Constructing an ethical life around pleasure: the best nosh for NOW (national organic week)

Drum roll in the mind please...................

5: Bioynamic Agricultural Association of Ireland event: Talk by Wendy Cooke, Cookery Demo by the "Tipperary Chefs" and Dinner Watergarden, Thomastown, Co Kilkenny. 13th September 4-8pm Tickets �50 Bookings Phone (056) 7754214
4: Omega Beef direct event: at Dungarvan farmers' market: a veritable feast, with la Touche veg, Jurgan's coffee, Joe's beef. Free ( i.e. the bbq bit is free, market will still be a market!)
3: Nenagh Community Harvest Feast event: great food, great place, great people, great price. For more, see here
2: Feelgood Hampers Event: organic wine tasting; organic antipasti; organic, macrobiotic, vegan, wheat free and sugar free cookery demonstrations; a three course meal; entertainment and a chance to win a Feelgood Organic Hamper. At Healthy Living, Athy Friday 19th of September at 7pm. ll for 25 quid.
1:Has to be the Leitrim Harvest Feast. A single event with 39 parts. Many free. From boxty competitions to raw cookery demos. Hard to beat really!

Special mention:
Erin Borkovich speaking in Dublin on the 20th
15th 21st September Simply Organic will distribute free organic fruit to local hospitals and schools Dublin area Greg@simplyorganic.ie

a biodynamic farmer in wicklow: Ernest, aubracs and a whole load of challenges

(noite: I'll have a comprehensive article on biodynamics in Food and Wine magazine soon)

All farmers work hard, but, pound for pound, the scattered few biodynamic farmers here in Ireland work harder. What�s more, they do so for no mark up, at least in the Irish situation.

Ernest Mackee is one such rare breed. In fact he�s a rare breed with a rare breed: Aubrac cattle.

Biodynamics as a type of organic farming deserves an article, perhaps a sequence of articles, to be explained. I won�t do this today. However, I will tell you that it involves an awful lot of dawn starts, occasional hours of spinning work, making complex sprays and preparations to harmonise your farming practices with the broader cosmos and the earth itself, the heroic building of uber-healthy compost, and all, as I said, for no real mark up. An organic mark up, yes, but no extra mark up for being biodynamic:

�Demeter has no market value separate to organic� according to Michael Miklis, administrator of the Biodynamic Association of Ireland.; �we haven�t broken the mould of organic�.

Biodynamic farmers� situation is also made me difficult by the fact that there are so few of them, and their certification body has ceased being a certification body recently. Demeter found the �8000 per year fee to be a certification body too high, in a context where they only had a 15 or so certified biodynamic producers. The other organic farmers who availed of their organic certification, while being more numerous, didn�t make enough of a significant difference for Demeter to remain in certification.

Ernest Mackee, up Donard in the hills of Wicklow, is one of the handful of biodynamic practitioners in farming in Irleand. Ernest has Texel-Belclare crosses and a pedigree heard of Aubrac cattle on his 137 ha.

�The reason I�m biodynamic is to improve the soil structure of the land and the health of the animals. It�s a holistic system. These improvements are gradual, but very noticeable over the 11 yrs I�ve been biodynamic. It�s a steady, slow process. The roots go down into the ground quite deeply, and they bring up the trace elements�.

Biodynamic farming is in many ways an act of faith. There is research to back up what Ernest says � the DOC trials in Switzerland. The problem is that the results are understood but the process by which the soil quality improves isn�t � at least not by the scientific community.

I asked Ernest how he knew it was better than conventional or standard organic: �I suppose I�ve been at it so long. I�m farming 46 yrs � I started when I was 16 yrs of age. Back then, there was a lot of fertilizer being spread. There were super phosphorous subsidies to nationally increase fertility - it really took off in 60s, 70s and 80s.�

With this many years in farming, and with the experience of going organic before going biodynamic, Ernest can lay a reasonable claim to knowing the pace at which a sward grows and regrows.

Ernest gets a good return from his Aubracs. �They are hardy and suited to a forage diet�. This is important in a context whereby, in his own words, �the price of meal has gone bananas�. This also means that Ernest�s customers get 100% grass-fed beef, which is increasingly showing up as a positive in research and is generally becoming more sought after.

�They also calve easily. They are not huge cattle, and they�re easy to maintain�.

