by UW Dirty Dozen Club members; Carilyn Brandt, English 2027, Kavya Rao, ESRM/Info 2027, Tess Petrillo, Environmental Studies 2024, Ariana Milo, Environmental Studies 2025, Kaija Koenigberg, Environmental Studies 2025, Aliya Thompson, Food Systems 2026
The Weekly Dirt newsletter is often a space for highlighting the student farm experience. This week’s issue recognizes the contributions, energy and creativity of our partner club, the Dirty Dozen Registered Student Organization* (RSO).
Below are haikus and poems written by club members who were inspired by their farm plot and growing community on west campus.
Dirty Dozen Poetry
messed up the amount of
fish fert (by a lot) but
still got tomatoes.
– Carilyn Brandt, English 2027
we bring marigolds
home each week, tuck them here and
there, splashes of sun
– Kavya Rao, ESRM/Info 2027
I thought about sharing fried green tomatoes
About pressing apples into cider
About weeding, planting, harvesting
About sitting in a circle
With a group of like minded peers
Gathering because they care for the land
Because they grew tomatoes, that didn’t quite ripen
And decided that they wanted to make fried green tomatoes
Eat them together
That they wanted to drink cider, because it’s fall
That they wanted to steward the land
Because that’s what they do
While trading stories, laughter, smiles
Ask each other, “How was your week?”
Say, “It was alright— how was yours?”
They chat about things that not most people do
Like the carrots they picked that morning
Or their tomatoes that just won’t grow, not enough sun
The book that they read on food sovereignty
The poem they read on regenerative agriculture
Maybe a new community garden they just discovered
A new kind of bread they baked
Vegetables they cooked
And then it’s about 6pm
Everyone grabs the harvest or the goods of that day
Waving goodbye to each other
With dimpled cheeks and curved lips
Saying, “I will see you next week!”
– Tess Petrillo, Environmental Studies 2024
if the plants didn’t grow
if summer came late, the frost early
there would still be this
– Ariana Milo, Environmental Studies 2025
I would never think
we would gather and grow here
season by season
new hearts with old goals
to tend soil and tend people
the gift of found place
– Kaija Koenigberg, Environmental Studies 2025
Amidst chaos we
find each other, growing to
heal bodies, earth, soul
even just for an
hour, multiplied by weeks this
abundance grows too
– Katie Olsen, Environmental Studies 2025
among these seeds
which I learn to sow and tend to
I too germinate
just cotyledons
still without our first true leaves
we grow together
photosynthesis
watch as we reach for the sun
see us blossoming
withstanding the rain
battered by the whipping wind
how resilient
– Aliya Thompson, Food Systems 2026
The Dirty Dozen is a registered student organization that serves to teach and practice sustainable agriculture with the UW community. This club will be a space for students interested in gardening, urban agriculture, and food systems both generally and at UW in particular to come together and share ideas about these topics and take action in these fields.
Recipe of the Week:
Hazelnut Muffins
Source: Marlene Bremner, from Salish Country Cookbook
“In addition to a food source, the hazelnut bush is also used for making arrows from the young shoots, and the Skokomish twist the peeled shoots into rope. The twigs are used by the Chehalis to tie things together. Fresh branches were made into mats for sitting on, and a green dye is obtained from boiling the nuts.” – Salish Country Cookbook by Rudolph C. Ryser
Ingredients:
1¾ cups hazelnuts
1 teaspoon baking powder
6 tablespoons oat flour
¼ cup cassava, tapioca, or potato flour
Dash sea salt
2 eggs
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
¼ cup agave syrup
1/3 cup grated goat cheese (Pecorino)
½ to ¾ cups cool water, as needed
1 tablespoon melted butter, coconut oil, or grapeseed oil
1 cup fresh salal berries, dried blackberries, or dried black cap raspberries
Instructions:
Place hazelnuts in food processor and process into a fine flour. Measure the flour to make sure that you have 1¾ cups flour. Anything extra can be set aside and saved for another use.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease a 2½ x 1¼-inch muffin pan with butter or coconut oil and set aside.
