I came to Newfoundland for the first time just over four years ago. I can still vividly recall taking the ferry across from Nova Scotia in the late winter, listening to the groaning sounds of the ice around the boat. Within two months of arriving I made my first trip to Bonne Bay, a remote fjord on the west coast of the island. I went to learn about the food system and fisheries in the region as part of a PhD program I was beginning at Memorial University that fall.
Maple syrup conjures up images of towering arboretums in places like Quebec or Vermont, but it’s a little known secret that the rugged and hardy maple trees of Newfoundland make darn fine maple syrup. With nothing more than a half dozen maple trees, some old salt beef containers and a handful of 25 cent metal tree taps, you’re good to go and can expect to end up with over a dozen bottles of hand made maple syrup.
Spectacular vistas, whales breaching, ice bergs floating by, and a foragers paradise. We are blessed with many wilderness areas that offer abundant edible plants. I rarely go on a hike without stopping to have a little taste of this or that. In this post, I will touch upon some of the edibles currently available in our wonderful wilderness.
Thanks to the listing from Seeds of Diversity, I was able to locate a gentleman in Newfoundland who has a great deal of experience growing a wide variety of potatoes here. Last week, I recieved by my set of samples from George, and here's what my benefactor told me about the varieties:
Red Dutch: A very dry, yellow flesh red from Holland in the 1940’s. An excellent potato. Late maturing.
Northern White: A white flesh variety, from Quebec apparently, from the early 1900’s. Very high yield. Good taste.
The Turk's Gut Heritage House is a lovely spot that locals, people from across the province and tourists from away stop at to enjoy excellent company, delicious home cooked meals prepared with local vegetables, and social activities. The Heritage House will be container gardening this summer with seniors and plans to soon create a community garden that will be open to seniors, children and the general public. Community meals and fun social events happen regularly at the Heritage House.
Keynote Blogger: Alison Dyer, Root Cellar Researcher
They were once to the garden and field what flakes and stages were to the coves: built by hand, located for access, and essential for a family’s sustenance. Root cellars, a place of riches and rich memories, have been called both a folk craft and a forgotten art.
Finding one of these cellars in an overgrown meadow is like coming across the closet to Narnia – a passageway to another world.
And so captivated, at first by their simple aesthetic, I embarked on a photo and oral history project to open up that passageway a little. The past few years have been a fascinating journey along which I’ve met people such as Bert White who continues to use the cellar he built many decades ago.
“At one time everyone had their cellar…because you didn’t buy
vegetables all year round and if you didn’t store them you didn’t have them.
It was a necessity, the root cellar was.”Bert White, Change Islands, NDB
While cellars still exist in this province, many are in disrepair or are not being used for their original purpose. We are losing an important vernacular architecture and, I realize as I interview more elders, on the verge of losing a critical part of our intangible cultural heritage: that of the knowledge associated with cellaring, of how to live well off the land, of how to be food secure.
As I continue my research I’m heartened to see revived interest in these subterranean buildings. And hopefully they’ll not just be for tourists, but for the livyers too.
Writer Alison Dyer is researching and writing a book on cellars and cellaring in Newfoundland & Labrador. She is looking, in particular, for contacts on the west and south coasts to interview. Please contact her at: squidink@nl.rogers.com.
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