Garden Variety Potluck in the Park, 10 am Saturday

Welcome to Bainbridge Barter! Here’s how our Garden Variety Potluck in the Park works. Please leave a comment below if you have any questions.

We hope you’ll join us this Saturday, April 14th at 10 am for our first  Garden Variety Potluck in the Park of 2012. This event is an open sharing potluck that enables each of us to share our surplus garden and home kitchen bounty with each other.

Bring a Basketful, Leave with a Basketful

Bring a basketful of whatever surplus you have grown or cooked up. If possible, package or bake your offerings so that many people can share the bounty – Think rolls or small loaves of bread instead of one big loaf, 6-packs of eggs, small containers of delicate berries, greens in a large bag so people can help themselves to just the amount they’d like.

We’ll gather around a picnic table on the main lawn area of Waterfront Park, starting at 10 am Saturday. As soon as everyone has arranged their offering, we’ll take a few minutes to share recipe suggestions for what’s on the table and ask questions about anything we don’t recognize. At 10:15 we’ll announce the start of sharing, when we can move along the potluck of garden and kitchen bounty to fill our baskets with our neighbors’ surplus, those things that we haven’t grown or baked for ourselves.

If there are leftovers, we’ll deliver them to Helpline at the first opportunity to extend the sharing even farther. We’ll be done in time for everyone to head to the Farmers Market on the Town Square at City Hall Park while there are still plenty of local foods there to add to your larder for the week.

Most often, everyone leaves thinking they’re heading home with better stuff than what they brought – That’s the magic of a gift economy! But it could happen that you don’t see anything on the table that you’d like to take home. It could happen that you head home with less in your basket than you brought. You’re welcome to remove your offering from the table before the potluck begins if you change your mind about sharing. This is a potluck experience with no guarantees except that you’ll connect with neighbors, learn about what’s growing well in other islanders’ gardens, and head home with a new appreciation for the value of things outside of money.

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Happy New Year!

May the new year bring each of us bounty enough to nourish our families and to share with others.

To get ready for the warmer soils of spring, one of our regulars has volunteered to host a seed exchange at her home, walking distance from the heart of Winslow. If you’re interested, please send me your email address, or let me know how else to contact you – You can me at realrockfarmer at gmail dot com to keep your contact info private, or you can leave it as a comment to this post.

Happy 2012,

Rebecca

 

Potluck in the Park – Still Meeting As Winter Approaches

Our Saturday morning Potlucks in the Park are still running. We’ll be taking next Saturday, November 26th, off since so many of us will be with off-island family for Thanksgiving. Then we’ll be back on Saturday, December 3d and will keep going until we run out of things to share with each other. It hasn’t happened yet!

This morning, along with the glorious weather and good company, we had these things to share with each other:

• Home-cultured kefir & yogurt
• Duck & chicken eggs
• Winter greens
• Fresh herbs – Including bay leaves, thyme, sage, rosemary
• Home-baked bread
• Home-cultured kimchi
• Home-baked cookies
• The last zucchini and bell peppers of the season
• Home-canned dilly beans
• Home-pressed cider
• Home-canned bread-and-butter pickles
• And maybe something I’m not remembering…

Join us on Saturday, December 3rd, 10 am at the picnic tables in lower Waterfront Park, WInslow, Bainbridge Island. Questions? Please post them to the comments section below.

Garden Variety Potluck in the Park, 10 am Saturday

Welcome to Bainbridge Barter! Here’s how our Garden Variety Potluck in the Park works. Please leave a comment below if you have any questions.

We hope you’ll join us this Saturday, July 16th at 10 am for our next Garden Variety Potluck in the Park. This event is an open sharing potluck that enables each of us to share our surplus garden and home kitchen bounty with each other.

Bring a Basketful, Leave with a Basketful

Bring a basketful of whatever surplus you have grown or cooked up. If possible, package or bake your offerings so that many people can share the bounty – Think rolls or small loaves of bread instead of one big loaf, 6-packs of eggs, small containers of delicate berries, greens in a large bag so people can help themselves to just the amount they’d like.

We’ll gather around a picnic table on the main lawn area of Waterfront Park, starting at 10 am Saturday. As soon as everyone has arranged their offering, we’ll take a few minutes to share recipe suggestions for what’s on the table and ask questions about anything we don’t recognize. At 10:15 we’ll announce the start of sharing, when we can move along the potluck of garden and kitchen bounty to fill our baskets with our neighbors’ surplus, those things that we haven’t grown or baked for ourselves.

If there are leftovers, we’ll deliver them to Helpline at the first opportunity to extend the sharing even farther. We’ll be done in time for everyone to head to the Farmers Market on the Town Square at City Hall Park while there are still plenty of local foods there to add to your larder for the week.

It could happen that you don’t see anything on the table that you’d like to take home. It could happen that you head home with less in your basket than you brought. You’re welcome to remove your offering from the table before the potluck begins. You’re also welcome to bring a basketful and leave with an empty basket, if that feels right to you. This is a potluck experience with no guarantees except that you’ll connect with neighbors, learn about what’s growing well in other islanders’ gardens, and head home with a new appreciation for the value of things outside of money.

New Garden Variety Potluck Start Time: 10 am Saturdays

Glimpse of the potluck table: Herbs, peas, hot pepper jelly, eggs, yogurt, huckleberries

Because we’re all enjoying lazy summer weekend mornings (even if the weather does sometimes feel a bit more like late spring or early fall), we’re moving our Garden Variety Potluck in the Park start time to 10 am.

Here’s the new schedule:

10 am Arrive at Waterfront Park with your basketful, add what you’d like to share to the potluck table.

10:15 am We will announce the start of sharing – You can still chat with other potluck participants, but now is the time to start filling your basket with what you’d like in exchange for what you brought.

