Sights of South Dakota: late August-early September 2015

I've been home for less than 24 hours, and I'm already reflecting on this summer on the Reservation. (Shocking.) I've done this extended trip twice now, and while I'm somewhat seasoned to the routine, no stay is the same nor should it be expected to remain the same.

From a growing perspective, the garden produced beautifully and continues to do so under the watchful and attentive eyes of six individuals in town. Perhaps my proudest moment was the kids' first pay-what-you-can farm stand. They wanted to sell vegetables to raise money  for a new piece of playground equipment, which they would like to vote on collectively. How cool is that?! My heart swelled as I watched adults in town, some whom I have not seen all summer, pull in with their cars, look around, support the kids' efforts, and ask when we were going to do this again. What really sunk in: People crave vegetables and good food. Now, it's accessible in La Plant. 

And, the kids really did help. I had a steady stream of them take informal shifts, ask to hold up road signs to drum up more business (some even made kites with the word "farm stand" on them), keep me company at the stand, and ask questions about vegetables, how I learned to grow food, school, and if I miss La Plant and them when I'm not there.  (The answer to the last question, while largely choking back tears: "Of course I do, goofball!)

I think this event really solidified that food is a magnificent, wonderful, unifying force. And, it's changing things, albeit slowly, on the Reservation.

This was not an easy summer. I dealt with many issues well beyond my scope of training and ones that I could not have anticipated, particularly youth suicide and navigating the mental health resources available to people in the area. Life on the Reservation can be unpredictable, tragic, heart-breaking, incredibly frustrating, nonsensical, and indescribable to family and friends who haven't been there. But, I truly take the ambassador aspect of my job to heart, and every trip to La Plant underscores the ongoing need to tell the stories of the people there, namely the children whom I have grown to love. I'm grateful for the challenges, new allies and support systems forged, the amazing successes (including the farm stand and the kids' participation in the Unity Concert in the Black Hills!), and the enormous learning curve of this summer. 

Now, here are some sights of late summer in South Dakota (including a trip to the Badlands!).

Sights of South Dakota: August 2015

Snaps from the last few weeks of food growing, foraging, and living in La Plant.

Sights from South Dakota: Growing a garden, learning to say "see you soon"

Working for Simply Smiles is definitely weird...and wonderful. Weird? I've done lots of things for my job that I didn't quite anticipate. The most recent example: Getting my CDL license so that I could drive a red school bus across country with my brother to get to the Cheyenne River Reservation. And, of course, wonderful. I'm fortunate that I can implement what I've learned in graduate school and in my past farming career in practical, meaningful ways. I also get to meet incredible people and have many unique experiences along the way. Not a bad job.

And, the La Plant Grows Its Own Food! project has been transformative for both me and, I hope, for residents of La Plant. It makes my heart swell when a child willingly goes into the garden space and wants to help, asks questions, or runs to me as soon as they arrive at camp and are excited about what we're planting that day. Or, when I have a group of adults who offer to take care of the garden, actively participate in its growth, or ask how they can grow things at their houses. Pretty wonderful, right?

In the span of one year, the garden has done just that - grow. Volunteer groups have helped to build new raised beds - 21, to be exact! - and these beds have greatly increased our growing space. Our compost system is thriving (fellow compost nerds, rejoice!), our native species project has physically taken root, and we're getting ready to enclose the high tunnel within the coming month to extend the growing season. There's buzz about the project among more residents in town and even throughout the entire Reservation. It has rumblings and makings of a food movement.

All this change, growth, and planning...and I won't physically be implementing much during the month of June.

Because Simply Smiles is becoming more ambitious in its programming and our holistic approach is attracting a wider audience of potential supporters and ambassadors of our mission, things - and people - need to shift. Rather than staying on the Rez for five straight months, the staff is taking office rotations, and mine starts this month. As a naturally anxious person/a (slight) control freak, not being present is a problem for me. But, the job requirements aside, my gut tells me this is a healthy break. I hope it is one that reveals and recognizes the roles and interdependence of communication, learning to cede control, trust, and, of course, the truly magical nature of growing, living things and beings.

I'm trying a new mantra: Things will be ok. Things will grow. 

Just when it set in this past Saturday morning that this - being in La Plant - was over, albeit for a little over a month, our friend and La Plant resident Ford Hill shook my hand.

"Goodbye, Ford," I said. "See you in July." 

"You know, in Lakota, there's no word for 'goodbye'," he said. "We say, 'see you soon.' Saying 'goodbye' is too lonesome and final."

So, with that, see you soon, La Plant. For now, I'll enjoy these recent memories and look forward to lots of delicious food and blooming flowers in the near future.

