Ode to Blueberries

 

Some things are sweetened by longing.   I put love and freshly picked blueberries in this category.   Falling in love, and finally having that love reciprocated, is at the top of the list of life experiences, of course.    At long last making it to the East Coast to eat ripe blueberries straight from the bush as the sun rises to warm them?  Right up there.

We recently returned from a tour of the Northeast where we were fortunate to spend a week at our relatives’  farm in upstate New York.  We arrived just as the blueberries made their vigorous deep violet appearance. We were in heaven. True blue heaven.

Each morning the youngest cousins woke and ran outside to fill several pints for the farm stand. I tried my best to help, but found that a one for the basket, two for me rhythm felt most comfortable. They soon learned that their aunt is not at all reliable in the Blueberry Picking department.

Here in Northern California I have tried a few times, both in our school garden and at home, to grow blueberries.  The southern highbush variety of blueberry is most successful in the Bay Area.  People claim great success with varieties such as "Revelle" and ""Misty" and "Bluecrop." Like their cousins, Rhododendrons and Azaleas, blueberries love acidic soil. They also like plenty of sun and a sandy well-drained bed.  The key, however, is that their roots must be kept moist as they grow. And they like a nice long, cold night. At the school I have had success with some small bushes producing fruit (before the gophers did their gopher thing) but nothing has grown more and more vigorous each year so that by the third year (which it was at the Neff family farm) you literally cannot keep up with the ripening fruit, glistening pearls of that irresistible sweet and slightly tart taste, bursting with high health and waiting for your nimble fingers, day after summer day.

Flavanols and reversatrol and proanthocyanidins…all sorts of crazy-good-for-you stuff is packaged in these  spherical treats. No wonder they are called Superfood. I teach elementary school gardening students to look for foods with the deep purple color-  this indicates cancer-fighting properties.

Home now, I dream I am picking blueberries. One for the basket…two for me.  This journey to the Northeast was a sort of pilgrimage.  I am grateful for the experience of traveling to a place where these fruits have always thrived and did especially well this year with the late rains, to savor them in their natural, exuberant state of well-being and bright blue productivity. Plus, the fruit of my dreams is only sweeter for my longing.

 Teya and her Aunt Nancy made pies

Here is a favorite "Peak-of-The-Season" Blueberry Pie recipe from an important cookbook called The Berry Bible by Janie Hibler  (only one cup of the blueberries are cooked, the rest are folded in, which gives the pie a freshly picked taste)

Makes 6 Servings:

3/4 cup sugar

2 1/2 tbsp cornstarch

1/4 tsp coarse salt

1 1/2 (3 cups) fresh blueberries (plus a handful for garnish)

2 tbsp butter

1 1/2 tbsp fresh lemon juice

1 baked 9-inch pie shell

1 cup heavy cream

2-3 tbsp confectioner's sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Combine sugar, cornstarch and salt in medium saucepan.  Put pan over medium heat and add 1 cup berries and 2/3 cup water.  Bring to a boil, stirring constantly until mixture thickens and turns clear instaed of cloudy looking, about 2 minutes.  Remove from the heat and stir butter, lemon juice, and the remaining 2 cups blueberries.  Pour the filling into prepared pie shell and refrigerate until firm, about 2 hours.

Before serving, whip the cream with confectioner's sugar and vanilla until stiff peaks form, and spread on top of the filling.  Sprinkle a handful of berries on top of the whipped cream. 

A Big Goat Party

I’m tired.  Really tired.  But who cares…My kids, of both the human and goat persuasion, are happy. 

Let me describe day one with baby goats.  Theodore (Teddy) and Delilah (Lila) arrive at our home dazed and subdued, wondering one thing:  when do they get to nurse again?  They’re old enough and sturdy enough to wean, but that doesn’t make it easy to leave Mama Ceci and go cold turkey.  They’ve been sipping from the milk bar day and night as long as they’ve been alive. 

Slowly they shake off the car-sickness, wander around their new home (our donkey stable turned enclosed chicken yard) for a few moments, realize mama and that warm elixir are not nearby, and begin to cry.  This goes on all day, non-stop.  We distract them for short periods with lengths of blackberry brambles, or oak and pine cuttings, but mostly, they want mama’s teat and the milk that comes with.  And they will cry until someone brings it to them.

Suddenly I’m thrown back to the weaning days with my own babies,  trying to get something done for the first time in years and all I can hear is my sobbing  one year old, outside with a babysitter who can’t stop the moaning and howling …the special cry, reserved for the immediate and imperative need for mother’s milk. 

What to do about these sorrowful babies?  I start by calling all the neighbors to apologize.  Their responses could have been a tape-recorded message.  “Don’t be ridiculous,” they all said, "This is Indian Valley.  We’re not the least bit concerned with animal noises and if we were, we wouldn't live here.”   So, that was a relief.  But still…the sound, it was  so sad.  It truly seemed we had locked two babies down in the chicken coop for the night.

Teya graduates from 8^th Grade in a few days, so that evening Sam and I took her to an end of the year parent-child celebration.  Jens and AJ decided they would go swim at a neighbors then bike home and put themselves to bed.  I only hoped they could fall asleep with all the noise, which only grew louder and more pitiful as evening fell.

Leave it to kids to figure out kids.  By the time I got home at 9pm, AJ and Jens were just  falling asleep in my room.  “Oh, it was a great night,” they reported.  “But we’re in here because we just got the goats down and didn’t want to disturb them as they were falling asleep,” AJ said.  I must have appeared confused.  “We tucked them into bed in my room,” Jens told me, “and we didn’t want to wake them up by going back in there.”

They had arrived home to a crescendo of crying, and being the practical children they are, they got straight to work.  AJ set up the old dog kennel.  Jens put the dog’s spiky collars on Teddy and Delilah and led them up to the house.  Then they sang them lullabies and petted them to sleep until everyone was happy and cozy, sleepy and...quiet.

Okay, I thought, having one of those moments where you the parent think that maybe, in fact, you do know nothing.  Maybe it is okay to have goats sleeping in your daughters' bedroom.  “Well…okay,” I said.  “That...sounds...good.”

All was well until around 3am.  I recall hearing something, but couldn't drag myself out of sleep.  I told myself,  "it must just be the ice machine."  Yeah, yeah, that’s it, the refrigerator’s ice machine making a racket.  I managed to sleep another  hour or so until AJ and I both woke up, realizing that there was a loud party going on.  Make that an unsupervised party.  Make that a big, unsupervised goat party, raging in the girls’ bedroom.  (When I walked in, Delilah was dancing on the top bunk and Teddy was butting himself in the mirror, reminding me very much of a frat guy I knew in college)

I don’t need to go into details, but suffice it to say that the dog kennel was not secure and that I’m doing lots of research on how to remove the smells of farm animals from non-farm settings.

I’m cleaning.  I’m tired.  But now, already on day two, all the kids are happy and playing, and everything is fine.

What is a Farmer's Market When you take Away The Farmers?

Here's a Wall Street Journal piece on the trouble some Farmer's Markets are having because some vendors, it turns out, are not farmers.

Wall Street Journal: Do You Need Farmers For A Farmers Market?

The Tipping Point at the Novato Charter School

In environmental circles the phrase “Tipping Point” is usually referred to when speaking about the catastrophic effect of climate change and our inability to reverse our own exponential negative impact on the planet.  Pretty depressing.  And overwhelming.  But I’ve seen a different, hopeful version of the Tipping Point in action over the past years at my children's school. 

In 2001, when the Novato Charter School moved onto a stretch of former US Air force base - barren, hard pan, cement runway rubble -  things looked pretty grim.  Many parents who had helped form the school just a few years earlier threw in the towel, saying the land was “dead” and that we could never have a healthy school on that abused land. 

Nine years, thousands of loans, donations, workdays, classes, and staff, faculty and parent volunteer hours later, it is my opinion that the Novato Charter School grounds have reached a Tipping Point.  The property is now home to one of the largest school gardens you’ll find – over an acre of trees, pathways, natives, succulents, arbors, chickens, greenhouse, butterfly beds, scarecrows…and wildlife.  Our school has become a preserve.  Walk through the garden some morning and you will hear the call of bluebirds and hawks, the songs of crickets, and frogs.  Lift a log and you will find lizards and millipedes.  Stand near the bugleia bushes you might just have a butterfly or ladybug land on your hand.

About three weeks ago a couple moved into the area.  After looking around, they chose our little school for their young.  They seemed to have chosen  the school for the beauty of the natural environment,  and the sense that their children would be protected and safe to grow.  This couple just happened to be birds.   Mr. and Mrs. Killdeer moved right onto the middle of the school grounds to lay their eggs.  It was the Sunflower Kindergarten class who discovered them that first  morning, and they roped off a large area so the new parents would feel especially secure on their nest. 

