This week we celebrated Leek Fest! What a plant this is! Its delicious flavors of garlic and onions and its abundant display each Spring make this one of our favorites.
In Wild Ways, students chopped up some freshly harvested leeks (also known as ramps) to add to mason jars full of whipping cream for some competitive butter churning! In the Great Butter Battle, two teams competed to see which could produce leek butter the fastest. Each team circled up and passed the jar of cream and leeks, shaking it with every ounce of their being until delicious butter was made!
We talked about what we know about the history of land caretaking on this continent by its first inhabitants, and got inspired to do a little of it ourselves. The Foxes made digging sticks and transplanted a lot of leeks into a patch that we have established on the land. We imagined the hillside covered in wild leeks for future generations! They also transplanted Ostrich Fern and learned about Bloodroot and Trout Lily. We all cooked up leeks around a campfire during lunchtime and talked about our upcoming campout with gathering excitement.
In FOREST and Cobblers, students took out big buckets of wild leeks to plant. In addition to planting, they also removed some invasives—namely Barberry, which tends to outcompete other native plants. Once done, they stood back and looked upon a landscape of leeks that will one day be covered in good food, tended by year upon year of loving Earth stewards!
—Josh, Chris, and the staff, April 30, 2021