Tag Archives: bicycles

OFRE launches the pedal powered apple crusher @ Devonian Garden’s Fruit Grower’s Festival, Sept 16th, 2012

pedal-powered apple crusher

It’s that wonderful time of year again! Apple season! Which means it’s OFRE’s cider season! Last year OFRE won a micro-grant from Next Gen’s

edmonton nextgen

MEAET event and used that grant money to partner with Edmonton Bicycle Commuters (EBC) and turn our apple crusher into a pedal powered apple crusher!

Meaet

edmonton bicycle commuters

We thought no better time to officially launch the pedal powered crusher than at our favourite cider event of the season: The Fruit Grower’s Festival! This pedal powered crusher was built with recycled, upcycled, and salvaged parts from bikes, wood shops, shopping carts, etc. Our volunteers worked hard over the winter designing and building this amazing custom apple crusher. Come to the University of Alberta Botanic Garden to learn about it and meet some of the people who helped build it and make it happen.

University of Alberta Botanic Garden

Here is a little video of a test run we had a couple weeks ago to make sure everything was working smoothly.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rOkvbe-s3Ro]

The event runs from 11am-4pm. There is plenty of activities revolving around fruit to learn about what grows in a prairie climate. You might be surprised by what you find out! There will also be seminars on different topics throughout the day. Amy Beaith (OFRE Director & official canner of OFRE products) will be giving a talk on canning and other ways to preserve fruit.

Ride for Rhubarb – Saturday and Sunday (June 25th & June 26th)!

Spring is here and it’s bike month in Edmonton. Time to ride and pick!

What is it? In honour of bike month, I thought it would be fun to do a rhubarb bicycle tour. Anyone who wants to come pick rhubarb, come along!

Where and when is it? Saturday: We will be meeting on the southside at a place TBA on Saturday, June 25th, @ 1pm. We will be picking rhubarb at a few places, and riding around the city with rhubarb on our backs and bikes. Sunday: We will be meeting on northside at a place TBA near the stadium, June 26th @ 1pm. Same idea as Saturday, except on the northside of the river.

Processing: In addition, on Sunday, we are hoping to go to a community league afterwards to process some of the rhubarb together making pastries, bbq sauce, and juice, most likely.

How can I help? I need volunteers for a few more planning items, so if you are interested in helping out, send a message to: ofre.edmonton@gmail.com. e.g. make pastry ahead of time, bring items like sugar, flour, jars to the community league, taking photos of the rhubarb riders, etc.

Thanks!