Guerilla Cultural Repair

See the cool things you can do if you know how to repair stuff?
For a year from September 2005, under the nose of the Panthéon’s unsuspecting security officials, a group of intrepid “illegal restorers” set up a secret workshop and lounge in a cavity under the building’s famous dome. Under the supervision of [...]

Read Full Post »

Making cheese

I’m starting to think that it really is all about fermenting culture/s. Most cultures around the world ferment their grain products before eating them (sourdough, beer, African grain porridges) and cheese, wine, beer, traditional soda pop beverages, sauerkraut, kimchi, pickles, most condiments (soy sauce,catsup!) were originally fermented. Seemingly we were comfortable with our role as [...]

Read Full Post »

Leaf Piracy

When the leaves fall my thoughts, and the thoughts of permaculture-inclined folk everywhere, turn to sheet mulch. Time to feed the gardens or start new beds with all the free, organic goodness falling from the trees. My heart-felt thanks to all my neighbours who so painstakingly rake their lawns, bag the leaves and stack [...]

Read Full Post »

Fashion Crimes

It was enough to make you vomit all over your new denim jacket. The Gap has been caught using child labor in an Indian sweatshop, and not just child labor–child slaves. As extensively reported on the news, the children, some as young as ten, were worked 16 hour days, fed bowls of mosquito-covered rice, and [...]

Read Full Post »

Fermentation Learning Party

I’ve done two workshops with Andrea Potter on lacto-fermentation as a food preservation technique. She’s a delightful teacher who passes on the theory and history of lacto-fermentation as she passes out the knives and gets us chopping. A few weeks ago Andrea was interviewed on CBC (5 min MP3) to promote the [...]

Read Full Post »