It took the Slow Food snail an extra month to arrive.

The storm delayed Christmas party took place yesterday at Chives for over 60 members and guests. A raised snail resting atop chef Craig Flinn’s famous chicken pies welcomed everyone to a feast of hot and cold dishes. It was all prepared by the Chives team augmented by dishes from 5 other Slow Food restaurants and wineries. Each dish was labeled with the ingredients and names of the local suppliers.

We changed the format this year to a stand up buffet that was produced at cost by Craig largely on a menu constructed from his wanderings through the Halifax Farmers Market the day before. He also set up a cooking demo in the large dining room where he showed how to make a very flavourful risotto.

The low cost of the event (a mere $15) enabled us to ask people for a generous donation to Feed Nova Scotia who manage the provincial food bank system. Two thousand dollars was collected for them to use in their food distribution which, unfortunately, has become a year round necessity.

After extolling the virtues of this heritage apple and praising the work of Slow Food in promoting local products, the Resolution concludes, “..all members of this House of Assembly acknowledge the tremendous work undertaken by the Nova Scotia Chapter of Slow Food Canada and wish them continued success with all future projects.”

Thanks to Hants West MLA, Chuck Porter for bringing this to the House.

The Ecology Action Centre today announced a plan to bring trap caught shrimp to the marketplace.
Caught in traps much like lobster, the shrimp is usually larger than those caught by draggers and much more sustainable.
The shrimp is from Chedabucto Bay off Canso and will be sold through Fisherman’s Market on the Bedford Highway and will be on the menu of selected restaurants. Ask your server where your shrimp comes from.

Congratulations to Susanna Fuller, the EAC’s marine coordinator and a Slow Food member. The EAC people, including Anna Magera (another Slow Food member) and Sadie Beaton have been working very hard this year to tell consumers about local, high quality, sustainable seafood.

UPDATE: spoke to Fred Greene, the president of Fisherman’s Market…he said the plan for now is to provide the shrimp to restaurants to see what the chefs will do with them and judge what kind of public response there is..

The shrimp will not be available to the consumer at the moment although Pete’s Frootique is going to have some. The restaurants that will serve them include: Fid, Wooden Monkey, Chives and Jane’s on the Common in Halifax and Tempest in Wolfville.

Here is the full release:

For Immediate Release

October 26^th, 2007

A New Sustainable Seafood Enters the Local Market:

Succulent Chedabucto Bay Trap Caught Shrimp

With the decline of the cod stocks, species like shrimp, crab, lobster and scallop have become the mainstays of Nova Scotia’s fisheries. While lobster and crab are caught with traps or pots, both shrimp and scallops are typically fished with gear that disturbs the sea floor.

Canso fisherman Mike Newell saw the potential for a new way of doing things. For almost a decade, fishermen in Chedabucto Bay off of Canso, NS have been fishing shrimp with traps. The result is a clean fishery – no bycatch, no damage to the ocean bottom – and a larger, better quality product. The trap fishery is also an inshore fishery, which means fishermen don’t have to go far and fuel costs are minimal.

“Trap caught shrimp are one of those products that can take advantage of the demand for local and sustainably caught food as well as providing a top notch product to a niche market.” says Ginny Boudreau, manager at GCIFA.

Until recently, these shrimp have not been separated from trawled shrimp in the processing plant. A new initiative through the Ecology Action Centre, the Guysborough County Inshore Fisherman’s Association and Fisherman’s Market aims to change that.

“This is an exciting opportunity to make the most of what we are doing here in the Canso area,” says local fisherman, Kevin Horne “It is a great opportunity for us to make the most of our fishery and benefit our community.”

“We have had chefs calling us and asking when the shrimp will be in”, says Sadie Beaton of the Ecology Action Centre’s Sustainable Seafood program. “Unlike meat or vegetables, the options for local and sustainable seafood are limited in Nova Scotia, partly because we do not celebrate our independent small scale fisheries in the same way we do farmers. This is starting to change.”

The shrimp will be available fresh frozen and unpeeled. This minimizes processing costs, and maximizes the quality of the product. A high quality product should mean that fishermen are rewarded accordingly, by price at the dock.

Although whole shrimp may seem strange to the average North American consumer, European seafood connoisseurs already know the delight of cooking the delectable crustaceans whole and peeling them as part of the dining experience. In Europe, people order bowls of sautéed prawns with their beer. We see an opportunity for Chedabucto Trap Caught shrimp to become a beloved finger food similar to mussels in Atlantic Canadian eating establishments.

Promotion of the shrimp locally is the first step, and as the market is assessed, the trap fishermen and Fishermen’s Market hope that this can be the start of a new way of doing business in the Canso area.

