Flavourful Saskatoon, March 5, 2012

Foodie news and events in and around Saskatoon – wild rice, fair trade sugar, hot cross buns, and food lies and illusions 

Rusty’s Wild Rice
 I was delighted to meet a new vendor at the Saskatoon Farmers’ Market this weekend.

Russ Cameron of Rusty’s Wild Rice is selling certified organic long grain wild rice grown in northern Saskatchewan. He is also selling wild rice/whole wheat flour pancake mix and wild rice flour.

According to their website, Aboriginal peoples in eastern Canada harvested wild rice as an important food source long before it was introduced locally. Wild rice seeds were introduced into Saskatchewan in the 1930s as a way to increase the population of muskrats and ducks for improved hunting. Saskatchewan is now Canada’s largest producer of naturally grown wild rice.

If you follow the link for more information, you will discover a school curriculum unit on Wild Rice as part of the series Rekindling Traditions: Cross-Cultural Science and Technology Units.

 Hot Cross Buns 
Earthbound Bakery (1820 8th Street East) was selling hot cross buns on Saturday – yeah! They're organic and lightly spiced with large chunks of fruit. Baker Trent Loewen says the buns will be available on Wednesday and Saturday this coming week. In the following weeks leading up to Easter they will be available every day.

Fair Trade Sugar 
I was delighted to discover a growing number of food products at Ten Thousand Villages. It really is an excellent source of organic, fair trade foods, such as sugar or spices, which cannot be produced locally.

The last time I was in the downtown store, they had two kinds of cane sugar. Level Ground Trading purchases their sugar from Fruandes, a Fair Trade organization operating out of Bogotá, Colombia. The sugar is purchased from independent farmers or associations of small-scale farmers, whose workers receive a sustainable wage, vocational training, health care, and education for their children. The sugar is hand-processed in a cottage industry press. It’s part of an effort by Level Ground Trading to help farmers diversify with dried fruit and sugar as well as coffee.

Ten Thousand Villages has also teamed up with La Siembra Co-operative, a pioneer of Fair Trade Certified cocoa and sugar products. The sugar comes from Paraguay and Costa Rica. The producers use organic techniques to grow and harvest their crops. Various kinds of sugar are available.

Is the food revolution just a great big fat lie?
Is the food revolution just a great big fat lie is an edited extract (The Guardian) from Get Real: How To Tell It like It Is In A World Of Illusions by Eliane Glaser. As the article’s sub-heading says, “From the multimillionaire chefs who claim to be just like the rest of us to the multinationals making public health policy, there's something a bit iffy about the new food culture.” My thanks to KathleenCrowther – @katdawnc – for sharing this article on Twitter.)

Flavourful Saskatoon is a weekly Monday feature. I also post regular profiles of culinary entrepreneurs, new restaurants and new food products.

Follow me on Twitter or subscribe to Wanderlust and Words by email (top right-hand corner) to stay on top of Saskatoon’s evolving food culture.

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