Q&A With Kathleen Van Cleve
By Cate Hennessey
In yesterday’s post, I reviewed Drizzle, a new book for 3rd-6th graders, by Chestnut Hill author Kathleen Van Cleve. Kathy graciously found time to sit down and chat about Drizzle, the importance (and loss) of place and family, and how books, relatives, and teachers shape a writer.
How did your family’s farm influence Drizzle?
Well, like in the story, an Italian immigrant– my grandfather – really did buy a farm from an Italian prince. In 1941, he bought 6,000 acres in the Pine Barrens from a prince who was also an ambassador living in the States … we grew cranberries and blueberries. Even though the farm isn’t operational anymore, there are cranberries growing at your feet since cranberries grow naturally in the Pine Barrens; they’re one of the few crops indigenous to the States.
Cranberry harvest is in the fall, and I think it’s staggeringly beautiful … One of the reasons Drizzle is magical is that I thought of our farm as magical … You can’t see a cranberry harvest on a beautiful fall day and not be stunned if you have any appreciation for what our earth can do.
So why set Drizzle on a magic rhubarb farm? Why not a blueberry/cranberry farm?
My first novel, Cranberry Queen, is set on a cranberry farm … I didn’t want to do that again. Rhubarb – I like the word – it’s fun to say. I had asked one of my nephews what his favorite vegetable was, and he said rhubarb (he likes to be a contrarian). So I tasted it and didn’t like it, which is why there’s chocolate rhubarb [in Drizzle]. Then I started to do research and realized rhubarb requires a lot of rain … it immediately makes it magical if a crop that needs a lot of rain grows in a place where there is no rain except what is guaranteed every Monday.
Even though the farm is magical, the kids in Drizzle are very real, and they carry burdens: Polly faces betrayal; her friend Basford has lost his mother to cancer; Polly’s brother Freddy becomes terribly ill. As an adult, how are you able to get back to a place where you’re able to evoke young people so well?
See, that question speaks highly of you because you’re so clearly a grown up. I’m 44 and writing a book about spelling dragonflies! I think like a child … I was the third of four kids born within five years and was allowed to just go off and read during my whole childhood – it meant I was safe and entertained and not fighting with my siblings. Plus I had thick glasses and braces – so I was allowed to stay a kid.
At the same time, I do think a lot of kids do have big things going on. I love the experience of reading things in the [children’s literature] genre and encountering something I haven’t thought about for 30 years, and then saying, I remember that. So I tap into that when I write.
You’re also very aware of the intricacies of human nature. For example, Aunt Edith is a wonderfully complex character – she was actually my favorite. What do you want young readers to take away from her?
She’s the antagonist, but I didn’t want her to be a villain … When she says, “I’ll destroy the farm if I don’t get what I want,” this is someone who has talked to presidents and changed the world because of her writing, and she refuses to be thwarted by the sale of a farm. Plus there’s the theory of benevolent dictatorship; she thinks the family will be taken care of financially.
But she has good reasons to sell the farm … she wants to write again. She gave up four years taking care of the farm; she’s desperate to be done. And she loves Polly, but she sees how much Polly loves the farm – like her grandmother, who believed she could “find all you need to find … in this rhubarb patch.” Aunt Edith can’t believe that somebody smart could make that choice. She also looks at Polly and knows that because she has the crooked finger, she’s the one [who can make it rain], and she doesn’t want to put that burden on her.
I hope people take away that [Edith] loves these kids – Polly, Patricia, and Freddy. I like Aunt Edith. I’m fascinated by people like her. There’s that line from Emerson: “I shun father and mother and wife and brother, when my genius calls me.” Being the Italian, maternal person I am, part of me says, No, no, there’s no way, but then again, I’m a writer, and I understand … I don’t know where the dividing line is. It’s hard.
Polly applies the water cycle and Emerson’s Self Reliance to work through dilemmas, but without her teacher, Owen, and Aunt Edith to introduce her to those concepts, that wouldn’t have happened. Did you have any teachers who shaped the person and writer you’ve become?
My aunt and uncle were my first teachers for sure. They were so amazing, so quick, so smart. They took me to plays, gave me books; they didn’t approach the world in a “you have to wake up, you have to go to your job, you have to come home” kind of way – all the responsible things that I’ve never done.
As far as teachers in school, mostly my English professor at St Andrews in Middletown, DE, who’s now headmaster – Mr. Tad Roach … he would assign a pretty standard paper, but I’d write a movie script or play. With Hamlet, I made up characters – Gertrude and Ramona – who see and talk about the play – and he wrote comments like,” I can’t give you more than hundred, but this is so great and fun.” He gave me confidence, showed me that it was okay to think that way.
From Penn, Al Filreis … he made us write an opinion paper every week … and he would read mine out loud to the lecture hall of 200 students. He forged a friendship with me that I didn’t have with any other teacher at Penn.
And then my screenwriting teacher, Shelley Evans, who told me, “You have a gift for this,” which was huge since writing’s never been the problem, it’s feeling like it’s okay, being confident … And my mom never stopped me from reading.
Drizzle’s acknowledgements give the impression that writing the book wasn’t easy. How long did it take you to write, and what challenges did you face?
It took three and a half years. I always knew it was about a farm where it didn’t rain, where a girl inherits the genetic ability to make it rain. And I always knew the last line: My name is Polly Peabody, and I can make it drizzle.
But the main issue between Polly and her Aunt Edith … that’s what I really struggled with. I wanted [the book] to be about what you do when you’re eleven and you love your parents, but your aunt, or this other person in your life, is everything – and suddenly this person shows their flaws.
When my grandfather died, the farm was left to my dad and his brother and sister. My aunt and uncle wanted to sell the farm, and my dad didn’t, but ultimately in 2003 it was sold. It’s really hard for me to accept still. People assume I wrote Drizzle because I have kids now, but it’s not. It’s this new phase of my life where this major part of my childhood has been lopped off, completely obliterated.
What makes it more difficult is that … my aunt, even than my uncle, is the reason I write, and with the lawsuit we didn’t speak for a long time … she passed away from colon cancer in 2008 – I didn’t even know she was sick. The book is dedicated to her. When Polly says about Aunt Edith, “How can I grow up without being able to tell her what I’m doing, what I’m learning, what my life is like? Sometimes, in the dark of night, I have an awful feeling that I really won’t see her again,” that’s informed by my aunt.
Are there any particular books that influenced you?
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The Witch of Blackbird Pond. Agatha Christie and Stephen King. Evelyn Waugh. And plays! Death of a Salesman. Tom Stoppard’s play, The Real Thing. And Angels in America by Tony Kushner – it’s the reason I went to New York; I used to be able to recite it.
Literature changes everything. I remember saying once to John Leguizamo, “What are we doing? Who are we helping? What difference are we making?” And he said, “We are, Kathy, we are.”
