Open View Gardens

I eat seafood only when I’m on a seacoast.  Never in Vermont. Or at least not by choice. I know that this rather severe, absolute rule flows from having grown up six miles from the ocean, and from spending childhood summers in a cottage overlooking the salty water–water that was once filled with lobsters and […]

Apart from the five inches of snow that fell the day before Thanksgiving and the very few nights of 20ºF frostiness we’ve had this fall, the weather has been, well, ridiculous. Yes, ridiculous. Okay, there’s some good in this consistent warmth: I am still picking greens and herbs–the ones the deer do not like, that […]

Growing up in a family concerned not only about our own health but also the health of the planet and the surrounding wildlife, buying and growing organic food was naturally an important part of our lives. During my last two years of college, as I studied food from cultural, historical, human rights and environmental perspectives, […]

I’ve just returned from a work trip to southwestern Montana where it seems that most people don’t plant gardens. In towns, out on the ranches, I saw little sign of tomatoes or lettuces, even kale or broccoli tended in neat rows or clustered in raised beds. And vegetables that do grow?  They fold up early. […]

My family jokes about how when my husband heads out on a trip, Mother Nature lets loose. An albino robin appears just before he’s to leave. An owl hangs around in broad daylight, staring intently into the screened-in porch.  Bats flit about the house.  Birds get trapped in my studio. Coyotes prowl the garden to […]

Barbara’s Note: When Kristina was a student  in my creative writing class at Middlebury College a few years back, it was clear that she  would devote her life to doing good for the world through her passion for workers’ rights, social justice and the health of the earth.  And sure enough, she has spent  the […]

When I travel, I seek out farmers’ markets and food shops as much as museums and historic sites, hoping for the unique and telling glimpses into a culture offered by hanging about where people buy their food. And so in Montreal this past weekend, yes, the unforgettable Jean-Paul Gauthier show at the Museum of Fine […]

Cross-posted at Eating Well Magazine. I’ve been wondering about my flower gardens lately–asking myself why I put so much energy into those lovely blooms that buzz nicely with bees and birds and bugs and bunnies (and sometimes deer) and feed my eyes so magnificently but not my stomach. Perhaps I should rethink those beds, make […]

Addison Independent PATCHwork Column for May 12, 2011 Kerplink Kerplank Kerplunk When I was a child, those sounds–berries hitting the bottom of a tin pail in Robert McCloskey’s Blueberries for Sal—echoed through the blueberry field behind our Maine cottage.  I spent almost as much time looking for signs of Sal’s blueberry-ing bear as I did […]

Last month was the wettest April on record in these parts. And right now May isn’t exactly feeling dry. Lake Champlain has reached record levels; the rivers leap from their banks; the fields are soggy.  Even our pond which never ever floods is making noises about heading out over its banks and down to the […]