Spice It Up Winter Newsletter Dec/Jan

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In this issue

Issue 2 - December/January 2010
FREE (OR CHEAP) STUFF
Next Spice It up Outing Wednesday Jan 26: art and gardening!
WEN prizes for volunteer gardeners!
WEN firewalk warms up winter!
Joint WEN and Capital Growth food network launched

Also this month

Next Spice It Up training date announced

The next Spice It up training starts on Monday 24 January 2011 at the Zacchhaeus Project, Walter Newby Centre, Bethnal Green Methodist Church, Approach Road, London E2 9JP. You can book by emailing food@wen.org.uk or call the office on 020 7481 9004. The training will take place on Mondays over the following four weeks. Please pass this on to women who may be interested.

Save the Date: WEN celebrates International Women's Day Tues 8 March

This promises to be a fantastic event. Workshops planned include: a women's seed fair, cooking demonstrations, herbalism, reflexology, massage, making bird boxes, and the ever popular Fruity Beauty workshops where we make face masks and face creams out of natural products! If you have any seeds to swap bring them along on the day. The action will take place at St Hilda's East Community Centre, Club Row, London E2 7EY from 10-2.30. Free lunch provided.

Seasonal recipe - Jerusalem Artichoke Soup

Ingredients

1 lb Jerusalem artichokes
2 shallots
2 cloves garlic
1 tbsp white wine vinegar
1 tbsp white wine
Salt and pepper
2 pts stock – veg or chicken, or just water.
1 apple
1 tbsp chopped hazelnuts
2 tbsp olive oil

Method:

Peel and slice the artichokes, and leave in a bowl of cold water with some lemon juice or vinegar in it. Chop shallots and garlic and fry in the oil until softened. Add the wine, vinegar, salt and pepper. Turn up the heat and reduce by half. Add the artichokes and hot stock. Simmer until the artichokes are soft – do not let them go to complete mush. Blend until smooth.Toast the hazelnuts lightly and cut apple into fine, thin strips. Sprinkle both on top of the soup when it’s in bowls and drizzle a small bit of olive oil. The soup is just fine without the added nuts, apple and oil at the end.

Meet Parveen!

Our new volunteer Parveen is a bundle of energy and enthusiasm and is in charge of mapping and visiting some of the new food growing spaces popping up throughout Tower Hamlets. WEN supports those spaces in Tower Hamlets which have joined the Capital Growth scheme, launched to help more people grow their own food throughout London. We plan to hold some joint events for members of the Peer Support Network and Capital Growth members in Tower Hamlets. Benefits of joining the Capital Growth include free advice, cheap training, discounted seeds and discounts on Streetvans if you want help moving gardening stuff. To join click here: http://www.capitalgrowth.org/apply/ In the New Year Parveen will visit many Capital Growth spaces and see what kind of support they might need.

Gardening tips for this month

Arctic weather conditions are promised over the Christmas period - which may be a good thing if you've got heavy, clod-like soil. If you get the chance to dig over your soil before the temperature drops again, then you can let the hard frost break up the soil for you, so you have less work to do next year!

This month and next are a good time for staying inside, doing maintenance jobs you've never got round to doing such as cleaning pots and seeds, and dreaming about what you want your garden/window boxes/plot to look like next year. Don't forget to pat yourself on the back for what you've achieved in 2010: today Spice It Up, tomorrow the world!

Meet women growers from other countries

WEN has joined up with Action Aid to support their new biofuels campaign, which raises awareness of how women food growers in Africa are suffering through biofuel production. Women food growers are being pushed off their land, often with no compensation, to make room for biofuels such as sugar cane to fill car engines in the UK. This leaves them destitute and hungry. As part of the campaign, women farmers will travel to the UK in February to talk about their experiences. WEN will let you know nearer the time, so you can come and meet them and show your support.

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Thursday 13, January 2011

Issue 2 - December/January 2010

A warm welcome to all the new Spice It Up trainees! WEN ran three courses in 2010, two since the last newsletter back in August. We hope all of you enjoy the second issue of WEN’s new local food newsletter, where we bring you details of all the free offers, upcoming events and news to do with organic food growing in Tower Hamlets and beyond. It's a space where we can share stories, photos, problems and solutions, so do get in touch with us if you have anything you want to share, or get help with. Photos are also welcome. Email foodnetwork@wen.org.uk .
As former Spice It Up Trainees, we want to support and encourage you to carry on growing through the Peer Support Network. You can all support each other, too, by sending in your suggestions and sharing your experiences through this newsletter and when we meet up for our regular events. We have an event with a difference coming up in the New Year, read on for details!

FREE (OR CHEAP) STUFF

There's lots of free or cheap gardening stuff on offer all the time in London - but not everyone gets to hear about it. In this section we're going to share all the inside information we know of so no-one misses out! And if you hear of anything going cheap or free, email us at foodnetwork@wen.org.uk so we can spread the word.

