traditional foods

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• UAF Cooperative Extension Service conducts Southeast Alaska Food Security Survey

A display shows the typical mileages food needs to travel to get to Sitka stores. The mileages are for several vegetables that are easy to grow right here in Sitka.

A display shows the typical mileages food needs to travel to get to Sitka stores. The mileages are for several vegetables that are easy to grow right here in Sitka.

Bob Gorman, the Sitka-based Natural Resource and Community Development faculty member for the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service, sent this e-mail out last week to local food people, health professionals and others interested in food security issues.

Please feel free to send this survey request around to other Southeast residents so they can complete it, too.

Subject: Southeast Alaska Food Security Survey

Dear Southeasterners,

Does everyone in your community have access to good, healthy food?  Will this always be true?  Do you have questions or concerns about your personal or community’s food security?

Southeast extension agents of the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service (CES) and Marine Advisory Program (MAP) are looking to engage university resources in addressing research based questions about Southeast Alaska’s food security situation.  Before CES and MAP can initiate this work, we need to determine if there is a real need and interest.

Please take a moment to fill out the online survey at http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/foodsecurity

If you have any questions about filling out the survey or need a hard copy sent to you, please call Linda Watson at 796-6221 or email ljwatson@alaska.edu.

If you know others interested in this issue and would care to forward this email, it appreciated.  We will wrap up this survey by the end of December, so please don’t delay.

Thank you for helping on this effort.

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• Sitka Seafood Festival moves from August to May in 2011

The Sitka Seafood Festival steering committee met on Monday, Nov. 8, to start planning the second festival. One of the biggest changes will be moving the festival from August to May in 2011 so the festival takes place before the tourist season gets busy. The new dates will be Friday and Saturday, May 20-21, 2011, at Harrigan Centennial Hall and the Crescent Harbor shelter.

The inaugural Sitka Seafood Festival in August was very successful, and it looks like the steering committee plans to keep the same basic formula for the second festival. The festival had a guest chef who worked with local chefs to prepare a special gourmet seafood dinner on Friday night, and Saturday featured a full day of events with booths for seafood vendors, children’s events, artists and other vendors, an entertainment event in the afternoon and guest band performing at night.

Notes from Monday’s meeting are posted below. The next steering committee meeting will be at 8 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 6, at the Channel Club, 2906 Halibut Point Road. For more information, contact Alicia Peavey at sitkaseafoodfestival@gmail.com or 1-928-607-4845.

• Sitka Seafood Festival steering committee meeting notes from Nov. 8, 2010

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• New ‘Field Guide to Seaweeds of Alaska’ will help Sitka residents identify various types of seaweeds

Alaska Natives have been gathering seaweeds and other sea vegetables for centuries, with the seaweeds providing an excellent source of vitamins and minerals. There are dozens of types of seaweeds available in Alaska, and most of them are edible.

The Alaska Sea Grant program from the University of Alaska Fairbanks recently released a new book by Mandy R. Lindeberg and Sandra C. Lindstrom called “Field Guide to Seaweeds of Alaska.” This book is billed as the first and only field guide to more than 100 common seaweeds, seagrasses and marine lichens of Alaska. The book features color photos, written descriptions and it is printed on water-resistant paper.

As part of the Sitka WhaleFest Maritime Market this weekend, one of the authors (Lindeberg) will be in Sitka signing copies of the new guide at 2:45 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 6, at the Old Harbor Books booth at Harrigan Centennial Hall. Lindeberg is a self-proclaimed “nerdy” Juneau biologist who works for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration/National Marine Fisheries Service Auke Bay Laboratory.

Mandy Lindeberg

Mandy Lindeberg

Lindeberg spent nearly 15 years working on the book with the help of Lindstrom, a professor and researcher in botany and marine ecology at the University of British Columbia who was born and raised in Juneau. Lindeberg took about 80 percent of the photos in the book, hoping to come up with enough decent images so scientists and naturalists had more than the sometimes-hard-to-decipher drawings found in most previous books, while Lindstrom helped with the taxonomic work and reviewed the scientific descriptions.

