Rohan Anderson's Blog

Your Ethics Vs My Ethics & Good bye

Ethics are an interesting human phenomenon. Ethics are a learnt thing, they’re personal, often very personal. Years ago I didn’t really have a large suite of ethics, instead I happily went about my business rather content in ignorance. As I aged, I started to see things in my life that compelled me to ask questions. What is this life all about? Why do I behave this way? Why have do I continue this habit? From these questions (and many more) developed an initial set of ethics, which continues to develop as I age (I dare not suggest ‘mature’).

 

Across the board in society, food ethics continually evolve. Years ago you’d never hear talk of local, free range, beyond organic or even vegan. I met a few vegetarians way back in the early 90’s but even then, a strict vegetarian was a rarity. These days though, many of us have an established view about the food we consume. Often you can see these views and ethics being passionately communicated via online platforms. One side tells the other side that they shouldn’t be eating meat, another team says meat is ok, but it has to be done ethically, another side won’t even consume any animal products, and then there’s people that just want an ‘In and Out Burger’. Another team even goes out of their way to support monoculture, pesticide and fertiliser based agriculture, stating that it’s the only way to feed the growing population of the world. And although many people would dispute that claim, it’s still the individuals right to hold such a belief. In some scenarios, ethics conflict with the ethics in a fiery storm of contradiction. Recently after posting an image of a hunted wild animal we shot to feed us, someone wrote to me, “wtf, I wish some lion will hunt you and eat you like this. How can you kill those innocent animals”. Deeply imbedded in ethics, lies many a paradox.

 

Much of the population remain distant of the realities of how the very food that fuels them is produced, be that plant matter and animal product. There is much wasted energy in arguments based on ignorant foundations, which, lets face it has been part and parcel of human civilisation. Wars have been fought over squabbles, racial or economically based motivations. The end result often achieves little, but ultimately costs the lives of many. Surely we have the ability to sort these conflicts out in a more humane manner, maybe I’m wrong and innately humans are prone to conflict, based on a differing set of beliefs. Anyway, I’m off track somewhat.

 

The point I’m trying to make is that now more than ever we are seeing a conflict of ‘my ethics are better than your ethics’. We spend time arguing with each other, convinced that how we live, the diet and lifestyle choices we make, are far superior than someone elses, and often this is all played out online. I can guarantee, even from this post, that someone will, on some platform still express their views, stating that someone else has it all wrong.

 

Meanwhile, back in the real world, away from the comments bubble on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and blogs, the majority of the western population is getting fatter, sicker and suffering from a plethora of chronic diseases as a result of diet and lifestyle choices. Thats a reality that none of us can deny, no mater what your persuasion of food ethics is. A reality that cannot be altered by opinion, is that as long as the humans continue to eat the poor food, the humans with continue to have the poor health. It is a simple case of cause an effect, regardless of the grey area reasons as to why it’s happening i.e. social issues, education blah blah blah.

 

Even more alarming than that is the reality that only a teensy wincy tiny percentage of the population have any understanding at all of what the food they are consuming, is actually doing to them, or secondary, have a care as to how the environment, including soil biota, livestock, atmosphere or the hydro systems are being treated.

 

One might suggest there is more ignorance than understanding or awareness in regards to our food production and nutrition issues. But it’s not like people aren’t making an effort to communicate about food problems. There is an entire genre of food documentary movies dedicated to these issues. Of which most are super depressing and leave you feeling an extreme sense of hopelessness post viewing, hence my current ban on food movies, thanks to a recent viewing of ’Just Eat it’.

 

Recently I’ve had a bought of depression and a feeling of utter hopelessness in regards to food woes. And it’s completely my doing. Allow me to explain. I started this site years ago, when I was chronically obese, I was medicated for hypertension, anxiety and depression and had the odd food reaction to the preservative sulphite. I had no idea where my journey was to take me, I just knew I wanted to change. I didn’t know I’d become a hunter, I didn’t know that I’d one day like fermented cabbage and cauliflower, or that I’d be excited about pickled beetroot on my home raised eggs for breakfast. I am happy that I’ve stopped eating frozen chicken nuggets and chips for my weeknight meals and I am glad that I decided to avoid food containing preservatives, agricultural chemicals and so on. Over time I changed from being a McDonalds, Subway, KFC loving consumer to a home grown DIY food producer, all because over the course of time, I  developed a set of ethics driven initially by a will to make change, as a result of health issues and a feeling of guilt about what I was feeding my children. Over the years I’ve poured my heart and soul into communicating this story, even the ugly bits. I’ll admit that sometimes I live so deeply entrenched in the process of making change that I get horribly depressed with the knowledge that this change (which would benefit other peoples lives, as it has mine) is not being embraced by the wider community.

