writing retreats

Farewell to 2012

by Rhona
January 1, 2013January 1, 2013
Copenhagen, London, Victoria, Weston A Price Foundation, writing retreats

Tis the season to look back over a busy year at the Iambic Cafe, as I wish you all a happy, healthy and sustainable 2013!

January… Copenhagen, mostly in the rain, and then some Cambridge…

then a farewell to London and then back to Victoria in the snow, just in time for GTUF’s seed swap:

February… the Victoria READ anniversary party at Government House, and then to Saskatchewan for a winter writing retreat in the snow, with nuthatch.

March… a mega-presentation (at the Imax theatre) by Wade Davis, in support of efforts to save the Sacred Headwaters – source of four of BC’s major salmon rivers – from extensive hydraulic fracturing (fracking) for methane gas extraction by Shell (and thankfully it worked, whether by Davis’ tread softly efforts or the more confrontational approach by Forest Ethics); the start of my studies towards a Permaculture Design Certificate in Nanaimo, with Brandon Bauer and others; and a poetry reading in Vancouver with Ruth Pierson and Ted Blodgett.

April…. freshly-hatched hummingbird chicks on my garden fence; work parties at Haliburton Farm and Gorge Park; plus more permaculture, a wild food festival and the Cucumbers to Clams discussion about local food, all in Nanaim0.

May…. A beautiful day at Alderlea Farm – with a beautiful lunch – and a chance to learn more about biodynamics from Dennis Klocek; and a trip to La Conner, WA to enjoy the Skagit River Poetry Festival (and an oyster taco or two!)

June …. tent caterpillar season with a vengeance; the Island Chefs Collaborative annual food festival; a tour of Terra Nossa Farm; and some lessons in wild food foraging with Roger Foucher.

July…. Canada Day of course; plus a tour of O.U.R. Ecovillage; a garlic harvest and the emergence of my mason bees plus a tribe of bumblebees from my Bombus Box.

August….at Sage Hill Writing Experience in Saskatchewan, then Calgary, then to the Okanagan for the ALECC conference; back in Victoria to discover the loss of my bombus colony; a tour of the Garden Path, with wildlife; and a rather special rural lamb roast with Slow Food Vancouver Island.

September… the Eat Here Now festival feeds bodies and minds at Market Square in Victoria; the Kneading Conference West teaches kneading skills and much more in Mt Vernon WA; the first Flavour Picnic feeds hundreds in Black Creek, near Courtenay; and panelists Trevor, Angela, Guy and Andrew give us words to chew on as they discuss community supported food systems in Victoria. Undocumented on these pages was my newest project which began in September and will finish in August 2014: a new course of study in holistic nutrition, which will skew my thinking in new directions over the next couple of years.

October… Raj Patel comes to entertain us with his thoughts on the global food system, swiftly followed by Gary Nabhan reflecting on climate change and traditional diets; Open Cinema turns 10; and Digging the City is born.

November… Digging the City gets some time in the spotlight at the Heritage House promotion; I get to hear my hero Sandor Katz at the Weston A Price Foundation conference in Santa Clara CA, with numerous others on the science of nutrition; and Digging the City gets dug some more at the Cornerstone Cafe in Fernwood.

December… Victoria Stone Soup event; visit to the Edible Garden Project in North Vancouver; my debut on national television; and finally, elves rest during the annual Christmas hamper stuffing party (this year 137 hampers made from donated turkeys & trimmings were collected by the Salvation Army for local families, including 4 vegetarian and 21 gluten-free baskets).

Sage Hill, Strawberry Scones, farewell

by Rhona
August 3, 2012April 6, 2026
Saskatchewan, writing retreats
4 Comments

I’m pausing in Calgary after an exhausting and exhilarating ten days in Saskatchewan. It was my second Sage Hill Writing Experience – a poetry colloquium a few Springs back was my introduction, but the summer writing program was a first, and an impressive one. Over the years, I’ve been lucky enough to have experience of other adult residential writing programs for comparison – the Banff Wired and Spring Writing Studios, and the Arvon Foundation courses in the UK. They all have their strengths, but the choice of faculty is always central. This year’s Sage Hill had a stellar cast:

L-R: Ken Babstock, poetry; Spider Robinson, science fiction; John Vaillant, nonfiction; Kimmy Beach & John Gould for introductory poetry & fiction; Helen Humphreys, fiction workshop; Lawrence Hill, fiction colloquium (=manuscript development).

I’d been dazzled, before coming to the workshop, by Vaillant’s The Tiger, and am looking forward to catching up with The Golden Spruce. There were seven of us in his workshop group, and we worked well and hard over what we swiftly realized was far too little time. Most of us were wrangling book-length projects, an impossible burden to lay upon a workshop group that had at most about 24 hours to read and comment on our work. We all managed to dredge some shareable sections for discussions, and the insights were phenomenal. John shared generously of his experience with writing and publishing, and led us all through what can – in a memoir-heavy field – be some very tricky emotional territory, with wit and sensitivity.