Lindeberg said the new guidebook will help people be able to better identify the types of seaweeds when they are out gathering (Editor’s note, federal and state subsistence laws prohibit the gathering of seaweed in urban nonsubsistence areas such as Juneau/Douglas and Ketchikan/Saxman, but seaweed gathering is legal in rural areas of Alaska including Sitka and most other Southeast Alaska communities, including areas just outside Juneau/Douglas and Ketchikan/Saxman).

Lindeberg said her guidebook will help people identify the various types of seaweeds, but it does not discuss which seaweeds are edible and how to prepare them, so people might want to use it with another Alaska Sea Grant book, “Common Edible Seaweeds in the Gulf of Alaska,” by Dolly Garza. The new “Field Guide to Seaweeds In Alaska” costs $30 and is available at Old Harbor Books or through the Alaska Sea Grant program’s online bookstore.

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• Sitka-based film, ‘Eating Alaska,’ goes international for screenings, national for PBS premieres

“Eating Alaska,” a film by Sitka filmmaker Ellen Frankenstein about local food and how Alaskans make their food choices, is going international with screenings in Poland, Croatia, Scotland and Canada in the next two months. The film also will be making its PBS premiere with broadcasts on various public television stations around the country during September, including two in Alaska (one with a live Skype interview).

The international screenings will be highlighted when Frankenstein and associate producer Valerie Lipinski attend the Kuchnia TV Food Film Festival and National Broadcast Sept. 30-Oct. 9 in Warsaw, Poland.

The film also will be shown (without the filmmaker in attendance) Sept. 16-19 at KinoOkus (Cinetaste), which is Croatia’s first gastronomic film festival that will focus on food education, environmental protection and sustainable development. Eating Alaska will be shown on Sept. 30 as part of the Reel Food Film Festival sponsored by the Ottawa Main Public Library in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. During September and October, “Eating Alaska” will be shown as part of the Cineco Environmental Film Festival sponsored by the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

In addition to the international showings, “Eating Alaska” will be shown for two live audiences in New York — on Oct. 5 as part of the Meet the Filmmaker Series at the Hewlett/Woodmere Public Library (Nassau) and on Oct. 6 at the Port Washington Public Library. “Eating Alaska” also will be shown a little bit closer to home, on Nov. 5-7 in Fairbanks, at the Far North Conservation Film Festival for those people looking for a live screening in Alaska.

While it won’t be broadcast nationally, “Eating Alaska” will make several premieres on local public broadcasting TV stations around the country during the month of September (click here for full schedule). The film will be aired in Houston, Texas; Evansville, Ind.; Austin, Minn.; Broomfield, Colo.; Charleston, Columbia, Spartanburg, Allendale, Beaufort, Florence, Sumter, Greenwood, Conway, Greenville and Rock Hill, S.C.; Greenville, N.C.; Anchorage, Alaska (at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 14, on KAKM Channel 7, featuring a live Skype online video interview with Ellen Frankenstein); Durham, N.H.; Keene, N.H.; Littleton, N.H.; Eureka, Calif.; Elmira, Syracuse and Utica, N.Y.; East Lansing, Mich.; Milwaukee, Wis.; and Fairbanks (KUAC), Bethel (KYUK), Juneau (KTOO) and other Southeast Alaska communities including Sitka (at 9 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 30, and again at 3 a.m. on Friday, Oct. 1, on AlaskaOne).

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• A reminder about Saturday’s Sitka Farmers Market and other items

Don’t forget, we have a Sitka Farmers Market from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 28, at ANB Hall (235 Katlian St.). We’re getting a little bit later in the summer, so hopefully we’ll have some root vegetables available this week, such as potatoes, carrots and turnips, that weren’t available earlier this summer.

Also, this is the last week to vote in the America’s Favorite Farmers Market contest. Voting closes at midnight (Eastern time, 8 p.m. Alaska time) on Tuesday, Aug. 31. Click the logo in the right column or click the link above and vote for the Sitka Farmers Market.

Finally, Saturday is the last day of the Alaska Grown Eat Local Challenge. This event runs from Aug. 22-28 and encourages Alaskans to eat meals made with local food. We live in an area with lots of salmon, halibut and other fish, plus people with gardens should have lots of greens, potatoes and other veggies in season right now, with lots of berries for dessert.