 

 

So these are my ethics, they don’t suite everyone. Sure there might be a few people out there that have similar beliefs, but really it’s not everyones cup of tea. As much as I’d love to see change in the western world in regards to the food we consume, the reality is rather bleak. Change will never be made on a large scale. That’s just the way it is. Lets take television for example, it’s still the most popular form of communication out there, even if much if it is rebroadcasted on the internet. You’d be hard pressed to find a hugely popular program that tells the real truth about food production issues and nutrition realities. Instead most of us are distracted by, and I quote my girlfriend here “tits and fast cars”. A Kardashian story will get more interest than an expose on 417 Working visa abuse, and for obvious reasons, her arse is far more entertaining than hearing about some poorly treated Thai students, being over worked and under paid so that production costs remain economically viable to produce cheap supermarket lettuce. Who wants to hear that reality?

 

So where to from here? Again my partner shares pearls of wisdom with me. “Live the life you want to live, for you and your family, and just focus on that”. I need to stop being frustrated that I can’t reach a wider ‘audience’. I need to stop focusing on trying to communicate how my life story could be beneficial to others. That’s surely a form of arrogance, even if the intentions are driven by the desire to help others and the environment.

 

For years I’ve gone to great lengths to communicate that what I do, isn’t going to solve the worlds problems, or it’s something everyone should embrace whether they live town or country. It’s what works for me and my family, based on our established ethics.

 

So with this in mind, I’m taking a hiatus from this site. I have tried for years to be honest in my message, to show the reality that isn’t shown at the supermarket, the fast food outlet or even the fancy restaurant. I’ve reached my goal. I’ve found the lifestyle and the diet that I didn’t initially know I wanted, but I’m living it now and it’s done wonders for me, and I should be content with that.

 

I thank you all for your support over the years, the conversations, even the arguments (although the ignorant haters can still go fuck themselves for being outright rude). This site, the ‘journey’, the conversation, it’s all helped shape me in some way. I’m still going to write for outlets like the Guardian and a few others that are popping up, but next year all my energy will be focused on setting up the Nursery Project. A place that will provide access for skills learning, for those people that already have the drive to want to make change, not a place for me to try to change people.

 

Peace. Out. Good bye.

A Year of Practiculture (pre-orders)

My next book ‘A Year of Practiculture’ is due for release in Australia in August, just before Spring arrives. This book contains the story of a year in my life, beginning in Spring, following the efforts to prepare for the harsh central highlands winter. It’s also full of recipes of the food I cooked, stories of factual events, excellent use of witty humour, and my food philosophy snuck in as per usual.

If you would like to directly support me, then you can pre-order the book from me and I will even scribble on it for you. Pre-order here

We decided to release the book in the northern hemisphere at the end of next winter, just as we have in the southern hemisphere, so that the reader can utilise all the information from the book, to prepare for the coming seasons. But if you’re USA, Canada or UK based and keen to grab a copy asap, I’m sure  there will be some online book retailers that will post OS.

Thank you everyone for your continued support. I’ve put all of my passion and love for this lifestyle into this book in the hope that you will find some practical, spiritual or culinary use from reading it.

 

Ro

 

ORIGINS

 

Sitting alone around a camp fire while the fella’s took off, looking for rabbit. I stayed put, really didn’t have the inclination for that kind of activity. Let’s face it, I have and endless supply of white tailed beast in my backyard. On this night, I saw no need to look for rabbit, I was on a bird hunt. In any case, I had a mug of Pinot to concentrate on, and a cracking fire to keep me company.