You currently teach screenwriting at Penn, and some of the scenes in Drizzle are so vivid that they beg to lift off the page. Is there a chance that Drizzle will be adapted for film?
I hope to adapt it myself this summer. Everything I write is very visual; it’s how I was trained. I just read and read scripts -hundreds and hundreds of scripts. So the farm, I can see it. I’ve been teaching screenwriting long enough; it’s time I bite the bullet.
Your sons, Jackson and Emerson, are 6 and 4. What are you reading with them these days?
Emily Jenkins’ Toys Go Out; The Diary of a Wimpy Kid series by Jeff Kinney; William’s Stieg’s Dominic and Doctor De Soto; the Magic Schoolbus. Jackson’s really into myths right now, like who is the Hydra, and who is Medusa. We also love Jon Scieszka – he remakes fairy tales – really funny! The book we read is The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales.
And Emerson, we’ve been into Tiger and Turtle, by James Rumsford. I encourage Too Many Toys, by David Shannon, since in our house, that’s so true. We do a lot of SpongeBob, too. We’re definitely a SpongeBob family.
Buy it here
Any new books in the works?
Yes! I think it might be called Small Town Gods. It’s about a boy, Ike, who wants to quit piano lessons so he can have more time to practice basketball. Ike’s piano teacher, who has special powers, offers to give Ike the perfect outside shot he wants, but in return, he can’t quit piano.
It’s like Drizzle, fantasy, but based in reality. I’m not a full fantasy person, but I’m not interested in the real, either. That’s why I love Charlotte’s Web. And I love the fantastic in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, but at the same time I love those mundane details, like how Charlie’s dad works at a toothpaste factory. Writing this way is so much fun – I can’t imagine going back to writing adult novels. It feels like this is where I’m going to stay.
Drizzle: By Local Author Kathleen Van Cleve
By Cate Hennessey
Drizzle, by Kathleen Van Cleve. Dial Press: 2010. 358 pgs.
The place where you grow up never leaves you. Sometimes it cleaves so strongly that it informs who you become and the art you create. For local author Kathleen Van Cleve, that place was her family’s farm in the Pine Barrens of southern New Jersey. She draws on her love for nature and the farm in her first book for children (grades 3-6), Drizzle.
But young readers shouldn’t expect an ordinary farm. Instead, they’ll dive into to a fantastical tale reminiscent of those conjured by Rhoald Dahl and E.B. White – with a sprinkling of J.K Rowling.
Eleven-year-old Polly Peabody doesn’t have many friends, but she does have a temper and a rather large chip on her shoulder. She also happens to live on a famous magic rhubarb farm: diamonds sprout from the earth, insects communicate with humans, and despite the dry Midwest location, it rains every Monday at 1pm.
But when Polly’s beloved Aunt Edith makes a choice that jeopardizes the farm, the rain stops. To make matters worse, Polly’s older brother develops a life-threatening illness. Polly must work through her frustration and lack of self-confidence to uncover the secrets that will save the farm and her brother — as well as discover her own answers about selfhood and loyalty.
Drizzle’s whimsy will captivate young readers, as will Polly, a protagonist whose imperfections will help children identify with and root for her.
Woven within these pleasures are important themes of family betrayal, respect for nature, and the usefulness of science and literature. (Polly applies Emerson’s Self Reliance and her science lab on the water cycle as she puzzles through her journey.) The result is a smart, thoughtful read that parents and teachers too will enjoy. Add a cast of memorable characters and the mystery of the rain, and the result is a book which encourages young readers to think more deeply about themselves and the world they live in. It’s no wonder that Drizzle has been chosen for Unionville Elementary’s 3rd Grade Read-A-Thon, to be held March 2011.
Kathleen Van Cleve has also published two adult novels, Cranberry Queen (a Book Sense 2001 pick) and The Difference Between You and Me, as Kathleen DeMarco. She earned degrees from the University of Pennsylvania, and after many years working in the New York and Los Angeles film industry, she now makes her home in Chestnut Hill with her husband and their two sons. The longtime writing partner of John Leguizamo, Kathy also teaches screenwriting at Penn.
Be sure to check back here tomorrow to read my interview with Kathy. We chat in-depth about Drizzle, the importance (and loss) of place and family, and how books, relatives, and teachers shape a writer.
17 Books For Your Summer Reading List
Do you remember the summer days of childhood? Marathon games of capture the flag, dripping popsicles, grubby T-shirts and shorts, maybe long afternoons at the beach or a mountain lake – but no matter where you lived or what you did, you had freedom and time to do as you pleased.
Freedom and time might be in short supply at your home these days, even when the sun is warm and vacation beckons. So, to maximize your summer reading hours, ccdwell has taken the guesswork out of what to pluck from the shelves with our recommended summer reading list.
These newly published (2009-2010) must-reads include the best of poetry to the best in kids’ environmental books, as well as cookbooks and non-fiction by local authors.
And if you know of a great summer book that doesn’t appear on our list, leave a comment and let us know. We’re always on the lookout for titles to share.
You can buy any of these books at your local bookstore or right here, where we offer one-click purchasing through IndieBound, a community-oriented service that brings together booksellers, readers, indie retailers, local business alliances, and anyone who wants to support their local economy.
Reviews by Cate Hennessey and Margaret Gilmour
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Cooking
Well Preserved: Recipes and Techniques for Putting Up Small Batches of Seasonal Foods, by Eugenia Bone. Canning is making a comeback as a way to keep your garden’s seasonal delicacies like tomatoes and strawberries available year-round. This book provides detailed instructions on preserving methods, as well as guidelines for 30 types of food, followed by recipes in which to use those perfectly preserved goods.
Earth to Table: Seasonal Recipes from an Organic Farm, by Jeff Crump and Anita Schormann. Celebrated as one of the best books on the market for novice locavores, this cookbook + composting tips + foraging strategies +canning and preserving guidelines provides a broad base for anyone interested in eating seasonally. A note of caution from online reviewers: the recipes, while manageable, probably aren’t for an inexperienced cook.
Clean Food, by Terry Walters. For many, the word ‘vegan’ equals complicated. But Clean Food presents more than 200 simple, fresh, seasonal, and sustainable dishes to challenge that attitude. Many of the whole food dishes can be used as main courses, but they can also be scaled down to side dishes to complement non-vegan fare.
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Gardening
The Compost Specialist, by David Squire. An essential guide that details every sort of compost bin from wood, plastic and wire mesh to a simple hole in the ground, along with how each crop, shrub or flower you plant will benefit from your earthy, wormy concoction.
What Can I Do With My Herbs? How to Grow, Use and Enjoy These Versatile Plants, by Judy Barrett. This book celebrates dry, poor soil and the herbs that thrive in these deficient conditions. Included is herb history, lots of herbal uses, as well as how to grow them in your garden to attract wild life such as swallowtail butterflies (that love fennel). The author shares her favorite recipes including lavender lemonade, thyme cheese rolls and a variety of herbal teas.
Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer, by Novella Carpenter. National Bestseller. This humorous memoir chronicles the author’s attempt at urban gardening in Oakland, Ca., “a postcard of urban decay,” where a vacant lot becomes home to edibles from tomatoes to strawberries, and a trove of farm animals and bee hives– all of which cohabitate alongside drug dealers, a deafening freeway and a junk shop. From Dwight Garner, NYT: “Farm City is a consistently involving book that includes one of the purest expressions of happiness I’ve read in a while, so I’ll end with that: ‘I felt young and healthy,’ Ms. Carpenter writes, ‘and nostalgic for the present.’”
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Fiction
A Gate at the Stairs, by Lorrie Moore. The year after 9/11, college student Tassie becomes a part-time nanny to a biracial child adopted by a professional white couple. But some people are not who they say they are, and Tassie finds herself in an adult world of loss she hadn’t anticipated. According to reviews, the strength and beauty of the novel is not so much in the plotline as the humanity of the characters, so carefully and lovingly wrought you can’t let them go.
Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, by Helen Simonson. Major Pettigrew, an ex-military gentleman in his twilight years, longs for the world to be as starched and proper as he. But when he finds himself in an unexpected romance with Mrs. Ali, he becomes the center of gossip in his small-minded town. Appealing characters and a good British wit complete the novel.
Ilustrado, by Miguel Syjuco. Winner of the Man Asian Literary Prize (awarded to the best Asian novel written in or translated into English), this novel begins as a murder mystery and expands into a satire about the political violence and corruption of the Philippines. The book’s disjointed style, which includes emails, blog posts, and flashbacks, may prove challenging, but in a recent interview with the New York Times, Syjuco reflects, “It’s … a contemporary novel. The way we consume information is fragmented.”
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Children and Young Adult
The Carbon Diaries: 2015 by Saci Lloyd. (Young Adult Fiction.) National Environmental Book award winner. This futuristic novel is written in diary form charting the first year of carbon rationing in Great Britain. Laura Brown, a 16-year-old Londoner and punk rocker, records her daily limits on utility, travel, and purchase of anything transported from afar, including food. This is an eco-thriller filled with an environment gone awry, family crisis and romance.
Earth in the Hot Seat: Bulletins from a Warming World by Marfe Ferguson Delano. (Nonfiction, Grades 4-6.) National Environmental Book award winner Nonfiction Category. Stunning photographic spreads and readable text takes young readers into the heart of global warming. Filled with scientific data, the book educates as well as entertains, and just as important, inspires the reader to become stewards for the planet.
Operation Redwood by S. Terrell French. (Fiction, Grades 4-7.) National Environmental Book award winner Fiction Category. Twelve year-old Julian Carter-Li goes to live with his uncle and discovers that his uncle’s company is planning to harvest a grove of redwood trees. The adventure begins when Julian and his friend Robin decide to runaway and save the forest, live in a tree house and best of all, see if they can make a difference. Sounds a bit like Hoot by Carl Hiaasen, which, if haven’t read, is also worth picking up. (Operation Redwood is a great read-out loud for younger readers (and anyone within hearing range.)
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Poetry
The Apple Trees at Omela: New and Selected Poems, by Robert Hass. A former Poet Laureate and Pulitzer Prize winner, Hass has always written with depth of and passion for the natural world – particularly northern California, where he lives. This book combines work from his first five books with new poems, some traditional, some more experimental – but all of it filled with simultaneous wonder and heartbreak.
Where I Live: New and Selected Poems, by Maxine Kumin. Kumin, another Pulitzer Prize winner, ranks with Hass as a poet to be reckoned with. For decades she has lived on a farm in New Hampshire, tending a garden, horses, children, chickens, and livestock; her poems have always been rooted in these labors. Kumin never fails to lay bare the raw emotions of existence, and her compassion for the living equals her compassion for death.
The Stranger Manual, by Catie Rosemurgy. Rosemurgy is an up-and-coming poet who lives across the river in New Jersey. Decidedly different than the work of Hass and Kumin, The Stranger Manual takes the reader on a wild ride through the voice of Miss Peach, a quirky, fluid character who is full of contradictions, insights, and wicked humor. Those who’ve read it say to expect to laugh out loud and be surprised over and over again.
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Nonfiction
If you’re looking for local flavor, these two books from local authors (published in 2010) will satisfy your craving for adventure, history and art—both are must-haves for your bookshelf, coffee table or bedside table. A great gift idea too.
Shipwrecks of the Delaware Coast: Tales of Pirates, Squalls and Treasure, By Pam George. (April, 2010). Climb aboard for an adventure in treasure, terror and local history as you wade your way through Delaware’s most intriguing and mysterious shipwrecks.
100 Artists of the Brandywine Valley, by Catherine Quillman. Summer, 2010 (look for it by July 1st.)
Thanks to Catherine Quillman for sharing her excerpts from her introduction:
“Coming up with the ‘100’ was not the difficult part—it was narrowing down the field from the dozens of accomplished artists who live and work here today. I decided to focus on those who work with the brush or pen, thus not including the many artists and artisans who work exclusively in crafts. A handful of the ‘100’ also work in ceramics and clay, but I still included them because either they are primarily painters or they see themselves as sculptors working in the figurative tradition. It also was difficult narrowing down a selection of photographers…My intention in compiling this book was not necessarily to create a book of artwork depicting the Brandywine Valley, but to define the many facets of the Brandywine Tradition—as a realist movement.”
52 Loaves: One Man’s Relentless Pursuit of Truth, Meaning, and a Perfect Crust
By Cate Hennessey
52 Loaves: One Man’s Relentless Pursuit of Truth, Meaning, and a Perfect Crust. By William Alexander. Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill: 2010.
We all get a little obsessed sometimes, especially when we hit upon something new and interesting (case in point, my three previous book reviews about chemicals in your home and how to avoid them). Usually, though, we lighten up a little and move on to other topics. I chose bread.
What I didn’t expect was William Alexander, a man who takes obsession to a level of intensity – and comedy – that’s hard to match.
His first mania, growing Brandywine tomatoes, culminated in the popular 2006 memoir $64 Tomato: How One Man Nearly Lost His Sanity, Spent a Fortune, and Endured an Existential Crisis in the Quest for the Perfect Garden.
In his newest book, 52 Loaves: One Man’s Relentless Pursuit of Truth, Meaning, and a Perfect Crust, Alexander chronicles with humor his newest infatuation: baking artisanal bread.
The enthusiasm begins when Alexander tastes at a restaurant the “perfect” peasant bread:
“The dark brown, caramelized crust gave a satisfying crackle when you bit into it… and managed to defy physics by remaining both crispy and chewy at the same time…The bread clinging to the crust was every bit as good… it had a rustic quality – a coarse texture that managed to be light and airy, with plenty of holes, yet also had real substance and a satisfying resistance to the bite…This bread demanded the attention of more than the taste buds: it was a delight to the eyes, nose, and the tongue as well.”