Safe as they are, the Kildeers still perform all kinds of antics when someone approaches.  Dad hops around threatening with his remarkable size (at least he feels big) and serious peeps…and Mom wanders off the speckled eggs to flap around very dramatically, acting as if her wing were broken, just to pull our interest away from her offspring.

The twin eggs are due to hatch any day now.  The chicks will emerge, ready to go.  We’ll watch them run away to find their own food, and we’ll hope they come back and visit soon.  The school’s eco-system has reached a Tipping Point, and now this healthy land will compound itself, on its own. Maybe these Killdeer kids will be back when they’re grown up and ready to hatch their own chicks.  We’ll be waiting.

Here's a little video.  Not much happens, but it pans to Father Killdeer, taking a break over in the sand box, about halfway though.  The Killdeer Family

And here is more information about Killdeer and their unique behaviors - ground nests, fake broken wings etc  Killdeer

UPDATE! 4/22/10 The chicks have hatched.  Below are two videos.  Amazing how ready they are for the world when they are born.  These guys are only hours old.
Mother Killdeer with baby #1.
Father Killdeer with baby #2

Spring Happiness: Mini LaMancha Goats

The Indian Valley Farm class is a gift that just keeps giving.  Last semester I overheard Maria Kennedy and Leslie Adkins talking about their goats and the fact that they often have kids for sale in the spring.  We have been visiting with the goats down the way for the past thirteen years, just loving these wise, sweet, feisty, hungry and affectionate animals...so it seemed that being within earshot of this conversation between my classmates was a sign.  It was time for goats.

Last weekend Leslie called.  Her mama goat, Ceci, had twins, a boy and a girl, both sturdy and healthy. 

The little palomino girl is Delila.  The boy is Theodore.  They will stay with mama for a few months at Inverness Valley Inn, then come to their new home where they will share the donkey stable and back pasture with the chickens.  I have been reading up about their care on an excellent site recommended by Leslie and Alden - Fiasco Farms.  This is the place to start if you are thinking about raising goats. 

Dirt Diva's "TALKING DIRT" is GOOD Dirt

Annie Spiegelman, Novato-based "Dirt Diva" gardening columnist and environmental activist extraordinaire, has really improved the crop of organic gardening books this spring.  I'm telling you, this is not only an excellent growing advice book...it is also great read.  Annie is simultaneously so funny and so practical.  You feel like you're talking over the neighbor's fence, and that neighbor just happens to be the person who knows what is really going on in the hood.

I highly recommend this book for anyone who feels overwhelmed by Organic Gardening Information.  And if you're already a seasoned gardener, this book will remind you about what is most  important.  I've read a lot of gardening books, and this one stands out.

I picked up my copies at Book Passage.  Here is the link to Annie's site, which will give you all purchasing options and upcoming book signings.

The Dirt Diva's Talking Dirt

Fields a poem by Faith Shearin

Fields

by Faith Shearin

            For Henry and Irene Spruill

My great grandfather had some fields in North Carolina
and he willed those fields to his sons and his sons
willed them to their sons so there is a two-hundred-year-old
farm house on that land where several generations
of my family fried chicken and laughed and hung

their laundry beneath the trees. There are things you
know when your family has lived close to the earth:
things that make magic seem likely. Dig a hole on the new
of the moon and you will have dirt to throw away
but dig one on the old of the moon and you won't have

enough to fill it back up again: I learned this trick
in the backyard of childhood with my hands. If you know
the way the moon pulls at everything then you can feel
it on the streets of a city where you cannot see the sky.
My mother says the moon is like a man: it changes

its mind every eight days and you plant nothing
until its risen full and high. If you plant corn when
the signs are in the heart you will get black spots
in your grain and if you meet a lover when the
signs are in the feet he will never take you dancing.

When the signs are in the bowels you must not plant
or your seed will rot and if you want to make a baby
you must undress under earth or water. I am the one
in the post office who buys stamps when the signs
are in the air so my mail will learn to fly. I stand in my

front yard, in the suburbs, and wish for luck and
money on the new of the moon when there
are many black nights. I may walk the streets
of this century and make my living in an office
but my blood is old farming blood and my true

self is underground like a potato. At the opera
I will think of rainfall and vines. In my dreams
all my corn may grow short but the ears will be
full. If you kiss my forehead on a dark moon
in March I may disappear—but do not be afraid—
I have taken root in my grandfather's
fields: I am hanging my laundry beneath his trees.

by Faith Shearin, from The Owl Question. © Utah State University Press, 2002.

(I first read this poem online at The Writer's Almanac )