Each autumn for the least three years, I’ve meet up with Nick at a rendezvous point out on his bird hunting turf which he’s been hunting for years. For some reason he invited me to hunt with him years ago and it’s become an annual pilgrimage ever since. Hunting quail is like hunting for morel mushrooms. It’s one of the rare activities where I’m prepared to put in more energy than what’s returned in output. I can spend a day hunting deer and fill my freezer that will feed the family for months, I can spend a day on quail and get one measly meal. It’s the same for trout fishing, it’s all relative I guess. Some tasks just pay off more than others. 

 

In some way, this is my folly. Even though the driving purpose is food acquisition, I’ll admit that it’s a lot of effort with little return. But man cannot live on Rabbits alone, or zucchini, or jalapeño. The point is that I like variety, even if sometimes more effort is required. While the boys were out hunting the evening for rabbits, I sat close to the fire, my back cold from the wind, but my legs and hands comforted by the warmth of burning logs. When the others returned they had a hare, of which the dogs feed greedily on.

Nick lives coastal, and he’s a keen fisherman so dinner consisted of two fish courses, calamari followed by whiting. To remind us what we where there for, he cooked us spatchcocked quail. Everything he cooked was done over the hot coals, and everything tasted amazing. Fresh tasty food that he’d acquired himself. He knew the origin of his food, he knew what he was eating. It’s deliberate food consuming. Nick is part of a growing number of people that’ve started asking questions about the food they’re eating, and the lives they’re been told to live, tired of the commercials suggesting what they should aspire to work hard for. I guess this why we relate. We see many holes in the system.

 

Nick, Leigh and I hunted most of the following day, in fields of soft grass, over irrigation dams and in across long straight paddocks so full of quail, even the dogs got confused. The pointers pointed, they retrieved and they rand 20kms to our 1. We got some birds, a few good meals worth, but definitely not a freezer filling day. So why do I go back year after year? Well the conversation is good, the value system make sense to me, and it’s a chance to hunt some place other than my surrounding paddocks. And at the end of the hunting day we actually had some food for our families and a new set of memories. All the lands Nick hunts on are privately owned so we don’t have the anti-duck hunting protesters there, which makes the day a lot safer. But what always has me absolutely stumped, is that no one protest us hunting native quail. I can’t grasp the logic of how people are prepared to put themselves in harms way to save a duck, but not do the same for quail, or rabbit, or trout, or yabbie, or deer all of which are sentinel beings yes? What makes one animal more valued than another? It always has me thinking about the poultry factory in South Australia that process 3 million chickens each week. No one human is standing out the front, placard in hand asking why the animals are living in horrid conditions and why so many chickens are consumed in Australia. To me it has contradiction written all over it.

The fact remains that there are more human raised birds forced to live in crappy conditions and killed in their millions, than there are wild birds hunted. But the media loves to focus on the duck hunting issue, the public perception of hunters becomes skewed, subsequently laws get changed, politically motivated to win over the public. There is the law of humans, and then there is the very real law of nature. Years ago, out of complete frustration seeing the flaws in the conventional food system, I picked up a gun and decided that if I was to continue to eat meat I’d have to kill it myself. An extreme reaction, to an extreme problem. I’m not alone. There is building momentum of people taking similar action, and it’s not just hunting. Let’s take Nick for example, he grows loads of food in his backyard, can be found in forests picking mushrooms, and feeds his small family with loads of fish, of which he pulls out of the water himself. Just like me, he wants to know the origin of his food, where it’s come from, how it was produced, what’s been added to it and what impact it has on his health, and the health of the natural world. It has to start somewhere. And it has. More and more I come in contact with people asking the similar questions. For now, it’s grassroots, but it’s building momentum. One day it might even be mainstream to eat organic, maybe even less processed foods. I’m not suggesting we all pick up guns and shoot our dinner, of course that would be madness. But there is always the opportunity for us to ask our food of it’s origin. It has a lot to tell us, and the food we eat tells us a lot about ourselves, what we believe in, what we value. Tonight I’ll cook my family the quail we shot yesterday. What does that say about me? Am I a murderer? Am I ethical? or do I just choose to live closer to natures way?

