From Seed to Table

Excerpted from The New Canadian Garden, $19.99, 2016, Mark Cullen. All rights reserved. Published by Dundurn Press.

Chapter 1: From Seed to Table

It was buried treasure. With each turn of the garden fork, more of them were revealed. Emma shrieked with the appearance of every potato as I turned over the sandy loam. She grabbed each tuber with her chubby four-year-old hands and looked at every specimen with wonder: Where did THIS come from? And why is it here?

The experience confirmed all of the good things that I looked forward to when first faced with the prospect of parenthood.  There are not enough precious moments like this in life and the memory lives in my mind like it happened yesterday, even though it was close to 24 years ago.

To fully experience the joy and mystery of life, we sometimes need to see it through the eyes of someone younger and less experienced.  Kids are the best facilitators of this. Our preconceptions about how the world turns are set on their ear when we view them through the kaleidoscope of a child’s mind.

And there is nothing that brings the generations together like food does.

Read more in The New Canadian Garden, available at book stores and Home Hardware.