Following from last week, at Kelly Street Garden on Monday, much of our tasks continued to revolve around setting up the garden’s mushroom cultivation systems. Once again, Kendra and I got the opportunity to help out with three different forms of mushroom cultivation: within the raised beds, on fresh logs, as well as in empty buckets. We started off helping to set up a tarp over the raised beds to deter any birds from feeding on the mushroom spawn as they grow throughout the remainder of the season. During this time, Kendra was able to spot a few mushrooms that had already started fruiting! I had been expecting the first fruits to only start showing next summer, so I was pleasantly surprised to make this discovery.
Afterward, Kendra, Rachel, Pepper, Jane, and I helped to set up two different varieties of mushrooms that will be able to fruit in only two weeks (specifically pink oyster mushrooms and Pohu mushrooms!). After watching a quick tutorial from Field and Forest, we followed the instructions by drilling alternating holes into several buckets and layering them with wood shavings and mushroom spawn.
As for the logs, after transferring them from Red Hook Community Farm over the weekend, we helped Renee set them up by placing them in the adjacent apartment’s bathtubs! According to what I had learned from Steve from the Cornell Small Farm’s workshop on Saturday, the logs typically require a 24-hour soak in order to stimulate mushroom growth by imitating the conditions of a large rainfall event. Still, it was quite entertaining to see how this advice was followed at Kelly Street Garden!
Thursday at New Roots Community Garden in Woodside was equally as educational. When we arrived at the garden, Kendra and I quickly discovered that the garden had begun reconfiguring all of their tomato trellising to a much more effective overhead crossbeam, and much of our day was spent helping to tie up all of the overgrown tomato plants. As well, we also had the opportunity to try our hand at a simple woodworking project: building the garden’s compost bin. Using only scrap and recovered wood, after struggling with challenges like crooked wood panels and building on uneven land, we managed to finish the day with the fully constructed bin!
However, the highlight of the week for me was in the cooking demo that Kendra and I managed to put together for Kelly Street Garden’s weekly food distribution on Friday! While Kendra and I had been discussing the possibility of putting together a cooking demo with Jenny throughout the summer, we hadn’t truly begun taking concrete steps to organize this event until last week. Furthermore, it wasn’t until this Monday that Kendra and I even began to think about what we wanted to make. While we had been planning with Jenny to use the special breeds of kale bred at Cornell, they were unfortunately still too young to be used. Yet, as I reflect on our experience, I now think that this was perhaps a blessing in disguise as this allowed us the opportunity to be creative and learn about all of the other crops and herbs that are typically harvested at this time at Kelly Street Garden. This thread of creativity even encouraged us to look within our own cultures for potential dishes to make, and we eventually arrived at a decision: nasturtium dumplings and cilantro garlic soy sauce accompanied by blackberry mint tea.
I had been excited to find ways to use nasturtium flowers and leaves ever since learning that they were edible, and found the perfect opportunity by incorporating the leaves into the dumplings for the cooking demo and using the flowers as a garnish in our drink. Still, while I had constructed an entire vision for this dish, what remained was still the execution. Much of the recipe development I had done in the past pertained to baking desserts, and as such, creating a recipe for a meal was new territory for me. Additionally, since I had proposed to use a dish native to my Chinese culture, I felt an added responsibility to represent this dish as accurately as I could, even if the ingredients that I chose were non-traditional. As a result, I took it upon myself to specifically try out a version of the recipe at home before Kendra and my live demonstration! Nevertheless, despite the quick turnaround in the planning of the event and the learning curve associated with creating the recipe and figuring out the steps for the dish, I was relieved that the demo managed to be a huge success with the local residents attending the distribution as well as all of the volunteers working that day. As well, while I had started the day feeling nervous anticipation, I found myself enjoying the process of teaching and walking through the steps in the recipe, and felt immense gratitude towards Renee and everyone at Kelly Street Garden that had accepted us into their space and allowed us to showcase our recipe with everyone. While Kendra and I regularly work in the garden and support the garden’s general maintenance, it was incredibly meaningful to me that we were able to use our talents to provide something valuable to all of the garden staff and volunteers. While I still have two weeks left with this internship to continue working with everyone, I will cherish these types of moments I’ve experienced this summer regardless.
Feel free to view a copy of our recipe and try out the dish yourselves at home!: Nasturtium Dumplings and Blackberry Mint Tea
(Other) Weekly Highlights:
