On July 4th, we heard a native American folk anti-establishment band play. The singer talked of growing up in Marquette on Lake Superior and the smell of homemade jam that his mom and the women of the clan would make. Here's a really neat song from that band called "Immigrant Son" from Drew Nelson Tilt a Whirl:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_RVCqhKZhQ
He said there is nothing like the smell of Michigan fruit to bring people together, and if you've ever had a Hart cherry, a Casnovia peach, a Fruit Ridge apple, a Grand Haven blueberry, Berrien Springs grape, you know of what he speaks. Problems of the world he avowed (and I agreed) could be solved if we all sat down over a pot of new-made jam and a loaf of fresh-baked bread.
I love all Michigan produce. I'm big on local grown so long as the pickers and harvesters are fairly paid and treated. I'm not naive enough to think that's always the case. Our itinerant labor camps are in sad shape for the most part. I can't eat our fruit and vegetables without thinking of the transient laborers.
So sad when I try to juxtapose the happy afternoons the kids and I spent in the strawberry field, among the blueberry bushes and in the orchard. So I say a prayer for the migrant pickers.
But there is one smell, that for me, transcends all. It's not a Michigan cash crop, nor very popular, so I can enjoy it without feeling too guilty. That's rhubarb. Rhubarb isn't a fruit. It a homely stalky thing, like celery and is related to buckwheat.
People around here tear out their rhubarb, thinking it's a garbage plant. How wrong they are. I have always had a heart for the underdog. I love the soul food spirit--take what others consider refuse and make haute cuisine. My grandmother used to make rhubarb sauce. It's easy. Just cube stalks and stew with a little sugar (I prefer brown sugar). My mother makes strawberry-rhubarb freezer jam with Jello and rhubarb. Rhubarb pie is easy too. Just add that sauce to a pie crust, dot with butter and bake. And when you can smell Lake Michigan through your back screen door and rhubarb sauce bubbling on the stove, you'll have found paradise.
For more on the spirit of The Smell of Rhubarb on a Lake Michigan Night read on.
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