Indian food you can make at home, updating our anthems, bringing in new members and...disposing of butts.

Grange Notes by Tim Swartz, President (with everyone’s help) for May 24, 2018

Flavors from the other side of the world, with ingredients from nearby

Farmers’ Market ingredients, and how to transform them

At the Baking Workshop in March, we were lucky to attract a local with experience in a different kind of cooking–Delna Boyce is an accomplished cook from India, who has worked as a caterer–and even better, she wanted to teach others how to do it!
We signed her up for a workshop as soon as we could–and it’s coming up Saturday, June 2nd, from 1:00 to 4:00. We have room for 10 people–so sign up soon, or ask any questions by emailing: merrykaysings@gmail.com, or leaving a message at: 802-229-9425.
Delna will be teaching Indian recipes and how to cook them, including how to find the ingredients. This won’t require you to send away for a lot of strange-sounding spices, legumes or greens, but rather to use locally available ones. I’m sure we’ll also learn about ways to explore further, too! This is a rare opportunity to learn from someone who grew up with the many flavors of Indian cooking.
We aren’t charging an admission fee for this–but we hope you will make a donation to cover the costs of the ingredients Delna is purchasing for this class!

By the way…can you name the dishes above?

Your Instagram images of the tasty items Delna will make may vary…but these are representative images, from the top left of:

Mango Lassi
Chutneys
Aloo Gobi
Chapati and Paratha
Dal with greens

Singing new anthems

One of our decisions at our May meeting was that we would like to try some new songs–adding to our expanding repertoire. Specifically, we will alternate singing a new “anthemic” song instead of the National Anthem as part of the meeting-opening. Suggestions so far have included:

Lift Every Voice and Sing
America the Beautiful
These Green Mountains Are My Home

If you have another nominee, please join us and bring the words and the tune, and we’ll join in! Most Grange members love the singing we do, and we think there are more singers out there.

Bringing in new members

Instead of bringing in an outside speaker for our June meeting program, we will be “initiating” new or new-ish members of the Grange. We’ll use the Obligation ceremony–a short welcoming ritual which introduces new members formally. We found that our Musician, Mat Nunnelly had slipped through the net after he joined, so plan to make his inclusion official, and also hope to welcome in Sascha Gershfeld, the winner of our Baking Contest in April.

We would be happy to have you join us, at the Grange on June 2nd, if you’ve been thinking about becoming a part of the Grange community, and helping us keep this volunteer organization and its Hall going, this would be a great time!

What do people do at the Grange Hall, and where should they do it?

Well, sometimes they smoke. We don’t allow smoking–or vaping–in the building or on the porches, but we have plenty of evidence that people don’t always read the signs. There are plenty of butts in the buckets of sand we have to help with wintertime traction–and those are easier to pick up than the ones on the ground.

We’d like to provide an “official ashtray” like the one below, where smokers could congregate away from the doorways, and have a place to put their cigarette butts. One proposal is to put it at the bottom of the ADA ramp, under the roof and away from the entrances and windows. The problem would be that it would make the ramp entrance uninviting for people to use. But if not there, where? Help us come up with the best solution we can find, at our meeting on June 2nd.

And after the meeting–it’s the monthly Community Potluck.

Join your friends bring your neighbors–there is always good food! All are welcome, whether you are a member or not. Bring something to share–amain dish, a side dish, meat, vegetables, a dessert, some chips, somebread, some cheese, some juice–we will eat (almost) anything! We start about 6:00, and will need to make space for the soundcheck for the contra dance band which will be playing for the CDU dance at 8:00. Please stay for that as well, if you’d like–there will be an admission fee. On this night, the caller will be Dave Eisenstadter, and the band will be Pete’s Posse. A great time will be had by all! There’s a newcomer’s workshop at 7:30 if you’d like to try it out.

Indian food you can make at home, updating our anthems, bringing in new members and…disposing of butts.