka residents had easier access to local fish and produce, and the participants wanted to build a community greenhouse and expand the community garden programs so more local produce could be grown in Sitka. Since there were a lot of tie-ins between the two projects, the Sitka Local Foods Network was created to streamline the work efforts.

The Sitka Local Foods Network now has five major focus areas:

* Creating and operating the Sitka Farmers Market, where people can sell locally grown produce, locally harvested fish and locally produced arts and crafts.

* Expanding local community gardens, so people who don’t have their own plots of land can grow their own fruits and vegetables. Sitka currently has the Blatchley Community Garden where families and other groups can get their own plot, and the new St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm which is a cooperative community garden with most of the food being sold at the farmers markets or used by non-profit groups.

* Planning and building a Sitka Community Greenhouse, which can help extend the growing season and allow us to grow additional crops.

* Promoting the use of traditional foods (subsistence foods), such as local salmon, halibut, cod, deer, berries, seaweeds and other foods that were in the Tlingít diet before non-Natives arrived in Sitka.

* Providing educational opportunities, technical expertise and encouragement so Sitka residents who want to build their own gardens have the knowledge and support they need.