(All photos taken by A.Gross, April-May 2015, Cheyenne River Reservation/La Plant, S.D.)

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Comfort food: Romanesco Rice

This summer, one of the dishes that I made countless times for the volunteer groups was cauliflower rice...and, people liked it! I certainly didn't invent the recipe (as The Kitchn recipe proves), but I was first introduced to this sneaky trick by a farming friend who was on the Paleo diet and broccoli and cauliflower happened to be in season and in abundance. The gist of the recipe: you can use cauliflower as a substitute for rice, couscous or any other starchy grain with the help of a trusty food processor or blender. Brilliant, right?

My local grocery store randomly had a sale on romanesco - a beautiful type of broccoli (see cover photo), identical in taste to cauliflower and most other things in the brassica family. So, it was Romanesco Rice time. The recipe below is adapted from many other wise people before me, but this is what I do and it's a good primer. It's great for a quick meal, especially when topped with a poached or fried egg (my fave), crispy tempeh or any other protein of your choice:

Romanesco Rice 

Ingredients

• 1 small head of romanesco, chopped into large cubes
• 2 carrots, chopped into large cubes
• 1 large onion, red or white, chopped into quarters
• 1 large clove of garlic, chopped in half
• 6 small mushrooms of your choice (baby bella, button, shittake, etc.)
• 2 tablespoon of coconut oil, or fat of your choice
• 1 pinch of salt
• 2 pinches of black pepper
• 1 tiny pinch of red pepper flakes
• 1-2 tsp of toasted sesame oil (optional and depending on your taste)

Pulse Romanesco and other vegetables until you see a fine, grainy texture like this. 

1. In a food processor, pulse onions and garlic until fine but not a paste. 
2. In a cast iron skillet, heat coconut oil over medium heat and add the onions and garlic.
3. Return to food processor and pulse romanesco, carrots and mushrooms until the size of rice or a fine grain. Depending on the size of your food processor, you may want to do this in batches.
4. Transfer the pulsed vegetables into the pan with the onions, add salt, black pepper, and red pepper flakes. Cook for 5-7 minutes, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are tender.
5. Season to taste: add more salt, pepper, or I added a dash of toasted sesame oil. This is a very strong flavor, so only use a little.

There you have it: Romanesco Rice. Yum! Try with other brassicas and mix and match other vegetables and seasonings that you included in the dish. Now, go eat some vegetables.

Oaxaca, Mexico | March 2015

“Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us, or we find it not.”

— R.W. Emerson

Upon arriving in Oaxaca from the dreary, gray New England, I was immediately struck by the vibrant colors of the southern Mexico state. Although the warmth and food were indeed perks of my trip, I traveled to Oaxaca (pronounced wa-ha-ka) these past few weeks for the first time as part of my job with Simply Smiles. Our programming in Mexico focuses on two distinct areas in Oaxaca - in Coyotopec, a suburb of Oaxaca City, and in the remote jungle community of Santa Maria Tepexipana. In both locations, we lead volunteer groups to help us to carry out our community development programs, which focus on education, food aid, home and infrastructure development, hookworm eradication and medical care. (I encourage you to read more about the efforts of Simply Smiles in Mexico here.) 

During my first week in Oaxaca, I had the opportunity to travel to my friend Gaby’s home village of Santa Ana Yareni, where her mother prepared a garden-grown and -raised lunch of soup and tamales (I think this visit may have been the closest living definition of “bucolic” and “picturesque” that I’ve ever experienced.) Other key food moments? During the second week, a family graciously gave us space inside their home so that I could cook meals for a volunteer group in the Santa Maria Tepexipana. Or, when I visited a community that lives and works inside the Oaxaca City dump and ate sandwiches made by a woman who owns a now thriving torta shop inside the dump.

Yet, food was only a small piece of the trip. In graduate school, I’ve learned much about defining your bioregion. Rather than politically defined boundaries and constructs, a bioregion describes an area based on ecological patterns, land formations, and, often, human and animal culture and interactions. This concept may seem abstract, but it really does help to contextualize the areas we call home and the places we visit. The concept of a bioregion has guided much of my thinking, both personally and professionally. My job requires me to spend long periods of time in distinct places, immersing myself in the unique culture and ecology of the region. Oaxaca, for example, is proud of its history, indigenous roots and large populations of Zapotec and Mixtec Indians. But, as Emerson’s quote suggests, to travel with only beauty in mind can do a disservice to the people and place, especially to those individuals who need and deserve a voice.

