Slow Food Pelham's January Meeting

Slow Food Pelham's meetings are gastronomic events in themselves. This month, Renee specified that our pot-luck theme would be Scandanavian food... a decision that was not met with universal enthusiasm, but which turned out to be inspired. The Slow Foodies seated communally around Renee and Daniel's long table in front of the fireplace were treated to pickled herring with red cabbage, home made gravlox with capers, potato and vegetable casserole, fried Scanadavian-style bread cheese, boiled potatoes with various sauces... and for dessert, licorice pudding, whipped cream-stuffed buns, and fruit soup. Not a Swedish meatball in sight.

We'll soon be posting all the recipes from our pot-luck dinners on the Pelham Convivium section of the Slow Foods Canada website.

This was a planning meeting, so various projects were put forward and these will form the framework of our upcoming year.

• a Slow Food cycling tour around Pelham and neighbouring regions. This will be in the form of a map-brochure which will outline routes that will take cyclists past local food producers, from cheese shops to market gardens to organic growers to bakeries. Once this has been completed, we will discuss having a one-day cycling event.
• a Slow Food oriented dinner at the Keefer Mansion in Thorold
• a repeat of last year's Cassoulet evening... this time to be held at Alvento Winery in Vineland
• an arranged tour of Upper Canada Cheese
• a repeat of the tour of Clos Jordanne
• visits to local farms and gardens such as Vivek's greens, and Mr. Knight's exemplary garden in Ridgeville
• a "foraging" evening featuring wild plants, vegetables, and mushrooms, along with game... in conjunction with a talk by Adam Shoalts who writes the natural world column for The Voice of Pelham
• a presence at the Pelham Market, perhaps in the form of comparison tastings of local and imported produce
• and the annual Featherstone Winery lamb roast in early September

Pelham Slow Food Celebrates Terre Madre Day

Terra Madre Day, December 10, was observed in the most convivial and delicious style by the membership of Pelham Slow Food at Pan Cafe in St. Catharines. Proprietor (and Slow Food member) Alex presented a menu of locally sourced foods (menu below) and credited the producers in her introduction to each course. Guests were encouraged to bring their own wine, and a nice variety of local Niagara wines appeared, including Inniskillin, 13th Street, Organized Crime, Creekside, and Vineland Estates.

Alex also offered a toast to Mother Earth that eloquently summarized the need for consciousness-raising organizations such as Slow Food, and events such as Terra Madre Day. Twenty-seven glasses were raised to those sentiments.

The Pelham Convivium joined 108 other convivia around the globe in honouring Mother Earth on this designated day, and a picture of the group will join pictures from all the other convivia on the Slow Food Website to mark this first Terra Madre Day.

The Menu for Pelham Slow Food's Terra Madre Dinner at Pan Cafe

Appetizer: local goat’s cheese, bread (de la Terre bakery), figs (St. Lawrence Market)

Soup: butternut squash (St. Catharines market) with roasted garlic (Vivek)

Main Course: roasted duck legs (Lakeland Farms) with red cabbage and mashed potatoes with celeriac (Vivek)

Salad: Vivek’s Greens with a maple vinaigrette (White Meadows Farms)

Dessert: Cheesecake with apple compote (Beamer's Orchards)

espresso/cappucino