Years later he decides to recreate this loaf that has haunted his palate and soul. So he commits to baking the same bread every week for a year in his pursuit of the ideal crust and crumb.
A purist and perfectionist, Alexander resolves to use only 4 ingredients – flour, water, salt, and yeast. He grows, threshes, and grinds by hand his own red winter wheat. He builds an earth oven in his backyard. And a bread machine? Out of the question.
In the hands of some, such single-minded dedication might become tiresome. (After all, this isn’t cooking all of Julia Child’s recipes in a year – it’s the same recipe, over and over again.) But humor, often irreverent, is Alexander’s trademark, and he invites readers to raise their eyebrows – and laughter – at his wry misadventures: ruining a kitchen oven, building an outdoor oven without mortar, and paying attention to his rising bread rather than his marriage, to name a few.
Perhaps the greatest pleasure of the book is the history and science of bread woven into each chapter; what some view as a simple, everyday food takes on a complex life with infinite variations and cultural implications. Of particular worth are the fabulously entertaining discussions of pellagra (a vitamin deficiency that scourged the South in the early 20th century) and yeast. In Alexander’s hands, dusty old names from high school science, like Pasteur and van Leeuwenhoek, come alive with comedy and insight.
However, the wit flattens over so many weeks, and the middle of the book bogs down – not unlike the baker – while he exhausts recipes, methods, and the patience of his family.
Luckily, as the pages begin to whisper “just another midlife crisis,” Alexander treks his bread starter, or levain, overseas in search of answers and inspiration: he participates in a bread baking course at the Ritz in Paris, bakes a loaf in a communal oven in Morocco, and teaches monks to bake their own bread at an ancient Norman monastery.
In all of these places, Alexander is out of his element; travel proves difficult, and humor can’t save him. This makes the overseas journey the most reflective and lyrical portion of the book. Most importantly, Alexander introduces colorful, complex characters who help him along the way. Through their generosity and necessity, Alexander finally stops worrying about his own bread and instead shares his skills. It’s only when he looks outside of himself and finds faith in other people that he perfects his bread recipe – and finds other answers he didn’t know he was looking for.
In this spirit of sharing, Alexander includes a lovely index of bread-making books and resources; and yes, he publishes not only his make-your-own levain technique, but four of his best bread recipes, including that of his “perfect” loaf.
With his mouthwatering descriptions, Alexander will make you want to try his bread recipes, too. But invite your friends – and even a few strangers – to help in the kitchen. 52 Loaves reminds us that good food isn’t about mastering the intricacy of a recipe or fulfilling a personal obsession. Instead, it’s about community.
Greening Your Family: A Reference Guide to Safe Food, Personal Care, and Cleaning Products
By Cate Hennessey
Greening Your Family: A Reference Guide to Safe Food, Personal Care, and Cleaning Products, by Lindsey Carmichael. Peter E. Randall, 2009.
Slow Death by Rubber Duck convincingly argues that common products like plastic containers, fragranced beauty products, and antibacterial coatings are pickling our bodies with toxic chemicals.
Grow Your Own Drugs teaches you how to make herbal remedies and personal care items so you can avoid those noxious chemicals.
But Lindsey Carmichael’s Greening Your Family: A Reference Guide to Safe Food, Personal Care, and Cleaning Products is probably the best book for busy families who want to make better choices about everything from laundry detergent to sunscreen.
The book is as sensible as its name, a compact reference for those who would prefer to buy all-natural than make their own. For each type of product it mentions – everything from meat to baby wipes to glass cleaner – Carmichael presents a brief overview of the typical chemicals found in them and how the chemicals have been linked to health problems. In this regard, Greening Your Family is a valuable abridged version of Slow Death by Rubber Duck.
Even more importantly, following the scientific background of each product are charts of safer national brands, individual product names, and important notes or cautions. In short, this provides consumers with a quick and helpful alternative to reading the small print on every label.
But readers should note that Carmichael labels the brands as safer, not safe. Even products marketed as all-natural can contain less-than-desirable substances, so some all-natural products are better than others.
To help consumers make even more informed decisions, Carmichael returns several times to the work of the Environmental Working Group (EWG), particularly its Cosmetic Database, as a place for consumers to research personal care products before purchasing them. It’s an intriguing and user-friendly resource that rates products on their safety; it also receives consistent updates.
Particularly useful this time of year is the EWG’s sunscreen guide. Who knew that the sunscreens we use to prevent skin cancer often contain phthalates (linked to asthma, allergies, and problems with male genital development) and parabens (which interfere with the endocrine system)? The sunscreen guide provides a handy list of the safest sunscreens, as well as links to buy those products online.
All in all, using the EWG databases in conjunction with Greening Your Family is possibly the best and easiest way to feel good about what’s going into the products – and therefore the bodies – in your home.
Grow Your Own Drugs: Easy Recipes for Natural Remedies and Beauty Fixes
By Cate Hennessey
Grow Your Own Drugs: Easy Recipes for Natural Remedies and Beauty Fixes, by James Wong. Reader’s Digest. 2009.
After reading Slow Death by Rubber Duck, I considered making my own personal products; then I’d have no doubt about what went into my kids’ body wash. Plus, my girls love helping in the kitchen. We could make soap in lieu of chocolate chip cookies.
In my quest for recipes, I found James Wong’s Grow Your Own Drugs.
The title raised my eyebrows at first. Was Wong suggesting I grow poppies and certain species of mushroom in my garden? Add to this a bright, cartoonish cover and rather corny photos of the author sprinkled throughout the book, and I was hesitant about what Grow Your Own Drugs had to offer.
Like some plants, though, the beauty of the book is in its substance rather than its appearance. Wong, an ethnobotanist trained at the UK Royal Botanical Gardens – Kew, quickly establishes himself as a scientist well-versed in the medicinal properties of plants, and many of the ingredients in his recipes have gone through clinical trials that prove their effectiveness.
In short, Wong is passionate about the usefulness of plants – so passionate, in fact, that he hosts a popular BBC show of the same title as his book. Several episodes are available on YouTube, and they’re a good introduction to what to expect of Wong’s book: highly informative and presented in straightforward yet inspiring terms.
The recipes in Grow Your Own Drugs range from simple to complex; some include breath-sweetening spray, insect deterrent, and deodorant (all natural versions of which can be difficult to find in your everyday supermarket). In addition, Wong’s formulas for preventatives and restoratives sound as delicious as they are helpful. Goji berry and shiitake mushroom soup acts as an immune system booster; a kiwi smoothie with honey, salt, and feverfew flowers eases a hangover.
Many of the ingredients can be grown in your own garden, and Wong encourages readers to do so (garlic is his favorite plant for its ease of growing and versatility of use, as I learned from his interview with NPR). But if you don’t grow your own, many of the plants, herbs, and fruits can be purchased locally or found at the supermarket; one of his staples, beeswax, can be found through any of the local beekeepers profiled in a previous post.
