The annual event draws a large crowd and makes a great family outing with cars for Dad, bouncy castles and face painting for the kids and the silent auction for Mom.

On the music stage is the Floyd Vedan Band and Johnny vs. Johnny.

This year’s car show is a great opportunity for Cops for Kids and Boyd Autobody & Glass to work together and help to support the children in the communities they serve, so come on down and help make this year’s car show another great success.

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The open-air restaurant wraps around the CedarCreek Wine Shop with every seat affording a breathtaking view of vineyard and lake. It is a treat not just for the palate but also the eyes.

“I’m excited to offer a farm to table culinary experience; CedarCreek is an ideal setting to promote the best of the Okanagan,” says Chef Keenan.

Receiving his formal training at the University College of the Caribou, Chef Keenan has worked with a number of prestigious fine dining establishments such as 360 Restaurant – CN Tower and CinCin in Vancouver as well as restaurants in beautiful Sun Peaks.

This year, the Vineyard Terrace Restaurant will serve brunch on Saturdays and Sundays from 11am to 2pm. The popular “Yoga & Brunch” package will also be offered every Sunday (beginning June 30) which includes an hour long Yoga class followed by a speciality brunch in the Pavilion.

CedarCreek Estate Winery is one of BC’s first eight wineries, located in the heart of the Okanagan Valley. Owned and operated by the Fitzpatrick Family, the winery crafts 100 per cent premium BC VQA wine. CedarCreek Merlot was voted best local red wine by the readers of Okanagan life.

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Urban “growth” fills a gap
Take a peek over the fence at a certain house on Penticton’s Martin Street and you’re likely to spot a considerable amount of produce growing among the flowers. This is, quite literally, tasteful landscaping. Peer over the back fence; on what was once a large expanse of simple lawn, you’ll see several large rustic wood bins overflowing with everything you need for salad, salsa or a stir fry—including the seasonings.
What’s with this large-scale produce production, smack dab in a downtown residential neighbourhood?

Donna Benson explains while she shows me around, pausing frequently to crouch down and exclaim with delight over a cucumber or a pepper. “I could flippantly say, because of pain and laziness,” she says: the house is her place of business, but because she lives in Naramata, watering restrictions meant maintaining the lawn was quite a nuisance. One day as she drove past the nearby soup kitchen, she thought about their need for fresh produce and the light bulb came on. She could make better use of the yard and solve her watering woes at the same time.

Unlike most yard renovations, this makeover happened on a shoestring. “I phoned someone at Home Hardware I knew and said, I have this idea, would you be able to donate some stuff, and he said yes,” says Donna. “Then I called Jack at Superior Peat, and he donated the soil, and then P&E donated the wood, which I think looks gorgeous.”

She’s referring to the bark-covered strips sliced from the outer edges of logs, a lumber production by-product, which create the raised beds in the back yard. She’s right; they are gorgeous. For labour Donna relies on a small army of people who simply enjoy weeding, watering, and watching things grow, most of whom don’t have a place of their own to do it. A friend at Penticton Area Cooperative Enterprises thought it would be a perfect fit for some of their clients; better known as PACE, the organization provides skill development opportunities. PACE participants pitch in with Donna’s other volunteers, like Martha—who’s on dialysis three times a week, but still finds time to put in a few hours every day. “It’s really all about the volunteers,” insists Donna, who’s amazed by their enthusiasm and commitment. “It would not be possible without them.” The volunteers assure me that they love it, too; one says it’s addictive, and he understands why farmers farm.

Much of the food that’s grown on this city lot ends up at the food bank. Fresh, nutritious produce is a welcome addition to the hampers, and Donna says it helps fill an alarming gap. “They’re short 10,000 pounds of food; 10,000 pounds. With all this around us, it’s ridiculous.…You see wasted land. I mean, we have everything here…” She crouches down to cup another vegetable. “Oh, look at that little green pepper,” she beams, then grows serious again. “The thing is, how do we mobilize all these resources to make things happen?”

Donna had little experience with growing vegetables, and was grateful for the expertise provided by the Penticton Urban Agriculture Association—an organization that is dedicated to “mobilizing those resources and making things happen.” The PUAA has teaching gardens in downtown Penticton where they share practical knowledge about planting, pest control, composting, growing organically, and more. Various members also volunteer to host sessions in their own gardens and share their experience.