The first shipment of the trap caught shrimp will arrive in town this Monday, with local chef’s serving up a variety of dishes. Individuals can buy the shrimp from Fishermen’s Market on the Bedford Highway and from Home Grown Organics on Allan Street in Halifax.

Within minutes of meeting Philip Docker you just know his product is going to be good. His commitment, passion, energy and high standards are readily evident and fully confirmed with the first taste of a ShanDaph oyster.
These are not just oysters from the Big Island coves between New Glasgow and Antigonish. These are oysters from Philip Docker.


The personal touch starts with the name. ShanDaph is a contraction of his grandparents names, Everett (Shan) and Daphne Baudoux. They reseeded this part of Big Island with native Virginica oysters in the 1960′s. Armed with a marine biology degree, Philip plunged into the unknown world of oyster growing in the late 90′s and despite setbacks has succeeded in restoring a family tradition.

Philip Docker was in constant motion today as he explained how to raise a first class oyster. It was soon apparent that constant motion is standard operating procedure as he detailed how, single-handedly, he moves oysters from various size cages and locations in the bay. We were amazed at how much work is involved in getting oysters to survive for two years and form a perfect market shape before you earn any money.

Philip is an environmental wonder, recycling material for most of his gear and investing in solar equipment for all aspects of his operation – he does not draw a single watt from the provincial power grid.
We were exhausted just listening to all the nuances that Philip has to consider in the day to day operation (not to mention all the paperwork needed to meet CFIA inspection standards).

Besides oysters, Philip has managed to grow bay scallops in this area which was not possible a few years ago but is getting easier due to better conditions due to global warming. And just to add to his product diversity, he also harvests Cohog clams.
All this work called for a reviving feast of the product and Philip obliged.

First, a shucking lesson for everyone who didn’t know how to separate shell from supper followed by a boatload of fresh and cooked seafood.

Everyone tried a raw oyster and raw scallop. The oysters are slurped; the scallop can be chewed. Both were incredibly fresh, briny and delicious.
This was followed by bowls of barbecued oysters, scallops and clams. Philip served these with a series of sauces he whipped up for the occasion. And finally, a tray of oven cooked oysters in a special tomato sauce. Everyone tried very hard to leave no shell unopened but there was just too much food.

Philip Docker exports his oysters throughout Canada but you can meet him at his stall at the Halifax Market near the Boulangerie bread stall (just look for the long lineup on the bottom level). Get to know him. Once you meet him, you’ll want to help build the brand.

That would appear to be the lesson for smart dairy farmers who want to make more money. They have a lot of smart farmers in Quebec.

On a recent visit to Quebec City it was possible to sample many local varieties, textures, animal sources and pungencies – many at a high level of craftsmanship. Quebec even has a map of cheese routes in the province that will lead you on day trips to all the artisan producers where you can taste and purchase cheese right at the farm.

And even with all this great cheese, Quebec consumers and food writers are demanding even higher standards and more consistent quality.

And what standards are consumers demanding in Nova Scotia? And where are the smart dairy farmers who want to make more money with value added products? And who is the champion in the bureaucracy who will open doors and cut red tape for farmers who want to create artisan cheese?

While we’re waiting for those answers, give a listen to Michael Howell’s contribution (featuring a great artisan cheese from Nova Scotia) to a podcast sponsored by the Dairy Farmers of Canada.

Lots of guides though and lots of contradictions you have to sort through to arrive at a personal approach to sustainable seafood. That was the focus this weekend as we looked at three seafood contexts that allowed everyone to ask questions and form an opinion and an approach to what to eat from a dwindling ocean resource.

First, a visit on Saturday to a cutting edge fish hatchery that may point to the future of fishing. Scotian Halibut is a land based fish warehouse in Clark’s Harbour that grows tens of thousands of halibut for it’s own and other grow-out operations around the world. Plant Manager, Harry Murray took us through a labyrinth of gloomy rooms that house a series of huge tanks, some holding 200 pound brood stock and others, their offspring in various stages of growth.

Through some revolutionary science unique to Canada, the facility will soon be producing only female fish which grow faster and larger than the males. The potential economic impact is huge. Is this genetic engineering? Maybe, but none of the modified fish are released to the marketplace just their offspring who are normal females. Here is the process as described on a DFO webpage.

The tiny halibut are fed a very rich diet of brine shrimp called Artemia which are grown at the facility as well. However, the process of producing them involves the use of harsh chemicals and bleach which is highly diluted but nonetheless released back into the ocean.

Scotian Halibut has grow out operations down the road in Woods Harbour. But, it appears that the payoff for them will be supplying female stock to fish farms around the world who will grow the finished fish. European producers already seem to be anxious to become clients. Meanwhile, Alaskan halibut operations who fish the wild stock seem anxious too. A tidal wave of farmed Halibut could swamp their markets.