For the more obscure elements, Wong includes a helpful resource directory with web and snail mail addresses. These hard-to-find ingredients, as well as the essential oils, can be pricey for those who just want to dabble with a few recipes , however. The up side is that many oils have a reasonable shelf life, so the investment may well be worth it for people who regularly brew their own remedies.
Though I found Wong’s book fascinating – especially the index of his top 100 medicinal plants, which includes other recipes not found in the main pages – I knew that replacing most of my household products with homemade ones would take time. That meant I’d have to save experimentation for the slower summer months. So what to do about my bathroom closet in the meantime?
The search was on for another solution, at least until my herb garden was at its peak and my mail order ingredients (like the pine resin for deodorant) arrived.
Tomorrow, I’ll share the best overall book for lowering the amount of chemicals that come into your home.
Slow Death by Rubber Duck: The Secret Danger of Everyday Things
It’s summer reading week at ccdwell!
Check in each day for Cate’s detailed, honest book reviews on just-published eco-books (2009-2010). Friday’s post is a list of must-reads that includes categories from the best of poetry to the best in kid’s environmental books, as well as more non-fiction, cookbooks and fiction.
By Cate Hennessey
Slow Death by Rubber Duck: The Secret Danger of Everyday Things, by Rick Smith and Bruce Lourie. Counterpoint. 2009.
When our daughters were infants, my husband and I spent one night a week making baby food. In the small kitchen we often bumped into each other, and the cleanup stretched toward midnight. But we enjoyed knowing where the food came from and what was in it.
We never thought about what we heated and served the baby food in, though. And we never thought about the plastic sippy cups or the lavender-scented baby wash or the nonstick saucepan or my husband’s wrinkle-resistant shirts.
But we should have. As of this writing, President Obama’s Cancer Panel has just released a report which states that chemicals in the environment bear a large burden for the increases in cancer.
The report backs up one of the most recent and thorough books on the subject, Slow Death by Rubber Duck: The Secret Danger of Everyday Things. Authors Rick Smith and Bruce Lourie argue that harmful, unregulated chemicals leach from common objects into our bodies and the environment. For example, phthalates and parabens – both commonly found in personal care products – act as hormone disrupters, and these chemicals may well be responsible for devastating conditions like autism, asthma, and infertility. Other chemicals, like the triclosan used in antibacterial soaps and coatings, are known carcinogens.
Worried about their families’ health, Smith and Lourie set out to discover just how easy it is to absorb and elevate the levels of seven high-risk chemicals into their bodies. So they lock themselves in a condo for several days and undertake what they call “normal” activities, like microwaving soup in plastic containers, feasting on tuna, bathing with fragranced products, using anti-bacterial hand soap, and hanging out on a couch freshly applied with Stainmaster.
They test their blood and urine again, which consistently show chemical levels increased beyond their expectation.
The increase in chemical levels is sobering, if not disturbing, and it makes the reader wonder just how much of the same chemicals have built up in their own body over years instead of just 4 days. Unfortunately the experiment goes to a few extremes; eating eight servings of tuna in 4 days and plugging air vents so as to inhale even more Stainmaster fumes probably don’t “mimic real life.”
Likewise, some readers may well be critical of Smith and Lourie’s agenda; after all, the authors make no secret of their careers as environmental activists. But overall, Smith and Lourie gain credibility through extensive research: they contextualize the chemicals and their experiment within environmental, legal, and medical history; contemporary sources include pediatricians, major corporations, government officials, and scientists; and case studies of citizens whose health and livelihoods have been threatened by chemical pollution illustrate real-world consequences.
In short, Smith and Lourie’s homework pays off, and their compilation of decades of environmental and medical research is valuable in its own right.
Slow Death concludes as a hopeful and proactive book. It shows how far we’ve come since the environmental disasters of 1960s, like the poisoning (and eventual rebirth of) Lake Erie. The authors also suggest that public support for a safer environment will move governments to ban or at least better regulate what goes into your kids’ toys and even your garden hose.
In that same spirit of optimism, the last chapter, “Detox,” offers a host of helpful, relatively simple solutions for lowering the presence of chemicals in your home. A preview: research toys before buying at Healthytoys.org; replace your PVC shower curtain with one made of natural fibers; avoid canned white albacore tuna; use glass instead of plastic baby bottles.
But more than anything, Slow Death convinced me to purge my bathroom of everything from the shaving cream to the tub cleanser. My only hesitation was that modern personal hygiene and housekeeping require a few necessities. How was I going to get a hold of products I felt good about using?
My first thought: go the same route as the baby food and make my own.
Check back tomorrow to find out about an ethnobotanist from the United Kingdom who’s been turning heads with his recipes for home-made, all-natural beauty products and remedies.
Honeybee: Lessons from an Accidental Beekeeper
By Cate Hennessey
Honeybee: Lessons from an Accidental Beekeeper, by C. Marina Marchese. Black Dog and Leventhal: 2009. 256 pages.
My first memory of honey comes from my father. Saturday mornings, he liked to spoon the golden sweet onto buttered toast and then fold the toast in half. Before bringing it to his mouth, he murmured, “The food of the gods!”
I agreed with him and ate my toast exactly the same way. I still do.
The other constant about honey in my life has been that it comes from the grocery store in a squeezable plastic container – sometimes bear-shaped, sometimes vase-shaped. It’s found in the aisle with the peanut butter and jelly, and then, once purchased, sits in the pantry with baking supplies.
C. Marina Marchese’s Honeybee: Lessons from an Accidental Beekeeper has made me whisk that honey from the pantry and examine it – as well as the honeybees that produced it — in a whole new light.
At first blush, the book may seem like it belongs on the city-person-turned-agricultural-pioneer bookshelf. Certainly, Marchese chronicles the first year of her journey from bee neophyte to beekeeper extraordinaire. (She eventually leaves her “real world” job as a designer to begin her own bee business, Red Bee.)
But the book’s center is not Marchese at all. Rather, it focuses on the creatures that provide her livelihood. As a result, the pages delve into the intricacies of the honeybee — its anatomy, sociology, lifecycle, and vital role in agriculture. In short, the honeybees make fruit and vegetable production possible; without the honeybee, our food supply would collapse.
If the importance of the honeybee to agriculture isn’t impressive enough, Marchese details the role of honey, beeswax, and the honeybee in history, covering countries as (more…)
A Taste of Heaven
By Cate Hennessey, Guest Contributor
A Taste of Heaven: A Guide to Food and Drink Made by Monks and Nuns, by Madeline Scherb
After the holidays, as the cold sharpens, even the kitchen can take on a gray cast. I’m restless. I want something new. I want to travel.
