Food History

Today some of my food history class met for a final expedition into the world of foods past.

We started at a local farmer’s market, where we explored winter produce. It was more late autumn produce than winter, despite the weather. Lots of organic lamb and beef, vast arrays of potatoes in all shapes and colours, lots of pumpkins and swedes and tomatoes and the last of the quinces. We all talked about what we would cook that night and next week and did some shopping, which was the best possible way of reinforcing everyone’s understanding of the effect of seasonality on eating habits.

After lunch we reconvened in Pialligo. Jonathan Banks of Pialligo Apples took us round his orchard.

Because some of the older apple varieties (including five crown and quarenden) had been stressed, green apples were growing out of season. Alas, the frosts were going to get them any night. Some were already being dissolved into refuse on the ground. I ended up with most of the fresh-picked apples to try to make verjuice (I’m still not sure how this happened, but I’m pleased as punch) and my students were almost terrifyingly enthusiastic about stripping the trees bare. We also stripped one medlar tree bare of its last crop (all seven fruit). All in all, less than a kilo of fruit, but rather strange pickings in June. Also cool to see that medlars grow on the tip of the branch (like quinces).

The apples were all in straight rows and had their own character. We were introduced to each tree and given its history. After the neat rows of apples, we went to the ‘wild orchard.’ Lots of self-sown stuff around the once-carefully-planted, from cleavers and hemlock and tansy through to Russian garlic and a tangled range of fruit trees. This would be an amazing place to walk through in Spring.

In the wild orchard we learned how apples and plums deal with each other (or not) and found out about morello cherries. The garden was unpredictable and profuse underfoot and we felt like children going over that and under this. Every now and again we would stop and there would be another feature to admire or another bit of plant history to learn. It was a fascinating study in how a disused nursery can be turned into a wild orchard (producing commericlally viable amounts of fruit) can turn into a moment showing what plants were Australia’s favourites in a place and at a time.

We emerged from the wild orcahrd and Jonathan turned to us and asked if we liked artichokes. Of course we did. I instantly started dreaming of artichoke soup. How much did we like artichokes, he wondered. It turned out we liked artichokes 2 kilograms worth, so he dug them up and my students lovingly extracted worms and shook them free of soil. We put them all in the produce bag and decided to sort out payment and who got how many later.

From artichokes we went to Russian garlic. It isn’t in season yet, but I happened to mention that you can use it half grown. And so we all have Russian garlic for slicing and eating. Very fresh, very fragrant. None of us will ever confuse Russian garlic for any other variety, either.

After the Russian garlic, it was a cup of tea in the garden near the studio, where talk ranged from cookbooks to feijoas to various other plants and their historical antecedents to home made liqueurs to wild-harvesting. Then we adjourned for a honey tasting. The honey from these orchards is particularly wonderful, very floral and gentle. We all bought some, and paid for our artichokes and garlic. The cleavers and the green apples were somehow just included in with the rest and I keep looking at them and thinking how lucky I am to teach subjects like this. I bet I don’t feel so lucky when I try to make the verjuice. That verjuice is going to be hard work without the right device.

seasonal+produce heritage+apples verjuice heritage+vegetables food+history