Mallika Makes Dinner

We had Mallika Nair with us for only a week and a half but what a wonderful addition she was. She came to us as an intern by asking if she could leave the farm she was at nearby and come stay with us and she thrived here and we loved her company. These pictures are artsy looking because they were too dark and I had to lighten them but you can get a sense of Mallika in the kitchen while cooking us an authentic Indian dinner. She called her family many times that day to get it all right.
 
Here's the final presentation.
 
These she called "sweet balls" but, no offense, we just had to call them butterballs. We still have most of them in our fridge weeks later. They're made almost entirely of butter, powdered suger and powdered milk - a real delicacy in India.
 
She left a week ago to go to NY and then back to school in Florida. She talked about coming back to the garden next year and we hope that works out for her because it certainly works for us.
 

Drowning in Blueberries

Friend and intern, Paul Horton, ran down to Georgia today to shake some more blueberry bushes. He came back with quite a few 5-gallon buckets. A friend there lets him harvest all the berries he can in exchange for helping keep the large patch in good shape.
 
Pat, Will and Paul being silly at the garden.
 
I've never liked rhubarb but recently Erin Kirley (famous baker around here) made a strawberry-rhubarb pie and I kind of warmed to it. Then Cameron made this pie and I really think my tongue is changing. It was good. I reserve the word "great" for blueberry pie but it was very good. There is also some strawberry-rhubarb jam in the background that she canned. There's a great deal of food processing going on around here - peaches to freeze, jam and dry, apples into applesauce, berries into the freezer and blackberries into bellies. It is such an overflowing, abundant time of year. Food just keeps appearing on the countertops.
 

More Honduras Children

 
 
 
 

Children of Honduras

 
 
 
 

Wendell Berry Will Have Lots of Us With Him

Wendell Berry Picks Jail Over NAIS

The National Animal Identification System (NAIS) listening sessions taking place across the country came to Kentucky last month. Wendell Berry, the agrarian poet and small farm activist, was there.
Story after story from these listening sessions has confirmed one thing: small farmers across the country are 100% opposed to the NAIS legislation. As you probably already know, NAIS promises to require every single livestock animal in America to be identified and tagged — no matter the size of the operation. So, you’ve got a few backyard chickens? Some milking goats? A small free-range pig farm? Say hello to expensive tagging & government paperwork. Not only will NAIS be so burdensome as to put many small scale farmers out of business, but it is a huge infringement on our liberties.
Thankfully, Wendell Berry is a passionate man, well versed in civil disobedience.
Listen to this crowd cheer him on as he gave his comments.
Read the text of his testimony:
The need to trace animals was made by the confined animal industry – which are, essentially, disease breeding operations. The health issue was invented right there. The remedy is to put animals back on pasture, where they belong. The USDA is scapegoating the small producers to distract attention from the real cause of the trouble. Presumably these animal factories are, in a too familiar phrase, “too big to fail”.
This is the first agricultural meeting I’ve ever been to in my life that was attended by the police. I asked one of them why he was there and he said: “Rural Kentucky”. So thank you for your vote of confidence in the people you are supposed to be representing. (applause) I think the rural people of Kentucky are as civilized as anybody else.
But the police are here prematurely. If you impose this program on the small farmers, who are already overburdened, you’re going to have to send the police for me. I’m 75 years old. I’ve about completed my responsibilities to my family. I’ll lose very little in going to jail in opposition to your program – and I’ll have to do it. Because I will be, in every way that I can conceive of, a non-cooperator.
I understand the principles of civil disobedience, from Henry Thoreau to Martin Luther King. And I’m willing to go to jail to defend the young people who, I hope, will still have a possibility of becoming farmers on a small scale in this supposedly free country. Thank you very much. (applause, cheers)
Did you catch that? Wendell Berry will go to jail if NAIS becomes law!
Fellow Food Renegades, it’s time to join Wendell Berry in fighting back. If you haven’t done so already, visit NoNAIS.org and find out what you can do to help! There are many different ways to get involved in this fight, the least of which is becoming a thorn in your congressperson’s side.
I owe a special thanks to Kim Hartke at Hartke is Online for bringing Wendell Berry’s comments to my attention.
This post is part of today’s Fight Back Fridays blog carnival, hosted right here at Food Renegade. For more news, anecdotes, recipes, and tips related to finding, growing, cooking, and eating Real Food, go check it out!
(photo by geoffandsherry)

Honduras Second Installment

Mango were cheap and pentiful
 
Sleeping quarters weren't bad either.
 
Blue water.
 
All the fish were served whole.
 

Honduras Meets Jake

I've been way tardy in getting photos up of Jake's trip to Honduras and I promised my mom I'd put up a few tonight. I have much more to post but for now, here's Jake and girlfriend Sara, and two of Jake in Grandpa Randy's hat. These were taken after the UNCA class was over and when Sara came to join Jake on an island for ten days. Of course you all heard that they got out one day before Honduras shut down the airport to keep the former president from returning. Guess you heard about the military coup too. My guys love to live on the edge.