Hold the Choo Choo Berries

By now we all know the nutritional benefits of Choo Choo Berry products. A few years ago it’s like the product never existed, but now you see it at supermarkets, health food stores and gracing the black board menus of cool restaurants and cafes. Come on, who doesn’t love a choo choo berry smoothy! And so good for you right! It’s almost too good to be true. The Choo Choo (French Polynesian – Chaux Chaux) has been independently proven to cure many aliments from heart disease, obesity, wrinkles, athletes foot and chronic gullibility.

Years ago before the choo choo berry entered our lives as the next hot nutritional super food, we had a pretty boring life. Life without choo choo berries? I can’t even remember it. I feel great empathy for my forefathers who had a very boring existence in regards to food. Poor buggers. All they had to eat was vegetables, fruit, dairy and meat that where grown close to where they lived because let’s face it, food logistics was really in it’s infancy. (might I say archaic). Back then, because people where so uneducated in the ways (and obvious benefits) of pesticide use, most people had no choice but to eat organically. No choice! That’s just not fair. We don’t know what hardship is, but our grandparents sure did. Imagine having to go 9 months out of the year without being able to buy a tomato from the supermarket? It’s just unimaginable. They where so hardy back then.

This morning when I was making breakfast I couldn’t help but be #grateful for the food I was preparing. I jotted down where the ingredients where from and how they where produced. The potato and onion bread was gifted to me yesterday from a lady I took out bush to teach her about forest mushrooms. The yellow tomatoes and rocket where grown in my garden. The eggs from my hens, and the bacon from my pig loving farmer Tammi.

Because I had an open jar of my home grown pickled jalapeño on the bench, I decided that just for today I’d not have any Choo Choo berry with breakfast. I’m making a stand, a deliberate statement! I’ve been battling internally knowing that the Choo Choo only grows in the tropical island climate on the French Polynesian Island of  Moorea, and therefore has a huge carbon cost to get to my breakfast plate. I also read somewhere that the working conditions for the labourers on the Choo Choo farms is inhumane so I’m doing it for the underpriveldged Choo Choo berry pickers of the world. I figure if I choose one day of the week to go without Choo Choo berry I can make a real difference. One day less a week has to make a difference right? Anyway, even though my breakfast is now lacking in nutritional value to maintain my perceived health I’ll chew away knowing that even just for today, I’ve made a difference.

 

 

 

 

 

BUILDING

Steam rose from my hot coffee, fumbling a sip between straight patches of country road while another cup of coffee sat precariously between my legs (probably a little too close for comfort). The second coffee was for my boss, Mr Hatton. I’ve been working as his ‘mud boy’. This entails slinging loads of sand and cement into the mixer, and laying sandstone rocks to create beautiful walls. We’ve been constructing a grand farm entrance out in the hills north of Daylesford.

Since I left my previous life, I’ve really enjoyed working on practical everyday projects that reward me with a tangible end product. I’ve found that working towards a visible goal is so much rewarding than my old world of spreadsheets, digital mapping and graphic design. Here I work physically hard, get great exercise, learn a new practical skill and work outside, in the wind, rain, sun and mist. The only downside to this work is that I’ve discovered someone more cynical about the worlds problems than I am. In someways is depressing. Poor Mr Hatton, he doesn’t stand a chance.

He thanks me for the coffee and sets me to work mixing cement and laying stones. The wall is coming along nicely. It started with simple foundations, dug deep into the soil. Then one stone at a time, a wall began to appear. Along the way Mr Hatton taught me how to keep straight lines, maintain the levels, and how to respond with the appropriate amount of cynicism to leftist talk back radio. It’s been a interesting apprenticeship.

Most days working on our wall, I’d cook us a lunch over a quickly prepared fire. The evening before each day of work, I’d make a stew, soup, paella or anything that I’d be able to warm up over hot coals. Mt Hatton commented that he might continue to hire me, not for my stone laying abilities but more so for my cooking skills. I think he liked the idea of a mobile cook at his service. I was pretty happy with the idea too. Although I must remember to feed him less bean meals. I don’t think it was just that we were working on a hill as the reason for the frequent wind.

