On June 29, The Food Connection hosted flavoured herbal vinegar and oil making workshop. This evening was my first Food Connection event. I brought my partner’s mother, Deasy, who is visiting from Indonesia. Right from the beginning we noticed the welcoming Food Connection environment. It’s always a bit intimidating to go to a group where you know no one. Soon after entering the room at Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House, our nerves were put at ease. This warm environment was

A Tasty Victory: The Food Connection’s 3rd anniversary party serves up a diverse, memorable evening of community spirit On Wed. May 25, I visited the Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House for a special hands-on Lebanese cooking workshop and community potluck hosted by my new friends at The Food Connection. Throughout the evening, I felt increasing gratitude as I watched our casual gathering grow into a lively and heart-warming example of food’s powerful message of hope, sharing,

It’s been nearly a year since I’ve been familiar with the concept of “Slow Food”. And no, that doesn’t mean food that takes forever to cook. I don’t think there’s a single definition that would sum up the entirety of the Slow Movement, including the concept of Slow Food. In fact, Carl Honoré wrote an entire book titled In Praise of Slow, in which he goes through the Slow Movement in great detail, and how it relates to cities, our personal health, and work life. However, to me

On March 30th, The Food Connection hosted a Community Growing Social, which was a fun casual evening where new and old friends got together to make Buddha Bowls, swap seeds and get excited about gardening. We appreciated the seed sharing with the seemingly unlimited choices and numerous ideas and tips for gardening; it was especially educational for us beginners. The discussion on bug infestation problems and solutions was of particular interest to us; one method that stood o

Bitters, Ginger Beer, Kombucha – Oh My! I’ve attended a few Food Connection potlucks over the past 6 months, but August’s potluck is my favorite to date as the workshop focused on two of my favorite things: fermented drinks (ginger beer and kombucha) and bitters (for cocktails or ‘mocktails’ – the non-acoholic variety). Back in April, Joey and I were chatting and I mentioned that my boyfriend Thomas has a food blog (shameless plug for Shady Morels here: shadymorels.com). I th

Ready, steady....cook! With nervous anticipation, my team pulled back a cloth to reveal the three ingredients we had been allocated for July's creative cooking competition; black beans, onion and zucchini. Now the challenge for our team, self-titled “Team Survivor”, was to use these base ingredients along with other pantry items to whip up a tasty dinner dish. All within 30 minutes! A daunting task for those of us like myself, who follow recipe books to the letter, or who hav

Searching for a good veggie burger recipe? I know I’ve been searching for one for several years. As soon as I heard that this month's recipe was coming from Whitewater Cooks, I knew I had to come out to this workshop. I'm a big fan of Shelley Adams' recipes so I knew this would be good. As with every Food Connection workshop, we introduced ourselves to everyone at our table. We were asked to share our experiences with veggie burgers. I confessed that during my post secondary

Every month we give people goodies to bring home from our free food workshops -- whether it's tea blends or spices, pickled vegetables or Irish soda bread. For our two-year anniversary this May, things got a whole lot meatier! We gave out 23 "goodie bags" of fresh chicken breasts, legs and thighs, bones for stock, and (for a lucky few) wings for wing night. Our neighbourhood supermarket, Buy-Low Foods made the whole thing possible, by donating thirteen whole chickens for our

Participants travelled from both near and far in torrential rain to our Show and Tea evening. The third event of the year was an intimate gathering, and as we arrived into the cosy, warm neighbourhood house, the entire group huddled around the table together to enjoy a delicious potluck supper of salads, pasta and fresh homemade bread. On the table beside us sat a wonderful array of teas brought along from our kitchens, cupboards and tea collections. After supper, we enjoyed

Chickweed, dock, plantain, clover, and dandelion. Weeds, they would seem. Most of us would walk on by without a glimmer of thought as to their utility. Some of us might recall seeing dandelion leaves in those pre-washed, ready-to-eat, packaged salads sold at supermarkets, but that’s probably it. Yet on the warm Wednesday evening in Mount Pleasant where a number of us gathered, our guest Lori Snyder, of Earth Awareness Realized Through Health, showed us otherwise. “A man may e