Things will end when people are done filling their baskets, and any leftovers will be taken to Helpline ASAP.

If you arrive late, you can still add your offerings to the table, but it’s likely there will be less to choose from. Early bird gets the worm and all that…

If you can’t make it in person on Saturday mornings, if you arrive too late, or if you have weekday bounty to share or trade, please join the Backyard Garden Barter and Exchange group.

Questions? Comments? Please post a reply here.

Perennial starts, borage stalks & flowers, 3 types of peas, eggs, hot pepper jelly

What ya got and what ya want? The July 9th Edition

It’s time for the First Official Garden Variety Potluck in the Park – This Saturday, July 9th, 9 am at Waterfront Park. At our test potluck we had a wide variety of greens, home-cultured yogurt, freshly-baked challah and rolls, home-made zero-waste toothpaste, just-packed kimchi, eggs from happy backyard hens, and a selection of perennial starts to choose from. What will this Saturday bring?

Easter Egger eggs to share

I’ll be there with fresh eggs from our Easter Egger hens, edible borage flowers and stalks (perfect for salads or munching out of hand) and, if we get enough sunlight, the first of our raspberries.

cucumber-flavored borage flowers and crunchy stalks to share

Please comment here to share what you’re planning to pack into your potluck basket, and if there’s anything in particular you’re hoping to bring home.

with enough sunshine and heat, there will be raspberries to share

See you in the park!

Join the First Official Garden Variety Potluck in the Park

contemplating some offerings: home-baked challah, euphorbia starts, fresh yogurt

Bring a Basketful, Leave with a Basketful

We hope you’ll join us this Saturday, July 9th at 10 am for our first official Garden Variety Potluck in the Park. Based on our test run a couple of weeks ago, we’ve come up with an open sharing potluck model that seems to be working well.

selecting from the potluck table

Bring a basketful of whatever surplus you have grown or cooked up. If possible, package or bake your offerings so that many people can share the bounty – Think rolls or small loaves of bread instead of one big loaf, 6-packs of eggs, small containers of delicate berries, greens in a large bag so people can help themselves to just the amount they’d like.

the potluck table, ready for sharing

We’ll gather around a picnic table on the main lawn area of Waterfront Park, starting at 10 am Saturday. As soon as everyone has arranged their offering, we’ll take a few minutes to share recipe suggestions for what’s on the table and ask questions about anything we don’t recognize. At 10:15 we’ll announce the official start of sharing, when we can move along the potluck of garden and kitchen bounty to fill our baskets with our neighbors’ surplus, those things that we haven’t grown or baked for ourselves.

swapping recipe ideas and growing tips

If there are leftovers, we’ll deliver them to Helpline at the first opportunity to extend the sharing even farther. We’ll be done in time for everyone to head to the Farmers Market on the Town Square at City Hall Park while there are still plenty of local foods there to add to your larder for the week.

It could happen that you don’t see anything on the table that you’d like to take home. It could happen that you head home with less in your basket than you brought. You’re welcome to remove your offering from the table before the potluck begins. You’re also welcome to bring a basketful and leave with an empty basket, if that feels right to you. This is a potluck experience with no guarantees except that you’ll connect with neighbors, learn about what’s growing well in other islanders’ gardens, and head home with a new appreciation for the value of things outside of money.

garden variety potluck bounty

What Ya Got? This Week’s Goods

Summer is officially here, but the usual schedule of garden goods seems to be a bit off this year thanks to our cold spring. Still! There are things growing, and growing well enough to fill a few extra bags and baskets to barter.

kimchi ready for barter

I’m working on some jars of kimchi for this Saturday, and have the last of our over-wintered French sorrel crop to share as well.

French sorrel ready for barter

What are you planning to bring this Saturday to our Beta Barter Day at Waterfront Park? Is there anything in particular you’d love to receive in trade? Please post a comment below and share what ya got and what ya want.

Bainbridge Barter is Here!

Spanish Lavender Ready for Barter

Bartering on Bainbridge? You have too much curly leaf kale and your neighbor has a bumper crop of elephant garlic. The exchange is simple and meaningful: you met a fellow gardener and return home with more produce than your garden can support. Bainbridge Barter is the place where you can exchange your excess, or your talents, for another’s bounty or services.

The Dream: Ever dreamed of taking part in a cash-less society knowing you might have something others could use and vice versa? Bainbridge Barter is here and we’re ready to jumpstart a sustainable dream: neighbors getting together every Saturday to barter for a better today.

Our aim? To keep excess produce out of the waste stream, connect people together with a common goal of a cash-less exchange of goods and services, open up new ways of seeing value in sharing and exchanging, interdependence, and community rather than over-consuming and living in isolation and self-reliance. Bartering is a way to begin breaking the boundaries.

What Can I Barter? Barter whatever you think others might find useful. For starters, we know there is great interest in your fresh veggies and berries from the garden, flowers picked from your plot, fresh eggs from your chickens and ducks, homemade goodies from your kitchen, and crafts you or your kids have made throughout the year. Years ago there was a Bainbridge Barter group that included farm animals in the mix live chickens were exchanged for geese, and that’s possible again! Bring your wares and let us begin.

Organic Eggs at Bainbridge Barter

How Do I Barter? For starters, some people find it useful to think in $5 increments. Be prepared to bundle your lettuce in an approximate $5 batch in exchange, for example, for a dozen organic eggs for about the same value. We suggest you bring a basket or blanket to hold your items (or a sign for your services) and you can either be stationary or walk about and barter.

Where? Waterfront Park

When? Saturday mornings from 9:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. just in time to stroll up to the Farmers’ Market and finish your weekly shopping for local produce and artisan items.

Foraged Berries Up for Barter on Bainbridge Island