The wall is now complete. It took us a few weeks of hard yet enjoyable slog. Soon a grand steal gate will be hung, and the project will be complete. I can see all the effort we put into that wall. I can touch it, I can even lean on it. It will be there for many decades, and we built it tough so theres a good chance it will last over a few hundred years. Just the very thought of that wall still standing strong in a few hundred years time. It’s got me thinking about another building that hopefully will be evident in a few hundred years. And thats changing the way we treat food.

I’m happy to admit that I am part of a growing (building) movement of change. There is enough information out there that tells us that processed foods are not good for us, nor is it good for the health of the environment or the long term health of our communities. I feel like a broken record saying the same thing over and over again. I present talks to blank faces, sometimes bewildered looking people that are probably thinking that I’m a crack pot with my crazy ideas about food and lifestyle. And I completely understand their way of thinking. I would have totally dismissed ‘me’ seven years ago. I would have thought I was just another food ‘evangelist’ complaining about processed foods. If I didn’t get sick from eating crappy food all those years ago, then I’d still be a skeptic of ‘me’. So in a way I have processed foods to thank for showing me what type of a consumer I don’t want to be.

This weekend on a stage in Hampton Queensland I presented a talk on my ‘food philosophy’ and used a few examples of processed foods, I held up bottled lemon Juice, a cheese and crackers snack pack and some oven fries. I read out loud the ingredients of the processed foods and stated that if I don’t know what the ingredients are, and I don’t know what that ‘food’ will do to my health, then I won’t eat it. At one point I saw some heads shaking at me, I’m not sure what their internal reaction was to what I was saying, but it’s a message that has to be shared. This crappy message that no one wants to be told, HAS to be told because it’s clearly changed the health of the western world. No food corporation will ever tell you this, it’s not a smart business move to say “our product will make you sick”. And when I talk about corporations, I’m not a conspiracy theorist, I’m just sharing a shitty truth.

Walk through the supermarket, pick up any random item of processed food, look over the ingredients and ask the food “what are you made of, what will you do to my body?” I do not know what the ingredients of most of the processed food on the supermarket shelves, but I do know that they made me sick. For years I was eating food labelled ‘low fat’ only to be consuming food with loads of hidden sugar that my body hurriedly converted to fat. I ate food with preservatives, then struggled to breathe for a few hours as a reaction. I got obese, I got hypertension from consuming too much salt and I suffered that most popular of modern diseases, anxiety and depression.

Now I eat real food. Food that I grow, or hunt or source from organic producers. I now know that food that starts from the ingredients that nature provides are ingredients our bodies have evolved to process. Plant matter, meat and diary. Humans have been eating food made from these basic natural ingredients since the get to and that’s what I strive to consume in my home kitchen. As a result I don’t suffer AT ALL from those above mentioned illness’s.

I’m home from Queensland now and feeling invigorated. I feel a ground swell building. There is change coming. It’s a market driven consumer change. People are sick and tired of being sick. We can no longer expect any changes or improvements in processed foods. We need to take back the control of our food, we need to start from basics. I’m prepared to be a facilitator of that change. I’m here to teach what I can and share the skills I’ve picked up of the last however many years I’ve been on my journey. This Saturday I’m running GROW with RO, sharing skills about setting up your winter vegetable garden. On Sunday I’m running a wild edible mushroom workshop. I hope that if I continue to share skills, continue to connect with people face to face and talk about our food then I’ll inadvertently be part of building the movement for change. We need it.

 

 

 

 

The work hours are flexible, the work conditions are tolerable

About

 

1.  I am not SELF SUFFICIENT and I’ve never claimed to be. I don’t believe anyone can truly be self sufficient. My aim in life is to remove myself as much as I possibly can from the very broken conventional food system.

2. SUSTAINABILITY is a load of rubbish. It’s a term that had good intentions but has now been used and abused just like our natural resources. Beware when you see this term used.

3. There is a lot of bullshit in the food industry and in our food system. The deeper I go the more I have to wade through the rubbish. Real food starts with real ingredients. I can no longer rely on the integrity of supermarket and conventional food so where I can, I will source my own, either by growing it, hunting it or picking it out in the bush. Beware the hip element of  ’nutritionally balanced’ food.

