by admin on August 11, 2010
Thank you for registering your BBQs with Meal Exchange for our first ever National BBQ Day celebration! Your support has truly made Saturday, August 7th, 2010 a SIZZLING SUCCESS! (Perhaps a cheesy way to describe it, but we were truly blown away by your amusing anecdotes, creative photos and an enthusiasm to beat). You can check out entertaining snippets shared with us by some of the proud barbecue hosts of their National BBQ Day celebration in the previous post below.
Also, a special thank you to all of you that tweeted creative messages with the hashtag #nationalbbqday. You really helped us spread the word about a great cause and that played a big part in joining hundreds of communities across Canada to come together to barbecue great food, raise funds and discuss how food insecurity could be addressed on the local level, so that their neighbors do not go hungry.
WestJet National BBQ Day Contest Results:
As for the WestJet contest results, surely you are already on the edge of your seats to find out what the winning entry is. Honestly, the choice was incredibly hard with all the great tweets and photos you sent in. The submission (whether a tweet or a photo) was judged on the basis of creativity, originality and relevance.
…and we are thrilled to announce the winner of the National BBQ Day WestJet contest – Emily Van Halen!
Here’s the winning photo submission:
This photo exudes the fun spirit of National BBQ Day and really shows that great barbecue is not only limited to meat burgers, but can be made just as delicious with lentils! (You heard it right, lentils make some mean veggie burgers, check out the full recipe on the post below).
Emily, along with her friend Neil (on the right of the picture) cooked up a delicious batch of lentil burgers made from scratch and using all local ingredients. Emily even shared her special National BBQ Day Super- Veggie Burger recipe for all of us to enjoy (Take a look at Emily’s website for more great recipes http://feelgoodfood.net/.)
Here’s the story behind the winning photo in Emily’s words:
“The way this came together was a real testament to how Halifax operates – word of mouth supersedes advertising by far. I made a poster, which we didn’t use (except for at the bbq itself). Neil rallied some troops, and then they rallied their troops, and before you knew it, there were about 20 people out for national bbq day. We made beef and veggie burgers from scratch, using all local ingredients we picked up from the farmers’ market that morning.”
Congratulations to Emily for winning a pair (2) of WestJet tickets, anywhere WestJet flies, courtesy of our friends at timeraiser.ca.
And of course a warm thank you to all of you for kicking off this truly Canadian summer tradition!
Can’t wait until next year!
by admin on August 9, 2010
All across Canada over one thousand people celebrated the inaugural National BBQ Day, joining their neighbors, friends and family to grill up some great food on August 7th. This is the first year of this summer time tradition and we were blown away by the vast amount of responses, photos and stories we received of communities coming out together for a great cause. There were people grilling in the back country of the Rockies, on farms in Orono (Ontario), wherever they found themselves on a bike tour of the Atlantic provinces, on the balconies and cozy backyards of our biggest cities and even some people grilling for food security outside the country…San Francisco, Washington and even Vimy Ridge in France. There were bachelor parties, family reunions, birthday parties and conferences that were registered for National BBQ Day.
Make sure you check out the photo fountain on the right, for all the great photos we received of the happy BBQers, their BBQ parties on National BBQ day. Also, below, check out some of the great National BBQ Day stories that our neighbors from all across Canada shared with us about their barbecues:
Ottawa:
We had our BBQ up at our friends’ cottage in Quebec – we enjoyed a weekend of great food – much of it locally sourced from our fantastic Ottawa farmer’s market just around the corner from our home (and some of it even from our backyard garden which is giving us a great crop of tomatoes, cucumbers and green beans this summer!)
The photos are of our son Isaac grilling up some burgers for his siblings and buddies – and of all the kids enjoying a backyard BBQ cooked up by 1-year old Vincent.
Hope you enjoy – we had tons of fun thinking about food (more than usual!) this weekend – great idea for a summer event!
Orono:
Well our BBQ went off without a hitch. Corn, burgers, sausages, and 20 of our best friends & neighbours made for a terrific Saturday. Everyone brought a salad or dessert and their favorite “beverage” along with an envelope donation to our local food bank.
Prices Farm Market in Bowmanville made my day. When I went down to pick up the corn I was telling the owner about National BBQ Day & what we were doing to support Meal Exchange & the local food bank and out of the blue he said “Then the corn is on us. Helping our neighbours is what rural folks do.” Buying local has more than environmental benefits.
Any way here’s a couple of pictures. Can’t wait till next year.
Halifax:
The way this came together was a real testament to how Halifax operates – word of mouth supersedes advertising by far. I made a poster, which we didn’t use (except for at the bbq itself). Neil rallied some troops, and then they rallied their troops, and before you knew it, there were about 20 people out for national bbq day. We made beef and veggie burgers from scratch, using all local ingredients we picked up from the farmers’ market that morning.
They even shared their own recipe of veggie burgers grilled for National BBQ Day:
National BBQ Day Super-Veggie-Burgers
2 cups green lentil beans, soaked for 2 hours
4 cups water
1 1/2 cups sunflower seeds/peanuts/almonds
1 1/2 cups oats
1 medium onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, pressed
2 tsp. cumin powder
2 tsp. ginger powder
3 tsp. sea salt
2 Tbs nutritional yeast
2 Tbs vegetable oil
Preparation:
Soak the lentils for 2 hours in a pot, make sure that the water covers the lentils by at least an inch.
Drain water from soaked lentils. In a large pot pour the 4 cups of water and add the lentils, bring to a boil and then turn down to simmer and cover. Cook lentils for 1 1/2 -2 hours until almost dry . Transfer into a mixing bowl and mash with a potato masher until they have a paste like consistency.
In a small skillet or pan toast sunflower seeds over low heat for about 4 minutes until they are golden. Let them cool a little bit and then transfer them to a Vita-Mixer blender or grind in a blender of your choice. They are also very nice in large pieces and the larger pieces give the veggie burger a little crunch.. Add all other ingredients to the mixing bowl with the sunflower seeds and lentils, mix well and form into medium sized burger patties with your hands.
Add the vegetable oil to the skillet and cook the patties on medium heat for about five minutes on each side. Let them get nice and crispy brown. OR grill them on the bbq (like we did) but they don’t get as golden brown.