Sunday morning at Shelburne Harbour and fisherman Darren Dedrick is light years behind Scotian Halibut. He has rudimentary technology and an eye on the present, not the future, in his efforts to make money in the Halibut fishery.

Darren uses traditional hook and line gear which means just that…a string of hooks with bait on them tied to a line that can stretch a long way behind his boat. He is in competition with the big factory trawlers that scoop up large schools of fish and everything else in their path. He maintains the traditions and methods that seem to guarantee a sustainable ocean resource if he could just make enough money at it.

Darren is very articulate about the issues and how he fishes and why regulations and marketing procedures inhibit the small boats from making enough money. And even though Darren acknowledges that Scotian Halibut may be the future, he is firm in his belief that his fish is as good or better tasting than anything produced out of a warehouse up the road on Cape Sable Island. And, a consumer tip here, he would never eat a fish sold at a grocery store.

Finally off to Charlotte Lane Cafe up the street from the Shelburne wharf where Slow Food members Roland and Kathleen Glauser have prepared a bountiful tasting menu of local seafood.
The menu includes product from both Darren Dedrick and Scotian Halibut:

Eel Lake oyster with leek and Pernod sauce
Jonah Crab cake with mango salsa
Smoked haddock and saffron chowder

Pepper cured halibut with beet horseradish Chantilly
Indian point mussel tabbouleh
organic pickled beet and sweet pepper

Red lentil and flax crusted haddock with chipotle mayo
Scallops on the halve shell with pancetta beurre blanc
Organic jasmine rice and baby carrot

Roland and Kathleen spoke about how they approach seafood in their menu planning. They like to use local ingredients whenever they can and that includes seafood that is sustainable. But a reality is that customers demand salmon and the only source is farmed which is not on anyone’s sustainable list. What to do?

As we discovered this weekend there are no easy answers. Everyone came away with a lot of information to digest as they seek a personal answer to what seafood they will consume.
The one thing we can all agree on is that we ate a lot of fabulous seafood this weekend.

The short term marketing effort hopes to convince consumers to buy products produced by local farmers and Nova Scotia food companies.
Although taste and quality are not the prime concern of the campaign, putting money in local food producers pockets is a worthy cause. And, if it encourages people to shop at Farmers Markets, more of the small organic growers will also benefit from the exposure.

Check the website for additional details.

A serene and peaceful feeling that comes with being in the country picking berries, chatting with old and new friends while focused on small patches of the earth in front of you. Trying to make your fingers nimble enough to pick clusters of blueberries without crushing them. It all added up to feeling blue, but in a Slow Food kind of way.

We had come to the farm of Slow Food members Dick Hinners and Barbara Jack in Cumberland County. They have been harvesting and selling wild organic blueberries for decades as part of a mixed farming operation. They raised their children here and now have reduced the operation to just a few acres of blueberries.

It would be easy to drive past the blueberry field and mistake it for hay overrun with weeds. But a short stroll through the field with eyes cast down reveals thousands of sweet and tasty blueberries spread along the ground.

Within a half hour everyone was picking a carry home container of berries which took longer to fill because quite a few were ending up in the mouth not the container. Barbara explained about the berries and how they are harvested mechanically and the historic importance of the fruit stretching back thousands of years in Nova Scotia.

Once we got our fill in the fields, Barbara and Dick took the group back to their house where we feasted on home made blueberry pies, cobbler, muffins, squares and more – all prepared by the local Women’s Sewing Circle group. Everything was delicious. People took home lots of five pound boxes and bags of berries, some of which were destined to be frozen. Sometime in January or February we’ll be able to relive that blue feeling all over again.

We paired with the South Shore bakery, Boulangerie la Vendeenne to promote the Slow Food Ark ingredient, Red Fife Wheat. We gave away samples of an organic bread made from the wheat and told people about how and where it is grown. And, several restaurants connected with Slow Food sold small tastes of food prepared from local ingredients and Market vendors.

The best taste experience as voted by the shoppers was prepared by Michael Howell of Tempest Restaurant. He made a cheeks and beets taste with ingredients from the following vendors:

• cod cheeks from Eric Publicover’s Fish Store
• red beets, spinach and radishes from Norbert Kungel’s Selwood Green Farm
• golden beets from Ted Hutten’s Family Farm
• goat cheese from Randy Hiltz at RanCher Acres

Many thanks to the other Slow Food members who participated – Jane Wright and Paolo Colbertaldo from Jane’s On the Common, Craig Flinn from Chives Canadian Bistro and Hanspeter Stutz from Le Caveau/Domaine de Grand Pre.

The video was shot mostly near Atlanta but it accurately portrays the concept and principles of Slow Food in a very engaging way. Have a look on this website.

And, thanks to Beth McMahon at ACORN for the heads up.