This year I found a perfect antidote for deep winter blues: Madeline Scherb’s A Taste of Heaven: A Guide to Food and Drink Made by Monks and Nuns. Much more than a recipe collection, the book acts as a doorway into the sustainable world of monastic communities, as well as the beer, wine, cheeses, breads, chocolates, cheesecakes, and other delicacies produced by them.
The book’s four sections, Celestial Spirits, Holy Cheese, Sweet Temptations, and Other Edifying Edibles, provide historical context on individual monasteries, the labor that sustains them, and the products that result from the labor.
Recipes then follow, and each includes at least one of the ingredients discussed in the section. For example, the Holy Cheese section includes a profile of Gethsemani Abbey in Genesee, New York; the accompanying recipe for Spinach Crepes calls for Gethsemani Abbey cheese. (The crepes, by the way, are creamy and delicious; the cheese is very mild, and the nutmeg in the cream sauce completes the dish.)
the book acts as a doorway into the sustainable world of monastic communities, as well as the beer, wine, cheeses, breads, chocolates, cheesecakes, and other delicacies produced by them.
Just as exciting as the recipes and the history are the suggested travel itineraries for those interested in visiting the monasteries in person. Some of the foods featured in the book (like olive oil from Ganagobie Abbey in Provence) can only be purchased by visiting the monastic community that produce them, and Scherb writes about these places and products with such reverence that I am more than tempted to book a plane ticket to Europe. (more…)
Lucid Food: Cooking for an Eco-Conscious Life
By Margaret Gilmour
Be sure to go: Lucid Food Book Signing and Tasting
Terrain at Styers, Glen Mills
Saturday, January 16, 12:00 – 2:00 p.m.
Learn tips and techniques for making easy and affordable eco-friendly food choices while sampling a few Louisa Shafia’s selections. Free and open to the public.
Has eating fresh food become complicated?
It doesn’t need to be. As food writer and cookbook author Louisa Shafia points out in her new cookbook Lucid Food, Cooking For An Eco-Conscious Life, without too much effort we can integrate affordable, local, earth-friendly food choices into our daily lives to cook up delicious, healthy meals.
This just-published (November, 2009) cookbook is filled with mouth-watering photographs and simple, tasty meals, and features a lengthy section on eco-kitchen basics you’ll want to curl up and read.
If you’ve seen FRESH or Food, Inc. you know there are options to an industrialized food system, and you’re not eating fast food burgers anymore. And with all the books about 100-mile diets and the life of a locavore (Plenty + Animal, Vegetable Miracle + Food Rules), much of the information Louisa shares is not new. So, with an ample supply of cookbooks emphasizing seasonal menus, do we really need another?
Louisa’s Lucid Food shows us that we do.
What’ gives Lucid Food new life is Louisa’s approach to important details, like the simple reasoning behind the choices she makes, and a few eco-terms and definitions you may not have picked up yet. Thrown into each section is a little surprise, such as an introduction to an ingredient you may have passed by in the past but become inspired to try. Examples: Dungeness Crab, a sustainable seafood choice, or the many alternatives to white sugar.
Then, of course, there are the spicy flavors and multi-cultural recipes all made with ingredients you can actually find locally throughout the year.
Louisa grew up near Germantown, PA before relocating to New York City to pursue an acting career. After five years in the city and one grueling on-stage tour around the country, she switched gears, choosing to slow down and purse her other passion: cooking.
She began by cooking vegetarian meals for a summer in Maine at a yoga retreat, then completed a five-month cooking school program before interning in San Francisco. “California being the local food mecca,” she says, “exposed me to using seasonal, local ingredients I now use in all my meals.”
Back in New York City, she cooked in a variety of restaurants, including Aquavit, where she went from relaxed California-style, to a more precise method of food prep and presentation. By 2004 Louisa started her own catering company combining all the styles she experienced, but never swayed from using fresh, local ingredients.
I talked with her this week about her new book:
What is your favorite book about environmental issues or any food/industrial agriculture?
Anything by Michael Pollan.
How do you stay connected to the food issues?
I read the New York Times daily, especially the Wednesday dining section. It’s the best way for me to keep up with the world of food.
What’s the one thing you would suggest that someone do if they want to make a change and begin eating more healthy food?
I recommend investing in a high-speed blender, a food processor, or a Crockpot. Any of these 3 items will drastically reduce cooking and prep time, and vastly increase the variety of dishes that you can make. (more…)
Brandywine Book of Food: Culinary Terroir
Once in-awhile something so delicious comes your way you just have to share it with everyone you know. That’s how we feel about the just-published cookbook featuring regional fare made by area chefs using local ingredients.
In the Brandywine Book of Food, Chester County writers Roger Morris and Cathleen Ryan, along with photographer Ella Morris, put together recipes, stories and mouth-watering images that taste so good you’ll want to devour them.
Which is exactly what we suggest you do.
Thanks to guest writer Roger Morris for sharing the back-story of Brandywine Book of Food.
By Roger Morris
About two years ago, Cathleen Ryan and I started down a path that proved to be as windy and full of surprises as a trek along the Brandywine.
Our goal was to produce a book that would reflect the culinary terroir of the Brandywine region of Chester County and neighboring Delaware – how the land, its waves of immigrants, the twists of history, social culture, and the current breed of farmers, winemakers, chefs and food artists all came together.
Last week, we reached that destination: The publication of The Brandywine Book of Food, which we believe is a pioneering work of considerable interest. Its birth statistics: 168 pages containing 75 recipes from the Brandywine’s best-known chefs, more than 180 full-color photographs, as well as the personal stories of many of these chefs, vintners and food purveyors.
There will be many book-signing events, and the books will be on sale throughout the region.
To start at the beginning: Anthony Vietri, the owner and winegrower at Va La Vineyards, told me one day about Cathleen, a pastry chef trained in France and America who was at that time just closing down Whitewing Farm B&B where she had been manager. Cathleen had been working on a regional cookbook, Tony said, but the project had fallen through. A shame, we agreed. So I called her.
We met in the main room of the deserted lodging and discussed how we would both like to do a book about food terroir in the same manner that one would write about wine terroir. Cathleen and I decided to give a go, wrote the first of many outlines, and set out to find an agent and a publisher.
We were soon joined by my wife Ella, a painter, photographer, and gallery manager, who would serve as tireless photographer and photo director for the book. I would manage the project and do the text. Cathleen would work with restaurant and manage the recipes. (more…)
Taste Test: ROOT
By Margaret Gilmour
If you like the taste of root beer, there is no question that you will like the taste of ROOT, a novel root-beer liqueur made from an 18th-century Pennsylvania folk recipe and 100% organic ingredients.
Just how much you sip of this potent spirit, though, naturally depends on what you’re used to drinking.
I mostly drink beer or wine, for example. Occasionally after dinner, I’ll have small taste of Port or Hungarian Tokai (Tokaji).