If you don’t have your own garden, there will be lots of local veggies and fish for sale at Saturday’s Sitka Farmers Market. Eating local food means the food is fresher, so it tastes better and it has more nutrients. Also by eating local food you eliminate thousands of miles of transportation costs bringing your food to your plate.

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• Feedback provided during debriefing meeting for inaugural Sitka Seafood Festival

Here is a run-down of the Tuesday, Aug. 17, debriefing meeting for the Sitka Seafood Festival. The following notes were provided by Alicia Peavey, who chaired the steering committee that organized the festival.

Thank you to those of you who were able to make the debriefing meeting for SSF. It went fairly well, and we were able to discuss quite a few aspects that we liked, or want to change about next year. I will list the highlights below. The biggest topics discussed were our first
meeting for next year’s festival, and our celebration/party for all
volunteers for this year’s event.

The celebration will be held on Sunday, Aug. 29th (EDITOR’S NOTE: Event postponed to a time TBA). SSF will provide drinks and some food. The Rec is already reserved, so we are looking into the Fly In Fish Inn or Talon Lodge. If anyone else has ideas let me know, and I will let everyone know as soon as I hear.

The first committee meeting will be held at 7 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 4, at Harrigan Centennial Hall. We will discuss next year’s event, but a
large part of the meeting will be devoted to figuring out committee
chair positions. Everyone who is interested at all in helping next
year should TRY their hardest to make this meeting please.
Thanks again to everyone who helped this year, what a fantastic event!!!

  • Not enough food vendors during the Saturday event
  • The fishing community was not asked about a specific date (we did try to address this, and we were told they did not know when the closure would be, but we are sending out info to all the fishing community now for next year’s event, and if you know anyone please ask their opinion on a date)
  • We are leaning toward the first week in August again for 2 reasons: 1) there are no other large events going on at this time other than Coast Guard Day and 2) We can piggyback off the Haines fair again and fiscally this is the only way we will be able to pull larger name people up
  • Need to advertise/organize salmon canning class better, and have a sign-up so people aren’t filtering in and out
  • We played with the idea of paying the head organizer position, or possibly paying a couple positions…we will talk more about this during the first meeting in October
  • We discussed continuing to use Sitka Conservation Society as a non-profit umbrella or trying to form our own. I am checking if we can use SCS again in that this seems like the easiest choice for this next year.
  • We need a head of the culinary committee position (hopefully someone involved in the culinary profession, but not actively cooking during the summer so they have the time for the festival)
  • We need to have solid committee chair people for each committee
  • We also discussed the budget, which was amazing!!!! We did such a fantastic job for the first year…I attached this, but as of now, we grossed about $12,000. You can look through and see what were the best money makers: the banquet brought in the most money, followed by the passport event. NANDA didn’t bring in any money, but I have not stopped hearing people talking about how great they were and how it was such a highlight. We decided something like that was the point of
    our festival, to offer an affordable celebration for all to take part in. So, although this didn’t make money, we decided it was an important part of the festival.

Much more was discussed, but these were some of the main topics.
Hope to see everyone at the party…you all deserve a LARGE celebration!

• Sitka Seafood Festival budget for 2010 festival

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• Sitka Seafood Festival to hold debriefing meeting on Tuesday (Aug. 17)

Now that the inaugural Sitka Seafood Festival is over, the steering committee will host a debriefing meeting at 7 p.m. on Tuesday night, Aug. 17, at the wine bar at the New Bayview Restaurant. The debriefing session will be informal and shouldn’t last long. People who can’t make it, but have comments, can contact festival coordinator Alicia Peavey.

To learn more about the Sitka Seafood Festival or to find out how you can be a part of the second annual festival, send an e-mail to sitkaseafoodfestival@gmail.com. You also can contact Alicia Peavey at alaska_al33@hotmail.com or 1-928-607-4845.

Anyway, here is a slideshow of scenes from the inaugural Sitka Seafood Festival. A similar slideshow can be found at the Sitka Local Foods Network’s photo site on Shutterfly.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

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• Alaska Grown, Alaska Center For The Environment team up to host the Eat Local Challenge 2010 on Aug. 22-28

The state’s Alaska Grown program will host its “Eat Local Challenge 2010” on Sunday through Saturday, Aug. 22-28 (click here to read more). This year, the Alaska Center for the Environment, has joined Alaska Grown as a sponsor as part of the center’s local foods and sustainable communities program.

