According to the Farmer’s Almanac, there are three key indicators that sweet corn is ready for harvest: “kernels fill the ear,” “silks turn brown,” and “ears begin to angle.” Driving around the peninsula these past couple of weeks, the farm stands are stacked with freshly picked sweet corn on the cob. Some varieties are golden yellow and others are a bi-colored “peaches and cream,” both are sweet, tender, and delicious. “Requiring a delicate balance of timing and technique,” the sweet corn season lasts only a nanosecond, so it is one to savor and appreciate. As the summer crop season comes to a close, these crops could be thought of as meal courses. The bookends of the summer crop season are strawberries, the appetizer course of summer, and sweet corn, the dessert course. The magic of sweet corn is in the first bite. Aside from burning mouths due to impatience waiting for the sweet corn harvest, the initial bite releases a snap of the corn kernels and the sweetness of the juice. Heavenly. Fourth generation Leelanau Peninsula farmer and sweet corn magician Curtis Kelenske and I walked through the 10-acre sweet corn field located off French Road as he offered his favorite recipe for sweet corn: boiled+salt+butter. Simple is better when eating freshly harvested sweet corn.
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The Glen Arbor Sun won seven awards in four different categories from the Michigan Press Association’s 2023 Better Newspaper Contest among local news media for stories published between August 1, 2022, and July 31, 2023. The Sun won two awards in Best Opinion, three awards in Business/Agriculture News, and one award each in Feature Story and Spot News. Winners included Abby Chatfield, Katie Dunn, Alexandra Dailey, Jacob Wheeler and Julie Zapoli.
The Leelanau County Solid Waste Council hosts a composting workshop on Tuesday, April 23, from 9-11 a.m. at the Leelanau County Government Center on M-204 between Lake Leelanau and Suttons Bay.
If you’re in Leelanau County with a craving for carne asada, tacos, burritos, or incredible nachos, here’s a guide to some of your best bets.
Join the Leelanau Historical Society on Wednesday, June 20, at 4 p.m. for the program Jens C. Petersen: From Bricklayer to Architect: The Life and Works of a Visionary Michigan Architect, based on Julie Schopieray’s newly-published book.
Don’t miss this annual foodie event happening in Leelanau County Friday, April 27, until Saturday, May 5. Throughout the week, book a time to dine at each restaurant on the list for a unique and mouth-watering experience.
It’s the last in a row of private properties along M-109. To the immediate east lies the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. Behind looms Alligator Hill. The Fourth of July had come and gone, and things were relatively quiet; the doors to the house were left open to allow the breeze to pass through. An old retriever lay sound asleep in the front of the house. Near him, a pet bunny was safely caged in another room.
JoAnne Cook of the Grand Traverse Band will speak on the “History of the Odawa Anishinabek people from the Grand Traverse Region” on Tuesday, July 25, at 4:30 p.m. at the Leelanau Historical Society’s Norbert Gits Family Gallery (inside the museum), located at 203 E. Cedar Street in Leland.
This year in the Glen Arbor Sun we’re publishing a series on the living legacy of the Native Americans. A desire to push back against the rise of xenophobia in contemporary America is not the only reason we chose to examine the living legacy of the local Odawa and Ojibwe among us. Across civil society in Northern Michigan, and throughout the nation, it seems that more and more people are interested in learning the Native perspective on this land and the human history it has witnessed.
Ruby John, 26, is a jewel of a girl. Her name fits her. She’s also a gifted and versatile fiddler. One balmy Friday evening in mid-June she’s entertaining families at the Little Traverse Inn, fiddling in the Ruby Sky Band with some of her friends: Dane Hyde, who sings and plays guitar; Katie O’Conner, a singer and Irish dancer; and John Driscoll, a flautist and singer. The next week she’ll play for a staff dance at the Interlochen Arts Academy’s opening of summer camp. And after that, Saturday July 15, from 7 p.m.-1 a.m., Tucker’s in Northport. She’s known for playing a Métis-style of fiddle as well as Celtic, and standard country-and-mountain-style.