Posts Tagged ‘sharing fruit’

Steinbach is a growing city, with a thriving surrounding community. What better a place to root another Fruit Share chapter! This is exactly what Rebecca Hiebert did in 2012, and Fruit Share Steinbach has been gaining recognition in the area ever since. I had the opportunity to speak with Rebecca this past week to learn about the exciting events happening this season.

 

fruitsharesteinbach

 

…Events Coming Soon…

Summer in the City (June 14 & 15) 

Look for the Fruit Share booth and stop by to get some great information and try a few tasty treats!

Pick & Preserve Events at Anna’s House & Steinbach 55+

Pick fruit and learn how to preserve it safely. Coming this summer! Stay tuned for dates.

Fall Wind-up

Celebrate the end of the season with a potluck & pressed apple cider! Date coming soon.

 

…Donation Sites…

There are several recognized Fruit Share donation sites in the Steinbach area including:

 

A BIG THANK YOU goes out to the numerous business that donated to Fruit Share Steinbach for the Summer in the City event. This includes: Sobey’s, Safeway, Superstore, Derksen Printers & Staples.

Rebecca would also like to acknowledge Sandy Tremaine, whom she has partnered with to spread the word about Fruit Share Steinbach!

If you are in the greater Steinbach area and would like to get involved with Fruit Share Steinbach, feel free to contact Rebecca at:
 
Phone: 204-326-3919

What a busy season ahead for Fruit Share Brandon! While the chapter is relatively new to the area, there has been terrific progress in spreading the word via local and social media. I had the opportunity to connect with Tanis Brown-Birch from Fruit Share Brandon this week about happenings this summer.

Recognition:

  • Announcement in the Brandon Sun (May 15th)
  • Radio interview on Bill Turner’s Feedback CKLQ 880 (May 27th)
  • Interview with the Westman Journal (June 7th)

Social Media Info:

By the Numbers…

  • Volunteers: 27 have signed up in the city of Brandon to date
  • First harvest planned for: Thursday, June 6th, 2013
Events & Fruit Share Booths:
 
–Brandon Global Market
 
  • Booth will be set up every second weekend to recruit volunteers, spread the word, provide information/flyers, and sample tasty treats. Contest to win rhubarb pies is coming soon!

–Brandon Multicultural Festival

  • July 5th and 6th in Princess Park

–Brandon Folk Fest

  • July 25th and 26th under the trees at Westman Communications Group Place (The Keystone Center)
What’s Happening Now?
 
With the first couple of rhubarb harvests very close, Fruit Share Brandon is getting the last pieces in place for a pie-making workshop Wednesday, June 12! They are planning on “Saying Hi with a Pie” to all of the charitable organizations that have partnered with Fruit Share Brandon. There have been generous donations of all of the needed ingredients from Sobeys South End, save for the fresh rhubarb that will be picked. The Student’s Union at Brandon University have graciously offered the use of their kitchen facilities for the making of the pies.
 
A few of the organizations in Brandon that have signed on as partners are: YWCA, Meredith’s Place, Salvation Army, Helping Hands, and The Samaritan House, among others.
 
Cooperating local businesses include: Aagaard Farms, Patmore’s Nursery, The Green Spot, Assiniboine Community College North Campus (a boatload of rhubarb from the Culinary Program!), Community Futures Westman (donating the use of an office for the summer!).
 
What’s Next?
 
If you are in the Brandon area and would like to get involved with Fruit Share Brandon, feel free to contact Tanis at:
 
Phone: 204-726-1513 ext 222
 
Don’t forget to connect to the Fruit Share Brandon blog, Facebook page and Twitter feed as mentioned above!It's my pie contest rules
 
 

WANTED – Rhubarb!

Reward? A tasty treat that can be used in jams, pies, cakes, crisps, and so much more!

Rhubarb is known as a cool season perennial plant that can survive the harsh Manitoba winters. Even with our late spring, rhubarb will soon be ready for picking, likely by the end of the month.

rhubarb

Keep an eye out for unharvested rhubarb in the coming weeks. If you spot unharvested rhubarb, why not knock on the door and see if the owner will allow you to pick a few stalks? Or, drop a Got Fruit? note in the mailbox to encourage them to sign up their rhubarb with Fruit Share. We have volunteers ready and eager to pick!

Share the word that Fruit Share is looking for surplus rhubarb. No surplus is too small! We always welcome the opportunity to pick a small patch.