Alaskans have many ways to eat local, from veggies they grow in their own gardens or buy from Alaska farmers, berries they pick, fish they catch, game meat they hunt, seaweed and other beach greens they gather, etc. The benefit of eating local food is it’s fresher so it tastes better and has more nutrients, and you cut out the thousands of miles of transportation costs needed to ship food from the Lower 48 and other countries to Alaska. Growing local food makes a community more sustainable.

During the week of Aug. 22-28, Alaska residents are encouraged to:

  • Try eating at least one home-cooked meal this week, made of mostly local ingredients.
  • Try to incorporate at least one never-before-used local ingredient into a meal.
  • Try “brown-bagging” at least one meal this week made primarily of local ingredients.
  • Try talking to at least one local food retailer and one food producer about local food options.
  • Try to choose local food products whenever possible.

By the way, a good time to buy local food for the Eat Local Challenge is during the third Sitka Farmers Market of the summer on Saturday, Aug. 14, and during the fourth market on Saturday, Aug. 28. The Sitka Farmers Markets take place from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on alternate Saturdays (through Sept. 11) at historic Alaska Native Brotherhood Hall, 235 Katlian St. We’ll see you there.

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• Second Sitka Farmers Market of the summer takes place this Saturday (July 31) at ANB Hall

The Sitka Local Foods Network will host the second Sitka Farmers Market of the 2010 summer from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, July 31, at Alaska Native Brotherhood Hall (235 Katlian St.). This is the second of this summer’s five big markets that started on July 17 and take place on alternate Saturdays through Sept. 11. The remaining markets will be Aug. 14, 28 and Sept. 11 at ANB Hall. A smaller market will be held on Sept. 25 at the Crescent Harbor shelter as part of the annual Running of the Boots fundraiser for the Sitka Local Foods Network (more details on this event later).

The Sitka Farmers Markets give Sitka residents a chance to buy and sell locally produced food and crafts. The markets feature wild local seafood (fresh, frozen, and cooked, ready to eat), locally grown and harvested fruits and vegetables, baked bread, locally picked berries, jams and jellies, cooking demonstrations, live entertainment, locally brewed and roasted coffee, music, local arts and crafts, and a variety of other items gathered or made in Sitka. We emphasize local products and lots of fun.

Because many Sitka residents had concerns about food security and how they could access more local food, the Sitka Farmers Market and Sitka Local Foods Networks started out as community projects that came out of a health priority planning meeting during the 2008 Sitka Health Summit. The markets are sponsored by the Sitka Local Foods Network, Alaska Native Brotherhood Camp No. 1, Alaska Native Sisterhood Camp No. 4, Baranof Island Housing Authority, Sitka Conservation Society, the Alaska Farmers Market Association and the SEARHC Health Promotion and Diabetes Prevention programs.

Vendor fees are just $15 per market. Due to construction in the parking lot, only indoor booth space is available this year. We are the first farmers market in Southeast Alaska to accept WIC coupons. To learn more or to sign up for a table, contact Sitka Farmers Market Co-Coordinator Linda Wilson at 747-3096 (evenings and weekends) or e-mail lawilson87@hotmail.com. Vendor rules, registration forms and other information for potential vendors can be found at this link.

Also, don’t forget that you can vote for the Sitka Farmers Market in the America’s Favorite Farmers Markets contest, sponsored by the American Farmland Trust, by clicking this link or the logo in the right-hand column and following the prompts. As of Thursday night (July 29), the Sitka Farmers Market was the leading vote-getter among Alaska’s markets participating in the contest, but we only had a five-vote lead over HomeGrown Market of Fairbanks. You can vote through the end of August, but only once per computer.