Leslie primarily drinks wine, and like me, maybe a small glass of Port later on a weekend evening. But she also enjoys a whiskey here and there.
Which gets us back to our taste test of ROOT.
Because I don’t usually drink hard alcohol, I thought one sip, over ice, would be enough for me. But that one sip provoked one other before I reached back for my beer.
What I liked: the blend of spices and smoky flavors lingering along with the root beer essence. I was relieved that it wasn’t syrupy sweet in the least, and was fascinated by the coolness––almost minty effect––it left in my mouth. But, most of all, I loved the aroma. (more…)
Goat Song: A Seasonal Life, A Short History of Herding, and the Art of Making Cheese
R E V I E W
By Cate Hennessey, Guest Contributor
Goat Song: A Seasonal Life, A Short History of Herding, and the Art of Making Cheese, by Brad Kessler. Scribner: 2009.
As someone who dreams of moving to a farm, I’ve thought a bit about the livestock I’d like to raise. Chickens, turkeys, a steer, and a few horses seem reasonable.
In all my musings, though, I’ve never thought about goats. They’re petting-zoo critters, or odd pets kept by rather odd people. And as far as functionality and sustainability, what do goats offer? Don’t they just climb ramps, eat weeds, and head-butt each other?
Finally, as someone who has read too many memoirs that try to encompass everything but the kitchen sink, I appreciated Kessler’s ability to focus on goats and leave the rest to the manure pile.
Essential Eating Sprouted Baking
By Margaret Gilmour
Unlike Leslie, I am not much of a baker.
And, honestly, in my house I prep, clean up and take over only when the menu is comprised of all things green.
So when a friend of mine, knowing I require cookbooks with inviting photographs to trigger any desire for meal preparation, left Janie Quinn’s Essential Eating, Sprouted Baking at my house, I opened the pages just to admire its pictures.
But I ended up reading the entire introduction.
The author, Janie Quinn, explains how she discovered the health benefits of eating sprouted wheat years ago. Interested in creating high-quality sprouted flours with only the finest grains, she teamed up with a manufacturer and a milling engineer, to produce Essential Eating Spouted Whole Grain Flours.
This endeavor spiraled into a successful family of green companies, including Essential Eating Lifestyle and Cooking School, Essential Eating Sprouted Foods and Essential Environments. (more…)
Ellen April Handcrafted Soaps & Body Treats
By Margaret Gilmour
Not all luxury items need to cost a lot, or be exclusive and hard-to-find.
Ellen April handcrafted soap, for example, is a slice of bliss Leslie discovered at the West Chester Growers Market last summer.
It was a bar of Northwoods, in fact, that captured her attention. One whiff of the forested scent took Leslie back to Santa Fe, NM, where she originally got hooked on handmade soap. 
Six years ago, Ellen Watson, the creator of Ellen April Handcrafted Soap and Body Treats, got hooked on handcrafted soaps too; so much so that she began mixing her own delicious suds in her backyard in Downingtown. (more…)
A Taste of Summer Vinaigrette
By Margaret Gilmour
With warm days ahead, simple salads that include crisp, local greens in all varieties can become a healthy, one-dish meal.
We believe that you should select your lettuce as you would design your garden bed: use interesting textures, play with combinations, but nothing you place should overwhelm the others.
Then, after focusing on the leaves, the other main ingredient becomes the dressing.
Leslie has tried many combinations, ultimately creating a dressing she loves and uses almost nightly in the summertime.
So, I thought I’d give her thoughtfully seasoned vinaigrette a try, reviewing it for you to let you know what I think. After all, my main staple is salad, so I can be, at times, a merciless critic.
Leslie presented me with a large, wide bowl tossed with Belgian endive, Bibb lettuce, arugula, and watercress, all just-kissed with her vinaigrette.
I chose a small plate for my tasting, and sat alongside a round cutting board imparting a few black olives, some crusty bread, a wedge of aged parmesan and one or two halved cherry tomatoes. A perfect complement to my salad.
My first, small morsel of greens was delicious. The splash of vinegar did not overpower any of the other ingredients, and the hint of garlic added just enough zip to the creamy combination of mustard and mayonnaise that had the leaves clinging to the mixture.
I was in heaven. I finished every bite before dragging a slice of bread across my plate.
If she ever bottles it, I’ll let you know. For now, here’s the recipe, which gets five stars and tastes like summertime.
Leslie’s Simple Summer Vinaigrette
Adapted from The Barefoot Contessa Family Style: Easy Ideas and Recipes That Make Everyone Feel Like Family
Ina suggests putting the dressing in the bottom of the bowl before adding leaves, then toss when ready. Serve in a wide bowl rather than in a deep one.
Local Flavors: Cooking and Eating from America’s Farmers’ Markets
By Margaret Gilmour
We can’t think of a better way to celebrate eating locally and the soon-to-open farmer’s markets (officially 5 weeks from today), than to review Deborah Madison’s cookbook about her journey exploring farmer’s markets across the country.
Local Flavors: Cooking and Eating from America’s Farmers’ Markets
By Deborah Madison
Some credit cookbook author Deborah Madison for adding “lacavore” to our vocabulary since she’s been writing about cooking with local flavors found in foods plucked straight from the earth for more than two decades.
She’s also supported for the Slow-Food movement for years, is on the board of the Seed Savers Exchange and The Southwest Grassfed Livestock Association, and stays involved with a school garden project near her home.
Madison’s cookbook, winner of a James Beard award, was released last May in paperback featuring melt-in-your mouth photographs of seasonal dishes, and reach-out-and-touch images of succulent produce.
It’s also filled with shots of farmer’s markets and farms you want to step into and visit for a day. Top off the visually spectacular spreads with side bar notes and stories detailing Madison’s stopovers at farmer’s markets near and far, and you won’t be able to put the book down.
But it’s also a cookbook, of course, driven by Madison’s market expeditions and seasonal ingredients.
The contents are ideally organized by season, a helpful guide for anyone inspired by cooking with what’s fresh and available each day. And it’s not entirely vegetarian, Madison also includes dishes made with organic meat.
The recipes are a creative, delicious mix of year-round temptations. Most are simple, some need close following, but all of them are worth trying at least once.
A favorite recipe: Asparagus and Wild Mushroom Bread Pudding
A favorite section: Greens Wild and Domestic
Most helpful chapter: The Foods That Keep
Buy it here: Local Flavors: Cooking and Eating from America’s Farmers’ Markets
Books that Inspire Simple Living
We’ve handpicked a few books filled with inspiring and entertaining stories, helpful resources and stunning images. Between the two of us, we either have a copy of the text on our bookshelf, or we have read it in the past.
Some of the books are mentioned in REVIEW, where we discuss good reading or products we’d recommend. So, be sure and check out the section to see if the book you’re considering is featured. It might help you decide which one’s for you. Personally, we love them all.