Beware the take away juice bar claiming to be a healthier take away option that is using fruit and vegetables that have been treated with pesticides and herbicides.
Beware the hip restaurant in Melbourne that offers you wild mushrooms that have been ‘foraged’ from a NSW forest.
Beware the low fat sub made from intensively farmed poultry and chemical covered salad
Beware the use of hip retro type face on food packaging and blackboard menus. There’s a good chance the food is the same old rubbish, it’s just been rebranded.
Be aware that what ever the latest nutritional super food is, be it coconuts or ChooChoo Berries that it probably doesn’t grow anywhere near your house. It may have traveled a great distance. So for weigh up the supposed health benefits with your carbon road miles legacy you’re adding to your account.
Anything that has ‘Artisan’ labeled on it doesn’t necessarily mean its a better product. It might be, it might not be.

4. Modern food is truly having an impact on our health. Never before have we as westerners been so well off and affluent. But we’re the sickest we’ve ever been. I was caught up in this. Because of the food I ate I became sick, nothing major but enough to make me want to change my life. I often had allergic reactions to foods with the preservatives sulphites, (in the form of breathing difficulties – respiratory inflammation), I had extremely high blood pressure and suffered from debilitating anxiety and depression. I was also obese. I changed my lifestyle to eating whole foods I grew myself and my health has dramatically improved. It didn’t happen over night and it took a lot of hard work to change my habits. But it worked. I am living evidence of how broken the system is. If not just for myself.

5. The conventional food system is damaging our planet. In order to provide for an over populated planet we are relying on a system that is resource hungry. We end up producing more food than we can consume and much of it gets thrown away. The cost is high. All large scale food production relies heavily on fossil fuels. A global market means food is transported all over the world. We cannot stop this, but we can reduce it. Local and organic makes sense.

This website chronicles what I do.  Take it or leave it. It’s not right nor wrong. It’s not advice, it’s not gospel. It’s my story.

No bullshit here. Modern food is plain rubbish. Processed food, the stuff that’s easy to prepare at home that you can buy from supermarkets. It’s not good for us. The rubber burgers, subs, fried chicken and pizza from the chains, it’s all shit. This ‘food’ is a product, driven by the desire to make a great deal of money for a company and it’s shareholders. It’s designed to extract money from your pocket. It’s not designed to keep you healthy no matter what it tells you on the packet.

Humans have survived for a long time by eating real food. I’m not talking about pre-historic food, I’m talking about cooking with real vegetables, meat, cheese, diary, herbs and spices.

Some of the longest living people in the world live on a diet of pasta, rice, beans, fish and wine. Food they’ve been happily eating for centuries.

Most of what you’re told by the media is rubbish. All of us should know that by now.

You don’t need to drink ‘good bacteria’ drinks.

You don’t need multi vitamins.

You don’t need to eat food labelled, ‘low fat’ low sugar’ ‘low salt’…..instead eat food with no labels.

Humans have lived healthy lives without these modern products for centuries.

These pages are about eating real food. The stuff that I can grow in the soil. The stuff I can hunt and harvest from the fields and the bush.

This is my answer. It may not be the answer for you as I don’t have all the answers.

This is simply my answer for me and my gang.

 

Disclaimer:

I make no apologies for my truck, guns, nor my love of fine outlaw and country music. 

And if it makes you feel good, you can call me a hipster, hillbilly, redneck or bogan. You can call me what ever you like. 

I am also aware that I can only control the food at my home. When I am away from home I may eat a Kebab.

Image: justin bovington

Seems to be doing the trick

Saturday mornings start at 5:30am, the alarm shocks me out of a deep slumber, I grind some coffee and murder a pot of coffee. With sleep in my eyes I drive a white van to a farm, pick up produce that farmer Rod has grown, and I drive it to Melbourne. I spend the day handing over heavy boxes of organic vegetables and fruit to punters in the city that want real food to cook with. It’s very rewarding, simply talking to people about real food is enjoyable in itself. By afternoon I’ve returned to Ballarat where I drop off the hire van, stumble into my car and head home for a spell of chilling out. Last night though, I went home via the forest. About a week ago we got a little touch of rain, and I gambled that the rain was enough for some mushrooms to sprout.

