Getting fresh in East York

Generating local produce picks up steam

Getting fresh in East York. Cindy Choua does some apple-picking during a Not Far From the Tree (NFFTT) event Sept. 25. NFFTT is a residential fruit picking program that makes use of the abundance of fruit trees in the city. (Sept. 25, 2009) Staff photo/DANIELLE MILLEY

Cindy Choua bends down to wash the red apple at the tap at the side of the post-war bungalow. She gives it a quick wipe then takes a big bite, relishing the crisp fruit.

"It's delicious," she proclaims.

That red "delicious" apple isn't of the store-bought variety. It was plucked from a branch less than an hour before by Choua's own two hands in the backyard of a tidy East York bungalow on Mortimer Avenue. Food doesn't get much more local than that.

With people becoming more aware of how far food travels to get to their plate and how important reducing food miles is to the health of the environment, eating local is becoming increasingly popular.

In recent years farmers markets selling fresh carrots and corn harvested that morning to be sold that afternoon to become dinner that evening have proliferated across the city. The East York Farmers Market is a popular Tuesday stop for many residents, and with the introduction of the East Lynn Farmers Market two years ago, procuring fresh local produce has gotten even easier.

Alison McMurray is one of the Farmerlicious Femmes who started the Thursday market on the east Danforth. They keep it going with the support of the Danforth East Community Association.

On this particular day in mid-September the booths are alive with the colours of the rainbow - fresh red field tomatoes as big as a fist, fragrant peaches, lush green herbs, and vibrant raspberries. Fresh corn on the cob is being husked, boiled and enjoyed on site.

For McMurray, getting on board with the market was a no-brainer as it combined two of her interests: fresh food and community spirit.

"It's very important," she says of local food. "Because I grew up with farmers in my backyard, to me it makes sense. The farmers are the future. If we don't have access to our own food sources..."

As a certified MyMarket, East Lynn features farmers selling only what they've produced so customers can find out when an item was picked or the difference between a bartlett and a bosc pear.

McMurray believes awareness is changing about knowing where food comes from. "When you taste a cob of corn that's been picked this morning, that's all the awareness you need," she said. "It's delicious."

Krista Darin concurs. "For me it's about taste," she said.

And for Darin there's nothing better than biting into a pepper or tomato pulled from her own garden.

Darin is one of the dedicated gardeners growing in the East York Community Garden.

The garden started in 2005 at a plot near Danforth and Broadview avenues and has since moved to an ever-expanding city-owned area on Haldon Avenue. It was part of a research project for diabetics with Toronto East General Hospital. Dorothy Murray was part of the original group that has grown each year. The garden was expanded this summer to allow more gardeners and some plots were even double booked.

"We really had an influx of people," Murray said.

Darin began gardening in 2002 in Montreal and when she moved to Toronto she was interested in continuing to grow some of her own food and found the community garden (she lives in an apartment). Local food was a big issue in Montreal and she sees it gaining ground here.

"Something is going on and people are moving in that direction," she said. "I do very much try to pay attention to local."

Murray grew up eating food grown close to home. "My father was a farmer and gardener," she said. "He always grew vegetables."

She thinks of her father when she tends to her tomatoes and cucumbers in her raised bed. Murray believes things like the 100 Mile Diet (an idea first brought forward in a book and then a TV show) are educating people.

"People are becoming more aware...that's causing people to be more conscious of the food they're eating," she said.

For some, eating food from their own backyards is a preposterous idea. Laura Reinsborough, who started Not Far From The Tree in Toronto (NFFTT), said some people don't feel comfortable eating food from their own trees so education is a part of the residential fruit-picking program that picks fruit from trees that would otherwise go to waste.

It began in Toronto last year in the Bathurst Street and St. Clair Avenue area and this year expanded to East York and the High Park area.

Homeowners register their trees and volunteers are dispatched to harvest the fruit, with a third going to the tree owners, a third going to the volunteers and the last third distributed to community organizations in the neighbourhood that can make good use of the fresh fruit.

Choua has been on a handful of picks and she has no worries about enjoying the bounty she and the other volunteers harvest.

Having recently moved from Australia to Canada she was looking for a way to meet new people; NFFTT gave her that opportunity and she liked the notion behind it.

"(I liked) the whole idea of it because there are a lot of people who let their trees go to waste so if we can try to use some of it that's great," she said while picking recently.

NFFTT is bringing back skills mastered by many grandmothers, including preserving. On a recent Monday a preserving party was held to help volunteers figure out what to down with their abundant harvest. The apple tree pick yielded a whopping 300 pounds of fruit, with each volunteer being able to take 20 home. Volunteers have turned their fruit into pies, juices, preserves and jams so the bounty will last well into the barren winter months.

There are several other programs in East York that are part of the local food movement, including Sharing Backyards, a sort of gardeners' personals site where those who aren't using their garden or have extra space to share can connect with those looking for space to garden; and at least one resident is looking to get into SPIN farming (SPIN stands for small plot intensive).

Helen Cohen is just at the beginning stage, but her yard is full of tomatoes, eggplants, peppers and other food. She is trying to figure out ways to grow vertically in order to make the most of every inch of available space.

She has been doing a lot of research about SPIN and has learned about people (mostly in the United States) who make money farming in an urban setting, including a 91-year-old woman who made $7,000 by selling through word of mouth.

Producing food locally is an important issue for Cohen. "We have to support the revitalization of food production in Toronto," she said.

With the number of groups and markets and backyard gardens sprouting up, it appears Cohen isn't alone in her thinking.

DETAILS

East Lynn Farmers' Market

www.eastlynnfarmersmarket.com

Not Far From The Tree

www.notfarfromthetree.org

Sharing Backyards

http://sharingbackyards.wordpress.com

FoodCycles

http://foodcycles.org

Toronto Urban Growers