No Canadian Citrus, You Say?
The card below the glossy Danish pastry at Francis Bread on Salt Spring Island says it’s made with “local Meyer lemon.” But isn’t a Meyer lemon more California than Canada? Yet the citrus used to make the curd on top of the Danish was grown less than a kilometre away, in Jane Squier’s green-house at The Garden.
The visionary horticulturist, researcher and passionate advocate of sustainable and regenerative agriculture grows Meyer lemons and much more in her 6,000-square-foot greenhouse. She grows things that seem impossible here, including passion fruit and five kinds of avocados. There are 35 varieties of citrus, including bergamot, lime-like Sudachi, rosy-fleshed pink lemonade lemons, yuzu and massive, bell-shaped pomelo.
Salt Spring is one of the Southern Gulf Islands, located off southern Vancouver Island. It’s known for its Mediterranean microclimate, but it’s no mythical Shangri-La. It dropped well below freezing last January. Summers are hot and dry. Prolonged drought is not unusual.
With her YouTube videos and occasional day-long seminars at The Garden, Squier teaches people ways to bring sustainable techniques to gardeners and farms. Even home gardeners can learn how they can help the planet.
After a lengthy career as a wholesale hydroponic lettuce grower in Calgary, Squier, her then-husband and their children moved to the three-acre Salt Spring property in 2003. They established a small wholesale hydroponic lettuce and basil farm. She was contemplating retirement in 2014 when she got the idea to turn the greenhouse “into something that wouldn’t use a lot of energy and would produce really neat foods.”
On an early spring day when the trees are barely starting to bud outside, stepping into Squier’s greenhouse sparks Garden of Eden thoughts. It’s quite cool. Squier says the fruit trees must be able to tolerate temperatures as low as 2 C.
The air smells of damp earth and citrus. Australian shepherd Brit patiently waits outside as Squier winds through narrow paths between robust trees dotted with brightly coloured mandarins and clustered grapefruit. There are bitter Chinotto oranges, the fruit that gives Italian Brio soda its signature flavour. Finger limes stuffed with “lime caviar” vesicles aren’t budding yet, but creepy, alien baby-looking Buddha’s Hand citrus are making a start. They’re mostly still furled on thin branches, although one vibrant-yellow specimen looks almost ripe, the fat fingers curled downward.
There’s a small copper Alembic still that’s used to make essential oils. A local perfumer is experimenting with Palestinian lime skins.
Squier is working on natural, soil-based ways to get the brix (the concentration of sugar) up on the Washington Navel oranges from Vancouver Island growers Bob and Verna Duncan.
Squier examines growth and soil, stopping at the pistachio tree that has yet to flower, the dwarf banana she’s optimistic will finally bear fruit and a “poor sad kumquat” that suffered from frost when the temperature plummeted last winter.
So how did she turn a commercial greenhouse into a lush garden? Squier has a horticulture background spanning more than four decades, including working in tropical agriculture as a district horticulturist in Papua New Guinea. Her curious mind, passion for the planet and belief that change comes from grass- roots, community efforts have combined to get her to this point.
The first challenge was turning the greenhouse soil, which had been covered with plastic for two decades, into a healthy and nutrient-rich growing environment. It’s an ongoing process, involving materials such as seaweed and farm-waste compost. What looks like patches of snow turns out to be the 40 sheep fleeces she bought from a local farmer to try out as mulch.
The greenhouse temperature is regulated by rainwater stored in insulated tanks and heated by a high-efficiency wood gasifier furnace. It burns less than three cords of wood yearly. The pools act as heat sinks. One is also a growing and harvesting system for the trailing passion fruit vines that grow over the rectangular tank. The fruit drops into the water when it's ripe.
Fans that blow warm air around the greenhouse are powered by a solar grid that has battery back-up for periods when the power goes out during winter’s short, dark days. The trees need light to flourish.
Collected and stored rainwater is also used to water plants. Squier stores enough to use that alone for the garden, even during the driest summer stretches. An anaerobic digester composts kitchen and garden waste, creating biogas for cooking, plus fertilizer and methane that boosts winter carbon dioxide levels in the greenhouse.
“I don’t buy a lot of groceries,” she says. “I just have a green- house to go into and get all my food year-round.”
