Reading Material

I've been sneaking some time with Barbara Kingsolver lately, seeking a change from the seed catalogs, gardening books and record-keeping.
Kingsolver's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle" is subtitled "A Year Of Food Life" and was written with her husband, Steven Hopp and daughter Camille Kingsolver. It's a chronicle of a family's food journey, packed full of information, recipes and love.

"This is not a how-to book aimed at getting you cranking out your own food. We ourselves live in a region where every other house has a garden out back, but to many urban people the idea of growing your food must seem as plausible as writing and conducting your own symphonies for your personal listening pleasure. If that is your case, think of the agricultural parts of the story as a music appreciation course for food – acquainting yourself with the composers and conductors can improve the quality of your experience. Knowing the secret natural history of potatoes, melons or asparagus gives you a leg up on detecting whether those in your market are wholesome kids from a nearby farm or vagrants who idled away their precious youth in a boxcar. Knowing how foods grow is to know how and when to look for them; such expertise is useful for certain kinds of people, namely the ones who eat, no matter where they live or grocery shop."*

It's kind of nice for me to think of myself as a farmer composer and conductor as I continue scooping planting mixture into cells, adding seeds and water as a well-orchestrated prelude to the symphony of green! You have the opportunity to experience the first movement which begins with fanfare at the Potter County Farmers' Market on May 24.

*ANIMAL, VEGETABLE, MIRACLE. Copyright 2007 by Barbara Kingsolver, Steven L. Hopp, and Camille Kingsolver. All rights reserved. (If you haven't read this book, you can find it at the Coudersport Public Library.)

This post is linked to: http://www.thismindbeinyou.com/2013/03/farm-girl-blog-fest-23-and-special.html