Sure, I took a lot of pictures of the flowers, animals and landscapes of Oaxaca, but I didn't want to turn the people or place into spectacles. I didn't want the following images and what I took away from my initial trip to the region to fall into the trap of poverty porn, nor try to characterize or define the region - an area the size of New England - as a whole.  Yet, the photos posted provide some context into the place of Oaxaca, and the people who allowed me to take their photos (after conversations in broken Spanish and a lot of hand gestures if Zapotec dialects were their native language!). This trip raised very real and challenging issues (i.e., hunger, poverty and privilege) and ones that I'm just beginning to process; but, I also tried to provide snapshots into the more light-hearted and entertaining. As the captions reflect, this is an attempt to begin to share my experience and the stories of the kind, immensely hardworking and overall beautiful people whom I met as a first-time visitor to Oaxaca.

(1) A view of the Oaxacan Mountains from the Simply Smiles Center of Operations, standing from inside our new dormitories (2) Cactus flora (3+4) Downtown, historic Oaxaca (5) Oaxacan mountains, framed (6) Flora in the park (7) Instead of barbed wire, shattered glass serves as an effective - and pretty - barrier on concrete walls (8) Water insecure: safe drinking water must be trucked in (9) Cactus (10) Dona Rosa artisan market, where a woman, Dona Rosa, created unique black pottery from San Bartolo Coyotopec in Oaxaca, celebrated for its shiny finish after firing (11) A mountain view (12) Life in four bottles: milk, Coke, Corona and formaldehyde (13) Tree at the Oaxaca City park (14) Gardens in San José del Pacífico, a town located at 8,000 feet in the Oaxacan mountains (15) Hey, goat (16) Street food in San José del Pacífico (17) Coffee seedlings in Santa Maria Tepexipana, a region that grows incredibly high-quality, organic beans (18) Loncheria, San José del Pacífico (19) A view from the jungle (20) Mescal is the drink of choice in Oaxaca, made from the agave cactus that grows both wild and cultivated (21) Maria Sabina, a shaman of sorts, who is celebrated for finding medicinal mushrooms in San José del Pacífico. Bob Dylan, The Beatles, hippies and expats alike sought Sabina’s “talents” and the town has become known for its medicinal and culinary mushrooms (22) …and the mushroom soup at this restaurant was amazing and magical! (23) My room in the jungle for the night (24+25) PSAs (26) Comedor Jazmin in San José del Pacífico (27) Jungle bananas (28) A schoolgirl in San José del Pacífico (29) Sunglass fashion, San José del Pacífico-style (30) Mexican Chinese food (31) Dog in the Oaxaca dump, which is an entire community of individuals and families who live in work in the dump, sorting through the mountains of trash from the entire city for recyclables (32) Mattress frames serve as fences for many home plots in the city’s dump community (33) A view of the dump community in Oaxaca, from atop a trash pile (34) Santa Ana Yareni, three hours north of Oaxaca City (35) An evening in historic Oaxaca City (36-38) Shots from Santa Ana Yareni (39) Draft animal-powered farm fields on the hillsides and cliffs of Santa Ana Yareni (40) A poised pup in Santa Ana Yareni (41) Up in the clouds in Santa Ana Yareni (42-46) Flora and fauna in Santa Ana Yareni (47) A prominent Catholic church in Santa Ana Yareni (48) Flowers in Santa Ana Yareni (49+50) Housing in Santa Ana Yareni (51) Garden limes (52) An older woman makes her way up the hill in Santa Ana Yareni (53) Cilantro and self-sufficiency (54) Cliff and mountain-side gardens in Santa Ana Yareni (55) En route to the jungle (56) A pooped pup (57) Road-side garden (58) My friend Gaby (in blue) and her family (59) Farmland in Santa Ana Yareni (60) Embracing a tree friend (61) Traditional adobe home (62) Kids in Santa Maria Tepexipana (63) A woman and her child waiting for their food supplies at the Simply Smiles despensa program (64) Alebrijes, or brightly colored folk art sculptures made from wood found in the mountains. On artist said that the shape o the wood determines the creatures he produces (65) Corn husks, used for tamales, animal feed and a fuel source (66) Cocoa pod in the jungle (67) Sunset in Santa Maria Tepexipana (68) Pineapple in Santa Maria Tepexipana (69) A hibiscus gift from a new friend, outside my temporary kitchen window in Santa Maria Tepexipana (70) A couple receives their monthly food supplies as part of the despensa program in Santa Maria Tepexipana (71) Handmade pottery in Coyotopec  (72) I had the opportunity to cook in a family’s home for the volunteer group during our second week in the jungle. It was a privilege to be given this space to use, and, as the token white people, we had a lot of visitors. But, it was also uncomfortable cooking large amounts of food for the group and being watched. In this region, people have been known to boil leaves to satisfy their hunger (73) A woman awaits her food supplies as part of the Simply Smiles despensa program in Santa Maria Tepexipana (74) A nursery in Coyotopec