And oh, what food! When she gets a kumquat craving, Squier walks into the greenhouse and plucks a few. Avocados ripen in a bowl on her kitchen counter. She dries jujube berries, also called Chinese red dates, to sprinkle on her morning cereal or make tangy fruit leather for cakes. The fruit is packed with health benefits. She grows fruit, nuts and even olives on land beyond the greenhouse.Something is always ripening at The Garden and Squier is adept at using and preserving the produce for her own needs. She sells the rest to a handful of friends, along with notable chefs and bakers from Salt Spring to Vancouver who are the lucky recipients of The Garden’s lush bounty.
“Holy moly. These grow on Salt Spring?” That was gobsmacked reaction of Ucluelet-based Pluvio restaurant + rooms chef Warren Barr in an Instagram post showing the small box of fruit he’d gotten from The Garden. Michelin-star-winning Vancouver chefs Andrea Carlson of Burdock & Co. and Joël Watanabe of Kissa Tanto are also Garden regulars.
Squier keeps the circle small and it’s a pickup-only business. Sales don’t motivate her. She’s more interested in experimenting, learning and working to sustainably build resilience in her soil, plants and trees so they can meet climate change challenges.
Chef Josh Blumenthal, whose resumé includes stints in international Michelin-starred kitchens, heads up modern Pacific Northwest café Oxeye Galiano on Galiano Island. He’s such a believer in using only local ingredients, he hadn’t cooked with citrus since he’d started working in Canada.
Then he heard about Squier and visited her farm. “I was blown away,” he says.
“Jane is so wonderful. The only place I’ve seen that kind of variety was California,” Blumenthal adds. “It’s wild to pick tangerine off a tree, standing in Canada. The Meyer lemons are as flavourful and juicy as anything I’ve had elsewhere.”
He’s also crazy about the yuzu and creamy “perfect” avocados she grows. He travels to The Garden every few weeks. He uses the Meyer lemons he picks up for curd and he preserves them with salt for vinaigrettes. He makes Indian pickled limes and ferments kumquats to make Moroccan-influenced paste to coat Gulf Islands lamb. He’s working on a Cabernet Franc vermouth project with A Sunday in August organic and natural winery on Salt Spring, using their wine blended with The Garden’s citrus, Arbutus bark and locally grown herbs.
Meanwhile, chef Barr arranges for pickups for Pluvio when friends or staff head to Salt Spring. He never places an order and just takes what Squier has available. It’s always perfect for his needs, he says. Everything she grows does well with seafood. He plans to make a Salt Spring Island version of Japanese condiment kosho with the yuzu he just received, mashed into a paste with locally grown chiles.
Barr enjoys the reaction from diners when he serves a plate and mentions locally grown citrus in the rundown of ingredients.
“That really throws people off. Some nod and are not sure what they heard and just play along,” he says.
“The amazing thing is the variety she has. We’re all in awe of Jane,” says pastry chef Adina Guest, who runs custom bakery Love’s Galettes on Salt Spring. Guest makes deliciously artful cakes that are a cross between a fairy tale dream and a vibrant Dutch still life.
Take the Madagascar vanilla buttermilk birthday cake she made for Squier. Crowned with flowers and dried and candied citrus, it showcased the abundance of the greenhouse: Japanese Sudachi, Rangpur and Bearss lime, passion fruit curd and crème fraîche finger lime mousse, all wrapped in yuzu Swiss meringue buttercream.
Guest also made the seven-layer pandan and coconut chiffon cake with whipped coconut cream and passion fruit curd for the edible Vancouver photo shoot.
“She’s one of my heroes for sure,” Guest says. “The more I spend time with her, the more that feeling intensifies. Every time I go and visit her, she’s trying something new. I just think she’s an incredible individual.”
Later, Squier chats over a cup of tea and a couple of those Meyer lemon Danishes from Francis Bread. She shares that after she gave the bakery’s co-owner Meghan Carr her kumquats, Carr said she’d been spoiled for life. She could never buy a grocery store kumquat again.
Squier loves community projects and isn’t really interested in being in the spotlight.
“The joy I get is what sustains me,” she says of The Garden.
Five pairs of gardening gloves are hung to dry in her cosy living room, strung across the Mexican blue-tile fireplace like a Christmas garland. Squier shares her simple recipes for citrus jam and intensely flavoured fruit leathers.
Like many other Canadian kitchens, there’s a bowl of avocados ripening on the counter. The difference is these came from her backyard.
The Garden
thegardensaltspring.com | @thegardensaltspringisland
Love’s Galettes
lovesgalettes@gmail.com | @lovesgalettes
