Wednesday, March 25, 2009
How to go homegrown
Roanoke Valley Extension agents are launching an ambitious community education program.
Lindsey Nair
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Eat local. Support your community's farmers. Grow a victory garden. Save our food!
The hum of these slow food tenets has lately been building to a hearty chorus, even in the nooks and crannies of America.
For Roanoke Extension Agents Sheri Dorn, Deb Chappell and Leslie Prillaman, it feels like the right time to do more than preach -- it's time to teach.
The three agents with the Virginia Cooperative Extension are pairing with Botetourt and Craig county agents Cassie Driskill and Andy Allen to launch an ambitious community education program called "Going Local: Growing and Eating Local Food in the Roanoke Valley."
Dorn, whose focus is agriculture and natural resources, is organizing a victory garden challenge with cash prizes for Roanoke and Roanoke County residents. And for anyone in Southwest Virginia who wants to attend, the agency is holding a lengthy series of public workshops on gardening and food preservation.
There will also be a huge local food expo at the Botetourt Sports Complex in August.
"Local foods are important to ALL people -- whether you are 4, 64, or 94; whether you live in the city or the county; regardless of race or ethnicity," Dorn wrote in an e-mail (laryngitis took her voice). "Where our food comes from and whether or not it is safe to eat is important to all of us."
Basically, there are two ways to eat local food: Buy from area farmers or grow it yourself. The Going Local program aims to facilitate both options for the people of the Roanoke Valley and beyond.
The workshop series, which has just begun and continues through fall, will cover everything from vegetable gardening and composting to constructing rain barrels and dealing with nuisance wildlife.
Chappell, the family and consumer sciences agent in the Roanoke office, will take on the "Eat Fresh Eat Local" part of the program. Along with area chefs and culinary students, she will lead cooking demonstrations and tastings with local food on the first Saturday of every month at the Roanoke Farmers Market, beginning in May.
Sam Dean | The Roanoke Times
As part of the "Going Local" program, Roanoke Extension Agent Sheri Dorn is organizing a victory garden challenge.
'Going Local' Calendar
She will also hold a series of food preservation workshops and will be coordinating demonstrations and tastings at the August expo.
For the expo, several farmers are already signed up to donate their products, including the Ikenberrys of Ikenberry Orchards in Daleville and Charlie Potter of Buffalo Creek Beef in Lexington.
"I think education to the consumer is the key issue here," Potter said. "People just need to be educated that it is not much harder to come and get my meat than it is to go back to the meat case and get a pound of hamburger at Kroger or Wal-Mart or Food Lion."
Dorn's "Vegetables for Victory" garden challenge requires participants to register their gardens and keep a log of their progress throughout the growing season. In October, they can submit their log, photos and application for a chance to win cash prizes.
The registration fee for the challenge is $20, which covers a soil test and the garden logbook. It also provides participants exclusive access to some online gardening classes.
As if that wasn't enough, Dorn and her cohorts would like to hold a series of "fieldside chats" with farmers to help them with marketing concepts.
And for the children, 4-H agent Prillaman is organizing a home garden project. For more information about that part of the campaign, check out the Your Community pages in the newspaper during April.
Without further ado, here is the list of activities that will take place as part of "Going Local: Growing and Eating Local Food in the Roanoke Valley." (See green box below.)
Most events have scheduled times and locations. If the time or location has yet to be announced, look for updates in our new Saturday garden calendar or on the Virginia Cooperative Extension Web site at www.ext.vt.edu.
You can also pick up a comprehensive guide to the campaign at the Roanoke extension office on Brambleton Avenue or at your local library.
Lindsey Nair's column runs in Wednesday's Extra.
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