Artist in Residence:
From the Archives
By All Citizens (Serena McCarroll)
Hello! I’m currently in the process of transcribing a roundtable discussion for my next post. Transcribing is hard! Why didn’t I learn to type in highschool? Here’s another look back at awkward rural acclimatization (via Going Rural).
February 5th, 2007
Both of my parents are from California and because of this, while growing up, mexican dishes were always in regular rotation. For me, quesadillas/burritos are a dinner staple as much as pasta and I’ll whip one up for lunch quicker than I would a sandwich. Where am I going with this?
Living in a small rural town has taken a lot of adjustment. One of the biggest adjustments revolves around grocery shopping. I’ve never been much of a cook, but in Vancouver it didn’t matter since Amy’s Kitchen was always there to save me. We used to live blocks from a large health food store. Organic fruits and vegetables were always plentiful and when I felt lazy there was always Annie’s Mac and Cheese! No more! Imagine my horror when I discovered that I couldn’t even buy refried beans locally. Tyler works in Saskatoon, where one can easily find a large grocery store. But after a ten hour shift with over an hour commute each way the last thing he’s doing is grocery shopping. We make do with what’s available in Bruno. I knew my days of snacking on Barbara’s Jalapeno Cheese Puffs were over, but refried beans I could not live without. When the owner of one of the local grocery stores asked if I needed help finding anything I said I needed refried beans. After asking me what on earth I would use them for he went ahead and ordered some! I purchased my first can the other day.
I have a lot to learn here. The local grocery stores don’t have a lot of produce to choose from. At first glance this might seem backwards to the casual observer but the reason behind it and the lack of a farmer’s market in a farming community is that everyone in town has their own garden. From what I’ve heard people here usually have more vegetables than they know what to do with. After canning and/or freezing everyone’s set for the winter. Tyler and I have our very own yard for the first time and this summer we’ll be able to plant our first garden. Learning the art of canning might be next. I see a deep freeze in our future…
Refried beans – a prairie obscurity. Who knew?
January 20, 2010