The week had its challenges: a lightning strike left us without internet access for two anxious days; the ticks were more active than they should have been, and the mosquitoes rapacious after a humid summer; there were a couple of brief interruptions in power and water supplies. And I think by the end of our time we were dizzy from too much sugar from all the creamy desserts and cornucopian platters of fresh cookies that appeared immediately after each meal. We were tired from too much dancing and singing, and too much time spent in the lounge lit only by our electronic devices.

But we were treated and fed extremely well. We had a couple of excellent thunderstorms and a tornado warning to further dazzle our views over the Qu’Appelle Valley, and lots of prairie sunshine. I spotted a few varmints in the grass, and we were endlessly circled and swooped by swallows, finches, hawks and the odd hummingbird. We took lots of pictures.

So it was with mixed feelings that I headed out of town yesterday morning, pausing at what a local described, on his way to his car, as “the best thing that ever happened to Lumsden” – the Fourth & James Bakery. We’d stopped there on previous visits to town. Doesn’t look like much at first glance, but the baking is first class, featuring such marvels as quinoa chocolate cupcakes for the gluten-intolerant, and fruit scones for the locavores (these ones featured strawberries from “just over the hill” – I’d missed the Prairie Cherry scones that were vanishing from the pastry case on a previous visit). Long may they reign.

The future of meat?

by Rhona
February 19, 2012
climate change, meat, writing retreats

The last few days at the SWG writers and artists colony are shooting past. The nuthatches returned last week, in fighting form, shooing away chickadees and picking all the largest peanuts to stash in nearby tree trunks.

Meanwhile my inbox has been attracting distractions. Stan has been sending me some meaty articles so I am sharing them with the rest of you as you prepare to tuck into your Sunday roasts.

The Guardian has just posted an article about the £200,000 burger that’s been whipped up in a test tube, in a well-intentioned move to cut greenhouse gas emissions linked to intensive cattle farming. Fair enough, sez I: if people really don’t care to know where their food comes from, and few seem to, why not? Could it taste any worse than TVP, or a frozen supermarket soyburger? It might even be healthier than a school cafeteria burger or frozen hamburger patty, since it wouldn’t be walking around in its own contaminants. Gwynne Dyer had been talking about cultured meat earlier this week, and some months ago we learned about the amazing progress Japanese scientists had made in recycling.. erm.. certain waste products into meat-like substances.

We are eating, I hope, closer to the source of our food at the abbey, although there were some niggling questions in my mind about the historical accuracy of the menu for last week’s Medieval Feast, which featured breaded fried chicken and macaroni and cheese served on locally-made bread trenchers. Try it yourself next time you don’t feel like doing dishes and your meal leaves your guests hungry enough to eat their plates!

READing and retreating

by Rhona
February 5, 2012February 5, 2012
writing conferences, writing retreats
2 Comments

I am back at St Peter’s Abbey for another winter writing retreat with the Saskatchewan Writers Guild and CARFAC artists. Mild and sunny outside, with hungry birds loading up on free peanuts. When I first started coming to the winter artists colonies, about ten years ago, only the chickadees were bold enough to come to our hands; then the nuthatches took over. Today it was only chickadees. Indoors, the colonists, as once we were known (retreatants just doesn’t have the same ring) are unloading ideas and getting into the swing of a quiet time among the monks.

A week ago I attended an anniversary party for the Victoria READ Society, which promotes literacy to all ages. This event was a day of games held at Government House in Victoria, introduced by Steven Point who toured the proceedings and seemed to be enjoying it. Also present was David Bouchard, the society’s newly-appointed literary ambassador, who was sporting his Metis sash and entertaining youngsters on his collection of flutes. Elsewhere there was a hot game of magnetic poetry happening, and much else besides.

Sick as a dog for Animal Health Week

by Rhona
October 3, 2011April 6, 2026
Banff, writing retreats
1 Comment

I’m in Banff again and at last, having left Victoria on Saturday morning for the long drive (some 932 km according to Google Map). I’d intended to stop over in Kamloops, but the wandering Irishman who vocalizes my GPS system got us lost and led me to a field the far side of town instead of the motel I’d aimed for, so I pressed on instead to Salmon Arm. Which made it a relatively short hop to Golden, where I’d last been in 2009: it was our breakfast stop in the neverending overnight Greyhound bus ride from Vancouver. It’s a stunningly beautiful location, perched on a river in the Rockies, just shy of the Alberta border, and I’d meant once day to return when I had a bit more freedom to roam. On that trip two years ago we had been set loose on the dubious culinary pleasures to be found in the Husky convenience store. If plastic-wrapped processed cheese and luncheon meat sandwiches are your dream breakfast, it was ideal, but I was hoping there was better fare to be found this time, so I stopped at The Island which had intrigued from its website.

