Meal ideas for a hot summer

Meal ideas for a hot summer

First We Eat: Get your meal preparation done before the day heats up and think ‘cold suppers’

Like many rural residents, Dave and I live surrounded by trees and shrubs: the double windbreak planted by my grandfather in the 1940s — caraganas, Manitoba maple, and linden — with ornamental crabapples, lilacs, blue spruce, white paper birch, fruit trees, highbush cranberry, columnar aspens. I love our trees. In the tough climate we live […] Read more

World Food Programme executive director David Beasley speaks during an interview with Reuters in Doha, Qatar on Aug. 24, 2021. (Photo: Reuters/Alexander Cornwell)

Afghanistan ‘marching towards starvation,’ UN food chief says

Doha | Reuters — Millions of Afghans could soon face starvation due to a combination of conflict, drought and the coronavirus pandemic, the executive director of the World Food Programme said on Tuesday, calling on political leaders to act fast. “There’s a perfect storm coming because of several years of drought, conflict, economic deterioration, compounded […] Read more


Workers unload humanitarian aid from a U.S. military helicopter at the airport at Les Cayes, Haiti on Aug, 18, 2021 after Saturday’s 7.2 magnitude earthquake. (Photo: Reuters/Henry Romero)

Haitians grow impatient for quake aid as hungry crowd gathers

Victims say they still lack food, shelter, clean water; some major hospitals damaged

Les Cayes, Haiti | Reuters — A hungry crowd gathered outside an airport in southern Haiti on Wednesday as people left homeless by an earthquake that killed some 2,000 people voiced anger that government aid was slow to arrive five days after the disaster, leaving many without food and water. Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who […] Read more

(Dave Bedard photo)

U.S. confirms will boost food stamps by record amount

Washington | Reuters –– The U.S. Agriculture Department (USDA) on Monday will announce revised nutrition standards dramatically boosting average food stamp benefits, the agency confirmed Sunday. The New York Times first reported the plan to unveil the largest permanent benefits increase in the history of the government’s primary anti-hunger program, saying the change would result […] Read more


When summer heats up what better way to cool down than eating ice cream

When summer heats up what better way to cool down than eating ice cream

First We Eat: Why not make your own? It’s really not that difficult and the varieties are endless

I love ice cream. I am not alone. In my immediate family, Dave and Mom perk up like hungry pups whenever we stop at our favourite ice-cream joint. A 2019 survey reveals that 25 per cent of Canadians eat ice cream two or three times a month, making us solid contributors to its global consumption, […] Read more

(Jennifer Blair photo)

Hemp industry looking forward despite hurdles

Industry 'on the edge of turning'

MarketsFarm — The number of hemp acres grown in Canada, of which more than 80 per cent are on the Prairies, have ebbed and flowed over the past few years. In 2018, 41,200 acres were planted, according to Statistics Canada, but the total more than doubled the next year to 91,100. In 2020, that number […] Read more


People queue up outside a public supermarket’s doors in Ciudad Bolivar, Venezuela, in April 2015. (iStock/Getty Images)

World Food Programme starts distributing food in Venezuela

Reuters — The U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) said Wednesday it had begun distributing school meals to children in Venezuela, where some seven million people require humanitarian assistance after years of economic collapse in the once-prosperous OPEC nation. The WFP’s first take-home rations were distributed for children under six years old at some 277 schools […] Read more

My husband Dave has lost count of the number of ways we eat chicken, but his favourite is still fried chicken, which I make once or twice a year.

A chicken in every pot

First We Eat: Every summer I pick up our year’s supply of butchered chickens from our local farmer

I buy my chickens from a local farmer. She sells me eggs too — blue, brown and white ovals so beautiful they can’t help but taste better than commercial eggs. Each winter, my farmer sends me a note when she is ready to order her chicks, and I guess how many birds I think we […] Read more


I for one am thoroughly sick of screens, and those viewing snacks have caught up with me. The recipe below for these whole wheat crackers may be just the thing you’re looking for.

Pass the crackers please

First We Eat: Many of us may be snacking too much as we watch too much TV. Try this healthier choice instead

Don’t you wish you could have your buddies over? Miss those chances to get together and just hang out? Me too. I miss parties. I miss hanging out. I miss visits. I miss shared meals. Who knows when we’ll be able to celebrate like that again as we move into our second year of COVID lockdown.  […] Read more

Video screengrab featuring an office at the JBS beef plant at Brooks, Alta. (JBS video via YouTube)

JBS Canada plant up and running after cyberattack

Brooks beef plant has 'resumed production'

Meat packer JBS’s major beef slaughter plant in Alberta went back to work Tuesday following a cyberattack reported to have downed several of the company’s operations in North America and Australia. JBS USA, the unit overseeing the Brazilian firm’s Canadian operations, and JBS-owned chicken unit Pilgrim’s Pride both reported “significant progress in resolving the cyberattack […] Read more