Friday, April 27, 2007

Peterborough Wednesday Farmers

- Market Opening Day Wednesday May 2nd -
Environmental issues are forefront for most Canadians these days. Climate change, over flowing landfills, soil, air and water pollution are issuesnagging us to take action. It can be overwhelming sometimes to know where to begin. The Peterborough Wednesday Farmers' Market is a great place to start. Food is one of those things that we make decisions about many times day.What we choose to eat, how it is produced and where it comes from all havean impact on the natural world.
The Peterborough Wednesday Farmer's Market, located in downtown Peterborough, is a unique market, as it is a local producers only market. What does that mean for you the consumer? Well that means that each vendor must ensure that 80 percent of all the products that they sell are produced from their own farm, while the remaining 20 percent can come from off farmas long as it is still regionally produced. By shopping at the Peterborough Wednesday Farmer's Market you can ensure that you reduce the “food miles”associated with the food you eat. When we reduce the distances our foodtravels to get to our table, we significantly reduce the greenhouse gas emissions our food we produces.Other good, green reasons to check out the Peterborough Wednesday Farmers'Market are:
· Healthy and farm fresh foods produce is picked fresh and brought to the market, often within a day of being harvested! Ecologically grown andorganic produce is also available just ask.
· Support your local agricultural community in developing a secure and healthy food system.
· You can leave your car at home and take the bus, bike or walk to the markets central location.
· Bring your cloth bags and/or support the Peterborough Wednesday Farmers Market by purchasing one at the market and reduce the number of plastic bags being littered, landfilled or even recycled in our community.
· The Peterborough Wednesday Farmer's Market is friendly, filled with vendors that carry a wide range of products from organic produce to localmeats, handmade natural soaps to fresh fruit, gourmet cooking to preserves, potting plants to spun wool, all locally produced. At the market you get to meet the growers, producer, chefs, and crafts people, ask them questions and get connected.
To start the season off in an environmentally sound way, the Peterborough Wednesday Farmers' Market will be giving away 25 Peterborough Wednesday Farmer's Market tote bags to the first 25 customers at the market on our OPENING DAY, WEDNESDAY, MAY 2ND , 2007. For the remainder of the day these beautiful yet sturdy market bags will be on sale for our opening day priceof $5 each.We hope to see you at the market every Wednesday! It is open from May toOctober, from 8:30 am until 2 pm on Charlotte St. (between George St. andWater St.). For more information contact:P aula Anderson 745-3238 or Lynn Hassen 705-324-9413

Thursday, April 26, 2007

The Martini Subculture

The Martini Subculture
By Chantal Saville

There is a whole world of people out there who live, breathe and drink martinis. Gin, a dash of vermouth and a lemon peel or olive. No more and no less. They are almost fanatical about it, to the point of getting right snippy if you dare to call one of those ‘other’ cocktails a martini.

A standard martini is a five to one ratio – five of gin, one of dry vermouth. A ‘dry martini’ uses even less vermouth. The less vermouth, the ‘drier’ the martini. People who are truly into the dry martini will ‘rinse’ the glass in vermouth, but ultimately pour it out before adding the gin. “Connoisseurs boast of… passing the vermouth cap above the glass, shining a light through the vermouth bottle onto the glass, momentarily passing the finished drink near a closed vermouth bottle, or jokingly whispering "vermouth" over the glass. It's been said that a "Churchill Martini" contains no vermouth, just British gin. The legend holds that Churchill would get as close to the vermouth bottle as to "look at it from across the room". This would make it very dry or a so called Churchill Martini.”[*] A ‘dirty martini’ has a little olive juice included with the olive, which is said to lessen the intensity of the alcohol. A lemon peel is another ‘acceptable’ garnish. In fact, the best way is to peel the lemon right over the glass. The peeling action releases some of the lemon oil onto the top of the drink. I myself prefer lime, but that’s a whole other story.

If there was ever a more schizophrenic drink, it is the martini. If you order a martini at a bar, you should receive a standard gin martini. Where it gets complicated is when people order a martini but in fact they are expecting something other than a gin martini. Because of course, the modern bartender can read minds! Should it be ‘shaken not stirred’? This ubiquitous sentence is from James Bond, who always orders his martinis this way in the movies. However, true martini followers have several bones to pick with Bond. First, he asks for vodka, which as we have explored above, is not what a martini is traditionally made with. More importantly, the use of a shaker causes the ice to chip into the drink, thereby diluting it. The proper way to mix a martini involves stirring it carefully with a long spoon. There are also those who say that shaking it will ‘bruise’ the gin. Ultimately, you can tell a shaken martini because it is cloudier than a stirred one, since the shaking adds air to the mixture. Furthermore, a true martini drinker will keep all his ‘tools’ in the freezer: gin, vermouth, glasses, mixing glass.

If you enjoy a good dry martini, you are in good company: Churchill, Truman Capote, J. Robert Oppenheimer, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Cary Grant, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt all partook in martinis, some with better results than others![†] During Prohibition, martinis were the drink of choice because gin was easy to produce – whiskey was too time consuming to make in the quantities needed by speakeasies. Today, there are thousands of variations on the martini that have been developed: Vodkatini, Kangaroo, Cosmopolitain, Appletini… I can’t even begin to list them. Purists, however, would disagree. They would say there is only one martini – stirred, not shaken.
© 2007 Chantal Saville
[*] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martini_(cocktail)
[†] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martini_(cocktail)

Monday, April 02, 2007

Update from Kawartha Food Share

Kawartha Food Share is pleased to welcome five new Member Agencies who are working to help fight hunger in Peterborough. These new member are:
- Big Brothers & Big Sisters of Peterborough
- Canadian Mental Health Association
- Peterborough Community Chaplaincy
- Peterborough Housing Corporation (30 Alexander Avenue)
- St. Johns Anglican Church

Each of these agencies are either creating a new or bolstering an existing food program to help clients who are going hungry. Kawartha Food Share is a distribution warehouse that now provides 30 agencies in the City and County of Peterborough with emergency food supplies. In 2006, our Member Agencies provided food to about 6,500 people each month, with 57% of these being adults and 43% being children. In 2006 we distributed over 400,000 items of food. The generous support of local residents, businesses and agencies such as the United Way enables us to help feed the hungry in Peterborough.

For further information please contact:

Chris Kawalec,
Office Manager
Kawartha Food Share
665 Neal Drive, P.O. Box 1413
Peterborough ON K9J 7H6
ph: 705.745.5377 fx: 705.745.7908
www.kawarthafoodshare.com