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• Sitka Seafood Festival adds cruise to Medvejie Hatchery for a tour and salmon bake to its list of events

On Saturday, Aug. 7, the Sitka Conservation Society is offering a Tongass summer boat cruise as part of the Sitka Seafood Festival. This boat trip will be traveling to Medvejie Hatchery for a tour of the hatchery and a salmon bake provided by the Northern Southeast Regional Aquaculture Association (NSRAA). The trip will depart at 11 a.m. and return at 2 p.m. Boarding begins at 10:45 a.m. at Crescent Harbor.

Tickets are $45 and can be purchased with cash or check at Old Harbor Books or at the Crescent Harbor loading dock at the time of the cruise. It is suggested that tickets be purchased in advance to assure participation. Food is not provided on the short boat ride to the hatchery, but hot beverages are complimentary. Binoculars are available on board for all.

King salmon fillets and baked potatoes cook over an open fire at an open house and salmon bake hosted by Medvejie Hatchery on July 10, 2010.

King salmon fillets and baked potatoes cook over an open fire at an open house and salmon bake hosted by Medvejie Hatchery on July 10, 2010.

This boat cruise is part of the Sitka Seafood Festival, a celebration of seafood as a wild and sustainable resource. This trip will head to Silver Bay and the Medvejie Hatchery to learn more about the multitude of seafood available in Sitka and the role different species play in our local ecosystems. Steve Reifenstuhl, General Manager of NSRAA (the non-profit that runs the hatchery), will be on board as a guest speaker. He will speak about Alaska and Southeast fisheries and the role of aquaculture in these fisheries. For more information on the Sitka Seafood Festival visit: http://sitkaseafoodfestival.org/

Allen Marine offers these boat trips at a reduced rate for non-profits. Please call 747-7509 or e-mail natalie@sitkawild.org for more information on this boat trip or others offered by the Sitka Conservation Society.

The inaugural Sitka Seafood Festival takes place on Aug. 6-7 at the Crescent Harbor shelter, Harrigan Centennial Hall and other parts of Sitka. A tentative schedule of events is posted below. Feel free to print it out and post it on local bulletin boards.

The Sitka Seafood Festival is Aug. 6-7, and the guest chef is Robert Kinneen of Orso Ristorante in Anchorage, who will prepare a gourmet seafood meal on Friday night with the assistance of several local chefs. Entertainment for the festival will be provided by the bluegrass band Trampled By Turtles (brought to Sitka with the help of Sitka Folk) and the four-man juggling, acrobatic, martial arts and comedy troupe “NANDA: Acrobaticalist Ninja Action Heroes.” The basic format of the event features a special dinner on Friday night with a variety of educational events, seafood booths and entertainment all day Saturday. Click on the poster link below for more details.

Also, don’t forget the beer tasting and smoked salmon contest from 6-8 p.m. on Friday, July 30, at the Westmark Sitka. This fundraising event costs $30, and there will be live music, treats from Chef Jo, a variety of beers to sample from local distributors and a chance to win the prizes in the best smoked salmon contest. There is a $10 fee to enter the contest (which is deducted from your admission), and participants receive five pounds of salmon to smoke. For more details about the contest, go to the Sitka Seafood Festival site or contact Molly Andrews at (509) 953-9509 or molly@sitkawild.org.

And don’t forget the Sitka Seafood Festival art and logo contest, so put on your thinking cap and send your camera-ready art entries to 411 Hemlock St., Sitka, AK, 99835, by Aug. 1. There will be a prize for the winning logo. Also, bring your seafood-, ocean- or marine-themed art to the art show Aug. 7 at Harrigan Centennial Hall. For more information, call Jeff Budd at 747-4821 or e-mail sitkaarts@yahoo.com.

To learn more about the Sitka Seafood Festival or to volunteer to help on one of the committees, e-mail sitkaseafoodfestival@gmail.com. You also can contact Alicia Peavey at alaska_al33@hotmail.com or 1-928-607-4845. Volunteers still are needed, and some of the lists of duties are posted below with the current list of volunteers.

• Press release about Sitka Seafood Festival cruise to Medvejie Hatchery

• Sitka Seafood Festival schedule poster (opens as PDF document)

• Sitka Seafood Festival details (talking points)

• Sitka Seafood Festival final sponsors list

• Sitka Seafood Festival list of volunteers for Friday night’s banquet dinner

• Sitka Seafood Festival list of volunteers for Saturday’s events