Donor Profile: Mission Hill Family Estate

Connecting over a delicious meal and favourite beverage is something all of us have in common. We use this to offer comfort, make friends, celebrate special occasions, and show appreciation, gratitude and love. Food is more than just nourishment; it allows us to create memories and express our creativity. Through this experience we are able to go on a journey, connecting with different cultures, traditions and stories.

Pairing wine and food is deeply embedded in our culture, and is a way to not only enhance one’s dining experience, but tune in with your mood and the meal you are eating. Thanks to the continued support from Mission Hill Family Estate, we are able to deepen the relationships with our community members and celebrate the joy of connecting over local food and wine.

Thank you Mission Hill Family Estate for your wine sponsorship, and thank you Executive Chef Patrick Gayler for taking the time to introduce yourself to Growing Chefs!

How long have you been working at Mission Hill Family Estate?
7 years

As Executive Chef, what do you do?
I help the sous chefs source ingredients, make menus, and train new cooks in the restaurant. I also host culinary classes and dinners too.

What makes Mission Hill different from other B.C. wineries?
Our commitment to quality and the Okanagan.

What is the most exciting part of working at Mission Hill?
Being able to focus on putting together great ingredients and wine is always exciting.

What makes you proud to work for Mission Hill?
Seeing guests from all over the world enjoying our unique winery and valley .

What is your favourite vegetable?
Onion or potato. I could never pick just one.

What’s your favourite food memory?
Turkey dinner at my grandma’s house.

CLICK HERE to learn more about experiences offered at Mission Hill Family Estate.

Getting Back to our Roots with Food Traditions: Part 4

We hope you enjoy this food tradition from the home of Amanda, our Program Manager.

Every year for the past 5 years, during the first week of January, my partner and I have hosted a large Ukrainian Christmas Dinner for as many of our friends as we are physically able to fit in our little home. It has become quite the event, not just for us but for those of our guests who look forward to it and come each year. We spend two days preparing everything using the knowledge and skills my Mom and my Grandma taught me and from my exploring of a cookbook I have inherited from my Grandma with traditional Ukranian recipes, in which she has of course, added her own notes and corrections in the margins. There is only one rule for guests that are attending this feast, no one is allowed to bring anything but their appetites- it is a full meal prepared and cooked by us for them and there is no shortage of food or drink to go around. 

The menu keeps expanding as I explore more traditional Ukrainian foods and recipes but every year the meal always includes:

Kutia - a sweet wheat dish that is central to a traditional Ukrainian Christmas Eve dinner

Borsch - a bright red beet soup 

Varenyky (pierogies) - a Ukrainian dumpling filled with either potato, cottage cheese, plum, sauerkraut, poppy seeds, berries, or raisins (we typically make a cheese, caramelized onion and potato filling)

Holubtsi (cabbage rolls) - Boiled cabbage leaves filled with rice or beans, mushrooms, and onions. My family usually added ground beef or pork when I was growing up but traditionally these were vegetarian at least for Christmas Eve dinner when no meat was to be eaten.

Nalysnyky - a sweet crepe filled with cottage cheese and dill ( and one of my favourite dishes!)

Kolach - a beautiful braided sweet bread with a crispy crust

Pickled vegetables

Sauerkraut

This is a new tradition that we have started and made as our own. It’s been a way for me to explore more of my Ukrainian heritage through food and hosting the meal really comes from the tradition I grew up with of feeding others and, of course, a love and appreciation of handmade, from-scratch Ukrainian food. Growing up, pierogies and cabbage rolls were always an inclusion at every holiday dinner. Christmas. Easter. Thanksgiving. It didn’t matter if there was a turkey or a ham (or both), it didn't matter how many sides were a part of the meal, there were always pierogies and cabbage rolls somewhere on the table and it was usually one of the first dishes of the meal that was eaten.  

There is something very special about feeding others and it was always something my family was always happy to do. My Grandma always had a fresh made pot of borsch for me whenever I visited. It was about a six hour drive to where she lived and no matter what time I got in at, there was always food that she had made just for me waiting. As soon as I got in the door I could smell the sweet beet aroma from the pot on the stove and after hugs and general greetings she would usher me to the table (usually commenting I was too skinny and needed to eat more) and put a full steaming hot bowl of her borsch down in front of me. This feeding others and hosting friends was a tradition in my home growing up as well. My sister and I were always able to invite friends to join for dinners, especially during holidays when I was in university and many of my friends were far from their own families. They were always invited and welcome at our table.   

Hosting a gathering of our friends and providing them with a hearty meal is how I have chosen to carry on these traditions and making it entirely out of those Ukrainian dishes I grew up with is my own way of exploring and staying connected to my family’s heritage. It isn’t necessarily difficult food to make, but it is time and labour-intensive with many steps involved, and the making of pierogies and cabbage rolls in particular is always a collaborative effort. I still like to help my mom fill and roll the cabbage leaves whenever I am home and she is making them. 