 

Spotlight on Jubilee Mennonite Church

If you have too much fruit, consider donating to Jubilee Mennonite Church, another charity Fruit Share shares its fruit with.

Jubilee Mennonite is a church, reaching out to those in its community.  The church runs a community kitchen, together with Donwood School, the local elementary school, where community members come (from many different backgrounds) and learn/swap recipes and make a meal for their family to take home.

They also have a community garden and use any leftover food to make a meal from this and invite the gardeners to come and eat and share in the extra harvest.

Donated fruit would be used eaten fresh, used to prepare meals and processed and preserved for later use.

 Contact Information

Street Address

365 Edelweiss Crescent

Phone:

204-668-9933

 Website:

jubileemennonitechurch.ca


Donations Accepted

Fruit

Rhubarb, Sour cherries (eg. nanking or evans cherries), Crab apples, Big eating/baking apples, Berries (eg. strawberries or raspberries), Apricots or Plums

Other Food Items

Canned Fruit Preserves (eg. jam, jelly, sauce, juice, etc.), Frozen Fruit, Home baked products (eg. fruit crisp, pies, breads, etc.).  Must be dated, labelled and have ingredient list. Also, garden vegetables and emergency food pantry supplies.

Non-Food Items

Used baby & children’s clothing

Donation Logistics

When

Monday – Friday, 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. except in July & August when the office hours are 9 – 12.  Arrangements could be made for after-hours drop off by phoning the church office 204-668-9933 during office hours and talking to Donna.

Where

Drop off at the main door (west door) where there is a doorbell to access, if someone is here.

Special Notes

Please phone ahead at 688-9933 to indicate the type and quantity of fruit you have to ensure there is space.

Sharing the Fruit

A very important part of Fruit Share is making sure that as many people as possible benefit from the fruit (and vegetables!) that we harvest. This year, we donated fruit to 19 Winnipeg-based organizations:

Action Margeurite St. Vital
Agape Table
Behavioral Health Foundation
Ecole Henri Bergeron
Fisher Bay Bible Camp
Forward House
Fred Tipping Place
Lions Personal Care Centre
Main Street Mission
Mother Therese
North End Food Security Network
Oak Table
Resource Assistance for Youth (RAY)
Salvation Army
Siloam Mission
Sisters of Charity Soup Kitchen
Union Gospel Mission
Westgrove Children’s Centre
Winnipeg Harvest

The above are a list of the official organizations we donated to - but we also shared the fruit among friends, family and neighbours who would not otherwise have had access to fresh, local and (mostly) organic produce. It was a pleasure to share fruit with everyone!

A successful harvesting season

Thank you very much to everyone who came out to Fruit Share’s 2011 Grand Finale yesterday afternoon – we had a lot of fun building cider presses, enjoying a tasty potluck and getting to know other volunteer fruit pickers.

prairie fruitWe also made an exciting announcement yesterday: not only did we succeed in meeting our goal of rescuing 7,000 lbs of fruit, we actually surpassed that goal! In fact, the grand total of all of our harvests this year resulted in…

7,386 lbs of fruit!

Thank you everyone so much for your participation and contributions – we couldn’t have done any of this without your support and your willingness to take part in rescuing fruit and distributing it to others in the community. Congratulations on a very successful year!

Recent Fruit Share harvests

Right now we’re in a bit of a lull before apple season really begins in August, but we’ve still been having a few great harvests.

farmhouse with currants

In the past couple weeks, our harvests included:

- 14 lbs rhubarb between two locations in River Heights.

- 10 lbs rhubarb at one location in the North End.

- 5 lbs bok choy at one location in the North End.

- Two 4-litre buckets red currants at one location in Crestview.

Winnipeg rhubarb

After a 10-lbs rhubarb harvest.

Everything was composted on-site and the Union Gospel Mission, Lions Personal Care Centre, Siloam Mission, North End Food Security Network and welfare clients all benefited from our harvests. Thank you to all of our volunteers for their hard work!

Fresh red currants

Last week we had a great harvest of two 4-litre buckets of red currants.

Winnipeg fruit

By the end of the harvest, all buckets were full of lovely red currants.

It took our dedicated volunteers nearly two hours to pick all of the currants! One of the volunteers, a social worker, brought one third of the fruit back for her clients. Thank you to our volunteers and to the homeowner for their hard work and contributions.

Winnipeg currants

The empty bush after all the currants were picked.