Mix hazelnut flour, baking powder, oat flour, cassava flour, and sea salt in a large mixing bowl and whisk together.
Put one egg in a separate bowl, and separate the yolk from the second egg and add it to the bowl. Save the egg white for another use or discard. Add vinegar and agave. Whisk together. Add cheese and mix in.
Combine egg mixture slowly into the hazelnut mixture. If the batter is too thick, add a little water at a time while stirring. Mix in the melted butter or coconut oil.
Add the berries.
With a large spoon, fill half-cup muffin pan cups threequarters of the way full (any size muffin tin can be used – smaller cups will make more muffins).
Place any excess in cups to equally distribute.
Place in preheated oven for 25-30 minutes.
When a knife inserted in the thickest muffin comes out without excess uncooked batter on the surface, the muffins are cooked.
When fully cooked, remove muffins from the oven. Gently loosen the muffins from the pan if they are sticky. Place a tea towel over the top of the muffin pan and gently turn the pan over so the muffins spill out onto the towel, leaving them on their tops to cool. Serve.
News and Noteworthy:
Upcoming Lecture on Seattle’s Food Action Plan
Thursday, November 21st
12:30 – 1:20pm
Kane Hall 120
Speaker: Bridget Igoe, Seattle Office of Sustainability & Environment
This weekly Food Systems, Nutrition, and Health Seminar examines emerging issues in food systems and nutrition as they relate to personal, public, and planetary health, and is held autumn and winter quarters. All UW students, faculty, and staff members are welcome to attend with or without registering.
The seminar will explore a cross-section of food systems and the United Nations’ 2030 Sustainable Development Goals, across economic, social, and ecological agendas, and hear from leaders and practitioners contributing to these spaces.
Applications for Organic Farm School Core Training Program 2025 open!
The Organic Farm School (OFS) has been training farmers on Whidbey Island since 2009. Their intensive residential Core TrainingProgram runs from April through October and is currently accepting applications. Curriculum includes rigorous classroom sessions, field trips to regional farms, and daily field work through which students obtain experience with all aspects of farm operations required to propagate, produce, harvest, and sell vegetable crops and livestock (chickens, sheep and pigs).
The application window for 2025 is now open! First day of the 2025 Core Program will be April 7. For application details, go towww.organicfarmschool.comor email Judy Feldman, Executive Director, at judy@organicfarmschool.org.
Rainier Beach Youth Conference
Saturday, November 23rd
10:00 AM – 2:15 PM
Rainier Beach Urban Farm and Wetlands
This event is organized by youth for youth and will feature workshops and activities that explore topics such as climate change, food access, and supporting wildlife. This conference will empower not just our youth but all people to engage with these critical issues and take meaningful action in their communities. Though this is a youth-centered event, all are welcome to attend.
There will be free lunch catered by local restaurants, a variety of learning opportunities, and a tabling session for opportunities related to the environment.
The UW Farm donates regularly to the UW Food Pantry. During peak season we also donate to nearby food banks. The links below are resources to help you or someone you know with food access.
Every year, we have the capacity to grow more food and increase our educational and research program at the UW, but not without your support. Every contribution goes to work immediately, helping us better serve students. Your support can sustain our momentum and help seed new opportunities for student internships, academic work, and future growth. Please consider making a gift to the Farm online
The Weekly Dirt is produced once a week by the University of Washington Farm, a program of the UW Botanic Gardens, School of Environmental and Forest Sciences, College of the Environment. It is published nearly year-round for educational purposes and the majority of the content is written or contributed by students and farm staff.
This issue’s contributors:
Managing Editor: Erica Fong, 2024-25 Americorps Education and Outreach Lead at the UW Farm
Around the Farm: UW Dirty Dozen Farm Club Recipe of the week: Rudolph C. Ryser, Salish Country Cookbook 2014 Contributing Editors: Perry Acworth, Farm Manager; Rebecca Alexander; Librarian, Manager of Reference and Technical Services, Elisabeth C. Miller Library Photo Credits: Perry Acworth. Other photos retrieved from the internet and noted in sections