For me, food is meant to be shared with others, including the experience of making it. This is a tradition my partner and I carry on as we set aside a weekend to spend together preparing these dishes to host our annual dinner, stock our freezer, or prepare the dishes to deliver to friends. Even after a few years of making them, we continue to refine our pierogi pinching and cabbage rolling skills, I still do not know how my Grandma got her cabbage rolls so neatly and tightly wrapped. We like to play around a little with the filling recipes, but I definitely stick pretty close to the recipes from my Grandma, as being able to make these foods helps me continue to feel connected to her since her passing.

Donor Profile: Champion Radish Club

The Champion Radish Club is currently made up of 61 generous individuals and families who donate monthly. They share our vision of a world with healthy, just, sustainable food practices and we’d love to introduce you to three of them!

RICHARD BANNER
A Champion Radish Club member since 2016, Richard Banner works with Polestar Communications Inc. as a writer and editor. He is the vice chair of the Growing Chefs! board of directors and has served on the board for over a decade.

CHRISTINA BOLISZCZUK & MIKE SHEARER
Christina was once a member of our staff team at Growing Chefs! and now works for Canuck Place Children's Hospice as a Major Gifts Officer. Mike is a Service Center Manager at Speedy Glass. The two have recently become first-time parents! They have been Champion Radish Club members since 2017.

RISA PAYANT
Risa is our newest Champion Radish Club member joining just this week! She works as the Executive Director of Common Weal Community Arts, a Saskatchewan arts organization and moonlights as an artist, a grant-writing consultant, and in a brewery. Risa is a mother of two.

What's your favourite seasonal vegetable?

Richard: I'm really enjoying the fresh asparagus this year. I like to think of the crisp green shoots pushing their way out of the ground and reaching up into the sunshine.

Christina: This is always tough to decide because I love pretty much all vegetables! Celery has always been a favourite since I was a kid for snacking - I still love ants on a log.

Mike: Corn on the cob!

Risa: I'm obsessed with zucchini. There's no dish that can't be made better with zucchini. Plus, I love growing monster zucchini in the garden every summer. I have the opposite of a green thumb, but the zucchini always pulls through!

What is your earliest food-related memory?

Richard: I remember the taste of green beans that I picked from the bushes in the back of my parent's home in Port Alberni. I didn't enjoy it then when I had to go out to the hot garden to pick the beans, but I still remember how good they were.

Christina: I have so many good food memories! When I was little we lived on a small hobby farm and my parents grew and raised most of our food. I feel quite lucky to have experienced this. When I was little we could walk out to the garden and pick fresh strawberries, carrots, and peas for snacks. Fresh always tasted just the best!

Risa: Eating dinner in the field during harvest. I feel like the smell of dirt and grain is nostalgic for everyone who grew up in a farming family. My prairie childhood is such a huge part of who I am and the most iconic memory is sitting in the bed of a pickup truck, covered in dust and eating classic farm meals with my Dad.

As a parent, what food values do you bring to your family?

Christina & Mike: We love to cook. We love making everything from scratch and consider ourselves fairly adventurous eaters. Having our daughter experience a wide variety of flavours when she starts on solid food is important because we want her to enjoy much of what we like and learn that there’s so much variety in food. When she is old enough we will have her join in the food prep/cooking experience as much as possible. Even toddlers can learn to help! Taking pride in the food you prepare makes you enjoy eating it so much more. It also helps to create a less picky eater which is always a bonus.

Risa: I think it's important to remember that food is what fuels us. It's so easy to succumb to thinking you need to make "kid food" (which is, inevitably, beige), but when you shift the conversation to filling your body with nutritious fuel, vegetables become magic. I also think it's crucial to let kids be a part of everything from grocery shopping to food prep to cooking. Meal times are family time and that extends well beyond just eating together.

How does being a part of the Champion Radish Club make you feel?

Richard: I'm happy that I can do a bit to help bring the Growing Chefs! program to kids in schools. I've seen how much fun kids have growing and eating healthy foods so I hope Growing Chefs! can bring the program to as many people as possible.

Christina & Mike: We love contributing to kids learning about healthy eating and being in the kitchen. It will benefit them their whole lives! Plus who doesn’t love digging in dirt and watching food grow? Growing Chefs! brings so much joy to the classroom and kids take those lessons home to their families.

Risa: So many kids in urban centres are growing up completely disconnected from their food. Growing Chefs! is doing important work in making sure kids in Vancouver understand where their food comes from and give them knowledge about what they put in their bodies.