Compost bins and wormeries for a fiver

Tower Hamlets Council are offering compost bins and wormeries for just £5 each - a real bargain. As you'll all remember from your Spice It Up training, wormeries are designed to take kitchen waste and are ideal for people living in flats. The Can-o-Worms is the best wormery on the market and usually retails at around £80. Hackney Council offers them at a discount of £25 so Tower Hamlets residents are really lucky. For information, advice and to order a compost bin or wormery please call 020 7364 6931 or email generalenquiries@towerhamlets.gov.uk Delivery takes 5 working days or you can collect direct from the Northumberland Wharf Reuse and Recycling Centre, which also sells cheap compost (see below). Northumberland Wharf Reuse and Recycling Centre opening times: 1-8pm Mon -Friday 9-6 Sat -Sun) Address: Yabsley Street, London E14 9RG.

Free compost tumbler for people wanting to set up community compost scheme

Residents of estates may want to compost their own food waste for use in a communal garden / food growing area. These tumblers are set up to do "hot composting" - capable of dealing with larger amounts and turning into compost more quickly. For more information call Ruhina at Tower Hamlets on 020 7364 6931 or go to:

http://www.towerhamlets.gov.uk/lgsl/501-550/533_recycling_and_reducing_wa/home_composting/community_composting_for_flats.aspx

Free compost

East London Community Recycling Partnership at Hackney Marshes offers free compost to anyone willing to pick it up. You just need bags and a shovel, and check that it's okay to turn up: 020 8986 5608

Bags of compost made from green garden waste are available for sale from Northumberland Wharf Reuse and Recycling Centre at a subsidised priced of £3.26 for a 30 litre bag. If you want larger amounts, London Waste do deliveries of a minimum 15 tonnes! Outside the 7 boroughs of the North London Waste Authority (Barnet, Camden,Enfield, Hackney, Haringey, Islington, Waltham Forest) this incurs a haulage fee but the compost itself is free. Get in contact with the London Waste Commercial team on 020 8884 5664.

Next Spice It up Outing Wednesday Jan 26: art and gardening!

The next Spice It Up outing will be a little bit different. We'll meet at the Ocean Somali Community Association for refreshments, then together we'll visit a lovely little garden nearby, next to the Victoria Canal, run by the Art of Growing Club at the Chisenhale Art Space. We'll have a tour of the garden and then take part in the Art of Growing Club's art class, which combines gardening with art and uses plants as inspiration for making art and sewing things from cloth. You don't need to be artistic to take part - there'll be people there to help you. The club is free and open to all. The art class finishes at 1, when we'll sit down to some gorgeous free lunch cooked by the women at the Wapping Women's Centre.

Date: 26th January 2011
Time: 10 am
Address: Ocean Somali Community Associaton (OSCA) Concordia Community Enterprise Centre, Railway Arches 420-421, Burdett Road, London E3 4AA

To book your place email foodnetwork@wen.org.uk or call the food team on 0207 481 9004

WEN prizes for volunteer gardeners!

Many of you are doing a lot of volunteer gardening in the community, and we think you should be rewarded for it, so we've come up with an idea. You keep a record of how many hours you volunteer for, and once you've carried out 50 hours' worth of volunteering you will get a little prize from WEN! Phone us on 020 7481 9004 and we'll send you out a form which you can use to record your hours. We're even thinking of holding a little award ceremony for you green-fingered gardeners out there! And for those who haven't started gardening anywhere yet (it's been very cold, we know!) we hope this will help motivate you to get going in 2011! The weather is meant to get warmer after Christmas....

WEN firewalk warms up winter!

Thanks very much to all of you who came along and supported WEN's Firewalk on 10 December to raise money to help support more food growing training. Three brave Spice It Up trainees took part - Azzezun, Francois and Dunja. They and 26 other brave WEN supporters removed their socks and walked over coals glowing at 1200 degrees Fahrenheit. All participants received training from a specialist ‘firewalking’ trainer in a ‘Learn or Burn’ seminar for two hours before hand; a combination of the practical side of walking over hot coals without getting hurt, and the inspirational side of conquering fear! There's still time to sponsor Azzi and the others here: So far nearly £5,000 has been raised to help WEN help women; we're hoping to reach £10,000. If you want to see some videos of the event click here:

Joint WEN and Capital Growth food network launched

Gardening fans including several Spice It Up trainees packed out the Tarling East Community Centre in Shadwell to launch a new food growing network supported by the Tower Hamlets Council and Capital Growth. It is envisaged that this can sit alongside the Peer Support Network and include men as well as women in Tower Hamlets, as well as food growers who haven't been through the Spice It Up training. Kate, Kirsten, Julia and Larissa helped run several gardening workshops during the day and joined in a tour of a local award-winning garden in the Tarling Estate. If you're involved in a new food growing community project, or enhancing a new space, then it's worth joining Capital Growth and the Tower Hamlets food network here: For further information on the event click here: