Years before its two-month pre-Christmas store, Global Village Nanaimo ran a one-day fair trade sale called Fiesta.
To this day, people regret the ending of that event, because in one day they could buy Christmas gifts, meet friends and learn about projects supporting impoverished people, including local craftspeople and growers.
Well, we have another such event in Foodshare’s Seedy Sunday and last Sunday was the best yet. Memories of Fiesta came rushing back as my husband, Al, and I sat outside the Bowen Park auditorium eating delectable squash/ginger/dill soup made by François, the Foodshare chef, conversing with old friends and meeting new kindred spirits.
We bought the fig tree we had wanted ever since our neighbour was away one summer and left us to consume her fresh figs.
If you have only ever eaten dried figs – dry, chewy and excessively seedy – truly fresh ones are a treat awaiting. Last year the peach tree on our south wall died and the baby fig tree will replace it.
Sloping Hill Farm was offering fresh-ground whole wheat flour which we will try with Al’s famous bread recipe. I have resolved to keep a basket of herbal teas beside the stove for friends who do not drink real tea and I enhanced my stock with some local teas.
I bought tubes of natural lip balm for my daughter-in-law, including a medicinal one for when she gets a cold sore from living in the northern Interior.
There were strawberry plants to replace the ones that have deteriorated over the last several years, and every conceivable kind of seeds offered by B.C. seed companies who provide the open-pollinated seeds that maintain the hardy strains in many varieties which will deliver us from the clutches of Monsanto and its subsidiaries.
Al found seeds for the fat Royal Chantenay carrots that feed us all year round, keeping solid and fresh and never losing their sweetness. Amateur seed growers usually lack the space to avoid Queen Anne’s Lace (wild carrot), which lies in wait to seduce the eating variety by cross-breeding.
We bought some potatoes to seed the early red crop because last year we accidentally ate them all without saving some.
I sampled Italian shortbread made by a lady from Qualicum Beach which was light without being powdery, and tasted every bit as good as the Greek shortbreads which are better known.
The exquisite, perfect, miniature replica of a pink cymbidium orchid in a tiny porcelain pot makes the perfect gift for the prize-winning gardeners with whom we will be staying during our trip to Scotland next month.
Some other time I might get into the argument about whether Seedy Saturdays and Sundays should be devoted only to seed-swapping.
For more information about vendors and their products, please call Foodshare at 250-753-9393.
Marjorie Stewart is board chairwoman of the Foodshare Society and president of the multi-stakeholder co-op, Heritage Foodservice. She can be reached at: marjorieandalstewart@shaw.ca.
