Food

Mother of invention

by

Born of water, wool, soap and human hands — felt is the most immediate textile that can be created from the back of a sheep. The directness of the process, and utility of the finished product has found its way deep into the heart and soul of our kindred featured artisan, Katherine Jolda, a woman whose creative life has manifested fundamentally crucial garments for the 150 mile wardrobe. She has been deemed “a brilliant inventor, natural philosopher, and felt athlete” by those who have both observed and worn her work.

The myth of the self-made yeoman

by

No figure is more endearing and enduring in agriculture than the lonely plowman out there on the horizon who raises himself by his own bootstraps to financial success. Only problem is, there is no occupation more dependent on the cooperation of society and nature to achieve success than farming.

Review: Songs of Petroleum by Jan Lundberg and Diamonds in my Pocket by Amanda Kovattana

by

At first glance, Jan Lundberg and Amanda Kovattana seem like unlikely kindred spirits. He’s a former oil analyst turned whistleblower and rock musician, while she’s a British-educated Thai émigré who makes her living helping people become organized. Yet their similarities run deep, beginning with a profound concern for the planet and a flair for writing. Indeed, both are indispensable contributors to one of the top news sites on energy and the environment, Energy Bulletin. Both also happen to be accomplished memoirists, and their memoirs offer rare insights into family relationships, the vicissitudes of wealth and the quandary of being an environmentalist in an environmentally apathetic age.

Urban planning and food

by

With more than half the world’s population living in cities we have been told that cites are where humanities future lies. At the same time, awareness of the future challenges humanity faces are growing…The cry has gone out for “sustainable cities” and urban planners the world over are responding. In most people’s (and urban planners) minds cities primarily consist of people to accommodate and methods to transport them…The problem with answering this question is that urban planners have forgotten the fundamental reason thing that allows cities to exist and that will determine their existence in future.

What’s in store for 2012?

by

I am not by nature a squirrel. I don’t get a big feeling for hoarding or collecting stuff (though I do, like many coastline dwellers, have a habit of pocketing stones and quirky things from the beach). And yet this is the time when it is smart to be thinking ahead and stocking up with summer’s abundance. Some wise Transitioners have been at this for months: plaiting onions, bottling raspberries, cooking up vats of green tomato chutney and damson jam, drying rosehips and borlotti beans. Along their hallways and windowsills sit pumpkins of various colours and sizes, seeds carefully collected in a drawer, dried herbs and chillies swinging from the ceiling.

Citywatch: Occupy movement identifies food movement common inspiration and options

by

Move over, Bill Shakespeare. The whole world is no longer just a stage, and we merely players with our entrances and exits. Today’s world is otherwise occupied, as people in over 1000 centers around the globe play their role, take their entrances and exits around platforms, portals and places— the Three P’s of 21st century movement politics—as in Occupy Wall Street. The city-based food movement is based on many similar principles, so city officials and food advocates should take a close look and wave their jazz fingers when they see an idea that can be adapted.

The biggest ear of corn this year?

by

In the absence of any info to the contrary so far, I am going to draw myself up in grandiose hauteur and declare that I grew the longest ear of dent corn in the world this year. It is Reid’s Yellow Dent open-pollinated corn and if it is not the longest ear, I bet it is the biggest. Other years, I have grown ears nearly as long as this 15 incher, but this is the first time there were 20 rows of kernels on such ears instead of 16 or 18 rows.

What if a variety of dent corn could be developed that consistently produced very large ears on every stalk? My biggest ears easily contain a pound of kernels each. Even at a plant population of 25,000, lower than commercial plant populations used today, that would mean a record-breaking yield of over 400 bushels per acre. Because it is open-pollinated corn, the farmer could save his own seed, thereby saving a bunch more money. Think of the conniption fits commercial seed corn growers would throw, if farmers started planting with their own seed.