Jennifer Vincent, a former PUAA board member, showed me around their teaching garden on Nanaimo Avenue, dubbed C.URB—the Centre for Urban Agriculture. Community support is obvious: growing bins are scraps from lumber yards and pallets repurposed from the now-defunct Canwood furniture manufacturing plant; irrigation equipment was donated by Grower’s Supply and Home Hardware; mulch is free from the Campbell Mountain landfill; and people have donated gardening tools and implements, now housed in a small shed. “It was a bit of a community project to build that,” says Jennifer.

Through a project the PUAA calls Sharing Land 4 Food, they also act as a matchmaking agency to connect people who would like to garden with those who can provide the land (it’s up to the landowners and labourers to figure out how they’ll share the wealth). Last year the PUAA’s teaching garden and related programs contributed more than 400 pounds of produce to the Soupateria and the local food bank.

Want to get involved in a tasteful landscaping project? Find out more at puaa.wordpress.com. —Dawn Renaud

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Life might be a box of chocolates for some, but for Don Elzer it’s a cup of tea—and it’s wild. It’s also about a foraging plantation in the woods, paintings, sculptures and a publishing company.

Located in Lumby, Don’s Wildcraft Forest (www.wildcraftforest.com) produces artisanal herb, fruit and berry loose tea blends with ingredients gathered from his own 20-acre Wildcraft Forest Plantation, nearby private lands and 15,000 acres in the Monashee Mountains. The teas are hand-mixed and packed in limited editions at the plantation.

“I’ll be introducing about a dozen different Wildcraft Forest teas this year plus a few other products that will help to champion wildcrafting,” says Don. “People are becoming captivated with the Wildcraft Forest and I would like to see that continue because it’s a wonderful culinary adventure and wildcrafting is as much about a philosophy and a way of seeing things as it is about food, wellness and art.”

The tea blends sound like the results of foraging trips, which they are. Coyote Sleeping Mint, for example, contains wildcrafted spearmint, Ponderosa pine, clover, wild rose leaves, mullein and thimbleberry leaves.

Visitors can stop by the plantation for a $15 tour of the first growth woods, learn about the wild botanicals being harvested and the onsite ecosystem, and to hear stories about nearby Coyote Sleeping (Camel’s Hump) Mountain. The tour takes in a trail that features over 20 sculptures created by artists, schools and community groups. Complimentary tastings of wild teas are offered and there is no charge to browse the village of art studios and galleries.

Don’s own art includes landscape paintings, environmental sculpture and assemblages created from natural objects. “What I’m most interested in right now is a series of work that incorporates stories into sculptural or painted images.”

Don  also publishes his own work and that of others under his imprint Wildcraft Forest Books. “I’m focusing on fiction and non-fiction but in areas of history, current issues, ideas, wildcrafting, permaculture and alternative living. I’m working at publishing 10 titles in 2013.”

Don’s past experience includes  consulting for rural community development and, with the Canadian Tourism Commission, developing a BC eco-tourism strategy and a creative sector enhancement plan for the Okanagan.

“(The consulting) gave me the funds that allowed me to experiment and grow ideas in other fields of work,” he says. “I guess you could say it funded the research and development of myself. But right around the time of the Olympics it seemed that funds for rural community development seemed to dry up.”

These days Don’s life is about writing, publishing and art in the winter, and the Wildcraft Forest from spring to fall. “Of course, the work is not really defined by the seasons because it does eventually all blend together.”

Don admits it’s a challenge to make a rural living, so he takes it “one day at a time” and wears many hats.

Living in a natural area like the Monashee inspires and keeps him creative. “I think the magic of a place emerges when you are there long enough. You can get to know a place, and it gets to know you.” —Dona Sturmanis 

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Little Hobo Soup and Sandwich Shop on Lawrence Avenue – honours in the Best Soup and Best Lunch categories.

We concur! Had the yummy chicken pot pie and biscuit. Amazing flavours and a rich taste that holds up to its name. Thanks Crystal and Steve.

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It is so important that you have voted for your friends, colleagues, neighbours and peers—to determine those who deserve to be winners of Okanagan Life magazine’s 19th Annual Best Restaurants and to help us pay tribute to the outstanding people in our communities who deserve to be named The Best.

Here are the winners – Best Restaurants 2013.

—John Paul Byrne, Publisher

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While gaming may conjure gambling for some, in the animation context it refers to video games, a huge market for animated characters. Canada’s video game industry is the third largest in the world (based on number of employees—16,000 according to the Globe and Mail), with a $1.7 billion estimated direct economic impact on the Canadian economy.