All very well, but where�s the beef?

�They don�t necessarily have less meat� Ernest tells me. �Some of the big cattle have huge bones. The Aubrac kill out rate can be as high as 80%. Some get E grades. Their bone structure is small, so there is a lot of saleable meat on them. They are more like Aberdeen Angus size than Dexter size. They�re not monsters like Emmental or Charlois�.

His returns speak for themselves: Ernest� animals consistently achieve just under the top 25% returns rating, when compared to the National Farm Survey Figures.

And yet, apart from a small number of private customers, much of his meat ends up in Superquinn as organic only. Better soil, better animals � shouldn�t he get better pay?

Ernest can be contacted on: 045 404973; the Biodynamic Association of Ireland on 056 7754214. A Teagasc farm profile of Ernest� s holding can be found by clicking on �farm profile� at www.biodynamic.ie

biodynamic nuns

I'll include the occasional profile of a producer here too. Here's one on the biodynamic nuns of wicklow town. A rare few nuns do seem to embrace the worlds of organics, biodynamics and sometimes also alternative therapies like Reiki.......

Religion is something you rarely read about in the farming pages of any newspaper. While many farmers may be religious, they probably see farming and religion as two seperate and different things. And organic farmers are probably not seen as the most regular of mass goers.

However, the Dominician nuns of the An Tairseach biodynamic farm and ecology centre in Wicklow town are special. I spoke to Sr. Julie Newman about their 70 acre farm.

'There are 3 aspects to the project: to preserve the land, to farm in an environmentally friendly way, and to develop an education centre to make people more aware of who we are and our place on the planet'.

The farm itself overlooks Wicklow Bay. It is a mixed organic farm; they have a suckler herd, some sheep, pigs and hens. They also grow cereals, feedbeans as winter fodder for cattle, and have 5 acres of mixed veg which they sell through their farm shop. They sell their own meat through the farm shop, and, as often is the case with direct organic meat selling, their prices are good � half that of the supermarkets. The shop opens Tuesday, Thursday to Saturday, and they also sell at two farmers' markets � Dalkey and Ashford.

Along with the farm, there is a special area of conservation. There, 12 acres are laid aside for restoring and enhancing wildlife habitats. This includes plantations of nearly 9,000 trees, mostly native broadleafs, a wetland and wildlife pond. Along with this they restore hedgerows and stone walls as part of the REPs scheme.

Sr.Julie explained why: 'With increasing development, habitiats are being destroyed at an alarming rate, and we'll be the poorer for it if we neglect other forms of life on the planet'

Sr. Julie also spoke of a gradual and slight change in how Christianity (in particular the women religious) views nature; 'Science tells us that the universe and earth has evolved over milions of years. Up to this, we took it literally from the book of Genesis, where man is more or less in charge and the earth is given to man to use, for his own use and benefit. But we would see that a little differently now, knowing that we are part of the whole community of life. We're part of God's creation, if you like, but all the other parts are not just there for us.We're just one of the life systems on the planet, not the pinicle of creation as we thought'

They have also opened an ecology centre. They hold various events and run courses on spirituality in a context defined by 'an evolving universe, an endangered earth and the Christian tradition'. This includes lectures, creative workshops on art, nature and meditation, visits to sacred places, and learning about organics, vegetarian cookery and bird watching.

While being organic, biodynamic farming also includes a more holistic and spiritual approach to the life on earth. On one level this obviously ties in with Christianity, especially as practiced by these particular nuns. In fact, it stems from a philosophy called Anthroposophy, which sees itself as Christian. On another level, however, the actual rituals of biodynamics (e.g. Homeopathic does of various sprays and preparations, stirring for a hour in a particular direction) can at first seem quirky. So I had to ask Sr. Julie about their reasons for choosing to go biodynamic.

'We believe that we are one with the earth, and everything is one, that we all came from the same source, and that we humans are influenced by everything else' She goes on to suggest that 'just as the seas and tides are effected by the moon, so too must we be on some level'. We are, after all, mostly made of water. She illuminated this esoteric statement with a practical biodynamic one; 'the whole idea of the earth breathing out in the morning means that you should harvest leaf veg then, as they are full of vitality at that time; likewise, you try to harvest the root crops when the earth is breathing in'.