You can purchase any from the list at your local bookstore, or right here on our site through IndieBound, a community-oriented movement begun by the independent bookseller members of the American Booksellers Association. Click here Learn more about IndieBound.
Also check out 12 of Our Favorite Eat In-Season Cookbooks: A great cookbook should ignite conversations, as well as spark appetites. All of these compilations do both and much more.
Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone
Well Preserved: Recipes and Techniques for Putting Up Small Batches of Seasonal Foods
Earth to Table: Seasonal Recipes from an Organic Farm
What Can I Do With My Herbs? How to Grow, Use and Enjoy These Versatile Plants
Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer
Major Pettigrew�s Last Stand
Earth in the Hot Seat:Â Bulletins from a Warming World
The Apple Trees at Omela: New and Selected Poems
Where I Live: New and Selected Poems
Shipwrecks of the Delaware Coast: Tales of Pirates, Squalls and Treasure
100 Artists of the Brandywine Valley
52 Loaves: One Man’s Relentless Pursuit of Truth, Meaning, and a Perfect Crust
Greening Your Family: A Reference Guide to Safe Food, Personal Care, and Cleaning Products
Grow Your Own Drugs: Easy Recipes for Natural Remedies and Beauty Fixes
Slow Death by Rubber Duck: The Secret Danger of Everyday Things
Trattoria: The Best of Casual Italian Cooking
Honeybee: Lessons from an Accidental Beekeeper
El Farol Tapas and Spanish Quisine
A Taste of Heaven: A Guide to Food and Drink Made by Monks and Nuns
Lucid Food: Cooking for an Eco-Conscious Life
Plenty: Eating Locally on the 100-Mile Diet
Flowers and Herbs of Early America
Essential Eating Sprouted Baking: With Whole Grain Flours That Digest as Vegetables
GoatSong: A Seasonal Life, A Short History of Herding, and the Art of Making Cheese
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle & Plenty
By Margaret Gilmour
With the food movement in high gear, and planting season so close that you can take in the scent of hay and earth, we thought we’d take a look at two books helping to bring “Buy Local” center stage. 
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food life
By Barbara Kingsolver, with Stephen L. Hopp and Camille Kingsolver
Published in 2007, Kingsolver’s Best Seller tells the story of her family’s move from Tucson, Arizona, to their rural farm in southern Appalachia, where they vow to become exclusively “locavores”—those who eat only locally grown foods—for one year.
Harvesting their own produce isn’t new to Kingsolver, her husband and two daughters, but they welcome the idea of relying on seeds sown from their own garden or from animals they raise. An important part of their plan includes supporting local farmers by purchasing ingredients that are difficult or impossible to grow or produce themselves.
The novel is an eye-opener for those new to the disconnected logic of industrial agriculture and the plight of the struggling farming industry. It is also an entertaining introduction to the concept of living on a “Buy Local” in-season diet.
Kingsolver reminds us that local, seasonal fare is not only healthier for us, but is also environmentally responsible, reducing the energy required for transporting food from its origin to where it is consumed.
Even if you are an experienced gardener or a accomplished chef who allows the seasons to determine what you cook, the chapters on canning and cheese making, the side notes on ecology, the quick-and-easy recipes and the stories about turkey-breeding are memorable.
Ultimately, the book is about reviving the celebration of food, family and connectedness which has been in slow decline in these fast-food, fast-paced times.
A favorite paragraph:
Barbara Kingsolver celebrates her 50th birthday by inviting a huge crowd of friends and families but requesting no gifts.
“To make everyone comfortable, we had to make a suggestion. Camille made the call, and it was inspired: a plant. The tiniest posy, anything would serve. And truthfully, while we’d put prodigious efforts into our vegetable garden and orchards, our front yard lay sorry and neglected. Anything people might bring to set into that ground would improve it. Thus began the plan for my half-century Birth Garden: higgledy-piggledy, florescent and spontaneous, like friendship itself.”
Buy it here: Animal, Vegetable, Miracle A Year of Food and Life
Plenty: Eating Locally on the 100 Mile Diet
By Alisa Smith and J.B. MacKinnon
This isn’t just another book about the connections between community, earth and the food we eat—it’s a absorbing story about a Canadian couple who chose to eat foods grown and produced within a 100-mile radius of their city apartment for one year.
It was also published in 2007 and came out just after Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. Unlike Kingsolver’s experience, these urban pioneers grow very little of their own food and instead rely on a small community garden and goods available from producers and markets within a 100-miles of their home.
Almost overnight authors Alisa Smith and J.B. MacKinnon, both journalists, go from grocery-store dependants to self-reliant consumers. The story is personalized with the down and dirty details of their survival—from spats over who gets the last spoonful of cocoa, to details on separating chaff from the rat-infested wheat a farmer offers them.
As the year evolves, so does their relationship. Through playful dialogue and daily events Smith and MacKinnon show us how sticking to a 100-mile diet is an ambitious task. They mourn their loss of wheat (which means no bread, crackers or pancakes), but find a myriad of new uses for potatoes. Simple, pure ingredients are included in their menus that tempt us all to try something new.
The authors discuss in detail how we’ve lost touch with the natural web of farming, and how we can change all that, not by struggling through a year of a 100-mile diet, but by simply supporting farmers’ markets, the Slow Food movement and area restaurants supplied by local farms. If you’re not convinced that buying locally is a smart choice, you will be by the last page of this book.
A favorite paragraph:
“The history of markets is wide-ranging, of course. Mexico’s open-air markets really are as ancient as its cultures. Britain, despite a profound cultural bond to its ‘green and pleasant land,’ only opened its first market in Bath, in 1997. Deborah Madison, the local-eating pioneer who founded Greens restaurant in San Francisco, has said that a farmer’s market makes a small town of a big one. It also opens a timeless space in the relentless here and now.”
Buy it here: Plenty Eating Locally On The 100 Mile Diet
The Simple Home: The Luxury of Enough
By Margaret Gilmour
Just after we decided to make Chester County Dwell a reality, Leslie discovered this beautiful book. And its pictures and philosophy inspired us both as they seemed to echo ccdwell’s mission statement that we’d just about finished writing.
Inside its pages 21 houses are featured with six different approaches to creating a path to a simple home:
1. Simple is Enough
2. Simple is Thrifty
3. Simple is Flexible
4. Simple is Timeless
5. Simple is Sustainable
6. Simple is Refined
The concept is illustrated through full-color spreads of gorgeous photographs and through the lives and choices made by homeowners living in places ranging from small apartments to larger country homes. The author explains that simple doesn’t have to do with size, or style, rather it’s an attitude you take on and choose to embrace.
Even if you only look at the pictures, you’ll soon find yourself with an urge to de-clutter and scale back a bit. All the images are clean, spare and filled with ideas you can try right away, or use when planning future renovations. And the section on sustainable living is a great guide to living a greener, more responsible life.
The Simple Home will definitely inspire you toward a simpler 2009.
Buy it here: Good Reads
