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Playing catch-up
Time has got away from me, but here are a few highlights of my doings since November.
Christmas came and went – abbreviated by pandemic restrictions, but enlivened by snow, which after a couple of days of heavy shovelling became old fairly soon, particularly when accompanied by a polar vortex. Which was then followed by an atmospheric river, though happily not to the degree we experienced in November.
And then some signs of spring (rhubarb) to come, though it’s frozen and thawed and frozen and thawed since then. It will be a while until the soil is warm and dry enough to start planting anything. Meanwhile, I’m sorting and swapping seeds with neighbours and getting ready to plan this year’s garden.
In literary news, one of my poems, Tasting Dirt (all about compost!) appears boldly on the front inner cover of the current issue of Small Farmer’s Journal (winter 2021). Fascinating and one of a kind journal, lavishly illustrated, with lots on farming with horses and oxen, and all kinds of interesting detail on everything from setting up a binder to a report on the apples of New York in 1908.
Another poem, Hügelkultur, which happens also to be on a soil-amendment theme, appeared in the autumn issue of the long running UK literary journal Acumen, and was featured as a guest poem.
And finally, an update on the rice porridge post below, from last summer: I made some with black (“Forbidden”) rice and it was as delicious as I remembered. In addition to the spring onions, crispy shallots, cilantro, sesame oil etc, I added some winter broccoli and Romanesco florets, and fennel fronds and slices and a dash of gomasio. A perfect winter food.
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Channel this!
I’m delighted to have a poem included in the current issue of the Irish environmental literature journal Channel.
The editors accept poems from around the world and have managed the question of how to celebrate each issue with a launch by inviting participants to record readings and some photographic context. Then they put it all together and livestream it!
I read two poems from my upcoming book Larder, and sent some photos which the editors invited us to provide, to give context to the contributors’ lives and environments.
This issue is celebrated on Thursday November 11 at 8pm GMT – which for me is noon in Victoria. See you there?
(From the Facebook event page🙂
Details
We’re delighted to announce that the launch of Channel Issue 5 will take place via YouTube Premieres on Thursday 11 November at 8.00pm.
The online launch will feature readings by Irish and international contributors drawn from a pool of over 1800 submissions, along with photography capturing the settings that have inspired their work. We love the poems and stories gathered in this issue—ambitious, disruptive pieces that seem at home in the flux we’re living in today—and we can’t wait to share them with you all.
Also featured will be an introduction to the work of our Issue 5 cover artist, Kevin Mooney, a Cork-based painter whose practice explores the migration of Irish people and the gaps wrought in Ireland’s visual culture by this history of displacement. Kevin’s current exhibition, ‘The Erlish Tide,’ opened in the Excel Gallery, Tipperary, on 30 October, and features large-scale paintings informed by his research into the history, mythology and folklore of Samhain and Halloween. ‘Peasant,’ the painting featured on our Issue 5 cover, is taken from a body of work exploring links between the folk cultures of Irish émigrés and the cultures of the Caribbean.
Issue 5 is now available for pre-order via our website at https://channelmag.org/current-issue/.
Those who can afford to further support our work may consider subscribing to Channel to receive each new issue upon its release, or becoming a patron to also receive access to our digital archive of back issues as well as acknowledgement in print and online.
The launch video will be viewable from our website at the time of its release, or open the video in YouTube to chat with other readers and contributors during the event. We look forward to seeing you there!
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The Future… and the Rice Porridge
I attended (virtually) the Oxford Symposium on Food & Cookery again this year, with much less time available to spend perusing the papers and attending the followup question and answer sessions, but it was delightful to spend some time with fellow food obsessives from around the world.
One of the keynote speakers this year was Rob Hoskins, founder of the Transition movement, speaking on “What is to What If”. I was much taken with his Rilke quote
The future must enter you long before it happens
which he used in the context of the power of imagination to make change in this world that so needs it. His talk coincided with the launch of the millionaire’s rocket and the inhumanity of that gesture in a time of such need.
“Capitalism sells us short term pleasure,” he remarked – together with all the social and personal perils that ensue when expectations don’t meet reality.
In a more grounded session, I got my hands dirty.. well, food-encrusted anyway, at a Kitchen Lab online workshop. Organized by Danish chef Birgitte Kampmann in Copenhagen and featuring a diplomatic chef in Ottawa, Cameron Stauch, we delved into several unusual ways with rice, inspired by Stauch’s cookbook, Vegetarian Viet Nam. Here’s my version of his delicious recipe for Mixed Mushroom Rice Porridge (Cháo Nấm) – well garnished with home made crispy shallots, toasted sesame seeds, cilantro and spring onions – which found its way that morning onto my brunch table… despite a momentary power outage in the midst of the session, which knocked out my modem long enough to miss a few crucial steps!
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In her latest collection, Rhona McAdam navigates the dark places of human movement through the earth and the exquisite intricacies lingering in backyard gardens and farmlands populated by insects and pollinators, all the while returning to the body, to the tune of staccato beats and the newly discovered symmetries within the human heart.
“…A beautiful, filling collection, Larder is a set of poems to read at the change of the seasons, to appreciate alongside a good meal, and to remind yourself of the beauty in everything, even the things you may not appreciate before opening McAdam’s collection….”
Rhona McAdam is a writer, poet, editor, and Registered Holistic Nutritionist with a Master’s in Food Culture from Italy and a deep-rooted passion for ecology and urban agriculture. Her work spans corporate and technical writing to poetry and creative nonfiction, often exploring the vital links between what we eat and how we live. Based in Victoria, BC, and available via Zoom, Rhona is always open to new writing commissions, readings, or workshops on nutrition and the culinary arts.