Though they offered me the option of a late breakfast, I opted for a lunch food. In a restaurant that aims for more challenging approaches (=quinoa bread french toast would not be found on many menus) I reasoned a seeming standard item could be interesting, so I chose the caesar salad. I should disclose now that I’m suffering from a heavy cold so my senses may not have been operating at full speed. But when I see a salad like this I’m afraid my heart sinks: it’s just too hard to eat with a knife and fork. The parmesan rounds were crunchy and attractive but, like the bacon shards, shattered on impact; the croutons were, I’m guessing with approval, house-made from interesting breads, but too sturdy to be forked. So it took a good deal of cutting and balancing to negotiate into my mouth. The dressing had a nice bit of heat; the leaves were fresh, and that’s probably enough said. I was next drawn to the Rosehip Creme Brulee which was pretty but I rather wish I’d tried the Crabapple one which might have had a more identifiable flavour. Will write that off to my congestion. Anyway, all attractively served by charming and friendly waitress and a proper send-off to the rest of my journey to join the Wired Writing Studio which commenced properly this morning.

I’ll be working with Stan Dragland on seeing if it’s possible to shape some of this blog into book form, and otherwise rubbing shoulders with a geographically scattered group – participants have come from Ireland, Argentina, New Hampshire, Australia, the Yukon and NWT, and all points from Nova Scotia to Victoria. Unusually I seem to be the only West Coaster this time.

I’m sorry to have missed the Salt Spring apple festival, and the zillion other things that are happening on Vancouver Island this harvest season. But we can all celebrate wherever we are Animal Health Week, which the Canadian Food Inspection Agency reminds us is good for our health too. I’d listened to a couple of audio books on the way out here and in Guns, Germs and Steel, Jared Diamond makes the point that human illnesses had their origins in the animals we domesticated – and colonizing cultures brought both diseases and animals with them as they moved into new territories. So it’s a complex and important thing to think about.

Speaking of healthy animals, I hope that little orphaned Hunter is happy and healthy; he stopped over with me for a month this summer, keeping the rats at bay, taking me for long vigorous walks and hectoring my neighbours, and is otherwise looking for a permanent home after a lifetime spent mostly in a crate. He’s a handful…

Shropshire nosh

Back already from a week in Shropshire, enjoying good food and better company as we whiled away the week talking about food and food writing with tutors Lindsey Bareham and Paul Bailey and enjoyed the opportunity of a lifetime to break bread with Claudia Roden, who was a delightful, articulate and well-travelled guest speaker.

On arrival last Monday it had been deemed warm and fine enough weather, after a week of record-breaking rains, to sit on the terrace for a before-dinner drink. Unfortunately this left us open to an enthusiastic welcome by hosts of Shropshire midges, wild with appetite. I had in all my years in England somehow never personally experienced midges and always imagined them as some smaller variety of mosquitoes, but now I think they are more like a tiny, carnivorous mutation of the fruit fly, which has evolved with an insatiable taste for human flesh and an instinct that causes them, en masse, to try to enter the human head by any available orifice. More like what we Canadians might call a no-see-um. Ouch, by any name.

Luckily we had a few distractions of our own: a generous sampling of excellent breads and local cheeses (clockwise from top left: Wrekin White; Stinking Bishop; Gloucestershire Brie; Shropshire Blue; and Cothi Caws Cynros goat cheese)

and some wonderful Old Spot ham

from the nearby Ludlow Food Centre,

which we visited on Wednesday. A custom-built local food shop, in essence the farm shop of the Earl of Plymouth estate, 80% of its provisions come from 4 counties (Shropshire, Worcestershire, Powys and Hertfordshire). It has a central selling area surrounded by kitchens, from which resident cheesemaker Dudley Martin produces butter and cheese;

desserts (she was finishing work on some raspberry brulees during our visit) from food prize-winner Catherine Moran’s Sweet Stuff Slow;

meats, responsibility of the centre’s butcher John Brereton (from the estate, including organic beef, lamb and traditional Old Spot pork);

coffees (roasted and ground in-house), baked goods, and preserves like this Thai Perry Pear Pickle.

It was all, as they say, food for thought and we talked about the centre for the rest of the week, with interest and ambivalence. While there I picked up a little morsel of Tipsy Cherry Fruit Cake, the handiwork of The Simply Delicious Fruit Cake Company, and it was. The jam and pate I bought at the same time will be sampled later.

We were near a pretty village called Clun, where they have a castle with views of the town:

We ate well, by our own fair hands, with a little help and challenge from Lindsey’s and Paul’s collection of recipe books. Wednesday’s team were the winners of favourite all-round meal, with some Chez Panisse chicken, roasted vegetables, baked potatoes, and a garlic, pine-nut and cream sauce to bind it,