Taking the backwoods road home from town is often a chosen route. There are two ways home, one on the paved country roads past rolling green hills of grazing sheep, cows or pastures of chemical laden potatoes, maize, canola or wheat or barely. The other route is bush. Unmade roads that weave in mesmerising fashion through moody eucalyptus forest and neatly planted pine plantation.

By the time I reached my chosen spot, the grey clouds had covered the late sun, it was now dusk, late dusk. Rain was falling sideways, filling my glasses with tiny droplets, rendering them unless. With my glasses off I walked bent over like an ancient man scanning the forest floor for pine mushrooms. After a few minutes I discovered a the first few buried under needles. I pulled out my pocket knife and gently cut the stem, and another, then another. In one hand I held a growing pile of mushrooms, in the other my knife. I was running out of hands. Off came my hat, which often ends up as an impromptu carrying device. In went the mushrooms, one after another until it was over flowing. Enough food for two good meals.

Walking back to the car I looked back along the path I had just traversed. It was almost dark, the rain continued falling sideways. A thick mist had developed high in the canopy of the pines, which by now sat darkly contrasted against the pale sky. I thought to myself “what idiot does this?” In fairly horrible conditions, after a big day of hauling boxes here I am, picking mushrooms on a dismal day for a meal I’m not even cooking for dinner because, well I couldn’t be stuffed. (I was planning for a mushy breakfast the following day.) I clambered into the drivers seat and drove those muddy roads home. I thought about the life I have chosen, the deliberate actions I take. It’s definitely not the answer for everyone, but I like it for me.

In the morning I cooked mushrooms with home cured Jamon, home grown garlic, home grown thyme, and served it on home made sourdough bread. Home made. I am pleased with my choices.

Once upon a time I decided that most of the food I ate was shit. So I thought that maybe if I took care of making it myself, then I might improve the ‘goodness’ of the food, and thus improve my inner ‘goodness’. Seems to be doing the trick.

Log Cabin For Sale!

The Smokehouse from Smith Journal on Vimeo.

Sometimes in life you have to give up something you love to make your dream a reality.

We have a dream to set up The Nursery Project, a place where we can demonstrate how we live our lives, share the skills we have learnt and build a community of mindful thinkers. To make this dream a reality we need cash. Personally I’m not a big fan of the stuff, but it’s a necessity of our society.

Over the last six months we have been working at raising capital for this project and we’ve come a long way, but we are still way off our original mark. So we’ve decided to sell something that we love. Our log cabin.

I built this cabin a few years ago from weed pine trees I felled south of Bunninyong. It’s a functional smokehouse but is also used as a kids playhouse and it’s been known to be used as guest accommodation.

The cabin is movable. We moved it from our last home on a large trailer, but it could easily be loaded onto a larger truck.

This cabin has a great deal of sentimental value to us, so it’s not an easy thing to part with, but we believe its a sacrifice we need to make to realise the dream or The Nursery Project.

If you’re interested drop us a line. Or pass the link onto someone thats looking for a unique cabin retreat, backyard playhouse or functional smoke house.

BID HERE! Thanks guys.

Veg boxes make Nursery Project a reality

It’s been another lovely growing season but like all good things it’s coming to the end. Autumn weather has definitely arrived, last night the apparent temp was 2.8C, suffice to say we had the fire roaring and blankets on.

The cool weather means that veg growing also begins its slow down. The warm loving plants like tomato, zucchini, corn and pumpkin are all starting to finish off. In a few months we will be relying on winter greens for our meals, and if the hunting season is successful we will pair winter greens with wild meat for some hearty winter tucker. While the veg is still around I suggest that we make the most of it for the remaining weeks it’s available.

