Early spring is one of the tougher times to eat locally in Maine, not because there isn't local food available, but we are often getting tired of the storage vegetables available. We will demo making soup and toppings from local ingredients, when and how to find local greens, eggs, seafood, and more. Come for the cooking demo and to learn about work going on in our community and state that supports local producers and harvesters and ways to get involved. 

This is a public event – parts of the event may be recorded and photographed.

This event is part of our annual Winter Garden Workshop Series: Growing Literacy! Every year, Brunswick-Topsham Land Trust, in collaboration with Growing to Give and Curtis Memorial Library, offers this event series to offer skill-building workshops and learning opportunities for gardeners of all abilities.

About the Speakers:

Christine Burns Rudalevige is a Brunswick-based food writer. Over the course of her 30-year journalism career, she’s covered sports, politics, business and technology.  For the past 15 years since completing culinary school, she’s focused on food. Her words and recipes have appeared in Culture, Fine Cooking, Eating Well, Cooking Light, MyMaine, and The Portland Press Herald. She is also the former editor of edible Maine magazine. Her award-winning cookbook, Green Plate Special, was published in 2017.  

Christine sits on the board of directors for Community Plate, a Maine-based nonprofit that uses storytelling and potluck dinners to fight social isolation and loneliness. And she serves on the steering committee for the Merrymeeting Food Council, a midcoast organization that seeks to advance a thriving, resilient, and equitable food system that supports the health and natural resources of our communities.  

When she’s not laboring over volunteer board work, a cutting board in the kitchen, or a keyboard in her home office, she’s pursuing a master’s degree in social work and learning from her two semi-adult children, a community of food-minded friends, hundreds of productive Maine farmers and innovative chefs near and far, and her 30,000 honeybees.

Harriet Van Vleck is the Coordinator for the Merrymeeting Food Council, bringing partners together to find community-driven strategies to local food system challenges and building statewide partnerships that support for our local work. After teaching and research work in Oregon and Arizona, she conducted her PhD and post-doctoral research at the University of Minnesota focused on the economic, ecological, and social impacts of agricultural land use practices. She helped develop the Farmland Inventory with the Bowdoinham Community Development Initiative, has served on the Steering Committee of Maine Food Strategy (now part of the Maine Food Convergence Project), and is on the board of the Hubbard Brook Research Foundation. She lives in Bowdoinham with her family where they tend to an ever growing number of fruit trees.