Workshop Date: Saturday, September 18
Workshop Time: 9:00 am - Noon
Cost: $20, with required pre-registration
Event Details
Join us to learn the science and steps of water bath canning and live fermentation!
Get hands-on experience with these two food preservation techniques: perfect for gardeners wanting to save their harvests, or those wanting to do some culinary experimentation.
Walk through each process and leave with samples of your work and the basic equipment to do live ferments at home. No prior experience required.
Safety Guidelines: -Merry Lea cares about the safety of our guests and staff. For programs involving participants over age 12, we ask all participants to join Merry Lea staff in following these policies:
Masks and physical distancing are strongly recommended for persons who are not vaccinated and optional for those who are fully vaccinated
Self-screen before arrival and continue rigorous hand washing.
Please note these policies are subject to change at any time.
Pre-registration required
Pre-registration is required by September 16 by visiting: https://www.goshen.edu/merrylea/water-bath-canning-and-live-ferments-food-preservation-workshop/
Contact Kaitlyn Sproles at kwsproles@goshen.edu for more information, or visit goshen.edu/merrylea/sustainable-farm.
Please note: We have multiple program locations! Simply entering “Merry Lea” into GPS may send you to our Learning Center location instead. Be sure to check directions beforehand. You want to go to Reith Village.
Merry Lea Farm of Goshen College
The Merry Lea Sustainable Farm is an educational, demonstration, and experimental farm specializing in perennial agriculture, carbon farming, regenerative agriculture, food literacy, and environmental education.
Our #3 nationally-ranked college farm is set within a 100-acre landscape that includes pastures, woods, prairie, wetland, orchards, vegetable gardens, and a historic farmstead. Students gain experience with annual vegetables, fruit and nut orchards, and livestock. One unique feature is a 5.5-acre Woody Perennial Polyculture mixed crop and animal system. The farm supplies food to local food pantries, Merry Lea programs, the Goshen College dining services, and a student CSA.
Curricularly, the farm serves the Agroecology Summer Intensive, Merry Lea’s PreK-12 programs, the Masters in Environmental Education program, public programs, and the wider community. The farm is located just south of Wolf Lake, IN in a part of northeast Indiana affected significantly by glaciation. As a result, our soils and surrounding ecosystems are diverse and quite interesting! We welcome you to come visit. Please contact John Mischler for more information.
We grow a diversity of crops and it seems like the list grow more every year! More traditional vegetables and herbs grown have included various salad greens, basil, beans (snap and dry), beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, celery, chard, cilantro, collard greens, cucumber, daikon radish, dill, eggplant, fennel, garlic, ground cherry, hyssop, kale, leeks, lovage, melons, mint, nasturtium, okra, onion, parsley, peppers, popcorn, potatoes, pumpkin, rutabaga, summer squash, sweet corn, sweet potatoes, tomato, tomatillo, turnip, winter squash, and zucchini. We grow mostly heirloom crop varieties and raise crops with organic practices though are not currently certified. Much of our produce is consumed by students or direct marketed in small quantities. We try our best to do some seed saving, and to raise seed types that reflect crops grown by native peoples of our region.
We are often experimenting with small plantings of more unusual crops, and some with small grains. This has included sorghum (sweet), heirloom spring barley, rice (Japanese variety), spring oats, jute, various flowers, and many species of cover crops. Our perennial plantings also include a wide variety of species, including apple, pear, cherry, plum, pawpaw, peach, persimmon, northern apricot, pecan, chestnut, serviceberry, blackberry, asparagus, raspberry, grape, and hardy kiwi.
Part of our mission is bring animals back to the farm and integrate them as part of crop production. We currently raise turkeys, meat chickens, laying hens, milk goats, meat goats, cattle, honey bees, pigs, and millions of soil microbes, beneficial insects, etc.
The main infrastructure of our farm, including our offices, are located at Rieth Village, located off of CR 200 S (Bear Lake Rd.). Production fields are adjacent to woodlands, meadows and wetlands, which are filled with beneficial insects, bats, and songbirds, all of which we encourage in our agroecosystem.