Okanagan Success Stories

Club Penguin stayed in Kelowna after Lance Priebe and partners sold it to the Walt Disney Company. It is now officially Disney Online Studios, part of Disney Interactive Media Group. Quite possibly one of the largest online children’s games in the world, Disney Online Studios has other animated properties as well as Club Penguin. Employing a substantial workforce, in 2011 the company was named by the Great Place to Work Institute as one of the top 25 best places to work across Canada.

After the sale of Club Penguin, Lance Priebe spent two years training the Disney team and doing other projects with the parent company. When he decided it was time to move on, he restarted a hobby studio, RocketSnail Games, which develops online games and digital toys. He also partnered with Pascale Audette (who had left Disney Online Studios) to start Hyper Hippo, a brand new enterprise that develops and publishes children’s digital episodic games. The first is called Mech Mice, “a third person, squad-based light tactical strategy game for kids 10+,” scheduled for release later this year.

“Kelowna is full of great talent and the high-tech industry is rapidly growing. This is a great time to start a mid-sized game studio,” says Lance. “Our dream is that Hyper Hippo will become one of the leading studios in Kelowna.”

Hyper Hippo

Bardel Entertainment

Vancouver-based Bardel Entertainment, a major animation and digital media company, opened a satellite studio in Kelowna in January, 2012, to build an alternate talent pool outside of the Lower Mainland. A partnership between Barry Ward and Delna Bhesania, Bardel has been providing creative services to some of the world’s largest studios for over 25 years.

Yeti Farms

Yeti Farm Creative, owned by Kelowna native Todd Ramsay, is a recent animation transplant from the Lower Mainland.

Yeti Farm Creative of Kelowna now employs 10 people. Seven are former students of Todd’s from a short teaching stint at CATO. Some are working on a video game for “one of the largest gaming companies in the world,” while the other artists are working on a variety of projects ranging from advertising to animated series for television.

See the May 2013 Issue for the full story by Dona Sturmanis.

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Raise a toast…“Here’s to The Best!”

We all have cravings. I’m sure more than a few Vancouver and Toronto hockey fans were craving one more win. Some cravings, however, are a bit easier to indulge.

Best Cravings is one of the largest sections in our Best Restaurants Readers’ Choice Awards. I know you can almost taste them, the french fries from Jeffer’s Fryzz food truck in Penticton. Perhaps you crave the best pizza (can we say Bordello’s in Kelowna?) or the best ice cream (yeah! Tickleberry’s in OkanaganFalls). No matter what your flavour sensation, best restaurants across the Valley continue to satisfy our appetites.

Being the best is all about acting on that craving to be at the top of your game, craving to be at the top of your industry. In true Okanagan fashion, I’d like to raise a glass in salute those whom our readers have voted The Best.

Whether you choose a cool brew (Cannery Brewing’s Naramata Nut Brown Ale), opt for a best white (Gray Monk’s Gewurztraminer) or a best red (Mission Hill’s Merlot), raise your glass high.

Before you do, I’d like to introduce you to one more wine—the Best Red of Them All. We chose a Meritage, a nice little blend of Merlot and Cabernet grapes, and created our very own wine label. We needed a special vintage because we’re doing some serious celebrating of our own here at Okanagan Life—marking 25 yearsas the magazine the Okanagan lives by.

With a focus on great writing and creative art direction, we’ve delivered to our readers a quality publication that has become the Okanagan’s best read magazine, and tops the chart for per capita readership in North America.

We’ve been telling the stories of the Valley for decades, beginning with our first issue in 1988. Our wine label celebrates those years with a collage of 25 front covers. On the first, we featured artist Robert DowReid, creator of Spirit of Sail, the grand sculpture on the Kelowna waterfront. In the mix you’ll also find Kelowna mayor Jim Stuart, Olympian and Stanley Cup winner Duncan Keith, and plenty of water and snow sports heroes. Through the years, we’ve published ablend of culture, sports, politics and amazing people and lifestyle stories.

We deliver 10 issues a year, which are read month after month in businesses and homes across the Valley. Which brings me to our White on Time label, a crisp Pinot Blanc I chose as our white wine celebration vintage. Using Okanagan-grown grapes, the winemakers at Bounty Cellars created, bottled and labeled both of our anniversary wines.

Let’s all dine out and a raise a glass of cheer. Pick a best restaurant, perhaps a best restaurant with a view (Hooded Merganser in Penticton, Earls on Top in Kelowna, or PeakFine at Sparkling Hill Resort in Vernon) and celebrate our Okanagan life. Raise a glass to our 25 years and to all the best restaurants and great businesses that make the Okanagan Valley a wonderful place to live and dine.

-John Paul Byrne, Publisher

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