There is a side benefit to supporting the veg box scheme. Every buck we make in profit we are putting towards buying land to build the Nursery Project. So every box sold helps us make the dream of having a permanent venue to run real food workshops, a place to set up a demonstration veg patch, an established orchard and plenty of space to house useful animals a reality. It’s a win win really. You buy a box of organic veg and fruit, we get some more money towards the Nursery Project. So in a a way you are inadvertently financially supporting this project. The Nursery Project is a big financial undertaking, we have come a long way but we need to continue to raise more funds to set this baby up, the win win veg boxes system seems like an ideal approach. Over the last two years selling veg boxes has provided our family with another source of income, just like any other small self owned business. But now I’m saving the money we’d be living off to set up a much bigger dream. Something I see real value and purpose in. Anyway, enough dream talk! Please spread the word on the internet, all of the internets. Tell your mates to buy a veg box and be an investor in something worthwhile.

Oh and for the international people that have asked about buying boxes to be donated, you can do so, and the veg box will be dropped off to the Ballarat Soup Bus which provides meals for people doing it tough on the streets of Ballarat.

So please spread the word. The last two weeks have been very quiet with everyone on easter holidays. But we’re all back now, lets eat veg!

Veg boxes, Lamb, Pork and Eggs available here.

Here comes the end/Out of touch

Here comes the end

It’s been a dry few months, a shower here or there but nothing worth checking the rain gauge for. A food gardener cannot complain about this warm start to autumn, to them it means an extended season for growing that important food for the family. To a grower it means a few more weeks of summer veg, that by mathematical chance will now linger on vines and bushes a little longer than expected. More red jalapeño than green. More ripe tomatoes for bruschetta. Alas, the seasons are simply playing with us. The unstoppable end always comes, as it does with all facets of nature.

The nights are cooler, the clouds fewer. By late evening the heavens empty, allowing a clear vision of celestial display. The open sky brings cooler nights. Plants feel this cold, they sense the change, either that or they simply run out of energy to grow. Maybe they don’t like the cold, whatever the case may be, it’s the unavoidable end for them. Leaves discolour, bean pods dry, zucchini become stumps. Growth will halt, all progress ordered to discontinue with the hint of the seasonal shift.

We have had the autumn break, that rain we so desperately long for, but we have noticed the drop in temperature. We’ve also noticed the roar of wind that signifies the change of season.

Like a day marked on a calendar there is an annual chore that for me is a very significant event. It’s when I begin to pull the now fully plump beans from the tangled vines. Once proud, optimistic vines of progress and growth, the bean plant is now tired, worn out and hanging on to its glory days. It’s gift to us is the food of its seed. The beans will dry, they will store for many years, and feed us when the garden hibernates come winter.

I pull on the gauntly vines to expose hidden bean pods lurking behind foliage. It’s a brutal technique with no shortage of grunting and yanking. There is a violence, a destructive element to the process. There is no other way. It is the end for this plant, it has to be harvested, it has to make way for the next crop. It’s a process that never fails to remind me of my own mortality. It reminds me that I too will be pulled out, removed, composted, and no doubt forgotten by nature, a measly blink of the eye in a much larger story of time.

Out of touch

Flames licked the side of the large log, sitting awkwardly in the fire. The warmth from the heater was welcome as I lay motionless, huddled under a cosy woollen blanket. It had been a long day, in fact the week had been packed. There was however still more to be done. An overflowing box of green beans sat in the room, waiting for me to hang. Some beans dry on the vines, whilst others are a bit slow, and are still very fresh and green come harvest time. It’s these green beans that I string up, to hang by the fireplace drying for storage. This box is just the beginning. Over the next month I will hang many more beans to dry.

After a few weeks by the fire the beans rattle like a maraca and are ready to be podded and stored. They serve as food, cooked with winter greens like chard, kale and spinach. It’s very much a simplistic approach to food, an approach inspired by peasant existence of the old people. It’s an approach that relies on a bit of gardening, a willingness to work and knowledge of how to cook with the ingredients you’ve grown. It’s worked for people for thousands of years, and it’s a usable approach for any time in human existence, past, present and future.

What works for me doesn’t necessarily work for other people. And it’s not one persons place to say what is right or wrong for someone else. It’s not my place to say this technique is right or better, instead I can simply say, “this is how I do it” it’s up to you to take what you will. It’s not for any of us to say one way of living is better than another. Instead we can simply take the good elements from what we observe around us and embrace them for our own unique existence.