Work day at community orchard

On Sunday 16th January there will be a work day at Trenoweth Community Orchard on St Mary's (weather permitting). This will run from 11am to 3pm, but you can come and go as you please.

One key job will be pruning the fruit trees, so come and learn how to prune properly from experts. There will be other jobs to do also, such as hedge cutting, tidying up and wood cutting.

Bring some food and drink to share at lunchtime, bring suitable outdoor clothing and hope for some good weather!

The orchard field is the one bordered by red below: It's just north of the pine belt, on the path that runs down to Innisidgen:

The Crash Course

Chris Martenson lives in New England and is an analyst who studies trends in world issues concerning resources, climate, monetary factors and so on. His insight in to how these factors will come together and impact on our future (particularly to those of us in industrialised countries) is fascinating if quite worrying.

He has put all these together in to comprehensive but concise videos on You Tube and called it the Crash Course. Chris has recently reworked this presentation for a UK audience. In six parts, it has been made available free and is essential viewing. Part 1 is below:

Fossil fuel addiction

A great video by Richard Heinberg of the respected Post Carbon Institute called "300 years of fossil-fuel addiction in 5 minutes". Entertaining but very informative:

Sense of place

I've just been watching a brilliant piece of video from Diverse routes to belonging conference, by Alastair McIntosh. He is the author of Soil and Soul, and has done some great work on strengthening the resilience of local communities in the Scottish islands.

His talk is titled "Reconnecting with indigenous identity" and he makes some really deep comments about the Transition movement. He says a Transition initiative can be
"...like a drop of water - it moves rapidly sideways...it has lots of colours...but it doesn't have roots. It needs to become more like salt in the gravy, it needs to penetrate and permeate. It needs to go wide and deep. It should be about reconnection with what is already there."

Wow, powerful stuff and very true; he is a wise man indeed. Watch his video here: http://internationalconference.posterous.com/alastair-macintosh-reconnecting-with-the-indi

Local food is on the agenda

Transition Scilly and the AONB have joined forces to do some work on local food supply and demand on Scilly. It's been a while since a concerted effort has gone in to strengthening the local food sector, yet it is a critical factor of resilience in a future resource-constrained world.

Firstly we will canvas opinion about the state of local food here on Scilly, then hold a workshop with key producers and buyers of local food. Following this a report will be written by a local food consultant, surmising the current state of play and making recommendations for the future. This will be published before Christmas.

Then the hard work starts! Having assessed where we are and some possible ways forward, we have to come together to make those actions happen. Gardens and allotments are important here in providing food, but it is the farmers, growers and fishermen of these islands that the fate of food security really lies with.

Getting a concerted effort in creating a resilient food supply is critical, but not easy. But first steps are important and we hope to have some positive developments to bring you in the near future.

Prosperity without growth

In these times of economic recession and a seeming desire to have financial growth at any cost, perhaps it's worth taking a step back to examine the question "do we have to have growth in order to maintain our standard of living?"

Professor Tim Jackson makes a very persuasive argument that we can be prosperous without relentless growth. This excellent video from the TED talks in Oxford recently is well worth watching. Tim Jackson's book, Prosperity without Growth is available here.

10:10 events

The 10:10 campaign kicked off earlier this year to encourage people, organisations, businesses and governments to cut their carbon footprint by 10% in 2010.

On Sunday 10th October the date will be 10:10:10 and this is being celebrated by people organising international days of action to highlight skills and actions that help us cut our carbon footprint.

Here on Scilly we've gone one step further...co-organising with the Council a two day climate change and energy fair with fantastic workshops as well as drop in sessions on the Friday and Saturday. On the Sunday will be some fun freeskilling events.

All the events are free and happen between 8th and 10th October in the Town Hall on St Mary's. Details on the posters here:

Five Mile Meal

Not so long ago, the idea of people from any community in the country, but especially an island community, sitting down to a meal prepared from local produce, would have not only been unexceptional but often a necessity.

By contrast, most of the food eaten on the Isles of Scilly today has travelled many fuel miles, before arriving on the plate.

On Sunday September 26^th, at St Mary’s Hall Hotel, some 33 people, both islanders and visitors, sat down to a ‘Five Mile Meal’. The chefs, Phil (St Mary’s Hall Hotel) and Mark (High Tide, St Agnes), faced the challenge of sourcing their ingredients from local island producers (see below for details).

The diners were treated to a starter, main course and dessert by each chef, making a total of six courses. At the end of each pair of courses, they were asked to rate each dish by marking a score on a card. It certainly was a hard task to decide which dish was better as all were delicious.

After the meal, the overall results were announced and Mark was crowned winner of the day. The champagne flowed to toast both chefs’ success. They had prepared a truly outstanding meal that highlighted the quality of produce available on the isles of Scilly. (See below for details)

Transition Scilly would like to thank Joan Shiles, the manager of St Mary’s Hall Hotel, and the chefs, Phil and Mark, for making this event possible. It is hoped that another Five Mile Meal will take place in March 2011. My taste buds are certainly looking forward to Round Two.

Patrick Brown.

Starters

Vegetable broth, lemon thyme & nettle dumplings (v)

(Ingredients from Parting Carn Farm & Star Castle Garden, St Marys)

Crab salad with organic micro greens with nasturtium

pesto

(Ingredients from Ian Mitchell & Scilly Organics, St Martins.

Tamarisk Farm & Covean Cottage garden, St Agnes)

Main Courses

Pan fried mackerel fillet, crab & lobster ravioli,

aubergine caviar & shellfish foam

(Ingredients from Lee Sandford, St Marys and Tamarisk Farm, St Agnes)

Pollock fillet on buttered courgette ribbons with

lemon & dill hollandaise

(Ingredients from Ian Mitchell & Scilly Organics, St Martins)

Desserts

Vanilla bean panna cotta with fresh raspberries &

a raspberry sauce

(Ingredients from Troytown Farm, St Agnes)

Baba Ani`s blackberry jam & apple crumble, clotted cream

(Ingredients from Parting Carn Farm, St Mary’s. and Troytown Farm, St Agnes)

Update on harvest week

This week has seen the first Scilly Food Festival taking place. It never intended to be a huge event as it was organised with very little time or money, but it certainly seems to have engaged people and brought the concept of local food to the fore again. The intention is to make Scilly Food Festival a significant event in 2011.



















The harvest festival on St Martin's was well attended and had a lovely display of great local produce.





















Many businesses have done local food menus for the week. If they don't normally use much local produce then it's good to see them doing so, and if they do already then it's even better to see them shout about it. Some businesses have really taken it to heart by producing entire menus such as this.

Positive reports have been received about a number of venues offering excellent local produce on their menus.
















Today we pressed apples by St Mary's Church, using windfalls that would probably just have rotted away otherwise. Pressing is a great social event and is a positive process where you get some great drink at the end. In fact the juice will be going straight to the Five Mile Meal at St Mary's Hall Hotel the next day.

There will be another apple pressing on Sunday 10th Oct at the Town Hall - more on that nearer the time.

So far the Food Festival has been positive and there should be a lot of positive follow up work leading on from this event.

Food Festival programme

The Scilly Food Festival happens in the week 20th-26th September and is shaping up to be a good celebration of food from Scilly.

There will be an apple pressing on the grassy area in front of the St Mary's Church Pavilion on Saturday 25th September at 2.00pm. We are encouraging anyone with excess apples to bring them along, plus some empty containers, to turn them in to juice! Even if you don't have fruit come along anyway and have fun.

On Sunday 26th Sept at 12.00pm there will be an extraordinary Five Mile Meal at St Mary's Hall Hotel. Local chefs will compete to produce the best meal from local produce in a unique event. More details on this poster.